New Schedules & Classes & Fun Weekend

So, I wasn't wrong when I said that the first week would be hectic.  Brutal is probably a better word choice as we changed Korean and foriegn teachers, most classes advanced up a level and changed teachers and books, new students, changed the lesson plan designs for first-third grade, and have all new books which require all new schedules, lessons, and tests.  I know how hard it was for the foriegn teachers, so I can only imagine how hard it was for the Korean staff.  Not only do they have to direct the teachers, but they have to deal with all the parents.  Trying to figure out everything was definately stressful.  For the first time, I actually remembered to stretch (if only I was always good about that) as I came home very sore and barely able to move the first day.  Thankfully, after a week, things are starting to settle down and hopefully will continue to get easier.

So, my new kindergarten class consists of 7 students.  Their names are Amy, June, Clara, Mellisa, Michael, Britney, and Daniel.  This was a combination of students from Megan and Sarah's classes.  I like them, but I won't deny I miss my class.  My old kindergarteners are always grabbing onto me in the hall and getting excited when I see them.  They make me feel a little guilty, as if I betrayed or abandoned them (to steal Megan's words).  I notice many similarities in personalities to students from my old class.  For example, June and Amy reminds me of my old Amy (very ironic), Daniel reminds me of Anthony, Clara reminds me of Serry, and Mellisa reminds me of Sohee.  So hopefully my experiences with the first class will help me with the new class.  I promise when I have time to take pictures I will... as I said, it has a very hectic week.

I kept my afternoon kindergarteners, Bella and John, but gained two new students, Sunwoo and Hillary.  I like them so far.  My third grade upgraded to fourth, but I still will be teaching them.  I will teach them newspaper after we finish science.  I got Megan's afternoon kindergarteners who are now first graders, along with a few new students, and I have to say those boys will keep me on my toes.  I have a full class of ten students for third grade and I really like them so far. 

I'm teaching two advance kindergarten after school classes, and those are interesting.  Not only do I teach them, but I get to call them once a week for three minutes, asking them questions about the readings we did in class.  The first time was awkward for me, so I can only imagine how they felt about talking to thier teacher on the phone.  Many of them were unable to answer the questions, so we will have to try a different approach next time.  And I really like my literature class so far, but one of the students always comes in late, and since I am their first teacher, I haven't actually taught him yet.  One of the girls is really eager and works ahead.  She is one of the students who teachers love cause she is always prepared and ready to answer questions.  We definately have some interesting characters in that class. 

Picture Stolen From Megan

Otherwise, it was a long week, and rough, but it was definately a fulfilling week and I was doing a lot of prep for my literature class at home, so I decided to relax this weekend (Nathaniel was busy so didn't harass him).  Megan invited me to go to Itaewon with her and Sarah, and that was fun.  All the Turkish men were hitting on Sarah (she could pass as Turkish I believe, but that is my opinion) and joking around with us.  I found it amusing, but I know that can bother some people.  Got a free orange out of it.  And bought REAL cheese at a foriegn food market and going to cut it up for a tasty snack ... yum!!!!

Picture Stolen From Megan

After Itaewon, Sarah left and Megan and I headed to the Palace, but sadly it was closed by the time we got there, so we only looked at the outside.  Will definately have to go back sometime, and I'm pretty sure the mountains that were around us were the ones that I had hiked with Nathaniel and his co-workers.  While walking around the Palace area, we saw some statues, and also what seemed to be a peace rally.  It made me happy to see people who wanted peace with North Korea (at least that is whom I'm assuming the peace rally was for).  After that, we headed home to find that a fire had occured at the building above the convenience story where I always withdraw money.  The building was completely dark and it was late at night, so I couldn't really see the damage, but there were three firetrucks there, and my apartment, which is fairly close, smelled like smoke because I had kept the windows open due to the nice weather. 

Picture Stolen From Megan

So I actually left my apartment and explored a bit.  One of my lightbulbs burst the next day (probably due to water damage), but Mr. Hang (not sure about spelling) was nice enough to make sure there wasn't any damage, and fixed another problem while he was here.  He seems to be here a lot lately fixing things, as one night, a tube snapped off and tried to flood my kitchen.  He came and repaired that.  Thank you Mr. Hang!  So it seems my apartment is mad at me for some reason .... I wonder why?  ^.^

23rd Birthday & Last Week Before New Classes

I apologize in advance, but this post will not have many pictures.  So, since Megan couldn't make my birthday brunch, we decided to drag Nathaniel around Myungdong and I got to explore a bit.  It was a lot of fun, though still a bit cold for walking around.  We went to a PuriKura machine which took your pictures with various K-Pop Star backgrounds.  I didn't recognize any of them, but Megan knew who all of them were.  Either way it was a lot of fun and we made them look really silly.  And yes Megan ... they are stickers ^.^ hehehe.  Then we went exploring again and she showed me Artbox which has a lot of different cute art supplies and items.  I could spend a fortune in there if I'm not careful (it is also where Megan bought me some really cute birthday presents ... Thank you again Megan!)  After that, I bought cotten candy on the street ... yay!  Sugar!  Then we went to lunch at a very expensive American buffet with a friend of Megan's.  But considering wine was on tap ... I guess it has a reason to be expensive.  After that I went home Nathaniel and Megan went to her K-Pop concert where I'm told she had a lot of fun.

 

Sunday, a bunch of the female co-workers went to Jeonja to have a breakfast brunch with me near Heather's place (which is really nice by the way).  It was called Butterfingers and was an American breakfast diner/waffle house type of place.  I wasn't very impressed with the food, but it was a nice change from always cooking.  We had to wait a while, and they even took our orders before we were seated and asked if it was okay to put us at a four person table (which was plenty big enough for all of us).  They were a little flustered because their English wasn't the best so were worried about communicating with us, but another customer helped them out.

 

Monday rolls around (my actual birthday and I have to say I feel weird on birthday now ... just like I remember that yeah I'm an adult) and it was pretty hectic.  Got Japanese candy from Ben (thank you thank you thank you ^.^) and found out that I am getting a real literature class in March.  It is a lot of work, but I am super excited.  My boss apologized a lot when she realized she forgot to buy me a cake, so I got that on Tuesday.  Was understandable since we were all really swamped, especially the Korean staff.  Met Nate, the new teacher, on Tuesday and he seems really friendly.  I'm looking forward to working with him.  David and Alex are officially done and leaving Korea.  I'm a little jealous of Alex who is visiting Japan with his family before returning home.  Graduation went well, though I didn't really have a part of it since my kindergartener's were not moving on to first grade yet.

 

We found out our new classes, and I've got a lot of hours and classes that need prep the next semester so I will be very busy.  But that means a little more money to go towards paying off those *not so small* student loans.  And my new classes look like they will be a lot of fun.  I am keeping my afternoon kindergarten and my third (though now fourth) graders.  Sarah will be teaching my old kindergarteners but I found out I will be their math teacher, so I still get to see them once a week.  I haven't told them yet, I wanted it to be a surprise.  ^.^  I will miss those two classes though, but I'm sure I'll like the new students I get too.  Many of my kindergarteners' moms gave me goodbye and thank you presents.  They were really nice, and one mom insisted on coming in and thanking me in person.  It was sweet.  Another mom had recently taken a trip to Japan  with her daughter and brought me back a Japanese snack and even wrote in a little Japanese (instead of just English) back to me.  I was really excited about that.  And I got a really nice butterfly hankerchief and some practical stuff.  Shared some things with the co-workers and it was just a nice way to end the semester.  Though we all are doing some spring cleaning it seems. 

Otherwise, I am trying to get rid of a large spot of mold.  I tried to buy bleach, but the worker didn't understand English, and I didn't understand Korean, so I think I just got regular laundry detergent.  Well, if it comes back, just means I will have to clean it again and have Nathaniel or someone else come with me to buy bleach.  And can always use the laundry detergent after I run out of the stuff I currently have.  Though I scrubbed pretty hard, the wall is still black.... and I'm afraid to do more and rip of the wallpaper.