Friday, March 23

Fun Fun English Time!

Today was a pretty rough day. I teach 1st graders and I planned the entire 40 minute class all on my own. I have never taught students with such a low English level before and it’s pretty intimidating. I have a co-teacher for the class, but the class was mostly led by me so there was very little translation happening. Some of the activities I thought would work were too advanced for the kids and the first class bombed… hard. It probably wasn’t the worst class ever, but I felt like going into the bathroom and shedding a few tears afterwards. After class, I had a chat with my co-teacher and things were better for the 2 classes after that.

Lunch was a bit disappointing, as well. Today was what I like to call a “rice & kimchi day.” That means that the only things I found edible were rice and kimchi. Today was a little bit different than most rice & kimchi days because we were served 3 different kinds of kimchi. On any given day, there are only 5 things served (usually rice, soup and 3 side dishes).

The soup of the day was seaweed soup with beef and rice cakes. We had rice with seeds (or grains of some sort?) and a few black beans mixed in. Today’s side dishes were radish kimchi, cabbage kimchi and a kimchi made from apple and cucumber. I know apples and cucumber in a spicy red sauce may sound gross, but don’t knock it until you try it. I love it!

The teachers I eat with have been so funny lately. They are so curious about English now…  and me. They’ve been asking me questions (through JuHye) like, do I have a boyfriend, do I like to go to public bath houses, am I on a diet (because I wasn’t eating soup). They have been trying to learn new words every day. Yesterday they learned lettuce and cucumber so today they had a little review and also learned seaweed and “Don’t do that!” One of the teachers turned to me and said, “Meagan, fun fun English time!” hahaha Ahhhh! Why are they so cute??