I feel really bad because I was supposed to mail Flat Stanley back last Monday, but I never got around to it. I emailed the teacher and she seemed fine with it. Plus, I made this book that I’m really happy with. I bound photos together and each photo has a caption next to the picture. I hope it’s something Flat Stanley’s owner will appreciate for a long time. I mailed it out today along with a ton of other things that I’ve been meaning to mail out.
I really love living in my neighborhood. I enjoy the sounds of my students yelling out, “Oh! Meagan Teacher!” when they see me walking down the street.
This afternoon, on my walk to the grocery store, some of the younger kids spotted me and yelled “메간 선생님!” half way down the street. That means Meagan Teacher. The 1st & 2nd graders say it in Korean.
A little further along I walked past the neighborhood trampoline and stopped to talk to these students that were jumping.
This little shop is right across the street from my school’s gate. They sell toys and other miscellaneous stuff that kids LOVE! Every morning, afternoon and evening, this shop is buzzing with kids. And when the school is closed, so is this shop.
Yesterday was field trip day. All of the students were gone so the kitchen was closed. The school ordered kimbap for everyone (super cheap sushi roll looking things). I don’t eat kimbap so I was really disappointed. JuHye offered to order some delivery for me.
Food delivery in Korea is so fascinating. It’s a big business. The meal comes to you on real plates and they bring you actual cutlery (none of that disposable stuff). They wrap it in plastic wrap, put it in a thermal box, strap it to their scooter and off they go. When you’re done with your meal, you put the dishes outside of the door and they come back later and pick it up.
That meal cost me 6,000 won (about $5.25 US). At the top are my side dishes — radish kimchi and pickled radishes, rice, miso soup, fried pork cutlet (돈까스)/salad/fruit, gravy.
I have had a really great day. Usually Fridays are my most stressful days because I teach the really young kids in the morning (1st & 2nd grade). The lessons are just really hard to plan and the kids have really short attention spans. Today’s lessons went okay.
I have a Flat Stanley visiting me from the States. A 2nd grade boy in North Carolina made him and sent him to his aunt in Texas who then sent him to me. I took him to school today. I had him visit my 2nd graders (not pictured) and then he spent some time with the 4th graders during lunch and recess.
Tomorrow we are going on a day trip to Gyeongju. We are hoping the cherry blossoms are still in bloom so we can get some good pictures.
This is the play area in front of my school. It’s usually full of children playing when I’m leaving work, but not today. Even though the weather was crappy, I had the best Friday at work that I’ve had since I can even remember.
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??
I was planning to cook dinner tonight so I had to run by the store after work to pick up a few things. When I was browsing the ice cream section, two of my 6th grade students spotted me and came over to say hi. I asked them which ice cream was good and they recommended a few. Before they left to go back to their academy (private cram school), I bought them each an ice cream for being so helpful.
Lunch has been quite strange for me since starting the new school year. There are about 8-10 of us that eat together, but more than half of them have changed this year. The previous teachers were all really nice to me and had already learned about my likes and dislikes (regarding food). Even though I ate in silence, it was very comfortable. Now, I’m going through the learning curve all over again. The teachers talk about me a lot more (in Korean) and always seem to be worried about how little food is on my lunch tray. Lately, a few have been saying “Hi!” to me and then the others giggle.
I had a really interesting lunch experience today. The lunch options weren’t that great for me. I am usually always able to eat rice if nothing else appeals to me, but today’s rice had mysterious white strips in it. When I sat down, I asked JuHye if it was tofu or fish cake and then the other teachers were so curious about what we were talking about. As it turns out, it was fish cake and the teachers learned a new word (In Korea it’s 오뎅, or oh-deng). It was really cute because I heard them saying “fish cake” all throughout lunch.
As I was picking at my lunch, JuHye turned to me and said, “Meagan, they would all like to introduce themselves to you.” They all went around the table saying, “My name is _____.” and what they did at school. JuHye translated the last bit. I honestly think it was the most English I’ve heard at lunch since I’ve been teaching in Korea. It was really sweet and I enjoyed it.
Here’s another example of my school lunches.
From the top left: dipping sauce, fried tofu, kimchi
Bottom: Rice and kimchi/ham soup
Life Outside of Texas 