New Student Names...

And the semi-annual English Nickname Awards are out.

The following names are my pride and joys:

Most Like Food:
Bread
Bacon
Egg

They belong to Team Sandwich.

Most Violent:
Zombie Killer

Most Like a Movie Star:
While I have a lot of Shreks (and even a few male Fiona's) this award goes to
Mini-Me

Most Random:
Evensces (Yeah I'm not sure where she got it from)

And Most Original Nickname Goes to the boy in class 3.4 who wanted to be called :
Jennifer's Boyfriend.

Disclaimer: Yes these are all real names that were chosen. They are all allowed to keep the names, except for Jennifer's Boyfriend. I told him I was a married woman, therefore could not have a boyfriend. He wanted instead "Jennifer's Husband".

Moths to a Flame

Yesterday, I went for a peaceful hike on the mountain behind my house. I was taking pictures, having a good time, when all of the sudden I hear a lot of people talking. Okay I think, it's a hiking club.

Wrong.

300 elementary students all stuck up at the top of the mountain. Bad place to be for a white girl. I was immediately swarmed, it was like moths to a flame. I panicked, and ran across the top of the mountain, just to get away. I ended up on a path that I'd never been on. I got a little lost after that. I just thought you'd like to know that I survived though.

In the process of surviving, I ended up finding an exercise place (Koreans have random gyms set up on mountains; just in case you don't feel like you are getting enough of a workout climbing). I didn't get any pictures because I was still reeling from being swarmed and there were a lot of people there. I thought it would seem weird if I started taking pictures of them working out. But in hindsight, I should have done it.


I also came across a teeny tea field. I'm pretty sure that it had 'gates' (okay logs lying across the paths) and there were signs that said 'Blee blah blo TV Circut blee blee blah imnida". I'm guess it was a warning that they have TV's up there and are watching you and maybe don't really want you walking in their fields. But seeing that I don't read Korean I couldn't be sure. So I walked around for a bit. Took a few more pictures, then found a path out of there.

I eventually made it home, in one piece.

My new house...or the one that I can afford at least!

On a side note: I went back to Pumpkin night club and saw the "dancer" again. This time no stage rushing from Koreans. Just a bunch of white girls standing in the middle of the dance floor going "Oh my God." I might or might not have been jumping up and down yelling "YES! He's doing it again." Not that I was happy to see 'it'. I was just happy to be experiencing the whole process and living Korean randomness to its fullest. Yes I thought you should know.

Bad Blogger

Hey All.

I know. I'm a bad blogger. No blogs for a while. Not that there hasn't been a lot going on-there has. I just can't seem to find time or the want rather to sit down in front of the computer, edit photos, and then write. Plus my school blocked blogger, so now I have to do all my writing at home. :( Maybe this weekend I'll get something up here!

Ed and I are healthy, and still lovin' Korea. School is back in full swing now, so that means sitting in front of the computer, trying to get kids not to give each other the finger or punch each other, making them do push-ups for above mentioned offenses, and 'teaching' about 10 hours a day. Fun!

In attempts to make his school (and students) care a bit more about English fun, Ed's started a website. He's not sure what the exact plans of the site are yet, but he hopes that he will get some student involvement. So be sure to check it out now, and again in the future.

Do You Remember My Name?

Ahh first week back to work.

Surprisingly enough it went pretty quickly.

My group of lovely hormonal crazies were fairly well behaved. Had a run in with Cody (you may remember him from the Vanna White blog). I asked the whole class what they wanted to be when they grew up and Cody appropriately replied:

Cody: "Je-ni-pu. I want President. President of Korea. North Korea and South Korea war." (makes appropriate boy gun noises) "South Korea war America" (more appropriate gun noises).

Me: "Dear God." I'm left a bit speechless at this point because I can't effectively communicate, or say, that's the most f*d up thing I've heard since I've came here. What I managed to say is: "Cody if you are EVER president, well that's just scary. I don't even want to think about it." So note to future people. Don't vote for Cody-EVER.

I'm not saying he's a bad kid. I just don't think he is proper president material at this point!

I guess Ed's classes are going all right. He's trying to figure out how to manage the classes and teach English appropriately with no real working media or materials. You may or may not know, but he has been banned from using the English Lab, not because he did anything wrong, but from what we can figure out its because he is not a Korean English teacher.

You see, the province gave all schools HUGE amounts of money to design new English Labs. Most Native Teachers have been allowed to use them, with the wicked awesome media, or even just some remotely normal power point and projector set up. Both Ed's school and mine are now equipped with super English labs. I can use mine. Ed can't use his. The labs have been designed to help further the students English skills, but the one teacher who can speak English fluently because he is an ENGLISH SPEAKER can't use it because the Korean English teachers want to use it to teach English-read teaching English in KOREAN. The irony behind the whole thing, if it isn't already obvious, is that they hung a huge sign outside the door that says "English Only Zone" outside the door. Ha!

Remarkably, Ed is trying to keep a positive attitude about it, and in time we hope that the other teachers who are 'supposed to be using' the lab (but never do) really never do use it and Ed can sneak in there to teach effectively again.

Alright, so that's enough ranting for on blog I guess. We survived last minute teacher's dinners

Co Teacher: "Oh are you going to teacher dinner tonight?"

Me (and Ed, I'm guessing): "Ummm sure, thanks for telling me last minute, again".

We survived giving students English nicknames (Me: "Beer is not a good English nick name, sorry"). We survived lesson planning, and miscommunications. And we survived countless hours on facebook. Lets see if now we can survive the weekend!

Adventures in Busan

Two weekends ago, Ed, our friends Nikki and Kerry, and I travel eastward to the 2nd biggest city in Korea, Busan. We had a great time, enjoyed a ton of great food (not Korean) and saw some pretty big fish (in an Aquarium). I'll just let the pictures speak for themselves!

Busan Street

Look closely

Yup that's the picture on the wall. Nice huh? Busan Aquarium

Tiger Shark

Underwater Tank...its like Sea World, but in Korea!
Speaking of Korea...
They had an art exhibit going on, so we took advantage of it!

Johnny "Beaver" Pisser

This is my scared look because the fake Jaguar is going to eat me.

We saw these two walking and we couldn't decide why they were wearing the costumes. Either they wanted to stay warm, or have their picture taken with foreigners.

Either way, Kerry and I decided we needed a picture with them.

That's Nikki in the background

No Smoking!

Where are we?

Oh! Hyundae Beach!

Sunset

This was not Busan, but rather Suncheon. The Suncheon Map had this huge picture of a dinosaur, supposedly for the Dinosaur Museum. We got a taxi to take us there (it took him about five phone calls to figure it out where it was). We knew it was going to be a great ride.

Thirty minutes later, we arrive at some school (pictured) that is closed. Apparently the school is the Dinosaur Museum, and it isn't open for visitors. We (Ed and the Taxi Driver and I) had a good laugh and took some pictures anyways. Its a good thing they keep the Dino's caged!