Missing the Following:

Its been ages now since I last stepped foot on Korean soil. Do I miss it? Yes. Very much. Am I glad to be home- of course. But still. To think, this time last year, I was enjoying Chusok, Soju, and the beauty of Korean autumn. I miss the following in no particular order:

1. I miss being a teacher! I miss going on dorky field trips with my preschoolers.

2. I miss this guy! Convenience Store Guy never spoke much more than a lick of English but was always friendly as hell and a bright, friendly part of my day.

3. Mingi. This kid was so frickin' cute and soooo unruly and misbehaving. Gotta love a spoiled 4 year old Korean child constantly keeping you busy.

4. Wild nights as the Soju Monster and good company. Damn, I know the terrible quality Korean booze downright ruined my stomach but still, where else can you get a bottle of booze that will get you wasted and almost hallucinating for only $1,000 Won ( about $1)????

5. Weekend trips! What a blast, even if it was cold and rainy and I bitched the whole time, I was still having fun. Trust me on this:)

6. The busy streets of Meungdong. Trips to Seoul came either one of two ways. Either ride for 45 minutes on a nauseating, over-crowded bus or ride for an hour and a half on an over-crowded, stuffy subway. I always chose the subway, or else I would feel like vomiting the rest of the day. Meungdong was always the ultimate fashion and shopping mecca for young Koreans.

7. Walks along the river on the little path to my house. I miss my old neighborhood, with all of its random call-girl cards strewn about, PC Bangs, and junk convenience stores. Oh, and I miss cans of Gatorade. Soo delicious!

8. Cute stuff galore!!!! Everywhere I went, cute and bizarre things would steal my heart and practically rip my eyeballs out of thier sockets. Everything and everyone was just so dang adorable, I felt as if I might burst.

9. Mondu. Of fuck, do I ever miss mondu!!!!!!! The ultimate warm your belly food. Those soft little dumpings are what dreams are made of. And cheap, cheap, cheap.

10. Korean BBQ and drunken, misbehaving coworkers. Lindsay's face is priceless and Aram, we always loved your misbehaving, abnoxious ways, even if we pretended we didn't. And my God, Korean BBQ is just sooo frickin' amazing. Best food ever.

Sometimes, I hear a little voice that tells me that I am ready for more travel and adventure. Day in and day out, I work here. We try to spice things up by getting a dog, getting a new car, new shoes, whatever but it still seems dull in comparison to my life this time one year ago. Then again, I remember many weekends never even leaving my apartment apart from getting a bite to eat. I remember being incredibly alone in one of the most densely populated countries in the world. But to me, the past is best romanticised and played up a bit.

Dealing With Cultural Differences

Lately, I have been trying to examine the feelings I have about Korean culture now that I have been here a good 6 months and have a better understanding of how things work. There are certain things about living and working here that make me uneasy. These feelings can contribute to culture shock. I love psychology, so naturally, I am very interested in this subject!

In any case, I took this information from a website I came across explaining why one would suffer from "Culture Shock." After reading this information, I wanted to shout a resounding "YES!!!!!!!" This site totally nailed it in terms of why one might feel so strange in a different place.

What are the causes of culture shock?

• Being cut off from cultural signals and known patterns of communication, especially the subtle, indirect ways of expressing feelings.
• Living or working over an extended period of time in a situation that is ambiguous.
• Having personal values (which were previously considered absolutes) brought into question.
• Being continually put into positions in which you are expected to function with maximum skill and speed, but where the rules have not been adequately explained.

The following chart explains the difference between American culture and Korean culture.

MONOCHROMATICE CULTURES	POLYCHROMATIC CULTURES
Take time commitments seriously	Time commitments are an objective to achieve, if possible
Adhere religiously to plans	Change plans often and easily
Emphasize promptness	Base promptness on the relationship
Short-term relationships	LIfetime relationships
Do one thing at a time	Do many things at once
Respect for private property Seldom borrow or lend	Reciprocal obligations Borrow and lend often and easily
Low context (one says what one means)	High context (words are not the full picture)
North America, UK, Germany, Switzerland & Scandinavia	France, Italy, Latin America, Spain, North Africa, China, Japan, Korea

Quite interesting, right?

Hitler is on the $20 Dollar Bill

Thank God for kids like Edward, my little weirdo first grader that reminds me that not ALL Korean kids stick to the homogeneity of their culture.

ho·mo·ge·neous

1 : of the same or a similar kind or nature

2 : of uniform structure or composition throughout

Yes, that one word about sums up the Korean population. But not Edward. He is truly one of a kind. Edward is the kid who wears moon boots everyday who constantly mortifies his classmates on insisting that extraterrestrials are real and looming outside of thier windows at night. He is kid who stares blankly into space while the rest of the class is reading a lively story about a dragon going to the grocery store and blurts out a question during this time, "Teacher, how does a rocket propel itself into the air?"

Basically, Edward is your typical completely brilliant kid who is socially retarded and completely clueless in the field pertaining to common sense. In other words, I totally adore the kid.

Well, anyhow, today in class, we were discussing American currency and I asked the question to the kids, "Who is on the $1 dollar bill?" And they answered, "George Washington," like properly trained chimps. And then I asked, "And who is on the $5 dollar bill?" One of the smart kids in class answered, "Abraham Lincoln." And then I asked, "OK, who is on the $20 dollar bill?" With complete and utter confidence Edward blurted out, "Hitler!"

I nearly fell out of my chair, not knowing weather to laugh hysterically or die of shock. Best of all, when I tried to correct him, he further insisted that it was true and that he read it somewhere that Hitler was on the $20 dollar bill. Oh man, classic.

Its days like these that make me happy to be a teacher.

Ooooh! New Glasses!

Look! I got new glasses! Yay!

I was happy to find a pair of frames that seem comfortable and fit my face and getting glasses made here is quick and easy. I just picked out a pair a cute pair and the price on the frames included everything. They put your old glasses in a machine that reads the prescription and your new glasses are ready in about 10 minutes. Simple as that! I chose one of the expensive pairs at the store and it still only ended up costing me $80 bucks. Sounds like I will be getting more cute frames here in the recent future:)

Also, I am modeling my incredible necklace that I made this weekend at the Kid Robot store. My kids have been going nuts for this necklace and so have I for that matter! The kids love playing with them and one of the charms is glow-in-the-dark, which is AMAZING to them!

It is getting cold as hell here and I need to stock up on winter things such as sweaters, a coat, mittens, scarves, a hat, and boots. Unfortunately, I am an ungodly huge beast of a woman compared to the cutesy-wootsie little bitty Koreans and as a result, pretty much nothing fits me here. All I really want is a winter coat! Sheesh! Nothing makes you feel like more of a hideous freak than having the trendy storekeepers snicker at you as you pointlessly try on sweaters that would never fit over your huge man-like shoulders. I did not have this problem back home so I can't help but to feel akward about the whole stuff not fitting EVER situation. Sigh.

And my job has been crazy busy to the point where I didn't get to eat lunch or take much of a break all day. I am as hardworking as the next person but I cannot help but to feel a bit frustrated at the end of the day. Just as I get one thing done, its like "Oh yeah, now could you just do this and that?" Guess that's why they call it work, right?!?! This week, we have the monthly tests, a Halloween party and festivities, and I have to do more stuff with the crazy play that my preschoolers are performing. I just need to psych myself up that its already Wednesday so I am practically almost finished with the week!

Now if I can just figure out what to be for Halloween......

Stumbling Upon Good Luck

As one might be able to guess, my lack of knowledge of the Korean language has been a bit of a barrier here thus far. Well, hopefully this problem will be no more! Last night, I was lucky twice. First, when I was walking home, there were two English teachers sitting on the front steps of the apartment right cross the street from mine so I was able to meet a few more Westerners in my neighborhood. A few of their friends walked by and stopped to chat. We had just got done talking about how Koreans tend to simply ignore us Westerners rather than stare or whatever, when a friendly Korean woman stopped to chat with us as well! She asked if any of us would like to learn Korean with her, no charge, because she was hoping to make some Western friends just for the knowledge and experience of it. She seemed very nice and sincere and I am hoping to start hanging out with her soon so that I can get the learning on its way. Fantastic luck, right?





I started teaching classes on Tuesday and things have been going fairly well, with the exception of my wild and crazy first class of the day. There are 12 first graders in that class, with about 5 of them trying their hardest to be troublemakers. The ringleader is an unassuming little girl who likes to egg on the boys, and one of the boys is by far the most dominant and disruptive chatterbox in the class! They had a talking to yesterday so I am sooo sure they will be better today..... 12 kids is a fairly large group to handle but I think we will get better. Sometimes they are just too smart for their own good, which often times leads to trouble!





All of my other classes have been a great joy to teach- they are very smart and hardworking, not to mention extremely funny! I have gotten a good feel for the teaching style that works for each age group and class. We have a lot of fun during the day making learning a game and challenging each other to do well. I especially like my higher level 5th graders, as they have all lived in America at one time or another and are all super amazing kids.





Well, I wish for my good luck here will continue. Hopefully, I will be learning Korean in no time, making even more friends in my neighborhood, and learning how to become an even better teacher. After only one week here, it is just amazing to me how much I have already learned and how well I have adapted to a place that is so completely new to me, yet so comfortably familiar. While time can only tell how well I will do, I am confident that I will excel at all I do here. What a good feeling!

A Little Blood Never Hurt No One

Bright and early this morning, Lindsey and I went to the doctor to get our health exam for school. Korean hospitals are kinda weird! We had to do the usual eye exam, hearing test, weight and height check, but also we had to have a chest X-Ray!!!! Crazy, huh? We also had to pee in a cup to test for drugs and they wern't too particular on the whole thing like in the states. They sent us both to the public toilet to fill up a Dixie cup with our name on it. Uh, excuse me? In the states, they are huge Nazis about the urine sample, as people here are total cheaters. Guess its not a big deal here? And most notable was the way that the blood was handled. I am not even sure the nurse used a clean needle and she wasn't wearing gloves or anything. After, she gave me a tiny piece of cotton to stop the blood. It bled threw immediately and she grabbed the bloody cotton with her bare hand and gave me another piece. Afterwords, we were talking with the doctor and I went to throw away the bloody cotton in the public garbage and he said "No, no, I will take it. Of course, he took the bloody cotton with his bare hand to properly dispose of it and there was no washing of hands involved in any of this! My god!

Today was my first day of class so I spent all day learning my schedule and observing. What a long day! Thankfully, tomorrow I will be on my normal schedule, which is shorter because today I was out doing school related things from 9 a.m. to almost 8 p.m.!!!!! Whew!

I feel very confident about everything here. I have mastered my neighborhood, shopping, and ordering food. I have always been quite independent but being in a foreign place and not speaking the language gives but succeeding none-the-less gives me a confidence above and beyond anything I have ever done before. If I had to compare it to anything, it would be moving away from home for the first time and mastering Iowa City all on my own by beating a worn path down the streets alone. Fantastic!

Tomorrow, I teach classes alone for the first time but feel I can handle it, beleive it or not! One of the teachers, John, showed me how to read my schedule and what books to use and what lessons to teach and what folders to use and how to mark the students papers along with about a million other things I need to know. I have everything carefully laid out for the day on my new desk and will arrive early tomorrow so I can be certain everything will go smoothly.

Today I tried a wonderful pork dish for lunch with two of the other teachers. The pork was fried with cheese layered inside, and the meal included soup, kimchi, a little salad, and rice all for $6.50!!!! Tax is included in the prices here and you don't have to tip here. How cool is that?! Surprisingly, I liked the kimchi- very spicy but a nice flavor as well. Mmmmm, rotten, pickled cabbage:)

I was very thankful that I slept like a champ last night for the first time since my arrival here on Thursday afternoon. I forced myself to stay up all day on Sunday regardless of the fact that I only had about 4 hours of sleep the night before. I had myself go to sleep around 10 p.m. and woke up about 5 minutes before my alarm was scheduled to go off at 7:55 a.m. I felt like a million bucks! I attrubute a great deal of that awesome sleeping power to the fact that I covered the windows with tin foil in typical Sara fashion. Light can eat my dust, I need total darkness when I sleep!