Oh Time...How You Do Get Away

There is no denying that time has a tendency to get away from you if you're not careful.

I constantly want to get on here and write about my time in Korea but many other things occupy my time.  I was hoping to write a blog marking my 6th month anniversary in Korea but that day came and went like a lightning bolt.  Now it's almost been 7 months.

So what in my life requires so much of my time that I don't get on here to write very often you may ask?

Well my mornings and afternoons are occupied by teaching the kiddies first and foremost.  In the evenings I do various things.  On Tuesday I go to a Korean class on occasion.  It's a fairly informal gathering of foreigners and Koreans.  Sometimes I have a hard time with the class because I don't always know what to ask to learn.

Wednesdays and Fridays I usually help with a couple boys from my church work on their English skills.  Both of them speak pretty good English but we are going through some English textbooks and I am helping them read and work on their pronunciation.

So that leaves Mondays and Thursdays.  Often times I will read or go out to eat with people or journal.  Probably could get some blogging time worked in but I don't always feel like it :)

Saturdays and Sundays could be used for blogging time but often times I'm busy or just plain forget on those days.  So that's a little insight as to why I don't blog very often.  I'm a little disappointed in myself.  I wish that I have written more on here.  I wonder how many things I would of like to of remembered are now lost from memory because I didn't write them down.  I am working on my second journal though so hopefully I've gotten lots of documentation of good things through that medium.

Oh well life goes on I guess...

"Cute" Heartlessness and Violence During the Educational Process

In the five months that I have been at Seok Hwa school I have noticed that the kids I teach are exposed to quite a bit of cruelty and violence each day as they are being taught.

One example is with a story I taught my students a month ago called "The Fox and The Crane".  In this story a rather mean fox invites the crane to his house for dinner.  The fox serves his meal in very flat dishes, which for him is easy to eat because he just put his small face down to the dish and licked it up with his tongue.  For the crane on the other hand he has no hands and a very long beak which makes it impossible for him to eat the dinner.  Stunned at what the fox has done to him the crane makes up a story about not being hungry and leaves.

At that point in the story my students and I are singing a cheerful song about the foxes cruelty.

Later in the story the crane invites the fox over for dinner.  The crane serves his meal in very tall, thin dishes which for the crane is easy to eat because he can stick his long, thin beak into the dish and drink it right up.  The fox on the other hand can't even get his snout into the dish.  The fox says something about being full anyways and leaves.  The crane, rather mockingly says sorry you were full and asks the fox to come again.

After that my students and I sing yet another cheerful song about the fact the crane has gotten his revenge on the fox for his treacherous act.

I am aware that many of these cute little stories are in fact based off of ancient fable written a few thousand years ago. One author in particular seems to of had many of his fables turned into little baby tales.  His name was Aesop (620-564 BC) and he in fact wrote a fable that was very similar to the Fox and the Crane tale I taught my children.  It was called the Fox and the Stork but for the most part it is the same and the saying "one bad turn deserve another" comes from this fable.  So I wonder is it a good idea to sing happy little songs that teach people revenge is in fact a good thing?

Another rather horrific story charmingly wrapped in innocent sheep's clothing is the tale of the Fox and the Goat.  For the most part the story I taught my students was the same as Aesop's fable.  In this drama a fox is parched and badly in need of water.  He stumbles on a well and foolishly jumps in without a way out.  Later a goat, who is similarly drained of all water in his body, comes across the same well. The fox tells the goat that the water is wonderful and tastes great.  So the goat jumps in.  The two play around for awhile and then the fox decides it's time to go and asks the goat to help him out.  The goat being a kind fella allows the fox to stand on his head and he is able to get out.  The goat asks to help in return and the fox leaves the goat to drown and die.

Similar to the Fox and the Crane I sang joyful little melodies about the rather sadistic and self-focused manner of the fox with my students.  I have found that Aesop was trying to get across perhaps two morals from this story: 1) "Never trust the advice of a man in difficulties". 2) "Look before you leap".  Although I can in some ways agree with both morals I wonder should we be singing adorably embryonic ballads about the sheer maliciousness of a fox (I absolutely love the thesaurus :D).

Well since I addressed the "heartlessness" aspect of this blog I will now move on to the "violence" aspect...

I shall accompany this part with a couple visual-aids.

(I will add more to this section later)

Exhibit 1:

This wonderfully sweet and innocent picture of pandemonium is from a story called Farmer and His Carrot.  In this story a farmer decided to plant a carrot.  When he is ready to pick the carrot he finds that he can't get it out of the ground.  So he enlists the help of a horse, cow, dog, cat and rabbit.  They toil for a long time not able to get the carrot out of the ground.  It turns out that the carrot has grown so large that a colony of prairie dogs find it and wrap rope around it so it can't be pulled out of the ground.  Some moles have gotten their little paws on it as well.  Back at the surface the farmer and his animals try one last time to pull the carrot from the ground and...POP!! out comes the carrot sending prairie dogs and moles a flyin, potentially to their demise.  Is this appropriate for little kids?

Exhibit 2:

This next picture (potentially more disturbing than the last one) show two tiny mice being utterly obliterated by a mouse trap.  This picture was not a part of a story but was in fact part of a matching game from a story to illustrate the concepts and vocab introduced in the story. To the left was a series of three pictures (perhaps "cause" pictures), one being a picture of four mice gazing upon a wonderful looking piece of cheese.  On the right side of the page was a series of another three pictures (perhaps "effect" pictures), one being the picture shown above of the destroyed little mice.  I ask, is this picture disturbing in any way?  Is it appropriate to show to little kids?

There are more pictures that I would like to add at a later time.  This blog was written to ask a few simple questions.  Are these stories of just plain meanness and illustrations of death and destruction appropriate for 5, 6, and 7 year olds?  Honestly I don't know.  Something about it strikes me as inappropriate but I wonder if I was taught the same stuff when I was their age.  I really can not remember.  If anyone wishes to share their insights please do...

End

Socks In Korea

If there is one article of clothing that I have really enjoyed uniquely in this country, it would be socks.  In America it would have to be t-shirts but here it is for sure the socks.  They are pretty cheap and are really creatively made.  I think I have bought 4 or 5 pairs of these creative socks.  They remind me of novelty t-shirts from back home.

There are socks for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Legos, Spider-man, Batman, Superman, Ronald McDonald, and pretty much anything else you can imagine.  If you are back home and would like a pair of these socks let me know, I will try to find you something.  They are only 1000 Won/pair which at this point in time is about equivalent to .86 cents USD.

Here's a few that I have purchased...

This pair looks like a little Lego guy.  This sock is, I believe, a copy of an actual Korean clothing brand called Banc.  You can see that the tag says "Banc Love", which tells me it's not actually a Banc product.  I've seen some really cool Banc t-shirts, including one that looks like the Joker from the Dark Knight.  I have heard though that these Banc shirts can range anywhere from $40-$60 per shirt.  When I heard that I sort of stopped looking to acquire one.

This rather cute pair of socks is, as far as I can tell, made to look like Ronald McDonald.  Not sure what else I can say about this pair.  I like it though.

Another cool pair made to look like Spider-man.  It should be said that most, if not all, of these sock are not endorsed by the companies or people that created them so they are basically illegal copies.  There is not a lot an American company can do to stop this.  On the other hand I find the socks to be quite fun and would rather they not try to stop it...

Now I could be wrong about this pair but I think it was made to look like Raphael from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.  This was the first pair I ever bought and I was pretty much hooked on these socks ever since.  They are such simple and yet fun and creative little products.  I will miss not having the option to buy these whenever I leave Korea.

What you have seen here is actually my entire collection of fun socks.  As much as I enjoy them I have not gotten out of hand in purchasing them.  I mean after all they are just sock, not many people really get to see a persons socks.  I do enjoy wearing them to school and showing them to my students.  They really seem to enjoy seeing them.

With that, I think I'll stop writing about socks for now...

I Love These Kids...

Hey readers Happy New Year!!

I'm just not blogging much these days.  Life is just getting in the way.  It's about 2 a.m. I got the random urge to put something new on this blog.  Thought putting some more pics of my dear students would be nice.  Most of these kids will be leaving the school in February and I'm slowly beginning to realize just how much I will miss them.  They have been such a joy to me.

Yu-Yae Bin (left) and Yu-Yae Rin (right) with their little cousin Chae-Won (middle)

A whole group just being themselves :D

Hyeon-Jeong (I think).  As I write this her name seems to of slipped my memory.

The most infamous of 7 year old classes, B Team.  Nevertheless they are dear to me.

I really can't remember what this little guys name is.  He actually is not my student but I see him often.  Super cute.

Looks like a mix to C and D Teams.

Su-Min-She has a sweet personality

Little 4 year olds eating pizza bread.

One of the best teams (D Team)...Although not looking very "best" in this picture, just looking funny.

The kids before Christmas weekend.  Gi-Hyeon is putting up the peace signs.

Little Gyu-ri

Me with one of the best 6 year olds ever, So-Hyeon.  Sadly her last day was on Wednesday. Don't really understand why her parents took her out a month before. 

Tae-Bin (left) and Woo-Jin (right) with their Robin Hood looking jackets.

What a fantastic group of kids they are.

An Unfortunate Event

Tonight as I walked home from my friends home I was involved in an unfortunate event.  I was walking on a sidewalk and a young couple was walking toward me.  The woman had a baby strapped to her chest.  As I drew closer to them something happened.  The women for some reason spun around and made a yelling noise.  As it played out I watched it in slow motion it seemed.  The yell did not seem one of panic.  In a split second a thought came to mind that maybe she was being silly with her husband or something, or perhaps she was trying to play with her baby.

But as she spun it seemed to grow increasingly unbalanced until she was facing me again falling forward.  There may of been a moment where I could of jumped in front of her and prevented what was about to happen.  Unfortunately I froze.  It was like my body would not respond.  She fell right in front of me right on top of her baby.

I was horrified.  I thought maybe the fall could of killed her baby.  Her husband and I tried to help her.  She made some noises of pain but looked okay.  She immediately checked on the baby.  Miraculously the baby seemed fine.  He/She actually seemed like he/she may of been sleeping.  I heard him/her make a fairly typical sleeping baby grunting sound.

I continued walking and as I rounded the corner I looked back to see if everything was alright.  The husband was brushing his wife off and then he looked at me.  I can only imagine what he was thinking as he stared at me in that split second of eye contact...

Long Time No See...

My oh my it has been almost a month since my last post.

Although it has been a good month so far it has also been difficult because I have been sick for pretty much the entire month.  That is a reason I have been absent from the blog for so long.  I just haven't had the motivation to write much.  I just feel so worn out most of the time.

I went to the doctor at the beginning of the month and he told me I probably had bronchitis and prescribed me a 4 day supply of pills.  I have no idea what the pills were.  I was basically told to take about 16 pills a day.  I did it and I have to say that I don't feel like they helped a whole lot.  By the end of the 4 days I was still coughing a lot and blowing my nose a lot.  After a few days it seemed as though things might be clearing up but last Friday my symptoms returned (literally the exact same ones) and I felt utterly exhausted again.

I really had no desire to go back to the doctor again and get another huge binge worth of drugs.  So I have stuck it out this week.  My symptoms have stayed about the same for most of the week.  Usually in the morning and evening I feel pretty good but if I go to work or something I will start coughing lots of stuff up and blowing my nose a lot for most of the day.  Hopefully I don't get pneumonia.

Oh well I suppose.  I will see what happens in the next couple of days.

So that is where I've been for most of the month, in a perpetual state of exhaustion and sickness.  I think culture shock, work, and just some life issues are all contributing to my exhaustion and sickness.

Nevertheless life is still good and I'm still having fun :D

I've gotten to eat some really great food.  In fact I had Chinese food in Korea for the first time tonight and I have to say it was pretty tasty.

The other day I got to see a friend for the last time before he moved back to America.  I felt really happy for him and yet sad to see him leave as well.

I've gotten to help at quite a few orphanages over the last couple weeks which has been exciting and challenging.

This evening my school had two Music and English Festivals (each 2 hours long) in one day that my co-teacher and I had to host.  Preparing for them was often a stressful time for him and I because it seemed as though things would get sprung on us at the last minute and we would have to change our material on the fly.  That is kind of a vague example but suffice to say Korea is a little bit different than America (haha) and sometimes it's hard to deal with those differences.  Some of the time I was preparing for this presentation I felt like I was kicking and screaming with stress while all the while trying to be a good servant for my head teacher.  I'm glad it's all over now and I'll probably be a better person having had to go through the experience in the long run.

Anyways God is good.

The Masan Chrysanthemum Festival

So October is pretty much done.  This past weekend was really fun.  I got to go to a Chrysanthemum Festival in the city of Masan.  It was a beautiful thing to behold.  After that I took part in a dinner of raw fish. That, to say the least, was an interesting experience.  Here are some pictures of this beautiful festival...

Right when you walk in

Pretty cool mask of chrysanthemums

 Me to the side of that mask

Beautifully laid out

This was a bunch of kites connected that went, I would say, at least 100-200 feet into the air.  Super cool.

Moo

 A golden statue in a garden of chrysanthemums

The beautiful sea/ocean 

The island framed.

Apparently that island is a really cool place to go to.

 I believe the next 3 pictures are of characters from a pretty famous Korean cartoon.  Can't remember the name though.

Me in front of a funny little scene.

 A close-up of these beautiful flowers.

 An owl statue in the cultural area.

 The Masan Fish Market where I indulged in raw types of sea life.  The highlight of the whole experience was the whole, dead, raw octopus I ate.