I have been battling to get the boys to focus on the work in front of them instead of falling asleep on their tables. I can understand it to a certain degree, the average high schooler arrives at school at about 7 in the morning and only leaves at about 11pm at night. As a student, I would probably also have taken the opportunity to sleep in the one class I didn't get graded on.

As soon as I turn the lights out to better see the projector - its time for students to sleep.

Yesterday, I was teaching a particularly unruly class, when one of the male teachers snuck in quietly and flicked two of the sleeping boys in the face. The teacher, smiled at me before grinning down at the groggy  students in sort of an evil Disney character way and pointed to a set of chairs in the corner. I momentarily stopped instructing being far too interested in what was happening. I felt like nudging one of the students and saying "Hey.. look at that ". Without a word, the boys got up, put the chairs on their shoulders and began doing 100 lifts. The teacher satisfied with his punishment, gave me a quick thumbs up and left.  No one in the class seemed to be remotely phased.

The chairs the boys lifted.

On a lighter note, I was asked to judge an English debate on plastic surgery last week, It was very entertaining. One of my co teachers asked me to be a part of the debate that he was filming. What I found hilarious, was the way in which the entire lesson was engineered to seem perfect. The often lazy and asleep second graders, were all of a sudden well groomed and enthusiastic. It was like stepping into the Korean high school version of the Stepford wives.
"Good morning Class, How are you today?"
Every student shot back in an almost sarcastic unison, "We are great teacher"
"Do you love English class?"
"Yes we do!!!!"

If only it was like this is real life. The naughty buggers would laugh and roll their eyes if I dared to ask how much they loved English class. As the hours went on, the debate seemed to become more and more ridiculous. It was like watching a comedy show unfold. Everyone would converse in formal English and sit perfectly upright saying things like, " Yes and one of the determining factors of the this study suggests..."
This was all until the boy behind the camera, said "cut".  A sense of immediate relief would sweep across the room and the boys and teacher would start nattering frantically in Korean and laugh. My teacher finally told me, just to make it look like I was writing something important down about their work. There was one section, where the boy behind the camera was told to zoom in on me while I pretended to look deep in thought.

Filming the debate.

One of the things I really like about the culture in Korea is the way the students clean up after themselves. I come from a country where it is perfectly normal to have a set of cleaning staff to pick up the kids rubbish. In Korea, janitors and domestic workers don't exist. And I suppose I can understand the reasoning - why should an adult have to pick up after a lazy littering child? At my school, the boys actively volunteer to be assigned to a room to clean. And they are happy to do it. Originally I thought that they were being punished. I asked my co-teacher Erica, "So what did they do wrong?"
"Nothing. They are just cleaning our office for us"

The cleaning crew in our office.

I am slowly figuring things in Yeongju out.. here is a few pictures of how my apartment block looks.

Last week I went to K-pop dance class. It was potentially the single strangest thing I have done in a while. In fact it was damn bizarre. But I loved it. I sat at the back giggling through every hip thrust and face pose. I feel like I couldn't possibly describe this to anyone at home.

When I arrived at the studio with two girls who live around my block, I expected a normal aerobics class. I walked to the back office where a middle aged lady asked for my name and school. She was dressed quite conservatively in a calf length summer dress and cardigan. I just assumed she dealt with the admin for the studio. Wow, was I surprised, when the class began, and the same lady reappeared in sparkly gold hot pants with a matching crop top!! The top was lined with shiny fake rhinestones, all while her legs were ironically covered in beige stockings as if trying to be modest. Another two ladies came up to the front to lead the class, one of them wearing a hot pink leopard print tutu.

Suddenly I felt under dressed... for aerobics class.

Here is one of the bands that we dance to - Girls Generation. I am assuming that our instructors outfits are based on what Kpop bands wear? :P

Say what you like about the outfits and the pelvic thrusts... these women can dance. Some of them were arguably twice my age.. yet seemed to shimmy and pose better than Psy himself. Some of the songs are even pretty catchy... I'm just not sure what they are on about. All I can say is, yes it is weird, but I will definitely be back!

The rest of my weekend was pretty relaxed. I had my first taste of pizza since leaving South Africa on Friday, followed by more makkoli and beer. Makkoli is a type of rice wine served in Korea that is pretty good (especially the kiwi flavour).  They serve it in a tin kettle and you pour the liquid into little soup bowls. Apparently the tin kettle starts off perfectly rounded but slowly gets all of its dents because drinkers are meant to punch it. I tried once... the tin didn't move at all. Maybe it only applies to people on their 4th or 5th pot. In all honesty I'm not too sure if its really what you do to kettles or if I am just easily talked into things.

Makkoli

On Saturday night I went bowling with Lindsay, Melissa and Robyn (Melissa and Robyn are also South African). Poor Lindsay was completely confused when we used the word 'robots" instead of traffic lights. Neither of us were particularly good at bowling but it was still a lot of fun. The teenage boy bowling one lane over by himself seemed to wrack up more points than all of us combined.  So we called it quits after one game and went in search of a place to drink instead.

Bowling!

Afterwards we met up with a whole lot of foreigners for dinner- jjimdak (Andong is famous for it) It is basically spicy chicken with glass noodles.

jjimdak

After a rough start to the week, I have begun to settle into things. Here is a quick few pictures of the classrooms I teach in.

This is just in the 'reading corner"  and is never really used. Every classroom comes equipped with one. Super cool!

classroom 1

the smaller classroom

My school boarders on a forest. When the building ends, the forest starts. Its interesting coming from South Africa - the school doesn't ever seem to be locked and isn't fenced in. I come from a high school with security guards and electric fencing.

My teachers are constantly worried that I haven't eaten. When I arrive at school in the mornings, my co-teacher hands me a cup of coffee and asks if I have had breakfast. On the off chance that I haven't, she leaps up from her desk and tries to find me something to eat.  She is such an angel and I feel like i am always inconveniencing her. Her and all the other female teachers are concerned that I do not eat enough at lunch. Its a difficult catch 22.  I am starting to get used to the raging fire of spice that is Korean food and actually finding a way to enjoy most of it. However, I just cannot eat as much as Korean women do. I had always had a very naive view on Asian women's appetites, assuming that because they are so thin, they must eat nothing but half a bowl of rice each day. Boy, was I wrong. In reality, they eat way way more than most women I know yet, outrageously, stay pin thin. A perfect example was when I told my co-teacher that I would probably have pasta later. She smiled and said, "Yes pasta is a very nice snack. But what will you have for dinner?"

 A typical lunch at school. School lunches will always come with rice and kimchi and a type of soup.

My teacher gave me a walnut pie because she was worried that I was hungry. It was so nice of her! They are actually really good. They are sort of like little doughnuts with soft walnut in the middle.

Yesterday the cafeteria served purple rice - was surprisingly good.

Its difficult because the teachers seem to be a little offended if don't finish my lunch as if it is somehow indicative of not liking Korean food. Ultimately, I have been stuffing my face with piles of rice and soup and kimchi. I literally sit there, feeling like a beached whale in my next few classes after lunch and really do not feel hungry again until the next morning. One of the foreigners, Karina, was telling me that you really have no choice but to stuff your face in the beginning and ease off after a week or two. I suppose if nothing, it's a cost effective solution. What's even funnier is that they find it absolutely astounding that I do not have rice and kimchi for breakfast. One of the older English teachers threw his head back and laughed for a solid minute at the notion that I have 'cereal' for breakfast "oh noooo wahhaha"

In my town of Yeongju there is a ladies Facebook group that organizes events occasionally. On Tuesday we all met at a coffee shop. It was great, I had this giant mocha choc ice shake thing, it was like drinking ice cream. It was really nice to meet up with the girls and just chat. Its helpful because all of them are teachers with more experience than me. They gave me quite a bit of advice on how to deal with unruly high school children.

Yum.

I loved hearing from another really cool teacher who has what she calls the "fuck up book".  If I had one, I would have most of the school in it. In fact the way these boys act would probably result in them having competitions to see who could appear in the book the most. My co teacher, who is as docile as a baby deer, feels nothing to whip out her stick before each lesson. She picks up her lesson plan, smiles at me sweetly, grabs her broken chair leg and trots merrily off to class. Its just the done thing here in Korea although I still will never touch them.

The sticks in different colours ha ha

So as it stands, I will be off to Seoul and Paju next weekend to see Tamrin!

My first day of teaching has been completely exhausting.

I think there is nothing more intimidating than walking into a classroom with 30 odd high school boys who look you up and down, roll their eyes, and tuck their arms around themselves before settling in for nice 50 minute nap.  I sat there thinking... this would never happen at elementary school. My voice is hoarse from trying to talk louder than they do to each other in Korean. Despite what we have been told on countless occasions at our orientation, my co-teachers have no intention of being in the room for my classes. In fact my main co-teaching Erica looked at me and scoffed, "You want us to be in the room with you? Why?"  So now I am teaching high school out of nowhere and with no experience, I am also teaching boys who cannot speak anything but Korean. Oh well, another interesting adventure I suppose.

Anyway, although I have been in Yeongju since last Tuesday evening, I only taught my first class today. I made an introductory lesson about myself , where I come from and showed a couple of pictures of my family. All that really came out of it was that random teenage boys were asking for my full name so that they could add me on Facebook (gross).  After my first class a group of boys gathered by my desk suspiciously- clearly waiting to ask something important. I naively thought that they might have an English related question. What did they really want?  "Beautiful sister number"
Ultimately they were all huddled around the desk, hoping that I might give out Christine's number (they had seen her in one of my photos and had clearly fallen in love). Its bad, but honestly they have never seemed more focused on English than in that brief moment when they were asking for her digits.  Apparently they are capable of speaking the queens English when there is genuine incentive. I think I might make her fake number a termly prize or something.

After lunch I taught a smaller class and that was really a whole lot more pleasant. I suppose they didn't really have very big shoes to fill as a member of the previous class had his hand stuck down his pants for the vast majority of the 50 minute lesson. There is really only room to grow from there, as far as I'm concerned.  I know I have to be firm, but I'm jut not quite at the stage where I can tell students off for going down south.

By the time the last class pulled around I had begun to get into the swing of things. I had stopped bothering to be all polite and moved the trouble makers around the room (tyrant Claire mwahhaha)

All in all a very interesting first day. I topped the evening off making these frozen dumpling things I found at the supermarket. They are pretty delicious.  I cannot read the writing, so I really don't know what they are made of. Pork, fish, cat could be anything. They are good all the same. I sat on Saturday night having a conversation with a really nice girl, Lindsay, who lives in my block. We were saying that Korean food is all about closing your eyes and grabbing a piece of 'something' with a set of chopsticks and hoping for the best. 

Nothing else too crazy to report. I did find a green tea flavored ketchup in Homeplus today which I really must try with fries at some point. Always wanted my chips to taste like tea... yummy.

Lastly cannot wait till Friday! Because the T-dawg with be gracing Korea with her presence!!!!!!check out her blog - Pears puddles and piano Keys

Here are 2 other great blogs from my fellow EPIKers.

With a gift for burning (Chasity)
Her beautiful adventure (Saree)


Sorry I will post pictures tomorrow :)

Yesterday we were taken to Andong to get our ACR (Alien Registration Card) and cell phone.

(For anyone who will be in this position soon, it’s important to know that you don’t actually get your card for a couple of weeks. Basically you need the card to be able to get a cell phone. If you are willing to pay a little bit extra (it is hardly anything) then they will issue a piece of paper with the number on it straightaway. You can use this to buy a cell phone on the same day.)

Samsung phones are much much cheaper than anything I have seen in South Africa and this is mostly because Samsung is a Korean product. Unlike South Africa, you can take out a year contract, which is deducted from your account at the end of the month and there is no initial deposit. So here is my Samsung galaxy S4! A big shout out to one of my coteachers who haggled with the guy behind the counter for a better deal.

Jet lag has eventually caught up with me. I figure you can’t go solidly for 2 weeks straight. Yesterday I slept through my alarm! It was incredibly embarrassing because the PE teacher is giving me a lift to school in the mornings, but eventually left yesterday because he couldn’t see me. I woke up to the sound of my door bell and jumped out of bed. Oh shit. It was my landlady kindly trying to wake me up.

The worst part is that I don’t even know how to say sorry in Korean. I eventually got my co teacher (Erica) to phone and apologize for me. I kind of figured that I had burnt that bridge and would be walking to school this morning but as soon as I stepped outside he was walking out of his apartment door and ushered me towards the car. So in all honesty I don’t know where I stand right now. I may or may not be walking tomorrow.

Was given this at school today. How does it look? Yay or nay?

My school

Last night I went out for Korean bbq with one of the people living in my block of flats Marais and another nice teacher Farhida. Basically, you sit on tables just raised above the floor and there is a circular whole in the middle of the table where they put coles and a grill. You sit there and take turns cooking your own meat and eating it wrapped in a type of lettuce leaf with sauces or other toppings. It’s pretty delicious.

I have been really surprised by how welcoming and considerate the foreigners around me have been.  I have had more than one person knock on my door and ask if I need anything or any help. It’s great because before I left, I had imagined sitting by myself having no concept of anything around me. When in reality it is the opposite. Looking forward to going out tonight to Mokolee bar (I think that’s what it’s called).

My school

My wonderful co-teacher Erica!!

One of the hardest things for me to get used to is bowing to everyone all time. No matter who it is, you just stop what you are doing and bow to a passing teacher. It is a little tiring but it is interesting to see how the dynamics of the school work.

Woman here are obsessed with how they look all the women got to the bathroom and brush their teeth and touch up on their make up after lunch. Its seems to be perfectly normal to take your makeup bag and toothpaste to work. In some ways I enjoy how everything seems to have an order here. They looked at me a little strangely when I didn’t do it as well. So the upshot is that mascara and eyeliner come with me to work each morning.

Anyway still pretty chilled :)

My view walking home:

Entrance to school

 

Around the corner for where I live.

Hi everyone. 
Sorry for the delayed blogging- I have been crazy busy.

I found out on the last night of orientation that I was going to teach in Yeongju.

My instant reaction was where the f*** is that? So I spent the evening incredibly worried that I was about to be stuck in the middle of a rice field for the year with nothing but plants for company. In essence, I spent our final orientation night out at the local soju bar with my friends (who all seemed to have been given much better locations than I).

Last night out at the soju bar. A lovely picture of Rebecca (Lurpekka)

 

A ton of food at our EPIK closing ceremony along with fan dance!

After a couple of sad goodbyes to the friends I have made over the last 10 days, I boarded a bus that would take us to Gumi in Gyeonbuk province where our co-teachers would fetch us. Once in Gumi, we stood outside the bus with all our worldly possessions in the bags around us and waited for one of the many co-teachers to call us. Someone commented that it was like waiting to be adopted. It felt that way.

 Eventually I found an older man (one of the teachers in my school) holding up a sign with my name. I had little choice but to just smile and hope for the best. Another South African guy Marc, also got ushered into the car along with me. In hindsight I am incredibly grateful that he was in the same car along for the ride. I may have burst into tears if I hadn't had a familiar accent to talk to. Marc has come to Korea with his wife (who is teaching in the middle school and seems very nice). The teacher who drove us, explained that we were going to be teaching under the same foundation but at separate schools. I would be at Yeonju Boys' High School and he would be at the girls high school. We slowly drove 2 hours in the direction of Yeonju. I watched as the countryside became more and more rural and I became more and more concerned. 

Finally we turned the corner into the town. And we were there! And to my surprise - It was a decently sized city.  With small skyscrapers mixed in between traditional homes. Everywhere I saw shops and big grocery stores. There is a big multiple story Homeplus and Lotte Mart (sort of like Macro in SA). I instantly relaxed- I was not in the middle of nowhere. 

Next thing I knew I was dropped off at my school. It was incredibly intimidating walking around school while many high school boys laughed and pointed at me because I was foreign and new. I was used to teaching the babies, not these big teenagers. I have since decided it is not so bad to be at a boys high school. I figure you might develop more of a relationship with your students if they are older than toddlers. Although I have not taught a class myself yet- so we will see. 

After I was taken to school, I was ushered off to my apartment, my heart was pounding every time the car slowed down. I sat there thinking, no not this flat, yes maybe that one. In the end they took me to a block of flats about 20 minutes from the school. Its great. I have a double bed! Its not very big, but I am so happy with how cozy it is. It turns out that this area is mostly for foreigners.

I had about 3 seconds to feel lonely before I got a big knock on the door. A really nice guy in my block, Farzam (he also let me pinch his internet- thanx man), asked if I wanted to come up to the roof and have a few drinks with the other foreigners. I was exhausted- but I was hardly about to say no. I was elated - in a decent city and people who speak English around me. Yes!

 

Sorry not great pictures.. I will upload a video when my new phone is working!

My main co-teacher is Erica as well as help from Mr Bae.  She has been like my surrogate mother. She has done everything with me!! I couldn't have asked for a nicer lady. She is also only about 2 or 3 years older than me.  She helped me shop for my apartment, took me to get photos and open up a bank account, organised for me to go and get my acr. All while Mr Bae took us to Andong and to get new cellphones. Erica still asks me every morning how I am doing or if I need anything. All in all I am ok!

Teaching a lesson today... wish me luck! Also finding out where I'm placed.. eeek. Holding giant thumbs!!!

Learning to count to 10 in Korean.