Teaching 3-13 year old's who cant really speak English can be incredibly challenging - but not without its laughs and rewards. Sometimes when things are lost in translation - it makes for a pretty funny moment. Especially when it eventually dawns on you what the child is trying to tell you!

The 5th graders. They have matching "Love Nambu" t-shirts for sports day.

I have had countless instances of 'green lemon' actually meaning 'apple' or on one particularly confusing occasion when a 3rd grader meant for it to be 'a small lettuce head'. I still consider it one of my greatest achievements as an elementary school teacher that I managed to accurately deduce lettuce from 'green lemon'. I have also become an absolute ace at charades. You don't know what a 'cat' is? No problem Claire teacher will make paws, scratch her nose and make meowing noises at you till you understand. You don't even want to know how I described a sloth.

The photo I used to explain "Don't sleep late".

I laughed at a friend teacher, Barbara who recently told me it took her the whole 40 minute lesson to figure out what her student meant by "young water".  The 2nd grader had been trying to explain that her water was dirty and old and she wanted a new one. Needless to say the child spent most of the lesson insisting repeatedly on "Young water no old age water". My first clue would have been anti-ageing cream or vitamin water - I think she did really well.

To me this is the crux of ESL teaching. No sentence is fully complete, even when talking to some of the most qualified and esteemed professionals at your school. My principal, who has recently, and quite triumphantly I might add, mastered "How are you?" Although when I reply he doesn't  actually understand how I  am so its a bit of a deflated victory on his part. He surprised me the other day when he came marching over during lunch and shouted "Noodles!" at my tray and then promptly disappeared from the cafeteria.

Kids getting ready for sports day!

"Me go toi- let-uh now now?" is a phrase I hear almost daily when students ask to use the bathroom. As a fully assimilated school pack member of almost 2 years,  I now happily say "Lunch-ie ti-m-uh" at 12:10 everyday and skip off to my midday meal with the kids, finding no error in my speaking.

Because of this confusing mesh of words and sentences it can be quite daunting if your new to Korea and aren't practiced in the art of charades and miming. So, for any newbie teacher who is battling their way through Konglish (Korean English) here's a list of things some of my students say and how to interpret it. I hope it helps you!

Phrases and how to interpret them:

1. Fire  Friday - They don't mean there is literally a fire - more that it's great that it's finally Friday and they can party (although at 12 and under its unlikely to happen).

2. Tissue - I need the bathroom (and I have serious business to attend to in there if you know what I mean).

3. Green Lemon - Any type of fruit or vegetable known to man (possibly tennis or squash balls as well).

4. No Jam - My high schoolers used to say this,  normally meaning "This doesn't work for me thanks" (Example: T:" Open your books please"  S: " Teacher, no jam.")

5. Jooombi - They mean Zombie, the same applies to Loobaat (Robot).


Can anyone think of any others to add?
Happy guessing!

It's spring in Korea! Cherry Blossom time again.  During winter Korea can get pretty bare and grey, spring buds are always a very welcomed change from snow and below freezing temperatures! Here are some Cherry Blossom pics from around Korea:

Oktoberfest at this German village.

Not only did I get to go to Oktoberfest a few months ago, I got to do it on an island off the coast of South Korea at a reconstructed German Village. A German village in Korea? Huh??
 Yes, you read that correctly, I experienced my first ever Oktoberfest, in the middle of Asia with not a German person in sight. It was bizarre and hugely entertaining.

Luckily Namhae island is connected to the mainland by a bridge highway. The island is fairly easy to access by car or bus, as no ferry's are needed. 

Two teacher friends and I decided to take an organised tour group trip with Enjoy Korea. The tour group picked us up in the centre of  Daegu and took us all the way down the peninsula to Namhae island for a two night stay at a pension and a look around the island. In true form, the bus collected us at about 10am and everyone was drinking by 11. Hey, it was my long weekend and we were going to a beautiful island - wouldn't you do the same? Drinks were definitely  in order.  Especially, apparently for the girl a few seats behind me who dropped the contents of her soju and orange bottle all over herself and her seat.

I vaguely remember a guy by the name of Blessing shouting at the whole bus to pull over because he needed to "pee like a racehorse".  I felt a little sorry for the conservative couple in the corner who said they didn't drink (despite the fact that they were attending a beer festival). The girl next to me rolled her eyes and took a long and deliberate swig of her soju before whispering "haters gonna hate".

The beach opposite our pension. 

Round the corner from where we stayed.

Bre, Chi and I with our signature "I heart Oktoberfest" Tshirts, drinking German beer. 

The festival took place at a traditional German village on Namhae with some of the most scenic oceans view I have ever come across. The German village itself has been a tourist spot on the island for over 20 years. During the rapid economic downturn in the late 1960's, many Koreans chose to live overseas and earn foreign currency. The initiative to build the village came about when many foreign nationals came back to Korea. The aim of the village was to make returning citizens more comfortable in Korea and merge two very distinct cultures, thus all of the timber and  building materials used were originally imported from Germany. Today, the village is more of a tourist stop, as many of the houses are used as museums. I left the bustling city of Daegu with is PC bangs and Dunkin Donuts in the morning only to be brought to what felt like Hansel and Grettle's home town a few short hours later.

In amongst the German Village.

The Oktoberfest stage.

The festival was great - but not without its Korean anomalies. After standing in line for a German Bratwurst with Sauerkraut, I was served a hot dog and spam slices with Kimchi inside. Close...but not exactly what I had had in mind. The Oktoberfest stage, made to look like a German fantasy castle had an array of Korean Kpop singers and rappers entertaining the crowd. It was such a confusing mesh of Korean and German, There were even a few Hymonies (Korean Grandma's) dressed in German corsets and Dirndl's - not quite what I'm used to seeing from the conservative ladies in Yeongju. The rest of the evening was spent watching beer downing contests, dancing to Kpop/German music and partying on the beach. It was a great time!

For better or worse, it was a great way to spend a long weekend. Namhae island is gorgeous and I would recommend it as a stop for anyone during the summer months. Here is a look at a few pics from our weekend on Namhae.

A photo with a Ginat German beer maid character.

Bre and Chi posing with the beer kegs.

Partying at the Beer Festival on Namhae. 

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A  few month ago three of us went down to Jinju to see the lantern festival. It was beautiful! Although pre-warning- it was packed! If your hoping for a toilet stop - even in a portable lavatory - you will need to put aside about an hour and a half. We ended up going to E-mart a few blocks down to relieve ourselves and split a pizza (anything to get away from the masses of people). The festival itself takes place along the river side in Jinju and lasts a fortnight- there is no entry price. The lantern installations can be found along the banks of the river and  and floating in the water along with a fireworks show later on in the evening.

 The whole experience was so beautiful especially as evening fell and the lanterns became more visible. Everywhere there were women dressed in traditional Hanbok and people beating the Janggu (Korean traditional drums).  It was great to watch the floating lanterns along the river.

One of my favorite lantern installations was of a man taking a dump while simultaneously chasing a pig away. I'm not sure what the artist was thinking, but it was pretty funny. The man's dump lit up and everything. I feel like this is something found quite often in Korea. To the right there was a kids eating a chicken stick - totally un-phased by the whole set up.

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It was a great time and I would recommend it  to anyone looking to see Korean culture. Jinju can easily be accessed by taking a bus from the main terminal in Daegu. Although, beware of the crowds as I spent a great deal of my day pushing past people and feeling like a sardine in a tin.

 Here are some lanterns pics from the evening:

Food in Korea is always quite different, especially if your served it at school everyday. A year in a half later, I still find myself confused by the somewhat 'unique' combinations served up on our trays. Ever tried apple and strawberry salad covered in mayo? I have.

 Although the meals seem foreign to me, they are a far cry from the unhealthy fries and burgers I was so often served in my university cafeteria. The students and teachers always receive a balanced and mostly fresh meal at lunch time made with healthy local ingredients. In a number of provinces, meals are served to the students for free. 

Monday:

Manngchi – spicy cabbage and tofu soup

Potatoes in  Gochujang red chilli paste

Korean spinach and Kimchi

fried chicken

and purple rice

Despite its nutritious value, I still often find lunch strange and out of my comfort zone. You can only call yourself  fully assimilated into the Korean school cafeteria when you learn to look forward to things you can barely pronounce like Dduk Guk and Sollongtang. The top of the mountain is when you have come to terms with Kimchi and recite the various health benefits of it - or at least many coteachers have told you. 

Tuesday: 

Spicy cabbage soup

Sweet and sour pork

Seaweed, soy sauce and sesame seeds

Korean cabbage and rice with Yangnyeomjang sauce

Recently, I agreed to take some pictures of lunch at my school to send home to a teacher friend in South Africa. She wanted to show her students that not everyone had sandwiches and an apple brought from home for lunch. I spent a week in the cafeteria photographing everything I ate off my tray. The lunch lady still looks at me suspiciously - or maybe just more suspiciously than before. I rarely eat all of the rice she serves and frankly this leaves her at odds with my true character. 

Wednesday:

Maeun-tang (fish broth soup)

Dwaejibulgogi (Spicy pork and vegetables)

lettuce and cucumber

rice and kimhchi

small anchovies and peanuts

After showing the South African kids my weekly menu, they apparently had a lot to say. The grade 4's (11 year olds) were particularly surprised by the metal chopsticks I ate with everyday, as South Africa only has wooden ones that you can get at sushi takeaways. It took a while to explain that just like we have metal knives and forks that we use again and again, so do other people have chopsticks. They also seemed confused as to why Korean children had to eat soup every single day and were they not allowed any peanut butter?

A child wrote down on her worksheet that she couldn't understand why there was "spicy stuff on the cabbage because cabbage is already so gross". Another boy said that it was "soooo unfair" that the government makes Korean children drink a small milk carton every morning. They finally came to embrace the idea when they were told that school lunch was free for all elementary school students who didn't have the money to pay for it. "Free food? Cool!"

Thursday:

(Kongnamulguk)  Soybean sprout soup

Jjimdak (chicken, potato and glass noodles in a sweet sauce)

Cucumber and red pepper paste

A green chili and Gochujang (soybean paste)

Korean rice and a yoghurt

Friday:

Udon noodles in seafood broth

Spicy mini sauces in a red pepper paste

Kimchi

Fried crab sticks

Rice and seaweed with a side of spicy pepper sauce.

So for better or for worse, here is a week of meals at elementary school in Korea. My advice is to see things in a 40/60 ratio. If you like 40 percent of you meal - that's good enough and you will be fine until dinner time. Like on Friday when I ate the batter around the crab sticks but not the actual crab. Seeing things half full is key. Hey you could always ask for more rice right?

When I first began the lengthily application process to be a teacher in South Korea, one of my worst nightmares was being placed in an incredibly rural area. I had envisioned living in the centre of a big cosmopolitan Asian city surrounded by like minded and interesting people. I think my assumptions were way off and totally unrealistic.

One of my biggest concerns coming to Korea was that I would be placed in some forsaken one stop country town, alone and nestled in amongst the rice fields. If you had given me the option I wouldn't have dared to choose a quieter area of Seoul, never mind rural apple-loving Yeongju.

Ariel view of Yeongju

However, a year and a half later I am advocating for why, in my opinion, small towns are better for native English teachers abroad.  Full disclaimer- I have grown up most of my life within 20 minutes of a big metropolitan city centre and don't do well without 'basic essentials' like a decent mall and a number of bars to choose from. Small town living was a massive change for me.

Yet, today I quite happily call Yeongju-si my town. After being 'dumped' by EPIK (The English Programme in Korea) in a town I knew nothing about, I have come to see  'The Ju' as my home base in Asia - a far cry from my initial frantic Google search of the area. Yeongju's Wikipedia page has little to no information on the area and is quite hard to find in the first place. My heart definitely sank when I was told by our coordinators that  I was going to a small town in Gyeongsangbuk-do province.

The riverside in the winter months.

On my walk home from school in Autumn.

Cherry Blossom Season at the river side in Spring.

Looking down on Yeongju.

Months later, I can see that it was the best place for me. Being put in a small community of 50 foreigners makes you a bigger fish in a smaller pond. When your whole life has been turned upside down by continent-hopping its nice to know things will be closer by and smaller to navigate.

Within my first week of being in Yeongju, I had had about 20 Facebook friend requests from the people living in my area, including a number of people who had come forward, offering to help me if I needed anything. The pay it forward attitude to the new people was incredibly comforting. Because that's the thing about living in small towns like these - there are only about 50 of us at any given time who can speak English in the city - so you might as well become friends.

I recently relived this experience, when  an expat, Shirley moved to Yeongju and came out to meet the expats at our local bar. Later on in the evening once she had left, we all looked at each other and said "Ok, we'll keep her".
She impressed us with her ability to drink multiple shots of soju and still down a beer afterwards,
Its as simple as that, if your an expat and can speak English - congratulations your in. You have a new set of built in friends to negotiate this country with. It doesn't really matter that you initially come from different ends of the globe.
Your friends now.

Shirley and I up in Seoul for St Patrick's Day.

Yeongju girls sleepover.

At the Norebang (singing room) at 3 am.

Simon and Jacques with all of us at Maekoli bar.

My birthday party a few months ago. Everyone, even peoples coworkers, came along.

Small towns mean that you also get to do a number of nerdy/cool things. Like throw an annual Halloween party and live in the same  apartment block as 10 of your friends. This mainly being because Yeongju doesn't see many western faces and somebody along the line decided it was best to just put them all safely together somewhere away from harm. My building has be affectionately named "the dorms".

Although I will say that small towns provide an endless stream of gossip. Especially when you have a small community leaving in a bout 4 or 5 different buildings across the city. I have gotten messages at 8 am in the morning at school saying things like, "You will not believe who hooked up with who last night".

A hike up Sky Bridge to the temple. About 20 minutes outside of Yeongju.

A view from the Temple halfway up  the mountain. 

Despite the gossip, you become very close with friends and find yourself immersed in a pretty tight nit community. When you have a birthday in Yeongju, its assumed that everyone is invited, even if there's someone new in town that you've never met. I have found that because our families and friends from home are not hear, your big occasion becomes everyone's big occasion. I write this as I am recovering from Frances' St Patrick's Day birthday party.

Last week after a drunken argument between friends over how Shepard's Pie was made, we decided to throw a 'Yeongju Masterchef' competition. I sat on a panel of esteemed judges/ whoever was hungry and in town. It was delicious and lots of fun to watch Simon and Lauren pick at each others dishes.

The panel of esteemed judges, for Masterchef.

The best advice I can give someone looking to come to Korea is try not to play it so safe. Everyone wants to live in Seoul or Busan because its the most familiar to us. Safe in a big city with everything at our fingertips is where most of us apply to be. Yet in reality, unless you work at a hagwon, this is highly unlikely to happen.
My opinion is be open to going wherever they place you because you might just be really surprised.