Second day at school...

September 1, 2009

Co-taught with Christina, grade 4 in elementary school (11 years old [in Korean years, so really only 10 years old]).

Introduced myself using powerpoint. Kids seemed to really like me and showed lots of interest.

4 periods back to back from 9-12:10, so I did the same presentation 4 times in a row. Got repetitive, but it was fine I guess.

Christina is just getting back into teaching from maternity leave, and she told me she was very nervous about it, hah.

The students in the 4th grade class were much more rambonxious and wild than I remember being. There are about 30 students in each class, but Christina only had a handful the students’ attention. I kind of felt bad for her, and at times I wanted to get up from seat and get the students’ attention by clapping my hands or raising my voice to let them know to pay attention, but I didn’t want to step on Christina’s ground, so I just let her handle it the way she wants to. When I teach, I’ll be sure the students know that they can’t goof off like they when Christina is teaching. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to be like some mean dictator up at the front of the classroom, but I’ll make sure the students are paying attention to me and not (a) falling asleep (b) talking to their neighbor or (c) drawing on the table. That’s just unacceptable, and I’ll let them know in a very kind, yet firm way, hah.

The school cafeteria is apparently still not finished, so one of Anne’s coworkers ordered in food for the rest of 5th grade teachers (Anne is a 5th grade teacher, so she (and therefore I) eat with them). They had ordered some bibimbap and some other soups, and it was all going fine until Ryan (the other guy who helped move me in when I first got into Incheon) to me that I “have to give him 4,500 won”. He told me this in front of the rest of the 5th grade teachers, and caught me really off guard and made me feel super awkward. Also, everything that I’ve read and even heard about at the EPIK orientation led me to believe that if I were eating out with my co-teacher/colleagues, they would ALWAYS pay for it because that’s Korean culture. WRONG! I didn’t know how to react to it. And then Ryan proceeded to ask me if I were rich. WTF? He also told me that 4500 won isn’t much for lunch, insinuating it wasn’t much for me. I did not appreciate any of his comments today at lunch. And this is after I gave him a Carolina Nike hat for helping me move in, when I was explicitly told that presents aren’t necessary. I’m starting to feel like my colleagues are trying to take advantage of me a little bit, so I have my guard up when I’m around them.

The afternoon is once again spent on my computer doing nothing really. I don’t have my own computer at school yet, which means if I want to use the internet at school, I have to share it with Anne. Apparently, I’m getting my own computer on Thursday, thank god. Anne said it won’t be new, so I wonder just how old it will be. It better not be some shitty, slow computer.

We are allowed to leave the school at 4:40 every day, so Anne and I left then to go to shopping with the government’s money! Yay! The government has given every co-teacher 2 million won to spend on their guest English teachers in order to help us settle into our new apartments. Anne had apparently spent only half of it already, so we have about 1 million won to spend on “apartment things.” We head to a furniture store, a buy a red dresser/coffee table type of thing, and then a new flat-screen 29 in TV. That cost about 350,000 won. We then head over to Lotte Mart to buy some other things, and by the end of the day, I still have around 150,000 won to spend. So I have to think of what else I want for my apartment, because I don’t want that money to go to waste! I still need to get curtains because the ones I wanted were out of stock, and the only other ones were god-ugly. We bought a fan, but I can’t figure out how to assemble it, so it’s currently just sitting in parts in a corner of my apartment. Woops. You guys know how I am with putting things together…

Head out to dinner with Stephen and a girl named Sophia from Texas. We go to a restaurant called “Party”. I’m sure we’ll go back there soon, and I’ll be sure to take pictures next time. We all had the “pasta set”, and it wasn’t bad at all. Nice surprise for sure. And the total bill for all three of us was like 18,000 won, which is like $15. It was insane because it was a pretty nice restaurant…I guess that’s Asia for you.

I then head to a PC Bang to check email/facebook, catch up with some people, thank god, and then head back home around 10 or so. I’m not tired, so I actually cook for myself! And I took pictures of I what I cooked. I was so impressed with myself, haha. I made eggs and toast! And it was yummy. I then put on some “How I Met Your Mother”, hopped into bed, and eventually fell asleep.