Halloween Part 하나

I was going to hold off on making a Halloween post until the end of the week, or at least until I'd taught all three days at Noan, but I'm in the mood to blog tonight, so I'll share my first few pictures. I have some awesome pics of my boy student costume, but I didn't take any today... It wasn't a terribly exciting costume. Just one of the masks from Scream and a big plastic axe I found at the open-air market (weird). I'll take a picture of it when I wear it at Dongkang. (Although, I did scare the hell out of one of my students. He turned the corner and saw me coming up the hallway, and I thought he was going to drop dead of surprise.)

Anyway, pictures first:

This was actually at the Naju Culture Festival which happened last weekend. I didn't spend much time there (unlike Meghan who was there practically all weekend, because she's really committed to learning about our hometown). But I met her and Allison there briefly on Saturday. We just walked around and looked at the random stuff. There were people selling stuff, carnival games, performances, a trampoline... you know, the usual. And... there was Naju's mascot (Pearboy)'s costume sitting on a chair. So we just did what we always do when we want something--stared at it helplessly, until some guys came over and offered to help us put it on. So we all took pictures in it, and then after we were finished, some Korean kids came over wanting to do it, and they were vetoed. Sorry, kids. Foreigner Privilege, baby. There are so many drawbacks to being a foreigner that it's nice when something goes right.

I love these kids. Really. On the left is JS, the boy I pelted with the eraser (and most recently sprayed directly in the eyes with water for giving me attitude after being late again). I can't remember how, but he killed me yesterday with something funny. Oh yeah, today he was chastising another boy for always asking for candy ("Teacher, me angel, him devil. Me handsome, him no handsome." -> Miss Camp = bad teacher) Then he gave him the middle finger. So I beeped him (that's Meghanspeak for giving him the two-arm X and saying "Beep" to indicate disapproval). I told him it was very bad and he shouldn't do it, so he said "몰랐어" and asked his friends how to say that in English. Which was unnecessary, because I know it means "I didn't know." Which I don't believe for a second, but I let it go, because I love him. He also used panmal with me yesterday, although inadvertenly, I'm sure. Panmal is the way you speak to people younger than you (he said 아니 instead of 아니요), so I gave him a hard time about it. The other boy is TH, the one who spouts random English phrases all the time ("Let's together swimming Saturday.") Yesterday's priceless TH moment was when he got up and started dancing during Thriller, showing me the "Korean shake." Gyration. P.S. If they had been wearing their ties, you'd be able to better see how accurate my costume is. Apparently I should have not worn the tie, and just worn a bright-colored t-shirt underneath. 씨발. (That's "shit" in Korean.)

This is CU. He's shy. :) I'm including this picture because I look good in it, and it demonstrates how some of my students hate me. A little.

I'm including this picture, even though I look bad in it, because I love this kid. :) P.S. There was only one camera, so I have no idea what he was looking at. My official title of my costume was "Korean #1 Handsome Boy Student," to which JS replied: "맞어. (Okay, correct). I am Korean #2 Handsome Boy Student." Everything is "Korea #1 ________"

I went upstairs looking to take these pictures for costume accuracy's sake. First I took a handsome boy picture, but this was for some of my favorite girls, who all wanted to pose with me as their handsome boyfriend. But, they're too shy to show their faces apparently.

Anyway, that's all my pictures for now. I announced my Speaking Contest today at Noan, and the students seemed enthusiastic. My co-teacher made my life super-difficult by not speaking English well, and confusing me and them, but I'll sort it out tomorrow, I guess. I also found out that I'm (apparently?) responsible for organizing two (or possibly four, not sure) musical acts for the NMS festival. She didn't tell me at first that she wanted it all to be in English, so I had a lengthy discussion with the students about what they wanted to do for our performance. ("Discussion" is an interesting term to use when it's me talking to my students who don't know English. What they want to do, btw, is nothing, and certainly nothing to do with English.) So we agreed on something, and now I'm going to have to tell them we're doing something else. (What we're doing, btw, is singing "Uptown Girl." Boys are singing, and girls are dancing, I guess.) P.S. I am not a choreographer. I'm happy about it, because it means I get to spend a lot of time with them and it will be way fun, but still... The problem is, I only get 5 practice days, because we can't start practicing until after final exams. But my co-teacher explained "School want... Englishy. Expect much. Third grade."

No pressure. It could be awesome. Guess I know how I'll be spending my free time for the new two weeks. Hmm... what other awesome stuff happened? Oh yeah... JK talked to me today during the watch "Thriller" and eat Miss Camp's money Halloween party portion of today's class. He said: "Miss Camp... my... reply" (Pause: Imagine how you would say the world reply if you'd never heard it said correctly. Got it? Repley? That's what he said.) So it took me a few seconds to figure out what he was saying, but I eventually got it. "My reply... different." (Me: "Difficult?") JK: Difficult. Yes. (Me: "Why not Korean?") JK: You can... read? At which point I wrote "I can read easy Korean slowly" on his paper, and we agreed that he can read easy English the way I can read easy Korean, with a dictionary. So he vowed to write me an email in Korean. Something to look forward to.

The actual Halloween lesson has gone pretty well so far. I did a powerpoint with various Halloween customs, which is pretty cool, if I do say so myself. The best part is the random family pictures I incorporated. Then I taught the kids Halloween vocabulary (witch, zombie, cemetery, etc.) which is totally not useful in their every day life. Then I told a ghost story from the teaching manual, which I illustrated painstakingly with a Powerpoint, but which the students mostly either didn't understand or didn't find interesting. Then we ate food and watched "Thriller," which the kids also didn't understand, but which they mildly enjoyed anyway. I'm teaching it again tomorrow to the two first grade classes, who I think will be good. They're very quiet. This week I'm getting a taste of what it's like to teach the same lesson a lot of times (I'll teach it 6 times at NMS and 3 more times at DMS, for a total of 9.) Some ETAs who don't teach out of books teach the same lesson 20 times, with only mild variations for grade level. And while that's much easier lesson planning-wise, it's really boring for the teacher. At least for me. So I'm glad I don't usually do that.

Okay, I guess I'm off to eat dinner. More later, I'm sure.