Feeling English Phonics

I got a new middle school student on Friday, and he’s a babe. I know that’s inappropriate, but it’s true. Damn 16-year-old boys. I could never be a high school teacher. And because he’s new he still thinks he needs to try in English class. Most of the kids gave up a long time ago. On Friday, during my last class, I decided that everybody was going to participate in the activity, I made two of the boys wake up (by hitting them with my book) and I made on boy put away his graphic novel that he had (not so cleverly) hidden behind his work book. I made them all answer questions about their favourite movie’s and video games (it was part of the unit). They often try to get away with answers like “I don’t know” or “no favourite” but I didn’t let them on Friday. And I hounded them with follow up questions if their answers weren’t satisfactory. It was painful, probably more painful for me than for them. I stopped a few minuets early and let them have free time, at which point they all immediately whipped out their cell phones and started texting.
After school, I went to Sally’s (who gets out on 9:00 on Friday, not fair!) to meet the guy she is kind of dating, Len from Canada, and we went out for back alley samgupsal. It was fun to see the eyes pop out of the heads of the ladies working there when we walked in.
Saturday morning I went to Jonggak to meet to Sarah Kim. After many disappointments and a lot of frustrations, she has finally arrived in Korea and I was pumped to hang out with someone from home. I was running a little late in the morning and was worried that I would be late, then I remember that I was meeting Sarah, which meant I could count on her being at least 15 minutes late. And true enough, as I was riding the subway, I got a text from her about how to get to Jonggak. I had left my English subway map at home, so I was at the mercy of the Korean map that I had in my wallet. We figured it out together, but only after she started going in the wrong direction. Fortunately, there are many many Starbucks near Jonggak yuk, so I settled in with a coffee and a book to wait for her. Our 12:00 meeting turned into a 1:00 meeting. It was her first time riding the subway and she did it alone so I wasn't annoyed. In fact, I rather like the atmosphere of coffeeshops in the morning or early afternoon in Korea. They are always very quiet and the few customers are usually alone, reading or doing work. It is pleasent and relaxing. The atmosphere chagnes dramatically as the day wears on, they begin to fill up with girls and couples and get much lounder and by the evening they are packed and it's impossible to find a place to sit. I honestly don't mind waiting for people if there is place to sit and a coffee to sip. I'm often late too.
She came bearing a care-package from Raeanne, which I was not expecting. I didn’t think anybody would think about sending me stuff, so I was really pumped and touched. It was a package of candy. Which I shared later with my friends, well some of it anyway.
Sarah and I spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around a few different parts of the city and eating. Typical of day in Seoul. I was supposed to meet up with my friends at some point for St. Patrick’s Day celebrations, but didn’t know the exact plan, so I also had supper with Sarah and two of her friends from California. All three of them, including Sarah, are of Korean decent. It was strange hanging out with them, all of them looking Korean but not really being Korean. They were really nice and I had a good time with them.
After supper, I went to meet my friends in Itaewon. Sarah (not Kim) is part Irish (I guess) and takes her ST. Patty’s day celebrations very seriously. I think their day started out in Hyehwa with a parade and free Guinness. Then they went to a soccer game and finally ended up in Itaewon at the Rocky Mountain Tavern (a Canadian pub), the Wolf Hound (an Irish pub) was apparently totally packed and insane. We had a few beers, Big Rock; I believe that is a Canadian beer. I shared the Rockets that pan sent me, educating the Americans who call Rockets “Smarties” and don’t have “Smarties” at all. I showed them the “Smarties” and explained that they like M&M’s, but I didn’t share them.
After Itaewon, it was still pretty early, but most of the kids wanted to go home. Sarah, Amber, Sally, Len, and I went to Amber’s new part of the town and found a lovely hof at which to hang. Lucker, it was called and the beer the cheap, even the imported beer. There was group of drunk of boys hanging out, one of which promptly fell in love with me and wanted my phone number. He told me I was beautiful and patted my head. I told him I didn’t have a cell phone. He didn’t know much English. His friend kept apologizing for him and eventually dragged him out. They were cute.
After a round of King’s Cup (lame drinking games again), we went to Party Party noraebang across the street sang a bunch. They kept giving us extra time (for free) so we kept singing. I love noraebang.
Sunday, I took another really long walk during which I stopped at a couple of the big department stores, Lotte and Hundai, with the intention of looking at jackets, I want a new one so bad. Unforantly, the one I like the most was around 128,000 won. I should have known, both department stores are pretty high end. I mean, they have Burberry. After my walk, I planned to go see a movie by myself, but then Sally called me and invited me to see Dragon Ball Evolution, which was so bad, it was awesome and at least two of my students were in the theater with their families, but I don’t think they saw us.
And because no blog post would be complete without, Wednesdays episodes of Boys Before Flowers were again, extremely disappointed. Nothing happened and now there are only five episodes left. I want Jan Di and Jun Pyo to be happy together for a least one full episode at the end, but I assume that they will only get together at the very last possible moment, if at all. On a much sadder note, one of the mean girls killed herself last week. The actor who played Sunny was apparently suffering from depression and committed suicide. That is a harsh dose of reality to such a superficial show. It is really sad.

41 Days until Bryan!