. . .
Although I'd like to admit we flew to Paris last weekend and snapped this shot, I actually just found it via the internets and thought it was super cool and wanted to share before I start rambling about Korea and life in general... let's drool together.
What has really been happening lately is a lot of good breakfast eating... pancakes a la wild blueberry, and cinnamon rolls on my birthday last week. What a chef I married!!
My expert color coordinator husband not only had this bouquet on the table (next to hot cinnamon rolls, no less), but he also chose the flower combo and paper and, in the style of my students' usual writing, "So, I was very, very happy and exciting and wonderful and beautiful. And I was so, so good because the flowers are very, very nice, so I am very surprised! So, my birthday is so nice!" I'm 24. Yikes.
What else has been happening? We can't, as usual, get enough of the cute, miniature Korean kids and their matching kindergarten uniforms. Before our long weekend in early May we went to a popular amusement park (Everland) for the day and honestly had more fun looking at cute as pie kindy groups walking/shuffling/wandering/eating snacks/posing for the camera than we did on the rides, though the woooden roller coaster was a close second.
Two weekends ago, we took the KTX (bullet-ish train) to Busan, the second largest city in Korea. The beach was such a beautiful change, and our friend Connor came with us so it was of course about a million times better.
We're up on top of the "Aqua Palace Hotel" here. We snuck by the suspicious elevator/hotel man and went to the top floor, where a restaurant worker let us go up the stairs to the top as if badly dressed foreigners were always wandering in the expensive restaurant inquiring if they could please just use this little staircase to get a view of the city. Anyway, it worked out great, and look at the bridge all lit up, too!
Back on the ground...
We also managed to squeeze into our busy schedule (it's a lie! ... another favored expression among our students - our schedule is anything but busy) a little picnic by the Han River, on a floating dock where you can catch a tour boat. We didn't want to catch the boat. We just wanted a covered area to look at the river, and no one seemed to mind or notice (until Dan popped open the champagne).
Today marks exactly 11 months in Korea. We arrived last June 18th and today is May 18th. In a way, it's wild how time has flown like an arrow (I have to tell my students to leave off the "like an arrow" cause we just ... don't say that). Truthfully though, my mind can't handle that 2009 is nearly halfway through. What? I can barely even type that. We are trying to hide a bit how overly excited we are to get back home. I'm not hiding it from you - just my coworkers and friends here. Last Friday while my kids were taking a test, I calculated that I had precisely 23 working days left, 99 classes to go, and 34 days left in Korea. I smiled. While I'm emotionally and culturally ready to get on a direct flight home, today at work reminded me that I will miss so many things about our job here. My kids were extra sweet today (though the younger ones were experimenting with English profanity in my first class, resulting in my efforts to be mad at them, but they're just so cute... ). I already know I'll miss the simplicity of our lifestyle here, and the closeness we have with our students (pre-adolescent, mostly!). There is definitely some mutual adoration in some of my classes, which makes not only teaching them rewarding and easy, but loving them and choking up at the thought of never seeing them get older (and possibly easier to talk to in English?) even easier. Dan and I so often just want to steal our students a couple of hours/days and hang out with them. It's also always entertaining when a student spells the name of the former president "Bushi" and shrugs with a smirk saying, "Sorry, I don't know spelling". I'll end this, with more thoughts to come, perhaps. Here's a picture from a few months ago of one of my favorite students Jessica, newly self-renamed Sunny.
Back on the ground...
We also managed to squeeze into our busy schedule (it's a lie! ... another favored expression among our students - our schedule is anything but busy) a little picnic by the Han River, on a floating dock where you can catch a tour boat. We didn't want to catch the boat. We just wanted a covered area to look at the river, and no one seemed to mind or notice (until Dan popped open the champagne).
Today marks exactly 11 months in Korea. We arrived last June 18th and today is May 18th. In a way, it's wild how time has flown like an arrow (I have to tell my students to leave off the "like an arrow" cause we just ... don't say that). Truthfully though, my mind can't handle that 2009 is nearly halfway through. What? I can barely even type that. We are trying to hide a bit how overly excited we are to get back home. I'm not hiding it from you - just my coworkers and friends here. Last Friday while my kids were taking a test, I calculated that I had precisely 23 working days left, 99 classes to go, and 34 days left in Korea. I smiled. While I'm emotionally and culturally ready to get on a direct flight home, today at work reminded me that I will miss so many things about our job here. My kids were extra sweet today (though the younger ones were experimenting with English profanity in my first class, resulting in my efforts to be mad at them, but they're just so cute... ). I already know I'll miss the simplicity of our lifestyle here, and the closeness we have with our students (pre-adolescent, mostly!). There is definitely some mutual adoration in some of my classes, which makes not only teaching them rewarding and easy, but loving them and choking up at the thought of never seeing them get older (and possibly easier to talk to in English?) even easier. Dan and I so often just want to steal our students a couple of hours/days and hang out with them. It's also always entertaining when a student spells the name of the former president "Bushi" and shrugs with a smirk saying, "Sorry, I don't know spelling". I'll end this, with more thoughts to come, perhaps. Here's a picture from a few months ago of one of my favorite students Jessica, newly self-renamed Sunny.
a few last thoughts... Who could resist falling in love with Tom's nonchalant, yes-I'm-wearing- designer-jeans-and shoes attitude? He always says "Hi, Julie" in the most laid-back, perfect English, even though he's been studying English for only a year or so. LOVE this kid.
And, lastly, a letter from my student Potter (after Harry Potter, of course) to his Father. Signed, "Wonderful, Potter". Click for larger image.
And, lastly, a letter from my student Potter (after Harry Potter, of course) to his Father. Signed, "Wonderful, Potter". Click for larger image.
Peace
