Snot
Sometimes I just can’t get the contradictions in Korea. Like my tendancie to think fart jokes are funny - poo here is quite funny too. The kids draw piles of poo in the margins of their notebooks, Grown women giggle themselves to death over mear mention of an impending large bowel movement. So shit is funny. Why is it then that when someone blows their nose (discreetly)in public people recoil in horror and disgust an look at you as if you have just killed their first born child?
As avid readers will know (I know there’s at least one of you ot there) I’m not one to bitch…pause for indignant laughter….Let alone bitching about students but Wednesday really took the cake when it came to my 6 o’clock class. A class, it should be noted, is full of really good kids whp are way ahead of the curve when it comes to learning. Except for one little S$*t who has, over the course of the 7 week unit, done, quite literally, nothing. No work in class, no homework, and insists on talking, screaming, walking around, throwing things, and ignoring my requests to sit the fuck down and shut the hell up. Now this particular class I happen to share with both Conan and ‘The Boss’ and i have mentioned it to both of them on a couple of ocassions to no avial, so On Wednesday I made a point of getting them both in the same room at the same time and tellin’ them how it was. Conan was basically mute while ‘The Boss’ mentioned something of an impending timetable change and that he would talk to Sophia about it. - (Raised eyebrows:) We’ll see.
Meanwhile my activity index is bottoming out as I climb out of a head cold that has been around since last weekend. Luckily I have been sharing the wealth and I was able to send Sophia home early on Thursady night and take her 7:00 class as she seemed to be suffering much more than I was. It means I get an early finish on Friday - Assah!
Thursday ended up being quite a bastard of a day as Conan was off having to fullfill his (annual?) one day military training refresher just incase The North invades some time late Sunday / early Monday.
Actually the other reason for the inactivity (besides inhierant laziness) is the will to save as much money as possible in the next four months. And as the current pay period comes to an end the fat wad of notes in the draw means I have done particularly well this month. It seems Teacher’s college is down the tubes due to conflicting time frames so we may well be back in The Republic before you can say Kimchi Chiggae 10 times fast. Or perhaps The Chosun Bimbo will become the Nippon Bimbo? The Shanghai Bimbo? Personally I like the ring to "The Beijing Bimbo?" But such thoughts are for another post. And it must be remembered that for a short time at least we WILL see the apperance of The Waiuku Bimbo. God help us.
This Friday will be the last of the month and so is regular no real classes situation, and I will get to dish out lots of candy in that we are celebrating Halloween a couple of days early. I have got my 5 O’clock class to practice a (somewhat) halloween themed reading which they will perform in front of the other classes hopefully to critical acclaim from my collegues. Having found somewhere to put my podcasts I was hoping to actually film the performance and put it up on the internerd somewhere and link to it from here so yous can all see I’m like a gud Engrish Teechaa ‘n stuff aye. (sorry you were saying something about my spelling the other day Julie?) At anyrate I will put some pics of the kids up anyway because I made them all promise to come in costume on Friday with the flimsy excuse that I would give them some candy. (Word spread, and so earlier this evening ‘The Boss’ pulled out one of those masks like the killer in ‘Scream’ and asked me what I thought. There will definately be a photo of that.)
Friday will also see a long awaited reunion with the International Man of Mystery that is Ken who has been in Bird Flu land for the last couple of weeks, probably not in the best shape for a big Friday night (considering I’ll have to teach his kids on Saturday afternoon in Suwon) and maybe he’s in the same position having rung me last night to tell me he was back and he was enjoying a Martini as we spoke. Then again maybe not.
That’s it. Longer than expected this one, but I notice looking at The Bimbo that i havn’t had much to say of late (virgin podcasts and so on) so this should tide you over.
BTW does anyone know if Winston will be heading to Busan for the APEC foreign minister’s meeting? I’d be keen to go down there just to have a ciggie with him.
The Podcasts Begineth
The weekend is over and I have little to report other than it is cold! This week will see me deliver my version of a teaching seminar on Monday afternoon in front of ‘The Boss’ and my other collegues. I’m not entirely sure why we do these - where one of us stands in front of the three other teachers and pretends to teach for ten minutes and then they all talk in Korean for another 10 minutes - but I’m a kid that’s my job.
In other news you can listen to my first podcast here. Props to podOmatic. Just click on the play button. You may (or may not) also want to record a comment - just follow the links on the page.
All hail Winston.
Finally the man got what was coming to him. Namely a a cabinet post worthy of his intellect and consistent with his policy position. All hail new Minister of Foreign Affairs (outside of Cabinet) the Rt. Hon. Winston Peters…(Clapping cheering etc.) As a NZF voter for as long as I have been able to vote it is gratifying to see my man in there! (I didn’t vote in 96 so don’t blame me for that National Party crappola!)
And what a post - Minister of Foreign affairs. About time someone with some sense got a hold of the Department of Labour and Immigration. (Notwithstanding my own dodgy immigration experiences…)
In other news: More Naughty Canadians
NB picture: NZH
Cuisine Bimbo2 Nangmyon 냉면
냉면 Korean cold noodles.
Ingredients
1 Packet of packet Nangmyon
some onion
some cucumber
some red peper
1/2 a boiled egg.
Method
THINLY slice whatever vegetables you have
boil egg (clean pot optional)
open packet Nangmyon
boil Noodles
cool noodles with cold water
place noodles in bowl
add packet Nangmyon juice (chilled)
arrange vegetables and egg randomly on top
add mustard.
Eat.
Nangmyon is more of a summer dish I guess - often when you eat it at a restaurant the cold soup it is served in is more like a slushy.
And there are different types my favourite being Bibim Nangmyon.
This was a pretty good effort on my part if I don’t say so myself. Indeed the end result actually ressembles the picture on the packet!
In other News: I was astounded to learn that in Korea there are some 20000 foreign teachers - of which less than 8000 are here legally. This little nugget of knowledge was part of Canadian coverage of a recent crackdown by Korean Authorities on Teachers (mostly Canadian by all accounts) teaching here illegally. See the Globe and Mail’s coverage here. It’s not hard to organise yourself is it? I obtained a visa for Korea in 2 days. I was then, a year later, able to renew my visa in the space of 10 minutes at the Daejon immigration office. I hold no sympathy for anyone falling afoul of Korean immigration law - I mean it’s not rocket science - get a visa, work, get paid.
There have been a number of ugly incidents of late that have fueled already rampant Korean xenophobia, another woman run over by a US Army Humvee, and two Canadians (again teachers) kicking shit out of a guy in a bar. Luckily the sleepy hamlet of Nonsan seems immune by in large to these sorts of things. Or maybe I’m just an ignorant foreigner? At any rate it has got me thinking about my chances of coming back to Korea for a third (and most probably final) year after a short holiday home. From what I can estimate my experience in Nonsan and in particular JungChul is the exception rather than the rule at hogwan’s across the lower half of the penninsula. You need only look at blacklists and other such testimonials to know there are a lot of shitty english schools around - my present experience thus sets very high standards that may well work against me in the future…who knows.
It’s been relativly boring of late thus very few posts. Still shitty and not sleeping well, but by in large still arriving at work on time and in a relativly good mood. Freaks me out that there are only 4 months left!
PS Congratulations to James and Ran who were married today in Dual ceremonies. Ain’t love a grand thing? Ranuka will join the very privilaged few who have managed to live with Kroy and survive. Well done you two lucky bastids! (Off to Bali for the honeymoon??!!)
Man I’m slack!
Has been one of those weeks where despite nothing pressing happening I have achieved very little! And I guess that includes an update from the city of Nonsan.
God bless Korea - It was another long weekend last weekend so I scooted up to Seoul on the Friday night to indulge in a bit of hooliganism, of which no more will be said. Then the weekend was spent sitting - for the large part - in my pajamas watching TV. EXCELLENT. Indeed it has been the forst weekend in a while where I havn’t felt compelled to do anything. I finally got to bed at about 5am on Tuesday morning.
Only to wake up at 1:40 that afternoon - remember I start work at 1:30. I got to work with about 30 seconds to spare before my first class! Tuesday while I was downtown paying the phone bill and changing my address I got a message from Ken who was having BBQ and was thus invited to join him. Marvelous. Intense negotiations followed on a number of topics including a new bar I have had my eyes on for a while and which (at that stage of the evening) I hadn’t tried, and whether I could tutor Ken’s children Lucy and Andy on the weekends - Negotiations I think we have sealed - nice little money earner that one (will) be. Not to mention the fact I will be heading off to Suwon every Saturday morning for the next 4 1/2 months - cool aye.
After a long communications black out (for what ever reason) Got a message from Mum that her and my Nana were heading down to Christchurch to visit my Great Grandmother who it seems is not in the best of health. Still as she (and my other Great Grandmother) are both in their 90’s things bode well for the other members of our family - I guess I will have to put up with my own mother for sometime yet!
In other news I was disappointed to learn that the Green party failed to pick up enough votes from special and overseas ballots to get Nandor back into parliament. I guess it is a bit of a shame for those of us who don’t have too much of an aversion to the decriminalisation of cannabis - I wonder if we can rely on the Greens to push the policy anyway?
Anyway I have yet to develop a curriculum for the Park family kids - which I really need to do - plus there are a ton of Jung Chul CDs that need to be copied - so I’m off.
