I’m so excited to be here... and to have such ready access to internet. It’s amazing! It’s going to be easy to keep in touch! Wooo!

So, here’s a bit of the scoop. I arrived late on Friday night, just in time to meet Krista, the teacher I’m crashing with until I can move into my apartment. She went to St Thomas (Twin Cities represent!) and seems just great. Lots of energy. I fell asleep pretty easily and the next day Brittany and Renee came by to say hello, and we went out for lunch. We ran into Sarah, Jackie, and Jo... and the six of us went to grab a bite to eat. The following evening, Krista and Chris came back from MudFest (I’m SOOOO going next year!) and we went out for ShabuShabu, a Japanese 3-course soup-noodles-rice meal (delicious), and then we met up with a few more teachers. I got to meet most of the teachers from my school, so that was nice. I think it’s going to be a fun year. Everyone seems to really enjoy work and hanging out... so I’m pretty excited.

It’s so developed here! I’m surprised by the fact that I was surprised by this. Haha. Of course it’s developed. And apparently, this “suburb” that I think is very city-like is actually quite small. 80,000 people small. Hmmm. I’ll decide that a bit later.

So, first things first. Today was my first day of training/observation/etc. And I’m going to adopt just about every child in the school. They are /so/ adorable. Seriously cute kids. The other teachers seem really nice, too. The school is located on a the 7th floor a building the downtown area. The first floor has a “Paris Baguette”, a French bakery (right?), the second floor is a bank, and I think they said a few of the other floors are for other “hagwons”, other private after-school academies where children can go to learn other subjects (music, art, foreign language, math, etc.).

I shadowed different classes all day, starting with Brittany’s class of Kindergarten students. Unbelievably adorable. Just the cutest little kids ever. They have a lot of energy, understand a lot of English, and apparently their parents always want to follow along to see what they’re doing. So, basically, I’m glad I get to see them for a few days, but I’m excited to not have to actually work with them. They start classes at... 9? I don’t start work until 1pm.

I’m technically Chris’ replacement, so I’ll be taking over some of his classes. He generally teaches the older kids (8-11 from what I saw yesterday). And I think that’ll be fun. Big shoes to fill with him, though. He seems to have a really great rapport with his students. I’m also going to be taking on an SR class. While I’m not exactly sure what that means, the teacher I’m replacing doesn’t like the class, and the Korean co-teacher I’ll be working with for them said that they “just aren’t smart kids. They’re the least smart class and they just fool around the whole time. They aren’t ever going to learn.” These kids are in 2nd grade...

The Korean education system freaks me out a little bit. Children are in regular schools for the normal length of the school day, and then many of them go to private academies (such as my school or other “lessons”) until 20h30. And teachers wonder why they screw around in class. They don’t have time to be kids! Of course they screw around! They go from class to class to class to class... for 12 hours each day... and then they have homework to do. And apparently, if you ask what they did over the weekend, they say, “Study, teacher. Study.” How sad is that?! And it seems that their methods of learning are based on “by rote” teaching (much like many other parts of the world) that never seems to develop the sense of critical thinking. Which to me is really sad. But we’ll see.

The classes meet for 2 hours every week, MWF for 40 minutes or TR for 60 minutes. Short class periods were a good decision. There’s a max of 10 students in each class. Small classes were also a good decision. The kids choose American names, and in one of the classes, there is actually a girl named Stephanie. In the Korean language, there is not “f” or “ph” sound, so they just kinda say “Seutepanie” with a sharp “p” sound. It’s pretty funny.

I teach my last class until 20h30, and then I head home. I think I’m gonna like this! Last night, I was so exhausted, still a bit jet-lagged, and just tiiiiired... I came home, made dinner, watched a bit of TV and promptly fell asleep at 10pm. And I woke up this morning at 9h35! I couldn’t believe it! I haven’t slept that much... I don’t even remember the last time I slept for nearly 12 hours! So I’m well-rested and ready for another day of observation. I get to meet the TR groups and hopefully chat some more with teachers to figure out what I’m actually supposed to be doing.

OH! I almost forgot! Our director, took Renee (the other new teacher) and me to the hospital to get a medical check to make sure we can actually work in Korea. It was very extensive. They did a chest x-ray... and then measured height/weight/blood pressure, etc... They also checked my eyes, checked my hearing, measured my chest, took a urine sample, and drew blood. Ummm, wow. Surprise! They wanted to be thorough, I guess. So hopefully I pass! :D Everything should be okay.

Next week is vacation, so there are 2 other teachers who will stay around the area (everyone else is going to really cool places like Thailand, China, Malaysia, etc.) We’ll be able to explore Seoul and maybe some other parts of Korea. We’ll see.

Keep in touch!