Korea is where it's at

Dear North Korea,
This is not ok.

Hello all! It's actually Thanksgiving (which is not celebrated in Korea) right now and in 2 minutes it will officially be Thanksgiving Day in America :) However, I will talk about today and my Thanksgiving in my next blog because I realize I have fallen behind, and I need to have material for when I write my next blog on Mondayish. My Thanksgiving resolution is to be more consistent with the blog :)

So, anyways, this past week and a half was not really that eventful, until Monday afternoon. And if you haven't been hiding under a rock, than you would know about the current situation with North Korea...if you HAVE been hiding under rock which is probably most of my college friends and others my age here is a link to the story.

There is MUCH speculation as to why North Korea did what they did, but reality: no one knows why North Korea does what they do. I think right now is most important for the South Korean president and our President to sit down with China's leaders and figure this thing out before it's too late.

Nonetheless, mother, I am perfectly safe. And although the news is really giving this a lot of attention, the U.S. Airforce base in my city seems to be going about business as usual. So, it doesn't seem it's so extreme that I will have to evacuate or anything. However, I did pack a little "necessity" bag if something does go down.

My adult students reactions were the worst. One lady started to cry. She said one of the Korean marines was from our city of Gunsan and that he was only a few days from getting out of the service. So, the mood is definitely a somber one.

O.k. enough about this...on a lighter note, this past week was a pretty good one. My students are good, my adult students remain my favorite with my high school students coming in at close second. I've noticed the more comfortable my adult students get with me, the more they go on and on about things. They tend to talk in circles, and this week I asked one of them a question and then all of a sudden my brain totally left the situation. As she was talking these were my thoughts: "man, it was a cold walk today. I can't believe that dog followed me for two blocks. I miss Cami. Remember how different she looked when she got a haircut? I need a haircut. I wonder if Koreans know how to cut Americans hair. More importantly, I wonder if they know how to cut curly hair. Maybe I'll see if Erika can trim it when she comes. Oh man, I can't wait for Erika to come. What should we do? I need to look into things to do in Seoul. right? right? right? right?" Then I quickly realized my student was asking me if she was right? So it's taking a great deal of focus these days to keep with them. But they really are improving, and it's great to see them talking SO much English.

On Fridays we have game day here at my Hagwon and we play games like Up Words and another English game called Word Up. Up Words is like Scrabble. One of my elementary school students spelled the word UAE this week. Of course I said, "that's not a word, you weakling." (I didn't really say "weakling") And then he was like, "um yeah, it's a country." And I was like, " No it's not." But then I vaguely remembered that in my last semester of college I remember learning about United Arab Emirates in my geography class. And although it was an abbreviation and I shouldn't have given it to him, I did anyway to applaud his thinking. Seriously, the kids 12, I learned about that country when I was 22. Korean education, ridiculous.

Also same day, one of the games had multiple choice questions. The question was, "Which is not delicious?" a) a banana cake b.) a chocolate cookie c.) a spider sandwich The student thought about for a minute and said the answer was probably "a" but that it really depends on the person...a Korean would say that.

Speaking of gross food. Last Friday my morning class of adult students took me to this bird lookout and then out to lunch. At this lookout, they had these silkworms cooking in a pot and a lady selling them. In my old "western" way of thinking, I would have thought those worms were snacks for the birds, but in my brand new "Asian" thinking, I knew those worms were snack for us humans. So, my students bought some and told me I needed to eat one because I needed an adventure while I am in Korea. So, I did as Koreans do and chewed that worm right up. It tasted like......a worm. And it may have upset my stomach a tad, but it had to be done and a memory was made. Here's a pic of the worm:
And the last story of the week that was pretty funny, yet embarrassing happened early last week. In my building there are 5 floors. Our school is on the 4th floor. I take the elevator every morning with pretty much the same people. Twice the doors have shut on me when I've attempted to catch it at the last minute. But last Tuesday, I was on the other side.

There were about 5 of us in this small elevator and I was closest to the buttons because I get off first. So as the doors were closing this older lady made a surprisingly quick dash towards the elevator. Like clockwork, the doors shut on her too...they literally shut on her. So, with my catlike reflexes I push the button to open the doors and let her on, but while I was holding the button down, the doors still remained shut, her tiny Korean shoulders squished in between these two elevators. The elevator got really quiet and all eyes were on me..especially the eyes of the woman stuck in the door. And after the longest 5 seconds of my life, I realized I was pushing the button that closes the doors. So embarrassing, yet the look on her face and the fact that she didn't say anything, not even a sound, while she was stuck was pretty hilarious.

Well, I never think I'm going to write as much as I do. So, if you didn't get to the bottom of this post in one sitting, don't feel bad. I probably wouldn't either. Happy Thanksgiving everyone..eat tons and tons of turkey for me! Oh yeah, and special shout out to my "secret" followers, you know who you are....Phil.