Sky: The Dragon Fly Slayer

Dear dragonflies,
You've met your match in a little boy whose English name is Sky.

Maybe you're busy? Kids running all over the place, laundry to do, dishes to wash, T.V. shows to catch up on..whatever it is, rest assured, this blog will not take up too much of your time. Although this is sure to be a very short blog, don't fret, next week I will hound you with a plethora of pictures and information about Korea's "Washington D.C.". Here's a little teaser:
Last week was painfully uneventful. The week really dragged on and on. Maybe it's because I bought my plane tickets and now I am showing symptoms of "senioritis," but waking up and coming into work has been rough!

These days many people are going on vacation. In fact, I haven't seen the regulars (Mrs. Ko, Mrs. Nam, Mr. Che) for the past 3 weeks. I know Mrs. Ko is backpacking through South America (I know right? Isn't she like 55? yes she is), I know Mrs. Nam went to China for a week long vacation, and really, who knows what Mr. Che does in his free time? I've also had many of my kid students out on vacations. Their summer vacation started in the middle/end of July and they will go back at the end of August..however, keep in mind, their "vacation" is spent in other "hagwons" (academies) studying and preparing for the next semester. Such a downer.

I've told you about Sky. He's been my student since my first day and he's definitely a fav. He had also been MIA for the past week, but finally he waltzed into the 4 oclock class on Tuesday. I asked him about his vacation. He said he went to Muju resort, which is up in the mountains. He went on to explain that they ate all this delicious food and went on a gondala, but he was most excited to tell me about the 'best' part. "Teacher, many many dragonflies I kill. I take my fan and 'wam wam wam' like baseball." I can just picture Sky. His family is enjoying a picnic, getting ready to take a ride on the gondala with the whole fam when they look around and spot Sky in the distance violently yet happily swatting the air with his cute little Korean fan. Would have loved to see that.

In the slowest way possible, the weekend finally came. Friday night I had my last class of middle schoolers over. I don't think I've talked too much about them. This class changes alot, but I've had a consistant group for the past couple months. I recently told them about my plans to come home, and they were much sadder than I thought they'd be. So, I decided/they asked to have them come over to my little apt and I would cook them some quesidillas, nachos, mexican rice, and smoothies for dessert. They loved the quesidillas and took the leftovers to spread this mexican fiesta to their family. On the other hand, they were not a fan of the Mexican rice..they said, "Teacher, our rice is much better!" True that, but if we compare Korean food to Mexican food, the Mexicans annihilate the Koreans.

The girls loved Lily. I mean LOVED her. I'm glad Lily could feel the love from them considering she's not feeling it whenever I leave her all day in my sauna-like apartment.

This is Allison, she is probably my best student hands down. This girl could live and work in America and be just fine.

Besides the minor mishap of one of the students, Joon Young, dropping the salsa jar and glass going EVERYWHERE and me later getting small shards of glass stuck in my foot, the dinner and dessert was a success!

Saturday Elizabeth and I went to the U.S. airbase to do some errands. During the week, I built up all this frustration from just simply not being able to communicate with the person at the convenience store or the bank lady or the waitress. And I about had it with people in the gym who would just walk up to me and start asking me these questions in Korean and just staring at me like overnight I learned to understand and speak the Korean language. This situation just ends in an awkward stare and smile from me and an even more awkward silence in which I start backing away slowly. Not being able to communicate is really taking it's toll on me. Although I am well adjusted to life and culture here, I'm tired of feeling so isolated...I wanna chat it up with the person next to me on the bus, I want to understand my Korean friends on a deeper level, I want to know what exactly my Korean coworkers are saying when I hear, "(Korean korean korean Korean) Natalee (Korean Korean Korean)." It's exhausting sometimes. All this to say, going to the airbase was such a relief. We stopped by the post office and the guy was so helpful, so nice, and I understood every word that came out of his mouth...such bliss.

Saturday night, Elizabeth, myself, and Alex (our friend who got us on base) had some dinner in Gunsan and ate ice cream with peaches and syrup (the best maple syrup in America..from Elizabeth's family's business...thank you Holscher family! I hope I can witness first hand someday that maple syrup operation you have going on over there!)

Well well well, that turned out to be longer than I expected...I didn't foresee my rant about the frustrations of living in a foreign land.

I hope you are enjoying what's left of your summer. I can't believe everyone will be heading back to school already..I mean I enjoyed my two day summer vacation, but seems like something was missing...probably the other 85 days :)