It always amazes me how quickly American holidays can pass
here if you yourself do not make any effort to celebrate them. Thanksgiving once again happened this year,
as it seems to do every year, and once again no Korea wished me a ‘Happy
Thanksgiving!’ I bought a coffee that
morning on my walk to school from a young Korean who spoke pretty good English,
and as I sat there in the empty coffee shop waiting for him to hand over the
caffeine, I half expected him to look at me and wish me a happy holiday. Granted, before coming here I celebrated
twenty-six Thanksgivings in America and got used to the ‘ol routine, but how
many Americans remember holidays that are not pertinent to us? There are so many double edged swords when
one is American.
Despite the fact that only Americans wished me a happy
Thanksgiving, I think I had more Thanksgiving meals this year than ever
before. Round one occurred about two
hours south of Seoul near where my boyfriend Mike lives, in a town called Asan. His college and neighboring private and
public elementary schools were hosting a fundraiser for a school in Cambodia,
which included music and a big Thanksgiving meal. The event was held at the ‘Helicopter Bar’,
which was an actual helicopter; one of those big green ones that I want to say is
from Vietnam times. It was quite neat,
the food was delicious (I had ham for the first time while in Korea and it was
AWESOME), the people were nice, and the music was great. I may be biased about the music because Mike
played a set chock full of songs I am now very familiar with, but I enjoyed the
others playing, too. It was also nice to
be somewhere new in rural Korea surrounded by a bunch of foreigners from all
over the world: America, Canada, England, Ireland, Scotland, and
Australia. Now that I typed that out, I
realize it was basically a whole bunch of white people. Hmmmm.
Round two happened that same weekend when I returned from
Mike’s, and this round was held in my apartment, and my neighbor Alicia’s who
is my co-worker. I took my first trip to
Costco that day to get a few last minute supplies, namely roast chickens since
none of us have real-live ovens, and it was like I was transported right back
into America. Except I was surrounded by
Asian people. The trip reminded me that
I am becoming more of a grown-up because I was able to contain my excitement
and get in and out quickly. Upon the
return from that trip we got all our ducks in a row, had all of our co-workers
over, and had quite a nice meal. It was almost
like being at home, except instead of eating at a table we sat on the floor or
on my bed, and none of us were related.
There was also nowhere to sneak away to if you didn’t want to clean up,
which was a choice move my brother used to make that I soon copied. I also had kimchi with the meal, which was a
first and as much as I love kimchi, it just didn’t quite go.
The next day was Monday so we brought the leftovers to
school to again share with everyone.
Round two with leftovers is always delightful, especially when the bus
drivers/maintenance men/two men who do everything shared it with us. During lunch they so often tell us about their food and how to eat it, sometimes
even yelling at us if we do it wrong (though kimchi in their bland soups is
quite delicious, even if they make that deep throated Korean ‘kaaak’ sound when
I do it) so it was fun to have the tables turned. I wanted to yell at them for eating stuffing
incorrectly, but there really is no wrong way to do that. They were super psyched about it all, and
even did some research so they could understand what the hell we were talking
about when we said Thanksgiving.
“Oh! Harvest! Yes, yes!”
It was another successful round of celebrating a holiday in
a foreign land, and it made me very thankful for the friends that I have
here.
Now as I get back to writing this, it’s only ten days away
from Christmas. I am starting to appreciate
how Koreans celebrate their harvest (Cheuseuk) in September or October so the holidays are
a little more spread out. I enjoy the
Christmas season here more than America in that I don’t watch any TV (and even
if I did I wouldn’t understand it) so am not inundated with commercials of
consumerism. The most Christmas stuff that is shoved in my
face is the decorations each subway station has, my favorite of which is my own
station, which has an upside-down Christmas tree.
School life has been more stressful for me than any other
job I have held, but also full of joyous times. It’s odd how one place can make me so
stressed my body starts to feel it, but so happy I shed tears of joy (thanks
for that gene, mom.) The stressfulness
stems from our owner who doesn’t always make the best decisions, and the fact
that one of our teachers did the ‘midnight run’, or called from the airport one
morning to say he wasn’t coming back. We
have been short staffed for a long time, leaving us no prep time but with the
same amount of work. We also just had
conferences, which entails longer hours of preparing things. This mainly consists of many, many overviews
of what was learned and what will be learned to give to parents who don’t read
English well or at all.
Working at a hagwon (private school) for this long has
taught me many things about the way in which they work. The main focus is to make the parents happy and we all have to bust our butts to make that happen, even if the work we do
is seemingly unappreciated or unnecessary.
It’s a good test for me though; to balance boundaries. I work on sticking up for myself, but also
letting things slide and not getting too angry over things I have no control
over. Sometimes it feels like I came to
Korea at exactly the right time as it makes me face up to the things about
myself that need the most work.
While I may be stressed out a lot, I know that I am growing
both as a person and a teacher. The children
that I teach are just precious and I love them more and more each passing day. They are American aged five and astound me
with the level that they are at. They
can write a story that’s a whole page; memorize a speech that’s 5 -6 sentences
long; sit for long periods and listen (kind of); do addition and subtraction
easily; remember the life cycle of a butterfly; know what synonyms,
homophones, homonyms, compound words, and contractions are; and so much more. They love to sing songs and will often burst
out into one when they are walking around the classroom (I am unsure where they learned this.) Their excitement spreads to me and I get
excited, which makes learning a lot more fun.
I speak to them in a silly voice with my glasses low on my nose and they
think it’s the funniest thing they have ever seen, or I sing a song fast and then slow and then fast again and they can't stop laughing. I wish I could capture all those little
moments when they leave me in awe, and have a video reel going when I hit those
stressed out times. They are wonderful
little creatures full of wonder and I feel lucky to be their teacher.
This next week of school will be fun as the excitement of
Christmas and a break will be in the air.
On Friday we are having a big Christmas party full of hot chocolate,
candy canes, crafts, stories, bingo, and Mike as Santa with me as his helper elf. Needless to say, I am excited about
that. While this week will be fun, I
cannot wait to have some time off for both relaxation time and an adventure. I am
going to Malaysia with two friends and I am super excited about this
adventure. I’ll be sure to write it out
when I come home. Merry Christmas and
Happy Holidays!!
