Anne in Korea: Apartment & Day 1

Hello faithful blog readers,

Today went very well! I walked to school with my co-teacher and began meeting everyone. I met the principal and vice principal and sat in the wrong chair and was very embarrassed. Turns out the one they point to isn't the one you sit in? I did use my broken Korean to address them though, and gave them all some maple syrup. They were speaking in Korean, presumably about me, and seemed happy enough. The principal did say I looked young, asked what my degree was (eek never felt so embarrassed of a BSc haha) and then said that teaching would be hard. The vice principal had fun saying my last name. They gave me green tea and were sort of warning me that it was green, and then my coteacher told them I had bought green tea at the grocery store and they all seemed happy.

Next up I met all the grade 5 and 6 teachers, as those are the two grades I will be teaching. I used my 3 Korean phrases and got a very positive reaction! They clapped and smiled and then they told me which men were single. I will be teaching English with a lot of homeroom teachers who don't speak much of it, but they all offered to help in any way they could.

I also will be teaching a single grade 3 class, which I think will be fun to mix it up. There is another Guest English Teacher at the school and he passed on his grade 3 knowledge to me.

I finished up my introduction lesson which I will be able to show for about a week because I have so many different classes (there's eight grade 5 classes and nine grade six's!). My coteacher said I was very good at computers ! Thank goodness my high school made us do a powerpoint presentaiton for every project ever - the skill has come in quite handy.

As promised, here are some pictures!

Oh my goodness how could I forget to discuss food. I had a cup of noodles for breakfast, and then had the school lunch. What was served? Rice, kimchi, soup, dried cuttlefish, weird cold omelette, and.. SPAGHETTI! What a lovely surprise. I was forced to eat the spaghetti at an excruciatingly slow pace due to my tools being chopsticks. The rest of the meal was really good too (except the weird cold omellete): the kimchi was much better than at orientation, and the cuttlefish was actually amazing. I didn't know it was cuttlefish until after I tried and enjoyed it. I totally thought it was a mushroom! There was so much food that I was unable to finish my plate out of fullness, and not distaste.

Finally, the weirdest thing to happen to me today: the previous tenant/teacher left behind some shampoo and conditioner. The shampoo is all in English, so much be an import. It says "violet shampoo to remove brassiness from blond hair." I thought "whatever, marketing gimick" but OH MY GOODNESS it was so horrifyingly purple and dark I fear my hair will be dyed purple. I am definitely buying some shampoo tomorrow.

Oh also the kids seem very cute. The brave ones said hi to me. The very brave ones asked my name and said I was pretty. I could totally get used to this.