Teacher, He's Crazy!

Let me tell you about Korean classroom discipline.


It’s Friday. Its still cold and icy in the middle of March. I can’t believe it, but I’m actually yearning for the rainy, mud puddle East Tennessee Marches that, although damp, were warm enough to wear sandals and shorts. I got all nostalgic for my flip flops--the ones that shot rain water dirt up the backs of my legs on my way to class last spring.

Now, on my way to a different kind of class, I try to avoid the iced over puddles sitting slick between the holes in the gravel, my winter boots not quite keeping my toes from feeling the cold. On my ways to class I have to dodge kids, ice, mud. Mud mud mud because our school is under construction and Seoul citizens don't understand the value of grass.

Fridays are bittersweet: I’ve got the weekend just around the corner (a sweet ass St. Patrick’s Day celebration in Itaewon where my friend Ian is making his DJ debut), but to get there I’ve got to teach five classes of fifth graders. On our way to class 5-6, Jenny (my co-teacher) reminds me that this class has the infamous ADHD kid lurking in its midst.



(Me, my friend Ian and some of his girlfriends at Roofers in Itaewon. It was a combined St. Patrick's Day Party and 6th month anniversary for those of us who arrived at the end of August.)

Now I’ve heard about this “ADHD” kid. The students say he’s crazy. The teachers pity and slightly fear him. They often talk about “the boy with the disease" who is supposedly taking his medicine to no effect.

I don’t know what the big deal’s about. I come from the good ole' land of the free-to-have-whatever-disease-you-want. It seems to me like every other kid in school had ADD or ADHD. Hell, we even knew the medicine names—Ritalin was fashionable in elementary school...sometime around late middle school Adderall became the new drug of choice. We knew that ADHD kids were just like us, if not a bit more fidgety, and simply needed an outlet for all their energy. They weren’t dumber than us. They weren’t crazy.



Jenny and I get to our classroom late in typical Korean-style fashion. This suits me just fine because every minute late is a minute less that I have to teach. We begin our lesson and it goes pretty well. I recognize some students from the fourth grade who were pretty high level and usually say hello to me in the hall. Our lessons are set up like this:

Introduction: Hello class./Hello Teacher….How are you?....How’s the weather?

Development: Introduce students to lesson material. Do the CD from the book which consists of dialogs and repetition exercises. Play a game.

We get to the game activity at the end of every class. This particular game required us to put the students in groups of four. Then each group was supposed to write down as many responses to “How are you?” in English that they could think of in a specified amount of time. Usually, this meant assigning one student to be the writer in each group. Having some students write while the others contributed orally served both the advanced kids and the lower level kids' interests. At the end, we would tally the scores on the board and give the winners a stamp in a chart at the back of the book.

So there’s one winner and six losers. We had just declared the winner and moved onto the next activity, when the ADHD boy began tearing up his partner’s papers and throwing them all over the ground. Several students turned around to watch. I stopped talking, thinking Jenny would discipline him. Jenny, however, tried to continue class. So it was like this: Jenny trying to teach up at the front of the classroom, drawing the students' attention to the tv screen, while the boy went on a silent tearing rampage in the back of the classroom. He tore up the girl’s worksheets and kicked her chair, shoved her and threw her pencils on the ground. I, apparently, could do little more than stand off to the side with my mouth open, looking as if I might do something. Finally I told Jenny “I think we should do something about that.”



She sighed and walked over to where the boy and girl were sitting. But instead of removing him from the classroom, Jenny took the girl from her seat and brought her over to the other side of the room where she stood awkwardly in the upper front corner.

ADHD boy began throwing the girl’s pencils, books, bag and jacket onto the floor. This made the girl, who was now the center of attention at the front of the classroom, begin to cry. Jenny, again, stood by the girl and wasn’t sure what to do. So I said, “Jenny, if you want to take him out of the classroom I’ll continue class on my own.”

Note: Us foreign teachers had no prior training on classroom management. When I asked questions about classroom management to veteran foreign teachers and SMOE administration, the general response I got was to “let the Korean teachers handle it.” It’s a weird time for Korean classroom management because physical punishment was just made illegal and there is no other system emerging to take its place. Furthermore, most teachers still use this form of punishment even though they’re not supposed to.



So anyway, by the time Jenny decided to follow my advice about the boy’s removal from the classroom, he had begun to hit other students around him. (By hit I mean hit in the chest and shoulders. Also, the students would grab his hands and they would push against each other as if in a test of strength). Some students were picking up the girl’s stuff and holding onto it to save it from the ADHD boy’s wrath. Higher level english language students were apologizing to me, saying “Sorry teacher, he’s crazy. I’m sorry you have to see this.”

After a while, it became apparent that Jenny was simply hovering around him. We had wasted a full twenty minutes of class time and our period was almost over. I managed to ask Jenny why she wasn’t removing him from the classroom. She replied “He’s too strong.” I was debating on whether or not I to just pick the boy up kicking and screaming and carry him out of the classroom, but I decided against it. I didn’t want his parents to accuse me of anything, and I didn’t feel like I could adequately defend myself (because of the language barrier) should his parents complain to the administration that I somehow acted with misconduct. I suggested that we call a male teacher to come in and help us with the boy, but Jenny replied that the homeroom teacher of this class would be back soon (like we were holding out, waiting for someone who could control him to come back).

Right around the time some of the boys from the classroom were getting up to help restrain the rogue boy, the homeroom teacher returned. She was about 5’5 and weighed 90 lbs. Jenny looked relieved. If the circumstances were different I would have laughed.

The homeroom teacher managed to drag the boy outside by grappling with him. She wrestled both arms under his arm pits and more or less hustled him into the hall. A couple of boys from the class helped clear the way (because all the children were up out of their seats by this point) and a couple more were helping her carry him out. Once they got out into the hall, several students rushed the door. I finally opened my mouth and told them all to sit down and close the door, but not before a few of them went out into the hall. Once we had finally gotten the class to settle down Jenny told me it was time for us to leave. So we left.

Outside in the hall, Jenny talked to the homeroom teacher who gave up her struggle and let go of ADHD boy. He immediately lumbered back into the room and started shoving students around. I told Jenny I’d meet her back at the office and got the eff outta there.



For me, that class period was hell because I felt that it was completely out of control. Later I learned that the general consensus was that his homeroom teacher was so skinny because the ADHD boy ran her ragged. (I saw her last year, she was just as much of a stick then as now). I felt like there were several things wrong with this situation and I will now list them:

1.“ADHD” is not a correct diagnosis, or at least it’s an incomplete diagnosis, for this boy's condition. ADHD is simply a term for diagnosing someone who has trouble paying attention and has excessive energy. Not someone who has targeted rage episodes at a peer for half an hour in the middle of class.

2.the reason this child is misdiagnosed probably has something to do with the fact that mental illness is not readily or openly discussed in Korea. Up until recently it was something one ignored or, if it was too big of a problem to be ignored, kept out of public site. This means there is probably insufficient research into mental health issues, especially issues pertaining specifically to the Korean population and the added cultural effects of Confucianism.

3.The home room teacher was obviously not equipped to deal with this boy’s classroom interruptions. The boy should have been assigned to a male home room teacher’s classroom.

4. There should have been a method set in place by the administration for dealing with this kind of situation or misbehavior. There was no recourse available to the homeroom teacher. She couln’t take the boy anywhere when he was interrupting class. There is no “taking you to the principal’s office” option in Korean Elementary Schools. The administration is above such duties. There is no detention room or even school officials to deal with this kind of severe misbehavior. In most cases, there is not even a classroom disciplinary code in effect. Teachers usually avoid discipline by instituting a merit system instead. Or they discipline on a case by case basis.

Now, I want to address why there is no set disciplinary code in the classrooms. I think one reason is that Koreans expect that the students will discipline each other. By this I mean that there is always an all important and dominating SHAME factor. Well-behaved students are expected to keep their not-so-well behaved friends and colleagues in line. And students, for the most part, do this because they are worried about how their class as a whole looks to the teacher, to outsiders, to their parents and to the administration. For example, in the situation above, the students kept apologizing to me over and over. They were worried about how this one boy made their class as a whole look. They tried to make him seem like a rogue figure, calling him ‘crazy boy.’ When he got out of hand, the 10 year old boys in class felt it was their duty to help their homeroom teacher by helping to manhandle the boy out the door.

There is one third grade class in particular where two boys sit up front kind of close to where I stand to teach. One of them is a good student and is usually quiet, but he’s friends with another boy who sits behind him. This boy likes to talk a lot while I’m talking and rock in his seat and do generally bad boy stuff. I know that all I have to do is look at that boy when he is turned around or talking and his friend in front of him will smack his desk and tell him to pay attention. I mean, crazy, right?

The crime rate in Korea is very low. The Koreans contribute this to the fact that there are no guns allowed in Korea. But I think it’s because of the SHAME factor. People don’t commit crimes because they are afraid that if they get caught, the shame brought on them and their family would be unbearable.

The suicide rate in Korea is very high. Young people, in the prime of their lives, often kill themselves during college or even high school exam week because they are afraid of failing their parents. There is a sort of urban legend story about students at a prestigious school in Seoul who got caught smoking cigarettes at their school and all jumped off a building. SHAME is potent stuff.


Here is my random list of the day:

1.The Yellow Dust came to Korea. It clouded out the sun and reminded me of the Matrix (remember that the future humans had to block out the sun so the machines couldn’t function anymore? But then the machines just used humans?) Anyway, all the Koreans stayed inside because they said it was super bad for your lungs and stuff. I didn’t notice anything except for the fact that the whole damn day (which was a Saturday wouldn’t you know?)was depressing as hell.

2.I have my first Korean test in like an hour! I’m so excited. I hope I pass. I studied a lot yesterday but didn’t study today because I wrote this post instead. Fail. I don’t have class next week but I’m not telling my school because I still wanna leave school early. (they gave me permission to leave early for Korean class)

3.I ordered my bride’s maid dress for lucie’s wedding!!!!!!!!!!





(Here are my choices for bride's maids dresses. which one do you think is better?)

4.I just got back from a third grade class. A boy was pestering a girl all period…flipping her the bird and calling her fat. Yong-eun simply kept yelling at him to turn back around in his seat and sit down, but didn’t draw attention to the fact that he was calling the girl names or anything. She bore up well under his constant torment and kept playing the game (usually kids who are being made fun of start crying or shut down and put their head on their desk). Ultimately, Yong-eun ended up using her rewards system to punish him. We have a chart in which we have each third grade class represented by their class number. The class numbers move up the chart according to how good they are. If they are bad, the class numbers fall. Right after this boy kept talking, she moved this class’s number down below all the others. Immediately the class fell silent and another boy began chastising the mean boy. On our way out, the kids (who usually say goodbye and get up to put their books away) was quiet, and the kids sat still as if waiting for us to leave.

5. I just bit into a rice cake and it spewed rice cake juice (???) all over my computer. The Rice cake was a present from someone to the teachers, not sure who.


6. For more information on ADHD, here is a helpful photodocumentary i stumbled upon:

http://www.webmd.com/add-adhd/slideshow-adhd-in-children

OhMiGod Korea

So I was leaving from Itaewon (the foreigner district) last week and I experienced the ultimate in Korean subway annoyances. Let me start from the beginning…

The trip started off okay. I had just left Neel and some others behind at the Wolfhound’s bar. On our way to the subway, Lisbeth and I spotted the holy grail of advertisements: a 20 ft banner advertising Taco Bell’s imminent return to South Korea (It had been here briefly and left after Taco Bell execs realized Koreans didn’t know what to do with on-the-go burritos and low grade meat tacos. Lisbeth and I were floored, and paused to take pictures and engage in what I like to call “foreigner-volume-level” exclamations.



Anyway, I got on the subway, rode the line 6 to my transfer at Dongmyo station, and broke into a Korean-style light jog in order to make my train on line 1 (which was sorta fun with my Wolfhound buzz). When I got there, however, I realized this train’s last station was Cheongyangni--the station right before mine. This happens to me about 40% of the time so I was willing to let this annoyance fizzle out a little even though it was late on a weeknight and I still had to hydrate and watch Gossip Girl before bed.

So I waited for the next rain in a semi-patient state. There’s an electronic board at most of the newer subway stations that shows if there are any trains at the two previous stops before the one you’re at. As the Cheongyangni train pulled away, another one popped up on the board.

While I waited, I occupied myself by trying to find the exact subway car door exit at Dongmyo that would open up at Hoegi by the escalators. This is very important, because if I’m in the right one—the car whose door opens right by the escalators---I can exit the subway train and jump right on the moving stairs without having to deal with Koreans cutting me off, or old Ajummahs disobeying the subway escalator etiquette and riding instead of walking up the left side of the steps.

Then, three things happen in quick succession:
The next train pulls into the station.
The loudspeaker announces that this is the train’s last stop.
I throw my head back and grumble at foreigner-volume-level.

Right around the time the third train rolls around (bound for a station past mine thank God), John Kennedy calls…my friend from TN, not the president. I haven’t talked to him in at least a month, and the first words he hears amidst the static and delay of our phone call are “Ohmigod Korea”…or something like that.



I board the third train (in what I hope is the ‘money’ subway car that will let me off at the magic exit). I have to stand up because there are no seats, but I don’t mind because I’m only four stops away and I’m talking to John Kennedy. We pull up to Cheongyangni, the stop right before mine, and everyone who had to get off of the previous train crowds onto ours. This makes the subway so crowded that there is barely standing room. Also, an old man gets on.

This man is not old old, just a little old. Old enough to get off work and get smashed at dinner on Soju and Malkali with his co-workers, or old enough to be newly forced to retire and bored with nothing to do except get smashed at dinner on Soju and Malkali with his other friends who have been forced to retire. Hell, who am I kidding? After you pass high school age in Korea everybody gets smashed at dinner on Soju and Malkali!

Anyway, this guy had had a bit more than the average Korean who usually just gets on the subway, swaying slightly, and smelling like he’d dumped a whole bottle of Soju on his pants by accident when the barbecue grill sputtered at dinner and he jumped, knocking the alcohol and a pound of kimchee and possibly garlic on his lap. This guy was leaning with his forehead against the doors, and, as the subway transferred from the underground track to the above-ground railroad tracks, he started holding his mouth with his hands, pinching his lips together.

As if this wasn’t enough, a girl was standing behind me pushing against my back, saying “Chamshinmanyon” (or at least, that’s how it sounds) which is something Koreans say when they want you to move or want you to wait on something. In this case, I think she wanted me to move. But my stop was the next stop, and, in any case, even if I had wanted to move there would have been nowhere to go. Nevertheless, the girl kept pushing and saying “Chamshinmanyon, Chamshinmanyon” to anyone who would listen…and people weren’t because everyone standing near the door was, get this, getting off at the next station. Can you imagine? Why would you stand by the door if you were getting off? That doesn’t make sense. If you’re getting off, wouldn’t you stand back in the middle and wait until right before your stop comes up, then start pushing on people’s backs saying “Chamshinmanyon” assuming that you’re the only person who wants to get off at this upcoming transfer station?

So there’s Chamshinmanyon girl pushing from behind me and the not-so-old guy about to puke all over the door everyone’s about to exit out of in front of me. Also there’s John on the phone listening to me bitch about everything.

When the train finally pulls into the station I see that I have grossly miscalculated the ‘money spot’ subway car and end up about five cars away from the escalators. But that doesn’t matter because Chamshinmanyon girl pushes me from behind as we get out so that I’m propelled forward at a speed that allows me to make up for the lost ground.

Finally I manage to get through the turn styles at Hoegi without falling victim to what I like to call the ‘Korean veering Phenomenon.”

Korean Veering Phenomenon: A phenomenon that occurs in Korea, especially in public places, in which Koreans utilize a sixth sense that allows them to detect when a foreigner is approaching them from behind at a pace quicker than the pace they are walking. This sense also allows them to detect the angle and direction from which they are approaching. Koreans often use this knowledge to veer gradually toward the right or left such that the foreigner runs out of space and can no longer pass them. You know KVP has occurred when you see a foreigner walking closely behind a Korean watching TV on their cell phone. (I myself experienced KVP the other day when I was trying to catch a subway train and had to round a corner to go down some steps. There was a large crowd of people coming up the steps in the opposite direction. There was just enough room between the wall and the crowd of people to squeeze around the corner and make it down the steps, but an old man (ajoshi) came out of nowhere and KVPed me into the wall. I ended up sort of side shuffling along with my arms spread wide until I made it around the corner and was able to run down the stairs)



That night after dinner in Itaewon, the missed subway cars, the almost-puking guy, and the Chamshinmanyon girl, I managed to make it out of the turn styles at Hoegi station without falling victim to KVP. Usually after this, I’m home free. All I have to do is walk a straight line the twenty feet or so out the door.

So remember, I was talking on the phone to John K., walking my straight line, when a small girl/woman runs into my left shoulder. Her head’s down. I can’t see her face. She makes no move to go around me. I think, “if I keep walking in a straight line and this girl keeps moving forward in her own direction, she will come unstuck from me and go on her way.” Because that’s what we were: stuck. It’s like she wasn’t a human but some sort of rag doll programmed to walk a certain way and then the programmer died and forgot to do give her a brain. (okay that’s harsh, but still).

I keep walking forward, and she sort of let’s herself be carried along with me. Her head’s on my shoulder and we kind of walk together for three or four steps. Then her boyfriend (I guess) swoops in and kind of ushers her away, saying something I assume was an apology.

Hey kids, its just another day in Korea. An especially bad one, and one that can be avoided if you avoid the subway, but a normal day nonetheless.

I had other stuff to tell you guys besides this story, but I got so bogged down by everything I forgot.

Here’s a list of things random happenings:

1.A 3rd grader stood up in class and asked “May I speak Korean now?”

2.There is a character in our 3rd grade textbook named “Lisa” who is an African American cartoon girl with dread locks. In the CD rom accompaniment to the book, however, the actress that plays “Lisa” is Indian (from India).

3.I guess I’ve been sleeping weird lately. When I stood up to go to the bathroom the other night I immediately dropped to the floor because my foot was asleep. Weird.

Thank God my co-teacher is a capable human being.

Thank God my co-teacher is a capable human being.

We’re a new team, her and I, and I was anxious about how well we’d work together. We do fifth grade, nine classes, at the end of every week. She’s new to the school, she’s young, and I didn’t have high expectations because when we planned out our lesson together she seemed to follow pretty close to the lesson plan recommended in the book-- which tends to be a bit dry and suggests games for students that are unrealistic because either the students’ level isn’t high enough or because they are not well behaved enough to handle the relaxed classroom atmosphere the game requires. Plus, her previous position as a teacher in Nowon probably meant that she taught higher level students who were probably relatively well behaved.

Side note: In order to understand the different levels of students one may encounter in the Seoul school system you must have the following background information: Most of the higher education level/higher economic level students that go to our Elementary School move to Nowon in middle school to get a better public school education because there is more money flowing into the school system there. This phenomenon happens all over the city even though the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education requires teachers and administration to rotate randomly to a new school every five years to help keep education levels equal. The discrepancies in quality of education probably happen because of the different levels of income. Higher income areas send their kids to expensive after school academies, have higher parent involvement in school activities and I suppose have more money in their budgets for classroom equipment. When you ask someone in Seoul where the ‘bad’ areas of the city are, they will tell you areas in which the education is poorer because, let’s face it, there is really no unsafe areas in this city.)

Needless to say, I felt that my new co-teacher had had the life up in Nowon and was dreadfully unprepared for the roughness of our student population. But The Powers That Be must have felt I deserved a break because she blew me away.

She had behavioral chants for them to say when they began to act up. She had them bow hello and goodbye. She had them make nametags with their English names on them and display them on their desks. In short, she was MegaTeacher.

Fifth grade went by swimmingly, and I felt myself beginning to enjoy getting to know them.

Here are some more random happenings:

1.The third graders absolutely hated the names Rose and Sam. Sam means “fountain” in Korean. I’m not sure why they didn’t like Rose, but one girl begged me to change her name. She even took the time to think through an English plea: “Please teacher, I don’t like this name.” When I took up the nametag, she put it in my hand and said “I don’t like this!” It was like I was calling her Crap or Butthead.

2.When I asked the fifth graders to name any states they knew, I got the following responses: Guam, L.A., Miami, Mexico, London

3.My Co-teacher kept telling the kids that San Fransisco was a state.

4.I took my first Korean class yesterday. It was taught completely in Korean by a rather attractive Korean man. He had a doll made up of two pandas connected by a string. When you pulled them apart, they made cute noises and a little song played. He used this doll to demonstrate something or other. The funny part is, he thought the panda dolls were the cutest/funniest/most entertaining thing. He kept pulling them apart and laughing even though to us (a class full of westerners…Germans, French, Egyptian, American, etc.) it was only slightly funny the first time. The entertaining effect the Korean teacher was going for worked, however, because we thought his fascination with the pandas was funny.

5.Andrew Dillon broke his wrist snow boarding a couple of weeks ago. Since then, he has decided to continue working out one side of his body.



(Andrew Dillon making the "L" for loser sign. He claims he was scratching his eyebrow in contemplation.)

Respectful Barriers

Let me tell you about something that happened to me this morning.

To begin, I was told that today I’d only have to teach two out of four classes because the kids were having class elections (a couple of days ago they all marched around the school with signs and posters and chants…). So last night I decided to celebrate with a couple of G&Ts and some beer with dinner—Lisbeth left my apartment saying “when I turn my head like this you have four eyes”.



(Neel and I eating Galbi (Korean BBQ), one of our favorite meals in Seoul)

When I get to school, I find out we have to teach all the classes. The reason for this is that the homeroom teachers can choose to hold class elections during different time periods than the officially scheduled ones. Their incentive to do this is that they want the kids to have English class because when they have English class the homeroom teacher gets to leave the classroom and take a break. So they call up the English teachers and “ask” them to come in and teach English that day. I put on all my best powers of persuasion and told my co-teacher, Yong-eun, that I thought that was kind of mean. She managed to get us out of one class but the other one was taught by a male teacher who was in charge of overseeing her duties as coordinator of after school classes.

This is third period. So right before we’re supposed to go to class, Yong-eun tells me she has a meeting to go to, and she’ll meet me up there. When I get up there, the kids are in full swing craziness, screaming “hello teacher” as soon as I get in the room, up out of the seats, drawing on the board, etc. Yong-eun tells me she has to go back to the meeting because it started late and was taking longer than expected and could I please entertain the students until she got back? Here are some things you should know before I continue the story:

1.This class is a third grade class. Third grade is the first year students are officially introduced to English.

2.This is the first English lesson this class has ever had.

3.I’ve never taught a third grade class by myself.

4.The homeroom teacher of this class is male. As a general rule, classes taught by male teachers are usually not as well behaved.



Needless to say, I had a very hard time entertaining them for the thirty minutes she was gone. I searched for “funny animal videos” on youtube and put them up on the screen. Kids asked to go to the bathroom and I had to tell them know by forming an “x” with my hands and leading them back to their seats. It was a night mare.

This whole situation makes me upset not because I feel as if my co-teacher left me in the lurch, but because of the reasons behind why she had to go to the meeting.

She was meeting with her after school committee of teachers because, on top of her responsibilities as an English teacher, she’s also in charge of after school classes (which she doesn’t teach). Her committee consists of her, a head teacher (the homeroom teacher of the class I was currently suffering in) the vice principal and another sixth grade homeroom teacher that was assigned to help Yong-eun. There are several reasons why this meeting was ridiculous:

1.The meeting had to be held in the third period, a time when Yongeun had class. We had just had an hour break before that in which she could have had the meeting; however, the meeting was probably arbitrarily set up by the vice principal and to have it changed at the last minute would have been seen as disrespectful to the VP. Lame.

2.The meeting took longer than expected because the sixth grade homeroom teacher that was supposed to help Yongeun dared to complain about her added workload. This was unforeseen because no one is ever supposed to complain or have negative feedback about anything except the administration. The Vice Principal was angry about her disrespectfulness. Yongeun was mad about the sixth grade teacher not taking her share of the work. The head teacher was mad because the VP’s solution was to assign the head teacher more of the work.

Now, the sixth grade teacher is new to the school, which puts her at the bottom of the totem pole which is why she was assigned to sixth grade (the worst grade) and to extra after school program work. BUT, she is also an older lady, which earns her some respect and is probably why she felt she could talk back to the VP.

The head teacher is male which automatically puts him at the top of the totem pole. Also, head teachers and positions of higher authority generally have less responsibility than their underlings.

This leaves poor Yong-eun at the bottom of the totem pole, overseeing a program that she has no concern for and no experience with just because she’s young and female and, therefore, least likely to argue.

Also, this leaves poor me, overseeing a third grade class that does not have the slightest idea what I’m trying to tell them and whose first experience of English class is funny animal videos and poor classroom management.

There is one more thing I want to cover. In general, the number of male teachers in elementary schools is much lower than female teachers; however, they almost always occupy a position of authority. Principals are almost always male and VPs are like seventy percent male. Male teachers are usually head teachers of their grades or programs (like the after school one). Our current English head teacher is a male home room teacher who doesn’t speak a word of English. Further, most of the time classes that have male homeroom teachers generally tend to be less well behaved. The men don’t concentrate on their classes or teaching, rather they try to scale the administrative ladder. There are exceptions, of course. One male teacher in particular I like really well. He’s a good teacher and his classes both respect him and like him.

To conclude, here is a list of random happenings I thought you might find amusing:

1.Instead of trying to separate the fish meat from the bone, I have resigned myself to eating fish bones during school lunches.

2.When my third graders got their English names, most of them liked the names “Jennie, Abby, Hannah and Lisa” They didn’t like “Jade or Patrick”

3.I wanted someone to be named Bob, but in Korean it translates to “bap” which is the Korean word for “rice.” Yongeun said no one would go for that.

4.Today the kids followed me all the way down the hall saying “goodbye” and waving.

5.I had to sprint yesterday to make my bus home. When I finally got on the bus, the bus driver made some exclamatory comments which I didn’t understand, and when I didn’t respond, kept saying them louder and louder until I just ducked my head and pretended to text someone on the phone.

Afternoon in a Haze

OMG. So I’m updating my blogs now in Word and transferring the whole thing over to Blogger because I don’t trust my school computer. Here are a few reasons why:

1.I am unable to select and hold a desktop background. Everytime I try to put a picture up or a nice rustic country scene the whole thing goes black within the hour. The school computer guy thinks I’m Goth or computer-retarded or something because whenever he comes in to look at something on my computer he sets a new pic for the background and tells my co-teacher, who informs me, that I can change the background if I want. It takes all my self control not to laugh helplessly in his face.


2.Explorer will only sometimes run certain websites like Facebook or blogger. Depending on the day I think. On Mondays Wednesdays and Fridays it will operate them with great efficiency. On Tuesdays and Thursdays it will refuse to operate the websites at all, and send me an “error” message instead. Every week day Mozilla will run everything slowly and laboriously, sometimes causing me to force quit the application.

3.My computer takes a good 3-5 minutes to start up every morning. The screen is black. When my co-teachers see this they come over and start clicking the mouse furiously as if this is the first time my computer is slow in getting started. I try to explain the fact that this is normal routine computer procedure and we just have to wait it out. I’m still not sure whether they just don’t understand me or they too think I’m computer retarded. The thing about Korea is, “do first, ask questions later.” (Click furiously, take time to dissect the foreign teacher’s ramblings later.) Another thing you could say about Korea is that the population as a whole (from what I’ve seen) has a much lower understanding of computer operating systems. For example, my co teachers frequently yank out my USB without properly ejecting it, causing me to cringe and ask if they could eject it next time. To which they nod agreeably, and then replicate the action next time. (What’s the foreign teacher saying again? Eh, whatever.)

4.There is a message that appears every so often that tells me there is a possibility I’m running a counterfeit copy of Windows and would I like to be a good PC user and purchase a real copy? I think this is where most of my problems stem. It seems that in their efforts to acquire an English operating system for my computer, they somehow acquired a copy instead of the real thing. The computer guy must have then unknowingly ran a system update which detected the fraud and injected the ‘EFF you illegal software user’ package onto my computer. Usually, I’m okay with this minor annoyance. But when my desktop disappears on my computer and all I’m left with is the current open windows I’m working out of, I get frustrated. I try to amp up my efforts to explain things to the computer guy. So far, I think he just thinks I’m a moron.

So now that you know the conditions I’m working under, I’ll begin with a somewhat quick update on my life.

School has now begun again in full swing. I had five classes today, three in the morning and two after lunch. Luckily, they’re all third graders. On Thursday and Friday I’ve got fifth and I have no idea how I’ll make it through the day. I have to give so much energy to speak and hold class attention for five hours. I’m dead tired now.

I hate this feeling because it hinders what I can accomplish outside of school. I’ve always got big plans post-school like working out, having dinner with friends, finally cleaning my bathroom. But I usually end up watching arrested development and making a sandwich, going to sleep and starting the whole thing all over again. NO wonder people hate working.

I’ve also started on a short story, and I hope I can keep working on that. Like I said earlier, I applied to MFA programs but I’m afraid I won’t get accepted to any schools and, as an effect, be discouraged in my quest to become a quality writer.

To conclude, here is a list of notable questions my third graders asked me today when I was introducing myself.

-Do you kiss your boyfriend?
-What is your blood type?
-How is it possible for your American mom to marry your Korean dad?
-How old is your dog? How old is that cat?
-The cat is big. (referring to Gary)
-Do they have computers in America?
-Do you know where Washington is?
-Are you married?
-Do you know Spongebob?
-What is your phone number?

Cultural Paradox

All the teachers just got a gift of luxury bath towels from the parents as a way to welcome the new principal. Whatever that means.

The gift was wrapped and each of us got one, but not a single teacher made a move to unwrap it. I was hoping we scored some chocolate or warm squishy rice cake, although the wrapping smelled like newspaper. I hesitated between mouse clicks and type strokes, my hunger ultimately trumping my concern for possibly committing a social faux pas.

The reason I’m telling you this is because my hesitation, that concern that I may be looked upon as weird or different--even more so than I already am in my status as a foreigner--, got me thinking about Koran social norms. I’ve drawn some conclusions that may be over simplified and grossly incorrect, but that I’m going to tell you about anyway because they’re entertaining.

Of course, as always, I will attempt to put these conclusions in list form for a more easily digestible reading experience.

But first I must preface the list with this: there is a contradiction in Korean society that drives me crazy. While Koreans are constantly concerned with the idea of a collective society, one that holds individuals in check and responsible for their actions through shame and social obligation (thereby requiring Koreans to constantly acknowledge each other in public), they also practice the weird and hard-to-adapt-to custom of pretending that strangers don’t really exist such that they can ignore strangers in certain situations. This will be easier to understand in the following list.

(My cousin, her friends, Andrew and I in Wonju Province at the Modugal festival)

Some social standards in Korean society:

1. Respect and make exceptions for the elderly and children.

(I almost labeled this “Respect and make exceptions for the weaker members of society” but this rule doesn’t apply to physically disabled people.) People observe this rule in America as well; however, the difference between the Korean and American perspective on this rule is that it is less of a rule in America and more of a moral or ethical decision. For example, in Korean society, it is almost required of a younger person to give up his or her seat on a bus or subway to an elderly person or children. This sounds like a small thing, but in the reality of everyday transportation in Seoul it gets to be a somewhat major sacrifice. Further, when you do give up your seat, there is rarely a ‘thank you’ but rather a dismissive wave that seems to indicate that your action was expected. The elderly come and stand by young people’s seats on purpose, and if you don’t yield immediately, impose a strategy of staring at you until you do. Young people have developed a defense against this social abuse: they watch TV on their cell phones or pretend like they’re asleep.

Other privileges children and the elderly enjoy include cutting line at subways, buses and bathrooms, blatant staring at people or things they find interesting, yelling or shouting in public places, physically fighting in public places. The elderly must also be spoken to in the polite Korean form at all times.


2. Dress nicely and appropriately when in public places or around people who aren’t family.

Koreans must always put effort into the appearance, or at least look like they do. Men and women frequently get hair cuts (at salons for like ten bucks). Both men and women style their hair and women rarely wear it casually pulled back. Most Koreans, like the numerous k-pop groups, follow a style or trend whether it be the newest western fashions, punk, androgynous, etc. High heels are extremely common. Women don’t wear hats in the long winter months of below-freezing temperatures because they don’t want to mess up their hair and make up. In the summer, women keep their shoulders and chest covered even in the heat to avoid being inappropriate. Going out in sweat pants or flip flops is hard because people stare at you. Its like…at least this is how I feel…that its your obligation to look nice because you’re representing Koreans. I mean, this may not be true everywhere in Korea, but I definitely feel like its true in Seoul.

I know my cousin won’t mind me using her as an example. We were getting our photos taken at a studio in Insadong, and they pulled our hair back tight in a bun for the photos. When we finished, there was a huge crease in our hair. I put my hair back, but she was worried about going out into the city and being seen. She said, “I’m acting like a typical Korean girl.”

3. Do not get loud or overly personal in public places

This rule means maintaining a relatively low sound level in bars, restaurants, subways, buses, streets, work place, etc. My co teachers and I leave our office to talk on the cell phone. Groups of westerners I have been with have been asked to be quiet or leave in many bars and public transportation places. PDA, cursing, and inappropriate talk is also frowned upon, and if heard by the elderly or middle aged, women may earn you some harsh stares.

The point of this list is to show that these social norms are stricter than American social norms because the public holds you more accountable. This is usually done through stares, but can sometimes escalate to someone telling you to be quiet or stop doing what you’re doing. It is not unusual to see an old man or woman yelling at a younger Korean for some crime no one saw committed.

(My friend Vivian and I in the subway in Winter. Lisbeth is talking to a stranger!)

Examples of the “Stranger” Rule

As I said earlier, even though Koreans hold each other responsible for their actions in public and feel like they are constantly representing Korean society and must, therefore, abide by certain rules and standards, they also treat strangers (in other situations) like they don’t exist.

1. You do not exist on the street

When I arrived here, one of the first things I noticed when I went out into the city was that people run into you. Of course, this happens in crowded cities. But in Seoul, it happens often, and without apology. People usually don’t alter their paths one iota to accommodate yours, and I often wonder what would happen if I didn’t move…would we just run into each other? Sometimes I try to do it, go against all my western instincts and just run into people (the way Andrew does when he gets really mad). I can’t help but swerve at the last minute and usually end up nicking people in the shoulders. The Koreans don’t look at you though, they just keep walking. They small Korean girls usually get knocked pretty hard and sometimes they let out a whine, but most of the time they bear up and keep balanced on their high heels.

Koreans walk and watch TV on their cell phones, they walk with their head down, they poke you in the eye with umbrellas, they fall asleep on you on the subway (literally head on your shoulder)…You can even see this kind of thinking while driving. People cut each other off and race to beat the bus, and try pass each other in the other lane at the last minute even though the traffic begins to pick up in their lane…But the Koreans never get traffic rage. They just accept it, maybe act surprised that they almost died, and keep driving.

2. You aren’t a viable option as a boyfriend/girlfriend unless you’ve been formally introduced

Aside from a few special circumstances, most Koreans meet their significant others through a ‘blind date’ or a ‘meeting.’ A blind date is pretty self-explanatory…a mutual friend introduces you and you go on a date. A meeting is what happens with a group of evenly matched people (even number of boys and girls) gets together to go out for dinner/drinks whatever. Most of the time, except for the boy and girl who brought the group together in the first place, the boys and girls don’t know each other. They play ice breaker games to loosen the ice such as “Image Game” in which a person says a statement (like who is most likely to get plastic surgery) and everyone points their chopstick at who they think the statement applies to/.

One time I was at a bar and the group of friends I was with (westerners, two boys and two girls including me) sat down with a group of two Korean girls and one korean boy who invited us (maybe because our groups almost matched?) The K-boy promptly asked the two western boys I was with which girl he thought was the prettiest.

There are some ways girls and boys who don’t know each other interact in Seoul. For example, night clubs in Seoul are places in which girls are pulled away from the tables they’re sitting at or the groups there with and made to sit with a different group of boys at the club. From there they can go back to their original table or they can stay to talk to the new boys. Also, dance clubs are another place where social barriers are more lax. Guys are usually very aggressive with girls on the dance floor, usually more aggressive with girls they don’t know, and this interaction sometimes results in friendship or hookups.

3. If you fall they will not help.

Unless you’re old or a child, if you fall or do something embarrassing in public, the general population will pretend it didn’t happen. As mentioned in a previous post, I was walking on the street looking around at the city and ran head-first into a steel sign. The guy in front of me turned around to see what happened, saw, and quickly turned his head forward again without breaking stride. I’ve seen other Koreans fall on the steps or in the street, I myself have eaten it in the subway or on the icy winter Seoul streets, the result is always the same.

Westerners are always the exception to the rules. If a Korean can tell you’re foreign, they don’t hold you to the same standards or expect you to follow the rules. But for me, its harder because unless I’m talking on the phone or with a friend, Koreans assume I’m Korean, and if I break a rule, they look at me as if I should know better.

I didn’t really mean for this post to sound so negative. It started off as an observation of a weird paradox I observed in Korean culture and evolved into a sort of rant. I guess it reflects some of my personal frustrations with living here; however, I have to note that I have come to appreciate Korean culture. It helps conserve your energy somewhat to not have to interact with strangers all the time. I like dressing up to go out into the city. I want to try out the night club experience. Its nice to live in for a while, but I fear that my western instincts and upbringing have ruined me for permanent living here. What do you guys think??

Back to School Again.

Disclaimer: I already tried to update this once, so if I’m a bit short bear with me.

It’s the same cracked walls and cold office, kids cutting me off on the steps and dust in the hallways from construction seeping through the temporary ply board walls that line the back of the school. But everything’s different. Teachers are moving about the room, introducing themselves and helping each other figure out the school’s messaging system. An older homeroom teacher came to the subject room, arms full of office supplies and a chair cushion, looking around for a desk. A vice principal came and led her away.

I have a new co-teacher who is now my ‘monitor.’ Her name is Jenny (or Julie?) and we now teach 9 hours of fifth grade classes together a week.

I came to school this morning with the absurd hope that I would get to teach third and fourth graders with my secondary co-teacher Yong-eun. Mijung (my former fifth grade co teacher) would remain my ‘monitor’ or main co-teacher and things would remain relatively unchanged except for the added perk of only teaching young, perfectly behaved 8-10 yr olds.

In reality, I teach 14hours of third grade and 9 hours of fifth grade a week. I have to establish a new relationship with Jenny not only for classroom and teaching purposes but also for personal reasons. I was just becoming comfortable with Mijung. I knew that she would never question a sick day, I could text her without actually having to call her, the best way to get what I wanted with her was to be open and frank with her and talk about everything. When that didn’t work, I could complain to Yong Eun who would talk to Mijung until Mijung felt guilty and tried to do more. I felt pretty sure that Mijung had my best interests at heart and mainly struggled with the contradictory directions that my needs and the administrations’ demands took. Now, I have no idea who this Jenny person is or how she works. She doesn’t even know the Can Do Kids’ song for Christ’s sake.

All of that would be tolerable if it weren’t for the fact that I have to confront my new co teacher about the number of hours I’m teaching. In our contract is says we teach a total of 22 hours per week. If total number of teaching hours exceeds that number I am due overtime pay. I’m pretty sure my new 23 hour a week schedule isn’t including overtime pay with it. I guess I’ll have to dust off the ole contract and refer to SMOE world.com for what course of action to take.

SMOE world is the closest thing we have to a union. It’s a website consisting of SMOE vets who dole out advice and complaints. You have to have a password. You have to pass inspection to join. It’s pretty serious.

In other news, I’m anxiously awaiting news from graduate schools and my future in the United States. I got accepted to UT law and offered a full tuition scholarship. I also got waitlisted at Vanderbilt for the MFA program there. Out of hundreds of applications they accepted three and waitlisted seven. That puts me in like the top two percent! Even if I don’t get accepted into a program, I at least gained some confidence in myself as a writer. People whose job it is to distinguish between potentially good writing and bad writing think my writing may be worth something…

I’m updating mainly because Will Hale lectured me on the values, both externally and internally, of blog updates. Him and T-rav skyped me not too long ago while drinking at Will’s apartment. I miss you guys terribly. I wish I was there to celebrate the UT victory over KY in basketball with you, eat a Moo Moo Mr. Cow at Moe’s, work for twenty percet tips at Tomo, workout at the T-recs, watch adult swim, sleep with Eli on the futon, and, most of all, take whiskey shots in the kitchen. I love you guys!