final words

this morning, i woke up and thought to myself, “i don’t think i want to blog anymore.” so, i’ve made the decision to stop blogging.

this is my last entry on this here blog. in a couple of months, i’ll probably take this site down or make it inactive, or whatever wordpress permits me to do.

i’d like to say that this was a hard choice to make, but it wasn’t. it really was an impulsive decision.

for a long time i enjoyed blogging. and i still do on occasion. but lately, it’s become more of a chore than anything else. and so i think it’s time to move on.

for loyal followers (all ten of you), i apologize for this abrupt turn of events. i met some interesting people through this space, and i hope to keep in touch with some of you in other ways.

this blog mainly came about as a method of relaying information to my friends back at home. gradually, it became a little bit more than that.

anyway, it was fun. goodbye, and have a good one!

william

 

lost…and found

the three of us—penny, oliver, and myself—took a walk in waryong park monday evening. the sun had already set (no daylight savings time in korea), and the few who were in the park were just using it as a shortcut to get from one block to the next. it was nippy.

we were maybe twenty minutes into the walk (i try to make our evening walks a forty-minute affair) when i realized that penny had lost one of her shoes—one of the hind feet. why didn’t she say anything!? i immediately called the significant other:

“penny lost one of her shoes.”

“uh-oh. you have to find it.”

“it’s dark. and the shoe is black. all i see are leaves.” it is autumn. tons and tons of leaves.

“try.” a lot of help you are! my inner voice shouted.

we backtracked. we went through the area where i was pretty certain she had lost the shoe. several times. here was me, a grown man, walking this one section of the park in the dark with his two puppies. and one of the puppies is missing a shoe. embarrassing!

a set of these shoes is ₩15,000. that’s not cheap. i wanted to go to the pet store right away to replace the lost shoe. because i’m the type of person who shoves leftovers in his mouth when he doesn’t want to pack it in tupperware. if i don’t see the problem, then it doesn’t exist. another phone call:

“i can’t find it!”

“you have to try again tomorrow morning.”

“okay. if i don’t find it tomorrow morning, then i’ll buy another set…stupid dog!”

penny has always been my problem child—er, puppy. she’s independent and willful. like a cat. she also moves like a feline. but the bitch is smart. she did it on purpose! my inner voice concluded.

this morning, i walked the dogs (sans puppy shoes) earlier so that i could squeeze a few minutes before work to retrace the previous night’s steps. on the way home from our brisk walk, i found the black shoe. it was sitting on the road, presumably untouched since the cinderella moment, a block from my house. apparently, penny had lost the shoe a mere three minutes after our departure the night prior. how could i have missed it?

anyway, i’m glad to have found the shoe. it kind of made my day. kind of like, false alarm, you don’t have cancer.

it’s supposed to be chilly tomorrow morning, and i wouldn’t want them to go out barefoot.

 

sweet november

it has been a good weekend. i feel well-rested and re-energized. i’m looking forward to november, my favorite month of the year (for no other reason than the fact that my birthday’s in november). there are going to be two n0-school days in november: nov. 18th (korean SATs) and nov. 22nd (interview day for prospective students). my birthday is on the 16th, by the way (i share a birthday with olympic gold medalist oksana baiul). and the social network opens on the 18th; i kind of want to see it.

school is going to be crazy. our school’s final exams got moved up a week because they’re going to start remodeling the dormitory in early december. i know that that’s a shit reason to move exam dates, but ::shrug:: that’s what we do. for most of december, the students are arriving in the morning and leaving at night, like what students do in non-boarding high schools. it’s gonna be crazy. and because the exam dates got moved up (seriously, they announced this, like, two seconds ago), our english conversation classes’ project presentation dates have to be moved around. i’m gonna have to work some magic rescheduling these presentations. sigh.

anyway, i’m not worried. work will always be work. i’m feeling good right now because i had such a relaxing weekend.

on friday, i did the laundry and watched my shows.

on saturday, i received a package from home. my older sister sent me one dress shirt from express, three packages of goldfish crackers (one has already been devoured), and ten packages of dog treats. the dogs got more stuff than i did. i sit next to prairie in the teachers’ office, and it seems like she receives a box from home every week (or something like that). so it was nice to get something from home. see? i have loved ones, too!

at around one, we took the dogs to the vet for their heartworm medication. in the states, we would buy a year’s worth of heartworm pills and visit the vet once a year. penny and oliver’s vet suggested that we come in every month for their heartworm pills because then he can give them a quick check-up (for free). so that’s what we do now; i adore my puppies’ vet. we also let the vet know that we’re planning on getting them fixed very soon.

later that day, around five in the afternoon, my internet stopped working. i unplugged and plugged and restarted stuff again and again, but nothing seemed to help (and i know my way around computers). so i gave up. that night (at like, 11:30pm), the significant other called KT, talked to an actual person, and scheduled a service call for the next day (a sunday). i was like, right…

today (sunday) was a gorgeous day. picture perfect. no clouds in the sky. breezy, but not chilly. since i didn’t have the internet (it’s like living without oxygen), i finished jennifer 8. lee’s the fortune cookie chronicles (review to come). and then i cleaned my house for most of the morning so that the internet guy wouldn’t judge me.

around noon, we had lunch at an actual restaurant (i really needed that), and went to e-mart. there, i totally caved and bought a portable vacuum cleaner (for all the dog hair—it’s mainly oliver’s). it’s light, rechargeable, and pretty. i haven’t used it yet (it needs to be charged for ten hours). i can’t wait!

around four, the KT guy came. he fixed whatever he needed to fix in ten minutes or so. he tried to explain the problem to me in korean, and i was like, yeah, that’s not gonna happen. then he immediately tried to explain it to me in chinese (to my surprise), and did a passable job of it (some cable up on my roof got kinked…or something). i was impressed! in the end, he realized that i spoke english and left me with these parting words: “internet very high. your laptop, slow.” i nodded and smiled. yes, my dell inspiron is over five years old.

the cost of him coming to my house for the ‘repair’? nada. “this is korean service,” the significant other boasted. yeah, and on a sunday (halloween), too!

i took the dogs out for a long walk in the park, where we encountered an ajumma walking her long-haired bitch. she and i had a five-minute conversation about my dogs. i nodded and smiled for most of it, but i got some things in. we both disapproved of people who throw puppies away on the street. she suggested that i get my dogs body harnesses (as opposed to attaching the leashes on their collars). i said my puppies were probably related, but that i didn’t know for sure. she said that they didn’t look like brother and sister. anyway…

when i yell “kennel!” both dogs run into their respective crates. i’m actually doing a good job training them.

i had a good weekend. and tomorrow’s november. all of my gifted kids keep writing on my facebook wall. one of my favorite students (hah-young) got accepted into yonsei and thanked me for proofreading her college application essay. i have apples and green grapes in the fridge. gifted classes are over!

sorry for all the randomness, but i feel light today.

 

friday feelings

♦ the gifted classes are finally over! i truly adore this batch of super geniuses (they’re all my facebook friends!), but these three classes were draining. on tuesday we had a pizza party with the M and S classes. on wednesday we had a pizza party with the T class. the school paid for all of the food, so i am grateful for that. it is safe to assume that i won’t be eating pizza in the weeks to come; i’ve had my fill.

during these ‘reflections’ classes, i made the kids fill out a questionnaire just for me. i asked them four things: 1) what was your favorite and least favorite thing in my class? 2) what are my strong and weak points as a teacher? 3) which project assignment was your favorite? and 4) what are three things you would change about the class?

i got a variety of answers on all of the questions, except for question two. the majority of the students (47 of them) wrote that i was charismatic, and that i explained things clearly. several of them also mentioned that i managed the class well. those were my strong points. i had a lot of fun reading my weak points as a teacher. all of them agreed that i appeared to be cold, that i always looked serious, and that i was very strict. many of them admitted to being afraid of me. oh, and i never smiled. hilarious.

i’m going to miss these kids.

♦ it suddenly turned cold this past monday. i have a little cold, and my hands are extremely dry (it doesn’t help that i wash my hands, like, thirty times a day). i also did something bad to my lower back yesterday, so today was especially uncomfortable. this weekend is about rest and relaxation.

♦ i just watched the season finale of project runway. what a load of baloney. i mean, i understand why [spoiler alert!] gretchen won, but that means that mondo lost. and i am not okay with that. i get that mondo’s final collection was borderline over-the-top. i get that since they awarded seth aaron the prize (for using colors and prints) last year, that awarding mondo the crown this year would be repetitive. i get all that. but…whatevs.

♦ on wednesday, a group of french educators visited our school. they were doing a tour of some of korea’s educational institutes and our school was one of their stops. we were given short notice, and mr. seo and i (along with class 1-5) were basically putting on a show. when the french people walked into my classroom, i was intimidated. i don’t know how to explain it, but they were so french! they smelled great, they looked dapper, and they were kind of direct and in-your-face.

while the students were doing group work, i got to converse with some of them (in english, of course). they were really nice, and i suppose it was nice of them to drop by? it’s not every day our kids get the opportunity to interact with the french.

it wasn’t until after the visitors left that i noticed that class 1-5 had not read the chapters they were supposed to have read. and yet, while the visitors were circling around the classroom, the students appeared to be on task and pretended to know what they were doing! our kids are so used to being on display that they can turn on “good students” mode very quickly. like an “on” switch. it’s really funny to see them exaggerate their speech and feign excitement over the littlest of things. “oh! that is very interesting!” “look at that!” “i like what you’re saying!”

♦ halloween is not really celebrated in korea, so i will not be celebrating it this year. my co-worker prairie suggested that i go as tim gunn. i do a pretty good tim gunn impression. look pensive, rest my chin on my hand, and say, “i’m worried.” or “talk to me.” or “it looks like student work.”

 

dog sweaters

it rained all last night and most of today (sunday). when mother nature decided to stop PMSing all over daegu, i rushed the puppies out. my dogs hate the wet pavement so it was a struggle walking them. the forecast for tomorrow is sunny (yay!), but much colder than it has been so far this fall—low in the 40s, high in the 60s. the weather is a-changing.

yesterday afternoon, the significant other and i took penny and oliver to a nearby petstore in search of doggy sweaters and shoes. this one shop, small but stocked with a whole lotta stuff (it’s where i buy their dog food—artemis fresh mix), was having a sale on dog sweaters. we purchased a red hoodie for oliver (he pulls off red so well for a dog his age!) and a multicolored knit sweater for penny. they were ₩7,000 each.

we also got them shoes for when it gets super cold in the winter. they were expensive: ₩15,000 for a set of four. oliver’s shoes are purple, penny’s are black. the shop lady put the shoes on oliver for a fitting and the poor thing couldn’t walk properly; it was like forrest gump with those metal braces. i’ll have to make them wear the shoes in the house for a couple of days so that they get used to them. we’ll wait on that training session until mother nature decides to get frigid.

penny looking festive. my dogs are longer than they are tall, so it’s a little difficult finding outfits that fit properly.

oliver in the red hoodie. he’s so hip-hop.

does anyone want one of these mongrels? i am joking. they are all mine.

 

what are you doing the rest of your life?

north and south and east and west of your life?

great song.

recently, i have been thinking a lot about what i want to do (and i repeat) for the rest of my life. when i was in the states this past summer, there was this article that appeared in the new york times magazine, titled “what is it about 20-somethings?”, that caught the attention of my peers. i read it, read reactions to it, and i admit, the article kinda rubbed me the wrong way. the writer doesn’t say anything that’s particularly exaggerated or untrue about people in ‘my generation,’ but still, i didn’t enjoy being put in a box of any sort (i also didn’t like her writing style). and it made me feel like some sort of aimless bum for having taken a teaching job in korea.

i recently wrote about feeling (temporarily?) dissatisfied with korea. my thirtieth birthday is looming (korean age). this is my fifth year in korea, my third teaching at this high school. my friends in america are doing bigger and better things. my friend roshni bought a house. my friend michelle is getting her phD from stanford. my friend darney just got engaged. my friend chumkee came back from neutering dogs in nepal (she’s at tufts vetinerary school). my friend gina is touring with dana falconberry (indie singer). and this goes on…

me? i rescued two dogs off the streets. the significant other and i celebrated three years being together. my job is comfortable. my house is comfortable. i live comfortably. but lately, on the inside, i am uncomfortable.

my friend yumi (who was an elementary school teacher in california before coming to korea) recently started teaching at a department of defense school in one of the military bases in daegu, and she told me that i should get certified to be a teacher. she said, “you should totally get certified. i know you can do more. being a native english teacher…you’ve gotten as far as you can go with that job. there’s no future in it.” after mulling that over for a few days, i agreed.

at present, i am at a crossroads. the past four years have been great, don’t get me wrong. i value the experiences i had teaching at the middle school, and i continue to learn from my current job at the high school. i adore my gifted kids. and most importantly, i still want to go into work every morning.

i am now thinking: i can see myself doing this for the long haul.

the internet gave me information on how i can get myself certified to teach in the united states. there are several ways, and all of them scare me. while browsing through the options, i stumbled on a teaching fellowship web site. i was immediately attracted to the process. you get trained, you get placed at a school, you teach for a specified period of time, and you get your certification. this method attracted me for several reasons:

1) there appears to be a support system for fellows.

2) the next couple of years of your life are pretty much planned out.

3) there is a high possibility of being hired by the district (that you are placed in) at the end of the fellowship.

soliciting the help of my close friends was the next step. michelle said that if i didn’t want to go back to school (and i don’t) then a fellowship would be a good idea. she suggested boston teacher residency because, according to her, they give you a lot of support (and you also get a master’s degree in education from umass boston after three years). her advice came with two warnings: these fellowships are tough to get into, and the schools fellows get placed in are…well, you know.

my heart was set on boston teacher residency. forget the fact that 600 people apply every year and they only accept 75—i was going to boston! the next morning, i told the significant other, “get ready to move to boston.” all i got in response was a suspicious “okay.” boston is a big city. my friends roshni and elisha live there. massachusetts is kind of liberal. three years in boston—awesome.

and then i talked to ms. berner, my ninth grade pre-AP english teacher. she told me not to waste my time. and that a degree in education was pretty much worthless. she told me that i could study theory and stuff on my own. and that i would be teaching idiots and future prisoners. ms. berner is blunt and kind of an elitist. she encouraged me to get certified in texas via an alternative method: take some online courses, pass some tests, and boom! you’re a teacher (you get fully licensed after one year of teaching). she told me to get a master’s degree in the subject that i plan on teaching while i’m already teaching. and that i should think about teaching really smart kids because while they’re the ones who need good teachers, they’re the ones who frequently get overlooked by the education system.

i think ms. berner thinks that i already know how to teach and manage a classroom. and i do. in korea. now i haven’t been in a classroom in the states in a long time, but i’m pretty certain that being an educator in the states is a completely different thing than being a native english teacher in korea. i kind of want some theory and support and practice. but i don’t want to go back to school. so i’m still kind of leaning towards the fellowships. dive in and pray to buddha that i survive.

currently, i’m undecided. and this is sooooo not a good time to want to be a teacher in the united states. i was hoping to get some credentials, get some experience, build up my resume, and eventually move back to korea to teach on a base or an international school. that seems like a good plan, right?

anyway, i am signed with EPIK until next august. i have several months to think about this. i could change my mind. a lot of things can change. who knows what the future holds?

 

friday feelings

♦ it was a tiring week. last sunday, ms. park and her friend ms. jung (who i know from when i worked at dukwon middle school) took prairie, joe (prairie’s husband), shaun, and i to haeinsa (haein temple). the weather was gorgeous, and the scenery was stunning. the leaves on gayasan (mt. gaya) were just on the cusp of changing to fall colors. thus, there were many visitors there that day. it was nice. i did realize that i had visited haeinsa a couple of years ago with all the EPIK teachers in daegu; it was a mandatory get-together. apparently, at the time, i wasn’t aware that we were at haeinsa. now i know.

♦ monday came and went. as i mentioned last week, monday was “circus day” at taegu foreign language high school. we had over fifty teachers from all over daegu observing our ‘open’ classes. mr. seo and i did a lesson on the book stargirl, and it went very smoothly (thanks to class 1-5—the best class ever). we mostly got positive feedback.

♦ i had gifted classes on tuesday and wednesday. tuesday and wednesday were also festival days at my high school, so there was a lot going on those two days. my gifted kids presented their final projects, and the projects were very good. in short, each group had to tackle a controversial issue in korea, identify the cause(s), analyze the situation from various angles, and then reach a detailed solution. topics ranged from abortion to over-education to south korea’s relationship with north korea to the death penalty to plastic surgery…

i only had problems with one group, and it wasn’t because they did a bad project. these three kids (two girls, one boy) decided to have a complete meltdown right before class was supposed to start. members of the group yelled at each other in the hallway, accusations were made, tears started to flow…i was like, what the eff!? did i mention that it was an open class? meaning, all of their parents were present? at the time, i did my best to calm the kids down, but i wasn’t sure what the cause of the argument was. it wasn’t until much later that i found out that one boy and one of the girls started dating a couple of months ago, and they broke up, like, last week or something. ridiculous teenage fighting ensued. the boy left (with his mom) without presenting his project. so much drama.

they’re my gifted kids and i love them. however, i am sick of this class and i’m super happy that next week’s classes will be our last. we’re gonna have a big pizza party. i’m gonna say goodbye to them. they will go home. and i’m going to miss them.

♦ the puppies are 22 weeks old. this morning, oliver lifted one of his legs to pee. this is a sign that he’s a grown boy—no longer my little boy. it’s sad.

♦ i am going to sleep all weekend. i swear.

 

friday feelings

♦ it was a crazy work week. “circus day,” as i like to call it, is next monday. apparently, every high school is sending an english teacher to observe our open classes (mine included). middle school english teachers are invited, too. we’re expecting around 60 visitors. it’s a big deal, and the entire english department was busy preparing for the day. side note: no one is actually enjoying putting on this dog and pony show—we’re all following orders from above.

next tuesday~wednesday is the school festival. it’s going to be fun, i think. i believe shaun, another native english teacher, is participating in the pop song contest (i sang in it last year). all the school clubs will operate their own concession stands or booths in order to raise funds. i try to participate a lot to show my support for the kids.

next tuesday~wednesday are the second to last classes for the gifted classes. it’s an open class (parents will be in attendance), and the kids are presenting their final projects. i’m eager to see their presentations, but i’m more excited that this year’s gifted classes are coming to an end.

i have pretty much mentally checked out of this school year. just going through the motions now. this year needs to end already!

♦ on saturday the significant other and i are taking prairie (and her husband joe) out to dinner. it was her birthday this past tuesday, so it’s my gift to her. we are having samgyetang. the american chinese restaurants serve a dish called “treasure chicken” but the name fits samgyetang better, in my opinion. it’s basically a whole spring chicken that’s stuffed with glutinous rice and boiled in a broth of ginseng, jujubes, garlic, etc. it’s delicious (and healthy). can’t wait.

♦ on sunday, ms. park (my deskmate as well as prairie’s co-teacher) is taking the four of us (three native english teachers plus joe, prairie’s husband) to haeinsa, one of the three jewel temples of korea, and also the home of the tripitaka koreana. since she can’t fit all of us in her car, she asked a friend, ms. jung, to join us. i know ms. jung. she was in my teachers’ class 3 years ago when i was still teaching at dukwon middle school. i like her a lot. it’s supposed to be a beautiful day, so i’m looking forward to the hike.

♦ i just saw this video on youtube and it broke my heart.

last week, my high school english teacher (and academic decathlon coach) asked me to help one of her current students. he’s depressed and borderline suicidal and his parents aren’t really helping him. she thought me reaching out to him might help with his situation.

consequently, i’ve been revisiting memories of my high school days, and i must say that i lucked out with my friends, who supported me no matter what. i enjoyed high school for the most part, because of them. good friends are so important.

 

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friday feelings

♦ since the students took their mid-terms this past tuesday through friday, we (the native english teachers) ended up getting dismissed at around one. snaps for half work days. really. i came home, walked the dogs, and spent most days watching modern family again. cuz i need some humor in my life.

it’s back to a regular work schedule next week. oh well.

♦ recently, i’ve been feeling a bit angry with korea for various reasons, but that’s for another, longer post, which i shall write soon.

♦ i’ve been finding oliver’s teeth in random places in the house. the puppies are teething. they are 5 months old. yay!

♦ i just got an email from the daegu metropolitan office of education, and am supremely annoyed with the new e-2 visa regulations. the new regulations require us to do more stuff with our diplomas and criminal background checks. it’s kind of ridiculous.

♦ this morning (saturday—oops!) i woke up at around 8:20am. ten minutes later, construction started to happen right above me. it is loud and repetitive, and it’s scaring the puppies (they’re “napping” on my lap). it’s also a saturday morning. i believe they’re fixing a leaky pipe because for the past couple of days i’ve found an ever-growing water puddle right outside my front door. the drilling is the worst; it’s like someone is trying to drill into my brain. this has been going on for forty minutes. also kind of ridiculous.