My Blog

05.15.06; Last week was interesting. I unofficially joined the inline skate club and can go to the park near my house to meet with them any night of the week. They practice from 7-10 every weekday.

Monday TEACHER’S DAY… Today we have the day off. I was so happy, last week I was suppose to have Monday off but BeupSu had school. So I spent the day doing a puzzle in the comfort of my own home watching movies and relaxing. Now I think I should get some lessons done and say hi to everyone.

Yesterday I went to a soccer game in ChangWon. Gyung Nam FC, it was a lot of fun. I also found out last week that their clubhouse is in HamAn. Not only do they live in HamAn, they live near my house. I can walk by it when I go to the park! That is something, and there are a few foreign players on the team. Ji-Sun (my host sister) told me that we should try to get to know one of them and then she can find a guy!

When we went to the game, they had an offer with SamSung that you could sign up for a credit card with no opening fee and get a free ticket. Tickets are so expensive to begin with here at $8 for the best seat. Also got another discount with the LG telecom card (at least I think it was that one!).

Then we went to see a movie. He wanted to see Mission Impossible. While we were there I realized something that made me laugh. Koreans try to always get a discount. If you do not get the discount and you pay full price then you are considered an idiot. Now, let’s see how Johnson made out with the movie tickets. I hope I can remember all of the tricks he used.

First of all, 2 movie tickets should cost $13. Then there was the LG telecom card discount of $2 per card. We used both of our cards so that would be a $4 discount. Then he used 2 other cards, I am not sure exactly what they were but it got us 2 other discounts. And he had brought his id card from LG because that will get a $1 discount, but they stopped doing that. He was so annoyed at the company for taking away that discount, I thought he would curse them forever! He then gave them a gift certificate for $5 that his company had given them. Perhaps that is why he didn’t scream at the company that time… hehe. After all of the different cards and tricks, we ended up spending $3 on the tickets.  Yes, there was a $10 discount with all of the cards and tricks.

I must say though that with all of the discount cards, they will need some back surgery from all of the extra weight! He told me while we were drinking coffee and waiting for the movie to begin that if a Korean pays full price everyone else will think that he is an idiot.

I have not gotten into the discounting as others before me have, I will not mention any names but I know of one of my friends on here who has more cards than can fit into any card holder!!! And I am not talking about Johnson here. I do have an LG telecom card, a Trial card (the local supermarket), a GS Mart card (from when I lived in Busan) and that is it.

So now, I will get back to work on my lessons and hopefully finish them so I can enjoy the week and inline skate past the clubhouse every night in hopes of seeing the one Brazilian guy that is on the team and saying hello to him in Portuguese. It would actually be nice to hear Portuguese again. It has been a long time. Or even to see any of the foreign players and say hi. That is just a small obsession with me right now. Something to spice up life in the country and inspire me to get out and do my exercise.

05.03.06, Well, today I came to school with 5 classes on my schedule. The average class load would be 4-5 for native speakers here. Being that we have exams tomorrow I thought I would just check and make sure if I was going to teach or not. So I asked all of my teachers 1 by 1 and all of them told me that they will go and review for the mid-term. So 5 classes, now down to NONE!

I was so shocked, I just had to write. So I am at school now… luckily I have a computer this semester and so I can write messages and lesson plans here. The week is just getting better and better.

Still there is more!!! BEST OF ALL:

Friday I will be going to Busan for a short vacation. I will stay there Friday and Saturday with the other native speaker in HamAn. Ok, now for the great news… we will be staying on the beach. We will be VERY VERY close to it if not right on it. And this is not the busy season soooooo there will not be too many people there. It will just be nice to sit next to the beach and relax. We can also go around Busan and do some tourist things. It is going to be a weekend of heaven! I can’t wait, and I am scared that I will not want to come back here!

Ok, more later. Yesterday I didn’t get any work done while I was at school so I should do something!

Mary

05.01.06- Well, I’d like to say that something really exciting was new but as usual it is the same. Good news, there have been field trips, tests, and other things that have made my schedule a little less crazy. I have not had a full week in a long time. I don’t know what will happen to me when I actually have to teach all of the classes. So I am relaxing and enjoying it.

As for things here. HamAn is the "Peaceful City" that it always is. Just a note for you, HamAn actually translates to Peaceful City. I checked out the characters (Cheng An or City Peace literally)!

Today BeopSu (the smaller school) Middle School invited me to go out to dinner with them. It is really a nice feeling to be out with them as they are a very small school. Teachers always try to talk to me about something. It feels like a family. I drank some soju (Korean alcohol) with a teacher and now he wants to take me out to drink. He was impressed that everytime he had a shot, I also had one with him. Hmmm, hehehe. That is good.

This weekend I will go to Busan with another native speaker and we will have some fun there. I want to take her to a sports game, and Hyundae Beach, perhaps some sight seeing. It will be nice.

We can be invisible for a few days and walk outside of our house without 10 students coming to us saying "Hi, ___ teacher. How are you?" And we will be able to relax. Yes, here I am known as Mary Teacher. Usually they call us Mary Sun Seng Nim, which translates into English as Mary Teacher. So I am used to that name now because if they use the Korean I usually tell them that they should speak English with me. So, we compromised on using an English translation that sounds like Konglish!

Now I am at home. I should get some lessons done for classes but I wanted to say hi. I have done about 3 different lessons in the past 2 months! That is how many classes I missed. And we still have Buddha’s Birthday/Children’s Day, Teacher’s Day, and election day this month alone. There is also a sports festival day or two in there but I am not sure if it is this month or next month.

Oh yes, that reminds me. Monday is a vacation day for HamAn Middle School. Here in the country, students have to help their parents on the farm. So they will have 1 harvesting day and 1 day to plant. Monday is the day that the boys at HamAn Middle School must stay home and help their parents. Unfortunately, I have to go to BeopSu Middle School. However, that just means that I need to go to work at 11 instead of 8:30!!! Feel sorry for me?!

Ok, will write more soon, going to get another lesson finished so I can rest easily. Even though this week is mid-term week and that means that many teachers need to have more classes in order to catch up before the mid-term. Sadly for me that means that there are less classes that I have to teach!

Mary