I have a male student in my adult Tuesday/Thursday classes that wears the tightest pants I've ever seen. What is it about Korean man/boys wearing uber-tight clothes? I think he literally has to pour himself into his pants. Leaves absolutely nothing to the imagination. Unfortunately.
About every 20 minutes he will stand up from his chair and lean over the table where we all sit. The first time he did this I just looked at him and asked him if he was ok. He looked back at me, smiled sheepishly and said, "legs asleep."
His legs and feet actually fall asleep when he sits down because his ridiculous pants are too tight.
Korean men spend SO MUCH TIME on their appearance. They wear super tight pants and shiny suits. The suits are what get me. I think they could double as aluminum foil with all the shinyness in them and they may possibly be radioactive. And the color coordination of their attire leaves me in awe.
I wonder how much time it takes them to get ready in the morning? Also, is there some sort of medical problem that may result from wearing their pants too tight? I have heard the population has been decreasing in Korea lately. Perhaps the researchers should look into the paint-on pants?
Saturday, May 29, 2010
Monday, May 24, 2010
Dangjin's 8th Annual Juldarigi (Tug of War) Festival
I was invited by some of my adult students to attend the Tug of War Festival (Juldarigi) in Dangjin. Many other foreign English teachers were also attending the festival and my friend, Jack, asked a bunch of us to go as well.
I'd made plans to meet with my students on Saturday morning so we could all go to the festival together. We met up outside Talking Club and I brought my friends Bennie and Ducky, too. It was gray and rainy, which completely bummed me out.
When we got to the festival, only about a 10-minute drive, I felt like I was in the opening parade of a circus act. Everyone stopped to stare at us and point and chatter and take our picture. One high school-aged girl asked me in best-rehearsed English if she could get a picture taken with me. (Note to self: Dye your blond hair brown STAT!)
She wanted me to bow my arm over my head in a 1/2 heart while she did the same. Koreans are big on making hearts with their arms for some reason.
We walked through the main gate of the festival, which took a ridiculous amount of time because everyone was stopping us and staring at us.
My Korean students wanted us to stop and try everything. So we attempted to do this jumping see-saw apparatus and us whities completely sucked at it, but everybody had fun watching us try and we had fun looking like complete morons in the attempt.
Next we walked through the artisan area and there was a potter throwing a pot. One of my students turned to me and asked, "You know Demmmi and Patrick Swayze? Movie Ghost? Sexy!" Ummm, yeah. I'm well aware of the movie and the "Sexy time."
There was also tons of food stalls and scarves and clay plates.
We came to a huge wooden table with a gooey paste spread on the surface of the table. There was a man pounding the paste with a huge wooden mallet. The paste turned out to be rice paste (you don't say? something made of rice....?) A group of old men pointed at me and handed me the mallet, which was a helluva lot heavier than it looked.
I swung it over my head as best as I could and nearly missed the table altogether. I tried again and hit the paste right in the center, sending it oozing to the sides of the table. All the old guys cheered and shouted, "So strong!" Gaaawd, just what a nearly 6-foot tall girl wants to hear. I was slightly embarrassed and tried to pass the mallet off, but the old guys said, "One more, one more." So I obliged and managed to whack the paste again before handing the mallet off to the next Waygook.
One of my adult students turned to me and said, "Rice paste, can eat, but taste is terrible," then she scrunched up her face in a disgusted look to hammer the point home that the rice paste tastes like crap.
We walked a little further and came to an archery exhibit where an old man was giving us pointers (in Korean) on how to shoot the arrow correctly. He kept grabbing our hand that was holding the bow and twisting it back in an unnatural position and repeating the same words over and over in Korean. I have no idea what he was on about.
We finally made it into the area where the rope was being kept until the start of the actual Tug of War began. The rope was massive and made in two seperate pieces. Each piece weighed 4 tons and had to be dragged for about 3 or 4 miles by hundreds of people. There were two teams; the orange team and the green team, which most of my friends and I were on.
One-half of the rope was said to signify the female and the other was said to signify the male. When the two pieces got together it was supposed to signify sex. It's so strange because there are countless times since I've arrived in Korea where I've heard about everyday products and produce being good for stamina, vitality and virility. Everything is based around sex, yet sex is such a taboo subject in Korea and it's almost never discussed in the open or in conversation. Korea is such a place of contradictions.
Anyway, so I eventually meet up with my other friends at the festival and everyone is well on their way to becoming three sheets to the wind. It's about 11 in the morning. It's going to be a messy day.
I continue walking through the festival with my adult students and we stop to have lunch. We have a lunch of Korean pancakes, which are made from eggs, various vegetables and pieces of seafood, like octopus. They are so freaking good. We also have kimchi (of course, it's served at every meal, even breakfast), toppoki (a really hot dish made from rice paste and red pepper paste) and we start drinking makeoli. Makeoli is a wine made from rice. It's delicious.
One of the adult students, Teresa, had woken up at 4 a.m. to make kimbap. Kimbap is awesome and it's actually part of my daily diet. It's basically like a sushi roll, but instead of raw fish it has pieces of ham, egg and vegetables. So yummy!
We all walked back to Teresa's car to get the kimbap, but by then it had started to rain. So we all sat in the car and ate kimbap.
All the Korean ladies had something to do that day, so after we ate the kimbap, we all went our seperate ways. Teresa gave me a big plastic container full of pieces of kimbap for my friends and me. She's so incredibly amazing.
I walked back to the Tug of War rope where all my friends were waiting for the ceremony to start. Half the rope had already been dragged up to the site where the Tug of War would actually take place. I'm not sure which part was male, the orange team or the green team, and which part was female, but I was on the green team.
It was time to start what turned out to be a very long, very slow and drunken process of pulling our half of the rope to the Tug of War site. Everyone was given cotton gloves to protect their hands and there were several ropes leading off the main rope to pull from. I can not emphasize enough how much this thing weighed and literally hundreds of people were needed to pull it. Couple that with the fact that both my friends Ducky and Kippy decided to hop on the rope and ride it like it was a bull. They were yelled at by ajumas, though. Obviously it was mostly Korean people pulling the rope, but we were all getting into it. There were South Africans, Irish, Americans, Brits, Canadians, Kiwis, Aussies, everyone was working together to drag this 4-ton rope through town. Rather metaphorical and touching, I'd say.
Everyone kept yelling, "Yong Cha!" which means, "Cheer Up!" I'm not really sure why we were chanting "Cheer Up!" but I'm sure there was some important cultural significance to it.
We'd all drag the rope for about 10 minutes and then get a 3 or 4-minute break. There was a man dressed up in traditional garb standing on the front of the rope who was in charge of when we would start and stop. He had a flag that he would wave forward with each heave and shout of "Yong Cha!"
At each break, there would be men that came by with a stack of paper cups and a copper kettle of makeoli. they would give us makeoli and miniscule dried fish (for virality, I presume) while we rested. They were especially concerned about us Westerners; following us around making sure our cups of makeoli were always full.
I understand why the effort took so long, obviously the rope weighed 4 tons, but also the breaks were frequent and everyone was becoming increasingly hammered. The "Yong Cha!" chant turned into "One Shot!" as the day wore on. Eventually there were tables at the rest stops where high school kids were handing out the makeoli.
There were photographers and video cameras everywhere. News crews were interviewing as many Westerners as they could. I successfully avoided being interviewed. I knew I wanted no part of drunkenly professing my love for Korean Tug of War festivals and makeoli broadcast on television. Several of my friends were interviewed and put on television, however. (And their students who saw the broadcasts have made sure they would never forget it.)
We eventually ran into the orange team crew coming down from having successfully dragged their half of the rope to the Tug of War site. I asked one guy that stopped to talk to us if we were almost there. He looked at us, looked at the road ahead and flatly said, "Uhh, no."
Shit. Where exactly were we going?!?
There was a traditional drum band that was following us behind the rope. The band members were playing music and dancing for the entire time. One old guy carrying a copper makeoli kettle grabbed me and my friend and took us back to the drum band. So he and I did the only thing we could; we started dancing along with the drummers and dancers. More picture taking ensued of the nearly 6-foot tall blond chick and the gigantic 6'2" black dude dancing with the Korean drum band.
We evenually parted ways with the band and went back to pulling the rope and we got to the bottom of a hill. I remember asking someone, "Do we have to pull the rope up that hill?!"
"Uh, yep," was their response.
Another hour of pulling a 4-ton hand-woven rope up a bloody hill. Thank God the makeoli was still freely flowin', but by this point someone had given us a huge jug of makeoli to carry with us.
One of the Korean spectators had given me a Juldarigi flag to wave, so I took a break from pulling and waved the flag around for awhile.
Two of my girlfriends, Bennie and Ani, had disappeared by this point and when they returned I had found out that they desperately had to use a restroom, couldn't find one, so they knocked on a poor, unsuspecting Korean's apartment door and asked in their best broken Korean if they could use the person's toilet. They ended up staying at this person's apartment for an hour, drinking coffee with the tenant and attempting to communicate with the man who spoke no English and they only spoke broken bits of Korean.
We finally made it to the top of the hill and the other half of the rope was waiting ever-so-patiently for the copulation to commence. I raced to the bathroom; too much makeoli! When I got to the bathroom, I noticed I had white lips. The makeoli had left a stain of white on my lips! Classy.
I went back outside and I noticed another drum and dance troupe so, naturally, I joined them. I was waving my freak flag high with my arms up in the air when one of my girlfriends found me and decided to join me in the dancing circle.
We eventually made it out of the circle and she told me that before she saw me, she and her boyfriend had been looking for us and her boyfriend saw me dancing solo in the drum circle and told her, "Well... there's Erika." And she said, "Oooh! That looks like fun!" And she joined me. Gotta love the serendipitous moments of happenstance.
She and I eventually left the dancing drum circle for yet another stop in the bathroom. This time there was a line and as soon as the ajumas (old crotchity Korean women) saw my friend and me they smiled and ushered us into bathroom stalls. We hardly had to wait. Ajumas often times go out of their way to be mean to Westerners but today, they were being exceedingly nice?! What's that about?! I assumed it was because we were participating in a traditional festival? Or maybe they had had just as much makeoli as we had? I wasn't sure, but I definitely wasn't going to argue.
My friend and I got accosted by an older Korean couple who spoke English. They were asking all about us and telling us about their lives. The woman worked at an English-speaking cultural center and wanted to know as much about us as she could. Then they insisted on taking a buttload of photos with us and then a lady from the drum band stopped by and wanted a picture of us as well. And the man dragged us over to a group of men surrounding a huge pot of makeoli. They insisted we drink makeoli with them. Who were we to refuse?!
By this point, huge gongs were being sounded by huge mallets operated by tiny Korean man/boys and fireworks had started to explode. I think it was safe to say the two pieces of rope were getting it on.
It was finally time for the actual Tug of War to start. I grabbed a piece of rope and tugged with all my might!! Jack was beckoning for us to go. Apparently the head honcho of the school districts in Chungnam province was going to take everybody out to dinner.
After all that dragging of a 4-ton rope (have I mentioned that?) for 4 miles I had to leave during the actual Tug of War? What the hell? The green team looked like it was going to take it, so I decided a free meal was going to win out, especially after all the makeoli I had consumed that day. I left and went to dinner. I still don't actually know which team won, but I'm SURE the green team won. We had all the heart. And I actually got a blister and a sore back from the cultural extravaganza. That's gotta be worth something!
I'd made plans to meet with my students on Saturday morning so we could all go to the festival together. We met up outside Talking Club and I brought my friends Bennie and Ducky, too. It was gray and rainy, which completely bummed me out.
When we got to the festival, only about a 10-minute drive, I felt like I was in the opening parade of a circus act. Everyone stopped to stare at us and point and chatter and take our picture. One high school-aged girl asked me in best-rehearsed English if she could get a picture taken with me. (Note to self: Dye your blond hair brown STAT!)
She wanted me to bow my arm over my head in a 1/2 heart while she did the same. Koreans are big on making hearts with their arms for some reason.
We walked through the main gate of the festival, which took a ridiculous amount of time because everyone was stopping us and staring at us.
My Korean students wanted us to stop and try everything. So we attempted to do this jumping see-saw apparatus and us whities completely sucked at it, but everybody had fun watching us try and we had fun looking like complete morons in the attempt.
Next we walked through the artisan area and there was a potter throwing a pot. One of my students turned to me and asked, "You know Demmmi and Patrick Swayze? Movie Ghost? Sexy!" Ummm, yeah. I'm well aware of the movie and the "Sexy time."
There was also tons of food stalls and scarves and clay plates.
We came to a huge wooden table with a gooey paste spread on the surface of the table. There was a man pounding the paste with a huge wooden mallet. The paste turned out to be rice paste (you don't say? something made of rice....?) A group of old men pointed at me and handed me the mallet, which was a helluva lot heavier than it looked.
I swung it over my head as best as I could and nearly missed the table altogether. I tried again and hit the paste right in the center, sending it oozing to the sides of the table. All the old guys cheered and shouted, "So strong!" Gaaawd, just what a nearly 6-foot tall girl wants to hear. I was slightly embarrassed and tried to pass the mallet off, but the old guys said, "One more, one more." So I obliged and managed to whack the paste again before handing the mallet off to the next Waygook.
One of my adult students turned to me and said, "Rice paste, can eat, but taste is terrible," then she scrunched up her face in a disgusted look to hammer the point home that the rice paste tastes like crap.
We walked a little further and came to an archery exhibit where an old man was giving us pointers (in Korean) on how to shoot the arrow correctly. He kept grabbing our hand that was holding the bow and twisting it back in an unnatural position and repeating the same words over and over in Korean. I have no idea what he was on about.
We finally made it into the area where the rope was being kept until the start of the actual Tug of War began. The rope was massive and made in two seperate pieces. Each piece weighed 4 tons and had to be dragged for about 3 or 4 miles by hundreds of people. There were two teams; the orange team and the green team, which most of my friends and I were on.
One-half of the rope was said to signify the female and the other was said to signify the male. When the two pieces got together it was supposed to signify sex. It's so strange because there are countless times since I've arrived in Korea where I've heard about everyday products and produce being good for stamina, vitality and virility. Everything is based around sex, yet sex is such a taboo subject in Korea and it's almost never discussed in the open or in conversation. Korea is such a place of contradictions.
Anyway, so I eventually meet up with my other friends at the festival and everyone is well on their way to becoming three sheets to the wind. It's about 11 in the morning. It's going to be a messy day.
I continue walking through the festival with my adult students and we stop to have lunch. We have a lunch of Korean pancakes, which are made from eggs, various vegetables and pieces of seafood, like octopus. They are so freaking good. We also have kimchi (of course, it's served at every meal, even breakfast), toppoki (a really hot dish made from rice paste and red pepper paste) and we start drinking makeoli. Makeoli is a wine made from rice. It's delicious.
One of the adult students, Teresa, had woken up at 4 a.m. to make kimbap. Kimbap is awesome and it's actually part of my daily diet. It's basically like a sushi roll, but instead of raw fish it has pieces of ham, egg and vegetables. So yummy!
We all walked back to Teresa's car to get the kimbap, but by then it had started to rain. So we all sat in the car and ate kimbap.
All the Korean ladies had something to do that day, so after we ate the kimbap, we all went our seperate ways. Teresa gave me a big plastic container full of pieces of kimbap for my friends and me. She's so incredibly amazing.
I walked back to the Tug of War rope where all my friends were waiting for the ceremony to start. Half the rope had already been dragged up to the site where the Tug of War would actually take place. I'm not sure which part was male, the orange team or the green team, and which part was female, but I was on the green team.
It was time to start what turned out to be a very long, very slow and drunken process of pulling our half of the rope to the Tug of War site. Everyone was given cotton gloves to protect their hands and there were several ropes leading off the main rope to pull from. I can not emphasize enough how much this thing weighed and literally hundreds of people were needed to pull it. Couple that with the fact that both my friends Ducky and Kippy decided to hop on the rope and ride it like it was a bull. They were yelled at by ajumas, though. Obviously it was mostly Korean people pulling the rope, but we were all getting into it. There were South Africans, Irish, Americans, Brits, Canadians, Kiwis, Aussies, everyone was working together to drag this 4-ton rope through town. Rather metaphorical and touching, I'd say.
Everyone kept yelling, "Yong Cha!" which means, "Cheer Up!" I'm not really sure why we were chanting "Cheer Up!" but I'm sure there was some important cultural significance to it.
We'd all drag the rope for about 10 minutes and then get a 3 or 4-minute break. There was a man dressed up in traditional garb standing on the front of the rope who was in charge of when we would start and stop. He had a flag that he would wave forward with each heave and shout of "Yong Cha!"
At each break, there would be men that came by with a stack of paper cups and a copper kettle of makeoli. they would give us makeoli and miniscule dried fish (for virality, I presume) while we rested. They were especially concerned about us Westerners; following us around making sure our cups of makeoli were always full.
I understand why the effort took so long, obviously the rope weighed 4 tons, but also the breaks were frequent and everyone was becoming increasingly hammered. The "Yong Cha!" chant turned into "One Shot!" as the day wore on. Eventually there were tables at the rest stops where high school kids were handing out the makeoli.
There were photographers and video cameras everywhere. News crews were interviewing as many Westerners as they could. I successfully avoided being interviewed. I knew I wanted no part of drunkenly professing my love for Korean Tug of War festivals and makeoli broadcast on television. Several of my friends were interviewed and put on television, however. (And their students who saw the broadcasts have made sure they would never forget it.)
We eventually ran into the orange team crew coming down from having successfully dragged their half of the rope to the Tug of War site. I asked one guy that stopped to talk to us if we were almost there. He looked at us, looked at the road ahead and flatly said, "Uhh, no."
Shit. Where exactly were we going?!?
There was a traditional drum band that was following us behind the rope. The band members were playing music and dancing for the entire time. One old guy carrying a copper makeoli kettle grabbed me and my friend and took us back to the drum band. So he and I did the only thing we could; we started dancing along with the drummers and dancers. More picture taking ensued of the nearly 6-foot tall blond chick and the gigantic 6'2" black dude dancing with the Korean drum band.
We evenually parted ways with the band and went back to pulling the rope and we got to the bottom of a hill. I remember asking someone, "Do we have to pull the rope up that hill?!"
"Uh, yep," was their response.
Another hour of pulling a 4-ton hand-woven rope up a bloody hill. Thank God the makeoli was still freely flowin', but by this point someone had given us a huge jug of makeoli to carry with us.
One of the Korean spectators had given me a Juldarigi flag to wave, so I took a break from pulling and waved the flag around for awhile.
Two of my girlfriends, Bennie and Ani, had disappeared by this point and when they returned I had found out that they desperately had to use a restroom, couldn't find one, so they knocked on a poor, unsuspecting Korean's apartment door and asked in their best broken Korean if they could use the person's toilet. They ended up staying at this person's apartment for an hour, drinking coffee with the tenant and attempting to communicate with the man who spoke no English and they only spoke broken bits of Korean.
We finally made it to the top of the hill and the other half of the rope was waiting ever-so-patiently for the copulation to commence. I raced to the bathroom; too much makeoli! When I got to the bathroom, I noticed I had white lips. The makeoli had left a stain of white on my lips! Classy.
I went back outside and I noticed another drum and dance troupe so, naturally, I joined them. I was waving my freak flag high with my arms up in the air when one of my girlfriends found me and decided to join me in the dancing circle.
We eventually made it out of the circle and she told me that before she saw me, she and her boyfriend had been looking for us and her boyfriend saw me dancing solo in the drum circle and told her, "Well... there's Erika." And she said, "Oooh! That looks like fun!" And she joined me. Gotta love the serendipitous moments of happenstance.
She and I eventually left the dancing drum circle for yet another stop in the bathroom. This time there was a line and as soon as the ajumas (old crotchity Korean women) saw my friend and me they smiled and ushered us into bathroom stalls. We hardly had to wait. Ajumas often times go out of their way to be mean to Westerners but today, they were being exceedingly nice?! What's that about?! I assumed it was because we were participating in a traditional festival? Or maybe they had had just as much makeoli as we had? I wasn't sure, but I definitely wasn't going to argue.
My friend and I got accosted by an older Korean couple who spoke English. They were asking all about us and telling us about their lives. The woman worked at an English-speaking cultural center and wanted to know as much about us as she could. Then they insisted on taking a buttload of photos with us and then a lady from the drum band stopped by and wanted a picture of us as well. And the man dragged us over to a group of men surrounding a huge pot of makeoli. They insisted we drink makeoli with them. Who were we to refuse?!
By this point, huge gongs were being sounded by huge mallets operated by tiny Korean man/boys and fireworks had started to explode. I think it was safe to say the two pieces of rope were getting it on.
It was finally time for the actual Tug of War to start. I grabbed a piece of rope and tugged with all my might!! Jack was beckoning for us to go. Apparently the head honcho of the school districts in Chungnam province was going to take everybody out to dinner.
After all that dragging of a 4-ton rope (have I mentioned that?) for 4 miles I had to leave during the actual Tug of War? What the hell? The green team looked like it was going to take it, so I decided a free meal was going to win out, especially after all the makeoli I had consumed that day. I left and went to dinner. I still don't actually know which team won, but I'm SURE the green team won. We had all the heart. And I actually got a blister and a sore back from the cultural extravaganza. That's gotta be worth something!
Friday, May 14, 2010
Put the Pizza Down and Nobody Gets Hurt
I've gained just under 10 pounds (or about 4 kilos for the non-Americans reading this) since coming to Korea, which obviously sucks. My eating habits are not so great. I eat a lot of rice, but I've been told rice isn't metabolized in a Western-raised body the way it is in an Eastern-raised body. I don't know if that's true or not, but I'm sticking with that story... Makes me feel a little bit better. Although that beer, soju and pizza probably aren't helping either.
In one of my classes this week my students were reviewing a few vocabulary words and writing sentences with the words. One of the words was "previously". One of my students appeared to be thinking quite hard on her assignment. When she handed me her paper the sentence for "previously" was: "Erika was previously thin."
Those silly Korean kids have such a limited vocabulary, they don't know what they're talking about.
I couldn't help but laugh and agree with her.
When I came to Korea I was told that people who start off thin in Korea end up gaining lots of weight and those that come to Korea heavy end up getting really thin. I don't think I was thin when I came here, but I was definitely thinner.
I just hope I get my act together and lose some weight, especially if I'm not able to fit into my clothes. They don't make clothes for fat girls in Korea.
I've also become much more self-conscious than I already was. When you're constantly being stared at it tends to make you think the worst. I spend much more time picking out what to wear for the day than I ever have before. I have to make sure certain body parts are covered sufficiently and I'm not showing too much flesh.
It's weird though because Korean girls and women wear the shortest and tightest skirts I've ever seen with their asses pretty much hanging out, but if I foreign woman shows her shoulders or the teeniest bit of cleavage than she's a dirty slut who deserves to be gawked at and cussed out. I don't quite understand that one.
It's funny because never in a million years have I been or would I be self-conscious and hyper-aware of my chest. But here, I'm doing everything I can to cover the girls up. And now that I've gained weight, the boobs have taken on a life of their own.
I really miss cultures where nobody gave a shit what anybody wore or how you wore it. It's so strange to be constantly aware of how I look or how what I'm wearing may be perceived by the people around me. It's just another thing I'm working on getting used to. I should be glad I'm not working in the Middle East, I guess. But a burqa would come in really handy for swimsuit season....
In one of my classes this week my students were reviewing a few vocabulary words and writing sentences with the words. One of the words was "previously". One of my students appeared to be thinking quite hard on her assignment. When she handed me her paper the sentence for "previously" was: "Erika was previously thin."
Those silly Korean kids have such a limited vocabulary, they don't know what they're talking about.
I couldn't help but laugh and agree with her.
When I came to Korea I was told that people who start off thin in Korea end up gaining lots of weight and those that come to Korea heavy end up getting really thin. I don't think I was thin when I came here, but I was definitely thinner.
I just hope I get my act together and lose some weight, especially if I'm not able to fit into my clothes. They don't make clothes for fat girls in Korea.
I've also become much more self-conscious than I already was. When you're constantly being stared at it tends to make you think the worst. I spend much more time picking out what to wear for the day than I ever have before. I have to make sure certain body parts are covered sufficiently and I'm not showing too much flesh.
It's weird though because Korean girls and women wear the shortest and tightest skirts I've ever seen with their asses pretty much hanging out, but if I foreign woman shows her shoulders or the teeniest bit of cleavage than she's a dirty slut who deserves to be gawked at and cussed out. I don't quite understand that one.
It's funny because never in a million years have I been or would I be self-conscious and hyper-aware of my chest. But here, I'm doing everything I can to cover the girls up. And now that I've gained weight, the boobs have taken on a life of their own.
I really miss cultures where nobody gave a shit what anybody wore or how you wore it. It's so strange to be constantly aware of how I look or how what I'm wearing may be perceived by the people around me. It's just another thing I'm working on getting used to. I should be glad I'm not working in the Middle East, I guess. But a burqa would come in really handy for swimsuit season....
Saturday, May 1, 2010
Incompetence Abounds
My office key was taken away awhile ago and I had discussed with Agnes the possibility of having the key returned to me. She said she couldn't discuss it at that exact moment and said we would discuss it later. I knew she would think I would forget about it, so I purposely waited about a week before I asked her about it again.
I had a couple minutes before my adult class on Thursday so I thought I would bring up the "key issue." I asked Agnes if she had time to discuss giving me the office key back. She asked me why I thought I needed the key. I told her it was incredibly inconvenient to try to get all my prep work done for all my classes and use the internet to email family and friends.
I told her I didn't understand why the key was taken away in the first place. I asked her if I had used the key or the office inappropriately and she answered, "No." I said, "Well, than why was it taken away?" She answered that no other teacher had a key and she didn't think it was appropriate for me to have it. She also said she didn't feel comfortable with me being in the office without her supervision. I asked her why she felt comfortable with me being "unsupervised" for 5 1/2 months and then all the sudden she didn't feel comfortable?
She didn't have a rebuttal, so she just looked at me, smiled and said, "Sorry."
I said, "So you're not going to give me the key back." She smiled and said, "Sorry," again.
I lost it.
I told her, "You are incredibly unprofessional and immature and so incompetent, but I'm getting used to that! You are by far the WORST working experience I've ever had!"
She said, "It is?"
I answered, "YES!!!!! And I just hope the next person that comes here has a better time than I have, but I doubt it!!!!!" and I stormed off to teach my evening adult class.
As I was walking away, I was absolutely furious and then I felt like a jackass because I was thinking, "Wow, that was an incredibly immature reaction, but whatever, I don't even care!!!" (in typical immature fashion)
The adult class is a 90-minute class, so halfway through the class, we have a break time. I went outside to make a phonecall and when I came back in the building, Agnes asked if she could talk to me after class. I mumbled an answer of "yeah, sure."
After class, all the students left and Agnes came into the classroom and sat down with a notebook in front of her. Apparently she spent the previous 90 minutes compiling a laundry list of all the things I had allegedly done wrong.
She started by saying that she didn't know how many jobs I had had in the past, but she doubted this was my worst. I told her I had been working non-stop since I was 15 years old, so I had had many, many jobs in my life and this one was by far the worst. She asked me why. So I gave her the reasons I could come up with off the top of my head.
I told her she never orders the books I need for class on time, so I'm running around scrambling trying to figure out what to do with my students. I said that wasn't fair to the students or me and it was incredibly disorganized and unprofessional. And after 6 months of me being here, she should have her crap together more by now. Not to mention, she has been running this school for the last three years, so she should really know to order books in a certain timeframe.
She admitted that, yes, she was very disorganized and she would try to order the books on time. She asked, "Would that make you happier if I ordered the books on time?"
I answered, "It's a start."
I then said that she never gave me my new schedule until a couple minutes before classes were supposed to start. I get a new schedule every month and I never actually get the schedule until the day the classes start. I told her this makes it very difficult to prepare for the classes. I told her that I had asked her for a new schedule last week for the classes that started this Wednesday. She didn't have the schedule ready. So I asked her again on Monday and she said, "Oh yeah, I'll get it to you." I asked her again for the schedule on Tuesday and she said, "Oh yeah, I forgot. I'll get it to you right away." I finally got the schedule Wednesday when I came to school to start class. I told her it was ridiculous that I wouldn't get my schedule for the month until the day classes started.
She said, "Ok, if I get the schedule to you earlier, would that make you happier?"
I answered, "Once again, it's a start."
The next gripe on my list was the pay that I always had to fight her for. I told her I give her a copy of my hours every month for a reason. I do it so she has a copy of the hours I've worked and so I have a copy as well. I told her every month there is an issue because she didn't want to pay me for work I've done. I used several national holidays as an example. I told her she would always fight with me about paying me for national holidays and I said that was ridiculous. She didn't want to pay me for Christmas for God's sake because I "didn't work that day."
I told her the fact that I've had to call the Talking Club corporate headquarters to find out what I should and should not get paid for is kind of ludicrous. She said she didn't realize she had to pay me for those days.
I told her I felt like she was trying to cheat me. She got all huffy and said, "I'm not trying to cheat you!" I told her, "I sure hope not."
She then asked, "Ok, anything else?"
I told her that was all I could think of at the moment, but if anything else came up I'd be sure to let her know.
Then she started on a list of things I had apparently done wrong. She said about a month ago, one of the students came up to her and asked what crazy meant. She told me apparently I had called this kid crazy and he wanted to know what it meant. She said I shouldn't be calling kids names. I said I didn't maliciously call any of the children names(except behind their back, of course). I told her it was probably a joke in the class, because my students always say to me, "Tee-chaa, you so crazy!" and I answer back, "No, you so crazy!" It's a joke, but apparently one student was a little sensitive.
I said, "Ok, I'll try to be more sensitive and I won't call anymore kids crazy."
Then I asked her why she waited a month to tell me about this. She answered that she forgot about it. Clearly it was really important if she forgot about it.
Her second gripe was that I had let some classes out a couple minutes early and their parents were paying good money for those classes and I shouldn't let them out early. Ok, I will no longer let any of the students out a couple minutes early. No problem.
Her last problem with me was that I had been teaching the Middle School English lesson from the book. She said that all I did with them was teach them from their book that was provided to me.
I said, "So you don't want me to teach them from the book?"
She answered, "Well, yes, I want you to teach them from the book, but I don't want you to use the CD that comes with the book."
The book is primarily based on listening and the CD is the main component of the book.
I said, "Ummm, ok, so you want me to use the book, but not use the book?"
She answered, "Yes."
"Ok," I said. "I will find a way to use the book, but not use the book. Anything else?"
"No," she answered. "That's all I can think of."
She then went on to tell me that she was sure her school was definitely not the worst place to work. She said she knew of several other hogwans near Talking Club that were far worse than hers.
Uh huh. I find that hard to believe, but I'll placate you if it means I can get out of this room right now.
She said she hoped the next 6 months would be better.
I said, "Yeah, me too!"
The next day when I came in to the school, all the teachers, the school secretary and Agnes were standing around speaking rapid-fire Korean. As soon as I walked in, they all got really quiet and looked at me. Geee, what were you guys talking about? Then Agnes came over to me, pointed to a box of books that had just arrived in the mail and said those were the books I needed to teach my classes that started two days ago.
I went through the books and realized she hadn't ordered enough. She came over, counted the books and realized her mistake. I didn't even react. I knew she would not order enough. She breathed a heavy sigh and said she would order more books right away and I told her I'd make the kids share until the new ones came.
This woman is so incompetent.
Do they screen for mental illness before they allow a person to open a hogwan?
I had a couple minutes before my adult class on Thursday so I thought I would bring up the "key issue." I asked Agnes if she had time to discuss giving me the office key back. She asked me why I thought I needed the key. I told her it was incredibly inconvenient to try to get all my prep work done for all my classes and use the internet to email family and friends.
I told her I didn't understand why the key was taken away in the first place. I asked her if I had used the key or the office inappropriately and she answered, "No." I said, "Well, than why was it taken away?" She answered that no other teacher had a key and she didn't think it was appropriate for me to have it. She also said she didn't feel comfortable with me being in the office without her supervision. I asked her why she felt comfortable with me being "unsupervised" for 5 1/2 months and then all the sudden she didn't feel comfortable?
She didn't have a rebuttal, so she just looked at me, smiled and said, "Sorry."
I said, "So you're not going to give me the key back." She smiled and said, "Sorry," again.
I lost it.
I told her, "You are incredibly unprofessional and immature and so incompetent, but I'm getting used to that! You are by far the WORST working experience I've ever had!"
She said, "It is?"
I answered, "YES!!!!! And I just hope the next person that comes here has a better time than I have, but I doubt it!!!!!" and I stormed off to teach my evening adult class.
As I was walking away, I was absolutely furious and then I felt like a jackass because I was thinking, "Wow, that was an incredibly immature reaction, but whatever, I don't even care!!!" (in typical immature fashion)
The adult class is a 90-minute class, so halfway through the class, we have a break time. I went outside to make a phonecall and when I came back in the building, Agnes asked if she could talk to me after class. I mumbled an answer of "yeah, sure."
After class, all the students left and Agnes came into the classroom and sat down with a notebook in front of her. Apparently she spent the previous 90 minutes compiling a laundry list of all the things I had allegedly done wrong.
She started by saying that she didn't know how many jobs I had had in the past, but she doubted this was my worst. I told her I had been working non-stop since I was 15 years old, so I had had many, many jobs in my life and this one was by far the worst. She asked me why. So I gave her the reasons I could come up with off the top of my head.
I told her she never orders the books I need for class on time, so I'm running around scrambling trying to figure out what to do with my students. I said that wasn't fair to the students or me and it was incredibly disorganized and unprofessional. And after 6 months of me being here, she should have her crap together more by now. Not to mention, she has been running this school for the last three years, so she should really know to order books in a certain timeframe.
She admitted that, yes, she was very disorganized and she would try to order the books on time. She asked, "Would that make you happier if I ordered the books on time?"
I answered, "It's a start."
I then said that she never gave me my new schedule until a couple minutes before classes were supposed to start. I get a new schedule every month and I never actually get the schedule until the day the classes start. I told her this makes it very difficult to prepare for the classes. I told her that I had asked her for a new schedule last week for the classes that started this Wednesday. She didn't have the schedule ready. So I asked her again on Monday and she said, "Oh yeah, I'll get it to you." I asked her again for the schedule on Tuesday and she said, "Oh yeah, I forgot. I'll get it to you right away." I finally got the schedule Wednesday when I came to school to start class. I told her it was ridiculous that I wouldn't get my schedule for the month until the day classes started.
She said, "Ok, if I get the schedule to you earlier, would that make you happier?"
I answered, "Once again, it's a start."
The next gripe on my list was the pay that I always had to fight her for. I told her I give her a copy of my hours every month for a reason. I do it so she has a copy of the hours I've worked and so I have a copy as well. I told her every month there is an issue because she didn't want to pay me for work I've done. I used several national holidays as an example. I told her she would always fight with me about paying me for national holidays and I said that was ridiculous. She didn't want to pay me for Christmas for God's sake because I "didn't work that day."
I told her the fact that I've had to call the Talking Club corporate headquarters to find out what I should and should not get paid for is kind of ludicrous. She said she didn't realize she had to pay me for those days.
I told her I felt like she was trying to cheat me. She got all huffy and said, "I'm not trying to cheat you!" I told her, "I sure hope not."
She then asked, "Ok, anything else?"
I told her that was all I could think of at the moment, but if anything else came up I'd be sure to let her know.
Then she started on a list of things I had apparently done wrong. She said about a month ago, one of the students came up to her and asked what crazy meant. She told me apparently I had called this kid crazy and he wanted to know what it meant. She said I shouldn't be calling kids names. I said I didn't maliciously call any of the children names(except behind their back, of course). I told her it was probably a joke in the class, because my students always say to me, "Tee-chaa, you so crazy!" and I answer back, "No, you so crazy!" It's a joke, but apparently one student was a little sensitive.
I said, "Ok, I'll try to be more sensitive and I won't call anymore kids crazy."
Then I asked her why she waited a month to tell me about this. She answered that she forgot about it. Clearly it was really important if she forgot about it.
Her second gripe was that I had let some classes out a couple minutes early and their parents were paying good money for those classes and I shouldn't let them out early. Ok, I will no longer let any of the students out a couple minutes early. No problem.
Her last problem with me was that I had been teaching the Middle School English lesson from the book. She said that all I did with them was teach them from their book that was provided to me.
I said, "So you don't want me to teach them from the book?"
She answered, "Well, yes, I want you to teach them from the book, but I don't want you to use the CD that comes with the book."
The book is primarily based on listening and the CD is the main component of the book.
I said, "Ummm, ok, so you want me to use the book, but not use the book?"
She answered, "Yes."
"Ok," I said. "I will find a way to use the book, but not use the book. Anything else?"
"No," she answered. "That's all I can think of."
She then went on to tell me that she was sure her school was definitely not the worst place to work. She said she knew of several other hogwans near Talking Club that were far worse than hers.
Uh huh. I find that hard to believe, but I'll placate you if it means I can get out of this room right now.
She said she hoped the next 6 months would be better.
I said, "Yeah, me too!"
The next day when I came in to the school, all the teachers, the school secretary and Agnes were standing around speaking rapid-fire Korean. As soon as I walked in, they all got really quiet and looked at me. Geee, what were you guys talking about? Then Agnes came over to me, pointed to a box of books that had just arrived in the mail and said those were the books I needed to teach my classes that started two days ago.
I went through the books and realized she hadn't ordered enough. She came over, counted the books and realized her mistake. I didn't even react. I knew she would not order enough. She breathed a heavy sigh and said she would order more books right away and I told her I'd make the kids share until the new ones came.
This woman is so incompetent.
Do they screen for mental illness before they allow a person to open a hogwan?
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