Would you Like a Straw?

Korean servicepeople continue to impress me. Just now, after buying a Sandwhich and a box 'o Chocolate Milk, I was actually offered a straw. Good luck having that offered to you at Loblaws! haha.

It's been a fun week. My apologies for not keeping up with the regular Wednesday update, but I was dead tired after last night. But lets start the recap on Monday.

It was one of the fellow-Canadians' birthdays, so we had a nice outing to a Galbi restaurant (with about a dozen teachers), followed by some beer at the Chicken Hof (pictured above - with Rory, the birthday man), and some Noraebang to cap it all off. In the morning, my Intro-leveled adults asked me if I was available on Wednesday for lunch - well - on the second try, anyway. At first, I was told 'We want to eat you on Wednesday' - which may very well be the most awesome rookie mistake ever heard.

We agreed to hold class an hour earlier than usual on Wednesday, in order to have two hours to eat (which the management agreed to) - so instead of having it from 11:00 to 11:50, we held it from 10:00 to 10:50. They took me to yet another high-class restaurant (I seriously need to get them all something around Christmas time), this time one that served Duck. It was served on a Korean BBQ type of setting, where the meat cooks in front of you, and it was very, very good. During a conversation, they mentioned that since we're done half the book, that it would probably take another two months to finish it. Then they asked what would happen after we finish it - so they're already thinking about the next two months, and evidently want four mour after that with me. I told them i'd ask management if they'd allow me to upgrade the class, once it's done, to the next level (Interchange 1, from Interchange Intro), and keep the same people. If that works, it means i'll have been teaching these same great people for a total of 8 months. That's pretty awesome.

On Wednesday, I was also told that I was picked (yet again) to be filmed as part of a Promotional video for GEC. I'm less and less surprised by these things, and fully expect my face to be put on a Billboard in front of the school by the time the year is over. Today (Thursday), they had a very Professional crew come in and film me; only, my class wasn't very big. So we combined both of my classes for that time-period (which was only 7 people), along with another random 5 Kids. I was then told to 'Pretend to teach'. But heck, I needed the kids to be somewhat responsive, so I was forced to come up with something on the spot. For anyone considering any ESL teaching, take heed of my words of widsom: Colors are your friends. So I opened my book, and asked 'What color is..... THIS!! THIS! THIS! THIS! What's my name?? What color is THIS?! THIS! THIS, What's my name?', getting faster and faster. Kids respond really well to these types of questions, i've discovered.

Although it was fun, as teaching always is, it really knocked me out of sync for the rest of the day - the lessons I had planned for those classes had to be cancelled or pushed back. Yet I still summoned the energy to go to the Spinning class at the gym tonight, so I guess I ain't doing that bad.

Tomorrow, we're having the annual GEC Halloween Party. Halloween, while not that popular in Korea, is still somewhat celebrated. Most districts have their own events, but Seogu, the district we live in, does not. So it falls to the GEC. Last year, i'm told that there was a whopping 3000 people who attended. They're expecting a somewhat smaller turnout this year, since there'll be a little bit of rain (at least it's not 15cm of snow - zing), but it should still be above two thousand. I have my costume picked out, and i'll make sure to carry my Camera with me at all times to capture the Korean Halloween for all of you. If I have an interesting-enough day, i'll write up a Halloween-Special post.

Until then, Cheers, and Happy Halloweeeeeeeen