A Korean Surprise: Impromptu Lunch?

On Thursday I finished teaching my 4th period class and headed back to the teacher's room.  I was starving because at this point it was 1:10 and I had been teaching non-stop all day, so I put my stuff down and was ready to head to the cafeteria. Just as I was about to leave, one of my co-teachers came over and said "We will go to lunch now.  You will come with me."

Ummm ok?  I could tell that this meant we were not going to the cafeteria, so I grabbed my purse and followed her to her car.

We then proceeded to drive to a restaurant not too far down the road, where we met the other English teachers from our school.

We ate a typical Korean lunch (lots of side dishes, soup, fish)...but I kept looking at my watch and thinking things along the line of "Shouldn't we be getting back to school now?"

It was 2:05 by the time we were done, and our next class starts at 2:10.  Of course, no one seemed worried about it.  We got back to school a little late, and went to teach our next class without anyone batting an eyelash.

Again, I couldn't help to think that I REALLY am in Korea now (in case the whole language thing hasn't given it away yet).  If a bunch of teachers in the US went out to lunch and were a few minutes late getting back, you would never hear the end of people complaining about those "lazy, overpaid teachers." Talk about a different perspective.

All in all, not a bad surprise.  School lunches in Korea are pretty good, but I can't complain about a random restaurant outing.  I have no idea why it happened, or if there even was a reason, but that's part of the mystique of these lovely Korean Surprises.

Finally Friday

I was sitting at my desk today when one of my co-teachers told me to go to the cafeteria.  Apparently from 11:30 on teachers are supposed to go get lunch whenever they have time.  Yesterday I went at the same time as some other teachers, but today I was on my own.

I got to the cafeteria and there were only two other teachers sitting at the table. I grabbed a tray and saw that there were bowls of noodles, so I took a bowl and moved down the line.  There were large bowls of what appeared to be a questionable looking brown sauce as well as something that was circular shaped and looked like it was some sort of breaded meat.  I skipped the sauce because it looked odd and I wasn’t sure what to do with it. I started to grab for the food that was next to it.  As I grabbed it, out of nowhere one of the cafeteria workers ran over and started yelling something at me, grabbed my bowl and put the sauce on my noodles. 

Silly American.  I don’t even know how to get my food from the cafeteria. 

But really, I don’t know how to do much of anything in Korea.  In short, even the simplest daily activities have become a guessing game.  It’s like suddenly being a child again, dependent on others for even the simplest tasks. I have to guess when buying food at the corner store because I don’t know what it says on the label.  I have to guess what exactly I’m eating at lunch.  I constantly have to guess when using my computer at school because all the programs are in Korean (I've used power point and Microsoft word millions of times, but when it’s in Korean, it makes it a HUGE guessing game….my computer at school is super slow, and I’m guessing it’s because the other teachers before me and I have probably inadvertently clicked on and installed so many random things over the years).  I have to guess what the stores I walk by sell.  I have to guess about what kind of food is served at a restaurant.  I have to guess what people are talking about when I walk by. The list goes on and on. 

You never can fully understand how influential and powerful literacy and language comprehension are until you are in a place where you understand nothing.  Over the past few days, I’ve become hypersensitive to how much I really DON’T understand. 

All the more reason I need to start studying my Korean. Of course, that would require internet, which I still don’t have.   

My small victory of the day was figuring how to turn on my hot water.  After three days of cold showers, I brought the subject up with my co-teacher again, at which point she drew me a picture of where the control is in my room.  Of course, it was easy enough to explain, and I’m not sure why it took so long to get that information?  But after playing around will a combination of buttons, I finally have hot water.  That warm shower will be glorious tomorrow morning.

I also got to meet a few more students today.  After school I went upstairs to see one of my co-teachers and passed by many students on the way who were so eager to talk to me.  As I sat in my co-teacher’s office, there were TONS of girls peeking through the door.  It really is so funny , and I can’t wait to meet them all next week. 

Of course, I am still lost about what exactly I should be teaching next week for this writing class.  I came up with some questions for the kids to answer, but I have no idea if they will be too hard or too easy, or really what the heck is expected of me.  Am I supposed to have some conversation in there?  Is the class really just writing?  How long do they write for?  I guess I will wing it and see how it goes and go from there.

I also found out today (surprise!) that I will be teaching a class at night.  It’s typical for EPIK teachers to teach an after school class, but I was hoping that since I have such a heavy class load I wouldn't have to.  Of course, today I was filled in that I will be teaching Tuesday nights.  I can basically teach whatever I want, which is cool, but also quite a bit of freedom.  The good thing about this is that I will get paid overtime, amounting to an extra 60,000 won (a little less than $60) a week, three weeks a month.  Not bad extra cash.