Report from the Other Side

I don't know If I mentioned it earlier, but my co-teacher, my lifeline, my lone English-speaking savior at school got married this past month. That's wonderful of course, except that she married a man in Daegu (like 3-4 hours away...then again...everything is 3-4 hours away in Korea). Long story short, she put in her two week--or the Korean equivalent--and now I've got myself an new co-teacher. I will mis Cho Seonsangnim. She was young, small and soft spoken, but she didn't put up with shit in the classroom. My new co-teacher is the complete opposite...except that she's also young and soft spoken.

The new girl, Li Hyo Chan, is fresh out of college. Or, at least, she graduated this year--the same time as myself. She's been spending her off time studying for the national teacher exam which, so she says, she failed. Thus she applies for the job at good ol' Jungang High School (that actually doesn't say anything so bad about our school, just that we're a private institution, and teachers who either fail or don't take the national exam work for private schools. Just the facts). Anyway, this is her first job. EVER. As an aside, Korean kids--at least ones even moderately focused on education--never have jobs growing up. No bagging groceries. No bailing hay. No begging for spare change on the side of the street. Anyone slightly interested in college spends 18 hours a day in school or studying on their own. With that said, this new co-teacher of mine was a little bit nervous when she came in to visit on Friday. I first sitting at the desk next to me, shaking, confused and on the verge of tears--her first words, following my "Hello, I'm Ben," were: "I have no idea what I am suppose do to!!!" Keep in mind she didn't even have to teach that day, just visit, or so I'm told. In a nutshell, my response was: "I don't know what you're suppose to do, either...but if you need any help let me know!"

Well, she's actually a very nice young lady--albeit a little green on the underside. Imagine how I felt on my first day though...and I didn't/don't even speak Korean. Like it or not, I'm sure she'll quickly conform to the realities of teaching at our school. With that said, her first look was a bit of a shocker. The same day she came in, I probably had both my best class and my worst classes of the year. Of course she sat in on the worst class-kids hitting, throwing, biting....just generally being adolescent idiots with built up sexual repression. The new teacher didn't say much, except "this is NOTHING like my high school, when I asked her about her thoughts. As of the first few days in class, I'm pretty much on my own. Cho Teacher (old teacher) could usually--temporarily--straighten the kids out with a good AYAAA!!! every now and then, while Li Teacher prefers a nice pat on the back and a thoughtful smile. We'll see how far that gets her.

I did have a good time last Friday, heading out with Cho Teacher and a few others from school for a goodbye dinner of sorts. Any Korean dinner/celebration is not complete without soju and beer, and this one did not disappoint. It's always nice to hear some of the teachers true feelings, unmasked by plentiful liquid social lubrication. I was fed "Korean style" by one of the Korean teachers...for which I reciprocated in feeding him (literally, putting a wrap of random things in his mouth) "American style." I think the most memorable part of the evening, though, was the food (shocker, eh?). For the first "session" we were at a Hanu Restaurants (literally, "Korean Cow"). Any beef is expensive in Korea, and domestic beef--the premo--is at the top of the pyramid. More than just the meat though, was how it was served. Half of it was sitting out raw on slabs of wood. It's like eating sashmi in a sushi restaurant, only red and bloody--and delicious. I'm still shocked at how edible raw beef is. I know, I know, maybe not such a good idea with parasites and bacteria and mad cow disease--but Hanu Restaurants are tip top and this beef meets the highest standards. This also helps explain why Koreans were so freaked out by a (imported beef) mad cow disease scare a few years back. Better yet though, I also tried cow stomach. The taste is fine. It tastes like, well, beef. The texture, however, is more like curdled rubber--so I'm not so sure where I stand on that one. To top it off I ate soup with chunks of coagulated cow blood (think finger sized chunks, the real deal). This tasted like...I honestly have no idea. But it wasn't bad, only a bit rubbery like everything else that night.

Anyway, enough of the restaurant review. This is plenty for now; I'll leave you with images of raw stomach and chunky blood. Cheers.