First Week Royalty

Week one down... only 51 left! I am actually shocked at the easy transition to life halfway across the world. Generally speaking, my day is pretty normal. I have anywhere from 4-5 classes a day and 15-40 students in each class. But as you can imagine, things are slightly different from American schools. Discipline is… interesting. Misbehave and you will get THE stick (yes, they beat their students). Keep it up, and you’ll have to do “London Bridges” (hands and feet on the ground, butt all the way up in the air) for as long as the teacher wishes. Now that’s my kind of discipline!

And everyone is SO giving! Now I’m not just talking about time here, because they actually throw presents at you. Day 1- I was immediately greeted by a Korean teacher, who insisted that I have 2 China coffee cups (they take their coffee seriously). Then, as the day neared to an end, the principal invited me and one of my co-teachers to dinner.

Naturally, I was very grateful, and accepted, thinking we would head to some Korean joint just in town. Boy was I wrong. We ventured 30 minutes into the Korean country side and devoured Grade A ++ meat while sitting under chestnut trees, looking out onto a lake. We actually roasted chestnuts on an open fire (and here I just thought that was a Christmas song). My co-teacher, Bianca, feeling as though she needed to contribute, decided to take us out to get some tea. So we drove from one lake to the next, and, going with the theme for the night, had $20 worth of tea (yes, that’s per person), while watching the sunset over the mountains. I know tea is suppose to be healthy and all, but for $20 a person, my life expectancy better have increased by 10 years.

And throughout the rest of the week children brought me presents and my co-teachers offered me an endless supply of food and coffee (I think I gained 10lbs and doubt that I’ll ever need sleep again). Children run up to me full of exuberance, just to say “Teacher, Teacher… HIIIIII.” My co-teachers tell me that I have the “Alex Effect” and some of the boys call me a celebrity, saying they are my followers. One boy, when I asked him what he wanted to be when he grew up actually said “your husband.” So yes, Asian kids ARE as cute as everyone says.

This week, I truly felt like a princess… Yep, I could get used to this.