I was talking the other day to David and he said something that made me sad. I mentioned one the students, called Sandra, a girl of about 6, and how whenever I pass her in the classroom she grabs for my hand and tries to kiss me.
David said, "She grabs for my hand too, but not to kiss me, just to hit me. I'm so ugly that all the kids try to hit me."
Actually, it didn't make me sad at all. I just laughed at him.
Wednesday, 30 June 2004
Manbag
I just received this email from my good friend Emily, who is currently travelling about SE Asia and whom I'll be meeting next month in Laos during my week's holiday.
I am rolling about on the floor, howlng, screaming with laughter. I am more hysterical than the time you carried me home through the Trinity/ Bon accord whatever centre after the schooner.
All this, at the thought of you with your male handbag.
I love it.
Can I just emphasise that it is not a male handbag, it is simply a handy bag made for men. Indeed, you could term it a "manbag". A manbag is, in fact, a very masculine thing, as Emily will see when I present myself before her fashioning the said item.
I am rolling about on the floor, howlng, screaming with laughter. I am more hysterical than the time you carried me home through the Trinity/ Bon accord whatever centre after the schooner.
All this, at the thought of you with your male handbag.
I love it.
Can I just emphasise that it is not a male handbag, it is simply a handy bag made for men. Indeed, you could term it a "manbag". A manbag is, in fact, a very masculine thing, as Emily will see when I present myself before her fashioning the said item.
Tuesday, 29 June 2004
Blood
I've made quite a few children cry in my six months of teaching, but today I had the honour getting my first child to bleed.
It was Ocean, the second youngest class in the school, of 4 and 5 year olds. On Tuesdays I take them, all 7 of them, to gym class. Although a lovely class, they seem to spend 50% of their time fighting, crying and saying "I'm sorry" or "Mi-an-hae" so I have to be careful what games I play because half of then descend quickly into three kids crying and the other four crowded round them apologising. Always over absolutely nothing, of course. Fights, by the way, are never actually proper fighting (which I'd actively encourage for entertainment value) but are just one kid putting their head in their hands and making a show of being in a huff.
Anyway, today I devised this game where they run in a circle to music, and when the music stops they have to pick up a small piece of red lego from somewhere around the room, and the child that doesn't have a piece of lego is out. Lego is small enough so that two kids won't be holding it and having the inevitable fight and cry. The reason I was keen on this game was because it meant I could play my own music, and so I had seven little Korean children running about excitedly to Felix Da Housecat's Bugged Out mix. This an admittedly average mix by one of house music's premier DJs. Fortunately my kids aren't too critical over their techno mixes quite yet, so were delighted to run about in circles.
The game was very successful and virtually without fights, until a moment of excitement caused a collision between Mikey and Eric, leaving Eric the worse off. He's prone to nosebleeds I think, and it was pouring away, mixing with his little infant tears. Shock reverberated throughout the rest of the class and Jerry ran away to get Cathy-teacher, who put Eric on the sofa. Every child who is sick gets to sit on the sofa, which magically cures all.
A dog, you may or may not know, can chase sheep innocently and all is ok. But when the dog finally attacks a sheep and draws blood, then things are never the same again. With the taste of blood the dog is taken back to its primeval roots and becomes savage around sheep in future, so must be destroyed or removed from sheep vicinity. Well, I've compared myself to a dog in the past, and again the comparison returns. For six months I've been teaching children, helping them, trying to better their lives.
But today I got my first taste of blood.
It was Ocean, the second youngest class in the school, of 4 and 5 year olds. On Tuesdays I take them, all 7 of them, to gym class. Although a lovely class, they seem to spend 50% of their time fighting, crying and saying "I'm sorry" or "Mi-an-hae" so I have to be careful what games I play because half of then descend quickly into three kids crying and the other four crowded round them apologising. Always over absolutely nothing, of course. Fights, by the way, are never actually proper fighting (which I'd actively encourage for entertainment value) but are just one kid putting their head in their hands and making a show of being in a huff.
Anyway, today I devised this game where they run in a circle to music, and when the music stops they have to pick up a small piece of red lego from somewhere around the room, and the child that doesn't have a piece of lego is out. Lego is small enough so that two kids won't be holding it and having the inevitable fight and cry. The reason I was keen on this game was because it meant I could play my own music, and so I had seven little Korean children running about excitedly to Felix Da Housecat's Bugged Out mix. This an admittedly average mix by one of house music's premier DJs. Fortunately my kids aren't too critical over their techno mixes quite yet, so were delighted to run about in circles.
The game was very successful and virtually without fights, until a moment of excitement caused a collision between Mikey and Eric, leaving Eric the worse off. He's prone to nosebleeds I think, and it was pouring away, mixing with his little infant tears. Shock reverberated throughout the rest of the class and Jerry ran away to get Cathy-teacher, who put Eric on the sofa. Every child who is sick gets to sit on the sofa, which magically cures all.
A dog, you may or may not know, can chase sheep innocently and all is ok. But when the dog finally attacks a sheep and draws blood, then things are never the same again. With the taste of blood the dog is taken back to its primeval roots and becomes savage around sheep in future, so must be destroyed or removed from sheep vicinity. Well, I've compared myself to a dog in the past, and again the comparison returns. For six months I've been teaching children, helping them, trying to better their lives.
But today I got my first taste of blood.
Monday, 28 June 2004
The Gin Girls And Other Koreans
Quite a pleasant weekend, in a fairly minimal and laid back kind of way.
It began at 3am on Saturday morning, when I woke to watch the European football, as ever. This time France lost 1-0 to Greece, which amused me greatly.
At 11am it was to the YMCA. Not for some man-on-man action, but because that's where my Korean lessons take place. This time, though, it was test day. I wasn't terribly nervous because there's nothing much at stake except pride, and I was fairly confident that the reading and writing part would be within my realms of comprehension. So it proved. Not easy, though, but manageable and I'm confident of a good result. The speaking test I didn't even realise was taking place until about half way through. I thought it was just our teacher chatting to us. I blundered about like a backwards child, but was alright overall.
There was a party afterwards. This being the YMCA and just noon, it wasn't a raging affair of soju and debauchery, but rather just a congregation of all the classes round a set of tables for pizza, fruit and coke (coca cola). As mentioned it my last entry, I'm very anti-social these days and prefer not to meet people I don't already know, so did my best to avoid any sort of conversation with anybody. I talked to Tim, of course, and both our teachers in the end. Tim fancies one of the teachers, a tall, attractive, very innocent-seeming one, and was most annoyed when she chose to sit next to me (being surly and trying to avoid eye contact with everybody) and chat away in pidgin Korean.
I'm obviously popular with the Korean ladies right now because afterwards I was desperately trying to find good CDs in the only slightly decent CD shop in Daegu, and was approached by a schoolgirl. This, it goes without saying, is always something I encourage. I think she was wanting to practice her English, and it was very good English. She recommended a CD to me and we chatted about music for a while and I decided to take a risk on the CD because it sounded like it might be ok. She was delighted I was going for her recommendation and gave me her discount card to use, which got me 25% off. She was a very charming Korean school girl indeed and the best thing about her was that she was called "Hyu-joo" which sounds just like "Huge Jew".
The CD turned out to be utter pish and I broke it into pieces and threw it in the bin. No, it was alright, quite poppy but in a summery, laid back, acceptable way and I'll certainly listen to it more in future. Well done Huge Jew!
I couldn't be bothered saving orphans that afternoon so dozed a little and then did some shopping and internet and was in bed for about 10pm so I could watch Holland beat Sweden on penalties the following morning.
Sunday was a good day, most notable for being my first lesson with my 132nd student, the shopkeeper's 23 year old nubile daughter. I met her at noon and the good news was that I was getting two for the price of one, as she was bringing a friend. The daughter is called Hyo-Joo (that's Hyo, not Hyu) I think and the friend something like Sun-i (as in a type of Muslim).
I was pleased about this development as it means that when gin is introduced into the lessons, there will be twice as much fun. From now on I'm going to refer to my two new students - nos 132 and 133 - as the "Gin Girls".
Anyway, it turned out to be enormous fun. We went to Hyo-Joo's (i.e. her parent's) home and spent over three hours in total working in a mixture of English and Korean. Their English isn't terribly developed, it's very obviously school English, and is probably just a step above my Korean. We used a textbook as our working template and just threw words at each other and tried to make sense.
Time went by very fast and it definitely did me good to have people to really practice my Korean with. Sun-i said she was very excited and hoped we could have a good friendship. I said "oori-nun jigum jin-ul masyeo-yo" which means "Now, we drink gin." No, I didn't actually, I just agreed.
Despite all my lecherous gin talk here, and my ignoble intentions, the girls were both very pleasant and fun, and good company. I'd been worried I might end up with a surly cow or someone too shy for their own good, and it would all feel too much like work, but it was anything but. It was very enjoyable.
Next meeting is Friday 8.30pm at my apartment. We'll talk in English and Korean at first, but by 9.30pm I hope that it will only be the gin talking...
Late afternoon then, and after the language exchange, it started to piss down with rain quite severely and so began an enjoyably thunder storm which unfortunately resulted in my TV reception getting cut entirely. As a result I had to go to Tim's house to watch the football last night/this morning, which resulted in me getting about 2 hours sleep today. And as it's now 7pm, this means I'm rather tired. Hence I'm going to leave the school right now, go to my little shop and buy some milkshakes (I sometimes get them free now), eat some food and go to bed.
Goodnight.
It began at 3am on Saturday morning, when I woke to watch the European football, as ever. This time France lost 1-0 to Greece, which amused me greatly.
At 11am it was to the YMCA. Not for some man-on-man action, but because that's where my Korean lessons take place. This time, though, it was test day. I wasn't terribly nervous because there's nothing much at stake except pride, and I was fairly confident that the reading and writing part would be within my realms of comprehension. So it proved. Not easy, though, but manageable and I'm confident of a good result. The speaking test I didn't even realise was taking place until about half way through. I thought it was just our teacher chatting to us. I blundered about like a backwards child, but was alright overall.
There was a party afterwards. This being the YMCA and just noon, it wasn't a raging affair of soju and debauchery, but rather just a congregation of all the classes round a set of tables for pizza, fruit and coke (coca cola). As mentioned it my last entry, I'm very anti-social these days and prefer not to meet people I don't already know, so did my best to avoid any sort of conversation with anybody. I talked to Tim, of course, and both our teachers in the end. Tim fancies one of the teachers, a tall, attractive, very innocent-seeming one, and was most annoyed when she chose to sit next to me (being surly and trying to avoid eye contact with everybody) and chat away in pidgin Korean.
I'm obviously popular with the Korean ladies right now because afterwards I was desperately trying to find good CDs in the only slightly decent CD shop in Daegu, and was approached by a schoolgirl. This, it goes without saying, is always something I encourage. I think she was wanting to practice her English, and it was very good English. She recommended a CD to me and we chatted about music for a while and I decided to take a risk on the CD because it sounded like it might be ok. She was delighted I was going for her recommendation and gave me her discount card to use, which got me 25% off. She was a very charming Korean school girl indeed and the best thing about her was that she was called "Hyu-joo" which sounds just like "Huge Jew".
The CD turned out to be utter pish and I broke it into pieces and threw it in the bin. No, it was alright, quite poppy but in a summery, laid back, acceptable way and I'll certainly listen to it more in future. Well done Huge Jew!
I couldn't be bothered saving orphans that afternoon so dozed a little and then did some shopping and internet and was in bed for about 10pm so I could watch Holland beat Sweden on penalties the following morning.
Sunday was a good day, most notable for being my first lesson with my 132nd student, the shopkeeper's 23 year old nubile daughter. I met her at noon and the good news was that I was getting two for the price of one, as she was bringing a friend. The daughter is called Hyo-Joo (that's Hyo, not Hyu) I think and the friend something like Sun-i (as in a type of Muslim).
I was pleased about this development as it means that when gin is introduced into the lessons, there will be twice as much fun. From now on I'm going to refer to my two new students - nos 132 and 133 - as the "Gin Girls".
Anyway, it turned out to be enormous fun. We went to Hyo-Joo's (i.e. her parent's) home and spent over three hours in total working in a mixture of English and Korean. Their English isn't terribly developed, it's very obviously school English, and is probably just a step above my Korean. We used a textbook as our working template and just threw words at each other and tried to make sense.
Time went by very fast and it definitely did me good to have people to really practice my Korean with. Sun-i said she was very excited and hoped we could have a good friendship. I said "oori-nun jigum jin-ul masyeo-yo" which means "Now, we drink gin." No, I didn't actually, I just agreed.
Despite all my lecherous gin talk here, and my ignoble intentions, the girls were both very pleasant and fun, and good company. I'd been worried I might end up with a surly cow or someone too shy for their own good, and it would all feel too much like work, but it was anything but. It was very enjoyable.
Next meeting is Friday 8.30pm at my apartment. We'll talk in English and Korean at first, but by 9.30pm I hope that it will only be the gin talking...
Late afternoon then, and after the language exchange, it started to piss down with rain quite severely and so began an enjoyably thunder storm which unfortunately resulted in my TV reception getting cut entirely. As a result I had to go to Tim's house to watch the football last night/this morning, which resulted in me getting about 2 hours sleep today. And as it's now 7pm, this means I'm rather tired. Hence I'm going to leave the school right now, go to my little shop and buy some milkshakes (I sometimes get them free now), eat some food and go to bed.
Goodnight.
Anti-social Nev
"What's happened to Nev?" seemed to have been a popular question this weekend, as both Matt and Tim relayed the message that a number of people had been expressing it.
Where am I? Well, nowhere really. The truth is,I have become very anti-social recently.
The football has exacerbated this condition, but my sociability index was on a steep downward trend for many weeks before it. Currently, my living schedule is: wake at 3.30am, watch football, study some Korean and do bits and pieces in my apartment till working from 10.30 to 7. I aim to be asleep in bed by 9pm.
I should mention that I'm hugely enjoying this new schedule and am seriously considering maintaining it even after the end of football.
However, it's killed my social life. And I don't care. I no longer have evenings free as I'm sleeping, which means that during the week I see none of my friends. And now, over weekends, as I don't go out drinking any more, this has resulted in most of my friends disappearing from my life. They're just a phonecall away, but to be honest, I can't really be bothered to see them anyway.
A few exceptions. Matt I still see every week. And through him, I see Rebecca also, who I like and get on with. We'll sometimes just meet for coffee, or go and see a film, or just piss about.
I see Tim a lot through both Korean class and the orphanage, which is where I see Mariano too. I also seem to see Laura quite frequently too.
The rest of my friends, increasingly little. A big goodbye for Kristi, who has now left Korea. I knew she was leaving in a few weeks, but it all happened much quicker than expected and suddenly she was having her leaving night on Monday. I knew about it but... just couldn't be bothered. I wanted to go to sleep instead.
The thing is, I'm gloriously happy with my life right now. I enjoy studying Korean, teaching might be tiring but is mostly enjoyable, and I enjoy having all this free time in the morning now, rather than the evening. In the morning I have energy to do things; in the evening I was always knackered.
The crux of the matter is that friendships (especially fairly new ones) need maintenance and I just don't have the time, energy or will for that maintenance. Weekdays, I'd far rather stay in than go out. Weekends, I'd rather wind down than get revved up. I suppose I'm also happy that if I ever want to go out, I can.
Yeah, it's likely that I'll still see some of these forgotten faces in the next month or two, but I'm afraid I'm a rubbish friend right now. I also haven't been drunk in a couple of months - maybe tipsy once. I think, possibly, a big drunken night might be looming. Matt seems keen for one, mostly because he's off his medication, and so is now allowed to drink again.
But when it comes down to it, given a choice between football and friendship, football will always be the victor.
*
Where am I? Well, nowhere really. The truth is,I have become very anti-social recently.
The football has exacerbated this condition, but my sociability index was on a steep downward trend for many weeks before it. Currently, my living schedule is: wake at 3.30am, watch football, study some Korean and do bits and pieces in my apartment till working from 10.30 to 7. I aim to be asleep in bed by 9pm.
I should mention that I'm hugely enjoying this new schedule and am seriously considering maintaining it even after the end of football.
However, it's killed my social life. And I don't care. I no longer have evenings free as I'm sleeping, which means that during the week I see none of my friends. And now, over weekends, as I don't go out drinking any more, this has resulted in most of my friends disappearing from my life. They're just a phonecall away, but to be honest, I can't really be bothered to see them anyway.
A few exceptions. Matt I still see every week. And through him, I see Rebecca also, who I like and get on with. We'll sometimes just meet for coffee, or go and see a film, or just piss about.
I see Tim a lot through both Korean class and the orphanage, which is where I see Mariano too. I also seem to see Laura quite frequently too.
The rest of my friends, increasingly little. A big goodbye for Kristi, who has now left Korea. I knew she was leaving in a few weeks, but it all happened much quicker than expected and suddenly she was having her leaving night on Monday. I knew about it but... just couldn't be bothered. I wanted to go to sleep instead.
The thing is, I'm gloriously happy with my life right now. I enjoy studying Korean, teaching might be tiring but is mostly enjoyable, and I enjoy having all this free time in the morning now, rather than the evening. In the morning I have energy to do things; in the evening I was always knackered.
The crux of the matter is that friendships (especially fairly new ones) need maintenance and I just don't have the time, energy or will for that maintenance. Weekdays, I'd far rather stay in than go out. Weekends, I'd rather wind down than get revved up. I suppose I'm also happy that if I ever want to go out, I can.
Yeah, it's likely that I'll still see some of these forgotten faces in the next month or two, but I'm afraid I'm a rubbish friend right now. I also haven't been drunk in a couple of months - maybe tipsy once. I think, possibly, a big drunken night might be looming. Matt seems keen for one, mostly because he's off his medication, and so is now allowed to drink again.
But when it comes down to it, given a choice between football and friendship, football will always be the victor.
*
Tuesday, 22 June 2004
The 132nd Student
This morning I worked out how many students I teach over the course of one week. I get most classes twice a week, and some up to five times. In total, I teach 131 students, all of which I now know the names of (the final class clicked into place last week). My class size ranges from 5 to 12. The average child is 8 years 5 months and a day, is 4 foot 11, 61% male, quite nice, and is fully Korean.
None of these statistics takes into account, however, the 132nd student...
I don't know my 132nd student's name, but I do know that she is 23, about 5 foot 10, 100% female (I hope), quite nice and is fully Korean. Yes, she's the daughter of the shopkeeper that I agreed to give free English lessons to in order to practice my Korean. Last Friday I met her for the first time, and the first lesson takes place this coming Sunday.
I may have mentioned, but I was a little anxious about this girl. Because what if she looked like a pig? Teaching a troll would be no fun at all, and I'm sure my Korean wouldn't improve much. So, fingers were crossed that she'd have acquired no stray bad genes from her handsome father and attractive mother.
Fortunately, it all turned out well. On Friday, when in the shop, she appeared in the door, the fine figure of an attractive young woman. Her English doesn't appear too good, in fact it's possible it's on about a par with my Korean. All the negotiations about where and when to meet for the lesson were done in Korean, with a smattering of German too from the father.
The poor father. He obviously thinks I'm a trustworthy fellow and is happily sending is daughter to learn English from me, whereas all she'll really learn is the true meaning of corruption.
Anyway, she appeared very pleasant (and of course, it is the personality that counts...) and quite shy too. The first lesson is scheduled for this Sunday at noon, in my apartment.
These are the first things I'm going to teach her:
1. I want gin, please.
2. I want more gin, please.
3. Please Nev, may I have more gin?
4. More gin now!
5. God Bless Scotland and God Bless Gin!
6. Yes, you can touch me.
It will be a joy to teach someone the joys of gin, in English. My kindergarten classes never quite got it, even when I mixed it with their milk.
So this week I have been exhaustively cleaning my apartment in preparation for this event, to make myself look civilised of course but also simply for health reasons. As I've only been teaching mostly reluctant children to date, it's going to be an interesting challenge to teach an interested adult. I'm hoping she'll be a bit better behaved than my kids, and unlike Eric of Ocean class last week, not wet herself. Likewise, not vomit or wipe snot across her face. Also, I'm hoping she's not obsessed with "ddong", i.e. faeces, like much of my children. Or shout "game ! game!" every five minutes. Actually, I may allow that one.
I was in the shop last night and my 132nd student and her mother were behind the counter. And they gave me a free juice and a free iced tea. This is a very promising development.
I asked David how many students he has, and he only has about 110. Therefore, if student numbers were a guage of teaching ability, I would be 20% a better teacher than him.
And, incidentally, 428% better than my mother.
None of these statistics takes into account, however, the 132nd student...
I don't know my 132nd student's name, but I do know that she is 23, about 5 foot 10, 100% female (I hope), quite nice and is fully Korean. Yes, she's the daughter of the shopkeeper that I agreed to give free English lessons to in order to practice my Korean. Last Friday I met her for the first time, and the first lesson takes place this coming Sunday.
I may have mentioned, but I was a little anxious about this girl. Because what if she looked like a pig? Teaching a troll would be no fun at all, and I'm sure my Korean wouldn't improve much. So, fingers were crossed that she'd have acquired no stray bad genes from her handsome father and attractive mother.
Fortunately, it all turned out well. On Friday, when in the shop, she appeared in the door, the fine figure of an attractive young woman. Her English doesn't appear too good, in fact it's possible it's on about a par with my Korean. All the negotiations about where and when to meet for the lesson were done in Korean, with a smattering of German too from the father.
The poor father. He obviously thinks I'm a trustworthy fellow and is happily sending is daughter to learn English from me, whereas all she'll really learn is the true meaning of corruption.
Anyway, she appeared very pleasant (and of course, it is the personality that counts...) and quite shy too. The first lesson is scheduled for this Sunday at noon, in my apartment.
These are the first things I'm going to teach her:
1. I want gin, please.
2. I want more gin, please.
3. Please Nev, may I have more gin?
4. More gin now!
5. God Bless Scotland and God Bless Gin!
6. Yes, you can touch me.
It will be a joy to teach someone the joys of gin, in English. My kindergarten classes never quite got it, even when I mixed it with their milk.
So this week I have been exhaustively cleaning my apartment in preparation for this event, to make myself look civilised of course but also simply for health reasons. As I've only been teaching mostly reluctant children to date, it's going to be an interesting challenge to teach an interested adult. I'm hoping she'll be a bit better behaved than my kids, and unlike Eric of Ocean class last week, not wet herself. Likewise, not vomit or wipe snot across her face. Also, I'm hoping she's not obsessed with "ddong", i.e. faeces, like much of my children. Or shout "game ! game!" every five minutes. Actually, I may allow that one.
I was in the shop last night and my 132nd student and her mother were behind the counter. And they gave me a free juice and a free iced tea. This is a very promising development.
I asked David how many students he has, and he only has about 110. Therefore, if student numbers were a guage of teaching ability, I would be 20% a better teacher than him.
And, incidentally, 428% better than my mother.
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