Nothing out of the ordinary has been going on in the realm of teaching lately. Even after my AQ course wrapped up I still haven't found this extreme urge to post about anything that I've done (It might be because I don't kiss and tell. . . oops)
This morning I had an open spare and I started reading up on OTAs and Fantasy Football articles. My brain started ticking, producing formulas, rating scales, and measurable categories to calculate and produce a top 200 fantasy player board, again. I had written up my wideout rating scales and set up a rough outline on Excel which I was expecting to continue because I guess writing isn't my thing at the moment.
Just now, one of my co-teachers alerted me that I need to write something over the weekend for the school newspaper. Half a page so the other half can be translated into Korean. The topic: anything. I've already conjured up a list of things that's still progressing and filtering as I type. Since I'm fresh out of ideas for topics in my adult conversation class I'm going to see what they think I should write about and discuss a recent Korean wedding (Spoiler Alert: its between two men!). And to think, I was going to write about the supermoon (there's a reason there isn't a link).
Hopefully this fun little blurb about whatever we collectively brainstorm will be the kick-start I need to get back into the swing of blogging and writing as a whole while putting off this top 200 players list yet another year. This 100 blog posts is looking pretty intimidating now but you'll get to read this school article and maybe if all goes well it can be the pebble to start the rock slide.
Wish me luck!
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
Sunday, June 23, 2013
Beer Fest!
In a very well-to-do area of Busan there was a lovely beer festival that ends today. I have been there three times all of which were great. There were obviously some major differences in between this Beer Fest and the typical Craft Brewery Tastings and Oktoberfest. The festival was outside in a big open square with plastic tables and chairs in the middle and food stations and taps on three sides and a stage on the other. I'd say there were about 250 to 400 people at the event.
1. Admission was 8,000 won. They give you a plastic glass and a wristband and then you can drink all the beer you want until 11:00 pm. Pay 8 dollars to drink as much beer as possible? That would lead to drunken anarchy in less than 40 minutes anywhere in North America.
2. This was not really a beer festival in a sense because there was only one kind of beer. Mind you it was MAX which is one of the better Korean Beers. This explains the admission price.
3. There was a whole bunch of entertainment: Live performers, dance offs, televised sports and a kiss-cam. They had a stage on one side of the square and the backdrop was a huge screen where they televised the baseball games. The kiss-cams were hilarious because when it went to an old couple the man would lay it on the poor old lady and then celebrate like he just threw the final out in the World Series. There were cameras around the square that would film the regular Joes and Janes dancing to Gangnam Style and Gentleman. It was really interactive and I think everyone enjoyed it, especially the kids.
4. Yes, there were kids at this beer festival. I guess its because there isn't this huge fear of exposing kids to drunk people and babysitters are so hard to find any day of the week because all Korean students do is study night and day.
5. People were not overly rowdy or even sloppy at this event. It's not like a kegger, tailgater or a country music festival. Thus, there was no reason to have security or an ambulance in earshot.
6. There were 4 urinals and one was clogged.
1. Admission was 8,000 won. They give you a plastic glass and a wristband and then you can drink all the beer you want until 11:00 pm. Pay 8 dollars to drink as much beer as possible? That would lead to drunken anarchy in less than 40 minutes anywhere in North America.
2. This was not really a beer festival in a sense because there was only one kind of beer. Mind you it was MAX which is one of the better Korean Beers. This explains the admission price.
3. There was a whole bunch of entertainment: Live performers, dance offs, televised sports and a kiss-cam. They had a stage on one side of the square and the backdrop was a huge screen where they televised the baseball games. The kiss-cams were hilarious because when it went to an old couple the man would lay it on the poor old lady and then celebrate like he just threw the final out in the World Series. There were cameras around the square that would film the regular Joes and Janes dancing to Gangnam Style and Gentleman. It was really interactive and I think everyone enjoyed it, especially the kids.
4. Yes, there were kids at this beer festival. I guess its because there isn't this huge fear of exposing kids to drunk people and babysitters are so hard to find any day of the week because all Korean students do is study night and day.
5. People were not overly rowdy or even sloppy at this event. It's not like a kegger, tailgater or a country music festival. Thus, there was no reason to have security or an ambulance in earshot.
6. There were 4 urinals and one was clogged.
Top 5: Sand Fest!!
So last weekend there a was Sand Festival at Haeundae Beach and I gotta tell ya: It was pretty cool. It didn't live up to the high expectations I had dreamed about the night before of statues and castles ten feet tall with intricate details. It was more an outdoor museum with portrait of popular things, surprisingly no Psy stuff. Nonetheless here's the best of the best: mind you I only took 7 photos. It might also be if I had to watch 5 movies that used sand-mation (patent pending) these would be them.
NUMBER 4: I saw this movie last night and the aesthetics are astounding and make up for a script that's 80% exposition. I like the textures and the slickness but I can't say I'm a big fan of the cowlick .
NUMBER 3: It's very segmented but it's really cool that Koreans know about Star Wars.
NUMBER 2: There were 5 pictures in this roll of film and I thought the Hulk was the best on of all of them, and Gollum's head is pretty sweet too. It's also the only one where he breaks through the strip.
NUMBER 5: This sets the tone of what's to come, classic films, heroes and dump trucks of sand. I like the classic look but there are no craters in the moon. That's Korean science for you, they can build a phone better than anybody else but they don't know what the moon really looks like.
NUMBER 1: This is not only a huge bias because Batman is just way better than everyone else on the list. I love the card sticking out of the sand, the shattered bat, and the colony of bats scattered on the sand. It took up a lot of space and there's lot of stuff to look at.
Monday, June 10, 2013
Revisiting my Teen Years.
I had a very up and down day half way through last week. I woke up before my alarm submitted work for my AQ and did all the regular stuff I do before school. Once I got to school the co-teacher, who I don't necessarily agree with all of the time, threatened my employment. She claimed in the class that she runs, and where I am her English assistant (aka puppet) that I am too boring and dry much like the students who occupy her class. The clinching threat was when she said she would phone the school board and also notify my vice-principal that I should not come back, and this co-teacher wouldn't allow me to teach in her class for the rest of the year.
I will admit that I am a little boring but moroseness, just like excitement, is contagious when students greet you with rolling eyes, and submitting sheets with ten words on them copied up to twenty times. Plainly stated, I hate her teaching style of "Listen and repeat. If you can't do that you're writing lines." and I hate how she doesn't have me contribute anything to her lessons or listen to my general input. I'm degraded and I hate myself for every moment I'm stuck there gazing out into these straight-lined faces. As she lectured down to me I felt completely above it; I'll admit I haven't been teaching since Confucius but I think for having taught less than a full year I'm doing really well. Then all of a sudden thoughts kept creeping into my head.
"I'm well aware of minimal role in this classroom."
"Go ahead, kick me out of your class. You'd be doing us both a favor."
and that pure teenage angst line; "You don't fucking know me!"
However, I kept it professional, after all she decided to have children doing supplementary work while this was going on. I don't think I got a full sentence out in the entire conversation. She squashes opposing views. I was at a boiling point by the end of the discussion, a great way to start the day. Less than a minute after the first class of the day came in and I just said to myself, "Be that used car salesmen, sell the shit out of this literal PPT of shit." and so I did.
After the class she was ecstatic about how good the class worked based on my contribution (which was almost 50% of the teaching). Either way, now I go into this class thinking that my co-teacher thinks I'm a useless ball of slime and day by day, class by class, I have to prove her wrong. She's gone with the school year and in December, when the curriculum is finished, I have complete control of the classroom, according to our conference we just had now. I do feel like a teenager now, a new chapter has opened up and I want to go in and grab the world by the balls but there's this lame parent here who is pretending like I'm not a qualified teacher and calling my curfew and giving me lectures that I couldn't give a flying fuck about. The important thing I've learned is I don't want to co-teach for the rest of my life.
I will admit that I am a little boring but moroseness, just like excitement, is contagious when students greet you with rolling eyes, and submitting sheets with ten words on them copied up to twenty times. Plainly stated, I hate her teaching style of "Listen and repeat. If you can't do that you're writing lines." and I hate how she doesn't have me contribute anything to her lessons or listen to my general input. I'm degraded and I hate myself for every moment I'm stuck there gazing out into these straight-lined faces. As she lectured down to me I felt completely above it; I'll admit I haven't been teaching since Confucius but I think for having taught less than a full year I'm doing really well. Then all of a sudden thoughts kept creeping into my head.
"I'm well aware of minimal role in this classroom."
"Go ahead, kick me out of your class. You'd be doing us both a favor."
and that pure teenage angst line; "You don't fucking know me!"
However, I kept it professional, after all she decided to have children doing supplementary work while this was going on. I don't think I got a full sentence out in the entire conversation. She squashes opposing views. I was at a boiling point by the end of the discussion, a great way to start the day. Less than a minute after the first class of the day came in and I just said to myself, "Be that used car salesmen, sell the shit out of this literal PPT of shit." and so I did.
After the class she was ecstatic about how good the class worked based on my contribution (which was almost 50% of the teaching). Either way, now I go into this class thinking that my co-teacher thinks I'm a useless ball of slime and day by day, class by class, I have to prove her wrong. She's gone with the school year and in December, when the curriculum is finished, I have complete control of the classroom, according to our conference we just had now. I do feel like a teenager now, a new chapter has opened up and I want to go in and grab the world by the balls but there's this lame parent here who is pretending like I'm not a qualified teacher and calling my curfew and giving me lectures that I couldn't give a flying fuck about. The important thing I've learned is I don't want to co-teach for the rest of my life.
Thursday, May 30, 2013
TOP 5: The first of many
In my conversation class last week I explained Top 10s, 20s, 100s, etc. My example was off of a fellow Ex-pat's blog titled "The Top 21 things Koreans like." There were the obvious ones like kimchi, Korea, hearing foreigners say that they love Korea and then there were ones that made me laugh: old Friends episodes, Internet Explorer, Dokdo, fried chicken, German made cars, and canned music. Then of course there were the materialist things too: high heels, and skin-whitening cream. I wanted them to make their own top 10 favourite things about anything, but the class digressed into a very odd, and shocking, conversation about race, appearances and misnomers about black people.
1. Fine - This is the by far the most vacant and common reply to the question "How are you?" It's the definition of an automated response even for the students who can't read they all know how to say I'm fine. I hate it, hate it, HATE IT.
So I figured I'd make up for the lack of top tens being made last week by pledging to do some Top 5s in the blog world.
Here are 5 words that have lost all meaning to me because I hear them to often.
Here are 5 words that have lost all meaning to me because I hear them to often.
5. EHHHHHH/ OI - After countless games of volleyball and the incessant cheering and hooting these EHHHs and OIs, I never want to hear them again. I doubt they had much meaning, if any, in the beginning anyways.
4. Handsome - I could survive on compliments alone but when those compliments are also given to less-deserving faces (Rowan Atkinson) I've come to understand that Koreans believe for someone to be handsome they need to have a face with a nose two eyes and and a mouth that has minimal scarring.
3. Nice to meet you - Children who I have known the entire time I've been at this school still say this to me. They don't seem to understand its a one-time sentence. I wish I could spend a full day just teaching them other things to say such as "Good to see you." Who am I kidding though, this is something for their English Academies to fix.
3. Nice to meet you - Children who I have known the entire time I've been at this school still say this to me. They don't seem to understand its a one-time sentence. I wish I could spend a full day just teaching them other things to say such as "Good to see you." Who am I kidding though, this is something for their English Academies to fix.
2. Yes - I try to ask a lot of questions and typically that's the answer. Until my co-teachers realize what I've asked them and they go the round about way of taking back their yes.
1. Fine - This is the by far the most vacant and common reply to the question "How are you?" It's the definition of an automated response even for the students who can't read they all know how to say I'm fine. I hate it, hate it, HATE IT.
Tuesday, May 28, 2013
Dates, Plans, and Hazards of Love.
I feel really happy, and also kind of sad. I opened up to a complete stranger, and I'm overcome with giddiness whenever I think about her. The way she talks, she just pulls me in with stories and her laugh.
That was written a long long time ago and those feelings have faded into nothing. Now I've come to the conclusion that being single is very important for me. I have always treated this adventure as a sabbatical from real life. This lifestyle is a budgeted fantasy. I'm living my life with few restrictions and limits but I have to clean up my mistakes all on my own. I've forgotten where I read this or where I heard it but falling in love is easy, precisely why its called falling in love. My mind is at a point where it is eager to tumble into endorphins and continue living like it's the weekend. Tragically, that won't happen until this crash course is off my plate. Coincidentally, when my course is finished, summer time truly begins: Summer camp starts, then Mudfest the first weekend, then Ansan Valley Rock Festival on the second, and then I'm flying to Bangkok to meet THE craziest guy I know for a Hangoveresque time. Don't worry, Dad, I'll be careful :).
The title of this post is because the fact I went on a date-date and two alternative albums I listened two them the following day on a chilly February desk-warming assignment. I remember the emotions vaguely but I have other reasons to be happy now after seeing the big picture. I'm one step closer to gaining some bilingual certification, ultimately returning home, settling in, and then I'll just keep my head up. Why you ask? So I won't see where I'll fall.
That was written a long long time ago and those feelings have faded into nothing. Now I've come to the conclusion that being single is very important for me. I have always treated this adventure as a sabbatical from real life. This lifestyle is a budgeted fantasy. I'm living my life with few restrictions and limits but I have to clean up my mistakes all on my own. I've forgotten where I read this or where I heard it but falling in love is easy, precisely why its called falling in love. My mind is at a point where it is eager to tumble into endorphins and continue living like it's the weekend. Tragically, that won't happen until this crash course is off my plate. Coincidentally, when my course is finished, summer time truly begins: Summer camp starts, then Mudfest the first weekend, then Ansan Valley Rock Festival on the second, and then I'm flying to Bangkok to meet THE craziest guy I know for a Hangoveresque time. Don't worry, Dad, I'll be careful :).
The title of this post is because the fact I went on a date-date and two alternative albums I listened two them the following day on a chilly February desk-warming assignment. I remember the emotions vaguely but I have other reasons to be happy now after seeing the big picture. I'm one step closer to gaining some bilingual certification, ultimately returning home, settling in, and then I'll just keep my head up. Why you ask? So I won't see where I'll fall.
Saturday, May 25, 2013
Catch-up Monday
OK here's my plan: I'll give you short concise summaries of the events that have happened over this week.
Monday was the first day of a volleyball tournament and also the last day for us. The atmosphere was off the hook, something I never expected from a bunch of middle-aged teachers representing their schools. But some of the younger female teachers from our school showed their support and were cheering the whole way through all of our loses on. It was really cool to be there with the cheers and the gasps at every play. I wish I had played a better game but we did the best we could've done considering our school doesn't have a gym and these other club teams practiced daily.
Another awesome thing about this event was watching other players run an entire game. The level of skill is peaks and valleys. Luckily, for those good-spirited teams with little talent, and in typical Korean fashion, there's an abundance of free snacks such as half-decent rice cakes, cucumbers, and watermelon. The principal who watched both our games took us out to dinner for some spicy octopus, shrimp and cow intestine. It was great.
And that was my Monday!
Monday was the first day of a volleyball tournament and also the last day for us. The atmosphere was off the hook, something I never expected from a bunch of middle-aged teachers representing their schools. But some of the younger female teachers from our school showed their support and were cheering the whole way through all of our loses on. It was really cool to be there with the cheers and the gasps at every play. I wish I had played a better game but we did the best we could've done considering our school doesn't have a gym and these other club teams practiced daily.
Another awesome thing about this event was watching other players run an entire game. The level of skill is peaks and valleys. Luckily, for those good-spirited teams with little talent, and in typical Korean fashion, there's an abundance of free snacks such as half-decent rice cakes, cucumbers, and watermelon. The principal who watched both our games took us out to dinner for some spicy octopus, shrimp and cow intestine. It was great.
And that was my Monday!
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