I feel like I'm living in a
frat house. My housemates are
Korean staff members of the
Yu Shim Cheon building where I work, and I've given them all English
nicknames. There's Go Pro, because his family name is "Go" and he's a
golf semi-pro. There's
Ranger, because his name,
Park Jun Ho is the same as a guy who plays for the
Texas Rangers. He's a
swimming instructor and used to swim for the
Korean national swim team. And there's
Tiger, because his name,
Jae Ho, means "tiger" in
Chinese. He's a swimming instructor, too. He hasn't moved in yet, but he probably will over
Christmas break. Go Pro moved in unexpectedly last night. I didn't even know he was moving in until he just showed up last night and announced he was moving in. All three of these guys will be sleeping in the same room, while I get a bedroom to myself.
Foreign teachers are treated much better than the
Korean staff here.
As well as having nicknames that sound like like frat boys', they drink like frat boys as well. Despite it being a Tuesday night, they dragged me out last night to drink a bottle of Bacardi 151 with them at a "jazz club" (in quotation marks, because it's a Korean jazz club, not a real jazz club; there is very little actual jazz played there) to celebrate Go Pro moving in. They then proceeded to try to set me up with a Filipino singer named Garnet who works there. She was nice enough, but not really my type.
Seems like everyone's trying to set me up. We have a new Korean teacher at our school named Mi Hi (I think that name sounds cute, like someone laughing: mee hee hee hee hee). So Jackie, our secretary/councillor calls me over to introduce me. "Mi Hi! This is Alex, our head foreign teacher. He's single. He's very handsome and a genius. Alex, this is Mi Hi, the new Korean teacher. She is very young and beautiful. She is also single. Here. Shake hands. Sit down beside her. Talk to her!"
"Mi Hi," I say, "This is Jackie. She's very subtle." Or that's what I should have said, but clever lines only spring to mind after it's too late.
I suddenly realized today that I haven't yet bought a present for our hagwon's secret Santa. I'll have to go to Carrefour after I finish teaching and get one. Fortunately, the person whose name I drew is easy to shop for. I'll just get her some makeup.
This is an incredibly busy week. I've already filled out student reports, made lesson plans, held a meeting, found teachers to substitute for me while I'm back in Canada for Christmas and laid out a new curriculum for the new year... I still have to make tests for tomorrow and plan for the school's Christmas party on Friday. And pack. I still haven't started packing, despite the fact that I'm travelling halfway around the world on Saturday.
It's going to be good to get back to Canada. Aside from the fact that I desperately need a vacation, it's also been nearly a year and a half since I've seen my friends and family back home. Two weeks doesn't seem like nearly long enough, but it'll have to do. I can nearly taste the Alexander Keith's India Pale Ale and Decarie Hot Dog poutine that I've been craving since coming to Korea.
I played a very frustrating game of Go this morning. Playing against a supposedly stronger opponent, I captured a small group of stones in the middle game, and got to be probably about 20 points ahead. After two endgame mistakes of about 10 points each, I ended up losing by a half point, due to komi. Those close games never seem to go my way. In my 4 months of playing on IGS, I've lost 5 or 6 games by a half point, and only won one by that margin.