For those of you who aren't on Facebook, or for anyone who'd like to see things in a clear chronological order, here's a collection of a couple months worth of Facebook status updates related to my school. Some are funny, some are slightly vulgar, and some are a bit sad/offensive. Koreans aren't known for cultural awareness.
These should give you a pretty good sense of what my days at school are like. Eventually I'll go back and add ones from before September, too, but this is it for now. Enjoy.
Brian Flyinginarestaurant Colella was one of the first people to lunch, delicious fried fish nuggets today, took 6. realized i was only supposed to take 2 and the principal came in soon after me followed by a wave of other teachers, so i ate 3 really fast to make it look like i only took 1 extra.
September 21 at 12:29pm · · LikeBrian Flyinginarestaurant Colella i was just told "eye color is surprise"
October 15 at 1:17pm · · LikeBrian Flyinginarestaurant Colella for some reason all the landings on the staircases at school are really slippery today. As I was going up, I told a kid to "be careful" because he was bounding down 2 or 3 steps at a time. Of course, he couldn't understand me so he slipped anyway.
October 15 at 1:19pm · · LikeBrian Flyinginarestaurant Colella in an effort to get them to tell me the correct past tense of "to wake" I wrote "I _________ up at 8am." on the board. the first answer I got was "give"
October 15 at 2:09pm · · LikeBrian Flyinginarestaurant Colella one kid just told me the past participle of "write" is "left" ... When none of them wrote anything down to answer "what have you done?" I told them to write "Somehow, I have not learned any English even though I have studied it since elementary school."
October 16 at 3:05pm · · LikeBrian Flyinginarestaurant Colella the population of my English cafe has doubled to 2. A 3rd almost came in but one of the two turned and said something to him and he left. He told me said "son of a bitch, go away," then explained further, "he is always drunk." These are 2nd graders.
October 19 at 2:11pm · · LikeBrian Flyinginarestaurant Colella my student wrote she had never been anywhere interesting. I looked at the top part of the paper. Jeju island was a yes, but she "was tired because [she] was very young." Insa-dong was a yes, but "it was a cloudy day and she wasn't happy."
October 20 at 11:40am · · LikeNamdaemun was a yes, but she "went at night and was tired." Cheonggyecheon was a yes, but "the water smelled bad." Nami island was a yes, but she had to "walk and walk and walk and was very tired."
Brian Flyinginarestaurant Colella oh my lord. one of my coteachers says she has to teach the students what "fee fie fo fum" means... *smh*
October 21 at 9:38am · · LikeBrian Flyinginarestaurant Colella one kid said he will have the most kids because "i love baby" but another kid yelled across the room, "baby hate you!" then, the 1st kid also said "i will be television." another kid said he'd be a teeth doctor and two kids yelled out simultaneously "ahhhh! DENTISTUHHHHH!!!"
October 22 at 9:52am · · LikeBrian Flyinginarestaurant ColellaOctober 22 at 9:52am · DeleteOne of the kids who yelled that, a girl, said she would make lots of money because "I will be a diplomat." I dunno if any other kids in the class even know what a diplomat is.
Brian Flyinginarestaurant Colella i also tried to tell my kids I have a sore throat, I was explaining and pointing to my throat and another kid yells out, "Oh! sick neck!!" ...yeah...
October 22 at 10:08am · · LikeBrian Flyinginarestaurant Colella have i mentioned that every week after one of my classes the same kid comes up and asks me "do you know dambae* elementary school?" every time I say no and he says "leally?" (really) and I say yes, really. every week. and he looks really surpised every time *not sure if dambae is really the name he's saying
October 22 at 5:03pm · · LikeBrian Flyinginarestaurant Colella the damnae elementary kid asked me about 5 times during 1 class today whether I knew it or not. the last time he tried to ask me I cut him off at "teacher.." and sorta yelled at him. that class was pissing me off as a whole.
October 26 at 1:06pm · · LikeBrian Flyinginarestaurant Colella namnae elementary school kid strikes again, about 8 times. finally he says "i'm disappointed that you lie to me all the time." wtf kid, I've been telling you "no" for a month and that's the truth. Today I finally told him "aniyo" hoping maybe if I did it in Korean it'll stick. he looked disappointed but maybe he understands.
November 2 at 2:13pm(Note: After this I told Hye-hyun about it and she talked to her friend who is the homeroom teacher of the class this kid is in. She then asked them about it and they said it wasn't just him but they all wanted to know and they appointed him ambassador. Anyways, she told them that I wasn't lying)
Brian Flyinginarestaurant Colella one of my students is telling me what he did on the weekend. watch tv, sleep, listen to music, and noraebong. I ask what song he sang. 'Gay Bar', he says. So I ask him to sing it for us and he yells out really loud "GIRL!!!!! I WANNA TAKE YOU TO A GAY BAR!!!!!!!" it was beautiful.
November 4 at 1:02pmBrian Flyinginarestaurant Colella I asked my students what do people do with pumpkins on Halloween, and I guess one kid thought I meant what is a pumpkin, because he replied "watermelon friend, but color orangee"
November 5 at 2:15pmBrian Flyinginarestaurant Colella I think the best thing Korean kids do is use the word "surprise!" in odd situations. Examples: A girl student told me "teacher! your eye color is surprise!" In class, a student wasn't doing the assignment so as I was walking around the class I pointed to his paper and asked why. His response: "Surprise!!!"
November 6 at 10:19amBrian Flyinginarestaurant Colella today in class, I was showing pictures from the DMZ and one of my students said "your camera function is good." I suppose it's not technically incorrect but it's still funny. Later, one of the boys in the front was yelling at a boy in the back and he started to go "MOTHERFFff.." and stopped himself, then proceeded to sing "Mother! Father! Give me one dollar!" to cover it up.
November 10 at 1:10pmBrian Flyinginarestaurant Colella
November 10 at 1:10pmThe boy he was yelling at in the back went "oh shit!" and then tried to cover by examining his uniform and saying "oh suit!"
By the way, I'm known on Facebook as Brian Flyinginarestaurant Colella for reasons I can't disclose.