10 months and counting.

Celebrating October birthdays. This is Puppy class. They are Korean age 5. There are 10 of them. It is a very hard class to teach. I have them everyday. Ryan, Daniel, Eric, Tom, Amy, Kate, Sally, Juli, Mark, and Jessica.

Well, tomorrow is November. That's 10 months down. If all was going according to plan, I would be preparing for my last two months in the ROK. PSYCH! I have 16 months to go. Heyoo. I feel good about that decision. Which is pretty lucky. Things are going well. Nothing real awesome lately to talk about. We had a Halloween party with the kinders. We went to this school called "American Village" and they had activities and a haunted house set up. Scared my babies out of their minds. I had about 6 death grips on me and lots of tears. But the next day, they all said it was fun. I didn't really dress up for the grown up activities. Friday night, I met Ian for dinner. I was wearing camo, so when we ended up a the Underground Halloween party, I was able to announce that I was in fact invisible. Yes, weirdly enough meeting Ian for dinner ended with me getting home at 6:30 Saturday morning. Sneak Attack. Very fun though. Thursday night I made dinner for Jason and Ian. It was the first time I had people over to my box for the sake of entertaining them. We played Scrabble and Chess and ate spaghetti. It was a fun evening. Saturday night, there were a lot of Halloween parties up in Seoul. I didn't go, so I basically skipped Halloween. I'm ok with it. Especially since there are no Reese's Cups. Lame.

Pictures of the babies in costumes. No cute quote this time. Just cute princesses, vampires, and power rangers.

Jason of Zebra class. A knight. He is the son of our amazing boss.

Sunny of Apple Class. A witch. Adorable.

Princess Erin of King and Dracula Kevin of Elephant. (Secret- they are my favorite kiddos.)

Wizard Ian of Apple Class.

First floor baby. Donezo on the bus ride home.

Orange pumpkins growing on the vine. Orange pumpkins oh so fine.

Me. Rex. Alex 1. Circle time. Loving Rexy's outfit.

One week left of October.

Sophia's birthday weekend was fun.

There was a huge party at Underground to celebrate their one year anniversary.

I constantly have wee-sing kindergarten Halloween songs stuck in my head.

Sophia and I picked up a new class of 7 year old girls on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons. There are three of them. They are very good at English and are capable of critical thinking and holding real conversations, so it makes class fly by.

Jason, Carly, and I are going to Thailand for winter break! We found cheap tickets and leave on Christmas day. Before we could make travel arrangements, we had to double check our vacation dates. Jason talked our boss into an entire week! Originally break was December 28th-January 4th, which would have been Wednesday-Tuesday again. But now we have a full week! With two weekends! Very exciting. Thailand!

KID QUOTE
Alex 1- Teacher, you live in USA?
Me- Yes I do.
Alex 1- You live in Indiana, USA?
Me- Yes sir.
Alex 1- Teacher! Uh I go there!
Me- Oh yeah!? When?
Alex 1- When I am 27 years old.
Me- Oh! Great! So in 20 years?
Alex 1- YES!
Me- Awesome buddy!
Alex 1- Yes!

Thought

Patience is a virtue.
(So they say)

I can't decide if you'd have better luck telling a 7 year old Korean child to wait or a member of the Dalsimer clan.

Farms, Palaces, Decisions

WARNING: This will be a long one.

On Thursday October 7th, we had a field trip to a farm. The kids dug up sweet potatoes, thrashed rice, and chased rabbits and chickens around. It was pretty fun. They enjoyed themselves.

All the kids digging for sweet potatoes. They loved it.

Rex and one of his potatoes. A day to run around outside and be as loud as we like? OK!

Erin feeding rabbits and chickens and having a ball.

On Friday October 8th, I hung out in Suji and went to a goodbye party for some token Suji folk. I'm sad they're gone, but I did inherit a badminton set.

On Saturday October 9th, Sophia, Nate, and I went up to Seoul and saw a huge palace. This is what the back of my ticket says. "HISTORY OF GYEONGBOKGUNG PALACE: In 1395, three years after the founding of the Joseon Dynasty, the new main palace, Gyeongbokgung, was completed and the capital of the new dynasty was moved from Gaegyeong to Seoul. The palace was destroyed by fire during the Japanese invasions of 1592 and was not reconstructed until 1896. A effort to fully restore the palace has been ongoing since 1990 and in 2010 is 40% restored." Ok, so I paraphrased a little. Anyway, it was a beautiful fall day! The palace was huge. We got a free English tour, so we learned what some things were and the significance of some stuff. For example, the ground is covered in ~2x2 ft blocks of fairly uneven stones. There are two reasons for this. One is that so the glare wouldn't blind the king. And the second had something to do with them wearing leather shoes. But I didn't really understand what she was talking about at that point. After the palace, we got some Indian food for dinner. It's the first time I can remember going to an Indian restaurant. It was good. After dinner, we decided to head up the Han River to see some fireworks. Big mistake. It was the most crowded even I have ever been part of. I almost died on the subway. It was terrible. It made me very grumpy and ruined the rest of my night. We couldn't even see the fireworks and I was done with the whole thing. So we came home and went to bed. We played badminton on Sunday. That was fun.

This is me. Enjoying a gorgeous fall day in Seoul, South Korea.

Mountains, blue skies, and a palace. Awesome Saturday.

The ceilings of the King's main hang out. Vibrant colors and gold guard dragons.

I just couldn't get over how beautiful it was. Some sort of pagoda on the water.

Just a beautiful day and a history lesson. Love it.


This is us playing with my camera. I think this would look so neat on some fabric as a pillow. So neat.

Subway trip from hell. This is how I'm going to die. I may have had a minor panic attack.

There were some times when my feet weren't even on the ground.

Today. Monday, October 11th, 2010. I was in the office making copies for puppy class tomorrow. My boss came in and said "Katie, next year, you stay?" I said " I think I would like that." She said "six months? one year?" I said "Ummmm one year?" She got a huge smile on her face, gave me a high five and walked out the room. At this point, I came out of my black out and had to sit down. But it's done. As of today, assuming we get all the paper work figured out and I don't get fired for something, I will be in South Korea until March 2012. Start making travel arrangements now.

I want to thank everyone who helped me work through this decision. It was a biggie and stressed me out a lot. Thanks for listening and trying to put up with me. I appreciate it a lot.

Kid Quote:

Sarah (king class): Teacher, eye ball please.

Me: What?
S: Give me your green eyeball please.
M: But then I won't be able to see...
S: It's ok.
M: It'll hurt!
S: It's ok.
M: What are you talking about? Why do you want my eyeball?
S: Plant eye in dirt. It grow. Eyeball tree!
M: You're crazy. What are you talking about?
S: TEACHER! Green eyeball tree!
M: AHHHHH! NO WAY!
S: Hahaha TEACHER!

9 Months and No Baby

Heyoo! I've been here just over 9 months now. Here are some things I've learned.

• My Robot class is considered to be 7 years old. They all tell you that they are 7. I found their birthdates. Here they are. You be the judge of their actual ages.

1. Alex 2--May 2004
2. Rex-- June 2004
3. Samuel--July 2004
4. Alex 1--August 2004
5. Clara--January 2005
6. Molly--November 2005

• In an effort to make the 7 year olds only speak English, I have implemented new methods of bribery and new speaking games. It's going well thus far.
• Two of the girls from King Class sit on my lap and sing for most of play time each day. I make them say Katie in the songs as much as possible. For example, "rain rain go away, come again another day, little Katie wants to play, so rain rain go away". It makes them giggle and it makes me feel important.
• I'm still torn between leaving and staying. And staying for a couple months and staying for a full year. And traveling in December or just saving up and traveling on my way out. And what to do when I do finally leave this joint. It's all stressing me out. A lot.
  
• I have amazing friends and family. Special thanks to my Brain Trust for all their advice and support. And to my K-pop friends for listening to me talk about the whole situation day in and day out.
  
• Friday night, I didn't really feel good so I wasn't really planning on doing anything, but SaraBrown came to town and we went to dinner then decided to check on Sunny at the Underground. Ended up being one of the best nights of my life. At about 2 am, Sunny said "Katie, you bartend?" I said "OK!" So I worked behind the bar from 2-5! I wasn't allowed to serve mixed drinks though, probably because Sunny is actually trying to make money. So when people came up and said "3 vodka tonics please" I said "3 beers? OK!". I had a hell of a time.
• We have a field trip this week, so I'll hopefully get some awesome pictures of the kids being cute.
  
• I plan on doing more 'Korean' stuff in the next couple months...I feel like it needs to happen. We'll see.
  
• Hope you're doing well! Kisses and Misses!!