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Published: September 17th 2010
New Phone
Laura with her new touchscreen phone!Dear Blog Readers,
We get ushered into the finance department of the Boeun Education Office after another horrifically awkward meeting with another supervisor who is the supervisor of my co-teachers’ supervisors’ supervisor. Angela, Laura and I exchange confused looks as to what the 20 minute meeting could possibly have been about but then were overwhelmed as everybody in the department stood up and began applauding us. After this welcome, one of the supervisor’s introduces us to the department, “Please welcome, Angela, Simon and Neall.”
So, quite a good, well actually, funny end to our third week at school! Last weekend we completed our settling down period in Boeun by finally getting our mobile phones! Thanks to our co-teachers Yuni and Eun-bi, they managed to wangle us a good deal. Laura has got a swish touch-screen phone and I saved the expense by getting the cheapest phone available. However, it is to my detriment since changing the language to English (I would say it translates but it would be the loosest sense of the word) still leaves most of mine in Korean so it took about a day to send one text! We treated them to some Pizza Hut (which
Rice Paddies
The paddy fields near our apartment. is very expensive here!) to thank them for all their help. On Sunday we went and climbed a nearby hill which has an ancient wall and overlooks the whole of Boeun so I’ve attached some pictures to this blog for you so you can see the view.
The week started well, I have Monday’s at one of my other schools - Wonnam - which is a 15min bus ride from Boeun. One of the students also lives in Boeun and gets the same bus and always makes sure I get on and off at the right stop which is really sweet. Back at Boeun on Tuesday I had one of those horrible moments when the computer doesn’t work! I managed to pull through by writing most of what was in my presentation on the board and I had a group activity so it wasn’t too bad.
On Wednesday I have quite a busy day with 4 classes and 2 extra classes after school finishes. On the verge of leaving, Eun-bi says that the principal wants to see me to practice his English. This turned out to be quite good in the end as it meant sitting watching CNN
Apartment
Laura on the way to our apartment - the Kukdong APT! and explaining what was going on and then he took me out for bulgogi (one of my favourite dishes out here - it is beef with onions and noodles). My stomach still hasn’t hardened to the huge variety of recyclable side dishes which are brought out to have with the bulgogi - it’s basically a lucky dip with the potential of eating something delicious or getting food poisoning.
Aside from the dodgy side dishes, I managed to pull through on the lessons on Thursday morning and just caught the bus to Naebuk school in time for lunch. The school has a grand total of 26 students and my first class has 6 students in it. I really enjoy it because you can really see making a difference and you get chance to talk to each student. The larger classes are great for getting everybody involved and you can get some quality answers to questions - for example, “What do you want to be when you are older?” “A killer.” “Why do you want to be a killer?” “Because I like killing things.” “Great, fantastic English, you get 10 points.” The bus home didn’t turn up but I managed to
Neighbours
Lennord, Michelle and Laura at the top of the hill overlooking Boeun. get the city bus back a little bit later which was good - although I felt bad that my co-teacher, Mrs Ma, stayed with me the whole time even after my numerous attempts to tell her that I was happy to wait on my own if she needed to get back to school!
Finally, after 4 classes this morning and our awkward meeting this afternoon, we’ve got back to our apartment - fresh with new locks so that the psycho who lived here last time doesn’t try to get back in - for a beautiful cream cheese onion bagel! Tonight we have drinks and potential norrebang to look forward to - however, it would be hard pushed to beat last week’s crucification of, amongst others, Living on a Prayer, Wonderwall, and a particularly ear crushing, Hotel California.
Thanks for everybody who commented in last week with some questions - I hope these responses are ok! Please send in more for next week’s blog:
Roxi - the food is good! It’s just impossible using chopsticks to do everything!
Mum - the fountains are pretty good here! The one Laura went under isn’t as good as the ones
Boeun
Panorama of Boeun! in Berlin but I pass one which rivals them on the way to school in the morning so I’ll get a picture soon!
Lauren - I just did a presentation about me, my family and where I live. I had a video of Dom playing the drums which went down brilliantly. I then had a worksheet for them to fill out about me, and then got them to introduce themselves! I hear you’re going on a huge trip to Korea so good luck!
Lucia - yes we have the luxury of air conditioning in our apartment! The weather has suddenly changed in about 4 days and it is now beautiful clear skies and our bodies have acclimatized to the point where we felt cold this morning and it was 24 degrees!
Hope you all have a great week and speak soon! We’re normally on Skype between 5-10pm which is 9-2pm English time or hopefully we’ll see you on at the weekends!
Tink and Laura
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Laura's Mum
non-member comment
Great to see the photos!
What does this blog title mean? Thank you for taking the trouble to put photos up for us; it really makes a difference to see you in your new surroundings, it's great! Looking forward to the next one...Love to you both. Mumxx