TOMORROW I'LL BE A MAN OF MANY COUNTRIES

I am a Canadian citizen and I have a Canadian passport to prove it. I have permanent residency in the United States and I have a "green card" to prove it. Tomorrow I pick up my Alien Registration Card which makes me a resident of Korea too. Boy, am I cool or what? Once I have that baby in my hands I can get my health insurance, open a bank account, and even get a Korean driver's license. I hope I can sleep tonight because the anticipation is making me think that these are the good old days. (There's no escape!)

Kelly called me just before noon to ask if I was ready to go to Suncheon. I can't win. She said yesterday that we were going at 1pm. She said we had to go then because Miss Moon had to go to the department store. What, Miss Moon again! What happened to our lunch date to talk? I didn't say anything. I wanted to say "drop dead" but I didn't. I'm polite.

They pick me up and there's another woman and her kid in the car. I don't know who she is and no one tells me. She looks a little like Miss Moon so maybe she's her sister. Who knows and further more, who cares? We go to the department store in Suncheon where the ladies are looking at kids clothing. Kelly tells me she needs 20 minutes. Fine. I sit. I wait. Then Kelly leads me to a restaurant where we ate before. I thought we were having Italian. She then said we could eat there or go for Italian. I said Italian. So we left Miss Moon and her sister? and drove to the Italian restaurant for lunch. I was quite surprised. She separated from Miss Moon. I'm always surprised and expect the unexpected.

I had lasagna. It was okay. The tomato sauce was quite spicy. They love spicy things here. I even paid. Kelly is always paying so I thought I'd be nice. Who said Korea was cheap. Lunch was about $27. Kelly is thinking about moving abroad. She asked me if Canada or the United States was better to live in. I asked her if she liked winter and she said she hated it. I told her southern U.S. then. She then said maybe Australia. She says she's not crazy about the culture here and doesn't really want her kids to go to school here. I asked her why she opened a school if she was thinking of moving and she said if she goes it won't be for about 5 years because she needs to save money. I don't think she'll go and I don't think she knows what she wants, but who does? (Okay, some people do). I told her she seemed unhappy but she says she's just exhausted. It's a long day with her daughter and cleaning the house and doing the school. She's hired a cleaning woman for twice a week. She doesn't like her husband helping around the house because he doesn't do a good job and they fight.

She told me I should marry a Korean girl. I told her I didn't know anyone. She said it's still early. (I think she's a little strange). She said the foreign English teacher who teaches at Posco (a huge steel company) married a local girl. He's 37 and she's 25 and she's ugly. I think Kelly thinks everyone is ugly. Maybe she's in competition with everyone else. I just thought it strange that she said that. So Kelly is moving to the U.S. or Australia and I'm staying Korea and marrying a Korean girl. And becoming a Buddhist.

The other teacher (Jason) who's Korean came into my kindergarten class today. He stayed 5 minutes and left. He couldn't take it. They don't listen to him either. Great big help, he was. What a joke. Now that I don't care about them anymore, I can handle it better. I'm very relaxed doing nothing in that class.

I played picture Bingo with the not-so-bright kids at 4. It was a big hit. They loved it. When they had the picture on their card, they would yell "Yeh"! If they didn't have it, they'd yell, "No, No, No"! I don't know if they learned anything (probably not) but they had fun. And they are basically well-behaved so I can't complain too much.

There were only 4 kids in my 5pm class. One of the missing kids is this girl who has an excellent vocabulary. I asked why she wasn't there and I got that she was mad at the school but they wouldn't (or couldn't) elaborate. I hope she doesn't quit because she is one of the bright spots there.

The kids didn't want to do the textbook and neither did I. I never do. They never do. They say it's boring and I can't disagree. "Game, game, game" is their battle cry. I told them no. They need to learn more. But all we did is talk so I think that's good. They talked some Korean amongst themselves but they'd talk to me in their limited English. They try and find the words to explain things to me so that's great. The books are so inane I can't stand them.

The boy on the right doesn't talk and if I do get a word out of him, I can't understand him because he's quieter than a whisper. The boy next to him is always goofing off. Even here, looking serious, he's just goofing off. The girl beside him is gorgeous and will break hearts in the future. Her English stinks but she tries. I think I'm making progress with her. The other girl was a pain but now that her best friend isn't in the school anymore, she pays more attention.


I think one of the girls in my 6pm class fell asleep. You can see so many kids run down by the end of the week. It's terrible. You can't get angry if they're tired. If I worked as hard as they have to, I'd be falling asleep too. This girl is one of my favorites. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday she's friendly. Thursday and Friday she isn't really friendly, just dead on her feet. I went to take some pictures of the class and the kids couldn't wait to pose:




I really like a lot of these kids. They believe in peace.


The Koreans love to do the peace sign. And I love the way they keep me on the go while I teach:


These 2 kids in my 6pm class are worse than useless. They're really good at saying, "teacher, I'm sorry" because I'm always asking them to be quiet. They mean no harm and it's impossible to dislike them, but they are a waste of time in any class. The one I'm beside is one of Miss Moon's daughters (the one who used her cell phone in class).


This is me with her sister (another Moonie). I like her. She's not a great student but she makes me laugh. She always starts out talking to me in Korean. She's the one who thought Leah's beautiful. I think this girl is beautiful too. The picture doesn't do her justice at all.


I will use the charming Miss Kim as my final picture of the evening. For some reason I never learned her "English" name and she said I should call her Miss Kim. Kim is her last name for real and she loves I call her that. She is also the only student who's said "fuck" so far. I think it was when I said I never heard any kids swear in English. I think she was showing me they could.


I have more pictures and I hope to get more. So tomorrow is Friday and I have nothing planned for the weekend. I will probably call the Australian bloke I met and see if he wants to do dinner and a movie. I should just go to a PC room or a Singing room with some of the kids. I enjoy their company.

Oh, and you can eat fried grasshopper. Some of the kid's grandparents have. None of the kids have. One kid said they eat earwigs. Strange place.