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You mean I'm supposed to eat that? …Life as an ESL teacher in Korea.

Posts Tagged school

The Flu

Nov 5

Posted by Tiffany in Teaching

  • Influenza
  • The Flu
  • Swine Flu
  • H1N1
  • The New Flu
  • Sinjon Flu (as it’s called here in Korea)

A sickness by any name, still makes you feel like crap.

I was fortunate enough not to get any type of flu, knock on wood.  However, I have been coughing and have a case of  Sinusitis.  Also realizing that Winter has not even begun yet, I’m ready to maintain my obsessive hand washing and antibacterial rinses.

Schools are closing all over the area.  Not my school.  I guess it is because my school is relatively small, or maybe because my director likes money too much.  Who knows?

My first class of the day only has four students, and they were all out sick.  It did give me an extra 80 minutes today to blog.  :lol:

I can’t help but be jealous though, of a friend of mine that is in Thailand right now enjoying bright warm sunshine while I’m stuck here where it feels like the icy chill of snow is just around the corner.  Today I swear I saw a few snowflakes!  Anyway, my friend is there because her school closed for the entire week.  They did inform her that she would no longer have a Winter vacation.  So instead of being bummed about the situation, she made some arrangements and flew to Thailand.

Chanchoche Swine Flu X <–  even balloons … LOL

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School

Oct 16

Posted by Tiffany in Korea, Teaching

Time is dwindling down on our contracts with Sisa English Academy.  I’d like to say that I’m feeling sentimental or wishing for more time, but that’s not the case.  One year  will be just the perfect amount of time here.

Some classes are still wonderful with kids smiling, speaking English, drawing cute pictures and sitting in their seats.  Other classes children throw shoes out of windows, jump on desks and scream at the top of their lungs that they “want you to die”.  Ahhh the life of a teacher.

It has been wonderful to walk to work everyday.  How awesome is it to make it to work in 5 minutes?  When I used to spend 30 minutes driving to work, this has been just the most amazing change of pace.  That is, unless it’s raining.

There is still 3 months left of teaching to endure but overall, it has been a great experience.  We had it easy at this hagwon.  There were no lesson plans to be made.  We could leave school if we didn’t have a class to teach, and up until recently we were home most of the day.  It was nice.

Since October 1st, Seth and I are the only Foreign teachers at Sisa.  So we were given all of Kevin’s classes when he left.  In reality, it’s still not that much work, but when you’re used to working 5 hour days, or less, being at school for a straight 7 1/2 hours is torture.

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Work work work

Jul 15

Posted by Tiffany in Teaching

I have never shared pictures of what my place of work looks like.  Nothing special stands out.  Actually, it looks like a million other office areas in the world: fake wood, uncomfortable chairs, copy machine, too many piles of paper.  Except that my office has Korean writing on whiteboard, I can’t understand the copy machine and the computer language button needs to be pressed anytime I want to type up a worksheet.  It’s a typical chaotic work environment.  Just recently we have moved into Pre-Summer Session classes… which means new students, new books.  We were given our new schedules the day of the switch-over.  Insane. It has been a few busy, crazy days.  I believe… Chickens with their heads cut off, fits perfectly.  That’s my big blue chair in the back.

This is where the teacher area is located.

This is where the teacher area is located.

My disaster of a cubicle

My disaster of a cubicle

Cute smiley faces my mom sent me in the mail and random cards I have received.   My tiny black coffee cup holder, water Nalgene, school books, library book, suduko puzzle, cds and tapes for classes.  Students have given me stickers and Hello Kitty buttons.  I am also blessed, being beside the coffee and tea that resides in an empty cubicle next to mine.  All day long I am scooting back and forth to avoid other teachers wanting a caffeine boost.

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Funny Signs

Jun 26

Posted by Tiffany in Korea, Teaching

This shouldn’t be funny… it’s quite sad.  But I laughed and decided to share.  Keep in mind that this is for an English school.  It’s actually the name of the school, which makes it even funnier… or more sad, depending on how you think about it.   Found this sign while wandering around Anyang.

This is over the main entrance to the school.

This is over the main entrance to the school.

Pic of the entire sign

Pic of the entire sign

This weekend is supposed to be sunny, so Seth is going to go hiking.  The past 2 weekends it has rained and rained, so I’m glad to have some dry free-days.

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Adjusting

Jan 28

Posted by Tiffany in Food, Korea

The school seems to be on the up and up.  It’s only 1 block away from our apartment, which is great. :smile: The other teachers (the ones we met, which is only 3, so far) have been really nice and helpful.  Today we get to meet our students and actually start teaching.  I kinda like that they’re throwing us into the work.  No time to freak out and worry.

We have a park right across the street from the apartment.  Apparently badminton is taken very seriously here.  Bring on the childhood memories of playing badminton with the Adkins sisters.  I’m making Seth go play with me once it warms up.  The teachers we replaced even left us rackets and birdies.  The birdies actually have real feathers!  How weird is that?

Shuttle Launch!!

We ventured downtown last night.  It’s amazing.  Tons of people, places to eat and shop.  We found this cheap place that served Marinated Chicken Galbi… that was recommended to us.

IMG_2261 There is a stove on every table and the meal is cooked in front of us.  It was extremely spicy.  They bring out a bunch of little side dishes.  (pickles, kim chi and that yellow fruit they put in sushi alot but I don’t know what it’s called)  I loved this meal.  Basically it was a type of stir-fry.

What I really can’t wait for is adjusting to the time difference.  It’s 5am now and can’t sleep.  We woke up about 3am, which would have been 1pm back home.  Ugh.

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