Slowly but Surely...

So today I taught five classes which is my normal teaching schedule for Thursdays and it was a good day. The only class that made me rethink my entire life and all major decisions was the last one, so other than that we're doin' great! ;) From this point on I'll be learning the personality of all my classes which is the best in my opinion. Today I had one class of all girls that was super quiet, smart, and on task. Next I had a class of eight Jr High girls and three boys that was more fun and easy going. I need to learn the pace of the class so I can determine how the speed I need to teach to get through the material. There are Korean homeroom teachers that prepare the material for the foreigners to teach so I will see my lesson for maybe fifteen minutes before I teach it. I'm definitely going to need to learn how to keep a good pace, explain basic words like confidence...? and take care of my voice because at the end of the day my throat hurts pretty bad..

Kids story: so far one of the boys insists on calling me Meeeegan. Seriously everywhere I go there's at least one person who calls me that. ha
I get onto the kids when they speak Korean in my class and this one boy was being really bad about it so his friend started making up what he was saying. ha! he said that the boy was talking about how much he loved North Korea and Kim Jong was his father and blah blah...it was hilarious. 

Cultural fact: If you say "crazy", it's bad. Calling a kid crazy is like calling them a bad word essentially. If you say "you're so crazy", they will probably go home and tell their parents that we were being mean to them. Also, writing in a red marker is something we don't do either. If i wrote a kids' name on the board in red, they would probably start crying. haha Also, the number four is like the number 13 in America. On elevators, instead of "4", they use and "F". 

Today, before school Asha and I went and tried out a local coffee shop. They have familiar coffee drinks. I got a white mocha and she ordered a caramel macchiato. So, it's very familiar still. The lady working was so nice. They usually know enough English for us to order but we try to learn korean words like hello, thank you, please, etc because personally, I think it's kind of jerky to not learn the language of the country you live in. She changed the music in the shop from Korean music to Maroon 5. Yup..that store is a keeper. 

We are called "Waygooks" (phonetically spelled) which means foreigners. Often times we're stared at and sometimes kids will point and yell or smile. We just smile and say hi. Owners of stores like people to see that the waygooks shop in their store so we have received a lot of discounts since we arrived and ya know...I'm not complaining. 

There is a group of foreigners that live here from America and South Africa who all go to the same church. It's a good community. It is usually extremely challenging moving to korea by yourself...or even with people because the culture is so different. We really have a great set up. The Lord is blessing our time here. We have people all around us to help and answer questions. We're months ahead of most foreigners when they arrive and I'm thankful for that...for reals.

Cultural Fact: There is a trash system here that is very precise and if you don't follow it, you're fined. It's pretty obvious who doesn't follow it=waygooks. So, we haven't quite mastered it yet. I know that there is a small yellow bag for waste, like food leftovers. There's a large green bag for regular trash and then a certain spot to recycle. You take the trash to the nearest light pole and tada! umm...but we know we've messed it up a few times so we take our trash out in the middle of the night and walk down a few light poles just in case :)

Tomorrow is my first full day with eight classes total! It will be a challenge but I think I'm up for it!