Alright! So I officially have the internet in my apartment now. And, I officially have an apartment (goes well with my internet). I also have a job, and a salary, and a toaster oven; hopefully this blog will address all the newness that follows with moving to a place of my own in Korea.
It was on September 12th when I finally settled into my apartment (pictures to come). In most English academies when a new teacher comes to fill the older teacher's position, he literally does that; replaces the old teacher in almost every aspect. Even my teaching schedule still has 'Jeremy' on it where 'Chris' should be written. I moved in on a Wednesday morning to an apartment that was not much to look at. The wallpaper was 'off white' a little bit more than it should have been, and the place smelled like moth balls (apparently there was a problem with mold..). The apartment, when first stepping through the door, had its kitchen on the right, its bedroom on the left, and its bathroom and shower straight in front. Yet, there were no walls dividing the different rooms (the bathroom has a glass sliding door); it was all in one room. This is what is called a studio, and it is the most common type of apartment that is offered to a foreign teacher.
So, after getting my place, I went to my new job. Now, I don't know how most schools work, but I think that mine is unique. There are four other Korean teachers who work at my school, and their job is to teach the kids English grammar. They speak a little bit of English, enough to understand if I have any issues in the classroom. These teachers each have their own class that they teach during the 2:10pm to 8:30pm day. My job is to teach each of their classes once a week. So, without going into anymore details, I teach 29 classes per week, and I only see one class more than once. Almost every class that I teach, I only see them once a week. That equates to about 200 students (learning their names is difficult).
Unfortunately, with this many students and seeing them so rarely, it's difficult to develop any type of personal 'student-teacher' dynamic. It makes it challenging to chart their individual progress, because they seem to all blend together with the once a week that I see them. But my job really isn't very difficult. I'm hired because I know English and have a good western accent, and lets face it, because I'm white. The parents want to know that their kid is being taught by an actual foreigner. So whenever there is a parent who comes to the school I must be present, just so long as they can see me and know that their child is learning from a white kid.
My neighborhood is... Korean. By this I mean that there are no foreigners in this area, at least none that I have seen. Usually, when you walk past another white guy you kind of look at each other and say "hey, what's up?", just for the fact that you'll be understood. It's pretty funny. But anyways, in my area there are no Outback Steakhouse's, or TGIF's, or any of those western food places. There are however Korean barbecue places and traditional Korean markets all over the place. All I have to do now is learn the language...
So there's a bit of info about where I am, and what I'm doing. It seems that I daily come across some issue, or some contrast to the culture that I'm used to that makes me want to blog about it. But I'm done for now.
Here are some pictures of the Busan Aquarium - it was awesome.
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=54147&l=ab75f&id=517865133
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Geez.... Time for an update!
Posted by chris at 9:21 AM
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2 comments:
so cool chris. keep the stories coming.
The Korean barbecue sounds lovely... :)
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