5/17/2008 5:06 am
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A little background about myself and my Hagwan. I live in Daejeon and I happen to be on the outer rim of Daejeon. About a fifteen to twenty minute walk from the last subway stop. Thankfully Daejeon has only one subway line so it is impossible to get lost and yet sometimes I find a way. I work at one of those everyday Hagwans that is probably not much different or special than any other schools in Korea. I think the word Hagwan translates into academy, but I could be wrong. Since some children come here after their regular school they can just want to have fun because they are after all kids. One child Lauren always speaks in a funny voice or an old man’s voice. My friend Monica, who teaches at a public school, and I have some of the same students and she can’t believe some of the stories I tell her about her mild mannered students playing practical jokes on me. One of the best one was right before a speaking test “Teacher you handsome today” to which I replied “Was teacher handsome last class?” My school has just short of a hundred and fifty students and their ages range from five to seven all the way up to 16 to 21. The college students who I showed Steven Colbert’s battle with the Korean singer Rain has been one of my favorite classes so far to date
The staff is made up of Joyce the administrator who looks and acts very kind and yet rules with an iron fist. Sarah and Josef who handle the secretarial and bus driving duties. Grace a woman that visited the merry old land of Oz; we have the same taste in movies both Korean and American. Then there is Ann a woman who has not been to any English countries, yet she has more degrees in English than I do. She is also married to one of the proud fighting members of the Korean Air Force. Ann also has two children both coming to the school. Ah the married life the one that was denied to me oh well. Then there is Paris the new English teacher trying to teach English and learn English at the same time.
Ann isn’t the only teacher/parent with a child at the school. Joyce has Andy a thirteen year boy who will one day become Korea’s next great magician. Sarah and Josef have two children Alice who is about eight years old and sometimes I’ll pick her up by her hands and spin her around after work. Their other child Nature is still a toddler and would make the same face right before she cried or laughed so the first few weeks when I met her so I treated her like a landmine that hadn’t been disarmed.
What has made this Hagwan more like a home has been the monthly theme days when the kids bake cookies, the monthly movie days on the week-ends when the school give the kids their choice of movies and then pick one regardless of the vote. For Halloween I went trick or treating with the kids in my vampire cape and they called me Dracula for weeks on end. Christmas was a bit a mixed blessing me being the only foreign teacher at my school I got dressed up as Santa Claws and handed out presents. I was handing out presents, trying to keep the bubble wrap in my costume and prevent the kids from grabbing at my beard and hat. Next year I demand no Santa costume, and I’ll have it written into my contract. I know my school will come at me with an Elf costume.
One day Nature looked at me and said a Korean word. I asked Sarah what it meant and she said “Uncle.” This is my extended family and this is my home.
Those are my principles, and if you don't like them... well, I have others.
Groucho Marx
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420 posts 5/17/2008 11:42 pm |
Ahhhhhh....that's a nice story.....keep up the good work, "uncle" 
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