Monday, August 31, 2009

No Method To My Madness


I don't get me.


I am not a neat-freak. No doubt about that. I've been home over 2 weeks and have yet to unpack my bags. I've just been digging through an open suitcase tossing items left and right until I find what I'm looking for.

When I get home in the evenings, everything just gets dropped at the door. My shoes, my purse, my pants usually get thrown against some distant wall, I've even forgotten the groceries at the door many times. Or, if I'm in an especially tidy mood, I'll just put the entire bag of groceries in the fridge. Bread, milk, canned goods... whatever. I'll deal with it later.

I just keep kicking things to the side to make a little path for me to walk. Though, now I'm out of room and my crap is impeding the flow of traffic on my path. Translation: I keep tripping over my own crap!

Today was my first day back at my elementary school. No classes to teach just yet. Today we just cleaned our office and classroom. After we were finished sweeping, dusting, etc my co-teachers went back to our office to pretend to be busy. I stayed in the classroom obsessively straightening the desks and chairs. Because, God forbid, things not be in a perfect line or at 90 degree angles!!

And I'm always like that. Everyday, every class. My kids still stare at me with a blank stare every morning when I ask, "How are you today?" But they definitely know what I'm saying when I point to them and say, "push in your chair." After class I walk around making sure all the chairs are pushed in equally. No one chair can be sticking out more than the others.

I never lose my keys. Ever. There is a specific place that they live and they never leave it. I can do nothing before my keys are in their designated spot. But my phone, wallet, purse, hell... even my pants, not telling where they are at any given moment.

I recently lost my pants. My pants!!! How in gods name, when you only have 3 pair to begin with, do you lose a pair of pants in a 600 square foot apartment? I tore the place apart looking for them. Only to find them folded in the closet. What little gnome snuck in and folded my pants?

I routinely find the remote in the fridge, makeup in the microwave, and Anastasia gave me crap about an empty pizza box I was too lazy to take down to the trash so I threw it in the fridge... where it lived for the next 5 months!

So how... how on earth can I be on both extremes of the tidiness spectrum? Being on one I can see, but both?

No wonder I don't bother with dating. Why waste time looking for someone who "gets you" when you yourself don't "get you." I've been living in this little head of mine for 28 years, and the stuff going on up there gets more ridiculous by the day!!!

Well, it's 4:30, time for me to leave school and head home.

Now, where the hell did I put my purse? ...

Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Beer..er English.. er Fitness-Pong

Since they took my middle school away from me, I decided to spend the last day just having fun with my students.  

Taught them a few fitness words:  Push-ups, Sit-ups, Jumping Jacks, Hula Hoop... etc.

I used the American, frat house favorite, Beer-Pong as a template for my game!


Sunday, August 23, 2009

Over The Hill

Just this week I hit my 6 month mark here.

On this wild little journey I call Korea, I'm standing at the apex of the hill. Half the journey ahead of me, half of it already behind.

The first 6 months were tough. Getting up the hill is always harder than going down.

Now I have friends, now I know my co-teachers, I know how to get around without having to think about it, my taste buds have finally been singed to the point where I don't break a sweat with every bite of kimchi!!

It's going too fast!!!

I want it all to slow down! I realized when I was back in America just how much I am going to miss this wacky little land. Now I'm starting to get sentimental at the little things and all the things I'll never see again.

I'll never see Buddha's birthday again, or the cherry blossoms, or the yellow dust, or strawberries, the grapes will be gone soon too, and Oh god... summer is almost over, there will never been a green Korea for me again!!!

And I'm definitely not ready to start saying goodbye to people in 6 months! I'm just starting to get to know them all.... and to rub salt in my wounds, today was my first day back at middle school. They informed me that schedules had changed and I won't be coming back to them anymore. I'll just stay all week at my elementary school.

I literally had to fight back tears! That school keeps me sane!! I can't stand having to say goodbye to these kids, they make me so happy. I'm going to miss my boys. They light up my days and we have so much fun. I had finally figured out my rhythm and had so many fun things planned. I was going to be a much better teacher this semester. Now it ended before it began.

I had freedom at this school. Just me and my boys, no co-teachers. No curriculum. No books. Just whatever I threw at them. My elementary school is the polar opposite. Strict curriculum, always going word for word by the book, constantly being scrutinized by co-teachers in class who sometimes let me do little more than be a human tape recorder.

This sucks!!!

Eh, you know the saying: When life hands you lemons... get out the friggin' salt and tequila, it's time for some shots!!!

Uhg, on second thought, after last weekends buckets-o-tequila.... I think I'm done for a while.

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

"Happiness Is A Warm Puppy"

On Sunday evening I was on the subway in Seoul and a man was peddling cell phones accessories. I noticed the bag he was carrying and, in English, it said, "Happiness is a warm puppy."

This immediately got me thinking.

Let's do a little math, shall we?

If: Happiness is a warm puppy
Then:
A = B

And according to Mallory's co-worker, Mr. Yoon, "Eating time is happy time" where Eating time is C

If: we assume Happy Time is equivalent to Happiness
Then: Eating time is Happiness
So:
C = A

then....

we apply the Transitive Property of Equality ( if A=B and B=C then A=C)

and since we already established that B = C and inversely C = B
then: Eating time is a warm puppy

now...

factor in the given: Korean people eat dog meat
then: C = B (Eating time is a warm puppy) could very well be a true statement!!!

now...

factor in the variable that many Koreans believe dog meat increases male virility and stamina

then: Eating time is bow chicka wow wow ????

In conlusion: I shouldn't think so hard after a 20+ hour flight!!!!!!

Sunday, August 16, 2009

Home Sweet Home

A brief synopsis of my vacation in the States:

  • Birthday burgers with the Bucklew clan, all 15 of us
  • making Vietnamese food with my best bud and sis
  • shopping shopping shopping, since I only brought one pair of pants and one shirt home
  • Ben's 30th birthday
  • running around Raleigh trying to see all my friends and not getting enough time with any of them
  • Getting to meet and rub on my favorite baby bump in the world!
  • Teaching old church ladies about getting lei'd
  • 20 hour kamikaze drive to WV with my sis for only a few hours of visiting
  • Showing Jen and Bec the kind of 'shit' Korean kids learn
  • Buying G'ma slutty hot pants
  • Stealing a kiss from an old friend
  • Meeting the newest and bluest (eyed) member of the Franzese clan
  • Meeting the mini-Mercer man
  • Wally world to buy all the swag for my Korean peeps
  • and Food. Glorious, vast, copious amounts of fattening, delicious, tear inducing, gut gorging fooooooood!!!!