My Adult Life

Ok all you seasoned adults out there go ahead and have your laugh at my youthful naivete but I'm gonna come out and say it:

I have never appreciated my free time as much in my life. This full time job thing really helps to focus the mind. Prioritize. What do I want to do with my precious 25 minutes? 40 minutes? The measly 6 hours between getting out of work and going to bed? There isn't enough time in the day. I have to eat, I have to run, I have to watch my TV (don't you tell me otherwise - I'll bite you). And on top of this all I'm supposed to write myself some fiction that will get me into grad school? You've got to be kidding me.

Grad school. Haha. I'm opening a poll. Law school? Or a Creative Writing MFA?...Michigan? Or somewhere more interesting? To be or not to be? Man I miss being a student....

For my "P.E." period I let the kids loose with two big boxes of Lego. Then I discovered that the school has a tiny little collection of Goosebumps that includes my old favorite. It's something about "Horrorland." It's the only Goosebumps book that ever actually scared me because as I recall it has a hopeless, unresolved ending that just sent chills down my little spine. So I skimmed the first few pages until my boss decided to pass by and glance disapprovingly at me. I spent the rest of the period with the book in my hands, feeling too guilty to open it up. Instead I supervised. God only knows what could happen to those children with all those Legos if I took my eyes off of them. Meanwhile my kids zoned out, completely unaware of me. I was so jealous.

In other news, I spent a delightful evening with Min Jung at the Maggiest coffee shop I have ever been in in my life (well, maybe not THE Maggiest but Maggie would certainly enjoy it). It's completely homemade, right down to the menus hand-written in colored pens in little, doodle-out notebooks. And tiny. And delightful. Did I mention that already? I scrambled to finish my mind-numbing evaluations for the afternoon classes. 50+ evals for 18 kids because each kids takes 3 different classes and you know if those parents don't get a nice comment for each class they'll come storming through and set fire to the school because that's apparently what Korean parents do. They're Hulks, all of them. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry...and so on.

She invited me (or extended an invitation from her mother) over to her place on one of these upcoming weekend nights to eat homemade Korean food and learn some Korean card game that foreigners apparently go gaga over. I am SO excited. I got all kinds of warm fuzzies afterward. Yay for friends. They make life sweeter.

I have Friday off. It's like the final stretch of a marathon. Scratch that. This is no time for similes. It IS the last stretch of a marathon. An insane, turn-your-teachers-into-angry-worker-drones marathon of stolen Saturdays. The finish line is in sight but I'm afraid I'll never get there. And even if I do...there's a whole nother race to run just a few paces down.

This is what I want. A luxury hotel that won't break my bank. Tickets to the symphony on Thursday. A massage. And moments - a long and sticky-sweet string of them - to forget about everything.

People

Here's the thing about TV. It shows the interesting parts of life. And what are the interesting parts of life? Not the daily routine, the walk to and from work, the time I spend refilling my water cup, the yell-at-the-class-to-be-quiet count, what I eat for lunch...

TV shows the outskirts of real life. The hours at the bar bitching about the routine, the hours at coffee shops giggling over shared pasts, the late night talks that spontaneously eat away the hours you should be sleeping. I haven't had too much of that yet. I'm still too new to this whole full-time job thing that people do. Tonight, though, I got a taste of it, and it's the perfect seasoning to life. Cliched, I know. But it's true. The things that depressed me a few hours ago seem more manageable now.

All it took was a 20 minute subway ride, a walk through the sketchiest part of Seoul I have seen to date (red-lit "tea rooms" that reek of pot??) and the unwanted attention of some business suit from Samsung whose opening line was "Ban Ki Moon went to my high school."

It's really all about the people. And my day is full of them. Little ones. Thus the introductions begin. It's late and I'm tired, so I'm gonna try to get through some of my favorites.

Here's a run-down of my classes. Every day from 9:10 until 1:40 I teach my main class of kindergartners - the Cherry Class. This is the class that requires all the work, the lesson plans, the parental placation etc. After 1:40 I teach 3 more classes:

M, W, F: "Yellow Class" grammar/"White Class" grammar/awkward preteen boy "drama class"

T, Th: one-on-one tutoring with one of the Cherries/Yellow writing/White writing

My top favorite kids (I know, I'm a bad teacher...I swear I don't let on to them)

Kimmy

In the Yellow class (which is by far my favorite class). Nobody else at C&C has heard her speak. But she speaks to me. She has tiny little voice and adorable dimples, and she does this weird thing with her eyes where she looks everywhere except where she's supposed to focus, but in a "I don't feel like looking at you" way. She's still the best in the class academically, and she's got a deeply hidden but awesome silly streak. For instance, in our writing class, she keeps addressing her letters to "pig." Is this your pet, Kimmy? No. Is pig a friend of yours? No. Does it have a name? No? It's just, pig? Yep, pretty much.

Brian

My absolute favorite Cherry. He is soooooo cute. He's the most mellow of the boys, and while he's a good student, he's not irritatingly fast at completing all his work. He's extremely helpful and never, ever fails to answer a question I throw out to the whole class. I can look out at that class when they're all being complete demons and I can know that Brian will smile back at me.

Leo

Ok, sometimes he drives me crazy. But you can't not love a kid with hair like Leo's. Its this weird, super-full-bodied, pseudo-mullet his mother gets re-permed every few months. He's tiny and really into the physical comedy. He's also scarily flexible and will just sit on the ground with his legs splayed open at odd angles. He's just a really happy kid, definitely the Cherry class clown. By a long shot the first kid I learned the name of. He kind of stands out from the crowd.

Katie

Also a Cherry. She's quiet, gets every answer right, and basically just sits there being angelic all day. She has bucketfuls of hugs that she brings to school every day and unloads them onto me whenever she's out of her seat. She's also just one of the cuter-looking kids in the class. My predecessor Maria said it best: the word to describe Katie is "love." She loves to love people.

Ok, that's my top four. More will follow, hopefully tomorrow, but in this life everything is mood-permitting. Good night, people!

Seoul Fall

Koreans take good care of their apartment complexes. We're talking redwood forests of 20-30 storey apartment buildings with tiny streets snaking around them. And, as I've discovered, that's where all the trees in Seoul are hiding. The apartment people steal them!

I took my break with me on a walk today because I couldn't handle being in that stuffy little school anymore and I set off to find some nature. I found it three blocks away, crammed in between luxury housing towers. It's like they took all the green in the area and hid it away. I stepped out of the mess of run down stores and fish-smell, cars running over you and bikes smashing into you, I walked through a wonderland of real sidewalks, playgrounds and shrubbery. I settled on a circular, roofed bench just beyond a miniscule put-put course almost hidden from sight by the grass and bushes. It was astounding how much it smelled like the suburbs.

Today marked the first day of non-rainy cold. And by cold I mean pretty much what Ann Arbor's summer was like this year. It was glorious. The sun changes everything and I felt the traces of a stunning Autumn-to-come everywhere. I can smell it now through the living room window. Like my chest just opens up to let it in. If anything can cure me of my rapidly-shrinking-boobs depression it just might be a Seoul Fall.

Well, we'll see about that one.

Sweetened with an Anecdote

Word of the day: Bitter

The bitter taste left in my mouth by the college campus coffee I travelled 45 minutes for that was almost worth it, and the cough drops I've been popping to avoid coughing around the natives who would inevitably brand me a flu-carrier.

The bitterness seeping through the very walls of our apartment as we all stew over the fact that it is now the end of our only day off this week, and we face another 6 days of Korean children in windowless rooms.

The bitter blow that came with the memory that five years ago I had guidance counselors holding my hand as I applied for college. Grad school applications will not be a forgiving experience.

The bitter texture of sheets of angst piling up in my susceptible mind as I try to figure whether these constant thoughts of going home makes me a quitter or whether I'm just figuring out what's really important.

Anyway, to lighten the mood, let me tell you what happened Saturday night. What started as a plan to have a good American burger dinner in Itaewon and go home early turned into quite an adventure. Somehow we ended up following strangers to the most American house party I have been to since sophomore year. There were two beer pong tables, a keg and - I swear I'm not making this up - red plastic cups. And I got to speak Polish all night because one of the guys we met was a Polish-American medic based in Okinawa. The Polish was the best part. Unfortunately the guy isn't sticking around beyond this week. Would have been nice to have a fellow Polak in this city. Having a secret language is empowering.

Things like this don't normally happen to me! I don't meet people that easily, I don't ever just "end up" somewhere.

Korea must be good for me.

Certain things that come with Korea - not so much...

Gratuitous Poem #4

Meant to lose myself among the giants

concrete castles full of homes

full of families making dinner

and peaceful evening television

My empty ribs led me there so I could

wrap myself in the excess

of so many people knowing they're home

like stepping off the edge of the pool

feeling the water rush through every opening

filling every space your skin doesn't keep

A plaza placed with three stone cats

curled and content in the dark

I thought they might wake, attack me

lone white girl with earphones in

vulnerable

A Letter for You

Dear Evan,

You are the most amazing boyfriend this planet has ever seen. Who else would take the time to send their girlfriend and obscenely expensive care package full of the candy she loves, the baking goods she hasn't been able to find, and the smells she misses most. Smells! A ziploc bag full of the spices you use when you're cooking for me. I can open that up and be home for a moment.

I had a dream that you introduced me to your birth mother. She was a young blonde who lived in the sea and had no idea you were her son. You told me never to tell her, but only after I had sent a text message to a mermaid I went to high school with asking about her. We walked through the Arb to get to my parents' Warsaw house where they were throwing a party for all the teachers who had ever taught me, and you sang songs you had written for me with the Hootie voice that had made you famous.

Today I broke down and finally told my boss I was sick. And I do mean "broke down." I started crying, confessing everything about how scared I was that they were going to make me take the swine flu test and put me into quarantine and cost me hundreds of dollars. He took me to his private physician two doors down who spent five seconds looking down my throat and up my nose, declared a cold and blamed the Seoul air and my foreign lungs. Prescribed me a bucket full of pills and that was that. Total cost: 7 dollars.

I wanted you to know that today was a good Korea day. And that was mostly your doing. And I love you.

Adri

P.S. I got two new cousins today! Congratulations to Robert and Christie, and big siblings Olivia, Clara and Stefan - and welcome to this big, bright, messy world David and Maria!!!

Gratuitous Poem #3

Pastel plastics that feed me on brighter days

when their voices don't pierce

an already sour knotted mood

and the pitterpatter doesn't pit itself

against my skull in all out war

When I can see rainbows in my hutch

life is swell and not

swelling

memories stay in the past

and don't flow forward

when you switch on my smile

and not my precarious mess of tears

That's when I believe

I can hold this world on my shoulders

better than Atlas ever could

Bullet Points Are a Good Way To Communicate

I learned something today, and that is to go running while the sun is out. Don't take a nap instead, assuming the sun will still be out when you wake up. Because by then it will be thunderstorming and you will have lost your chance.

Some interesting tidbits from my week:

• Korean children think its funny to insist you have a baby in your belly when you're having a fat day. Cindy thinks its funny to do this on non-fat days. She also likes to pick up glue sticks and push them into my hand proclaiming "here, it's your baby."

• A woman on the subway today had such awful eye-makeup I was surprised she wasn't being shunned by people. She looked like she had the freaking swine flu. There was all this iridescent white powder up to her brow line and her eyes were ringed with Pepto-Bismol pink. Good to know even in Korea women suck at making themselves presentable.

• A kid finally peed their pants in my class. I knew it was only a matter of time. A couple of them keep interrupting class to go to the bathroom and I had to draw some lines. I told her there were only 5 minutes left until break time and she could go then...turns out the girl doesn't understand half of what I say (I was informed of this later). My room smelled like pee for the rest of the day.

• Korean Outback Steakhouse? Really? In between the babyback ribs and the fettucine alfredo was the bulgogi and the galbi all decked out American style with steamed broccoli and steak sauce. Because a Korean meal is incomplete without bizarre sidedishes in little bowls scattered all over the table but an American meal turns up its nose at such clutter, OS compromised and served a single little bowl full of sweet and zesty, not-quite-kimchi, pickles.

• Koreans love to clap along to songs they know. They also love to clap along to strong beats and fun, fast paced music. They also love to clap along with a traditional Korean drumming ensemble performing a complicated piece of intertwined rhythm. Watching all those little old Korean ladies try to pick out one beat to clap along with was hilarious. But I'll give them credit, some of them refused to stop, determined to show exactly how much they enjoyed the performance.

Wow, most of those points started with "Korean." Where am I again?

Anything But Boring

Well, this weekend has certainly had its share of adventures, that's for sure. And its not over yet - but I'll get to that later.

Friday: I slipped out of school almost as fast as my awkward preteen "drama" class (four of them, bespectacled and oblivious, staring at me for 40 minutes) and into the light of weekend bliss. Heather, Rebekah and I headed to Itaewon after a delightful dinner of pizza (curry chicken pizza with a cheese and sweet-potato filled crust and spicy mayo dipping sauce - yum!). We had margaritas at the bar with the sand floors and gossiped and marveled at the lack of Koreans in the vicinity. Once Anne and Danny arrived we headed to another place to meet up with Samantha's hoard of English-teaching friends. This was possibly the sketchiest bar I have ever been to, but the music was great and drinks were free for ladies until 2am. Free and unlimited! You can imagine how that went. But don't imagine too wildly.

Saturday: Quiet and slow with a gloriously late start. Indian food and room work covered in the previous post.

Sunday: Exploration of the fabulous Deoksugung Palace and the heart of metropolitan Seoul. We were treated to the second performance of a free Autumn concert series at the palace. It was a neo-traditional Korean music festival, and it was amazing. The extent to which music can connect people is staggering to me. I am a foreigner, a tourist. I don't understand when you speak Korean to me. But I understood this music.

Saturday is also the day everything began. A call from Hyo Jin informed us that a boy in Heather class (who had not been in school for a week already) had been confirmed to have...THE SWINE FLU. Is that the sound of the world as we know it ending? I think so!

We were told we had Monday and Tuesday off. And - what else would you expect? - we rejoiced! I mean to say - poor kid. But a four day weekend awaited us and we were giddy with the thought.

Monday: The day it all fell through. At 7am I got a text message from Anne from the hospital where she lay with 2nd degree burns from an accident with a large quantity of boiling water. At 10am I got a call from our supervisor (but not the boss) informing me that because the school was closed for these two days we were required BY LAW to offer make up days on two upcoming September Saturdays.

The resulting day? Heather, Rebekah and I braved an unknown corner of Seoul to find the burn hospital Anne was at. We brought her a motley assortment of books because she had nothing with her and ended up staying for 3 hours just chatting and giggling. She was in a room with four older Korean ladies and no one spoke English. It's an experience I wouldn't wish on anyone. On the way there, the way back, and deep into the night we analyzed, schemed and brought into being a mini union. With the four of us roommates (the only English teaching staff at our school) unified in discontent over the sudden disappearance of two of our precious Saturdays I think things might happen around here.

With any luck, tomorrow morning we will meet with our boss and get some direct and reliable information about the situation. Tonight all I can do is wait and see.

Big week ahead.

Spaces

Today was the day. I put my mark on the room and now I know I'm staying here for the year. In one fell swoop I bought bedding, moved the furniture, and swept and scrubbed my predecessor's filth right out the door. And it was hard to do. Not just the scrubbing and the moving - the mindset was extremely elusive at first.

For four weeks I've been living temporarily. I still don't have much food, I haven't yet done any household chores and until today I had only done that one load of laundry. And the room was a yellow box where I slept on borrowed sheets and kept my cup and alarm clock on the floor because the set up made sure there was no where else to put them.

After lunch with Heather and Rebekah at Everest (the Indian restaurant that at once makes me happy and homesick) we all trekked over to E-mart and I faced the music in the bedding section. Choices are limited here, to say the least. What I ended up with was blue sheets and pillow case, but a white duvet cover. It looks good. A shot of ice to the otherwise warm and sandy space.

I feel better now, sitting on my little iceberg bed looking out at this room that feels mine now that my hands have changed so much. My hands have created this space. Now it's mine. Or will be soon. Now it will be harder to leave it. So I guess this means I'm actually doing this Korea-for-a-year thing. Wow.

Mood Swings (and a poem just for kicks)

If I walk under the sun

my breath can lift me away

from the cardboard box bedroom

breaking the ice from my eyes onto the floor every morning

waking into darkness

I find my windows in other places:

laughter on the wall,

the first child I see,

a glance from someone who knows

And I am talking to you

across a universe

wiping my own tears

because you can't reach far enough

This is by no means a complete poem. What it is is an illustration of the crappiness that was the first half of my day. It got so crappy that I sat down and wrote a poem, for god's sake. While my kids colored I sat at my desk and stared off into space and scribbled in the notebook I decided would be the Poetry One.

By second period I could feel my vocal chords giving up. My energy had evaporated. Then I don't know what happened, but something switched on. My afternoon classes floated by and before I knew it I was getting everything ready to go. The boss came in to talk about a boy who had recently been moved up a level, and after I spent a good 7 minutes spouting my opinion at him (which I was very proud of, by the way - who knew I had an opinion about the language level of 8 year olds) he got up and told me "Miss Adriana, I really like your teaching style. It makes me feel comfortable. Thank you for working so hard."

!!!!

Could it be I'm actually good at something? Is it possible the compliments I've been getting really aren't just a reaction to the novelty of me? Nah.

My new roommates are a breath of fresh air. We actually chat when we're at work, and the beerings we've gone out on so far have been talkative, uplifting, and just plain fun. I'm actually in an amazing mood right now after getting back from the place that will for sure become our favorite haunt - Woodstock. Big mugs of Cass (the Korean beer they have on tap) are quickly becoming my new favorite thing in the world.