1.26.2010

Readjusting.



Hot Yellow Fellows posted this and I thought it was a prime example of what I'm not sure I'm ready to come back to trying to understand again just quite yet. I mean, when one of my students looks at me, indicates another student and says, "Teacher he smell boy!" it's funny enough. But then, they're fifteen. I realize that, essentially, they are children's entertainers. I just.... really?

Sigh. MJ Oppah's umma is in the hospital with something that sounds pretty damn serious and it's one of those situations where you're not quite sure what to do, because you want to do something kind to help, or to show that you care, but at the same time, you don't feel quite close enough to make that kind of gesture yet. I don't really want to stress him out by being a stupid foreigner who can't figure out where the hospital is and shows up with some kind of oddly cooked foreigner version of Korean food, and making him explain to his entire family what the foreigner girl is doing there. You know? That's got 'disaster' written all over it. And also might come off as a bit stalkeresque at this point.

It would've been really nice to come home to a Mike Magnes after this trip. Unfortunately, he's busy dying of the worst sinus/whatever infection ever and not being covered by his job's insurance just yet back in New York. JH Unni phoned me in the cab on the way home from the airport yesterday just to check in. I asked her to catch me up on any of the gossip I missed while I was away. She said nothing too interesting had gone down, that there were a few things, but I sounded too tired to hear it just then.

It was nice to arrive at the airport and have the cab line staff approach me in English and look completely taken aback when I answered them all in Korean, and then having them willingly shift over once they realized I knew where I was going and, in general, what was going on. The Korean conversation with the driver in the cab was relatively effortless. It seems I am still improving, despite putting very little effort into studying. I seem to pick up small things everyday and then after a while, they just sort of sink in. Texing with MJ Oppah and JH Unni in Korean has helped loads. At this point, I can understand everything they're saying, but it's also stuff that I wouldn't know how to phrase exactly in the right or natural way, if I hadn't had it said to me first.

I need new hangers and possibly a new clothing rack to accomodate all of the ridiculous shopping I did while I was in Glasgow. I'll have to hit up the Homeplusuh later. On that note, I've just recieved a message from my baby brother, which never happens, so I'm off to respond to it in too much detail. Smalltown's lost his phone because that's the kind of thing he does, so I'm going to try to catch him out for a drink sometime this week (no classes again until Monday) and catch up on what I've missed while I've been away. To all the people who have been leaving comments, I've read them all and appreciate them all, and will try to get back to them, but I may miss some because there's been a big pile up. Thanks for reading, as always, though.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

hello

I'm no Picasso said...

...Hi?