Schedules.

Ah good night with the boys. Still dealing with the ongoing Ko-teacher vacay tagalong situation -- will update about that once it reaches some kind of resolution. Almost took a golden opportunity to back out of the teachers' trip today just because I could. I don't know why I get so whatever about group things. But it was like, they handed me this fucking schedule.....


I just have a hard time with it. I do. And usually I can make the best of it and I'm glad I went or whatever. But to me it seems like sometimes Koreans and Westerners work completely backwards of each other. The school schedule is up for change at the drop of a hat. Sixth period just moved to fourth and today's third period is changing with Wednesday's and second period is cancelled altogether -- what's the big deal? Okay. I've come around to that part of things. I've even almost completely come around to, "I know Children's Day is in three days, but the principal hasn't decided yet if you will have a week off or just one day, so you can't make any solid travel plans or even let your friends know what you're up to." But the other side of it -- the let's-go-have-fun-by-scheduling-every-second-of-our-time thing.... ugh. Still having major issues with it. Why do I have to go do the sight-seeing at 3:30 -- why can't I do it at 5? Why am I an adult and I was just handed a schedule with "free time" written on it?

Beyond that concern, this is officially 48 hours I'm going to have to sneak around to get in cigarettes. And that's not really going to help with the being grumpy about the schedule thing.

The good news is, a couple of my favorite third graders caught me on my walk home today to ask if I would be teaching English over the vacation. I said yes, I'll be at the school all but two weeks of the whole damn thing. Oh very good! We come study English! I just gawked at them in horror. Are you serious? Yes! Study with 리즈샘 very funny!

Now come on boys. You need to get your little selves a coupla girlfriends or something. The third graders aren't even given an invite to the camps because everyone figures they're so unfocused by the end of the year that there's no way any of them would sign up. One of these guys was at winter camp last year and swears it was the best way to spend his vacation ever. Now, I do my best for those boys because I feel so goddamn bad for them that they're stuck there with me for four hours a day when they should be sleeping in and playing computer games in their pajamas. But it's still English camp. And these are not students who are particularly dedicated to the study of the language, if you know what I mean.

But whatever. They know I love them and I told them, frankly, that vacation is boring as hell and I'd be very happy to have their company. So that's something to look forward to.

Anywho. I've been getting a lot of emails about this blog lately. It's strange -- I never set out to be a blogger. Keeping a blog is something I've done since the early years of high school, and I just thought it was appropriate to start a new one when I moved to Korea. But things seem to be changing around here fast. It's not just family and friends anymore. It's nice, though. And I like hearing from different people who all have different backgrounds and perspectives. So I put one of those handy formspring things in the sidebar there. Because, frankly, I find myself immensely boring. So I'll let you guys direct things from time to time, if you so choose. Ask away.

This is probably me signing off for the next couple of days. I'll see you all when I return from the drunken debauchery that is sure to be 50 odd Korean public school teacher staying overnight at a ski resort. Lord have mercy.