A Christmas without sunscreen

I'm adding Christmas to the long list of things that snuck up on me this year, the list includes small innocuous things like the 4kg that returned to my belly over the last couple of months, also the months September, October, November and December. Then more important stuff like my ability to travel across an unknown country by myself fearlessly and the employment of time management skills I vehemently refused to learn all through high school! Is this what living is?


It's -8 in Buyeo today and my body felt like lead as I tried to drag it out of bed on Friday morning for the last day of school. I am off to Pohang this weekend for Christmas and to spend time with family, since that is what Christmas is about. It doesn't feel anything like Christmas this side, I am not sure if all those years of hearing "I'm dreaming of a white Christmas" ever made me actually want this. There won't be snow in Pohang so that might make it better? worse? I don't know.

I'm awfully homesick and jealous of you all. I hope you all have a blessed Christmas with your families, the sun and the mountain. I hope you eat a lot but don't forget to leave space for dessert. Don't fall asleep in midnight mass and sleep lekker long after lunch. May the Love of the Lord Jesus Christ keep you safe and happy, and if you're not into that sort of thing I still hope you are safe and happy.


Love from Pohang
Vasti

The song of ice and fire

or "11 of approximately 48"
or "Winter has arrived"
or "Let's stay warm, but not too warm"

SNOW! I saw my first snow on the 9th of December 2011. I took a picture, I touched it and I even tasted it! I have lived, and now I can go peacefully into the void. I joke; it was great but not that great. I must say, I think I hyped it up a little. Mostly it was cold. The most exciting part of seeing snow was not the pictures, it was walking out of my apartment rushing to catch the bus and having my breath stop in my chest and my body stop all together so that I could watch little white flakes fall from the sky onto my clothes. It’s nice because it’s new. It was like I got to discover something after I had not discovered things for a while. I think this is part of the value of travelling. Seeing new things, pushing your brain out in new directions, making space for things you previously had not had space for. As someone who spends a large part of her life in her head, I was used to only stretching my brain with new ideas and new challenges. The soft caress of stretching your brain with new natural scenery is gentle and powerful and wonderful. It's a light refreshing yoga session for your brain as opposed to the weight lifting you do at university or the cardio you do keeping up with the news and peoples personal dramas. I just kept my eyes open and absorbed as much as I could all the way to work. When I got to work the cheer of kids mucking about in snow kept my heart light and made me smile through the cold. So even though I don't have eyelashes to speak of, I will still try to catch some snowflakes on my face and send you pictures that will hopefully show how my soul feels.

FIRE! On the 12th of December there was a fire in my apartment building. It took place in an apartment below mine, either on the third floor or the second floor, I'm not sure which. It took place in the late evening, here's how it went down. I take a nap and wake up to the smell of smoke, I think, 'not my smoke problem, I didn't cook, I didn't use a heater, I don't smoke so I'm fine'. However none of my windows are open so where could the smell be coming from... I investigate. Once I step out of my bed room the smell of smoke is even stronger and it becomes clear that the 'not my problem' approach is not going to be helpful. I search my apartment for a fire that I know is not there (just in case) and minutes after I complete my search my upstairs neighbour rings my bell and starts asking me things in Korean. The only words I understand are 'restroom' and 'where' so I direct him to my bathroom and try to tell him that the fire is not in my apartment. I think he gets it, turns out he is also getting smoked upstairs, assumed the fire was one floor down and politely came to ask me to put it out. Once he finds out it’s not my fire he calls the fire department. This whole time I am in my apartment, doing a quick clean so that I am not completely embarrassed when the fire department shows up. Ten minutes later, voilà...firemen, in those universal firemen uniforms but with writing I don't understand. Curse my poor Korean. The fire men walk up the stairs past my apartment to the source of the call and my neighbour sends them down to me, apparently he was unconvinced by my insistence that it was not my fire. The firemen gather at the door to my apartment and then politely ask me if they can walk on my floor with their boots. I do not take kindly to this (it's cute but something's burning, someone might be dying, this is not the time for niceties), but I am polite and after a quick inspection and some frantic hand gesturing on my part they realise I am not the cause of the smoke. At this point my eyes are stinging from the smoke in my apartment. The fire men move downstairs and I try to do something helpful, I can’t think of anything and the smoke is making me cough so I open the windows and doors and flee. I go down the stairs and out of the building where I meet an assortment of neighbours in pyjamas standing and chatting in Korean while the fire fire-fighters walk up and down the stairs carrying fire extinguishers. I still don't know if the fire was on the second floor or the third. I start to panic, what if I can't sleep here tonight, where do I go? What if the fire is blamed on me and my school expels me. I think of people in Korea I could call, everyone seems too far away or too unfamiliar to call up in the middle of the night with nothing more than panic and speculation. I call my mother. She says "Oh my word girlie" and "Shame man" and "sjoe, are you ok?". She says it in a familiar and comforting way while I try not to sound panicked and let off steam about how these things will happen to no one but me. She asks questions I can’t answer but it's nice to have someone to talk to and I appreciate that she doesn't panic with me, that would have been a disaster. 

Anyhoo, eventually the fire department leaves and my building is still standing, no one told me anything so I assume it's safe to go back inside. My apartment is still smoke ridden and I can barely breath. My clothes smell like smoke, my hair smells like smoke, my bed smells like smoke and I am frozen to the core and feeling utterly miserable.  I left the doors and windows open and climbed into bed, put my electric blanket on high and proclaimed my misery to the facebook universe. Immediately I get comments of support and suggestions for what I can do and I start to relax. I take a midnight shower which gets the smoke out of my hair but wakes me up like never before, I close my room door to the smoke in the main area of my apartment and climb into bed to chat with Sinclair and Ashika till I can't keep my eyes open anymore. I fall asleep at about 5:30am and text my co-teacher when my alarm goes off half an hour later... I will not be making it to school today :-(

My apartment is back to normal, I got the smoke out of everything. It has snowed twice since the first time and I don't hate snow (I need snow boots though). I'm okay, the year is winding down and I would be lying if I said I don't miss my varsity style vacations. A pox on all of you who make your facebook posts about beaching, braaiing and good weather! Not a very serious pox. 

Good night and good love!

Vasti

Double digits baby

Or "Part 10 of approximately 42"

or "Where's Vasti?"

It's getting colder in Korea, in fact it is getting cold quickly. Last week I was complaining a little about how the weather was changing but I am wearing my hard core winter coat to school every day now. Last week I was able to take it off when I got to school but these days I keep it on all day long. I need a more hard core scarf. As most of you know, I am a summer baby. I was born in February, the hottest month of the South African year. I like warm. Sinclair says the month you are born in doesn't affect how you handle temperature later in your life but he was born in winter, sweats buckets in summer and has an internal heater that never switches off so I don't even believe him (why would he say something like that anyway...). I don't think I am made for the cold at all and what's worse is that I have been losing weight since I got here and all of a sudden this seems like a very un-thought-through plan, I’m losing my insulation...

I wrote the last paragraph ages ago, back when I was on top of things and deadlines still meant something.

I keep living, which seriously gets in the way of my writing. Because of this I only get to think of all the cool things I want to tell you guys but never actually tell them to you because that would involve me using my free time productively and not just spending it recovering from the fun I am having. Also, there was a bit of a slump at some point, it all seems very blurry to me, lots of episodes of Law and Order SVU and not much being an active member of Korean Society. I have gained back more than half of the weight I lost and I would call that falling off the weight-loss wagon but there are rumours that no such wagon exists and that I made it up. 

So I have been Busy, but what have I been Busy doing? Lord knows, time flies so fast here... just last month I was flabbergasted at it being November and can you believe it...December! Who keeps doing this? Who is the bra (South African slang for person, often boy person, not to be confused with brassiere) that sneaks into my world and changes the calendar dates when I’m not looking... and why is he adding the days to poor Sinclair's calendar? Apparently on that side it feels like I've been gone many, many years (or that's what I gather from all the love msgs). Let’s investigate this mystery of the missing time by taking a look at my usual schedule.

Mondays: 

Wake up at 6:00 (not really but let’s go with it)

Turn on the water

Do a short workout

Pack a lunch, eat breakfast (I have special K but I wish it was oats*)

Take a shower, wash the dishes. 

Lament the cold weather, check facebook, emails, smurf village crops (which I have forgotten to do today so they will wither before I get home).

Get dressed and leave for school at 8:00

Get to school at 8:45

Classes till lunch and then lunch at 12:10 (lunch is delicious, always, I love Korean food, I eat too fast and get tired after lunch) then classes again till 2:40 (you're probably waking up now, it's 7:40am SA time)

Back on Facebook watch other people complain about how awful Mondays are. I don't feel it. It's Tuesdays that are awful!

Prepare for Tuesdays, although you can never prepare enough, Tuesdays have classes with grade ones and then an after-school class of screaming banshees (the worst of the grade ones and two together in one class for forty gruelling minutes) But back to Mondays.

Just after three ya'll arrive at work and I start chatting to Ashika, Randall sometimes my mum, sometimes Aunty Emmy. Lately Ferron has also been alive in the mornings, so we can also get our chat on. Sinclair goes to work late so he comes on about 30minutes before I leave for home. Ok, so one hour of distracted work/distracted chatting/facebooking. Now it’s 4:30 and I have to pack up, my bus leaves at 4:50 so I leave school at about 4:45.

Get home at 5:35 - Lament the cold.

Drop my bags, pee (I don't know why but I always have to pee when I get home. No matter how much I peed at school...one of life’s weird little stuff I suspose.)

5:45 -Make a rushed dinner, usually just veggies and 두부 (Korean tofu) cause it's quick an easy. Eat a quick dinner and pack my Korean studies bag: pencil case, text book note book, cup for tea or coffee (they only have paper cups and I feel it’s wasteful) put off all the lights and then

6:20 off to Korean classes for two hours of intensive Korean study and exhausting gossip with the other foreign teachers. We like to complain about the Chungman Education Department, I do it because it makes me feel a little more like a grown up, but I’m sure some of them have legitimate grievances. I only have that one about them not telling me about orientation in time so I had to miss time with my mum.

Korean Classes ends at 8:30, I walk home for about 25 minutes and then get home just before 9:00 at which point I am exhausted. Like bleeding eyeballs exhausted and I pretend to do stuff, mostly sit and stare into the distance and make lists in my head of stuff I should be doing before I fall into bed for sleepy time. 

Tuesday:

Didn't get enough sleep, don't feel like working out. So get up 6:45

Facebook and check mail from bed (god bless ipads), get up, Lament the cold, make breakfast (still not Oats), eat slowly and berate myself for skipping my workout, promise to make it up to me. Everything pretty much runs like Monday mornings.

Get to school and have fun with my older grades, make sure the younger grades know that I am not here for fun, I am here to get English into their heads by any means necessary; THIS IS ENGLISH CLASS! (said as if English Class and Sparta have something in common). I have the grade ones today, last semester I sang “head, shoulders, knees and toes” with them every day. When I got back to school this semester and I tested them, I found out just how hard it is to teach without speaking the same language. I tested them on “head, shoulders knees and toes” and found out that they didn’t understand the function of “and” in the song, so they had just learnt four basic body parts: “head”, “shoulders”, “knees-anne” and “toes”. Adorable but frustrating. The last class of the day is even more traumatic, it’s the mix of grade ones and twos. They can listen, repeat and even do worksheets but they cannot follow instruction. If they learn nothing else from me this year, I take solace in the fact that they all know what “SIT DOWN!” means. They don’t get very noisy though, if they did I’d make them get down on their kness-anne for two minutes with their hands on their heads. I have found though that if you ask kids to close their eyes they also stop talking... weird but useful. Today class ends at 3:30 and I am exhausted and worried about being lame in chats but I do it anyway, also my co-teacher usually pesters me on Tuesdays about signing registers and drawing up weekly summaries. The day goes fast and I have to run for my bus. I sometimes make it, sometimes don't make it. Missed it yesterday. Get home at 5:35 and chuck my bags on the floor! Tired, but skipped my workout so I have to sneak it in before Korean classes. Put the water on, put some food on the stove and jump into a workout. Push hard, work hard, Life's hard, get tired. Take the food off the stove, jump in the shower while it cools WORLDS FASTEST SHOWER.

After the shower, I gobble up all the lovely rushed food that I made and I run out the door for Korean classes. I get to Korean classes still a little hungry and gobble up the delicious snacks they have to offer (Korean snacks should get an email to itself, remind me of this when I say I have nothing to write about). I drink coffee all the way through the lesson and still feel pretty tired when I get back home. At nine I get into my house, think about doing the dishes but that would involve me putting the water on again and waiting for it to get warm, there's no way. I change and crawl into bed, early rise in the morning.

Wednesday:

Wake up at 6:00 for a Skype date with Sinclair, This usually puts me in good mood for Wednesdays, even though sometimes I am so tired that I cancel them. We usually only Skype for one hour because at 7am my time it's midnight in SA and he has work in the morning. Then I either turn around and nap for a bit, or I get up and start packing a bag and some snacks, getting showers and breakfast done, dressing and general prettifying.  

Sinclair: bored, tired and unaware that I take
pictures of him while we Skype.

Wednesday is an easy day at school, I have four classes in the morning and then I am free just after lunch. After lunch I clean my classroom cause it gets pretty filthy, the kids only ever tidy. I repack all my resources, the kids mess that up in the week too, one lesson with crayons and I know I will be scrubbing my desks on a Wednesday. Then I lay out the work I need to do for Friday, which is another long day. I usually spend part of Wednesday in the staff room making photocopies, talking to teachers and showing face, sometimes just reading on the couches, there is a sweet spot that always gets sun, then it's back upstairs for chats and work on personal things like budgets, emails, life planning, over thinking my morning talk with Sinclair and more chats till home time. At this point I’m super tired. I trudge down to the bus stop with a miserable look on my face and sleep on the bus on the way home. Panic about missing my stop every time, make my stop every time and hit my apartment at 5:45 I’m not sure what happens to my bags. Too tired to think, too tired to work out, I’m lucky if I eat supper, usually just drink whatever liquids are in my house and eat whatever does not need cooking. Lay about my apartment for a few minutes until I have to go down to Korean classes. Korean class I a haze... I participate but remember very little. People’s faces are blurry and the way they keep looking at me like I’m strange gets on my nerves <-- OK I’m exaggerating a bit here :-). But you get the gist, I’m tired. I walk home... get there at about 9:10 and SLEEP. The night takes me and I awake on Thursday morning with something akin to a hangover.

Thursdays:

Thursdays are at Guam, my second school these days are filled with stress but not of the teaching kind. I have a draak of a co-teacher here(and not in the dragons-are-awesome kind of way). She doesn't let me teach the kids at all, she feels competent in English and so she isn't really behind the native speaker programme, nor is she behind the teach English in English programme, so I sit in her class for hours on end and listen to her shout at the kids in Korean and when I try to speak to her about it she bursts into tears and says "I'm not bad person, I"m not bad teacher". Ai, with some people you never win...but on the upside she doesn't expect me to prepare lessons or even participate so I get to zone out and find peace in my mind. I can't do my own work, and I have to sit in on her class, both our contracts require that we teach with each other in the class, but it's peaceful and I spend most of my Thursday's at Guam working on the newsletter that I send to you... yes this one, Yes I am at Guam as I write this. Guam is also the school with a gym so... workouts before I even get home! I pack in some workout clothes and do my workout at three in the school gym. Guam is not only closer to Buyeo than Hongsan is but they also let me leave earlier during the cold months so I get home at 5 :-) woohoo! And no Korean class... Woohoo! But I can’t sleep or i'll throw out my pattern so I try to do productive stuff. I will make food slowly, eat slowly. Clean Wednesdays mess, shower in a normal amount of time. Sometimes go out for a long dinner with Ernest, talk about how long days are and how quickly time flies... too relaxed and relieved to lament the cold. Get to bed early and sleep....

Fridays:

Wake up feeling ready for the day.

Wake up at 6:00 

Turn on the water

Do a short workout

Pack a lunch, eat breakfast

Take a shower, wash the dishes. 

Lament the cold weather, check facebook, emails, smurf village crops

Get dressed and leave for school at 8:00

Get to school at 9:00

Long day at school again today, but I can handle it... or at least I think I can till the after lunch slump hits and I’m over everything. Then I still have to teach two grade four classes and the dreaded Kindergarteners (cue scary drum music)! 

The Kinergarteners are balls of energy. They storm into my class on a Friday at the end of a long day which is at the end of a long week and they cannot understand English and they cannot sit still and they don't understand that I’m tired and they have all the emotions of fully grown people but with none of the self control. They are exhausting! If I give kid A a thumbs up but I don't give kid B one then kid B starts crying... and I don't know why he's crying because he can't speak English and I can't understand Korean well enough yet. And then the other kids start shouting at me about making B cry and the whole class turns against me and their eyes turn black and their mouths open wider than humanly possible and their wails fill my ears and the classroom and the world and over the din I shout IT'S JUST THE ALPHABET GUYS! IT'S NOT THAT HARD!

When they leave at 3:30 they take all my energy with them. I lay slumped and exhausted in my teachers chair like a rag doll that has had its stuffing taken out...And I think about what excuse I’m going to make to my fellow Buyeonese for not boozing with them tonight. Breathe slowly and slowly prepare myself for Sinclair’s last minute realisation that he can't skype with me this weekend. One of his many family members are having a birthday, he's cuddling with his male friends (they call it braaiing but it my head they're having sleepover style pillow fights and play wrestling with each other, most of them are pretty cuddly), he's going to play golf and then drink a bottle of whiskey, I don't know what it is but something always comes up :-) Sometimes the things that come up are on my side. I celebrate all Korean holidays and festivals and whatnot, so if stuff is happening here, I’m in it to win it. In fact I’m especially in it if there is something to win. And that brings me to the weekend...wait let me finish off Fridays. 

So I get home, the bus trip is a long and tiring hazy dream blur and the walk up to my apartment is ten degrees steeper than it was on Monday and the apartment itself is further up the hill, I don’t know how they do this but Korean technology never ceases to amaze. I put my bags down and flop down onto my bed with an unrealistic idea of how much time I have ahead of me. The weekend feels like days and days of rest but rarely is this the truth. Weekends, much like Korean women's skirts, are extremely appealing from a distance and always shorter than you expect them to be. Friday evening runs into Friday night... I do sweet blissful nothings, unless I get called out for boozing. Even if I don't get called out for boozing I know I’m going to get drunk dialled and guilted about sleeping Friday nights in, I am not the oldest Buyeoan, so I have no excuse, as I am often reminded. I’m trying to hide from them that I’m actually a really boring person so that I still get invited to do fun stuff that involves delicious food, if that ever comes around. What’s that blissful feeling of warmth and cushy pillows? Is it sleep? Yes, it is... come to me my love.

Coffee in cute places

Weekends: Each weekend has its own thing. For the past two weekends I have been hosting people at my flat. Last weekend it was Maryam and Natalie, two girls from another town in my province. The weekend before that it was Petra and two of her friends from Pohang (which means I have not had a weekend Skype with Sinclair in over two weeks). Sometimes I go out with friends to neighbouring provinces but this is expensive for someone who is trying to save as much as I’m trying to save. They always end up shopping for clothes which I find a little boring to be honest...clothes smothes, nothing fits me. I miss Mr Price. I'd much rather go stationery shopping and the other girls find that boring and my enthusiasm for pens a little creepy. What’s weird though is that I would be down for super girly stuff like movies and manicures and massages but they don't seem into that either... just shopping and eating in pretty places.  We have pretty places in Cape Town and I can read the menus :-) I digress... ok, so weekends have no structure really but what I do insist on is getting home before two on a Sunday. And if you visit me, I'd like for you to bugger off before 2pm as well. Then I get to work. I do try to keep things tidy in the week but on Sundays I clean. I clean house then I clean body and nails and hair, clean out my bags and my cupboards and put washing in the machine and do sleep prep. Got to be peaceful on a Sunday night. Sometimes I Skype with Emlind while I do my hair. 

Me at one of the entrances to Gyeongbukung Palace

Other activities that go down on weekends are things like:

Going to the Seoul for shopping/partying/exploring/banking.

Going to the Seoul National museum

Going to Gyeonbukung (Gyeongbuk palace)

Me at the SA restaurant in Itaewon

Going to Itaewon (A refuge for foreigners of every sort, there used to be an American army base here and thus a lot of Americans and then stores that catered to Americans and then as more and more English was introduced people from other countries would spend weekend in Itaewon. Eventually they built stores that catered to their nationalities and now it is like a foreigner owned place in Seoul. There are international markets there and there are popular foreign food restaurants. There is a place called Braai Republic which is a South African restaurant but doesn't sell any South African beer and has a massive Zebra skin up on the wall and feels fake. Honestly, I would have preferred a Nando's. At least when the craving hits I can go get some potjiekos, even though they import their meat from the US and Australia. The highlight of going there was sprinkbokkies! This is a ridiculously long bracket, I didn't mean to do it, sorry)

Saffas in korea

Going to Pohang: Pohang is Petra's city. I've been there three times, four maybe but it's massive. So I will end up going there many more times. Buyeo is much smaller and you can see all the touristy things Buyeo has to offer in about two wekends. Petra's city has a cinema! And a beach! And KFC and McDonald's and all sorts of western things. Most importantly, it has free accommodation at casa da Petra.

Not all my weekends are action packed, sometimes I like to stay home all weekend. In fact I’ve been dying to do a Lord of the Rings festival and the colder weather will not only keep me indoors but also help me sympathise with the fellowship wrt their decision to get out of the snow storm and brave The Mines of Moria. I’ll see if I can throw together some butternut soup and make day of it J more fun times in Buyeo.

Casa de Petra

So that’s my week. Whodathunk it would take me four weeks to write it down? I have noticed that I may seem a little crazy, a little bit like I am doing too much and wearing myself out and just taking on a lot. So I want to add something that explains a little, I'm being sincere and I think it's important for me to say this. I love being here! I love being tired and then having energy and then running out of it. I love being angry at myself and hating workouts and missing home. I love every moment of the difficult co-teacher and the wailing kids and the fact that I haven't had a peanut butter and jam sandwich in months. I love long walks in foreign places and the fact that the police don't carry weapons and I particularly love feeling like a human being. You see the thing is, for a while around 2007-2009 I didn't feel like a human being. I didn't have proper feelings of exhaustion and rage. I didn't really feel much, and if I were not so well rehearsed in loving people I would have probably stopped loving all of you and you would not have been able to keep me from the black abyss that was clawing at my soul (a Jesus also comes in handy here). Depression like many illnesses and disabilities makes you feel separated from the healthy world, a world that healthy people take for granted and a world where it is easier to find peace in your spirit. The benefits of sound mental health are not discussed enough and the small, crippling consequences of poor mental health are not easily translated. Not being able to gather the strength to berate myself for skipping a workout is worse than anything I could say to myself after skipping a workout. Not being able to care about my own well being is a gabazzillion percent worse than just choosing not to care. These things sound weird, strange, and awful if you're reading them properly...but they are part of me. So while I will lap up any sympathy you send my way, don't for a moment think I am unhappy. When I say that life is hard I mean it and I would not want it any other way. 

Wishing you good mental health and a wonderful festive season (if those two are not mutually exclusive)

Your friend/niece/cousin/daughter/sister/mentor/girlfriend/student/servant

Always

Bashti Teacher

Friends, lovers and fans

Or "Part 9 of approximately 42"
Or "More about me, less about Korea"
or "The K-POP tutorial"


So this week I hit my six month mark! Can you believe it? I can not! It is shocking! Shocking I tell you, Shocking! How could I have been here for six months already, it still feels like I just arrived. Well not just arrived, but it does feel like I am Princess Jasmine in that scene where Jafar has trapped her in the massive hour glass and the sand is falling on her head and she is completely overwhelmed. Time is running out, my Korean is terrible, I've fallen of the weight-loss wagon, the grade sixes are leaving in two months and I don't even know all their names! I am not even close to perfecting this being-a-grown-up thing, but six months have come and gone and I am feeling hopeful for the next six.

For the love of Ashika

Today is my friend Ashika's birthday. I miss her terribly and would like to send a Shout-out to her. I just want to say, Ashika, I love you like a limb. I don't want to be parted from you and though I sometimes take you for granted I know life would be much harder without you (which pretty much sums up how I feel about my limbs). I hope our friendship stands the test of time, the test of distance and some other tests. Don't ever let the muggles get you down.


As some of you must have heard in my graduation party speech, I am a friend person, not only friendly (not very friendly) but a friend through and through. I have had difficult friendships, easy friendships, close friendships and really weird friendships in my lifetime but in each of them I have tried to be a good friend. Being a good friend is really important to me and my poor mother had to watch as I put my friendships before my family, before my work and before myself. I try not to do that anymore, but I find it difficult. I have a disease, it's like extreme Ubuntu, Ubuntu to the point where I stone myself for not being in line with the people around me even when what they are doing is detrimental to me. Ubuntu where I spend a lot of time asking myself what I am if the people around me are not happy. Now that I don't see my friends all the time, I find it hard to support them, I find it hard to comfort and enjoy them. I find it hard to make myself available for their enjoyment but at least I still get to be an example to them and learn from their (sorry guys) copious mistakes :-)

Oh romance!

If I am honest I have to admit that things between Sinclair and I are taking some strain. It's better than I could have hoped, 1) He stayed (he hasn't been snatched up by some other girl, Lauren Julies, Illandra Rich, I'm watching you both), 2) He doesn't guilt trip me about coming home (well not everyday) and 3) we are both losing weight (when I get back we're joining Feeders Anonymous) but not having a warm bodied friend and waking up at six to Skype on a weekday does take it's strain and even though we cancel sometimes because we're both too tired or too busy to Skype it does feel like I have more of a responsibility to put the effort in because I am the one that left his poor soul in the most beautiful city in South Africa. I guess long distance is hard for both parties in different ways. I don't feel lonely as often as Sinclair does, because I don't have an empty Sinclair shaped space in my world, but I don't feel as comfortable moaning about missing him and missing South Africa cause I did choose to leave and every morning I choose to stay here and quite frankly, I'm gonna keep choosing this for as long as it takes for me to achieve the goals I came here to achieve. Any way, six months marks the longest time Sinclair and I have been physically apart in our nine year relationship, and while I can see that it's getting more tough we are still going strong. No fights or threats or affairs with work colleagues, no neglect or resentment or tears drenching the keyboard, in short - No drama. Since he's not coming to visit in January anymore I will only see him in July, which means we are still nine months away from physical contact... wish us luck!


I know that a couple of emails ago I went on and on about how much I appreciate the support of the people around me but I cannot say it enough. Thanks you guys! If I ever became famous (lets pray I don’t ever) I’ll be one of those really obnoxious stars that work really hard but accept all my awards saying “To my fans, you guys are the best, I couldn’t have done this without you” when what they mean is “I love that you are obsessed me, please love me more so that I will be motivated to work harder for your approval and people will think I’m worthy” when what I really wanna be is  the Johnny Depp kind of star who basically says “I like doing this so much that I don’t mind that other people think I’m worth more than I’m actually worth”. In short, fans would go straight to my (already oversized) head and try as much as I want I will not be able to see myself realistically. It took me a long time but I’ve accepted that I may be a drama queen but I should never actually study drama and become famous. I love singing so much, and God has blessed me with an awful singing voice because, of course God knew if he gave me a weapon of great power I would accidentally wipe out the whole world and stab myself in the process. The world does not need another Kanye. So to my current fans, love me but not too much, love me in secret, feel free to buy me Jungle Oats.


So, K-POP: Who can guess what that "K" stands for? That's right, KOREA! Lets all say it together "KOREA!" Not to be confused with J-POP which is Japanese pop music. How ever K-POP is like nothing you know of pop music... It's strange and wonderful and one of those things that you either love or hate with your whole soul until it overpowers your soul and forces you to love it! To be honest I hated it when I first heard it, but it grew on me, and now Negachay-Chalaka (I am the best) is one of my favourite songs (In the K-pop genre, not of all times).


The characteristics of K-POP bands: K-POP bands usually have anything between 4 and 14 members of the same sex. They usually have English or partially English names. They have snippets of English in their songs. They do not only sing but sing and dance. Each group has it's own distinct style and cannot be confused with other groups so nothing like the backstreet boys/n'sync blur of the nineties. The groups are made of teenagers or people in their early twenties and usually have a life span of about five years in which they make loads of money before their group is dissolved. This all seems pretty standard so lets get to the weird part.


The weird part: So K-POP is not a genre as much as it is a music industry. By industry I mean factory... Young boys and girls all apply to join specific music academies whose soul function it is to produce K-POP bands. So you apply, get accepted and go and do your time, they give you voice training, dance training, Learn multiple languages (because Korean pop music has become popular in Japan and China too), you have to write exams, they dress you, brand you and when you graduate you are either slotted into an existing K-POP band or you and some of your classmates are formed into a band which is completely managed by the academy. You don't have much agency after you are branded in the group, you will be known as "the cute one" or "the chubby one" or "the weird one" what ever persona you are given in the group is carried through in a very spice girls manner. Scary spice couldn't show up looking posh... although in the end Posh spice did look a little scary. Your entire professional career is planned by the agency and they use the profits to first an foremost make back the money it cost to make you a star.


The even weirder part: So if you do well in your band you can be promoted into to a more successful, usually older K-POP group. You could go Solo but solo artists aren't as popular as the groups are. The lead singer is usually just the most popular girl but she changes throughout the life span of the group and no one is sure if this is because public opinion changes or if the behind the scenes string pullers are affecting public opinion through the media. It really all is a big show.


The on the ground experience: Each of my students have their favourite band and one of the first things I got asked when I arrived at school was which K-POP band is my favourite. I used to say T-ara (pronounced tiara) because it was the only one I knew but now I know a few more and I really like Super Junior and 2ne1 (pronounced 21, I assumed it was pronounced "too anyone", since they also have a single titled "Too anyone" but my students insist they are called 21). foreigners are also into K-POP and Korea’s music groups have large following in Japan the Philippines and China. They are working with some US artists as well but (forgive my skepticism) i think that will probably more to widen the Americans reach and not to have K-POP stars become popular in the US. Although I have heard that K-POP is big underground in the US. I’ll add a few links to the songs that makes me smile, I hope you like it.


I’m gonna end off this email with a little gem that I found that confused and delighted me. It’s a South Korean cover of a popular South African song. In Korea it's sung by BeBe Mignon, here it is. Don’t ask me how they even discovered this song, I always feel like South Korea is so far removed from South Africa but clearly my two worlds are colliding. Imagine how weird I felt hearing that in the shop one day.


That is all for today. I hope you have a wonderful day and that you appreciate the warm weather coming your way. Think of me when you hit the beach for the first time and also if you drive past steers :-)


Peace like a river
Bashti Teacher


Here are the K-POP songs that get my knee a-boppin’


2NE1 - I am the best, Super Junior - Mr Simple, wait till you pass the intro (this one also explains why Sinclair doesn’t have tow worry about me leaving him for a Korean man) and then lastly, 2NE1 - Ugly (i think i just like this one because the chorus is in English and I have some idea of what it’s about, not 100% sure though)


That’s all <3

If some of this was too personal please let me know

Or "Part 8 of approximately 42"
or "Judith Turner visits Korea (JT in the ROK)"
or "An even more pimped out school"
or "Toilet humour"

Hello dear readers,

How are you all? As a group, and a single entity, how are you? Do you guys ever get together and discuss my strange emails and reminisce about hearing all my nonsense first hand?

The last email was late and thus did not contain an update as much as a status report. You deserve an update so here it is. As you already know I am well, still fascinated by this country and its people and my ability to function well so far from all that I know. What I’m going to tell you now is a story of anger and disappointment and then some joy at the end. So let me begin...I only get 8 days of summer vacation. 8 days is hard to come to grips with when you are fresh out of university and used to getting four months a year off. I can barely remember what I did in university vacations, two months of summer vacation seems like enough time to fix the world, surely I could have done it with all that free time. I feel guilty for not doing it...but back to my working-persons vacation. Obviously the ideal would be to have all eight days consecutively (with one weekend somewhere in there) unfortunately I have two schools which end and start at different times and have two separate summer camps which resulted in my having to split my vacation into three days in one week, then a week of camp and then four days and a public holiday and then one week of camp and then one day and, wait for it… a week of orientation. I know you’re thinking “Why did she have to go to orientation, she had been there for like four months already.” That’s what I thought too, but it’s mandatory for everyone to attend orientation and I missed mine by two months. So now it was catch up time :-(

Orientation was awful, not only was I in lockdown for a week with lectures everyday from 9am to 9pm but it also started the day after my Mom arrived in Korea. When I got the news I was devastated. While my sister and Mom were gallivanting around Korea I was stuck learning how to DRAW UP LESSON PLANS! Something I have been doing since I was fricken 12 years old! Really, I planned my first workshop/lesson in youth at church when I was twelve and then continued to run lessons and workshops for the next 10 years of my life! Apart from the fact that I couldn't run in the sun with my lovely mother I was also slightly isolated from the rest of my SA peeps. I wasn't available to Aunty Emmy or Ashika or Randall (my usual early morning-chat crowd) and for the first time since I got to Korea I was unable to speak to Sinclair for something like four days straight. Sinclair and I don't call each other every day but there is always an email or a quick chat or a facebook poke or something every day. That's how you make long distance work... So ya, that was a hard week and one of the reasons I fell off the email-every-fortnight plan. But I'm back on and not at all bitter and angry, so let’s talk about more cheerful things.

So after gallivanting around the beautiful East Coast of Korea with my sister, my mom jumped on the KTX (Korea’s bullet train) and met me in Deajeon, the biggest city (sort of) in my province. We didn't stay there long though because we had to hop on a bus to Buyeo, my little town. My mom says it's bigger than Stellenbosch but I don't agree. What we do agree on though is that it looks a little like Korean Salt River. Being the capital of the Beakje dynasty means that Buyeo is very old and you can tell by the buildings and design. However Buyeo is beautiful and on the very first night my mom arrived in Buyeo I took her to Korea's oldest man-made lake (Gumnanji Pond). It's small for a lake, a pond actually but it's beautiful at night because it is lit up from the bottom and there is a temple right in the middle of the lake with a bridge leading onto it. Gumnanji Pond is also the venue for Korea's annual lotus festival. My mom missed it by about two weeks but the pond had been spruced up for tourists coming for the festival, it looked lovely. We went at night though so it was quite dark.

While on her visit my mom cleared out my storage cupboard, chucked out all my pots, cutlery and crockery (we bought new stuff) and helped me make my kitchen more ergonomic. I must admit to waiting for her to join me in Korea before making some decisions about my house. There are still lots of things I need in my house, a full length broom being pretty high up on my list...Korea doesn't have full length brooms and I don't know why. So even though I sweep with my little (quite useless) broom I often end up vacuuming my linoleum floors. It's weird. I bought colourful kitchen utensils and yellow pots. I feel a little like I went for style over pragmatism but I'm young and the only person who will have to suffer the consequences of this decision so I don't mind. My favourite thing of all my new purchases is my dish rack. It really frees up some space in my kitchen and makes washing the dishes less of a chore, that's a pretty big deal, washing dishes is a pain. I still have not figured out how to keep my apartment clean but I have perfected the art of laundry, even the drying and the packing away. Now I just have to learn how to manage all the other junk :-(

More on the catch up front: last semester my beautiful little school 장암(Jangam), was taken away from me. You haven't even seen the pictures yet. I have a new second school now. The schools name is 규암 (pronounced gyu-hum(silent h)) and it's MUCH bigger. There are about 500 kids (my little Jangam had 70 kids) so I have to get used to an entire horde of new snot noses. Anyhoo, at Guam I only teach grade sixes and grade fours, which is kinda nice cause I don't really like the little-little ones that much, and I only teach four classes in the morning so I have the rest of the day free to lesson plan or... wait for it... gym! So ya, Guam has three floors, two wings, a Gym, a track, a cinema (you read right), an indoor playground, a whole room full of extra resources, a cafeteria the size of a restaurant and special section of the school for kids with learning disabilities. The Korean word for special needs kids directly translates to "students who need more love". I was extra nice to the special needs kids in my class after I heard that. Koreans use the integration system in their schools. Special needs kids attend normal classes just like everyone else and then some. They aren't kept separate. In fact the special needs teacher at my main school looked disgusted when I told her we have special schools in South Africa. She said integration is the only way. I can see the benefits of integration but South African schools are so under resourced. I mean I don't know of a school in SA that has a cinema and calls it an audio visual room. The audio visual room at The Settlers High School was a box on the balcony of the school hall.

So two embarrassing but also adorable things happened to me this week. The first involved my co-teacher with whom I have had a rocky relationship, her actions in this story are so cute. I’m glad we've warmed up to each other.

So I got a terrible mosquito bite right behind my knee...awful! As you already know mosquitoes in Korea are not like mosquitoes in South Africa, they are hardcore and their bites become bumps of doom (I rarely got bitten in SA)! I've lost some weight and now my pants are a little more loose than usual so every time I moved my pants would rub up against my bite and the whole thing was just an awfully itchy affair. After teaching three back to back classes I needed some serious itch relief, screw not scratching cause it makes it worse, screw marks left on my legs, it was a fight to the death and this bite was going down. Unfortunately my classroom has glass doors and anyone who walked passed would only see me with my hand down my pants jerking around like mad with a satisfied look on my face and I was not gonna risk that so I made my way down to the ladies staff bathroom. It's lovely in there, heated toilet seats and classical music, the perfect atmosphere to satisfy an itch, if I had had the forethought I would have brought a scented candle. Unfortunately my plans were thwarted by the presence of my co-teacher brushing her teeth. I couldn't just back out; walk into the bathroom, see her, walk right back out again? No, that would be suspicious so I took a cubicle instead, zipped down my pants and started scratching. After about a minute my co-teacher, standing right next to my cubicle puts on the tap, runs the water, I assume she is going to rinse her mouth but she doesn't, she just keeps brushing and I realise that she thinks I am having difficulty peeing so she run the water to... you know... boost my performance. The pressure! But I don't need to pee. I don't have a pee at all, I can't even force myself to pee. SO AWKWARD, what to do? The longer I wait the harder she thinks I need to pee but exiting seems a bit strange too. Eventually I just bite the bullet and left the cubicle without a single dripping sound. I did however wash my hands, I'm not sure why, I hope she doesn't think I'm weird.

Translation: Guam Elementary School

The second story involved my male co-workers and my ego (mostly my ego). So it's autumn in Korea (I'm wearing two jersey's) and it's getting colder (and a scarf and stockings under my pants), but the sun is still shining, in fact the skies are blue. When the sun is directly on my skin, it's not that cold, but the moment I go into the shade little patches of chicken-skin crawl all over me. Also it's cold in the mornings so I wear my coat. However, the Koreans aren't showing even the slightest bit of response to the weather, my kids are running around in shorts and t-shirts, living it up like it's summer. My classroom also gets pretty warm cause one side is all windows and the heat gets trapped inside. So I was on my way to lunch and as I leave the class I realise that it's a little more chilly outside my class than inside but it's not unbearably cold and I don’t go back to get my coat. I'm walking to lunch and the fourth grade teacher joins me and asks me if I'm cold. Now there is something you must understand about Korea and in particular Korean men; they are just like men everywhere in the world. They are always in some or other pissing contest and I don't like to let people win. So some things you will hear often when you come to Korea (esp from the men) are: Kimchi is too spicy for foreigners, Summer to too hot for foreigners, Hangul is too difficult for foreigners and obviously Korea gets too cold for foreigners. So despite the fact that I could feel the cold on my skin I said "No, I'm not cold". I wasn't that cold, it was manageable. Then at the lunch table the VP ask me if I am getting cold and I say "Nah, I'm fine" and on my way back to class the grade five teacher asks me, "Are you getting cold?" and I said, no, no, no. They tried to make me get my jersey but I said No, No, No. I should have learnt from poor Amy, bless her soul, because then I saw myself in the mirror and realized… I had the most noticeable nipple stand imaginable. Like I had two pistols pointing out at the world, they must have been so embarrassed around me. I didn't know if I should laugh or apologise to those poor men. Anyhoo, I hope they forgive me, I wore my scarf over my boobs for the rest of the day...it was the best I could do.

Next time we will talk about k-pop and I will convert you all to lovers of bad Korean pop music, for now here is a taste

Roly Poly, T-ara -it's called Roly Poly but if you listen carefully (not that carefully) you'll hear that they are actually saying loly poly. K-POP rocks!

Love you all
to bits
Even those of you who don't love me back (but you guys a little less than the others)

Stay happy and look after Cape Town for me

Bashti Teacher

The possibility of a four month slump

or "Part 7 of approximately 48"

or "creative differences and konglish"
or "the inaccessibility of problems"
Some pictures, finally!
and a little Poem from Randall Crisp

This letter has been a long time coming, I have been super busy and super lazy and that is not a combination that results in meeting deadlines. So, many things have happened in the last two months but I am awful at remembering them well, here are some thoughts on some snippets that I do recall.


When I applied for the position as an English Teacher in Korea the question that came up the most was "What do you expect to be the hardest obstacle to over come while living in Korea?". The obvious answer was "The language barrier" and in some ways that is true. For instance, I have a new (and deep) respect for menu's with pictures. I think signs in multiple languages are better than good directions in one language. I think it's strange that I can count to ten in five languages when knowing how to say "left" and "right" is so much more important. On the other hand I am shocked at how far you can get in Korea with only three Korean words. One of the reasons you can get by fairly well in Korea with only English is that Koreans LOVE English. They are clearly spending a lot of money on importing the language to their country, but apart from that they also use English a lot in advertisements, pop culture and music. This morning on the bus I was subjected to ABBA's greatest hits. This brings me to one of my favourite things about Korea: Konglish. I'm sure you have heard about Xhinglish in SA, iPenut-butta and what not, well in Korea they have Konglish. Its the Korean attempt at English, and it is fun. Hangul (the Korean language) is spoken in two tones. formal tone, and informal tone. Since tone carries a lot of the meaning in Hangul lots of the wording can be indirect, almost like speaking in proverbs and idioms all the time. So often things that that get translated are just strange and inappropriate. For example, on the wall in the Lotteria (korean fast food hamburger place) there is a sign that says "When you touch me you will know what true happiness is" which I am guessing means something like, "pure joy in every sense" or something more appropriate that didn't translate well. Any way, my point is that it is every where. Kids walk into my class with t-shirts on that are really not what kids should be wearing. My friends saw a toddler walking behind her mom on the beach and her top said "Bitch please, I'm fabulous". One of my students came into class wearing a t-shirt with a black cat on the front. Underneath the cat is read, "Our pussy's, Our choice". A fifth grade boy had a top that read "I don't want to be here, You don't want to be here, (and on the back) let's go home together". Clearly their parents have as much English as they have. It's fun though :-) My favourite Konglish experience was from my co-teacher. We were working together during the grade three camp and the kids had to make a poster of their groups theme. After a heated discussion in Korean and a lot of moaning in one of the groups, my co-teacher went over there and gave them a second sheet of poster paper. I asked what had happened to the first sheet, she took out her phone and after a minute or so she turned to me and said, "They are having creative differences".  

So, every one has been asking me if I miss home, and I don't want to sound like a terrible person but no, I don't. I haven't really experienced home-sickness that much while I have been here. I've had some cases of Sinclair-sickness and some definite cases of boerewors-sickness but home I've been able to deal with. How ever among the foreigner community I have been hearing rumours of a four month slump. That's apparently how long it takes for your "honeymoon" period with Korea to come to an end and then you start regretting ever coming to this godforsaken country and you start really wishing your kids would stop saying "Nice to meet you" every day as if they didn't already meet you when you arrived. I have not yet hit the four month slump, and can you believe I am already five months in. Here's what I think made the difference. I am, by nature, a boring person. I like to read  books, and think about myself in the future, with robots, dragons or aliens and I don't really need to be entertained much more than that. So I spent the first couple of months just hanging around, being over whelmed and loving it. Now the real fun begins, I get to leave my safe little town and go see the rest of Korea, and this is an exciting prospect. I think everyone else sort of rushes in and does everything they can do in the very first couple of months, and then at month four they are tired and feel like they don't have much left. Remember Korea is a small country, you can explore it in a few months. I have set aside this year to focus on personal growth and debt management, maybe next year I will do the rushing around like a chicken with my head chopped off thing :-) Ai, I think my slump will come some time late next year, and then I will be chewing your ear off about how miserable I am.

I have been cooking at home now for a while, trying to get in some healthy and nutritious meals to support my weight loss programme. It has not proven easy, there are so many dishes to be cleaned after every meal, I feel like it would be okay if I were cooking for two, but it's just me, how can so many things get dirty. And I usually only start cooking when I come back from a workout, which is at about 7:30pm or 8:00pm. At which point I am starving. Here are some problems with cooking when you're really hungry: 
1) You make way too much food 
2) You burn your tongue trying to eat it straight out of the pot 
3) It's always delicious but you cant tell if it's your cooking skills or your hunger that makes you think that. 
Any advice would be appreciated. Healthy recipes with very little ingredients and things you think I will find in Korea can be emailed to me. I will try them and send you a picture of my completed meal. I do not have an oven though, I have gas stove and I love it. I am excited to cook with gas when I am back in SA. I hope it's not expensive. 

There is peace in my soul here in Korea, and for someone with a history of anxiety problems this is a very big deal. I was pondering why I have this lightness of spirit and this calmness here, and not back in SA and my answer is that I cannot access problems here. It may sound strange but all the problems that might be getting me down are in Korean and I can not speak Korean. When my mom came to visit she was going on about Julius Malema and I was thinking "pshhh... that man makes me stress no more". He's not all up in my grill like he used to be in SA. Also, I don't know what keeps my co-teacher up at night because her problems are in Korean. If my school was in financial difficulty, I would not know, because it would be in financial difficulty in Korean. Yes, sure I could try and find out what's happening here, google translate all the schools notices but... I really don't want to. These problems are around me abut they do not affect me because I have the choice to access them or not. Oh what bliss lies in only hearing Julius Malema jokes and never the awful things he actually says...I think I could apply this when I get back to SA though, I mean I would hear all the junk that you get bombarded with in SA, but I think I will learn to tune out what I don't want to hear, focus on what I need to hear to achieve my goals and continue to live as stress free as possible. 

Some sort of notice board at my school, I have no clue what it's about :-)

Another thing I know counts towards my being happy here is all the support I am getting. I have never been a hater myself, but I am glad I don't have any haters either (Haters:people who are not on board with my plans, people who do not want to see me succeed for any reason, probably because they are hating though!). Leaving behind people you love and making the best decisions for yourself is hard. Especially when the people you love have well trained puppy dog eyes, but I have only been hearing supportive comments since I got here. Korea still has a very sexist ideals, a lot of Korean women are marrying foreign men because they feel like foreigners allow them to be independent and don't only see them as home makers. Many Korean women struggle to get into high powered positions and my principal who is a woman has a very tough time in a profession that is male dominated. She has to be extra hard and unfortunately sometimes I suffer because of that. But when it was explained to me that because she is a women she has more to prove, I cut her some slack. Plus she paid me a massive compliment by asking me to work more hours at her school and less at my second school :-) Sinclair is not sexist, and since I grew up in house where my mom was the primary bread winner and my father was humble and lovely, I have never really been able to grasp the concept of having more to prove because I have the potential for massive boobs and the ability to squirt kids out of my womb. Sexism really makes no sense. Anyway, I was saying.. support. Thank you aunty Sherry and aunty Julita for helping my mom buy some stuff to bring over for me. Thanks Emmo for sending me baked beans :-) Thanks Aunty Patricia for the most wonderful pamper hamper; that face cream is heaven in a tube. And thanks every one who takes the time out of their day to send me an email or comment on my face book pictures. I am happy to say that I don't know how it feels to have the ones you care about not want what is best for you. 

Randall wrote me this poem, I don't know why but I will share it with you. He's one of my readers, I'd call him a correspondent but he owes me an email from since forever! 

her name was Bashti

she was a Teacher

  with bietjie sand in her hair

  and her sandals lamin in the rain somewhere

she taught in english

  and sometimes dyslexic too

  but we dont judge her korean

  cos it sounds... uhm... damn

I hope you are  well and that you didn't miss me too much in my email absence. Remember, it's important to only miss me a little each day, other wise you'll get burn out and just give up on the whole missing thing all together. That would break my heart, it's nice to be missed every once and a while.

I hope you're well and that you're happy

Brace yourselves for summer as I brace myself for my first snow ever

Love you

BYE!

Bashti Teacher

Anyeonghaseyo (안녕하세요)

Or "Part sixof approximately 48"

or "BattleKorea"

or "A quickie,cause I'm realbusy"

Bug spray and body bug spray

A war isbeing waged at 102-403 Ssangbuk Ahpahtah (Korean pronunciation ofApartment). Every nightwhen they lights go out and sometimes while the lamp is still on, themosquitoes in my flat attack! The mosquitoes launch their aerialattack at everypart ofmy body, forcing me to remain under covers despite the heat; they areruthless. It got to a point where I slept with a can of Koreandoom next to my bed and just blasted it at the slightest sound, which obviouslywas stupid because eventually I had to leave the room or die, so I ended up sleeping in myspare room that night on the floor. Mozzies 1:Vasti 0. In my artilleryI now havedoom, bug spraythat you spray onto your skin, a bed slipper and the netting over my windowsglued shut. It helps a lot that every now and then a truck drives around Buyeothat pumps out this white powdery bug repellent. Most foreigners complainthat it gets into their chests and what ever, but I am justgrateful.

It's theend of the first semester and teachers are scrambling to get all their workdone in time. I have completed all my curriculum lessons for this semester and I'mmostly watching movies or playing English games with my classes. How ever, somehome room teachers are so behind that they call individual pupils out of myclasses for extra instruction or otherwise cancel English class altogether justso that they can have an extra lesson on what ever it is they are behind on.This is all done secretly because the principal would be pissed if she foundout English class is being cancelled. The Korean home room teachers don'twant the principal to know they are behind in their work so they come up with allsorts of strange reasons asto why class is cancelled. The grade four teacher told me that myclass was cancelled because the grade six class is writing an important examand English class is louder than other classes. The grade three teacher didn'teven try, she said class is cancelled because it's raining outside. Monsoonseason is looking up :-) I kid, I am sure that she probably had a verylegitimate reason for cancelling the class but she doesn't have enough Englishto explain it to me and thought:"Vasti really doesn't have to know why,let me just tell her anything."

Ok thatwas about two weeks ago, tomorrow I finish my first two weeks of summer Englishcamp. I am exhausted; I couldcurl up and sleep right now. I haven't written anything in this email for about two weeks anddidn't even notice my usual deadline slip by (neither did you so I don't feel too bad about that).Sjoe, eks moeg!

(Here isa passage I wrote back when I still had time to speak of)

My Ex-VP/the Yoga instructor at my school and my Mum.

I don't knowif I told you guys in a previous email but on my first day at my small school(JangAm elementary) the school was having sports day. And before the sports bitof it commenced the entire school warmed up together by doing kiddies yoga. Theteachers were the instructors and the kids stretched and contorted to a catchytune playing in the back ground. I thought: welcome to East AsiaVasti. Last week I found out that my vice principal runs an hour long yogaclass every Monday andFriday from 3:00pm-4:20pm and I joined. Free yoga! Is there anything better tostart and end you working week? Turns out my vice principal is basically acontortionist. She'sprobably around 40 years old (Asian 60) and she's still more flexible than most of the kids. There is agrade one girl who keeps up with her, but that’s probably only because she's grade one and doesn't know thathuman bodies are not suspose to be able to assume those positions. Anotherdistinctly Asian thing that happens at my school is that the new grade twoteacher performs acupuncture on my fellow staff members in the staff room everyonce and a while. I have been too shy to ask him to do it for me but I'm keen.Hopefully someone volunteers my arm soon or I'll have to ask and hope he'sfriendly to foreigners. Adding to my twice weekly low impact workout is aseries of outside gyms conveniently placed all around scenic places in Buyeo.These pieces of exercise equipment aren't hardcore, they more like ellipticalmachines and that circle that you stand and twist on. There are three sets ofwork out equipment within walking distance of my apartment. I'll add pictureswhen i can.

That’s it folks,

Subpar, I know but I needrest... you guys write for a while, I'm going to sleep.

I'll catchyou again it about two weeks :-)

Be sureto check out this cute link... and if you're moved by it feel free to adopt a Koreanchild.Adoptionisn't really sociallyacceptedhere so the majority of Koreanorphans are adopted by foreigners... grab one before they notice their mistake:-)

Cutest Korean child ever

If you geta chance, send me topics you'd like to hear about...

Be good

BashtiTeacher