I have been in Korea for three weeks so far and it has ranged from being extremely fun to kind of frustrating. Sorry I haven't been able to update until now, but I did not get internet in my apartment until last Friday. So, this post is just about my first week here.
Arriving in Korea was interesting. I was exhausted (I can't sleep on airplanes) and had been up for about 24 hours at that point. I was met by a 'volunteer' co teacher and a school driver, at the airport. The car was a flat bed turquoise truck. After driving for 2.5 more hours, stopping at a bakery and buying some food for the next day, we went to my apartment.
View of Yangpyeong from the road..
My first view of Yangpyeong was almost the same except it was nighttime.
The view out my apartment window.
You can literally see mountains in any direction that you look.
My school is on the smaller side (for America mid range for Korea). It has a total of 600 students. Each grade is broken into 6 different classes. I will only be teaching 10th and 11th graders. I won't be teaching the seniors because they have to concentrate on getting into good universities and doing well on their entrance exams. My co-teacher, Ms. Kim, is very kind. She has taken me around the school and introduced me to most of the teachers. Because Ms. Kim doesn't own her own car, I've gotten to know a few of the other English teachers because they would have to take me to run errands around town and translate things for me.
My introduction to teaching was also a little bit rough. I had to go to another city during the school day to get my alien ID card so that I could get bank accounts, phones, internets, etc... We thought that I would be able to get back in time to teach an "English Club" or the last 2 hours of the school day. I got back an hour late because the driver got lost. You should also know that I had only briefly talked about said English club the day before and only really had a vague plan for the time. I literally walked into the school, and the other teacher came running to me and said that I needed to be ready to teach the rest of the class in the next 10 minutes. The really nice thing, after my deer in the headlights moment, was that I didn't have any time to be nervous about trying to entertain 20 students for the next hour.
My classroom
This classroom is the nicest classroom in the entire school. It's officially called the "English Zone" and doubles as my office.
Since that first class, I have really grown to enjoy teaching. Despite having the average bored, sleeping, chatting teenagers for my students, teaching them is both a learning experience and can be very entertaining--especially when I can coax them into participating. And, after unpacking, getting my bank account set up, signing up for a cell phone, getting internet in my apartment, and buying the remaining items to make my apartment more homey, my rough road to and in Korea is finally smoothing out.
PS
For all those Minnesotans out there... you think the mosquitoes there are bad.... The ones here bite with vengeance and and the bite swells up twice the size as the ones in MN.
