Drinks all around!

So I proposed to Rachel last Sunday. 

Now many of you that know us are aware that we have been together a long time, and that it was only a matter of time before we got married.  I had the same thought.  Before I get into the whole story about the ring, the proposal, and so on and so forth, I would like to refer you, dear reader, to the FAQ section of the blog. 

No, we are not going to have a ceremony in Korea.

Yes, we are going to come back to the States for the wedding. 

No, we have no plans yet as to what, how, when, or other wedding arrangements. 

Yes, you are invited (I refer this to close to kith and kin and not you casual reader, sorry). 

Yes, congratulations are appreciated, but please do not send, post, or give anything until we get back to the States. 

No, we are not entertaining any questions about future offspring, and such questions will be met with snarky responses including but not limited to: references to cloning, crazy cat lady starter packs, or insisting on bizarre names (Example: Cuddles McKill Strike).  You have been warned. 

No, this is not a shotgun wedding. 

Yes, we will be keeping people posted as to details. 

That being said, what follows are some of the more amusing things that happened leading up to the proposal. 

After notifying a number of our closest family members, we learned that most of the people that we talked to weren’t too surprised that we are engaged.  Weird.  Well O.K. it isn’t that weird.  I had been thinking about it for a while.  I had, in point of fact, been squirreling away money for some time.

Now I had originally planned to pop the question, so to speak, at the start of the fall term of our school.  With the summer break upon us I decided that I had the means and opportunity to get the ring.  On the pretext of going for one of my long, long walks downtown, I went through Seoul’s massive street markets.  Insadong and Myeongdong are two such areas near downtown that offer a wide range of art pieces, knick knacks, and of course jewelry.  There being so much out there, it was difficult to find a place that was accommodating to the strange bald man looking at the expensive shiny things.

Several months back (nearly a year ago, thinking upon it now) Rachel’s Uncle Adam came to visit us.  One of the places that we went during his visit was Myeongdong market, and coincidently we went looking through a few jewelry stores.  Now this is not a small place that has one or two jewelry stands.  This is a massive place.  So, in all the gin joints in all the world, I ended up back at the same jewelry shop that Rachel, Adam, and I had gone to, except now I was looking at rings.  Now I wouldn’t say that the old woman and middle aged man behind the counter were uncomfortable when I was looking around, but for some inexplicable reason, the man’s English got 10 times better when he figured out that I was a serious customer.  What was amazing was how timid he was about quoting prices (you are having a thought… and the answer is not important), but this being something special, I told him several times that we could do better when he showed me the cheapest ones.  As I’ve mentioned before, jewelry made from precious metals here is sold based on the price of the metals and stones in question, so if the price of gold is very high, a piece of jewelry could cost more a week later.  Fortunately for me the price of gold was very low at the time. 

So I have the ring, which was the easy part.  Now how to give it?  After hiding it among the scarves and winter gloves in the closet (it is bloody hot here), I started plotting and planning how to deliver it.  It didn’t help the fact that I hinted that I was planning something, figuring that I could throw her off any possible missteps on my part by assuming an alternate agenda.  This was fortunate; because Rachel knew something was up and even suggested that it was for a proposal.  I masterfully deflected suspicion by offering an alternate explanation- that I was getting her a teddy bear.  This was in fact all part of the plan, as I did have a teddy bear, with the ring tied around its neck.   One of the problems with being on vacation is that you start looking for things to do and places to go.  So while I was biding my time with Frodo Bearington, most of the nice restaurants that I had thought of taking her to were being crossed off the list one by one.  After Saturday night I made the conclusion that I was just going to have to wrap it all up into a weeklong bow. 

So on Sunday afternoon, after getting something to eat in the Shinsegae department store, sitting down with some after lunch coffee, waiting for our seats for the new movie Snowpiercer, I gave Rachel the bear.  I felt a little amused as she didn’t notice the ring for several moments, instead choosing to hug the bear close, telling me how much she loved it.  All the while I was suggesting that she should look at the bow more closely. 

Well you can imagine her reaction. 

The rest of the day was filled with long conversations about who do we call, what sorts of things we should include in this blog, and so on and so forth. 

I suppose there are several things that this blog is announcing then.  Not just our engagement, but also the fact that we are planning on coming back to the United States by next year. 

Anywho, thank you all very much for reading through something that has very little to do with Seoul, Korea, or other more culturally germane things, but is of monumental importance to me. 

In closing, I think it appropriate to be somewhat sappy. 

I love you Rachel (soon to be Koehler).   

Reader’s discretion advised

The following blog may contain material that may not be suitable for all readers.  This blog may include subject matters that could be offensive, taboo, or otherwise inappropriate for some readers. 

Still reading? 

Right, well what do pedophiles, Dr. Mengele, and being irate over elevator bills have in common?  All three were apparently appropriate school meeting conversation topics for Not Dr. House. 

For those who have not kept up on the current cast of characters our new office, Not Dr. House is an older man whom works with us in the temporary office.  Anybody who talks to him for more than 5 minutes knows that he is a little weird.  Normally, I am perfectly fine with weird.  I have a number of weird friends that I love spending time with.  Not Dr. House is another story. 

There is something odd about conversations with him that makes me either want to run away screaming or take a shower.  The first time, after insulting both Rachel and I, we had a conversation that ended with something like, “Hey don’t take it so personally.  I’m from New York, I’m rude to everybody”.  Knowing some wonderful people from New York, I don’t buy it. 

Now what all this has to do with the question above should start to become apparent. 

Something that is both a great thing and the main source of this blog is that somehow I have been promoted to one of two academic coordinators for the school.   (How that happened, I have no idea)  I have also been given a number of tasks that are quite important, such as developing the standard employment contract for the foreign staff (Yes, a lawyer read and is currently checking it since I finished) and developing the pre-assessment/ entrance exam interviews,  among a few other projects. 

Wishing for some measure of co-operative consensus, I sought advice, pointers, and suggestions from my colleagues.  This is where we will be turning from day to day work to “Oh dear god, what did I just hear?”   I am not sure exactly how this happened, but what started as a professional meeting between peers about details in the latest draft of the contract, de-evolved into an anecdote about some weird guy that Not Dr. House knew that turned out to be a pedophile.  Now what in the name of Zeus’s butthole that had to do with the discussion at hand?  I have no clue…

Now in the last few blogs, I have spoken very highly about our handler, Mr. Yang.  It was when Not Dr. House snapped at him, that I about lost it.  The background for this has to do with the flip side of our new apartment, utilities.  A larger apartment, in a wealthier area, means that we have to pay a little more for utilities.  This was expected and Rachel and I are happy to pay.  Not Dr. House  wasn’t.  I have had a number of conversations with him before about “Antique Pawn Show” (a cross between Antique Road Show {A show that we don’t have access to} and Pawn Stars {a show that we do have access to}).  We would laugh and talk about some of the things that we had seen the night before (when you only have 6 or so channels that are English dedicated, you tend to stay on those channels, and The History Channel is one of them).  When Not Dr. House got his utility bill, you would have thought that someone in a black ski mask had dropped off his TV at gunpoint and forced him to use it.  The part of his bill that got the most of this rage was his apartment maintenance fee, for maintaining things such as elevators, security guards, and janitors.  This rage was then directed towards Mr. Yang.  Now I have written about Mr. Yang before and just about everybody came to his defense.  Don’t mess with Mr. Yang, man.  He has backup. 

After that rebuke, there was a period of relative calm.  Then we had another Zeus’s butthole moment.  One of my tasks was to develop a 1^st draft of a curriculum presentation.  Along with that was the need for developing pre-assessment tools and entrance exams.  I have been very busy at work.  I also digress.   Again, wishing for some collaboration, I asked for some help from the rest of the staff.  Somewhere, somehow, the meeting went from “that question is too difficult for a kindergartener” to “Dr. Mengele did XYZ with twins”…This transition from Not Dr. House was seamless and was overall very awkward. 

When confronted, Not Dr. House acted as though nothing was out of the ordinary, and that it is perfectly normal to transition from children’s assessments to Godwin’s Law. 

Now I had originally planned a different ending to this blog, but since starting it, Not Dr. House has been canceled midseason.  It was one outburst too many when, after being informed that we will need to come in a couple hours earlier than we have been (we have been getting in to work at about 10am for the past while, rather than 8am like we would during normal teaching hours), our lunch out with the boss became a one man version of the never before seen Broadway show Not Dr. House  and Mr. Childish.  Not Dr. House was something like a child who was pouting because he has to take a nap.  Rachel and I left before the worst of the foot stomping/temper tantrum, but it was apparently severe enough for my boss and several of my co-workers to come to the conclusion that Not Dr. House had jumped the shark. 

Things are hardly quiet now.  We are staying busy, and more teachers are on their way.  For the moment we have a presentation, summer term, student interviews and the premier of the new Star Trek movie to look forward to.  As much as this blog is about the train wreck that was my former co-worker’s stay, things have remained pleasant here.  In fact, I think things have stayed pretty good.  More about the good times to come.  

The Usual Suspects

With a full week down at the new job, I can safely report that I think we have hit the gold mine.  As I mentioned in the previous post, our apartment is amazing, especially for Korean standards.  Rachel and I thought it appropriate to offer Mr. Yang (our most magnificent handler) a bottle of fine imported liquor.  OK, so it was a bottle of Jack, but yet it’s a luxury here. 

Now, after a week I have gotten a good idea as to the characters that surround us.  Keep in mind that we haven’t started working yet.  What we do have is around 2 months or so to plan and write our curriculum.  So instead of classroom antics or dealing with students, we have settled into something resembling a more traditional office setting.    Allow me to take you on a journey through the cast of characters that make up our office. 

The Man with The Golden Watch:  Our owner, whom we have only seen once, screams money.  What he said was that he wanted the best education that money could buy for his daughter, so like anyone who has too much damn money, he did the most logical thing, and built a goddamn school.  Not that I am complaining, but jeez, talk about pressure.

The Well-Manicured Man:  Below the owner is our man who runs the day to day operations of the business.  Like the owner, he screams money, and style.  Seriously, I envy him for dressing as well as he does.  I am fairly certain that his cufflinks alone cost more than my car.  Clad in his finely tailored suits (no tie), magnificently wavy hair, and more often than not a matching scarf, he screams class.  Even with all his class and cash, he is a really nice guy.  His son is going to school in Boston and he even has a driver’s license from the state of California.  Obviously, communication has not been a problem.   

The Mysterious Mr. Kwan:  In a room off to the side of the main office is our principal.  He looks very stern and gives the impression of someone you do not want to be on the other side of the desk from.  I can’t write too much about him, simply because he doesn’t speak too much.  But from what little we have talked, he is supportive and understanding. 

The Good Witch of the South:  As many people who have kept up with our experiences here, have some reason to fear for any new boss that we have.  Just to recap, our last boss was a cross between Marie Antoinette, Ms. Trunchbull, and the Wicked Witch of the West.  Justine is very much not any of these. Justine has been very nice, almost too nice.  To go a little further about how different and refreshing this has been, I want to describe a little about leadership styles.  Marie A. was a micro manager.  Everything needed her personal OK and that was rarely given without a casual remark of “Bla bla bla, classu.  Bla  bla bla however.  Bla bla bla floppy (comments removed by editor)” Justine on the other hand is more of a “do whatever you need to do” kind of person.  She gave us some tasks and the occasional emails to check and see what we are doing and beyond that has left us alone to do what we need to do.  Overall, she has been a wonderful manager. 

Not Dr. House:  NDH is far too complicated isn’t it?  Well let’s just call him Jerry then.  Jerry is an older man, and quite the character.  He has been having quite a bit of trouble sleeping over the last week, and has started to show signs of sleep insanity.  No, I’m not kidding.  It was when he mentioned that he had a stock pile of sleeping pills and may start mixing them with a large amount of beer, was when I started getting really worried.  It wasn’t so much the joke about suicide, as it was the question I had in my mind as to why someone would have a stock pile of sleeping pills.  Don’t get me wrong, he’s a nice guy, but even as he said himself, he isn’t very good at small talk.  Basically, he is the teaching equivalent of a computer geek.  He does teaching, and that’s about it. 

Mr. Lorre: The last of the teachers (for the moment) in our cast is a quiet guy whom is more than a little socially awkward.  He is very well dressed, except for his jackets being just a little too small.  I know because he never takes the things off during the day.  He’s from San Diego, so he gets cold very easily.  I admit to laughing a little when walking down the street with he and Rachel, and I feel very comfortable and everyone else is looking very uncomfortable.  I am a terrible person.  (The Editor is scowling at me while I am writing this)  He is very polite, and on occasion suffers quite a bit from people like The Well-Manicured Man.  Case in point what I shall call the Doughnut Incident.   Mr. Lorre mentioned that he thought a girl at the local Dunkin’ Doughnuts was kind of cute.  The Well-Manicured Man suggested that he should go after her.  It turned out that Mr. Lorre had already tried, having found and messaged the Dunkin’ Doughnuts girl on a dating site. She deleted her account the next day.  The Well-Manicured Man then suggested that he should try face to face communication because “You are a man!”  Now, Mr. Lorre was looking increasingly uncomfortable as time went on.  The Well-Manicured Man continued offering to come with him when he talked to the Dunkin’ Doughnuts girl.  In fact, the Well-Manicured Man suggested, everyone from the office could come as some completely non-terrifying, glass fogging, comitatus of wingmen, because “you are a man!”

Well that’s all the news from Korea.  Where all the women are strong, all the men are good looking, and all the children are above average.  

The Desk Against the Dark Arts

I sit at a desk.  It’s a very nice, square thing.  My coffee stained mug sits close to my mouse pad, while my phone is covered up with alphabet flashcards.  I have a little candy jar, appropriately labeled: “Danger” and “Poison” sitting on top of some ESL games for most occasions.  To my left is Emma G.  (the new Emma).  To my right sits nobody. 

            This desk has not always been empty.  Indeed, it has seen many visitors over the course of my time here, but none have stayed long.  It has gotten so bad that I have begun to think that either there is something about my body odor or that the desk is cursed.  To my delight however, I am told that I smell great.  Thanks be for a steady cash flow for cologne, deodorant, and after shave lotions.  Since the beginning of this new semester, the desk has had 3 korean teachers come and go.  Consider at the time that I have written this (12/20/12), less than 3 weeks have passed in the semester.  This means that the desk has gone through a new relationship a week. 

            First there was The Man with No Name.  He was a quiet, reserved fellow.  He looked shy, and more than a little nervous sitting at the desk, almost as if he was afraid something would bite him.  He lasted for 2 days before learning that he was required to teach primarily in English.  Next came Hanna.  She was young, bright, and had lived in Melbourne for a few years.  She had personality, a strong smile, and was willing to converse with me.  She lasted 3 days. Finally I come to Jenny.  I am not sure what to say about her because she was gone within 2 hours of sitting at the desk.  2 hours! 

            When three things happen in sequence, science tells us that there may be a pattern emerging.  Now, I consider myself a rational person.  I am well educated and read big, important sounding books.  I am analytical and overly critical at times.  So I have come to only one possible conclusion about what is happening.  The desk is cursed.  Magic and sorcery is the only possible explanation.  The Dark Lord desires my neighboring desk and has cursed it until the day he can take that desk for himself.  Either that or the new head teacher is a real hard ass.  But I like magic as an explanation better.  

Revenge of the Blog!

I know that it has been a very, very long time since I have put myself in front of the warm glow of my laptop screen, no doubt leaving many of my good friends and family (Rachel’s included ) thinking that I am dead in a gutter somewhere, or just lazy.  I would like to think that the latter has nothing to do with my delay, but most who know me know that that would be a lie. I am not completely blameless, however.  I do have a small backlog of blogs that will be published in due time, but in the meantime allow me  to detail the very awkward 2 months that has been my life. 

When last we left our heroes, we were in the process of moving from one apartment to another.  Our lease was for some mysterious reason only 9 months long.  Even several weeks after the move, I am not sure if it was worth all the confusion and anguish that it caused.  Don’t get me wrong, our new place has its nice qualities.  It isn’t a coffin shaped rat hole, nor does it have a strange musty odor to it.  It’s new, clean, spacious and in its own apartment building in a residential area and not above a KFC.  The good along with the bad were wrapped up together, however.  Now, there are a number of details that I have elected to omit for sake of brevity and frustration.  I had an earlier draft of this particular section of the blog that somehow ended up being deleted or lost. 

Now, our move was one of many.  Indeed, like Alice’s tea party, some jerk in a fancy hat screamed “CHANGE PLACES!” and chaos ensued.  A new teacher was on her way from Scotland, Rachel and I were moving into our new place, and John was moving into a new place as well, a few days later.  Not trusting in the competence of the CEO to give us adequate aid, I took it upon myself to start moving stuff in the night before our last day.  I can only imagine the look on the few locals that were awake that late at night as I made trip after trip down the street, once with luggage, and again with bed sheets filled with pillows like some blending of Santa Clause and a tramp.  With little sleep (and a great deal of preparation for the lack of foresight on the part of my employers) we were moved in with few issues.  We were, however, denied a number of contractually guaranteed comforts such as a TV, a table, or a chair.  You may be thinking, why couldn’t we have just taken the ones from our last apartment?  Well those belonged to that apartment and not us, so no we couldn’t take them.  I just about flipped the table over in my boss’s office when I was denied a chair…A CHAIR!  More often that I would care to admit I have had a facepalm moment as consequence to these events.  An example was when my boss texted me saying “Oh hey, do you know who the Wachowski’s are?”  I said yes.  “Well they’re on channel 10 and it’s a really heartwarming story…” “That sounds nice, I would really like to watch it but as you know I don’t have a TV…” I am not sure if my sarcasm was detected through the text, but the point still stands. 

Moving on, I am sad to report a number of failures to organize all of these moves was not unexpected.  There was even a period of time where we were under the impression that the newest teacher wouldn’t be given a bed on time of her landing.  There is nothing that says welcome to your new home like, I know that you’re jetlagged and probably half –delirious from sleep deprivation, mixed with a little culture shock, but here, sleep on this bare hardwood floor, your bed isn’t going to be here for another 2 weeks.   Fortunately, things worked out for Emma G.  (the Scottish one, not the Canadian one, who is Emma L.).  The landlords had a bed in place (conveniently saving the school’s backside) and she was able to get some sleep that night. 

Time has passed since then and both Rachel and I are thinking about the future.  It may come as no surprise to anyone who has kept abreast of my sojourn here that I have decided not to renew my contract at Avalon.  This whole process, which is still going on at the moment, has left my head shaking.  First it was how I was offered (unofficially I might add) a month long break in between contracts to go home and see my family.  Yes, I turned it down.  Wait! Stop!  Put down the (insert fragile object here)(insert family member’s name here). I have a very good reason.   First, I would get a free ticket home and not Rachel.  Second, I knew that this was a sham, because I know their calendar cycle, and there is no room for a month long holiday period that I could have taken advantage of.  Finally, the place sucked.  My suspicions were confirmed as that offer never made again during our negotiations.  Indeed, much of what you could call negotiations was more of a guilt trip trying to get me to sign on for a few months more. 

It’s not as if this is where I have been spending most of my time these last few weeks or anything.  Since the end of Christmas, I have been working what was called the “Winter Intensive period”.  That basically means that I have been working 10 hour days and been getting less sleep than normal.  The one thing that I was really looking forward to was teaching an introduction to music class.  I thought, cool!  What fun it will be to go over what the difference is between an oboe and a clarinet… seriously I thought this was going to be a lot of fun.  The problem was that my students were far too young to appreciate the material.  Also not being given any support material that worked, like music, was problematic.  I ended up teaching Tchaikovsky via Fantasia and Tiny Toons.  The pleasant parts aside though, this last month has been a very long march of drudgery and constant work.  Homework books have been lost, papers have been lost, and more classes were added.  It has sucked.  

So we are in the process of looking for new gigs.  We have sent out a number of resumes and even heard back from one, but nothing solid yet.  Our fingers are crossed.  I thought that it might be best to get back down to safer and less stressful country, like Busan.  It’s warmer, less stressful, and I have even found my old recruiter from my first job.  I choose to remain hopeful.  On a side note it appears that my talent has not gone unnoticed.  I got a phone call a few days ago from none other than Marie A.  Yes, she’s back in the blog.  She has a new school that she is in charge of (don’t ask me how), and offered me a job.  Yes, that was the same reaction that I had too. 

Right so on to the parts that will have people worried.  First of all as I am writing this I am recovering from a case of stomach flu.  It was a moment of “are you fucking serious?”  when I called my boss, explained what was wrong, told her that I had already been to the doctor, and didn’t think that the risk of vomiting on the students or being covered in offending pools was worth the effort of me coming in to work, and she responded “Are you really sure you can’t come in?  Because I don’t know if I can change the schedule with so little notice.” It is moments like this that made me positive that the whole month off thing was really a sales pitch and not in the real deal.  Sad as it is, as soon as I got better, I passed it along to Rachel.  We’re both fine now, but oh what a fun weekend that was…

For now we are back to the usual routine of getting out late at night and sharing dinner.  I don’t feel nearly as tired as I was, and I have been able to even get some work done on other projects that I have been working on.  Still, we are waiting for more news about where we will be going next, and we will keep you posted out there in the ether.  

A Decent Pair of Pants!

So that had little to do with Korea, I know, but like Brainiac and Solomon Grundy I have felt similar frustrations about the elusive pants.  Now before I begin, I want to briefly talk about clothing in general in Korea.  What I am about to say has been said before, but it bears repeating.  If you are curious about this issue then please read on.  If, however, you are less interested in the fine details of clothing sizes then skip ahead to the paragraph after next. 

For any of you whom do not know this already, I am a fairly large person.  The average Korean is not.  There are also some basic structural differences that make things more difficult.  Some of the basic bone structure is different just enough to affect sizes.  Now if you reading this and are thinking that perhaps this may not be relevant to yourself, think again. Many members of the female persuasion have had issues also.  If you are thinking of living here for any length of time, I would highly encourage you to pack extras of the following items:

• Pants:  Nothing beyond a US size 38 is easily available

• Socks:  If you have wide feet like me, or anything past US size 12, you will not find anything.

• Shoes:  Like socks, anything beyond a US size 12 is nearly impossible to find. 

• Belts: Like pants anything beyond US size 38 is very difficult to find. 

• Women, the local women do not have hips (or feet past maybe a size 8).  Pants may be in your    waist size, but the hips will feel very snug. 

Now that that’s out of the way, on to some amusing stories.  I bought a few pairs of jeans online, along with some nice slacks.  This summer was very hot.  Wanting to be more comfortable, I wore my jeans more often than not.  My jeans have since worn out.  Holes have appeared and it was time to replace them.  And then I ran into problems.  You would have thought that getting clothing shipped to Korea would have been a very simple process.  Amazon.com, JCPenny, Target, and other usual online clothing chains will not ship clothing to Korea.  Macy’s will, but they are very expensive.  What I managed to find, that also fit my personal style, was Eddie Bauer.  They ship to Korea, have a number of fine things, and are moderately priced.  With the point and click world at my fingertips and a credit in my hand, I ordered a number of new pairs of pants.  Simple, right?  Were I more juvenile I would more than likely make some rude noise with my mouth and tongue, but since I am not I will refrain from doing so. 

I instantly had a hold placed on my order and Eddie Bauer was determined enough to send a letter via ground mail to my permanent mailing address in the USA.  Why?  I had no idea at the time.  As it turns out, it was to confirm my Korean mailing address, because I kid you not, they could not confirm the spelling.  It wasn’t because of suspicion of fraud or something that could have been solved via email, no.  It was because they could not confirm the spelling and wanted me to call, on the phone, with a confirmation number, from a letter, sent to the USA.  This delayed the delivery of my order by nearly 2 weeks. 

On an amusing aside, I was walking through E-Mart, with my headphones on listening to another one of my wacky audiobooks.  As I was going through the store I saw an older, foreign gentleman, whose wrinkled tattoos suggested navy career, stopped and pointed at me as I went by.  His local assistant began to chat with him.  Taking off my headphones, I was curious what was being said.  As it turns out, the soccer ball shaped octogenarian, asked with frustrated hope, “Where did you get those pants?”  I replied that I brought them with me, and I saw his heart sink.  He and his assistant went off to the few foreign quarters to find the few places that sell larger sized clothing.  As I have mentioned in previous blogs, these places do exist, but they are few and far between.  They have also shown themselves to have a limited stock. 

Just a few days ago now, my package of new pants finally arrived.  The tragedy throughout all this was the fact that the order was wrong.  I ordered 4 pairs of pants and a belt (all one size smaller than I had been wearing, woot!).  One pair that I got in the package was so small that Rachel was able to wear it comfortably.  Another said the correct size on the package, however had been mislabeled and was about 6 inches too small in reality.  I have yet to mail it back, but will be done in the next few days so that I can get the correct size.  But I at least have a few decent pairs of pants.  

Robespierre and the Reign of Terror

With recent events being of such importance to our lives here in Korea, I felt it imperative to come back to my keyboard and type a brief summary of the days since Adam’s departure, culminating in the departure of my boss. 

Yes, Marie A. is no more.  As no doubt by now dear reader, you have noticed that I have chosen to continue with the metaphor that I established in Viva La Revolution.  Perhaps not, but then I am an eccentric hobby historian, so if I force some people to go to Wikipedia and look something up then I can at least say that I made someone learn something.  For everyone else who knows about French History, I know it isn’t a perfect metaphor, sue me. 

Alright, so let me go back to the beginning.  The Chuseok vacation was over and we had been told that Rachel’s replacement was going to be landing that Monday.  It had been pressing on my mind for some time that this was going to be someone who may possibly have no idea where anything was, who anyone is, or what to do.

In re-reading my first entry, I failed to describe the amount of terror and anxiety that can come with your first few days in Korea.  I have, since moving back here, gotten a few requests from old friends and new acquaintances for advice and info on coming to Korea, so for any of you who are searching the far corners of the internet for help, here are a few tips for you.  I got lucky my first time, and the second time I knew exactly what to expect, so Rachel got lucky.  There are a lot of people who are not as lucky.  For example, for anyone who is reading this and thinking of making a trip to Korea yourself, let me give you some survival tips.

• Your apartment will more than likely be empty when you get there.  So expect to go shopping immediately before you pass out from your flight. 
• You will need to get very basic things- bottled water, toilet paper, and even pillows were not provided our first day. 
• You may have the luxury of being put in a “love motel” for the first few days. This is not as bad as it sounds, but it can scare off people who are not prepared. 
• To find these things, find a major street and walk down it.  On a long enough timeline, you’ll find something that you’ll need, i.e. a McDonalds, E-Mart, HomePlus, or any number of convenience stores, where you can get a quick meal, water, or even paper supplies. 
• Most of these places are 24 hour and can help you in that “just landed” first night or two.

Fortunately, Emma did not have to suffer any of this.  Oh, our newest employee is a lovely person named Emma, who hails from Canada.  It was especially amusing to me, to see that Rachel had a fellow non-goy in the school, for a few days at least. 

What was unfortunate was the pressure that came from the reign of terror that was Marie A. Over the past few days since coming back to work, this issue of wanting to know when Emma was going to be flying in was of great concern to me.  I had heard that she had been here for a few days already, and as I have already talked about, it can be bloody scary.  After being told several different times for when her plane was landing, I was called into our Glorious Leader’s office and told to back off, because I was sounding pushy.  Forgive me for sounding pushy when I have been told contradictory information about when a new person will be joining our staff and I want to avoid such problems as I have already talked about.    But finally Emma arrived, and everything was well…for a whole few minutes at least.  Then the reign of terror began. 

OK so this was less of a reign of terror and more like a series of bothersome events, as opposed to, say, a real terror.  First, there were the observations.  Now as a teacher, observations are part of the job.  You have to let people watch, judge, and critique what you do.  There is a difference however, between constructive feedback and what we generally got.  I was lucky enough to get only one observation, which I’ll talk about soon.  Emma had been under nearly constant scrutiny since she arrived.  What struck me as strange is just how many observations we were being given.  By the time my turn came around, most of the others had been through one or two already, either with Marie A, or our new head teacher, who is a wonderful person.  She is open to new ideas, humorous, and most importantly gives a damn about her students. 

This brings me to my observation.  Technical problems and other issues forced me to adapt the lesson I was being observed in, so that the students could still learn everything that they needed to do their work and I could still cover all the material that I needed to go over.  Specifically in this writing class (keep that in mind, I’ll bring that up again later) I had to teach material about Myths and Legends, and cover some important editing skills.  Now to accomplish this, I was supposed to print off student essays from the website, and teach why various mistakes were made and how to correct them.  Well, there was a problem with the website (again) and so I typed up an example essay for them to edit instead, to teach them to apply specific skills that I had covered that day.  This was wrong.  What I should have done was magically produce the essays in question and do exactly what the curriculum demanded.  After explaining the technical errors, Marie was convinced that I didn’t know how to do the prescribed lessons and proceeded to talk at me for a while about how to do what I should have done.  Now there was one thing in particular that was said during this conversation, that underscored the serious difference between Marie’s and my approach to teaching.  It went something like this- “the students should never be looking down at their book, because if they are, then they are not respecting me as a teacher.”  Remember when I mentioned that this was a writing class?  Yeah, I thought the same thing.  This went along with forcing the kids to remain seated when the bell rang, until I had dismissed them.  Fair, however given the fact that it was the last hour of Friday and the kids were undoubtedly really tired and hungry, I thought that they could get up and leave as fast as they want.  They earned it.  Perhaps this is a byproduct of my own education or just a personal philosophy, but the students come first.  If they are engaged in the material, if they are learning something, and if they want to come back (not just drag themselves in because their parents are forcing them) then I have done my job, and everything else is dross. 

This was not the worst of it by far, but the only thing that I can say is that John had a few minutes left over in his writing class and gave the time to the students to use for getting their homework done.  Marie A. decided that this was not only against the curriculum, but she also felt an ethical duty to force the kids to erase the work that they had done during this time, telling them that “homework must be done at home”.  After I heard this, Marie entered a new level of cartoonish, adolescent literature villain,like Miss Trunchbull or Aunt Spiker… read a book!  Or watch the movies… whichever, they’re both pretty good.

Going back to this observation meeting that I had with Marie A, I was also given details about a conference that I had to attend on Saturday.  Now, if there is one thing that working in Korea has taught me, it is to be adaptable.  What I mean by adaptable, is to know that plans can and do change regularly, and with some degree of severity.  For example, we had thought that Mr. Kim (our finance guy) would drive us to the conference in one of the school vans.  However, his wife just gave birth to their first child, so he was (understandably so) unable to come.  This made Marie very upset.  She then requested that we take the train down to the conference ourselves, and she would pick us up and drive us the rest of the way to the University where the conference was being held.  The next morning, after a 50 minute train ride, I asked Glorious Leader how soon she would be there, only to receive the news that she wasn’t coming and that we needed to take a cab the rest of the way.  This would have been fine, if I’d had any more information other than the name of a college.  So just like your average Freshman wandering campus for the first time, we stumbled around the campus, looking for signs of where to go, hoping that some of the locals could offer help if we needed it.  We finally managed to get there safe and sound.  What followed was 6 hours of some of the most boring demo lessons that I have ever seen.  As it turns out, this was less of a demonstration, and more of a “look how awesome these teachers from other campuses are, and in fact they are so awesome that we are going to give them a large shiny award” thing.   OK, it didn’t make much sense to me, either.  But it was eventually over.  We looked around for a taxi to take us back to the train station, and failed miserably.  We started walking back.  I’ll admit that I thought that this was rather pleasant.  It was a cool fall afternoon, the sun was out, and the air was lovely.  About 20 minutes into our walk, we got a phone call from the Glorious Leader, who said that we should have waited longer for her to get out of her part of the conference.  Now I, like you just now, had no idea that she was even there.  Moreover, I am not sure when she was under the impression that I had developed the psychic powers to know that she wanted me to stay. 

Now we come to Monday morning.  The first day that Rachel was officially off from work.  So it was hi ho, hi ho, it’s off to work I go.  Within 20 minutes of me being in the building, I heard the news that Marie A had been fired.  To say that it was a shock would be more than an understatement.  What’s more is the fact that I also learned that Mr. Kim, our finance guy, was also leaving the school (wither by choice or not is still under some speculation).  So like some who supported the revolution in the early stages, they themselves were put to the guillotine.  What remain now are the people of Avalon.  The tone has visibly changed in the school.  The teachers are more relaxed, and despite the fact that we have all had to do more work, they seem happier.   However, this may all change. 

Something that one of my co-teachers mentioned reminded me about the revolution once again.  After all the terror, killings, and the push for freedom, this inevitably led to the rise of Napoleon and the return of the nobility.  While we are enjoying the peace of not having a thanocratic dictator (sorry… wrong… Glorious Leader) intolerable wicked witch, many of the other teachers are waiting for the other shoe to drop.  There was one small tidbit of information that I learned over the weekend that brings this point home.  My school is a publicly traded company.  I knew that hogwans like ours were private businesses, but I didn’t think that they had to answer to stockholders.  The CEO, therefore, may bring in business managers, and other people who may be fantastic at making sales, but they are the last thing that a school needs. 

Perhaps, dear readers, you will read a blog in the future about the failed second revolution of Avalon.  You know the one I’m talking about, right?  No…?  Well I suppose I’ll save the description for when the time comes.