Friday was the first day of school and yesterday was the first official day of subject classes, and my first day teaching with my new co-teacher, who I will now call Hoon. He’s super nervous and I’m super nervous having to teach with him, mostly because he’s awkward and super nervous.  Did I already say that? But he’s nice, so I guess that’s something. My classes are good, and I’m finding myself putting my foot down more which I guess is a good thing since it’s the start of the year.  I’m leading these intro classes with him because he’s never done it before, so again, more pressure on me. But all went well so far.  Luckily I am a chatter box so I talk enough for the both of us. We teach 3rd and 6th together so it should be interesting.  It’s just frustrating when I have to tell him to translate something into Korean for them, especially the 3rd graders who are just beginning to learn the language.  He’ll learn.  I just keep telling myself, “think how you were 6 months ago and how Leni and Jin probably felt.”

I’m also a bit nervous because he is my head co-teacher now since Leni is no more 😦 Basically, he is my go-to for everything regarding life (apartment, school stuff, etc). I was originally told it would be Jin, which would make more sense, but nope, Hoon is.  Today he accidentally told me 2nd period was cancelled and we didn’t have Leni’s 6th graders.  He was wrong, and had to come running back to my class.  Eeeep.

Last night the school went out for bbq and soju (obv) to welcome the 4 new teachers at my school. Hoon and another guy, who’s name I’m unsure of, but he helps the special ed kids, have started sitting with us at lunch and dinner because Hoon needs to hardcore work on his English. Hoon gets drunk and then starts talking more to me, so I guess that is the secret. But I have noticed that a lot more teachers are starting to come up to me and talk the little English they may know. Especially when they get some of that liquid courage in them. I was really excited to get to catch up with Leni at dinner last night and made her sit next to me.  She sat down and after a few minutes looked over at Hoon at another table and was like “do you think I should switch with him?” I told her probably, but i don’t want her to.  So she stayed and we played catch up.  She was like “he’ll get drunk and then he’ll come over.  That is good.” lol. I love her. She also told Jin that her hair grew a lot over vacation.  She told me that according to Koreans, if your hair grows a lot very quickly it means you are thinking of sex before you go to bed, and very often. Once again, I LOVE HER.

The rest of the night was lovely.  We all abruptly left from dinner, as is the usual with Koreans.  I never know when we’re leaving until everyone stands up and puts their coats on. This part I thought was funny. We all start walking out and the principal starts putting his arm around Leni and then other random people telling them to come and walk to the bar we are supposedly going to. I didn’t feel like going because I wanted to go home and read the last book in the Hunger Games, Jin didn’t want to, another teacher Jiyeun didn’t want to and neither did Leni and a couple other girls. Instead, we all follow the men because they’re all too nice to say I just wanna go home. So we follow.  And then proceed to stand out in the rain under our umbrellas for like 10 minutes while the others are all inside and they decide what we should do.  I had no idea what they were saying so I’m just like doo-dee-doooo. Then I turn to Jin and ask her and she says “none of us want to go but don’t know if it’s nice.  So we are not decisive.” This is also why I think Asians get the bad-driver rep.  Slow and indecisive.

We ended up going in.  They also gave me the menu to pick what we should order at the bar for food.  I of course chose pizza. The pizza came, one had freakin honey on the side and the other was a saucy aight pizza. They all took pieces and put them in the bowls we were given and kinda picked at it. I of course had like 3 pieces.  Leave it to the fatass waygook. I also inhaled the bowl of rice ring things that they put on the table with your drinks.My vice principal also pointed out to the whole table of teachers that I am older than Hoon.  Everyone started giggling thinking they were probably trying to make a match out of us.  Awkward!

One last thing that brightened my day yesterday. Leni had her class write who their favorite teacher has been so far at Nowon Elementary.  She said many students wrote their last year homeroom teacher, but my little peach of a Jinho (on the left below) wrote that me and Jin are his favorite teachers. I knew I loved him for a reason 🙂