It's been a long month, since I last wrote. I've been to Thailand and back....had a good time, by the way. I saw Chris Wells and Saramanda, two old Peace Corps friends. Luckily I was in the north when the tsunami hit. I didn't really realize until afterwards that a bunch of my family was worried. I just took it for granted that they all would know that I was in the north. After all, I did tell them. I'm back though and after my sister calling my up twice, waking me once and slightly drunk today, I'm pretty sure she's convinced that I'm fine.

But, since getting back, things have changed quite a bit. Before I left, I had been planning on signing with another school around here. Since returning, that's fallen through and now I'll probably be going home early March, indefinitely. I went back to talk with my "new boss" about my visa situation, saw my new contract and haven't talked to them since. They changed what they originally offered and were trying to stick kinder in there without me noticing. That and they wanted me to come back without a visa, go on a Japan run and spend half of my alloted airfair for my entire contract. I don't think so. I told them they could call me until the end of this last week, if anything changed...and nope no word. I'll now be on my way home at the end of this school year. I just sorted out a bunch of boxes that I had packed and threw away a bunch of clothes. I would have worn them had I stayed, but they certainly weren't nice enough to keep. I still think I may have to send a box of stuff home, but I'm not gonna take care of that right away. I'm nervous about going home, knowing that I won't have a ton of money to go on. Also, I'm not really sure what I'll do, other than substitute. I'm just not the kind of person that goes into things blind, but I'm trying not to worry about it too much. At least I won't have to worry about a place to stay. My folks place is always there. Plus, I already know they won't be there the month of March. I'll be able to readjust in an empty house, at least.

I've got a horrible cold, at the moment. It's going on 3 weeks now, starting pretty much after getting off the plane in Thailand, probably bad plane air. After either 5 or 6 days of 24 hour dry hacking and nearly two weeks total, I decided to go to the doctor at the end of last week. The doc listened to my lungs, did x-rays, and wrote me a prescription for 4 days of drugs. The problem is that they haven't been helping at all. Now, nearly 4 days after that, my cheast actually hurts to the touch from coughing so much. I coughed so much yesterday I actually spontaneously puked. Thankfully I was in the bathroom at the time, but it still wasn't any fun cleaning it up. It was all over the floor. Now, my voice is going out too, and we have a kinder parents presentation tomorrow. One can only hope that I'll be able to properly speak tomorrow. Otherwise there will be some mighty feisty 5 year olds in front of a bunch of parents, with a teacher not able to scream. I guess we'll just see though.

over and .....out

 
Our school lies right on one of the main roads in the neighborhood. Yes, there are cross-walks, but nearly everyone completely disregards them more often then not. The other day, I was going to go across the street during a 20 min. break and didn't even think twice before crossing the street. Lo and behold, I get whistled at by 2 maybe 20 year old, walking cops pretty far down the road. I was kind of busy, so just pretended like they could have been whistling at someone else. I even saw one of them nudge the other to just let it go. I tried to walk past them on my way to the bank and of course the one that didn't do the nudging v-lined right to me. He started yelling at me in Korean and I did my best "I don't have a clue" look. It was nothing, except that not 20 min. later after I left the bank I automatically went to cross again and as I was already half way across saw those same two youngsters staring me down. I had to run back and as I walked past them bow and appologize. Yep....what can I say? I guess I'm a jay-walking fool. What was funny was not 2 seconds later, I saw them also shout at the buday-chigay women that works in the restaurant below our school.

How many days later and I haven't seen any of them since. It's back to normal. No cops and everybody crosses as they please.

 

This is Sophia. She's one of our 5 year olds. She was extra giggly that day. She would stop long enough just to get a breath and then would be off giggling again.  

 

They also light the candles on the cakes and bring the kids in by age and have them blow out the candles for pictures. Then they shuffle them out and bring in the next group of kids and relight the candles for them and another picture.  

 

This is another one of the posed "kisses" from the birthday.  

 

Every couple of months we have a "birthday party" for the kinder kids. All of them that have birthdays within those 2 months get dressed up, we have a huge spread of food set up and they basically make as big a thing as they can with it. Ya know...it's got to look good in the pictures for the parents. This is one example of what they always do, pose kids in shots looking like they are really giving a birthday kiss. Yes, they actually stop them mid-"kiss" and tell them to wait for the camera.  

 

This is a closer look at the ad on the side of our busses. Funny....that they chose a pic with both Clinton and I....both of which will probably not be teaching kinder next year.  

 

This is one of our busses. Yep, that's the latest advertisement for next year. It's one all 4 of the different vehicles the school uses.  

 
I just got back around an hour ago from going skiing with Jane, her daughter and a couple of Jane's friends. It was fun, but a long day and a half. They were up really late last night and it seemed to take forever for us to actually get to the slopes. Well, it actually did. We got out of our "condo" as Jane called it, at around 11 something Saturday and then couldn't start until nearly 2, after the lunch break, when they closed down all the lifts. Jane's friends and I all wanted to go snowboarding. Listening to us made Jenny, Jane's 9 year old daughter also want one. Thus, all of us rented snowboards and were on our way. We walked out and I was like...you've got to be kidding. In what I call a small resort (only 5 lifts), it was like all of Korea was there. Every time we wanted to go to any slope, we had to wait somewhere around 45 min., just to get on. It wasn't my first time snowboarding, but I hadn't done it since college, and I wasn't all that good then anyhow. But, I looked stellar next to all of them. They were all doing it for the first time. Jane couldn't have been more cautious, but a couple of her friends were falling as much as me, trying to do stuff. I wasn't exactly impressed that it was all fake snow, and basically more like lots and lots of ice crystals that seems more like salt than snow, but I tried to make the best of it. I was doing something different in Korea. It turned out to be fun, but man, did I bruise the hell out of my butt, falling a couple of times. I looked after I got home and yep....I actually have purple spots on my butt. Thank god I'm the only one that's gonna see those. One of my knees is black and blue too, but oh well. I kinda figured that would happen as well.

I was so hoping that Nate wouldn't be here drunk when I got home tonight. I got my wish, when I came in the door. I hollered and got no answer. But....I can't even really fully put into words the mess he left behind. I picked up over 2 dozen big beer bottles, a soju bottle, a makoli bottle, and a couple huge 40 oz. beer bottles.....only to another 6 in back. And that's just the alcohol. I'm assuming that that was only over the span of last night and some of tonight too! There were also bags everywhere as well as other paper and trash. Oh, and I can't forget the pile of cigarrets and the stench that comes with them. The best part, was the 4 !@@# B-B-ish guns that they must have left behind, before going out, as well as the $%#@! B-B that were ALL over the floor. I can't even express how much I hate the guns! There's something wrong with a 30-something year old man and his other male friends shooting !#$@! B-B guns any time they possibly can, when they get together. I mean, testosterone is one thing, but come on! What are they 10? Oh....I almost forgot....they broke our glass light fixture in the kitchen as well! I've already counted down the days that I have left living with him, before I'm gone. Oh...I almost forgot as well, that he conveniently added another program onto my computer, after I asked him a long time ago not to add anything! He'd even already done it once (after I told him!) and I told him again! Anyhow....I just spent the last hour picking up all his shit and cleaning most of the stuff up, including removing the program. No, I didn't have to clean, but I know it would have bothered me, waking up to that shit. This way, if they do come stumbling in drunk and decide to shoot more....I can only hope that they think of me and don't! I know they will know that I cleaned up everything. More likely though, will be that Nate will come back completely hammered around dawn, pass out for most of the day, and then the boys will come over to "pick up" their guns tomorrow night. They'll say they are just going to hang out and "watch movies" or have a "calm afternoon" or something lame, like that and will end up just drinking more and being stupid again. I swear though, if that happens, I'm gonna have to say something. This is getting a little out of control!

 

This is by far the best picture that I took that day. Clinton was climbing around with the kids for quite a while. He and Steve, a 6 year old, stopped long enough for me to get this shot.