Shit Poke (똥침)

For any foreigner who has taught English as a second language in South Korea, the words “Ddong Chim” may strike terror into their soul.  For anyone who has never ventured into the schools in South Korea, ddong chim is a foreign concept.

Korean Children, Swearing in English

I was explaining the difference between ‘circle’ and ‘circular’ to one of my

more advanced elementary school classes when James looked at me and earnestly asked, “Teacher, what is fucking?”  I was caught off guard, and thought maybe he’d said a Korean word that happened to sound like an English swear.  I was hoping that was it.

Konglish Clothing

One Wednesday afternoon, my students started filing in to start class.  I sat at my desk, waiting for everyone to arrive before officially beginning class.  One of my students was in the back of the room playing with a friend.  It looked like she was wearing a shirt covered with rows of beer bottles.

“Hey, Wendy, come here,” I said.  She walked over and I realized it was, in fact pictures of sharpened pencils.  There was English in the top corner of the shirt.  It said, ‘I MNOT FUCKING CRAZY.  A PENCIL STUB.’

Foreigners and Sports Confusion

Basketball

I was on a Sunday afternoon hike when Blythe sent me a text inviting me to play basketball.  Having always sucked at shooting hoops, and being in the middle of my morning exercise, I sent her a text politely declining.

She was persistent.  She called.  Voice to voice, I had a harder time saying no.  “You don’t understand, I really suck at basketball,” I said.

“So?  Willey is the only person who knows how to play basketball.  Tasmin, Claire and I don’t have a clue.  We don’t play basketball in the U.K.”

The Rion Can Lun

While job hunting for schools in Korea to teach at, I had to constantly email my resume and photographs of me.  One school had a website where you could upload your information directly to the school, rather than work through a recruiter.  There was a browse button next to the words “uproad resume here.’  I smiled, clicked on the browse button and selected my resume.  As it loaded, the screen said, ‘uproading…’

Cleaning Up to Settle In

“When someone hands you a flyer, it’s like they’re saying ‘here, you throw this away’.”  -Mitch Hedberg

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Many people hate flying.  I usually love it.  However, when I left America to go to Korea for my second year of teaching English, I made the mistake of flying with a fucktard company called United Airlines.  A mechanical delay in Chicago caused a missed flight in San Francisco, an hour spent in a customer service line, a 24 hour layover, a morning flight to Vancouver, followed by a 12 hour flight to Seoul.  Upon arriving, I learned that my luggage had been lost along the way.