Erin and Justin

Having a role with very little responsibility, no control over who is in our classes, which or how many classes we teach, or the text book we are to use, one might think that there is no room for fun or autonomy. But the truth of the matter is, we are expected to be demonstrably non-Korean to the parents, more than we are expected to be useful to the students. This therefore, gives us loads of room to teach whatever we want, so long as the basic text is being covered. And considering that many of the texts are either way too easy or way too hard, we teach all kinds of things.

Recently we came up with a winner - getting kids to draw their dreams and then describe what is happening. This is of course, not only good speaking practise, but creates excellent souvenir pictures for us!

See some of our students' dream pictures at: http://s136.photobucket.com/albums/q164/erinfearn/Korea/Korean%20Dream/?start=all

Damn! We met a lovely woman (and she's Australian!) and she's just about finished her year, so she's LEAVING!

But we had an excellent night out with her for her birthday, with cake and dinner and beer and noraebang and a hip hop club, and we met some of her friends as a consequence! Jiyeong and Jiyeong (one of the Jiyeongs is featured in the photos, singing passionately, as is only expected at a noraebang).

SEE PHOTOS AT http://s136.photobucket.com/albums/q164/erinfearn/Korea/Alisons%20Birthday/?start=all

After 6 weeks of taking advantage of the supermarket bargains (mainly vodka), we have settled ourselves down somewhat, and become comfortable in our now-familiar jobs and cosy home and new language. Well, we can speak enough to say hello and goodbye, get around in taxis, order food - usually get vegetarian messages across (except to one particular English-speaking Korean man, who we suspect is aiming to convert) - demonstrate some politeness... but we'll learn more. ONE of us can even READ Hangul (despite not understanding it most of the time)!

We have made some friends - and almost everyone we have met, even the Korean people are very transient. It's funny that on one hand, we're quite fixed here, with a home and a job and a local community that we're becoming acquainted with, and yet we are reminded of our temporary status with each person we meet.

And now finally, our employer is sending through our applications for working visas, so shortly we will be able to head to Japan for a long weekend, and work in Korea for real! And by that I mean legally

So anyway, Yellow Dust.

Yep! Yellow dust. Neither of us had ever heard of it, but its an annual springtime phenomenon, where dust, collected in Mongolia and China from deserts and river basins, is carried on winds across Korea and Japan. This results in respiratory problems and an increase in other disease in both people and livestock. There's a news article I found if you're interested, at http://english.kbs.co.kr/news/zoom/1348045_11781.html

So we are wearing masks during our walk to work on the days when its clearer, and catching a taxi to work, on days when its bad.

See some more photos of our Korean life at http://s136.photobucket.com/albums/q164/erinfearn/Korea/Yellow%20Dust/?start=all