2002-10-29 - 10:24 p.m.

Tuesday, October 22, 2002

~ ~ The Anniversary of my First Full Day in Corea!

(13:00)

I slept the clock around and have spent the time since then doing laundry and nibbling on the fresh vegetables I picked up near the cafe where I ate supper last evening, Two ajummas on the train introduced me to "soon mu," so I bought a "mu," a kind of giant radish but not a daikon, as well as green onions and cherry tomatoes. A "mu" looks like an elongated white turnip (the kind with the purple top). It's very tender and has a mild, delicate flavour, not at all peppery.

Today was a good drying day for the wash, but it's pretty chilly outside. The breeze is still snapping flags out straight and the high temp is 17 degrees C/ 63 F. Both the boss tomcat and the pretty, grey-tiger 'queen' showed up when I started doing laundry. I gave them the rest of my squid. It had been in my backpack since Saturday, so I figured they'd be more apt to enjoy it than I, and they did.

Thomas wanted his scritchy-scratches. She's too shy for that, yet, but she carefully observed his obvious pleasure. He rolls around like a silly boy.

(14:40) I've got no ambition at all today. Made out a shopping list to replenish the larder after having let it get low before the Japan trip. Here it is nearly 3 p.m., probably as warm as it's going to get today and I'm just getting ready to go out, not 'cause I want to but because I've got to. I'm on my last can of stove gas, have no bread, and only 4 saltines left. Those cherry tomatoes need lettuce!

Later--- Went down to the farmer's market and got lots of goodies: garlic, leeks, mushrooms, carrots, tofu ("dubu"), loose-leaf lettuce and four cans of stove gas. (They come in 4-packs at the hardware store and are cheaper than getting them in the local 'Quick-stop.")

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sunday, October 27

(10:30)

Catching up --- I spent all day Wednesday making 'pan chan', blanching veggies and making sauces to marinate them. Got some spicy bean paste at the grocery store and used it to season a stew made of leeks, carrots and potatoes. The "dubu" got fried in butter and sesame oil, along with some green onions. It sure was good! In Corea, dubu is often fried before it's put in soups, stews, or other mixtures. Frying gives tofu both flavour and texture. Coreans like their food to have both!

Thursday was scrub-up, clean-up day at the Anam "pad." I even washed the walls! Unpacked my winter clothes and washed them. Just generally got things organised and spruced up. I was thinking that I'd have two students in here on Friday, and "neatness counts," as my old teacher used to say. Thursday afternoon, Cho called to ask if I could teach the 2 p.m. class in Guro on Friday. I figured I could squeeze it in, and said so.

At eleven p.m., Chung called to cancel; he had a term paper due Friday. Knowing college kids, he "pulled an all-nighter" to get it done. I was glad I'd said "Yes" to Cho earlier, though I'd planned on Chung's cash to pay my phone bill. Half is better than none.

I've been humming "Alice's Restaurant" all week. The idea of teaching it came into my head last week and I consulted Jim about the words. He verified them, and they are useful and commonly used in giving dirctions, with a colloquial twist: "Walk right in. It's around the back. Just a half a mile from the railroad track. You can get anything you want at Alice's restaurant." [The Corean word for railway station, "yahk," almost rhymes in there, too.] About all that's needed to add to that lesson is, "Ya can't miss it!"

Those kids in Guro, the 2 o'clock class, are pretty much out of control. They were giving Michael fits the day I sat in on his class. So class prep for them needed to have a lot of interesting activities, plenty of pupil movement and encouragement of each student's input. They are a handful!

We had a good time, but Cho noticed 2 spots of peanut butter on the carpet later. He got right down and scrubbed them up! We are friends, so he just said that he didn't allow kids to eat messy foods in class, but I could tell that his high standards were being tested.

I broached the idea of teaching half-time and getting an E-2 visa. Cho really liked the idea and called the head of the hogwon to explain it in Hangul. He thinks there will be no problem. He also called Immigration for the forms and procedure guidelines, so there is real progress. Furthermore, he said he'd make sure my contract was written "to let you do anything you want." He is a graduate law student, so that means he has plenty of resources available to write the contract so that it fits Korean laws and still gives me a lot of latitude. I envision a clause that says, if I have any income-generating ideas, I will run them by the school director for approval and give the school a percentage. Or, put another way, the school will hire me out to do projects with other businesses. That could open up a way for me to do "free-lance" editing and proofing! The Korea Herald, for example, could pay the school for my services.

These are just ideas, possibilities, but Cho's Corean ability to start things moving fast in the right direction encourages me.

On Saturday, I made it over to Carol's for the women's meeting and, because I'd been absent for so long, got asked to chair. I "briefly qualified," as we do in Maine, which is an innovation in Korea. [That's a 5-minute synopsis of one's background history, what led up to the decision to join the fellowship, and what happened as a result.]

(13:35) For lunch today, I cooked up the rest of the 'dubu' (fried in butter and sesame oil) and stir-fried onions, carrots and diced sesame leaves to go wih it. Then I stir-fried the raw brown rice to toast the grains (a week's supply) and boiled it after it was well toasted. This cuts the boiling time to 20 minutes, a considerable saving of cooking gas. (I think most of the cooking happens in that instant when the first cup of water hits the super-hot toasted grain. It froths and hisses like mad for about 15 seconds.) Twenty minutes is just the time it takes me to do a thorough Corean scrub-up (shower and shampoo). When I stepped out of the shower, the lovely smell of the cooked rice hit me. It smells a lot like fresh buttered popcorn.

While it was cooling to eating temperature, I experimented with horseradish powder and barbecue sauce until I got a proportion I liked best: One level spoonful of horseradish powder and 4 spoons of Korean beef-rib barbecue sauce. [These products are made by Ottogi and can be found in any Korean grocery store.] It makes a great spicy dip for tofu or meat.

Seems like all these spices and the garlic I eat (4-5 cloves a day) ought to ward off any "flu bugs" but I'm keeping an eye out for a flu shot clinic, anyway. Teachers and hospital employees form the habit and I've been both. ;-)

(18:30)

Went to the Sunday afternoon meeting [Topic: Anger and dealing with it]. To my mind, there's several kinds of anger. One is a cover for fear; that's very common. Then, there's anger related to control over others, or the lack of it, and anger connected to judging and expecting. I get mad at myself when I don't do as well as I "ought," that's the latter kind. The others aren't big issues in my life in the last few years, although they certainly are for other folks.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tuesday, October 29, 2002

My pupil from the garment trade come yesterday, but told me that she will have to stop lessons for a month or so, because her aunt's husband has cancer. Her aunt is her boss. So she will be shouldering most of her aunt's business load, so her aunt can tke care of her husband. Oh, Lord, I can relate to that! I'm going to miss Hihuan, though.

I told Cho about her when I saw him yesterday afternoon, and today he called with enough extra work to make up the difference for the month of November. He also said the school is moving on my visa sponsorship. Whew, I'm again amazed at the compassion of Coreans. A Corean told me once, "It's all about survival. We pull together." What a great cultural trait!

Chung came today, to make up last week's missed class, and will be here again on Friday. He is a great kid,- well, young man, actually. I enjoy working with him. I hope he keeps at it with regular practice. His assignment this week is to get an English-language newspaper, read it, and mark vocabulary (problem) words for discussion on Friday. He identified reading as his weak spot in his last homework assignment, a base-line self-analysis quiz.

Winter is rolling in; it got down to -4 degrees C / 25 F last night. We're still getting that sharp north-west wind out of Siberia. The high today was 11 C / 52 F, but it sure didn't feel like it, with that wind! The sky was beautifully clear, though.

May you all have as snug a home as I have here.

Happy Trails!

~ Sil in Corea

previous - next

http://www.newdream.org/

Free clicks save land at http://www.therainforestsite.com

Copyright 2001,2002, et al. Sillama1 (Andrew knows my real name, and you will suffer from rectal boils if you take anything from this site.)

Fight Spam! Click Here!