I was under the impression that I had to get the introductory speech at our assembly, so I was really stressed about that, but it turned out that I didn't have to. Relief! I simply had to be present at the ceremony, which only involved smiling and waving.
My Hyunseo was the student representative for the kids, so he had to present the Vice Principal with a document and say some kind of "swearing in" pledge for all the kids entering the program. I told him he did a great job and that he had a really cool voice. He said, "I know."
I knew I was going to do a serious/interesting film discussion on the first half of Pride and Prejudice with the kids, but I was stressed about what exactly I'd talk about, I had an hour and a half between commencement and when I needed to start teaching, so I took that time to sling together a really cool outline of what I wanted to talk about.
Because I wanted to strike the right balance of discussing serious thematic stuff like Marriage, Finances, Social Hierarchy, the Importance of Manners, etc. and also making it fun and funny.
It succeeded beyond my wildest dreams.
The kids were the best audience ever. In the history of life. They kept laughing and answering questions and they were easily like my American kids back home. Our literature classes were always informative and funny and stunning, and this was just the same.
One of the girls had read Pride and Prejudice translated in Korean, so she knew the plot well. The other kids had no clue, but I was shocked by how invested in the story they were. The boys didn't know that they were supposed to have an innate male resistance to Jane Austen, so they were all up in it. (And now that I think of it, my own dad, who's one of the manliest men I know, has always liked Jane Austen, and I always admired him for it.)
We wrote essays at the end, and it was great. My next class with them, we'll watch the other half of the movie, and they're looking forward to it. I am, too. I just fed them Oreos today, but I might spring for for-reals baking next time.
I asked my JH about how he liked being a 2nd-grader. He immediately started talking about his homeroom teacher, NG. I didn't realize that JH was addressing a complaint rather than a positive attribute when he said, "You know, NG is very chic". I agreed and said he was a really cool person. JH looked confused, so later I looked up the definition of "chic" for Koreans--it doesn't mean fashionable, polished, sophisticated, like it does in English and French. It has some of that connotation, but it more commonly means "cold" or "stand-offish".
So that's a little sad, that NG's not showing his warm side to JH yet. JH is made of hearts and moonbeams--he's designed to love and be loved, and I know his homeroom teacher last year (Adorable History Teacher, who moved to the boys' high school this semester), really showed him the kind of sweetness and appreciation that built up his spirit.
I saw Sangbin again, which was great. I love him so much and since he lived in America, i can be slightly sarcastic with him and he gets it and thinks it's funny. He asked if the 6 giant boxes of Oreos on my desk were for them, and I said no, they were my lunch because this is what Americans eat, and didn't he remember our lifestyle? He died over that one.
My and JY went out for lunch, along with Jung-Y Teacher, a math teacher who is a very nice girl (she's one of the people from my October vacation, though I haven't talked to her much since). We had good convo, mostly in Korean. It's good practice for me.
Got my nails done! Which was a tremendous relief, since I haven't had them done since November. Too long to go without cute nail art! :-)
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