One of my dreams was realised on Wednesday morning.


I got to stand on the extendable ladder of a fire engine.


I know. How exciting things get here............


We took the preschoolers to the local fire station so they could learn about fire safety blah blah. I was really quite bored there, what with the whole talk being given in Korean, until I spied the fire engine and the extendable ladder. Kids or no kids, I was determined to get a spin on it. So I escorted my little tots ( all aged 3-5) onto the buckety shaped thing on the end of the ladder and got myself a decent viewing spot. What a larf. I almost contemplated becoming a fire lady, but then my unshakable fear of fire stepped in and flattened such notions.

As we are all aware, North Korea has a veritable arsenal of nuclear weaponry which could be unleashed on the South without a moments notice if Kim Jong Il were to wake up on the wrong side one morning. So, to keep us on our toes and aware of our roles should there be a disaster, the government in the South conducts regular nuclear attack drills. On the 15th of every second month or so, an eerie, WW2 style air raid siren is sounded as local civil service types order traffic to come to a complete halt and pedestrians must stop dead in their tracks. And we must stay like that for 15 minutes. That's right. No movements for 15 minutes. We wait for the emergency services to come running past ( the most I have ever seen has been a fire engine and an ambulance) and then we are allowed to try and recover the 15 minutes of our lives we lost. I am not sure how EXACTLY this drill is supposed to aid us. I had always presumed that upon the assault of a nuclear strike, we would all be wiped out in a cloud of mushroom shaped smoke and that would be the end of it. Damn Hollywood for distorting my view of reality. It appears that if there ever is a strike in Daegu, we will all remain motionless for the emergency services to rush through, because OBVIOUSLY, we won't be vapourised.

And no, we can't sue in the event of a death




You know how there are certain things that you should and should not do?
Well, on Wednesday I indulged in an activity that I should not have done, putting the lives of little children at risk, and, as ashamed as I am to say this, I loved every second of it.

My school took the foreign teachers and the preschoolers to a karting track to teach them about road safety. When we arrived at the track, the foreign teachers were directed to fully-operating karts, told to sit in, drive around twice and get a feel for the karts, with NO sign of helmets or seat belts. So, off we took, getting to know the car and getting to know that the brakes really were quite useless, that the steering was rather lacklustre and that these little karts were capable of some impressive speeds. After a few spins round the track we came to a stop.....and that was when the morning took an interesting turn. While we were sitting in our karts, each teacher was handed a little kid, said kid was placed in the flabbergasted teacher's lap and the teacher was instructed to drive around the track three times. With the kid. Without a helmet. Without a seat belt. The only thing keeping this kid alive was the very careful driving of their teacher.

In theory.

Afer a few laps, my confidence was up and kid or no kid I was going to see just how fast the kart could go on the long straight. The kids loved it, ( if their yells of "faster teacher!!!" were anything to go by), and there weren't any injuries or crashes. While this may seem completely absurd to lawsuit happy nations, it appears that here, if you crash it's your own fault and if you sustain a head injury..... well you should have known better
And that is how road safety is taught in Korea. Brilliant!

ABOVE PICTURES
The first picture is of the most adorable kid I teach. His name is Dino, (because he loves dinosaurs), he is only four and is my little angel who gets away with murder in my class.
The second picture is of me with some kid. I don't teach him, but he was thrust at me by the school manager. I don't think he enjoyed his spin with me as I went far too fast on the last lap and the little tyke almost drove his fingernails through my hands

Blossoms



































Spring is here, so the cherry blossoms are in full bloom. These pictures were taken by Susung Lake near where Ian lives.

Pretty.

Today in a class of 7-year olds I introduced some new vocabulary. One of the new words was "sure", as in "Sure, I'd like a coffee". Anyhoo, in order to enforce the meaning I asked some of the students to form sentences with our new word. None of them had anything creative to say- most of the sentences went along the lines of, 'Sure, I want some candy', 'Sure, I want a drink',blah blah. That was until the resident nerd piped up with, "If I say sure, people will like me".

The kid is screwed.

Last week, one of the little girls that I teach got a block in the face. A friend of hers was a little energetic in his block tower demolition and so accidentally kicked a block into her cheek. There wasn't any major damage, just a little red mark in a rectangular shape but such was the drama being shown by the victim, that I was forced to escort her downstairs to put some placebo cream on her "injury". With that accomplished we took the stairs back to the playroom, all the while with the little 8-year old whimpering at my side. Eventually, the sniffling and snorting got to me, so I asked her what was up. She raised her head to look at me, her huge eyes welling up with tears, bottom lip quivering and said, "Eileen teacher, with my face, no one will marry me".

What rubbish are these children fed? What eight year old should be getting themself in a state because they have a minor scrap on their face and so will never be marriage material?

Pah.

So, I was at a local family's house this evening. How nice you say. Indeed, it was and it wasn't just nice, it was rather intriuging. The father is, what can only be termed a "chain smoker". His medical background has done nothing to stop him nor have the pleas of his wife and mother. Anyway, this evening he stood out on the balcony of his apartment while I chatted with his wife. I noticed that he had exited the living room with cigarettes AND a carrot. Yes. A carrot. When he finished his cigarette, he put out his cigarette and replaced the vacant space between his fingers with a carrot. He then started chewing ferociously on the raw vegetable. Naturally, I was rather curious so asked him if he had a particular fondness for raw carrots post inhalation. "No", he said, unamused, "Carrots prevent lung cancer". "Eh?", I spluttered. "Yes!", he responded.

The man has himself convinced that a carrot is going to save him from early death and nothing I said could sway him.

However there does appear to be a grain of truth in what he says!

The baseball game was being recorded for TV and what better attraction than a row full of foreigners. Maryanne captured this shot of the camera man filming us. He actually climbed up over the seats to stand in front of us and run the camera from one person to the next.

I lamented my lack of wardrobe and makeup for my Asian TV debut.

Last weekend, Ian, Corie, Maryanne, Adam ,Chris, Jeff, Hyron and Jenny and me went to a baseball game here in Daegu to watch the local team, the Samsung Lions. It was a beautiful, sunny day so we figured what better way to spend an afternoon, than sitting out in the sun watching a nice game of basball. A game which I do not understand, (and still don't) and a game that is more dangerous than equestrian sports and extreme mountain biking combined, what with the "balls", (more like lumps of steel wrapped in pretty white sweaters)that kept missing me by inches. Bah. They should learn to hit the balls in straight lines. Below is photographic evidence of the wild day had by all.


So, as we can see, there was quite the crowd at the game




However,nothing was stopping the resident cheer team




What with the hectic on field play and the roaring, heckling crowd, it was impressive that Ian and I were able to fit in this inpromptu photo session...with our sunglasses.




We never really worked out why the entire team was sent out for "circular movements" 20 minutes before the game ended.




AND LOOK!!! NO BASEBALL. This is a few of us at a local brewery bar after the game. It is called the Ariana Broi and is famous for its "All you can eat buffet and all you can drink brew". It even has a dodgy Eastern European band..complete with Eastern European inspired hair and Eastern European inspired clothing and non Eastern European inspired Abba numbers.

A few weeks ago, Ian and I went to the tradtional market in Daegu called Seomun Market. It is a huge bustling area where you can buy everything from dried fish to bedding. If one peruses any of the literature for the market, one is informed that one will be exposed to local goods, foods, embroidery and the famed Korean friendly manner of the stall workers.

Or so they tell the tourists.

I had heard that there was a little known section where I could see caged animals waiting to be sliced, diced and minced. Little Miss Innocent here though that there would just be the usual hens, etc., sqwaking about, trying to aviod the axe of death. I had tried to find this area before, but had been unsuccessful in my hunt.

Perhaps I am more of a Little Miss Wierd, seeing as I actually wanted to see such a place.

So with Ian leading, we started to meander through the mazes of stalls and finally came across a little alleyway that was lined with stall workers selling a mixture of fish, dried fish and an assortment of veg. Further ambling, revealed more stalls displaying the Korean delicacy of chicken feet. Yum, I hear you say.

It was the stench that got me first. Then the sight of the caged animals, then the listless uncaged rabbits, thrown on boxes, making no attempt to escape. The caged, dirty puppies, whining for attention almost broke my heart. The tear jerker was seeing the kittens thrown into cages with dogs and rabbits. The little balls of dirty, bloodied fur were clawing at their little metal cells and clambouring over the apathetic puppies, mewing with desperation.

I think any future I had in an abbatoir has come an abrupt end.


Also, it wasn't until I had left the Kitty Killer area did I wonder who on earth would purchase the clothes that were hanging directly opposite animal blood, faeces and entrails. Ick.

Today, a dog and a child followed me home.


How do I interpret that?

For all the ex- Ding Ding Dangers, (hee hee, sounds hilarious), you will be delighted to know that the Susung premises has been extended to the third floor. I know! I passed by today and was astonished by the sight of exposed wiring and piping on the second floor, whereas the third floor is painted in reds, yellows and purples, showing more vibrant hues compared to the original yellow and dirt.

Now the tense, unpleasant atmosphere has been upgraded to techicolour!

So perhaps my last post was a little unfair.


Anyway,you know when a cat is trying to cough up a hairball? Yes? Well that is the sound old men and women make here when they are spitting on the street. Their whole body seems to suck the contents of their lungs into their mouths and nasal passages and with one great "hwwaawhhhcccckkkkghhttth", the nasty produce is ejected onto the street for all and sundry to step on.

So I had to be told by my Canadian boyfriend that this weekend sees St. Patrick's Day. I had completely erased the date from my memory.

However, I don't fancy spending the day with a bunch of people who are drinking to the memory of their Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Aunt Peggy who survived the famine, rowed from the Old Country to the New in one of those cute Irish boats, set up an Irish souvenir stand in Manhattan, made her fortune, married a German, moved to Wyoming to run a ranch and spawned a series of generations of offspring that are CONVINCED they are Irish for a whole 24 hours and are terribly disappointed that I won't drink myself stupid, jig and reel myself to death and end the night with my personal rendition of Danny Boy to make the hearts of the masses melt and see Great Aunt Peggy turn in her grave

If you don't have an Irish passport, don't go flaunting your Irishness.

Bah.

Korean parents think that learning phonics is a waste of time.

I am teaching a young class phonics, as they are new to the language and are incapable of identifying letters in the alphabet and so it is essential that we focus on this area. However, this week a number of the parents have phoned the school, complaining that the teaching of phonics is unnecessary and irrelevant and that they expect their children to be able to read a basic level reading book by the end of the month.

The Korean teacher has tried to explain the importance of first learning the alphabet and associated sounds before beginning the reading process, but the parents are refusing to change their stance on this matter.

Therefore, we have to change the entire course to suit the whims of these parents. Schools here should rid themselves of the "school" title and instead employ " Institutes of we will acknowledge all idiotic demands made by parents".

It appears that only those who have eaten more than their RDA of carrots will be able to read the below description of Gatbawi.

I could fix it...

A weekend or two ago, Ian and I hiked up to Gatbawi. To save on typing I have posted a photographed description below. How smart of me! However, here is a brief rundown-
Gatbawi is placed atop one of the many peaks of the local mountain range and is a worship site for local Buddhists. It was rather tiring climbing to the top, but the eventual view was magnificent and we met so many kind people on the ascent. One family gave us oranges, others showed us how to trick the little birds to sit on our hands and we met a clinically insane old man who proved to be quite friendly. Perhaps we caught him on a non maniac day.

Anyway, below is the Buddhist image in acid rain polka dots















Here is a description of the above Buddhist image














And here is me with a view.

It was almost pathetic to see me mow down old ladies in my rush to get to the bagel stand at Wal mart tonight.

Although, perhaps even more pathetic was the idiotic grin I sprouted when I actually got to bring the bagels home with me.

I have been having some pretty bad reactions to the local cusine here, again. I thought I had built up some sort of an immunity to the burning red spice of death, but apparently not. I do not want to go through the pain I had last year, so I have decided to abolish certain Korean foods from my diet.

I give myself two days. Tops.

Snort.

We have a new teacher in our school, a very nice American boy. He has only been teaching a few days and so is still adjusting to the zoo like lifestyle of a hagwon, what with the incessant screaming, the neverending stream of questions starting with ,"But, why teacher?", and the ant like attention spans. Today he had to deal with a very excitable, young class that are oblivious to the sitting still concept and find rolling around on their desks far more entertaining. After this class, he strode into the staff room and flopped onto his chair whispering, " Birth Control".

Still though the kids can have their good days............... and is that a pig I see soaring overhead?

What on earth does Ricky Martin have to do with the Winter Olympics?
Isn't he from Puerto Rico? The Olympic Committee might as well have blown the entire budget on U2 instead. What with the Irish passion for snow......

I love the Eighties. Really. I do. What other decade could have produced such greats as Boston, Chicago, ( band names reached their creative peak during these illustrious times), Meat Loaf and Foreigner. How I mock those who admit their love of such shocking music, being screeched or crooned by a mullet sporting, rail thin, drainpipe jeans attired youth with the face of a two year old and the legs of an elastic band. How I have been forced to hang my head in shame as I have made these blasts from the past my jogging buddies. There is nothing quite like the crescendo of "More than a feeling" followed by
"I'd lie for you" with the rising tones of "Toto" to get me going at a pace not shy of a steady trot. Of course I also like to join in with the power choruses, so it is taking everything in me to not let out a few chords or indulge in some air drums.

Also the oldies who hurl themselves around the lake area each night are starting to recognise me so I am getting lots of cheery waves and "Hello!"s from those aged 60 and over who can still run past me. I think I might join them for tea and gossip mongering by the lakeside when the weather gets a little better. Should they prove themselves to be unhip and not with it, then I'll get just get accquainted with the team of guys who practice their breakdancing in a park near the lake. One of them is going to be spending some time in spine rehab at the rate they are going. They aren't very talented, yet think they are, so attempt all sorts of head for feet
poses that will result in neck braces for all.