This month has been another busy one, with two open classes at school, much action in both cricket and baseball, and the onset of my first Korean winter.
There's been lots going on at school, with preparations beginning for the next school year starting at the end of February, and a couple of open classes. The school is a private kindergarten for kids aged 4 years old to 8 years old from 09:00 - 15:00, then a private English academy (or Hagwon) from 15:00 - 18:00 for kids aged 8 to 11. However, only kids that went to the kindergarten can go to the Hagwon, so there is obviously a big push to get the kids who are leaving the kindergarten and moving up to elementary school to come to the Hagwon next year. For that reason, we had an open day for the Hagwon, when all the parents come in to watch me teach a lesson, followed a few weeks later by another open day, this time in the kindergarten. Both went well, and it looks like the school will be expanding next year which is good news. The owner was very pleased, and took all the English teachers out for a very nice meal, where I saw some very rare cheesecake;
We were also given some tickets to a concert by a famous Korean opera singer, called Kim Dong Kyu. None of the other teachers went, but it was really good! He did some Elvis songs, and some Frank Sinatra songs, aswell as some classic opera 'hits.' The only downside was before the concert, we had to sit through a 45 minute talk from a bank about saving money, interest rates, tax, and various different savings accounts. All in Korean. With the usual fascinating powerpoint presentation demonstrating how interest rates have changed over the last 10 years. That was less fun, but the concert was great.
Elsewhere, my science classes continue to stray further and further away from actual science. We have four 'immersion' classes that have extra activity classes in addition to their regular English lessons, the activities being science, art, music, and reading. At the start of the year, my science classes were reasonably sciencey, but they've got more and more arty, as we have drawn pictures of a bee, painted a bag, and recently, just drew a vase and glued some flowers on to it. I really feel sorry for these kids. When they go to high school, they're going to have a very confused notion of what science actually entails.
In sporting news, the cricket season is over in Korea. It ended with me playing in the Allstar game (yeah, I'm an All Star!), and meeting the Sri Lankan Ambassador to Korea, aswell as the President of the Korean Cricket Association. Very much looking forward to the Ashes, the return of the domestic cricket season in April, and hopefully going to see some international cricket at next year's Asian Games, right here in Korea!
In baseball, my team had their most successful season ever, winning through the playoffs to make it to the Championship game yesterday, against the regular season winners. As expected, it was a tight game, until a couple of individual errors allowed them to go from 2-2 to 5-2 up in their final innings, and we were only able to pull one back, to lose 5-3. Still, I thoroughly enjoyed my first season of baseball, and after I was shockingly omitted from the All Star game next weekend, it will be a few months before I swing a bat again.
And finally, the Adventures of Tyrion the Turtle
Well the little man had a real adventure last week, as I took him into school so the kids could play with him. They are currently learning a song about a little turtle, so it was a good opportunity for them to see one in real life, and despite a few screams from scared girls, and a few less scared boys trying to pull his head off, he's still alive! He's also very much looking forward to Christmas, and celebrating the birthday of Je2sus
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