Well, it finally happened. I took the wrong bus on Thursday. I'm convinced mine just didn't show up though because I waited about 10 minutes after it was supposed to be there, then finally just got on one that the bus driver said was going to Seokseong, which it did not. I got off at my main school, and then got on another one headed to Seokseong. I was only about 10 minutes late, and Joo said it was no big deal. It was a hassle, but not a huge deal.

Wednesday we played teachers' volleyball for an hour and a half. I showed up a little early because everyone else had a teachers' meeting, but I'm (thankfully) exempt from those seeing as how I don't speak Korean. I showed up at the gym and this older guy was there, so we started practicing and man he kept spiking it at me! I was relieved when the other teachers showed up so we could start the game and I could get a break.

My vice-principal was on my team, and before the game started he and that other guy kept trying to get me to spike the ball over the net. I was semi-successful. My team was me, the VP, some guy I don't know, and Mrs. Jee (special ed teacher), Mrs. Chung (2nd grade), Mrs. Lim (kindergarten), and three other women teachers I don't remember. They put me in the front row, and the VP was the setter and the other guy was the third front row person. They played all nine players at a time, so it was a fairly crowded court. It was a pretty tight game the whole time, though I was a little confused because it was definitely rally scoring, but I think we went to 30? Maybe 27? I'm not sure. When I was serving in the first game Mrs. Chung told me, "One more!" and then we won that point, yet kept playing, so I don't know.

Once they figured out I wasn't very good at spiking, the VP stopped setting me up. Like most recreational volleyball games, everyone was lifting and slapping the ball like crazy. Almost every serve was underhand, and most of the teachers didn't bump the ball, but would "set" everything, even serves. It made the game a little challenging because I'm not used to setting serves, so every time a ball came at my face I would move aside so the person behind me could get it, but since setting serves was so common, they weren't always expecting it.

After volleyball ended at five, I went home, got a water bottle, and headed to soccer. We played five-on-four because there wasn't another team to play against. I think we played for about an hour and a half, then went home, showered, and off to a farewell dinner for two of the Canadian teachers. We ate at this duck restaurant and it was delicious. I think my problems with Korean food stem primarily from the fact that I've mostly been eating school lunches, and if your only exposure to American food was the elementary school lunch, then you probably wouldn't like it either.

I think I overdid it with the volleyball and soccer because I was really sore for the next few days. My forearms especially felt like they'd been beaten with a meat tenderizer. I've got volleyball and soccer again tomorrow. Joo told me on Friday that there will be four schools at volleyball tomorrow for some reason, and so he wanted to know if I'll play for Seokyang or Seokseong. Uh oh... my Seokyang principal is crazy about volleyball, but Joo said the Seokseong teachers need me. I said maybe one week I'd play for Seokyang and the next for Seokseong. We'll see.

So more on the arm petting front... from talking to the other native teachers, it seems Koreans are totally fascinated/repulsed by us hairy Westerners. Ben, one of the English teachers, said that he was trying to explain body hair to his middle school boys and so he rolled up his pant leg and showed them his calf, and they completed freaked out and thought it was so gross.

Friday at Seokseong we had donuts in the teachers' lounge. Krispy Kremes! They were quite good. I had no idea you could get Krispy Kremes here.

Saturday Kevin and I went to a native teachers' barbeque in Majeon (spelling? no idea). We got a ride with Ray to Daejeon then hoofed it to a bus stop and took a bus to Majeon. We stopped for some KFC because Daejeon is big enough to actually have Western restaurants, like TGI Friday's and KFC and McDonald's. They've still got that special Korean twist though because I ordered what I thought was a chicken sandwich only to have it be the spiciest chicken sandwich known to man. In retrospect ordering the "Zinger" may have been a mistake. My mouth and lips were burning for like ten minutes post-sandwich.

I had my second teachers' training on Monday. It seems like we're putting the brakes on in a big way... last week we were doing things like, "He drank hot chocolate. She flew a kite." etc. but I think it was too fast for some teachers, so now we're doing the alphabet and numbers. There's some real discrepancies in the English levels of the teachers, so it's hard to balance that.

Next week is Chuseok, the Korean harvest moon holiday. I'll have Tues-Fri off plus the weekend as usual. Lots of people are going places, but I don't know if I can because apparently everything is booked. Not having Internet at my apartment makes it really hard to plan a vacation of any kind. I sent a copy of my alien registration card (ARC) and bank account to the agency people, and I swear Mr. Kim said my Internet should be working soon, but it wasn't yesterday, so I'll have to investigate this further.

My Seokyang classes are anywhere from 25-31 students, and it's kind of a lot. It's hard to discipline the kids when they don't know what I'm saying. Things like, "If you don't stop talking, you're going to have to stay late" mean nothing to them. "Listen up, pay attention, be quiet, no talking when I'm talking," etc. are to them what these commands in Korean would be to me, i.e. just noise. I finally taught them, "Pencils down, stop talking" but during class I always walk around and get right up by their desks to make sure I have their attention. I mime a lot, "Listen up" *touches ear*, "Listen and repeat" *touches ear, touches mouth* help. Though by now they should really know "listen and repeat," it's more of if they choose to ignore it. They all have notebooks with the exaggerated lines to practice writing, but a decent number always forget and then think that means they don't have to write anything. Wrong. Use the worksheet I just gave you. I'm constantly walking around the classroom to make sure they're actually writing like they're supposed to and not just goofing off. It's a learning process.