Nothing profound

First, I would like to wish my sister, Rachel Friedman, a very happy 22nd birthday!!!!  I wish I could be there to help you celebrate!

Not much has happened since the last post.  I am loving it here!  However, before we arrived in Korea, Zach and I swore that we would study the language and be able to speak and read Korean at least a little.  Since being here, we have done little studying.  After speaking to other couples who came together, we found that is quite common.  We came as a couple and always have each other.  People who come by themselves don't necessarily have people to speak English every hour of the day.  Since we have each other, we fall into speaking English instead of forcing ourselves to learn the language.  The same is true for meeting new people.  If you come by yourself, you are forced to meet people unless you want to be a loner.  Zach and I have each other, so it (kind of) gives us an excuse to not HAVE to hang out with others....which is a bad thing.  We came here to experience new things and meet new people.

The last couple of weekends have been great though.  Zach and I went to a bar last weekend just thinking we would have a couple of drinks and go home.  Well, we met some people and hung out with them all night.  We left the bar around 2am and then went to a Nori Bang (pronounced Nori Bong) which is a karaoke place in Korea.  You can basically rent a room and have your own little karaoke party with your friends.  That was an interesting experience.  Next time I go, I think I'm going to have to be way drunk!!!!

new friends

These new friends also taught us several Korean drinking games.  One game (not even involving alcohol) involves slapping, or rather, hit others' hands.  It can get really violent!

the violent "hitting" game



This past weekend, a girl named Brandy was leaving to go back to the States for a few weeks for a vacation. A few of us had dinner then we went bowling and had a few drinks.

Also this weekend, one of the very first "foreigners" we met in Korea got married.  We couldn't go to the wedding because we were waiting on the electrician (another long story) but we were able to go to the reception.  Normally, Korean weddings don't have receptions but Nic and Se Min rented one of the bars and invited their friends to help them celebrate.  It was great to see them so happy and I met some great new people!!

 The happy couple.  Se Min is giving a speech.

 Just some of the people at the reception.

The Iksan Girls!!

I've had a lot of fun meeting new people and I look forward to getting to know them and hanging out with them more!

The reason we are here...(a couple more things)

There were a couple things I forgot to mention in my latest post.

First, it's winter here, right?!  So it's cold.  Not like Indiana weather, but it's cold!  Our school does not have central heat.  Each classroom has a gas heater but the hallways and bathrooms do not have heat.  I can see my breath while walking down the hall.  However, once the heater gets started in the classroom, it stays pretty warm!  The bathrooms also don't have hot water to wash your hands.

Another interesting thing.  There is not toilet paper in the bathrooms.  The toilet paper is in the teachers' office.  There are also no hand towels to dry your hands.  Also, the soap in the bathrooms is not in liquid, it's bar soap.

I am not complaining about any of these things.  I just wanted to let you know

The last thing I forgot to mention was about learning and remembering the students' names.  Korean names consist of a family name and a given name.  Some of the names that I had to learn and put faces to are:

    So Jae Won
    Park Hun Sol
    Kim Ji Hoon
    Jong Ji Soo

It was pretty difficult at first, but I am really starting to learn their names and can even call out to some of the students by name without looking at my cheat-sheet!

The reason we are here...

As promised, I will explain a little about our teaching experience so far.  I will explain it from my point-of-view.  Zach's experience will probably be slightly different than mine, but probably pretty much the same.

We are English teachers at a hagwon (pronounced hogwon) (an after-school school) called International in Iksan, South Korea.  Here is a picture of the outside of the building.

We are located on the 3rd floor of the building.  The first floor (basement) is a small grocery store.  The second is another hagwon.  Our windows are the white ones below the neon sign.  Depending on traffic lights, it takes about 10 minutes to walk to the school from our apartment.

Since we are an after-school program, we start later in the day after the kids get out of public school (usually around 3:30pm).  Except right now, the kids have about a month-long break from public school and go to camp for a couple hours per day.  So, for the month of January, we start a little after 1pm and get off earlier.

Each class we teach, we have a Korean teacher counterpart.  Every class is about 45 minutes long.  In the lower-level classes, our Korean counterpart has the class for 25 minutes and I have them for 20 minutes.  Some classes I see everyday (the lower-level classes).  Others, I see Mondays/Wednesdays or Tuesdays/Thursdays.  We are really lucky at this hagwon because we have books; some hagwons don't have books.

I start out my day with a phonics class.  These 4 kids barely know any English!  They just spent 4-5 weeks reading one book, The Lion and the Mouse.  It goes like this.....

     Part 1.  Little mouse.  Big lion.  Big, big trouble.  Let me go begs mouse.  Someday I will help you?  You help me says lion.  Ha ha ha!  But lion opens his paw.  He sets mouse free.  Part 2.  Big lion.  Big net.  Big big trouble.  Roar!  Mouse sits up.  He follows that roar.  Help me begs lion.  Mouse starts to chew.  He chews and chews.  He sets lion free.  Lion does not laugh at mouse now.  Now he knows.  Even the littlest mouse can help the biggest lion.  Always help others.

I do spelling tests with them once per week and the and go over pronunciation, etc. the rest of the week.  It's kind of difficult when they have questions for me because they know so little English.  I am really excited because next week we are starting a new book!  It's a Cat in the Hat book!

My next class is also a lower-level class, but they can definitely understand a lot more than my phonics class.  They can read and comprehend a lot of English.  They are learning things like... "Who's he?  He's my father." and "Where are you from?  I'm from France."  They are also learning adjectives and prepositions.  However, we don't use those "English terms" with them.  The next class I have is just a step up from them.  And the class after that is even another step up.  They are all pretty basic classes though.

Then, I have some "advanced" classes.  These classes are 1 1/2 hours.  They have two books.  One has a story (Some are really interesting.  I learned some things about Queen Elizabeth that I didn't know).  They then have about 4 pages of reading comprehension.  I check the pages as they finish and we go over it as a class.  The other book encourages more talking in class.

Finally, I have a middle school class.  They are concerned about passing their TOEFL test (the most widely respected English-language test in the world).  They listen to a CD and fill in the dictation into a workbook.  Zach has 3 middle school classes.


I teach about 6 classes per day.  In all of my classes, I have to remind the students that they can only speak English in my classroom.  It is a constant battle!


Well, I know this wasn't the most exciting post, but some of you wanted to hear about my teaching experience so far.  I really like what I do!  The kids are great....usually!!!  It's fun to watch them learn.


That's all for now!  Thanks for reading!