Day 718 - Bingsu Problem

True story of my week thus far. I never said I was proud of it, but admission is the first step towards solving your addiction.

Day 718 - Students Studying for Speaking Tests

Boys of every culture: why are you so obsessed with your junk!?

Day 718 - Where I've Been In Korea Updated

Really need to get to the north-east... time's running out!!

Day 716 - Back on the Wagon?

• Sorry for failing at updates.


• General Update: My (unofficially offical) return ticket to the States is for August 1st. I'm looking forward to getting a car, a new apartment, and a smart phone. I'm not looking forward to applying for jobs in order to pay the ginormous bills for said car, apartment, and smart phone.


• TOPIK Update: Vocab/Grammar 56, Writing 36, Listening 64, Reading 78; Overall 58.5. Good news: compared to last time, that's Vocab/Grammar +21, Listening +7, Reading +37, Overall +16. Bad news: Writing -1, and I missed passing by just 4 points on the writing section. I registered to take the test again in July. I must be the biggest sap in the world for this stupid test. I'm studying, clearly focusing on writing, but unfortunately, my co-teacher has diagnosed my problem as "not thinking like a natural-born Korean speaker". In other words, my responses make sense and are grammatically correct, but they are not the exact, *natural* response a Korean would make. Womp wompppp.


• School Update: This week I started administering the final speaking test. 8 questions for the first and second years, 4 questions plus a roleplay for the third years. Speaking tests are nice because it means I get to reward the good students with lots of praise and good scores, and I get to show the bad students, numerically, how much their "too cool for your class" attitude is worth. After this week, there's not much left, teaching-wise. Next week there's finals, then a week and a half where I'll just show movies and take pictures of the students for the next ETA assigned to this school, and maybe buy some treats for the classes that DIDN'T make me cry this semester.


• Social Life Update: Went on a double-date with my friend Rachael and her Korean boyfriend last weekend. We saw a baseball game in Daejeon, which was fun but incredibly hot. Baseball in Korea is crazy -- like college football in the States, complete with team chants, and a little song for each player. As each player comes up to bat, the fans sing his personal little cheer song. For example, http://pann.nate.com/video/207987445


• Coming Soon: DY took some leave for next week so that he could take me to see some of the things I've wanted to see around Korea. For example, the fortress from the picture in my banner. I've wanted to revisit that fortress and re-take that picture since before I got off the plane two years ago, but I just haven't done it. Also, the ETA Final Dinner is Sunday, which will be fun. I guess. Meanwhile, there's about 150 speaking tests standing in teh way of me and the freedom of pressing "play" for every class hereafter.