Lunching With the Ladies

Despite, or perhaps because of, my week requiring me to do absolutely nothing, it seems to have been one of the more stressful ones since coming to Korea. Mostly because at one point I thought my principal was going to take away all my vacation time and make me teach vacation school the whole time. This however was skillfully averted by Ms Park, who also did not want to come in on her vacation to teach, and so I am back to having many weeks of vacation. Apparently the crisis ended when she was able to make the principal laugh. Whether he was laughing himself  thinking I should teach nine weeks of vacation school, or if Ms Park told a funny joke, I shall never know. But I am very grateful for her skills in getting me out of lots of work. I guess the principal still expects me to "better myself" like the other teachers do during the holiday. Ms Park goes to the library to study English. I shall work very hard to practice my English at home with Jordan. Perhaps I will watch some movies for extra practice.

Aside from the mini-crisis with the principal, the week consisted mostly of my lunching out with the ladies. On Tuesday I went out with the three women in my conversation class. They took me to a traditional Korean restaurant where they brought us about 500 mini plates of food. I see now why the Koreans kept talking about our dishwasher when we moved in, there are so many dishes I can't comprehend cleaning them. The conversation at this lunch focused mainly on when I would be having babies (they were shocked when I said it would be at least five years, I wonder what they would have done if I had said never) and what chores Jordan does. The women here seem to have heard that Western men do things around the house and always ask me what Jordan does. I then give them an impressive list of things, while they oooh and tell me he is very good (and handsome!). After lunch we went to the cinema to see the new James Bond, which was well received, although one of the women prefers Pierce Brosnan.

Yesterday I was invited to a housewarming party. Ms Park was very excited to use the word 'housewarming' because we had recently been discussing it. The party started at another traditional restaurant in the country that is actually owned by one of the teachers at my school. There were about 20 women who were invited, and I learned that the women who moved was treating us all to lunch. The restaurant was very cute, although it smelled bad because they eat this one fermented bean that smells terrible. I always cringe when we have it for lunch because the whole cafeteria smells bad. I eat really fast on these days. Luckily, we ate in a side room which didn't smell like smelly fermented bean. We had a big pot on the table with lots of vegetables in it which they turned into soup. I ate a mushroom which was not tasty. I ate some tofu which was. We then went back to town to view the new apartment. Everyone was very impressed by this "luxury" apartment and we walked around oohing and ahhing. After some fruit and tea it was time to go home.

Today I went to lunch with all the English teachers at the school, four of whom I teach with and one who only teachers third grade so I don't know her. We went to a so called "Western" restaurant, which means we got to eat with a fork. I was glad the food was at least a little western since my ability to eat Korean food is rapidly decreasing the more I eat it. These ladies wanted to know about Jordan's cooking skills, and Ms Park told me I should talk lots so they could practice their listening skills. This conversation ended with Ms Park telling the other ladies my life story in Korean. Good times. In all I've decided I like going to Korean parties because I'm not actually expected to be social. I can just sit there and smile.

It's going to be rough next week when I have to go back to teaching and can't sit around knitting hats, making Christmas tree ornaments and going out to lunch. I've scheduled a viewing of "The Grinch" in all 18 of my classes. We'll see how it goes. I might have to switch to Frosty half way through.