Thursday, March 5, 2009

It's Raining, It's Pouring

What a day. I woke up at 8 and said to myself, "AUGH! I am sick of waking up at 8!" and gave myself firm instructions to go back to sleep. Unfortunately the night before I had not given myself firm instructions to set my alarm, so at 10:02 this morning I gasped, realizing my hair looked something like Frankenstein's bride's, and I had 18 minutes to shower, dress, and walk to work.

I made it in 16.

Unfortunately when I got to school, the rush I had felt to get ready did not fade away and there was this panic feeling to most of what I did. In my first class I didn't even get to the book. We walked around asking for water (please!), tissues (please!), and to use the bathroom (please!). Out of a crowd I could probably pick out six of the sixteen (improvement!), and sometimes I get their names right. "Sa-Sea-DANIEL!!!!"

I almost ate lunch in silence, despite going with someone, out of a sincere need to recuperate. It's well past my last class, but my ears are still ringing from all of the shouting we all did. I think, though, that shouting is fun, and if they start shouting in English, well, that's not too bad. Their accents are really very good. They can all say "f" and "th" quite well, so the building blocks are solid. Now if Annie would stop saying she's a boy.

In the afternoon, I started with a class that has gone from three to seven to nine. The two girls who shared Aidan's class got bumped way up because a class of two is just too small for how much they pay; I tried to incorporate them into a class of kids who have at least six months' experience on top of them, and I think it overwhelmed poor little Julie. She sat there crying with her pencil case spilled across the floor, big alligator tears falling down her cute little cheeks, and her pigtails shaking with each heart-achey sob. Oh, dear one, please don't cry; I know how the story turns out, and you'll be okay~

The one-on-one student I was teaching, the one who made me nervous, has left ECC. Possibly because my coworker brought an article on prostitution to discuss during their class period. Last week had been such an improvement that I'm actually a little disappointed. Not disappointed that I got to leave work at 4:30, though. And just when I thought I was back from "infatuated crush land," Prince Albert appeared with an umbrella to save the day.

It's been a long time since I looked this forward to a Soju Friday, let me tell you.

2 comments:

Tamara said...

Soju Friday....I'm jealous! :)

Tracy Paige said...

You know I want your early korean fridays and keep my later american mondays. I think that'd be a perfect combo. But I guess I shouldn't complain since my typical work week is only 4 days long anyway. But I cram a whole lot of stuff into those for days that I need three day weekends to recouperate.