A Zombie with a Lesson Plan

It’s Thursday- one more day teaching and the weekend will have finally arrived. It’s Thursday and I’ve already worked over 40 hours this week. The other foreigners are breezing through another week; coming to Swaton an hour later than me and leaving two hours earlier. I know this will eventually be my fortunate fate. For now, I’m completely consumed (mind, body and South Korean soul) in teaching. I wake up and I’ve come to expect the jammed streets, a million tongues speaking above my head, the fearless grey and blue birds, taxis whizzing by (possibly drunk if it’s the afternoon), the street venders (I can’t buy from them with my limited Korean), but the smells carry me through these tiny alleys of commerce and into my school on the sixth floor of a conglomerate complex. I’m no longer disbelieving this reality. Still, while I’m now footed, this job has taken the tourist out of me. For once in my life, I need a weekend- and I earned it. I need the time and freedom to explore. I need to drift and enjoy these fifty-degree pre-Spring days. My camera needs natural light to convince myself and all of you of this crazy life. I get to school at 9am and never leave before 8pm. Korea comes and goes and I have neither the time nor view to witness it. This will change; I’m reassured of this every time I see a co-worker gleefully exit school well before me. Each day I can see the preparation getting less. I know how to deal with new students, where to find syllabuses, what vocab quizzes to give, where to find the flash cards and how to project confidence onto others. I’m nearing the end of my second week and I was warned this job takes a month to adjust to. I apologize for not writing more, not relating more. It eats at me every minute but I’m a zombie with swollen ankles by the time I get home. That and I still don’t have my cpu hooked up. This life doesn’t truly set in for me until I’ve documented it and shared it with all of you. I need this weekend. It will be a rare moment to stop this dream, sift through the images and maybe, just maybe, make some sense of it all.