A Few Photos of my Kids

Photo 1: My boys!  This photo shows each of their personalities so perfectly.  Steve is acting like a superhero/ comic book character (he's the one in the middle doing Spiderman hands).  Ryan has me in his gun sight, despite the fact that I've told him a million times there are no guns in Miss Kelsey's class.  Junsung (the one standing up) is about to do something stupid that will cause others bodily harm, in a misguided attempt to be cool (he kicked into the air right after this and barely missed Steve's head).  Thomas is observing everyone, and doing something that looks somewhat like a video camera (which I could totally see him doing in the future).  And Andrew is quietly watching the action from the background, making a peace sign with his fingers.

Photo 2: Three of my girls.  Cindy is in the background without a smile on her face, which is somewhat odd.  She's very quiet and VERY smart, but she's also usually a pretty happy kid.  Cherry is in the middle with the huge grin, which is typical of her.  She is always so enthusiastic and energetic.  

Side note: Good story about Cherry-- Young and I were taking a video of them once while I taught them about bears, and when Young was watching the video later she noticed that Junsung, who sits next to Cherry on the carpet, had been flailing and inadvertently punched Cherry in the face.  She sits there for about a minute quietly, holding her eye in obvious pain.  Junsung, of course, does not care or notice that he just punched someone.  Little bastard.  Anyway, after a minute, I ask a question, and Cherry's hand immediately shoots from her eye into the air and when I call on her she gets really excited to answer and grins really widely.  Never even touched her eye again.  She's a trooper.

Back to the photo, on the left is Sally, the spinner.  I called all three of their names twice to get their attention so I could take the photo.  Sally had to be called six times.  Finally, I decided to just take the photo while she wasn't looking, and at the last second she looked up to ask me a question.  She's such a space cadet.

Photo 3: Jully.  During play time (when I took the photos) Jully had work she wanted to finish, so she was at the table.  Most beautiful child ever.  The photo is, unfortunately, a bit grainy.  Take my word for it though.

Photo 4: Steve!  This kid took two pictures with me, the first of which included him with karate chop hands in front of his face.  I literally had to pull his arm down to get his face in this shot.  He cracks me up.

Who has two thumbs, brown hair, and a probably sinus infection? This guy!

Yeah, I'm sick for the first since I got here, and in all honesty it's not that bad. It's looking like it's probably a sinus infection, and my voice is completely trashed. As Sally put it today, "Miss Kelsey sounds like a monster!" Thanks, Sally. It's sweet of you to say. Except that I kind of love that about kids, the way they don't know what they are and aren't supposed to say, so they actually tell the truth. At least I don't feel that bad. I know that, working with children, this will be far from the last time I get sick while doing this job.  The worst part of it this time is that tomorrow all the teachers are going up to Seoul for the night, and we rented a house so that we'll have some place to crash after partying all night. I will probably barely be able to talk and, as drinking would be a horrible idea, I'm going to monitor myself pretty heavily. Lame.

Today I took a bunch of pictures of my kindergarten boys (because they stay later Tuesday through Friday for another lesson, so it was just them and me) and one or two of my kindergarten girls, so I'll post those soon. In Korea, people do not care as much about you taking pictures of their children. On the subway last weekend there was this really cute boy, and I subtly tried to take a picture of him in his dad's arms, without letting his dad know what I was doing. I was thinking that since in the US you do NOT take pictures of people's children, I probably shouldn't here either. But the dad saw me pointing the camera, and rather than get angry, he changed his body angle so I could get a better shot of his son. It was kind of weird. Anyway, so I'll post those soon, but I'm at work so I can't right now. I'll post some pictures from the Han river, which we did this weekend.

Basically, the Han river tour is like the Circle Line in New York, one in Seoul. I took some pictures of stuff off the side of the boat, but then I met this small Korean boy who fell in love with me and, in spite of the fact that he spoke no English and neither did his mom, he ended up playing with me for about half the trip. He even stole my camera for a bit and ran around taking photos of the boat, and of me.  He was adorable.  I would guestimate his age at around four.

Today was an activity day at school, and it was multi-cultural day. I ran the Mexico room, as I speak the language and know a fair amount about the culture. It was really fun, and the kids had a good time, which was the point. We played a Mexican card game, listened to Mexican music, learned a few phrases in Spanish, and ate chips and salsa. Most of the kids were too nervous to try the salsa, no matter how many times I told them it was tasty and not too spicy.  They eat spicier things here all the time.

In fact, I eat spicy-ish food now, and I actually enjoy it, which is entirely new. I have always hated anything with even a little bit of spice, but now I really like some stuff, especially Tak Gkalbi, which is nothing like pork or beef Gkalbi. With Tak (which means chicken, as opposed to Duk which means rice cake) they throw a tons of greens like cabbage and these weird leaves, in with some chicken, potatoes, rice cakes, onions, and spicy sauce, and they sautee the whole thing together. Afterward  they put cheese on top and it melts.  It's seriously delicious, even if it leaves my mouth feeling like I've been making out with a jalapeno. By the end my lips, throat, and mouth are on fire and my nose is running. Sometimes my eyes tear up a bit. It's really not that spicy for most people, but it's taking some getting used to for me. I have a feeling it will be one of my favorite meals by the end of my time here. It's already up near the top of the list.

I read an article the other day that actually talked about some of the effects of the spicy diet they eat here, and one of the interesting consequences is that the top two kinds of cancer for Koreans is throat and stomach cancer, from the acidity, spice, and saltiness of the food.  Even children here regularly consume large amounts of very spicy food, and those children will continue to eat the same dishes throughout their life.  I’m not exactly worried about getting cancer from eating the food, but it’s an interesting look at how culture and lifestyle can change so much about us physically.