Dispatches from Gangneung

Here is another installment in Melissa Steach's adventures as a first-year teacher in Gangneung on the East Coast.  There are so many comments in here that bring me back to my first year in Korea!  Great stuff!

 

Jason

www.asknow.ca

------------------------------------------ So there's this teacher I work with. Nice lady. She's friendly and upbeat. But here's the thing: she smacks. She sits at the desk next to mine and she chews like a cow. She chews her food, then she slurps her coffee, then, without fail, she says "Ahhhh" -- Repeat. Thursday I rode with Lindsey and her family to E-Mart. This is Korea's version of Wal-Mart. I arrived very excited to stock up on body lotion, moisturizer and some new boy shorts. My joy quickly dissipated when I saw the prices. Oh my god! How much for Neutrogena?!?!? You've got to be kidding me! The saleswomen who swarmed around me didn't understand. They pressed every brand of shampoo, lip gloss, vaginal fragrance, you name it as long as there was English writing on the label, in front of me. All at once they pointed, gestured, acted out the reasons why I should buy the product in their hands. I was overwhelmed. I couldn't explain the price issue. They were confused. "Cheap!" they chirped with questioning eyes. Lindsey's daughter Cathy had been assigned the position of Teacher Melissa's translator. At age twelve, her English is decent, but faced with the onslaught of salesmanship and my constant guffaws at the prices I saw... All I could get out of Cathy when I asked her what one of the many women were saying was "shampoo?" Halloween arrived and the children at QES went bananas. I arrived as a pumpkin. Despite the candy, I thought we were off to a healthy start. Each teacher had an assignment. Lindsey put boys in one room and girls in the other. They played Halloween games. Evelyn occupied another group of children in the screening room upstairs. They got their English lesson the old fashioned way: They watched it. Julie monitored the hallways and I painted faces and hands. At first the children all wanted jack-o-lanterns on their hands or cheeks until someone would decide on a ghost, then the next ten kids would all want that. This pattern continued for about two hours until, just when I was gonna hang myself in the hall and really give'm something to scream about, Max asked me for Donald Duck. When I finished he ran into the hallway and excitedly shared his freshly painted hand. The fun began. Like a pop quiz in pictures, each student came in with a new challenge. "Sponge-a Bob-a" asked one. "Colorful cat" said another. "Oni from Star Craft" challenged Jordan. Aw yeah I thought. I got so involved with my new personal competition that I didn't hear the trick or treat begin. Julie had closed the door to my classroom and though some twenty students stood outside knocking and yelling "trick-a or treat-a" for what I was told to be five minutes... I hadn't heard a thing. Finally, one of the two girls watching me paint a blue mouse onto Lucia's hand shook my shoulder. "Teacher. Trick-a treat-a time." The teacher's outing was Saturday. All of us went hiking in Mareung Valley (Utopia Valley). I thought last Saturday's grueling hike at Sorak Mountain was a fluke. I was wrong. I erroneously thought that a hike here is comparable to a hike in LA. You know, Runyan Canyon at the least. Frye Canyon or the Palisades if you're feeling adventurous. Oh no. It is literally a national past-time here. We hiked a total of five hours, passed two Buddhist temples both more than a thousand years old, drank water directly from a mountain stream, rested at three different waterfalls and had lunch atop a rock nestled in the forest next to a prayer sanctum marked by lovingly arranged rock totems. Once we finished our lunch of Kim bap (Korean version of sushi hold the fish, add pork), apples, persimmon, boiled chestnuts, pastries and a thermos of sugared coffee, I excused myself to climb further into the forest. While the others chatted and rested before the trek down I went further into the prayer sanctum to meditate. A prayer I could not have prepared poured forth as affirmations of gratitude. I understood then how communication has absolutely nothing to do with talking. That behavior really says it all and that is what I am truly responsible for. I don't know how long I escaped into this fold before an investigative chipmunk stirred next to me and drew my attention. He wanted to know what I'd brought along with my prayer as an offering. I left him a piece of apple and a halved chestnut before rejoining my group. During one leg of the hike up I'd counted more than five hundred steps. The three different sets of steps (more akin to ladders) we'd endured on the way up the mountain were no less daunting on the way down. My left knee began to pop and just when I thought I'd maybe been too grateful for my healthy body too soon, a patient stretch got me to the mountains base. I arrived invigorated and said another silent prayer: May I please be able to maintain at least half of what I'm learning long enough for it to become part of my being and not just some more esoteric babble because the proof just ain't in the pudding. My plan for Sunday was to sleep all day. Saturday's hike had followed four days of ninety minute yoga classes. I was beat. But by 3 p.m. I couldn't sit around any longer and so decided to take a cab downtown. Fall is my favorite season. I wanted to bundle up and expose my face to the crisp cold air. Lindsey told me that whenever I wanted, I could hop into a cab and simply say "downtown." Getting the cab was easy... however, the cabbie and I spent twenty minutes pulled to the side of the road and while the hazards blinked, we played charades. The cabbie and I threw clues back and forth. Words, gestures, sounds. At one point I found myself hoping on my butt across the backseat, purse in hand, acting out "shopping." I called Lindsey on her cell: no answer. He called dispatch: no luck. Finally after throwing in the towel and reaching into my purse for the won to pay for my time in the cab, dispatch called back and downtown we drove. Though we still didn't understand anything the other said, together we giggled all the way there. I browsed for about an hour. Downtown is a little older than the rest of Gangneung. The streets are narrow and the stores crowded. Music seeps into the streets from every shop mixing with the smells of coffee, pastries, roasting nuts and dried fish (stingray being a local favorite... teeth and all). I hailed a cab home with the confidence of knowing my apartment's street name or at the very least the name of the popular nearby market. After climbing in I started with my address, the engine idled. I tried again with Donghae Market... nothing. I ended with Dunkin' Donuts and off we went. During the drive home this new cabbie taught me to say "dong tek chi." This, he communicated, was the name of my neighborhood. I surmised that he was telling me this because he knew I didn't really want to go to Dunkin' Donuts, but figured as long as I knew this phrase I'd be able to at least get within walking distance of my apartment. We arrived at our destination. Smiling, we exchanged our own particular good byes before I exited and headed home. I fell into bed. Waking up in just enough time this morning, I downloaded pictures from the past couple of weeks before leaving for yoga then work. Saturday's adventure had made my legs tight and even though the instructor kept telling me "good job" in Korean, it sounded like the English word for "crutch." "That's what I'm gonna need when you're done with me," I said under my breath. She caught the look on my face and matched to the tone of my voice, she knew exactly what I'd said. Communication. We laughed and the day was good.