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Monday:
I officially hate grading. It feels like it's never
ending . . . on top of that, I'm running out of easy
charts to give my jazz choirs (it's hard when you've
got 5 choirs each doing 4 different songs, and you
have limited repertoire available), so I'm rapidly
trying to pump out new charts, and have them copied so
that they're legible before my Wednesday choirs.
Work, work, work, work.
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Wednesday:
I was pleasantly surprised today when my Seoul
students actually surprised me with a cake and snacks
for Teacher's Day (actually I wasn't quite surprised--
I accidentally walked out of the classroom to get some
water while they were putting the candles on the
cake-- oops!). And this time, they actually
remembered plates, cups and chopsticks. Nice! Of
course, this made me even more disappointed when the
next choir, comprised of all 1st year students totally
crushed my spirit today with crappy attendance and
lack of preparation. Guess I can't have it all . . .
It was pouring rain today, which meant a whole lot of
foot pain for me, which meant a rough salsa class. I
wonder if my foot is going to hurt during the rain
forever?
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Thurdsday:
It's the annual 2 day PaekChe festival, which means no
classes, and a big outdoor party with boothes from all
of the departments and non-stop performances all day.
And of course, I'm pretty much obligated to attend,
because the students like to see my face outside of
class sometimes. I hung out with Ben and Jae for most
of the afternoon, drinking beer and having students
drag us all over to get us to spend our money on
games, snacks, whatever. When they left, I hung out
with Yoon, the only other vocal teacher that I like,
and the only one who speaks English really well. We
had this one funny little student hanging off of us
the whole day-- Hyun Ji is this tiny little girl who
looks like she's about 12 years old, but is feistier
than any other kid I've ever met (in fact she even got
in a fight at the festival because someone made fun of
her appearance!) What's unusual about her is that she
actually looks quite masculine and seems to be openly
gay. Now, Korea as a society is extremely homophobic,
so I really really admire her courage in being so
straight-up, kind of a "This is who I am, so if you've
got a problem with me, deal with it" attitude.
Koreans tend to be very conformist-- dressing the
same, sounding the same, acting the same-everything's
about the group mentality. And for me, a Canadian,
everything's all about individuality; so when I try to
get creativity from my students, it can be really
trying. So when I see someone like Hyun Ji, who is
really outside the norm and not scared to be there,
I've got to give her major props for that.
Aside from all the fun and laughs for the day, I also
received some incredibly sad news that is still
boggling my mind-- last year, there was a vocal
teacher named Ji Yeon, who was really sweet and
friendly to me. She left to study her bachelor's
degree in Holland last September. Today, I learned
that she had secretly been battling severe depression,
and 2 weeks ago she took her own life. When I think
of what a great girl she was, and how lonely she must
have been . . . Korea does have a shockingly high
suicide rate, but the fact that it was someone I knew
and liked . . . it's devastating.
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