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Week 38- Y3(Nov 25th to Dec 1st) |
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Sunday:A lazy morning at Jason's place, complete with turkeysandwiches, leftover mashed potatoes and pie, plus badtelevision. I headed to the bus station around 4, andthis time the traffic was absolutely insane-- the tripis supposed to take about 4 hours. This time it took6 and a half hours! That's like the length of time ittakes to fly to Bangkok! I thought I was gonna die. Ihave the worst luck with traffic and vehicles. And Ihate hate hate this country for traffic and baddriving skills right now! |
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Monday:Good god I am swamped with homework to mark . . .someone remind why is it that I like this job so much? Anyway, as I was marking the Seoul first yearhomework, I was horrified to realize that almost everystudent had given me the same answers-- and all ofthem were wrong. You'd think if they were going tocopy off of one person, they'd at least choose thesmart one . . . so now I have to decide what to doabout this. If it were a Canadian school, I'd justmake them all keep the crappy mark, but I actuallyhave to give a certain percent of students an A grade.Only about 10% of students can receive a D or lower. Judging from this assignment, it looks like I'm goingto have to be very creative with my marking thissemester . . . |
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Tuesday:I got a really cool email from my friend and formerStarbucks co-worker Bryant-- he's quit Starbucks andhe's going to be in the Philippines from December toMarch! Sweet! I now have a travellingpartner/contact in the Philippines! |
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Wednesday:So I ended up deciding to give the Seoul first yearstudents another chance-- I told them that they coulddo their homework over again (alone), but they onlyhad 24 hours to do it, and I wouldn't accept any latepapers. So now, stupid me, I'm stuck with 40 extrapapers to mark!In other news, Chang Hyun called me last week to offerme a gig with him and Kenji at a pretty well-knownclub in Gangnam. Of course I was excited about it, asit's always a pleasure to play with Kenji and ChangHyun, but my health isn't quite up to par yet, so Iwas a little worried as well. Anyway, it turns outthat I can't do the gig at all-- because of my stupidvisa! I'm pretty pissed about it. Blue Moon is toowell known, and it would be too obvious-- foreignershave been fined for playing there in the past. I'm sofrustrated with this ridiculous law! On top of that,there's been a lot of media recently about immigrationchanging the laws of visa renewal-- apparently theywant every renewal applicant to go back to their homecountry to renew their visas . . . every time. Dothey realize how ridiculously expensive andtime-wasting that this is? And what's the point? Howis this supposed to curb "foreigner criminal activity"(especially seeing as foreigner criminal activity ispractically non-existent, particulary among Englishteachers)? Sometimes this country is so entirelybackwards in their processes that it makes me crazy! |
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Friday:I was adjudicating recitals tonight, and one of mystudents sang the most stunningly perfect ballad; andat that moment it occurred to me that I'm going to beincredibly sad when this class graduates. As much asthey drive me crazy sometimes, they are the firststudents I've taught through the whole 2 years, andthere are a few of them that I'm really attached to. It'll be really hard to see them go. |
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Saturday:Tonight the dance studio had their regular Saturdaynight party at a new wine bar. (This is where Andyand I will be performing the first week of January). The bar is owned by Helen's best friend, and he'strying to promote it as a wine/salsa club, and theremay be some potential for me to do jazz gigs hereeventually. It was really fun-- Andy and I tore upthe floor a little bit, and we got a lot of goodattention. Helen says that everytime a beginner seesus dance together, they want to take private lessonsand work harder! It's kind of nice to have some fans. . .After the wine bar party, I met up with Nate inGangnam. We had been invited to a club opening by theowner, who heard Bamboo Wife at Freebird and wanted tobook us for gigs. But the guy never got back to uswith directions, so we found the cheapest bar inGangnam (ie the most expensive neighbourhood in Seoul)and had a few drinks before calling it a night. |
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