Middle School Time Warp

Think back to your former self in grades six, seven, and eight. If I'm guessing correctly (I bet I am), it was probably a strange, strange time to be alive. Of course middle school is weird! You're like, literally growing into yourself, and people are starting to take you a little bit seriously, but you don't really have freedom, dating is suddenly this big confusing focus, the social scene is super touchy and mysterious, you still don't quite know what is going on in the world, and you have a lot of feelings most of the time. Teachers focus a lot on "picking the right paths", and there's this new pressure about "the future" and "going to university."

I mean, I was practically a Hanson brother back then. The word on the street was that I stuffed my bra (lies!) and this photo chronicles the recovery period after THE haircut (you know, the one that was 100% too short and you couldn't style it and your mom cried?).

I think we can all agree that middle school is just a flat out weird time. 

So for me, as a newly 25 year old woman, it's a little weird to be living in such close contact with middle schoolers. A few things happen:

- I'm constantly reminded of all the weird things that happen in middle school that my brain had evidently sealed off
- I feel HUGELY compassionate for my girls, especially when they have major emotional moments and unexpectedly mature existential crises
- I realize that no matter how many affirming/soothing things I tell their stressed hearts and minds, a lot of it might not really ring true for a while (things like: be yourself, it will be okay, this test won't matter in the grand scheme, and this is probably not who you are going to marry)

The thing is, they just need to get a few more years of life under their belts so they can do what I'm doing now, which is look back and laugh and maybe give a sigh of relief that middle school is in the past.

This job certainly stays interesting though! In some ways my position is slack compared to a full blown teaching job. We get to hang out and eat with the kids, our programming is fun, and we don't have to deal with curriculum and planning. On the other hand though, we are dealing with the kids when they are OUT of the classroom, which means that they are probably slightly more relaxed. I have a suspicion that when that 3:55 bell goes off, their best behaviour goes with it.

Anywayyyyyy.
In other news, I turned 25 on 09/09 and it feels great to reach a quarter of a century. I am pretty on board with aging since I feel like I'm becoming more myself all the time. I have a tiny section of grey hairs starting (no joke) and I think they look badass. My birthday was a great day!

The girls decorated the board and sang for me.

This AMAZING thing was given to me by Maggie, my colleague. You just add water and the Jeju moss grows! 

Cutting out the cupcakes for our birthday wall.

I have also been exploring quite a bit so here are some lovely photos:

Two seconds from our campus.

The right side is the middle school and the left is high school

Some fun shells I found at the beach

When you touch the sand here, it never ever leaves you.
 The little shell pieces vacuum seal to your skin and
you find sand in weird places like, a week after you swam

SO gorgeous

SO scary

ONE OF MY GIRLS DREW THIS OMG

Moseulpo, the closest little town to campus. I go there once in a while to mail stuff

Sanbangsan

GOD so beautiful. The gold things are buddhist prayer scrolls

A random historical boat that at one point held Dutch explorers who were captured and kept prisoner on Jeju

Mango shake deliciousness

Being a tourist

I should clearly be on a pamphlet.

I finally tried the McD's here. They even deliver! 

This amazing balcony in our dorms. The girls and I come out here for yoga.

Boy bands are HUGE here. This shopping bag is ON POINT! A post about K pop will be written in time.

Another day, another squid surprise.

OHHHH and our staff page came out! Feel free to creep my colleagues and I. 

The KIS dormies are a great looking crew. I nailed my staff photo, obviously:

Also, zillions of gold stars for sending me mail! I have received some wonderful letters (even one from a long-lost cousin) and it has been lovely.

In case you were desperately searching for my address:

Shila LeBlanc

Korea International School (L214) 34 Global Edu-ro 260beon-gil, 

Daejeong-eup, Seogwipo-si, Jeju-do, 699-931

Sending you love from South Korea! Happy Canadian Thanksgiving! I'd do unspeakable things for a turkey dinner. 

Also, for the record, I was (mostly) an adorable child:

Covers with Ms. Shila

On the weekends we run programs with the kids all day long. Our supervisor suggested that we organize clubs about things we were personally interested in, so naturally I decided to continue my newfound hobby of doing covers of pop songs.

We met on a Saturday afternoon, and in those first 30 minutes of our first session together, this was exactly how I felt:

Here I was, my typical enthusiastic self, and the kids were completely silent. There must have been some kind of mix up... these kids SIGNED UP for this club, so surely they wanted to make music!!! 

I asked if they liked to sing, and they replied that they did not. [false]

I asked if any of them could play instruments, and they replied that they did not. [false] 

I asked if any of them had artists they liked to listen to, and they said no one. [also false]

The attempt to break the ice was unsuccessful, so after a quick run down of some great cover groups, I set them to work to find a song they wanted to cover while I sat in a corner scheming about all the different ways I could disappear into the wallpaper. 

I was sweating.

BUT. 

By the end of that first session, the kids had chosen a song they liked. By the next one, the kids were slowly sorting out the arrangement and it was actually fun. We learned to do beat boxing. When I saw my kids in the hall they'd say hi with a beat box snare sound. We learned how to hear the different parts of a song. We started putting it all together. And slowly but surely, I discovered that these sneaky kids were actually very talented.

As it turns out, Korean kids are simply more concerned with humility than "standing out". The key was to discover their talents in less upfront ways. For example, while peeing, I heard a girl singing beautifully while she washed her hands. I came out of the stall and AHA! SHE WAS IN MY COVERS CLUB. From then on she was put on melody and totally nailed it. Another method was putting the song on REALLY LOUD and asking everyone to just sing with it. Once the shyness factor was mitigated, the kids flourished. And I was discovering all the individual strengths of these dumplings. Which were many!

I felt more and more excited. This was actually a great idea!

Finally, we were ready. We recorded it in only two takes, and for our very first attempt I'm super, super proud of these guys. They chose the song, they figured out the parts and learned them, and even overcame their intense self-consciousness of being recorded. Considering the initial level of reticence, it was a big win. Give it a listen, ideally with headphones since it's a tad on the quiet side.

I'm excited for our next session!!

A Month of Meals

"How is the food?"

I get this question all the time. To be completely honest, there have been some ups and some downs. Since I'm living in the dorms and supervise many meals, I have cafeteria food most of the time. Some days it's really, really delicious. Other days it's can be very sad and confusing.

First, let's get a few things straight:

1. I fully recognize how lucky/privileged I am to have these meals.

2. I genuinely appreciate the efforts of the cafeteria workers who work day in and day out to feed the truckloads of staff and students.

3. My personal ability to cook or bake stuff is a solid 1/10.

4. Thus, having someone cook for me 3 times a day is pretty dreamy.

5. Some of the questionable meals that I will mention are actually really popular with the Korean kids. I'm just... adjusting.

6. I will try anything once and have given just about everything at meal hall a go.

7. LOL the photography of things on a tray. Sorry in advance.

Glad we're all on the same page. 

So a few things I have learned about Korean food so far:

- There is never a meal without kimchi

- Seafood all day everyday

- White rice at every single solitary meal

- Spicy spicy spicy (which I love and Blake hates)

- There is no such thing as too much sauce

- Never judge a meal by appearance. Some of the tastiest things have had the most questionable presentations.

- Chopstick etiquette is mega lax. It's totally fine to stab your food, or take a chopstick in each hand and rip your food apart. The only real no-no (according to my girls) is having a food item in each hand, and eating both items at the same time (which yeah, no kidding that would be pretty rude). 

This was my first meal, which was breakfast. Fish cakes, asian pears, dry French toast (syrup isnt a thing), potatoes, rice, yogurt, cereal.

Here is the high school caf. I actually don't eat here with my kids, but come here on my time off to get some space from the middle school spaces. It's totally gorgeous and the high schoolers are significantly quieter than the middle schoolers.

Top 15 Interesting Meal Moments:

1. This... casserole:

2. This acorn-flavored jelly (dotorimuk):

 3. This soup, which distinctly reminded me of the "hot ham water" incident on Arrested Development:

4. This chewy, strangely-sauced thing (lotus root):

 5. This. The students carefully unroll the dough and wrap up the meat. My chopstick skills, however, were not up to the task so I ended up just ripping it up and mixing it. It's a Chinese dish (ggot bbang):

6. This sad chicken situation:

 7. These creepy shrimp assaulting these perfectly fine veggies:

8. These slippery pieces of fish (tteokbokki):

9. These imposter chicken balls, which I sadly discovered were actually fish balls:

10. These, which I thought were citrus something or other, but were strongly spiced radish:

11. These wrinkly, chewy, dry beans:

 12. These ground-up fish tubes with a texture I regretted discovering (eomuk):

13. These squid flakes:

14. This salad, which in an unexpected turn of events tasted EXACTLY like a gin and tonic:

 15. And last, but certainly not least, my ALL TIME least favorite, LITERALLY entitled "squid surprise." What an unfortunate surprise it is:

 Now for the food winners:

1. This amazing melon thing. It tastes like cantaloupe but is much crunchier:

2. American-style spaghetti with a sweet tomato sauce:

3. Any kind of gimbap which you can get at the deli or any convenience store. It's essentially sushi minus soya sauce (which I miss):

4. Lychee! IT IS SO GOOD! I still havent figured out how to open them without spraying a kid in the eye, but once you open the soft-ish shell you just pop it in your mouth and spit out the pit. MMMMMM

5. Seafood pancakes, which are really growing on me. It is a pancake, yes, but not very sweet, and there are enough things inside that it isn't too weird (pajeon):

6. This perfect pomegranate which I saw a few days ago on the side of the road. Can you imagine?!?! Casual tangerines and pomegranates are growing all over the place. What a dream come true!

7. Kimchi pancakes, which I actually liked:

8. And last but not least, my all time fave to date, bibimbap! IT IS SO DELICIOUS. It's basically rice with veggies, an egg, and sauce. Sometimes there is some random tasteless jelly inside, which is confusing as to why it is there, but whateva. It's SO TASTY!

The wins definitely make up for the losses, and I think there is a chance that I will get more on board with the strange selections as time goes on. Just the other day I actually WANTED kimchi, and wasn't just having it because it's in like everything.

There are also endless delicious things to be had off campus, like:

This perfect sushi

And this perfect birthday brunch

 

And this other brunch Caitlin made out of the goodness of her heart (she has also made delicious things such as Mexican food). Caitlin, feel better soon! 

There was also the time where I ordered an entire chicken by accident. The foreigner struggles are real! It did seem like a steep price, but I had heard SO much about how good the fried chicken is here that I figured it was just the price you have to pay. Twenty minutes later, the lady handed over enough chicken to feed my entire floor. It was in fact delicious, and Blake was in luck that day.

And there is pizza! With CHEESE (a rare ingredient here, sadly).

 In sadder news, the Blake struggles continue.

Seriously, everyone send him a motivational email or two so he eats more.
I'm mostly kidding.
It's just that his lunch trays are so desolate sometimes. This is from a while ago but the other day was the very same scene.

Don't worry though. It all works out because he goes down the road and eats an entire pizza in 20 minutes. 

I'm excited to see what other interesting foods will be tried before I finish this gig.

More about my life outside of meals later. Sending you love from Korea!!

Shila