I’ll do misc. quotes first, then do my Taemin section. I write these down in my lesson planner at work, so I can have them forever.

Random Quotes:

Me: what job do you want, when you grow up?

4th grade girl: me! me!

me: yes, yu-rim?

yu-rim: i want to become a zoo mother and have rabbits and penguins and unicorns and dolphins and puppies and jebras(zebras lol) and mountain lions and ducks and more rabbits and kittens and a big pink pony with rainbow colored hair and i want all the kids to play there and we will have justin bieber.

me: ah…right.

yu-rim: it’s my dream.

***

nick: teacherrrrrr

me: ‘sup nick

nick: i have a secret question

me: what is it?

nick: teacherrrr, it is secreeeeeeeet!!

me:….

***

charles: teacher teacher teacher teacher teacher

me: what do you want, chuck?

charles: teacher teacher teeeeeeeeaaaaacccchheerrrrrrrrrr teacher

me: What?!

charles: i love this word.

Taemin quotes:

taemin: teacher, what is cheongmunhakja?

me: astronomer

taemin: i want to be an…an astronomer of panties.

me:…you’re 9.

***

taemin: teacherrrrrrr, you’re so hot.

me: excuse me?

taemin: you’re so hot teacher!!!

me: that’s…you’re 9.

taemin: age and weather, not same?

me: …I look hot. because it’s hot outside. and I’m sweating.

taemin: yes teacher! I said that!

***

taemin: it’s raining men!

me: where did you learn that?

taemin: hallelujah!

me: no seriously (진짜) where did you learn that?

taemin: my mother play song late night.

me: ? late night?

taemin: as I go sleeping, she play it.

***

taemin: why we do song, teacher?! song hates me.

me: you hate singing?

taemin: no! this song will kill me! so song hates me!

BUT KOREA IS AWESOME, and I got TWO pair of new glasses to replace them for only about 170 dollars. I got a pair of black ones that are super simple and utilitarian, and a pair of awesome red gucci ones. The high-quality thin lenses for my -4.25 eyes were 60 dollars. $60. Glasses are so inexpensive. THis is all without eye insurance, by the way. One of my pairs of glasses, had I gotten basic lenses, would have been 30 dollars. As it was, they were 70. The other pair was 120.

Korea is awesome sometimes. I didn’t know anything about buying glasses, but necessity is the mother of invention. I took Amanda with me so I wouldn’t buy some ugly hot pink ones, but basically I just looked it up on Dave’s and read that there was a one-day turnover and kinda just went. I had an eye exam, cause it’s free, and my prescription was the same. This bodes well for my lasik lol.

Anyway, cheap glasses make up for the despair I felt this morning when I saw that my glasses were broken in half at the nose. I was not looking forward to only contacts or the Harry Potter pre-oculus reparo look. So even though I wasn’t sure how it worked, I just DID it, and it was super easy and fast. Picking my new glasses up at 3 tomorrow. Yay!

Happy mother’s day to my mommy.

Um, I walked to school in radioactive rain, dude. But seriously, thanks for the warning.

I will teach your children with 6 eyes and they (and you) better like it!

But today was a special occasion, indeed. The season opener of Korean baseball season. Carly and I became big fans of Korean baseball, and when the season ended in September, it was a sad day indeed (also SK won! Gross)

But baseball is back!

A Korean pop group, called Secret, opened with the first pitch for the Doosan Bears, but that wasn’t enough to save them from LG (my team.) We crushed, natch.

In other good news, spring has come, which, if it continues, means I can re-start my hiking career. Also excited to see more games this year, and start doing outside stuff like last summer again. Honestly the winter really sucks here.

To some people, this might not be a big deal. Carly and I know our Big Bang fangirlism is a little bit crazy. Gina laughed and said “I wanna know what you guys would do if you couldn’t get the CD the minute it comes out?” because honestly, the week counting down to their new CD, the media blitz and the general inundation of our lives with Big Bang here there and everywhere was RIDICULOUS. And looming over it all was the possibility that I would have come here, lived in Korea, lived right near SEOUL, and never gotten to see my favorite KPop band. It seemed a tragic fate, and yet I was resigned to it.Carly, who shares the poster collecting, the midnight release buying, the general obsessive following of the talented Big Bang, seemed also resigned.

About a week and a half ago, an amazing opportunity just fell into our lap. Carly’s coworker had two extra tickets to see Big Bang. Offered them to her. It was…destiny.

I know I came to Korea for life-changing growth and language improvement and all of that. BUt a little part of me came here just because of some of the random cultural things I loved– Big Bang was a big (haha) part of sucking me into Korean culture during college, of making me as interested as I was. I know other people like Korean music here in Korea too. Gina is starting to get into it (She loves DBSK, and SHINee) and Sanford is more of a long term goal…But Carly and I…we’re the sort of people who will pay 200 dollars a piece to go and see our favorite band perform without hesitation, because we know this is our one chance.

I’m leaving in 3 months. I saw my favorite band perform live. They were amazing. My birthday tickets were originally supposed to be for February 26. One month late, but I’m as happy as can be.

Videos tomorrow when the internet improves.

Love, Maia

I imagine not seeing my 6th graders ever again after June, and it makes me SO SAD.

I’ll miss them.

I miss America too. But I get America for the rest of my life. Korea is only possible RIGHT NOW, at this time in my life.

Should I stay? I wish I could just stay until December. Go home for Xmas and never come back, start grad school in February (spring term). The rest of me wants to go home in July, have a job by September, apply to grad school by January. What should I do?