an expat for one month already

Time is flying! I feel like there's a lot that I've been meaning to write about but haven't had a chance yet.

Our shipment of "household goods and unaccompanied baggage" finally arrived last week, which means I have my bike again, yey! And I've already found the best route for commuting to school. I should say that William actually found the best route using Google Earth. Maps seem to be nonexistent here (along with road names a lot of the time).

William's route takes me around the edges of the city then on smaller country roads, but on my ride home yesterday I rode through the city so I could take some photos. This first one is a main intersection near Shinhan Middle School, where I'm teaching. I took a few "this is the city" pictures, then I rode through Tongbok Market, which is a big outdoor market near the train station. Some of it doesn't really look like it's outside because there's a thin covering overhead, but there are no doors to get in, its all open to the street. It's a cool atmosphere! It was crowded with people selling their items, whether food (lots of raw seafood), clothing, household items, toys, etc. and with people like me walking around, looking, or buying. There's a photo of a pile of raw squid in the Picasa web albums if you're interested in being at least mildly grossed out :)

I wasn't the only one riding through the market on my bike. I thought this older guy in suit and hat looked cool on his bike. I like my racing bike, but this guy's bike is what everyone has here....an old metal bike with a chain guard to keep the grease off of pants/skirts (that would be nice), with big shiny fenders, and sitting completely upright. I've even seen people my grandparents age (70's-80's) riding around town. Slowly yes, but still riding.

As for school, it's going okay I guess. I will say I have far more respect now for some of my former teachers, who I thought had to be the worst teachers ever at the time. Teaching is hard and I don't think I'm very good at it. It doesn't help that I have somewhere near 40 students for every class and I only see each student once a week. I don't know a single student's name after a month of teaching. And with so many in a class, I have some who can say next to nothing in English and others that can hold mini-conversations with me if they stick around long enough after class. It makes it difficult to come up with a lesson plan that hits both ends of the spectrum. Either one half is completely lost or the other half is completely bored out of their minds. I'm going to start playing games to hopefully get them motivated to speak more English. Whether they learn anything, we'll see. I think I might be learning more than they are.