Drift Reality > South Korea > Teaching English 3

My growing fear/dislike of my Expressways 2 class was probably the means by which I came to know the other foreign teachers at my Hawkwan.

At the front of the teacher's office, Justin, Robin, and Greg sat in close proximity to one another. I was seated facing them and I began to develop a distanced fondness for their antics.

Robin would consistently come to my Hawkwan wearing blue jeans, black chucks, and an assortment of punk rock t-shirts. He was lean back in his chair, facing the teacher's room and keep a rolling commentary as the various teachers entered the room.

Greg was seated two tables down from Robin, directly next to Jane, a vaguely unattractive Korean teacher who spoke in a rough staccato. The two of them would relentlessly hound Jane as she walked into the teacher's room every day. Robin would say in his sweetest voice, "Hi Jane, how are you doing today?" To which she would respond my shooting him a dirty look.

She would place her books down at her desk and immediately, Greg would begin hounding her.

"Jane?" He would ask in a tender voice. "Why don't you ever talk to me?" Feigned dejection would gradually begin evident in his voice as he would ask, "Jane? Why are you ignoring me? Jane?"

Jane would brusquely huff and turn to him and ask, "what?" Her Korean-English would begin with a high pitch and quickly drop in intonation, so that it sounded more like "Waa - uhhht?"

At this point, Robin's New Zealand accented voice would begin beckoning to Jane: "Jane, will you go out with me? Jane?"
Greg, who would be staring at Jane's behind at this point, would slowly pan his gaze upwards and tenderly say, "Jane, I just want to be friends."

Usually by this point, Jane would stomp off towards the bookshelf and Robin and Greg would enjoy a rude cackling laugh together. It was all quite amusing.

Rob, who was seated directly behind me, and Justin, who was seated in front of me would occasionally throw in a crude comment or two. For some reason, they were not overly receptive to my attempts to make friends with them during those first few weeks and it took some prodding on my part to get them to say anything.

When they did talk, all they seemed to do was insist on how bad the conditions were at my Hawkwan, and how much they hated teaching their classes. I avoided buying into their pessimism for as long as I possibly could, a span of about two weeks, but eventually I began to crack as a result of the traumatizing experience that my Expressways class had become.

It was a little difficult for the Korean teachers to empathize with me, seeing as how they managed to somehow keep absolute control over their classes with the greatest of ease, so I inevitably turned towards the dark side of the force.

After our morning classes, Jake and I would sometimes have a cigarette on the back stoop of the school before we headed to the PC-Bang. On the Friday after I had arrived in Seoul, we were standing outside discussing what possible measures I could take to try and gain back at least a small measure of authority in my class. Jake had been telling me how earlier that day, he had taken one unruly student's bag, and hurled it into the hallway. I was a bit shocked to hear this coming from Jake, especially considering he seemed like such a gentle, passive guy.

At that point, Greg and Justin walked outside and joined us.
"I was just telling Jake how one of my classes is an absolute nightmare," I told them as Justin lit his cigarette. "How do you guys deal with difficult students?" I asked.

Greg turned his eyes skyward as he pondered the question for several moments before responding, "What was the student doing?"
"Well, it's pretty much the whole class." I said, and then quickly added, "There is this one student in particular who just doesn't do a thing except talk to the other kids during the class."

"Have you sent him to the corner?" Greg asked.

"Yeah, he just keeps talking."

Justin, who I had heard say about three words since my arrival in Korea, interjected at this point.

"I carry a marker around and hit the kids on the head with it."
I looked at him, a bit shocked. "You hit kids on the head with a marker?"

Greg seemed to find my reaction amusing and said, "We can get away with a lot more over here than back West."

"I can't believe you hit a kid on the head with a marker!"

Jake chimed in at this point, explaining, "That isn't nearly as bad as what their Grammar school teachers do to them, or what their parents do to them." He began to shake his head nervously as he continued, "Sometimes I get kids coming into class with black and blue bruises all over their arms and legs."

"Sometimes on their face," Justin added.

"It is just a different standard of punishment over here," Greg said and for the first time, I noticed a weary, drained look in his eyes. "The kids are used to a lot more than what we expect."

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