It was Friday, July 19. The last class was finished and five weary foreign teachers made their way to their apartments to collapse in relief. The semester was over!
The next morning blurry eyes stared in annoyance at the ceiling. It was 5am and I was wide awake. Cursed sleep schedule! Pulling myself out of bed, I made my way outside and started walking towards the track. Might as well get a mile or two in. Seeing that the cafe was lit up, I made a mental note to show up to breakfast.
Got to breakfast and walked inside. The place was deserted except for three very American men. The Americans were here! The staff for summer camp had arrived. Five teachers, four leaders, and two assistants (though one was Chinese, not American) had come ready to teach English to elementary kids in promotion of our school.
Spending the weekend with them was a breathe of fresh air and I felt new life flowing into my veins. However, it was a mixed blessing as I listened to them talk about being on vacation for the last month or so. American schools have more than twice as much time off as Korean schools in a year. So this was slightly maddening. It was worth it though to be with our new friends.
Our schedule was easy once we got past the first and second day. Staff worship at 7:30am, classes, lunch, classes, recreation, supper, the morning and evening assemblies, and family time. Our staff meeting was at 9pm and on a good day we were done around 9:45pm. On the longer days, it was after 10:30pm.
I cut the morning walks out of my routine quickly. Was getting plenty of exercise at the assemblies and recreation alone, not to mention all the other stunts I was doing to keep my kids interested in class. Was also getting good food. The cafe prepared as much American foods as they knew how. French toast for breakfast, pizza buns for lunch, and breads at supper. Was heaven I assure you.
We taught classes in rotation. My first class was "election" and I figured I would start the morning off right by making sure it was done in the gym or eleswhere in a way to that used up my kids' energy. Then I had story time and man was that fun to do. Then it was workbooks. We covered summer themes for games and vocabulary, wrote essays, kept a journal, learned famous American cities, and memorized US states and capitols. After lunch, my kids had had gone to the store and picked up sugar. So now I was striving to drain their energy and keep their attention both. We did A&P involving lots of paper, tape, yarn, and other artsy stuff. The 5th and final class was in the Kitchen and ranged from paper items to food items. Then I chased them to recreation to drain more energy from them. If I was lucky, during out family time that was 8pm to 9pm, they would be tired enough to stay in their seats while we did last minute essays or worked on their skit for Talent Show.
Tens days later it was graduation. We performed for Talent Show. I gave the kids diplomas and awards. Then with gleeful giggling I sang, "I'm gonna sleep sleep sleep, I'm gonna dream dream dream. I'm gonna sleep. I'm gonna dream. Praise the Lord! When those blankets are open wide, I'm gonna dance on inside. I'm gonna sleep. I'm gonna dream. Praise the Lord!" The principal took us all to Pizza Hut the Saturday night before. Now we went to a Mexican place downtown, went shopping, hit Readers Coffee (cafe), and ended at the Noraebang. Sang to our hearts content. We even dragged Geoffrey's family with us.
Then I came back and slept.
My two weeks of summer break has started... and yes, I will be spending half of break in the classroom preparing for next semester. Praise God for down time :D
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