The First Day

Wow! The first day of my teaching career in Busan, South Korea was great! The staff is superb! Everyone wanted to help me out, I met the English department, I have my own desk, my own laptop to use at school and the school is very big! 800 students big. The Vice Principal and the Principal were pleasant to talk to and the English Senior teacher is wonderful! Quite helpful and the Korean co-teacher has been resourceful and helpful throughout this transition stage.


The day started with a staff meeting for all of the school teachers and administrators. I gave a short speech about myself as an introduction (it was translated in Korean as well by my co-teacher). I was quite nervous and sweating a lot by this time. When everyone gave a round of applause it made me feel comfortable even though I am the only foreign teacher at the school of like 50 staff members. Since this is an "All Girls School" there aren't too many male teachers to begin with. Fortunately, there is an English male teacher (Sam) in the English department, who kindly introduced himself and made me feel part of the school community. Well, my speech was quite simple, I talked about where I came from, why I wanted to come to Busan, and what made me inspire to become a teacher.

The students are about to begin their final exams in few days so I don't have any formal lessons to teach this week. However, I did observe 5 classes and the students had many questions to ask! Some of the questions include: my height, my shoe size, my hobby, favourite Korean food, favourite colour, favourite K-Pop singer/group, favourite K-Pop song, how many siblings I had (and if they were older or younger), if I had a girlfriend, if I knew how to draw, if I knew how to sing, if I knew how to play the piano, and my blood type. There might be more questions that were asked but these were the usual ones I got.

Some of the statements I got are more flattering and some are over the top: I'm so tall, I look great, I look smart, I am a good drawer, my voice is hot like Justin Bieber and my favourite remark is the one where I look like Jacob from Twilight! Then they promptly asked if I had a six-pack like Jacob. I just laughed it off and said, "no, no six-pack but I do have a shape... circle!" They started to giggle away and it was quite a hilarious moment.

Oh, outside my office, there was a huge commotion during the transition of classes because the students really wanted to meet the new foreign English teacher. Many of the students were shy and curious but said, "hi" or "hello" whenever they could. They seem to love Justin Bieber, Super Junior and Big Bang a lot. I felt like a celebrity with the attention I was getting. I hope it doesn't continue for the whole year because it would become a distraction to the other teachers, the students and myself. I am sure it'll wear down as the days go by. I was able to eat a Korean lunch and the dessert was great! Ice cream filling inside a bun? I never knew that was even possible but it was delicious. Well, now my co-Korean teacher is going to help me with some grocery shopping and some items for the room (such as an adapter, iron, bed covers, etc). I'll keep you posted but I am so happy to be here now!