Me

Today is Good Sounding day and I feel lucky. Nothing exciting ever happens on the 27th of November but it is something I have always looked forward to. Good Sounding day is my own personal holiday to celebrate me.

Of course, most people feel this way about their birthdays but birthdays come with baggage. Unlike my aniversário, I do not expect anyone to remember that today is special. I do not feel any older and I will not receive a hallmark card.

What l plan on doing is snuggling under some warm blankets and then taking an extra long shower. I will also drink a lot of coffee and eat a particularly large portion of cheese. I will moisturize my feet and then put on clean socks...if I can find clean socks. I will do regular things with care.

I've posted some pictures of good things for you on my good day. Hope you have a good weekend. Goodbye.

Breaking Rules

I have a class every wednesdays that mostly consists of little girls. A couple of months ago, one of these girls asked me to draw a puppy in her notebook. I didn’t see the harm in it, so I made her a puppy. The little girl carefully colored it in and then put it away. The following wednesday, the same little girl and two other girls asked me to draw them kittens. I am not really suppose to draw in class but I did it anyways. In order to redeem myself as a teacher, I told them they had to participate in class to receive any more pictures. I felt pretty good about my compromise with the kids.

I am beginning to see that there are problems with this deal. The number of little girls wanting pictures has multiplied and now some of the little boys are wanting pictures too. During my class, I am probably popping out a new picture every two minutes. In addition, I have noticed that these children are bringing markers and crayons to class in order to tailor their critters. I have turned english class into art class.

Even though I am aware that I am doing something wrong, a part of me enjoys it anyways. When I was a little girl, I always wanted someone to draw me a picture. I took great pride in cutting those pictures out and laminating them into toys. Now I am the adult drawing critters for little girls.

Eventually my ‘art’ class will come to an end. These children will level up and new ones will level in. So for now I think I will continue to humor these children with dogs, kittens and birds while they try to speak english. That isn't so bad is it?

Things I learned today:

Rabbit ~ 토끼

Hop~ 깡충

Horse~ 말

Today's lesson

Someone once told me that I would learn something new everyday. I used to dedicate a couple of minutes every night to acknowledge these daily finding but eventually I quit. Somewhere in between being too busy and not caring, I stopped recognizing my baby steps. Instead, I started noticing the big steps everyone else seemed to be taking. All of my peers were getting their masters, getting married or 'getting' pregnant. I was saddened by my lack of direction. So, in an effort to change and to pay off my loans, I moved to Korea.

Korea is different than Canada in almost every way. While living abroad, I've learned that you cannot expect the ordinary to be anything but unordinary. Consequently, I have found myself immersed in daily lessons and my life has turned into a succession of foreigner baby steps. Culture shock forced me to take one day at a time and I have gratefully (not gracefully) accepted this challenge. In an effort to be humble and to trust that things will work out in time, I've temporarily slowed down. Perhaps this year I will learn how to properly use a semicolon or maybe I will become flexible enough to touch my toes! Or maybe, just maybe, I will stop trying to control everything and I will learn to be content with the way things are.

This blog has been designed to share with those I love, the lessons I am learning on my great adventure. I hope you enjoy my medley of thoughts and that some of you find comfort in my awkward journey to understand myself. What did you learn today?

다이아나