New Years Eve in Seoul was great. There was a big party downtown, from what I’ve heard it’s like Times Square. Instead of spending my last bits of 2009 in the freezing cold surrounded by drunk people with fireworks, I went to Itaewon instead. I spent the first half in a gay bar with a few friends because Daniel was in church. Grace came as well, and it actually took her close to an hour to realize that we were in a gay bar haha. After she realized she commented that it wasn’t fair that there were so many men there, and all of them were gay.The drinks were a little expensive, but whatever, it's New Years, right? Plus we could sit down which was a real plus seeing as how I was wearing 3-inch heels.

After hitting The Hill, Grace and I got coffee and met up with Daniel and his friends at The Loft. It was still Ladies Night, so we got to drink for free, and the music was good. Poor Grace though, she’s a really shy girl, and all these foreign guys kept hitting on her really aggressively. I told her to just pretend like she didn’t speak English, and one guy even told her that it was okay, and that he didn’t care! The bar was really fun though, I was wearing a great top that I normally can't get away with in Korea (because showing off your cleavage and shoulders are a bit of a faux pas here). Grace and I wound up going out in the freezing cold at 3am to get food, luckily all the little shops were open and we went to the closest one just to get out of the cold. We wound up staying until Grace could take the subway home, a little after 5:30am, and Daniel and I left finally around 6:15am. By the time we got home and went to bed, I could actually see the sun coming up.

I went to Costco right before NYE, let me tell you how much going to Costco sucks when you don’t have a car! Well first off, the place was extremely crowded, even for a Tuesday morning. I accidentally walked off with some old guys cart! I was hoping to get new bed sheets, which Rhea told me she found there for really cheap, but I didn’t see them anywhere. They did have blankets though, so I got one for Daniel because he was complaining that my apartment was too cold (I think it’s just fine!). I also picked up bacon, pasta, Alfredo and Marinara sauce, cheese, and a few other things. I found out when I got to the cashier that they only accept a certain type of credit card, which of course I didn’t have because I’m not Korean. Then they told me I couldn’t buy one of those huge reusable Costco bags, So I had to put everything in a cardboard box. When I went to take it out of the cart to go to the subway, it was ridiculously heavy! Needless to say there was no way I was going to make it to the subway, so I wound up taking a taxi.

We got our first big snow of the year, which also happened to be the heaviest snow in 71 years! It started early Monday, sometime after I went to bed. By the time I left for work there was already a few inches on the ground. After I left my apartment with my hat and scarf, I learned that it if perfectly acceptable in Korean culture to go out in the snow with an umbrella, duly noted for next time. There were a few places where I stepped and the snow came up past my boots! None of us were looking forward to going back to class, and luckily only a few kids actually made it in. I only have four of my twelve students, and one of them didn’t even make it in until close to 11am.By the end of the night, there was more than 11 inches of snow.

The afternoon classes were cancelled, and were all classes on Tuesday. But at the last moment they sprung these stupid Annual Evaluations on us. For each kid we have to fill out a five page form comments on their Social, Emotional, Physical, Intellectual, and language Development. And then for each section we had to hand write comments for them. So I have 12 kids, with 5 comments for each kid, that’s 60 comments! And the typed draft was due by Tuesday morning, with the completed forms due by Friday. It was a load of crap, there’s no way they should have expected us to do all that work during our break time. Because I’m sure not doing that after work. And the worst part is, I can’t even be honest, I have to fluff it up for the parents and make it sound like their kid is doing great, even when they’re not. For the most part in my class, the girls are all really smart and they always participate in class, but the boys never do. So it’s not like I can make them learn.

The kids had placement tests too on Friday. Both my class and Megan’s class had the same test, even though Megan’s class has been here for almost a year, and my class has only been here for 3 months (with half of them only being here for less than 2 months). So off course when you look at the scores, my class looked terrible. Hopefully it doesn’t reflect badly on them. I got a new supervisor, and I think she’s trying to give my class more class work than they can handle. Having 12 kids in class is really hard to control, and I have to make sure that every kids write down every single answer, so I spend more time checking their pages then actually teaching them. Plus, the work is hard, and my smart girls get it, but the boys don’t, they just write down what I tell them too, and unfortunately I don’t have time to go over it with them and make sure they understand. It’s a crappy situation.