Happiness

Ahh, I bet you thought I'd forgotten Happiness. No, I was saving it for today.

Last week was my very first week as a teacher. It was hard, stressful, difficult to control the kids, and more often than not, I felt like I was drowning. Although there was that wonderful moment where I taught my kids to read.

Over the weekend, I talked a lot with my co-teacher, Brandi, and she gave me a lot of pointers and advice that made more sense to me after my first week than it did before my first week. (And I thank her for taking to time to tell me everything all over again.)

So after talking about it, she and Yong Suk took me out for my very first 'Saturday Night' in Korea. And oh was it awesome. I won't elaborate too much because some of you might be appalled at how much I was able to drink over 9 hours and still come home sober. But I will say that we hit seven different places and ate and drank ourselves silly at each. I bought my first headband, I had my first soju mixed with strawberry (kind of like daquiri mix but with soju instead of the alcohol that would normally go in a daquiri, and also served in those cute little cups), I visited my first Noreabang (nora-bong), which is like karaoke, only way better because it's just you and your friends singing karaoke in a room without a bunch of strangers watching and possibly booing, and I went to my first foreigner bar. Sadly, there are no pictures of Bubble Bar or German Bar. I'll do better next time, I promise.

After such a great night, and after taking the time to absorb everything on Sunday, I returned to work yesterday with a new goal: making the kids think I have confidence in my teaching ability. Apparently, I pulled it off. I was very strict and didn't take any crap from any of them. And today was no different. In fact, the 7 kids in my 'worst' class behaved like angels. It was amazing.

I came home so happy (yet tired) that I decided to take myself out. I stopped at a beauty shop and even got some 'service-uh' ('service' translates to free stuff for foreigners, and usually only foreigners. The 'uh' on the end is because every syllable in Korean languate has a consonant and a vowel, so if it ends in a silent letter, like 'e', they add an 'uh' onto the end... mainly foreigners get service because they want us to come back. We may not know what the name of the shop is, but we know we like it there because they give us free stuff. I guess.. something like that. Yong Suk always complains because he never gets service unless he's with Brandi. haha) Then I wandered to the end of that street and saw Chosan University, which I learned is a private university. About a mile down the road is Chonnan University, which is a national university. Very cool, and I'm close to both of them! On the way, I bought another headband! I eyed it Saturday night, but thought maybe it was too much for my first one. I couldn't shake it from my head, so I bought it tonight. Isn't it lovely?

And then I wandered past the Chicken On a Stick man and bought another one of his delectable creations of, well, chicken on a stick. I would say I walked home in the heavenly aura that surrounded me once I left Chicken On a Stick man, but I kept walking (because I wanted to walk more, and I was hungry) past my apartment and went right over to Paris Baguettes where I stumbled upon a wonderful display of peanut butter and strawberry jam right above some bread. So I bought one of each and then walked home in a heavenly aura.

And to me, that is happiness.

On the other side of the world, a tow truck is picking up my car that I've voluntarily repossessed because I plan on being here so long that it won't matter. But I don't care. Bad things can and do happen, some because of your own fault and others because that's just how life goes, but happiness is knowing that you are still you, you will always be you, and you've got peanut butter, jelly and a loaf of bread in your hand, chicken in your stomach, 2-minute downloaded episodes of NCIS at home, and you couldn't care less about your credit because you're finally living your dream of living in a foreign country and you're not sleeping.



I made it. And I couldn't be happier.