So this will be pretty random again, as I’ve only got about 20 minutes before class starts again.

In one class yesterday, a class I like a lot, one boy was being a jerk, when I remembered a method used by my elementary teachers for such students. I put “Spot of Shame” on the chalkboard, drew a circle and filled it in heavily with more chalk, and then had him stand with his nose in it.

It worked really well.

In a later class, also one of my favorite boy classes, one student joked with me about the “magic stick” from last week, and I was in a very good mood. Another student asked me where my green tape was. A different student told him he’d seen it in my kabang (bag). Then I realized they were talking about the duct tape. Seems the threat of duct tape has spread between the classrooms.

So I decided a few weeks ago that I would write the rules of my class on the board every day. It’s the third week now, and I am asking THEM to tell ME what the rules are. Sounds simple, right? One would think. Only this time, my good boys were being real jerks and just blowing me off as I stood up there. Finally, I threatened them with a writing assignment.

Of course they didn’t cooperate, (what the hell was Mr. Lee doing?) so I left the classroom, got some ESL reading material, and returned. I asked for total silence while I dictated, and told them that if they were talking during the dictation, that they would get dictation again the following week. Of course, they couldn’t stop talking, so we now have dictation for four weeks. I stopped at the desk of one boy who was smirking about this and continuing to joke around with his friend, only to notice he hadn’t written much of what I’d said, but had instead written many smutty words. (the “f” word, the “c” word, sexy, body parts, etc.) I ordered him to wait in the hallway until class was finished.

After class, he returned and was getting high fives like he was a hero or something, so I marched him down to his home room teacher’s office and presented THE EVIDENCE to him. With an English speaking translator, the horror of what the boy had done became evident. The boy offered up his friend as being equally complicit in the crime (some character/ great friend, huh?) and meanwhile (typical) all the teachers were at a loss for what to do about it (because THEY don’t want to punish anyone).

So I turned to the boy and lectured him how it was NOT OK to disrespect me like that, and then sensing that I wasn’t really going to get anything more than “this is really bad” verbal support from the Korean teachers, I got in the boys’ face and told him that next week, HE was in charge of the entire class being silent. And if he wasn’t, then I was going to go to his home and visit his parents.

The boy looked like he was going to cry. We’ll see how this plays out next week…

…until my contract here is finished…

34 minutes until class 1-1 starts again.

I never got the list of Korean students parent phone numbers as promised.
I never got an answer from the home room teacher whether he would assign my essay.
I sent a request to be translated through Y, but since I am blissfully free of her domination, I have also lost her translation services. So that’s just great. I’m even MORE powerless and LESS credible with that class than I was before.

Today’s class 1-6 went well. The new female teacher observed so she knew what to expect. Not only did she observe. but she jumped in to assist during conversation time. I had some nice conversations with the boys about the topic of the day, which was technology…

Class 1-7 was an entirely different story. Mr. Lee just stood back and watched, as always. I had to pause the class about twelve times until I was given respect. He’s just standing right next to boys that are wrestling in front of him and here I am thirty feet away and I have to stop everything and go break it up. Later, boys are singing and talking again right in front of him and he’s just standing there. This time I put him on the spot and said, “Mr. Lee. Could you please help me out here?” I think I sounded pretty disgusted, but who the hell knows. I thought I sounded irritated when I told Y things like, “are you my mother or my friend?” So I’ve no faith in how I am read any more. Maybe it just doesn’t matter to anyone what any individual thinks in this group culture.

So yeah, I’m counting the days. I can’t afford to leave Korea for several years. But I can leave this damned school as soon as my contract ends. I really enjoy teaching small groups, so maybe that will change my outlook. For now, I’ll just tread water. But March 1st is an awfully long ways away.

I have spent the last year exposing myself to benefit society.
Like Mr. S., I can say I cared about society but society doesn’t care about me.

I think I am finished.

I can not continue to sit with adoptees and bond through tears.
I can not continue to try and introduce any new ways of thought to people with ears in their fingers.
I can not continue to give and give and give to people who don’t want it.

I must do something that gives back to me.
I must protect some small place for myself.

I no longer care to help Korea.

I am going to do what I have to do and leave at the earliest opportunity.
I refuse to cry about any of this mess ever again.

I now have zero interest in learning Korean.
I am now only in Korea to capitalize on my English skills.

As soon as my bills are paid and my son graduates, I am searching for a new home.

Today I taught 1-3, my second worst class.

No matter what I say or how temporarily effective my my classroom management is, two minutes later the infants are back to their old tricks. The stupid boys three feet away talk amongst themselves, as if I am invisible, as if I can’t see and hear what they are doing. Today I asked them point blank, “how stupid do you think I am? Actually, YOU’RE stupid to think I can’t see and hear you when you’re three feet away.”

One boy just never took a break from his conversation all class, and as I was beginning to talk about the value of the listening exercise, I remembered how an elementary teacher once taped a boy’s mouth shut in class. I told the students about this and told them I would do this to the next one that was DISRESPECTFUL and spoke while the speaker was talking. Of course, not two minutes later I had to follow up on this threat. I marched out of class, went to the office, and asked for tape. I came back with a fat roll of masking tape and had the boy stand up and I taped his mouth shut. I continued talking about the pacing of subtitles in English movies and watched in horror as the boy pulled the tape off of his mouth. So I sent him to the back of the room and told him I would have him come to my desk after class. I had two other students join him.

Instead, I took their student numbers and told them I would call their parents.

After class, I went back to the office and traded up for duct tape…

I went to lunch and showed my duct tape to the other teachers. Y got very concerned and looked like I’d threatened to rape the boys. She told me I can not tape the boys mouths. I told her no. I AM going to use the tape. We use this method in America and it works very well. All of the teachers got very concerned and acted like I had suggested stripping the boys naked and taking photographs of them. I was told to please beat them instead. I was told that taping the boys mouths would cause many problems. I was told the parents would complain to the principal. So what? Let them complain. It’s not our culture they tried to convince me.

LOOK. Nothing you Korean teachers do for discipline works. Your beating doesn’t work. Your threats are empty. You have rules and don’t enforce them consistently. All the students know they will get a second chance, so none of the rules have any power. The students rule you.

There was silence. I was encouraged to hit the students again, but please please please don’t use the tape. I told them I can’t hit the students – it is unethical. I was told I CAN hit the students. I told them that a foreigner is not protected from lawsuit and we can not hit the students. And we do not want to hit the students because it is abuse. They think tape over the mouth is abuse.

I tell them that maybe tape is what is needed. Using shame in a shame culture seems like the most effective method of all. It seems I have hit upon the ultimate shame.

I don’t know what the rest of the year will bring. I am sick of this place. I am sick of these people. They can’t solve any problems because they all live in fear.

Today I asked Seven Star if boys cried all the time when he was growing up. He was initially confused. Then I explained how strange it was for me to see the boys crying at the drop of a hat here in Korea.

He said there is an expression, “A man can only cry three times in his life: when he is born, when his child is born, and when his father dies.”

I figured as much. I am some strange sort of feminist: I want women’s rights, but I celebrate the differences. I want everyone to be able to express themselves. But for God’s sake. Why does being sensitive to others have to mean being a total wuss? (and they’re not sensitive to others) Be a man. Women have to be men all the time. We have to shoulder the weight and responsibility of the world. And you don’t see US crying all the time. We DO WHAT THE FUCK WE HAVE TO DO.

Part of the non-coital pillow talk, as I was trying to sleep with one eye open and every fiber of my being tense, came this question,

“Do you know the REAL story of Clementine?”

“Wha?”

“You know, that children’s song. Oh my darling, oh my darling, oh my dar-ling Clementine…”

“Yeah. What about it?”

So the “REAL” Story of Clementine is she is a fisherman’s daughter. The wife passes away, and the father treats the daughter like his wife. The daughter loves the father like a husband. A terrible storm hits the fishing village, and the whole village blames the calamity on their incest. The daughter commits suicide – and – heartsick, the father follows suit.

I tell her that it’s a CHILDREN’S STORY for God’s sake and no, I have never heard that. I thought the father was a miner. There was no mention of incest…a CHILDREN’S STORY. Not a horror story. I tell her it must be some Korean story, not an American story. She swears up and down it is the REAL story of Clementine.

I google it. Nope. Just as I remembered. The father is a miner. from the ’49 goldrush. His daughter is an ungainly behemoth that only a father could love willowy and beautiful. He can’t even afford to buy her shoes. She looks natural and beautiful in her bare feet. She dies and the father is sad.

Where the hell did this “REAL” story come from? Every day it seems I hear some such thing. How preposterous it is when Koreans tell Americans the REAL American story, like they know it better than we do…

On the way home today, I passed a little girl skipping, her mother following behind. She was singing Clementine in Korean. I wonder to myself if she is singing the “REAL” story, or the one handed down to me by my Florida cracker white mother. How surreal it is to hear the lovely sing-song voice of a beautiful Korean child singing an American folk song in Korean. How surreal it is I don’t know what she is saying.

I wonder if the little girl will grow up thinking American natural disasters are a result of incest. Little girl, YOU have your mom. No natural disasters occurred to my home town, despite my abuse. Just skip while you still can, and sing out loud without reservation.

The makkoli is especially good tonight. It is payday, and the weather is nice. Summer is over and with it, its oppressive humidity. I found a free internet connection at the GS25, and I’m playing Wilco’s More than the Moon, and remembering a brief minute when I was in love with a boy. A boy who wouldn’t follow me.