school for boys

This week all of our students are male. This news was greeted with general groaning and trepidation, but overall they've been pretty well behaved; no girls to impress generally seems to balance the kids out. That said, there's been some interesting fiascoes and very quotable moments this week.

As usual, they're fascinated by my piercings. My ability to shove my finger through my earlobe has earned me the nickname "Monster" which I have accepted good-naturedly. The students I've had always remember me, and a few in particular make it a point to wave and yell frantically every time they see me. This has also led to a few good quotes of the week. For example, tonight in passing: "Ohhh, Monster teacher. Holes good. I like your holes." Um.....thanks. Another lad had already heard of my stretched lobes, and so during introductory question time when we usually get asked "where are you from" and "what's your favorite food," he put his hand up and asked "teacher Lauren, can you throw a pencil through your ear?"

Tonight we played a game called Helium Stick, where the entire class has to keep one finger on a long stick, and lower it to the ground without removing their fingers. The combined contact, however, makes it rise instead. They get maddened by it, and I admit, I get a bit gleeful at their frustration. I felt bad tonight, though. One unhappy boy told me, "teacher, this game....it breaks friendships."

By far, though, my favorite student this week has been a precocious kid named Gyung Hoon. He has great English and a mischievous sense of humor. When I jokingly told the students I was 14 years old, he piped up "oohhh, same age as my mother!" Eventually I told them my real age, and later on he patted my shoulder, perfectly deadpan, and said "teacher, you are 30 and I am 15. It will never work between us."

Perhaps the strangest overall occurrence this week, however, was last night. I lucked out and had movie night, so my responsibilities consisted of fetching the students to the concert hall and getting them to sit quietly for the movie. Halfway through, however, they stopped the film because the boys' schoolteachers wanted a word with them. We English teachers vacated the room and went up to the sound booth to see what was happening. Apparently some of them had been rude or disrespectful, so it was punishment time. Now the strange part: the punishment consisted of calling the naughty boys up on stage, and making them bend over in a sort of forward crouch and pretend to be a motorcycle. Then the teacher would yank on their ears. The right ear was the accelerator: when yanked, the student yelled "VROOM VROOM VROOM." Left ear was the horn: the teacher tugged it and the student hollered "BADI BADI BADI!" This was all accompanied by general laughter and applause from the audience.

Sometimes this job is really, really strange. But always entertaining.