english activity contest.

this weekend was a short one for me - i worked on saturday... something i swear to never do again. a day or two after the call from GIMFL (the boarding school) i got another call from the board of education. "can you work on november fourth? we need someone to judge the english speaking contest," said the lady. "november fourth... november fourth...?? what day of the week is that?" i replied. "it's saturday morning." my immediate reply was "i don't work on saturdays" then she more or less begged me, as if my saying no would jeopardize the entire affair, and there wouldn't be a contest! so i asked how much it paid. $30. how long would it take? 2-3 hours. where was it? Seomyeon elementary school. "well, i guess a couple of hours won't kill me, okay, i'll do it." BIG mistake. i should've said no. no way. or as they say in korea ANIO.

a day and a half before the "english activity contest" i got an official document at my school (from the board of education) outlining the details of who, what, where...etc... as it turned out, the even was taking place in Jangyu... the same city as the boarding school i had been to. as far as i knew transportation was NOT included and since it cost me like 13,000 won there and another 13,000 back the last time i went, well, let's just say i was not interested in paying that myself (the boarding school paid for it). especially if the job was only paying me 30,000 all tolled.

after hours of trying to explain that i wouldn't do it unless they paid for my transportation - they agreed to pay me an extra 15,000 for a taxi home and that jay would drive me there in the morning. this was all right with me... i was just disappointed that this woman had lied to me about the location - telling me it was in gimhae when it wasn't... i'm slowly learning that koreans like to pretend that they have a culture built on mutual respect but they'll do or say anything to a foreigner just to get them to agree. needless to say if this woman ever asks me for anything again i am going to say no. i don't appreciate being lied to.

anyway, the competition itself also lasted longer than the 2-3 hours she told me, i was there from 9 am to 1:30 pm and last time i checked that's four and a half hours - on a saturday!!! argh. i was also told they would provide lunch, and there was nothing... more lies... anyway, there were a bunch of other foreign teachers there, so i saw some of my friends, and actually ended up getting a lift back to gimhae with scott - the other canadian epik teacher here in gimhae. so i didn't have to pay for the taxi after all....

i was judging the grade four students on their spoken english. they would come into the room and sit at a desk about two feet in front of me. there were two korean teachers who were also judging - one on my left and one on my right. the one on the left would start with 'beginner' questions "how are you? what is your name?" then the one on the left would ask 'intermediate' questions, "tell me about your family" and then i would ask the 'advanced' questions, "what do you do after school? tell me about your hobbies, and would you like to travel? where? why?". then the kids would have to choose one of three pictures and talk about it.

we did this with over forty kids. the winner was miles ahead of the rest and actually got 100/100 from the other two teachers. she got the highest grade i gave 93/100. her english was better than any of my middle school students and she's three years younger than them!

anyway, lessons learned - 1. do not work on saturday (unless they're paying too much to say no) 2. don't trust mrs park at the board of education. 3. beware the korean who is too eager to please you.