Moments for Rejoicing

As concluded in an earlier post, the joys in my life do outnumber the moans and groans; hence, as a counterpoint to my previous moanings and groanings I shall now recount some of my celebration moments of the fall:

1.    The antibiotics worked!  I have felt so much better in the last ten days than I have felt in at least six weeks.  Add to this glorious condition of general health the fact that mucous no longer secretes unexpectedly and perniciously from sundry facial orifices on random days and you may more fully appreciate my jubilation.

2.    One morning in early December, I decided to brave the cold and walk to work.  Certainly an auspicious influence for my rationale did include the realization that the temperature had risen several degrees to achieve a position closer to "freezing".  Upon entering the street that morning, even noting a smattering of flakes moseying in a generally downward direction did not deter me.  About a block away, I thought saw a flash, and to confirm my thought, a few moments later I heard the distinct rumble of thunder.  Soon my walking commute became enveloped in a thunder and lightning snow storm.  After a particularly clamorous clap of thunder, the snowflakes pushed themselves as close to a pelting velocity as flake structures can muster.  Having retrieved my umbrella from my backpack, I was actually feeling rather giggly--such joyful wonder at this unexpected juncture of events.  At the traffic light I met up with a soldier decked out in winter PT gear who was whooping and hollering in glorious disbelief.  He escorted me to the gate in gleeful good cheer, and this walk to school has since become one of my most favorites during my time in Seoul. 

3.    I really enjoy my students this year.  They are lively, fun, and generally self-motivated to learn.  They make me laugh.

4.    I like teaching English Language Arts.  With all these years of teaching collecting behind me now, I realize more fully that English Language Arts really is my favorite subject to teach.  I am in the right place.

5.    My colleagues in the English Language Arts Department this year are all good teachers dedicated to both students and their subject—not always a given any more these days.  Our conversations teach me and entertain me.

6.    Being under the weather, so to speak, for goodly chunks of time this fall has reintroduced me to the enormity of what I can watch via the television screen, Netflix, and my own private collection.  For the first time in Korea, I watched two of my best-loved movies—My Brilliant Career and Out of Africa—in close succession and wandered through the first two seasons of Downton Abbey.  Each fully transported me into its world.

7.    Over the Thanksgiving break, I journeyed to southwestern Korea to the city of Gyeongju, where the ancient Silla Kingdom placed its capital.  In the Korean Culture and Language Course I took my first autumn in Korea, the professor claimed that this city was the one we most needed to visit during our time in Korea.  I finally made it, and the experience created some distinct visual memories.

Tumuli--burial mounds.

Bulguksa Temple, first constructed in the sixth century.

Truly I am very blessed.

Some Moaning and Groaning

Although overall life remains good—even very good—perchance this fall will rank as my roughest one in Seoul.  Hence, I shall now whine:

1.   It’s COLD!  And way earlier than in my previous three years in residence in Seoul.  In fact, snow has fallen on multiple days this past week.  Despite not being particularly measurable, temperatures preclude the possibility of precipitation arrayed in anything besides white.  And the dreaded truth of wintertime in Seoul contains the reality that once the temperatures plunge, they prevail, pretty much entrenched within the weather patterns until late in February.  Seoul just does not participate in any kind of thaw once the first serious cold arrives until the planet finally revolves its way through the winter season.

2.   Seoul American Middle School will receive its accreditation visit in February of this year.  Such visits tend to generate a flurry of time-sucking activities to showcase all the wonders the visited school has established within its auspices so that a visiting team can see in two and half days what teachers do in an entire school year and what a school, as a whole, develops over a period of years.  Add to that the fact that this fall Seoul American Middle School received national recognition for being a Blue Ribbon School, and perhaps you can imagine the elevated frenzy and stress accompanying the original “dog and pony show” endeavors so that this visiting team is also cognizant of why such a status was warranted.  I am very weary of all the stuff to do that really has little impact on improving teaching and learning in a classroom.

3.   One weekend early in October, a germ established what has become a long-term habitation inside me.  Blasting headaches, congestion, aching teeth, conjunctivitis, a string of canker sores along the left side of my tongue, mucus—all have presented themselves at least once this fall.  Did I mention mucus?!  Yeah, well, my body has produced unthinkable quantities of it in the last eight weeks, and I think it may have oozed through pretty much every facial orifice at some point.  So, the germ vs. me routine unfolded this way:  I would rest up for a couple of days, and the symptoms would abate.  As soon as I added any physical activity—I forsook any thought of running sometime in the middle of November—or otherwise exerted myself, though, symptoms reappeared.  Last week when I awoke with my right eye stuck shut, seeming to threaten a SECOND bout of conjunctivitis, I sought medical attention, the first time I have ever had to do this in Seoul.  Forthwith I made an appointment with an international clinic recommended to me by my friend Pam, and Dr. Kim—a physician trained in the USA who set up a practice in Seoul geared for expats and foreign workers—diagnosed me with a bacterial sinus infection.  He prescribed a ten-day course of antibiotics and a decongestant. 

4.   My digestive system seems to balk when antibiotics enter its domain.  My last course of serious antibiotics occurred after my surgery for appendicitis over five years ago, and I fully recall the digestive tract shudder.  I have been on antibiotics for two days now and the rumblings abdominal are truly phenomenal!

5.   May car emits a funny sound when I turn sharply to the right.  SIGH.

6.   And alas, I remind you that it’s COLD here!  Way too cold for the likes of me.  More and more I am convinced that I may actually be a tropical girl merely in the guise of one with northern European ancestry.

Meanwhile, having purged myself of the perversity in my life—and I certainly realize how inconsequential it all is in the scheme of things—let me confess that the list of joys in my life this autumn outnumbers my moans and groans.  Stay tuned.