"Well at least you've been almost as bad about updating as I have about checking for updates."

-Mark

Well Mark was right, I’ve been terrible about updating this. This is because there isn’t really an opportunity to at work, and I’m there all damned day, and when I get home I just want to sit and not think and sometimes drink.

So Mark also asked,  "Settled into the job a bit better or still about the same?" And the short answer is I’m readjusting to hating my job? No, not really. Every Sunday, try though I might, I start feeling extremely stressed out and anxious. Monday mornings on my way to work it gets worse. I get through Elmo classes, it’s not as bad as the crippling anxiety of course, but I can’t even feel relief because I go straight into elementary classes, with just a slight break for lunch. Despite it all, the anxiety and stress doesn’t really go away until Thursday night.

 Eric is still a major issue, whereas Ian isn’t because thank God, he’s out of school for February. Maybe as part of the Lunar New Year holiday which was today, Monday, but we are blessed with Tuesday and Wednesday off as well. So I’m still stuck with the worst problem student, but it’s a bit less hectic because Ian isn’t occasionally throwing his own pint-sized monkey wrenches and whining into the mix. The other 2 kids, Allen & Jayden? Those 2 are fucking angels.

Part of this is undoubtedly because I absolutely and positively started bribing the little demi-monsters with lollipops. For the first week, it was for everyone who did their work and behaved. Now I’m starting to tell them that either everyone gets them because everyone in class did what they were supposed to, OR no one does because not everyone was behaving/working/what have you. I know that singling out kids (Eric) who are chronically misbehaving isn’t what you should do, but when it gives me a minute of some semblance of order, I couldn’t care less. Also? Glorified babysitters don’t have a responsibility to care that much. And as I’ve said, my job title notwithstanding, that is my actual job.

Adjustments all around too, because last week Jayden and Allen were excited to show me their new pencils, or something, and when Allen & Eric got into a fight and Eric supposedly head-butted Allen in the face (not enough to cause screaming, crying, bruising, marks or bleeding), Allen came to get me to fix the situation. So if nothing else, I’m seen as the disciplinarian! Which fits, since someone who’s been teaching in Korea for almost 10 years told me that Korean kids in general encounter very little of that. Particularly boys.

Outside of the kids, work isn’t my favorite place to be because I have no friends at work. Kiara and Sara answer any questions I have, but they converse together and ignore me the rest of the time. I’d prefer to have a friendlier work environment, but, well, there isn’t one! Lol. The Korean teachers are fine. What’s funny is, Kiara went through exactly this, none of the foreign teachers liking her before. Now she’s acting that out with me. But neither Kiara nor Sara offer the kind of company I’d miss anyway. For example, Kiara, “I-came-to-Korea-to-see-God-in-a-different-way,” enjoys philosophizing, and I get to witness it without having to worry about being dragged into the devastating wasteland of her lagging intellect through participation. Like when she wanted to ask Sara, who’s Muslim, if she feels weird about everyone at the school talking about Jesus loving them since she’s not Christian. If everyone around her were talking about some Muslim saint loving her, she’d feel that of course that saint and God doesn’t love her or care about her because she believes in Jesus. So she’d feel bad.

How bad does it feel to know that Kiara thinks Jesus doesn’t love you because you use the Arabic word for dad instead of Hebrew or English?

Beyond all of that, I’m at work a fuck of a lot. Aside from meaning I don’t have the time for keeping you knuckleheads updated in a timely, reasonable fashion, I also have less inclination to spend the 3-4 hours before bedtime working out. Suffice it to say that is a whole other issue. I’ve started doing shorter HIIT workouts. No more than around 10-15 minutes, though there’s usually a 10 minute cool down as well. I am currently getting those workouts in about 3 times a week, sometimes 4. There’s a gym with weight equipment kind of around the corner from me called the Personal Trainer Gym. I’d look to go there to join once I ACTUALLY have money again, but then wonder about how I’ll get myself to go there given my lack of desire to spend the precious minutes I’m not at work working out.