Episode 40: In Which DFM Decides To Play A Fun Game Called "Police School"

I had a bit of a scare today.  The Phys Ed teacher was a bit later than usual and so I thought I was going to have to entertain seven PE classes with nothing but my handstand walking.  Come to think of it, it'd probably work, but I was glad anyways when Woojin finally sowed up.

The goal of the activity today was to work on balance by walking on the foam path.  One person from each line would walk towards the other and then a game of kawi-bawi-bo (this translates directly into "scissors-rock-paper") would take place to see who got to move on first.

Some of the boys take their kawi-bawi-bo very seriously.

This girl was supposed to be doing a "Superman" with her arms out in front of her, perpendicular to the floor, but the excitement of being in DFM's class was just too much.  Poor thing, her face will probably be stuck like that forever now.

Some of my readers have been having Louis withdrawal.  Don't worry, he's still there.  This picture is a bit overexposed, but readers shouldn't have too much difficulty finding the school clown.  He got placed in the corner about three times this class; that's an improvement!

In Special Art class, the children continued their exploration of British culture by colouring the Rose of England.  This just goes to show you how stuck up England is.  There are four countries in Great Britain, each with their own National Flower, yet which one do you think gets sent out to Korea for "purposes of make propaganda?"  Regardless, I thought this was a well coloured picture, so I included it here.

I've also started to step up my teaching a bit.  I'm speaking to the children with more full sentences, and I'm making them say and do more.  I asked one girl what the name of the flower was and she said she didn't know.  I told her, "yes you do," and she then got the right answer.  DFM - 1, English - 0.

If you've seen Kindergarten Cop thirty times or more like I have, then you know that the most important lesson to teach kindergarten students is how to "stand at attention."

This girl doesn't quite have have the ferocity I'm looking for just yet, but we'll keep working on it.  I wish I had brought my police whistle with me...

After work I had to go meet my boss, and it turns out his office is right next to the Traditional Folk Village of Namsan Park.  I had tried to visit this place on my last trip to Namsan Tower, when I got lost andwalked up the stairs to the top again before I knew where I was.

Inside the large traditional home from the earlier picture were a number of scenes of traditional Korean living.  I think the first picture is a kitchen, and the second picture is of some sort of living room with these examples of traditional Korean clothing on display.

This is a device for grinding and mashing up grain.  The grain goes in a whole in the ground, and then the operator(s) work the Y-shaped yoke with his/her/their feet to raise and lower the smashing weight that comes down on top of the grain each time the operator(s) step(s) off the yoke.

Many traditional Korean games were outside as well.  This woman couldn't speak any English, but she's the only person I saw get her arrow into the narrow jar 2.5 meters away.  Ironically, of all the people in this picture, the one non-honkey in the pink shirt is the only person who spoke any English (and he just barely spoke it at that).

This is the traditional Korean silk garment known as hanbok.  It's really colourful and really expensive.  This woman was part of a professional photo shoot, but I managed to sneak myself in and take a freebie.

And another freebie of this guy too.  This man was posing for a picture from his friend, while wearing this traditional back pack (more of a back basket really).  He saw me coming, but I pretended to be looking at something else, and then... *click!*  Another unsuspecting victim has his soul stolen.

I've alluded to the horrible wheel chairs in Korea before, I think, but here's a picture of what passes for a wheel chair store in Korea.  Korea is advanced in many ways, but definitely not in its attitudes towards people with disabilities.  You can find better wheel chairs than this in a Ralph Klein era Alberta Hospital.  "Wow... hamazing!"