Monday, June 29, 2009

beard-off

in constant search of things to entertain ourselves, the lion’s share of the male teachers at my school have started a beard-off. a beard-off is when all participants grow their beards out, with the goal to be the last person to shave it off. usually a few drop early, complaining about how itchy it is. this is especially so here and now due to the heat and humidity. so far we are seven days in and all are still on board, but we shall see. the deciding factor may be an external one. it is understood that korean women generally do not like beards, and some of the teachers wish to avoid anything that my have an adverse effect on their social lives.

speaking of ways to entertain one’s self, fourth of july approaches. this is a holiday that will obviously not be observed here but by us few foreigners, and even amongst us there is only about half americans, and amongst them only about half are here without some anti american baggage. so the remaining celebrators are truly a small number. fortunately, explosives need only one hand and a lighter to do their magic.

at the end of this month I will be going to japan for vacation. the korean department of education just through us a curve ball by announcing that any teacher that goes abroad must be quarantined for a week before reentering the class. apparently they are still very concerned about swine flu, despite it’s dwindling impact. we’re not sure if this will really be enforced because if it is, the school lose half of its teachers for a week. we shall see.

2 comments:

  1. My favorite 4th of July was spent on the night train from Moscow to St. Petersburg. We regaled the other passengers with loud renditions of the theme from Team America.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm sure that made you man new friends. We have worked out a cultural exchange where the American teachers will celebrate Canada Day (Wednesday) by being generally inoffensive save for a constant stream of snarky anti-American comments. In trade, the Canadian teachers will have to be completely offensive and blow lots of stuff up on Independence Day.

    Freedom isn't free.

    ReplyDelete