I'll Just Bee on My Way

26. Mixed American living in Incheon, South Korea- here's to year six! International elementary school teacher. Likes baking, eating, studying languages (Korean, Mandarin and German atm), and sitting on the floor in front of the fan. Feel free to address me in English or Korean!

[pattybees]

Chuseok complete!

I’m so~ glad my school decided to give us today (Monday) off as well as the actual red days for Chuseok, because I am not ready to be back at work quite yet!

Thursday was spent loafing around the homes of myself and my friend that lives a few floors down. Nothing special—just chilling out and doing a little bit of lesson planning because I always feel like I should get even a little bit done during vacations.

Friday morning, Moon and I woke up at the ass crack of dawn to go and pick up his brother and parents so we could go to his grandma’s house for 제사 Jesa (just look it up if you don’t know what it is because I’m not very good at explaining it. It entails setting up a big table full of food for past ancestors to enjoy as part of a ritual to show respect). After jesa we had breakfast and just chilled around and chatted. Since it was my first time at Chuseok with Moon, and my first time meeting some of the family members on his dad’s side, it was a little stressful but not as much as I had anticipated.

After getting through breakfast and all the chitchat, it was time to go to Taen for the third time in two months to see Moon’s other grandma. We all piled into the car (sans Moon’s brother, who had to work), and the GPS took us down a winding course that avoided the main highways at all costs and just took us down smaller national highways and the occasional country road. The going was pretty clear, but it still took us five hours to get there.

Since I’ve been to this grandma’s house multiple times before and met a lot of Moon’s family many times before, it was a lot more chill. Two of Moon’s cousins were at the house, and I let them play some Mario Kart on my Switch, and we went out for a drive to a nearby harbor to see the full moon on Friday.

Saturday was just a day of killing time. Moon and I took his cousins into one of the nearby city for a few hours so none of us would die of boredom sitting at home with the older people. When we got back to the house, we grilled up some meat and had a mini feast as always seems to happen when we go to visit this grandma! Around 9 or so, Moon and I went to bed because the plan was to leave grandma’s house at 1am to beat all the traffic back. We actually ended up getting woken up around 2, left the house by 2:30, got home by 4:30, and then crashed.

Aaaand finally, Sunday! After going on a much needed grocery shopping trip, Moon and I went to Seokmodo, where I had my first hot spring experience @_____@ The water was really nice, and I think we’ll have to go back again sometime! From there, we found a good local restaurant for dinner, then came home for beer and a movie. Awesome date day~

Tomorrow is back to reality... anyway, happy Chuseok, y’all :B

[pattybees]

The Best Kind of Guy and Time for Myself

Time for another of my periodic updates!

I spent all of July in the US with Moon and my fam back home. It was so nice to see everyone and eat everything I wanted and not have to worry about shitty air for a whole month. Moon got to see America in summer for the first time, since the last time we went it was winter. We went to my grandparents’ house at the beach and Moon (sort of) learned to swim. He got drunk off of Fireball and Bourbon my gramps plied him with, and my mom took a photo of Moon passed out, which Moon promptly sent to his mom and friends like a badge of honor.

We went to Philadelphia and ate ourselves stupid at the Reading Terminal Market. We were disgusted by the heavy clouds of weed smoke from the boys blocking the metro entrance as we exited to go “home” to our AirBnB. We were enchanted by the changing views of the city from the top of a nighttime tour bus.

We went to New York and saw some old things and some new things. We spent too much money and had too much fun.

We went to Korean markets multiple times so Moon could cook for my family. He insisted on cooking for them multiple times.

We had a party with my dad’s side of the family, and Moon learned how to dance from one of my aunts. Well, sort of.

We did so much in that one month, and it was excellent. I didn’t take a whole lot of photos (but Moon sure did!) because I didn’t feel like I needed to. I was just so busy being there and existing. Who has time to take out a phone or camera and try to package up a whole experience in a few frames when they’re busy existing?

We did a lot of other stuff too, including coming back at the end of the month. I’ve been getting back into studying, and I’ve been going into work every now and then. I don’t have my own classroom any longer, but I have my same position as last year. I’ve been spending a lot of time at home on my own while Moon works lately, but that’s not a bad thing. I get time to do what I want and be with myself and some excellent books before the school year starts.

This summer vacation time has been the longest down time I’ve had since I started working in Korea a long six years ago. It’s been restful, and it’s made me grateful for the job that I have, and for Moon. We have our disagreements, but we don’t argue. We never argue, and we never have, not once in over three years, because we talk and listen and understand. Moon is very considerate, and I try to be as considerate as he is even if I’m not good at it sometimes. He’s the best kind of guy.

Moon usually does the cooking, but his job has him out late these days. This morning, I decided I would try to make a soup like he does so he could have it with some rice for breakfast before going to work. I couldn’t get it to taste like the soups he makes, which are always great to me. I asked him to help me fix the flavor a bit, he gave me a few suggestions, I tried them, and then I asked for help again. It was okay but not nearly what I had hoped it would be. Moon said he would eat the soup as it was, and he did. I know it wasn’t particularly good, but every time I mumbled an apology or joke about the soup being a little off, he assured me that it was delicious. He was lying, and we both knew it, but sometimes the best kinds of lies are the little ones everyone knows are being told just to make people smile on lazy mornings.

The best kind of guy, for sure.

[pattybees]

School year complete

Year six of teaching (year 1 at international school) is complete!

Yesterday was the last day of school. It was a half day, and the kids didn’t have specialties, so I had no classes. Instead I was holed up in the library for about the thousandth time this week helping manually transfer our whole catalog into a new system :]

Anyway, looking back on the past school year, I’m so glad I got out of public school. Even though international was a ton more work, I had so much more freedom, and it was thousands of times easier to form good relationships with my coworkers and the kids. There is not a single kid in primary (except junior kindy, because I didn’t teach them) that I can’t call by name, which is a miracle considering I’m horrible at names. One of my friends is moving to a new grade next year, and when she told me, I immediately started telling her about all the kids moving up into that grade, who gets along with who, who should be far away from who, who has what little quirk, and so on. The kids were great and all, but I’ll see them in a few months. Until then...

Vacation! I’ve already put 2 hours into video games this morning, and it isn’t even 9 yet! Real vacation mood. And later on today, Moon and I will have dinner with his fam and finish up packing to hop on a plane tomorrow. We’ll be in the US for a minute, and I’m real hype about it because we’re chilling for two-ish days at my parents’ house before going down to my grandparents’ place near the beach. I haven’t been at their house in summer in six years now, so I’m so ready for swimming and kayaking and all!

Anyway, I hope everyone is enjoying their summer so far! Glad I’m bouncing right as the humidity starts rolling in and rainy season is starting!

[pattybees]

This is what I was up to on Saturday! In the four-day weekend (bless my school for taking Friday off in addition to Thursday), Saturday was definitely the most tiring.

Thursday, I mostly just loafed around the house. Since Moon’s first job is at a bank, he got to sleep in a bit, and we just kicked around until it was time to go to work. Then, one of my friends/coworkers who lives in my building came up, and we half-heartedly attempted to do some lesson planning and grading. I gave up in favor of playing Animal Crossing.

Friday, Moon took off work from both of his jobs, and we spent the day getting various stuff done at various banks, and going to a few doctor’s appointments.

Saturday, I left home early to get to dance practice. This event was posted up in a Facebook group I’m in, and I decided to step way out of my comfort zone and participate. Those of us who took part had been practicing the choreo for two weeks, and then on Saturday morning we crammed into a tiny dance studio for two hours of intense practice before going out into the wild. We did the dance multiple times in multiple places, and I was so damn tired by the end, but it was so much fun! Everyone was super nice and chill, and we all worked so hard. We were definitely catching attention left and right as we moved about. My only gripe with this video is that a lot of the shots that show me clearly are shots where I’m messing up or not really giving it my all, but of course, that’s on me! Everyone was hot and tired, and I wish I had just pushed out the last bit of my strength to make every performance as great as our first few. Still, I think I did alright anyway considering I’ve never had any experience learning dance! It was a good experience anyway :)

Sunday was just another chill day because every muscle in my body was sore haha. Moon and I did some planning for our vacation to the US, and now I’m back at work. I feel so unmotivated to plan stuff though... I only see each class a maximum of three more times before the end of the school year, so all that remains is wrapping up the last loose threads of content, and the last lesson for each class will probably be a total write-off. Looking forward to my first real summer vacation in six years!

[pattybees]

A little late, but I went to the Seoul Queer Culture Festival on Saturday! One of my friends wanted someone to go with, and I hadn’t been before, so we dragged ourselves out of Incheon in the morning to go. It was a lot of fun, and I’m glad we got there early before it got very crowded like it was in the afternoon, because we were able to check out a lot of stalls and such. I think the coolest people there were the monks giving out bracelets and fans, and the parents’ group. Moon was very surprised to hear that monks were at the festival, and it was nice to see religiously affiliated people out actively supporting rather than hating (not to say there weren’t others! There was definitely a church or two repping the rainbow, in spite of the religious bigots outside the festival area going on about how everyone inside would go to hell or whatever. Haters stay mad.)

The parents were also really cool, and I actually bought a book from them written by some of the parents and some LGBT people about their experiences with their children coming out, or coming out to parents. I’ve only just started reading it, but I’m glad I bought it.

Anyway, my friend and I hung around a while before dipping out to grab lunch. When we went back, it was really crowded because the afternoon events were getting underway. After two hours of speeches and performances, we joined the parade. It was such a good atmosphere with great energy, and I really enjoyed it (even though my legs were dying by that point). We dipped out of the parade once we got to 경복궁 and met up with Moon, who had slept in a bit and come to hang around Seoul later in the day. From there... we went home, haha. I was so tired, but it was such a great time.

Yesterday was a chil day at home, minus a quick grocery trip. Moon and I kicked around the house most of the day, and we finished off the weekend grilling meat at home. It was so perfect, and I wish Monday morning didn’t come! T T Less than a month until I’m on a plane to the US for vacation... so close...

[pattybees]

I got sick off of the students again :] No matter how many times I tell them to cover their mouths when they cough, they never listen~

Anyway, Moon and I had planned to go to Seoul for the Africa Festival and/or a language exchange meetup. I didn’t have the energy to go that far, so it didn’t happen. Instead, after getting some medicine and groceries, we went to the Incheon Bus Terminal area. I wanted to go there mostly because there’s a little stall that sells these really good waffles and we haven’t been in a while. Just my luck that the stall we were looking for was closed because of construction in the area T T However, I did find a new stationery store to haunt since my fav in Sinchon shut down! Also, we dropped in on a bookstore, and I spent a little time looking at clothes for ideas for an outfit for something I’m doing in June. More on that later!

Later in the evening, we grabbed pizza, and we ended up kicking around 해돋이 공원 Sunrise Park in Songdo. The air had gotten a lot nicer throughout the day thankfully, so it was perfect weather for a walk. Very chill day <3

[pattybees]

Cultural Diversity Day part 2

I had to scold some grade 1 boys for making fun of a girl’s skin. They were calling her “dark” and “cola” in a mean way. Grade 1, fam. Grade 1 :]

[pattybees]

Cultural Diversity Day

Today my school is celebrating all the different cultures of our students. The kids are dressed up in their traditional cultural clothing: Of course a lot of kids are rolling up in their hanbok, one of my Nigerian students rolled up in some of the most beautiful colored and patterned clothes, and another student dropped in to ask me for help fixing her headscarf (she had to tell me how to do it, and I think it looks okay!). I enjoy working at a school with so much diversity.

I’m also glad that none of my coworkers (that I’ve run into so far today at least) have jumped on the traditional clothes train. I really couldn’t think of anything to wear other than what I normally do. I actually heard another teacher joking about it: how she didn’t have anything special to wear because her cultural identity only goes about as far as saying she’s from X country. I was thinking about something similar, too. Yesterday in the staff room, a coworker and I joked about how we should just be wearing plaid and overalls to rep the south. The more I think about it, the more I realize there’s a lot I don’t know about my background. I know my great-grandmother on my mom’s side made pierogis, and now my Nana makes pierogis, and I’ve heard “Ukraine” thrown around a few times, but that’s about it. I don’t really know anything about the background of my dad’s side of the family either. It doesn’t really bother me; just an observation.

[pattybees]

One thing I am looking forward to next school year...

...is having a whole bank of materials I made this year to draw from. My final year in Korean public school, I really took the stash of materials I had built up over those five years for granted. Lesson planning was a simple matter of finding corresponding lessons from previous years and the materials I made and just making a few tweaks. Compare that to this year, where I had to pretty much build my curriculum from the bottom up. Next year will be soooo nice. I’ll save a lot of time on planning, and I will be able to use that time to think of more creative ideas to use!

[pattybees]

Getting ready for summer

Hello, all! It’s been a while. I’d like to say I’ve been really busy and all, but that would only be partially true. I have a lot of time after I get off work, but I fill it with studying, exercising, playing games, and generally loafing around the house >.>

Anyway! It’s been nearly three months since Moon finished his military service, so almost three months since we’ve been living together. We seem to have worked out all of the bugs (there weren’t many to start with) and everything is well! It’s so nice to be able to see your best friend every day! Lately he works until late at night, so except for the weekends we only really see each other in the morning, but that’s okay. Much better than seeing him once every two or three months :B This situation is only until we go visit the US, anyway.

We’re going to be spending a month in the US (thank youuuu, long international school summer vacations)! We have so much stuff we plan to do and so many people we are going to see. I’m going to go wedding dress shopping, going to go to my grandparents’ house for the first time in years, going to eat all the good food, clean up all my junk from my parents’ house (hopefully)... So many plans! Exciting!

But, before we can go to the US, there’s still time here in Korea. The school year is winding down, and I’ve almost finished my first year as a teacher running my own classroom. The other day, one of the other teachers, whose twin daughters go to the school, says she was flipping through their binders, saw their work from my class, and was impressed! A lot of my materials and all are stuff that I made myself after seeing the very vague learning objectives in the provincial documents, so it was very nice to hear that! I’m so glad I made the switch to international, because continuing to work in the public school system and being micromanaged by people less qualified than I in ESL/EFL was very grating. Even though the large majority of my time is not spent on ESL/EFL-related stuff, I don’t mind!

That’s about all! I hope everyone is doing well. I still lurk here on Tumblr even though I don’t post often. I see some people I’ve been following for a long time still posting, but a lot seem to have disappeared. I guess that’s just how it goes!

[pattybees]

It’s been a long time, hasn’t it? My internet presence on all platforms—Tumblr, Insta, Discord, you name it—has sort of died lately. It isn’t that I’m not still lurking around, and it certainly isn’t that I’m not still studying a lot. Part of it is just being busy from work but the biggest reason is that Moon finished his military service!

He escaped almost a month ago, and besides a few differences in how we clean and my sometimes kicking him out of bed in my sleep, everything has been great. He cooks a lot, so I do a lot of the cleaning in the living areas. He cleans the bathroom, and I get our breakfast and his lunch for work together in the morning since I wake up a lot earlier than he does. We work similar hours, so we have a lot of time to hang out~ We spend so much time going here and there, and we can keep each other laughing until we go to sleep at night. This past weekend, we met up with one of his old uni friends, and we also went to the observatory near the airport to watch the planes, followed by a picnic lunch at the beach. :D

Military Moon is no more! Got my best friend back <3

[pattybees]

Beauty is

seeing people on Facebook talk about dealing with petty coteachers and planning winter camps and relishing in the fact that I no longer have to deal with any of that. So nice to have a real break @______@ No worrying about counting up vacation days for NEIS, hearing the VP say how she doesn’t think my camp will be fun (the kids enjoyed all of my camps, thanks), dealing with extra cooks in my kitchen... lovely <3

[pattybees]

My lovely Moon came out on vacation again this past Saturday. Only two more months until he’s finished the military for good!

We’ve spent a lot of time just hanging out and rearranging/reorganizing our house. On Saturday morning, I met him in Seoul when he bus came in from the boonies, and from there we went to Incheon. We lazed around the house for a while before going to Incheon Terminal to eat our favorite (at least my favorite) waffles and get him some new glasses. In the evening, we had dinner with his parents, and that was Saturday.

Sunday was a busier day. Last time he came out for vacation, we spent way too much money eating out. So, this time we decided we would cook at home for most of our meals. We got a decent grocery haul Sunday morning, then went home to make lunch. Moon made some really awesome 순두부 찌개 sundubu jjigae (he cooks so well????), and then we went to Seoul to kick around a bit and check out the lights at 청계천 Cheonggyecheon.

Monday, I had to go to work T T We had the absolute worst luck—all of Moon’s remaining three 휴가 periods miss my vacation periods by two days or less. Such is life, though! After work on Monday, I went home and made chicken parmesan for dinner. We did more cleaning and arranging and such; nothing too special, but it’s always nice just hanging out with my fav <3

Yesterday, Moon said he had something special planned for dinner but wouldn’t tell me what. All he told me was to not touch any of the ingredients on the counter when I got home from work (he had to run out real quick), and asked if I would invite one of my coworkers/friends who lives in the same building since apparently he had prepared enough to feed an army. We ended up feasting on carbonara 떡볶이 ddeokbokki and jacket potatoes, and he also made some 김치찌개 that we just ended up throwing in the fridge for later since he made so much!

This vacation of Moon’s feels a bit different from others. As I said, we’ve been working on arranging everything and making the apartment feel more cozy. Also, spending time together cooking has been super fun, and everything has just been so good and happy! On Friday, we’re going to have a little pre-Christmas party before he goes back to the army on Saturday. I’m thinking about attempting a roast chicken in my little oven, and we’re going to make some Christmas cookies! It’ll suck when he goes back in, but he’ll be back out again next month, and one more time in February before he’s done for good <3

[pattybees]

Chill day at home

Today ended up being a day of food prep and study at home :D I was thinking about going to my Sunday Chinese meetup (which I didn’t go to the previous two weeks for reasons), but I’ve had this eternal cold and didn’t feel like doing anything that required wearing real clothes. So, I kept my pajamas on and dedicated the day to food prep and studying~

In the morning I prepared some sugar cookie dough to roll out, cut, and bake next time Moon comes out on vacation. Then I made chicken burritos for lunch, and then in the evening I tried out a new recipe for some oatmeal breakfast bars. They turned out absolutely awesome, and I’m excited to take one as a snack to work tomorrow :D Somewhere in the midst of making all that food, I did some voice chatting with people in the Korean learner community I hang out in most of the time when I’m online, and I got at least an hour each of Korean and Mandarin study in.

Something about days like this just feels right. Moon always worries about me when I tell him I just stayed home all day, but I don’t need in-person human contact every day. I’m happy just being in my house with me <3

[pattybees]

99 Days

Lately, I’ve been so busy. I have learned what absolute hell report card season is, and I’m not even a homeroom teacher! I had to write card comments for every kid from senior kindy up to grade six, which took about a thousand years. Then, I had to edit another teacher’s comments (we all had to get our comments peer-reviewed). Then, instead of taking me in for math rotations on Monday, the 4th grade teacher I EA for told me to spend the time reviewing his comments. Then today he asked me to, instead of EAing during math rotations, edit another teacher’s comments @_____@ It needed to be done and it wasn’t during one of my planning periods, but was I ever sick of anything report card-related even before he asked me to do that. Eugh.

November is a busy month at work. We’ve done the report cards, and this Saturday we have to go to the KORCOS (Korean Council of Overseas Schools) convention all day long. Bleh. I’m low-key burnt out by this point, and we have parent-teacher interviews soon, and I have to go in next Saturday as well for some school stuff and... yeah. I love my school and the kids, but I’m so done with November! I’ve been giving my kids projects to do during class time lately because I don’t feel like teaching I haven’t done any major assessments yet. Haha.

The silver lining to my Saturday being stolen this weekend is that we have Monday off. And having Monday off means that I will finally, finally go to see Moon at his base! The place he’s been working at has their off days on Monday and every 2nd and 4th Tuesday, which means that I was never able to make a weekend visit. This time, I’m going to make a small adventure of it. I already prepped and froze some cookie dough so I can just throw it into the oven Sunday morning and have some fresh cookies to take to him. I’ll stay in Seoul Sunday night to be closer to the bus terminal, so Sunday afternoon will be spent hanging around my old stomping grounds with one of my best friends. Monday morning I’ll take the very first bus out to Moon’s base and spend the day with him! I’m super excited that I finally get to see it. The last time I was out that way was the day he went in over a year ago, and of course it wasn’t exactly the same place. I’ve always been curious what his base is like.

At this point, he has only 99 days left. It’s a little unbelievable. It seems so close and so far all at the same time. I think I’m going a little crazy. Last night he was telling me over the phone about how a lot of guys are going to be finishing their service soonish so they had to hash out their remaining vacation days. Moon got the absolute shit pick of days, with his December vacation ending the day before my winter break starts, his January vacation starting the day after my winter break ends, and his February vacation also not coinciding with my February break. Like, seriously? I cried like a little bitch, tbh. He said it’s not set in stone yet, but I’m not very optimistic that one of the other guys will graciously switch even a few days with him. I know it’s not something that he has any control over, but I was of course really disappointed about it! And I felt bad about being such a little bitch about it because I know that made Moon feel even worse about it even though we know that it’s very much an 어쩔 수 없는 상황. Meh.

But, still! 99 days! NINETY. NINE. DAYS. @_________@

[pattybees]

So I was on the bus back to Incheon from Seoul

and we’re deep into Incheon and this girl about my age asks how long it is to Hongdae? Like girl, I got ON the bus at Hongdae. How did you not realize we were leaving Seoul?? And that we just spent the last 30+ min on the highway going away from Seoul?? Just... with all the technology we have today, how...?

[pattybees]

Falling into routine + good news!

Hello, all! I’m still alive after a month of working at my new school. I still love it, even though it is a ton more work than the public school foreign teacher thing. Having five years of experience in that way really helped me prepare for this role in that I’ve got my classroom management mostly down, and I already am familiar with lesson planning, making materials, and all this other fun stuff. Differences include not having a coteacher (this is a good thing, though sometimes I would love a second pair of hands in the room when I have first graders @_____@), having my own classroom, and actually being able to give homework with the expectation that students will turn it in or face consequences. My principal thinks I’m doing great so far, so I’m really happy!

That said, I’m very glad for all the off days that have been popping up recently. Over Chuseok, I went back to Seoul for the first time since I moved and saw a lot of my friends. It was so comfortable being back in the city I lived in for five years~ And the weather was great, so it was really perfect.

I’m really excited about this week not only because today is another day off, but also because Moon comes out on vacation again this weekend! I’m going to go to Seoul to meet him at the bus terminal, and then we’re going to come back to Incheon to start a busy day of looking at potential wedding venues.

@_______@

We set a date for July next year, and even though it’s hella early by Korean standards, I want to find a place and get it locked down to make sure we actually get a good place and the date that we want. More information on all of this forthcoming, but the fam has been informed, and in less than a year I’ll be married. Crazy! I’d rather not do all the big ceremony stuff and whatever... but it’s really important to Moon’s family (and I’m sure my mom would probably be a bit disappointed as well haha) so we’re tryna pull it all together!