@bird_esque @warmandbarky @gambolholic I FUCKING FOUND IT.Starting this week, Monday nights are tango lesson&milonga nights for me. Hold me to that, will you?
My co-workers are all very consistently concerned (part 2): that I don't like spicy food. Which is true, usually. Those of you who have gone with me to Indian restaurants know this well.
But my former habits notwithstanding, I've been eating everything I think I can stomach from the school cafeteria - which means a helluva lot of spicy food. I don't even blink at kimchi anymore. And I'm pretty sure that my spice tolerance has gone up significantly over the course of the past month. (Sidenote: I'VE BEEN HERE A MONTH. WEIRD.) At first, I needed to drink cold water after every meal and my mouth would still burn for 10 minutes or so... but now my mouth doesn't burn at all, and more and more frequently I join my co-teachers for hot rice tea immediately following the meals.
All of that, with one notable exception: Wednesday this week, I took a serving of hard-boiled egg cooked in soy sauce with vegetables that I thought looked like sweet peas. Hey, I love sweet peas! I'll take a big bite of them. But as we all know, they were hot peppers, not sweet peas. My mouth flamed and my eyes watered profusely, and I had a good laugh about it with the other teacher (all of whom had known to avoid the hot peppers, of course). Now, every time they tell me about a Korean food I haven't eaten before, they say: "It's a little spicy, but less spicy than hot peppers." Giggle giggle. It's great.
I taught shy girl again today, and she spoke! Just a little, just for a second, but it made me really happy and relieved.
Thursday after work, I was invited to join the teachers' meditation club, and why not? I've never really tried it before, but now seemed like the perfect time.
It lasted two hours. There was a professional meditation therapist visiting the school this week, so the club took 4 times as long as it usually does. And everyone went around and shared their feelings in Korean - I had no idea sharing feelings was a part of meditation! - and of course, I was the only one who spoke in English (though there were 3-4 people there who could what I was saying). Several of the teachers shared their feelings for extended periods of time, and many of the club members started crying while they were talking. I felt really awk. It probably would have been really emotional if we spoke the same language, but as it was, I just didn't understand.
Parts of it I really enjoyed, and found useful. But I don't know how I feel (hehe) about the sharing of feelings at the beginning and end of the session. I haven't decided if I'll return to the club or not. It meets every Thursday.
Teachers' choir is wonderful. After practice today, they served snacks which tasted like Devil's Food cookies. Only they were chocolate-dipped rice cakes. Dduk dduk dduk. Man, that chocolate really hit the spot.
Tomorrow evening, I'm visiting Park Mi-Ran's house. She's offered to teach me how to make [a dinner dish the name of which I can't remember, which consists of sweet potato noodles, served cold with steamed vegetables and suchlike], and then take me night-time hiking with her husband and her on the mountain next to her house. Lordy-Lou.
The End! Heartz.
My co-workers are all very consistently concerned (part 2): that I don't like spicy food. Which is true, usually. Those of you who have gone with me to Indian restaurants know this well.
But my former habits notwithstanding, I've been eating everything I think I can stomach from the school cafeteria - which means a helluva lot of spicy food. I don't even blink at kimchi anymore. And I'm pretty sure that my spice tolerance has gone up significantly over the course of the past month. (Sidenote: I'VE BEEN HERE A MONTH. WEIRD.) At first, I needed to drink cold water after every meal and my mouth would still burn for 10 minutes or so... but now my mouth doesn't burn at all, and more and more frequently I join my co-teachers for hot rice tea immediately following the meals.
All of that, with one notable exception: Wednesday this week, I took a serving of hard-boiled egg cooked in soy sauce with vegetables that I thought looked like sweet peas. Hey, I love sweet peas! I'll take a big bite of them. But as we all know, they were hot peppers, not sweet peas. My mouth flamed and my eyes watered profusely, and I had a good laugh about it with the other teacher (all of whom had known to avoid the hot peppers, of course). Now, every time they tell me about a Korean food I haven't eaten before, they say: "It's a little spicy, but less spicy than hot peppers." Giggle giggle. It's great.
I taught shy girl again today, and she spoke! Just a little, just for a second, but it made me really happy and relieved.
Thursday after work, I was invited to join the teachers' meditation club, and why not? I've never really tried it before, but now seemed like the perfect time.
It lasted two hours. There was a professional meditation therapist visiting the school this week, so the club took 4 times as long as it usually does. And everyone went around and shared their feelings in Korean - I had no idea sharing feelings was a part of meditation! - and of course, I was the only one who spoke in English (though there were 3-4 people there who could what I was saying). Several of the teachers shared their feelings for extended periods of time, and many of the club members started crying while they were talking. I felt really awk. It probably would have been really emotional if we spoke the same language, but as it was, I just didn't understand.
Parts of it I really enjoyed, and found useful. But I don't know how I feel (hehe) about the sharing of feelings at the beginning and end of the session. I haven't decided if I'll return to the club or not. It meets every Thursday.
Teachers' choir is wonderful. After practice today, they served snacks which tasted like Devil's Food cookies. Only they were chocolate-dipped rice cakes. Dduk dduk dduk. Man, that chocolate really hit the spot.
Tomorrow evening, I'm visiting Park Mi-Ran's house. She's offered to teach me how to make [a dinner dish the name of which I can't remember, which consists of sweet potato noodles, served cold with steamed vegetables and suchlike], and then take me night-time hiking with her husband and her on the mountain next to her house. Lordy-Lou.
The End! Heartz.
No comments:
Post a Comment