What do I have in my pocketssssss

Did you used to have weird things in your pencil case when you were in school?

  By school I more mean elementary/primary school, but I guess in general. I think for me, the strangest thing I used to have were things I found outside, like interesting rocks or sticks. There were other more "normal" things like tazos or other collectible cards, and kinder surprise toys. 

I am sure there are other people out there who had more interesting things in their bags and pencil cases. 

  Kids doing and having weird shit is not Korea specific, I have come to believe that children are, in general terms, the same globally. They all tend to like cute fluffy things like puppies, boys tend to also like gross things like squished bugs, and girls like pretty pens. They tease each other, and draw all over their things. They hit each other, cry, and then make up within 10 minutes. Some are sleepy during class, others are full of beans and won't shut up (and different kids fill these sleepy and rowdy roles every day). 

  Some kids like blue, others green, some can't speak properly in their own language, let alone a second one. Some have a heap of friends, some a few. Some have none. You can generally tell a child comes from an unsupportive home, or a bad environment by their behavior or the way they dress. Or the way they associate with other kids. 

All children, all over the world, are strange. 

  I guess some things they will grow out of (like, at some point little Kang Joo Min is going to stop crying when he doesn't get to sit with his friend, and eventually Hye Jin is not going to try to sit in her partners lap during class... 

  Anyway, this isn't Korea specific, as I said, but I want to tell you some of the things I have seen the kids carrying around. Let me know if yours do the same, where ever you are...

• a frog in a jar
• Stanley knives in pencil cases (they don't tend to use a normal pencil sharpener here)
• a watch face, no band on it
• Pokemon cards
• smartphones with cases so big they need to carry them in little shoulder bags
• fluffy pencil cases shaped as various animals (the best was the fluffy blue whale that one of my gr 6 boys had)
• dead bugs - usually dragonflies
• candies
• vitamins (which they eat like candies)
• passes to get them on to the Air Base - I am constantly telling the kids to keep these in a safer place than their jacket pockets. Its like, a national security risk or something
• hot packs
• k pop memorabilia 
• mini slinkies
• play dough and clay
• nail polish
• spare phone batteries
• sand from the sports field
• a hamster

In other news...

  We had first snow yesterday for the season... and its totally early. Last year it didn't snow until December. But, I have been told by a semi-reliable source (yes, that's right, you know who you are...) that early snow can mean new love is on the horizon! So that, coupled with my new found interest in feng shui love charms means that any day now my milkshake should bring all the boys to the yard. I am still the most unlucky in love person I know, so maybe the snow will bring in some romance. Don't think I don't know that you are all waiting for some smutty stories...

  But the snow is beautiful. I mean, it was really just a fly by blizzard of sorts, and although it snowed a little again today its still not quite cold enough for it to settle and stick. I am a crazy person who actually loves this time of year, when the snow starts and its all exciting. If only they would let me have a heater on at school... But this is old news, everyone surely remembers me complaining last year about the cold?? No??? Rest assured, cold fb status updates are coming. 

  Countdown is on for heading home for 3 weeks. We are down to under 40 days... So I best get started on my Gillian Michaels 30 day shred. Which I was supposed to start this morning but unfortunately due to a mistake on my part my alarm didn't go off. I was late for work AND I didn't get shredded. Was so stupid too, I have like, a million cables under my side table at home, and I plugged my phone into one of them over night to charge and the stupid thing wasn't even connected to the wall. I plugged the phone into the camera charger or something... It amazing I woke up in time for classes at all.

Anyway, that's all for now... I want to do a write up of my touristy trip to Gyeongju soon, so stay tuned. It was a great weekend and pics turned out amazing. 

xoxox