Korea Cool Down

Busan is no longer the inferno it has been for the last month. Once September hit, it was like someone snapped their fingers and BAM it's super comfortable outside. It felt very drastic and instantaneous, but I really feel like it was just the timing of that insane heatwave; it just happened to clear out at the very end of August. It's finally comfortably in the low 80s every day and the nights are finally getting down into the low 70s, which means we can open our windows instead of having the air conditioner exhausting itself 24/7. All of August I don't think there was a single night when it even got INTO the 70s; 80 degrees at night is very, very uncomfortable.

The seasons here are dictated by month and not by the weather. For example, "beach season" is from July 1-August 31, no earlier, no later. Outside of those dates, whether stifling hot outside or not, the beach is nearly deserted, keeping the expats happy and satisfied at not being crammed on the sand like sardines. I'm sure this Sunday will be another toasty, empty beach day despite that it's September.

On the school front, things have changed a bit. The teachers consist of one foreigner (myself) and three Korean teachers. I worked with the same three Korean teachers for well over a year, and it's here recently that they have all left, replaced by new faces, those of which all speak very good English, thankfully. I now have seniority at Avalon: Nammun Edition. One of the new teachers, who shall remain nameless, sometimes likes to treat me like I have no idea what I'm doing despite me having a year+ on her. She also has spent significant time outside of Korea living and travelling, meaning she doesn't think exactly like her Korean counterparts do. She's a bit conniving, sneaky and somewhat lazy, doing as little as possible and always trying to get out of things by making the other teachers think that it's the best way. But lady, I know what you're doing, the others might not, but I do, because I do the same things. I'm not dumb. For instance, new books arrived this week. The kindergartners usually take the first 15 minutes of class writing their names and all their information on the covers of those books because they're 6 years old and slow. That's 15 minutes of chilling and not teaching. I'm sure she knows this and tries telling me not to worry about doing their names on Monday and that she would take care of it on her class. I KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DOING! So I say, "No, really, I've been doing this every two months for a very long time, I've got it." So then she gives me one of those looks like awwww maaaann and I continue on my way to class where the kids happily spend 15 minutes writing all over their books while I enjoy those minutes of not having to teach them the new, nearly impossible lesson: the difference between "fl-" and "fr-" blend sounds. Good luck teaching that to small children 1. Whose language does not even have an "f" sound and 2. Who cannot differentiate the difference between "r" and "l" anyway.

...but she's a nice lady, really.


As I finish this up, it's slightly drizzly and hovering around 71 at 11:30am. I still refuse to put on a pair of pants to go outside. I've worn nothing but skirts, dresses and shorts for the better part of four months and putting on pants means that I'm giving into the fact that WINTER IS COMING. (a little GOT reference for your day.) Nope, no pants today.