all quiet on the eastern front

winter intensives started at ye olde job. which means i'm back to working 12 hour days. it's dark when i go to work. it's dark when i leave work...dawn and dusk conspiring to convince me that no time has actually passed. then i come home. drink shitty beer. try to muster up the energy to eat. which usually just results in consuming partially frozen sticks of imitation crab meat. i don't even like crab meat. real deal or otherwise.

speaking of meat (always the best of segues...), i edited several essays yesterday about things that kids like. high on the list of "likes" was "pig meat." call me crazy, but i think that's funny. easily entertained these days. cabin fever. or i guess "english academy in korea with only one native speaker" fever, in this case.

i must at this point note that all my korean co-workers are great, and communication really isn't a problem (duh, they're english teachers), but there's definitely this insurmountable "otherness" that i think we all feel but fail to acknowledge. but i guess why would we acknowledge it...

these days in particular, their very efforts at friendship and inclusion are ultimately repellent to me when i've already been at work for at least 12 hours. i think they're weirded out that i don't want to eat lunch with them, or hang out after work. but after spending that much time with the same people and in a particular building, when extrication becomes permissible, then fuck yeah i'm leaving.

so yes, i've been in a foul mood, due mostly in part to the jobby job. other stuff too that i'll save for myself, as a result of living too much in my head. as for the job, it's all confusion as of late, and as soon as i start to feel like i know what the hell i'm doing, my co-workers change something again. apparently no one thought to include my classes when planning the next two months at the hagwon, despite all the exclamations of "teamwork." let it be known, a huge reason that i took this job was because it provided the materials for classes. no prep work. the thought of prep work makes me at least consider having a panic attack. it's not that i can't come up with anything, it's that i can't focus on anything. i sort of see all topics as inextricably linked and can't really pull myself out of the mindset of a "native speaker" to acknowledge how there might be a linear order to how an esl learner actually, well, learns. anyhoo, i could expound upon this, but it probably doesn't mean anything to anyone who doesn't work at my clusterfuck of a job right now.

it's just bizarre because the first 6 months of this gig were systematic, the epitome of order. i suppose i had an undue amount of confidence in my skills after pretty much owning all my classes. and with no other foreign teachers' methods by which to gauge mine, i looked like a fucking saint. now i'm given new books, new teachers and a whole new system to which none of the other "real" teachers gave any consideration. most of the time 10 minutes before class starts. fucking frustrating.

i'm teaching mostly elementary students these days. which i actually prefer, despite the fact that i'm still unsure what/how to use the materials. it's bizarre that these kids at my school see me and communicate with me on a more regular basis than any other humans on the planet. geez, now that i put it that way it is pretty remarkable. the kids are there 4 days a week for intensives. so i see them all, at least in passing, every day that i'm at work. my favorite classes are the ones with my youngest kids. 5 little 4th grade boys that make me not mind being in this cult-like atmosphere. they're just so earnest and creative. it's strange to have the opportunity to teach a class of elementary school esl learners that actually calms me down. i would never have imagined that was possible.

i've sunk back to this feeling of just barely hanging in there every day. somewhere there's a poster of a kitten hanging from a tree, or maybe it was some sort of primate. regardless...killing time until something jars me out of this complacency. there are days when i'm quite sure that complacency is far too kind and gentle a term for what i'm feeling, but i don't need to dwell upon that here. i wish there was some more eloquent, pointed way to express what i mean. of course there is, i just can't express it. as i've lamented before, i'm losing my words, yo. anyhoo, i had just started to feel shitty like this in suncheon when i left. overwhelmed by monotony, routine, boredom, the job itself, the uncertainty of everything. ironic that uncertainty brings me down, as i admittedly hate routines. and what's more certain than a routine? now i'm not sure what exactly is going to pull me out of the funk.

been reading a good book recently, that i would probably never have thought to pick up of my own accord. the glass bead game by herman hesse. i vaguely recall reading siddhartha in high school, or maybe that was one of many books i was sposed to read but never actually finished. seems like that bad habit never really stopped upon entering college, so the irony of ultimately becoming an english lit major is all the more striking. most notably in my one faulkner class. i wrote some pretty great papers having never actually completed a faulkner title. i digress...
anyhoo, there's a passage in the hesse that seems particularly noteworthy in the context of my life abroad, and how i felt when i left missouri in the first place:

"this matter of not being able to understand may not be as drastic as you make it out. of course two peoples and two languages will never be able to communicate with each other so intimately as two individuals who belong to the same nation and speak the same language. but that is no reason to forgo the effort at communication. within nations there are also barriers which stand in the way of complete communication and complete mutual understanding, barriers of culture, education, talent, individuality. it might be asserted that every human being on earth can fundamentally hold a dialogue with every other human being, and it might also be asserted that there are no two persons in the world between whom genuine, whole, intimate understanding is possible--the one statement is as true as the other."

sort of touches upon lots o' themes i've been trying to reconcile for a while now. i get the feeling i'll never sort out the notions of transience vs.settling (whether in the vein of locations or relationships)--contextualized by this everpresent confict of communication and relatability. maybe that's a good thing. keeps me on my toes. also makes me feel like i'm constantly killing time until whatever the next step is...

anyhoo, that's what's going on in my brain. as far as my social life, i've been drinking a lot more lately than i had for a long time. strange how drinking copious amounts of alcohol is what keeps me feeling the most sane. the most human. and since i am a human, it's good to feel like it sometimes, however infrequently.