Yesterday was an utter waste of a full planetary rotation. I have these things I need to get done, given that I’m moving back to Ilsan in about 9 days. I tried to get them done. I failed.
Friday night, I went out with my coworkers – our reconstituted Hongnong Elementary English Department (with the usual caveats, of course, regarding the rather grandiose impression a term like “English Department” might give). We went as a sort of goodbye-to-me dinner, in Gwangju (convenient for the Korean teachers, since they all live there).
First, we went for coffee at this place behind the Jeonnam Univ campus, which was owned by a friend of the art teacher (note that the art teacher is an honorary member of our “English Department” because he hangs out with us, sometimes).
After that, we drove downtown and ate at a pretty posh galbi restaurant there. Here is a candid picture of the three Korean teachers, Ms Lee, Mr Go and Mr Kim.
Finally, we went to a bar-type-place over near the bus terminal, but we stayed too late to catch the last bus to Hongnong (which doesn’t leave that late) and so Moyer (the other foreign teacher) and I ended up in a taxi back to Hongnong. I don’t really have many good things to report about traveling by taxi, in Korea – especially long distances – but this trip was pretty good, as taxi trips go. The fare was prenegotiated and as reasonable as can be expected for a one hour taxi trip, and I ended up spending the whole hour having a conversation in 90% Korean Language with the driver. I think it’s the longest such sustained conversation I’ve ever had, and it left me feeling almost giddy with the level of accomplishment it seemed to represent.
Reflecting on it afterward, I realize it also shows how far I have to go – I often stumbled on things that should be simple at this point, and sometimes the cab driver would go on for whole paragraphs where I only had a vague notion of what he was going on about. But in general, it seemed like a good finale to my year in the Korean countryside.
