The Attempted Poisoning
Shelton Bumgarner
Migukin Editor
While in general I receive a great deal of enjoyment from teaching my
kids, sometimes they do things that can only be described as
endearingly annoying.
FIRST PERSON
Take the following as a prime example of how you, like, have to enjoy
dealing with kids on a regular basis too if you want to come to Korea
to make make some quick cash, drink a lot and otherwise act like a
lecherous, debauched renob.
I often drink coffee in class (or at least I used to) and so I put my
coffee cup on the teacher's desk in classroom and went back out to get
the roll book or somesuch.
When I came back into the classroom, there was a huge brown wet mess
on the floor in front of the teacher's desk.
"What thuh?" I said, looking around with my eyes wide open.
I sat down and got the kid whose name I don't know, but who I usually
refer to as "New Kid Who Talks Too Much and Too Loudly" to go get a
mop.
What did he come back with?
Was it a mop?
Yes and no.
There was a mop, but it was attached to the hand of my director who
looked confused and annoyed.
"I don't think you should drink coffee in class anymore," he said with
a grimace.
Shit. Lead Pant And You I took a sip of my last-coffee-in-class while
I still could, only to have my students groan loudly as I did it.
"Dirty, teacher, dirty!" they said in unison.
"What?" I asked.
"Jason," one of said, pointing to a student, then pointing to the wall
where some paint was exposed and then pointed to my coffee cup.
"You mean Jason put paint chips in my coffee?" I said in disbelief.
"Yeah!"
"I sorryyyyyyyyyyy, Te-Chaaaaaa" Jason said in Konglish fashion. Often
students will essentially be talking Korean with English words stapled
on to it so it sounds like gibberish that you can barely make out.
Whereas the English language uses stress for emphasis, Koreans stretch
words out, so that's way they often use the "~" when they write
English words.
Now, Jason is a known nutcase kid and I wouldn't put anything past the
little booger. In the States, he would probably be taking some serious
anti-pyschic meds by this point, but this is Korea, so...
"Then why did you do it!" I said, letting my frustration get to me.
"I don't know." he said.
Then he started crying, his face beet red.
I hate it when stuff like that happens.
[Editor's Note: A slightly different version of this post orginially
appeared on Ahssa!]