Lost in Translation

Indian Summer is surrounding us with warmer days and cooler nights. The leaves are still changing and falling and the kids are not interested in learning about American Thanksgiving and not listening to a word anyone says because it is that time of the year. That time where they have been in school for too long and we have to buckle down and get to work, but the kids only want to play and are showing just how smart some are and how dumb others are…

A break from my whining:

“Dan- Do you have any pets?”
“Yes! My twins!” (with a big smile and no idea why I started laughing at his answer)

Chanel lipstick: 82,900 won (90 USD) Victoria brings and is playing with in class. Puts it on me and asks for me to lip print her and the class with CHANEL lipstick—we played with 90 DOLLAR lipstick! Only in Korea…

Gina: “Cassandra-Teacher, here…” (puts something small and hard in my hand)
“OH MY! Dude! It’s a tooth! GINA! Whaaa? When?”
“Just now in class…”

The third year seven year olds are getting to the point they can begin to learn and understand idioms (word or phrase with a non-literal/real meaning) So now the hallways are filled with them either explaining what “over the hill”, “tie the knot” or “cross my heart and hope to die” mean or asking you whether you are “wearing your birthday suit.” This is, of course, on top of the other amounts of outdated slang we already teach them to say and the random things that already come out of their mouths: “dude,” “super duper,” “mullet,” “knucklehead,” and etc…

We use a book series called Junie B. Jones. She is a kindergartener and the series progresses through at least first grade. She is an early 90’s brat. On top of being so weird and having to help explain random events/puns (a guy’s name is Vallony and she says it is her favorite kind of sandwich) she also has really bad grammar and what we would consider a little kids way of talking (pasketti instead of spaghetti). Recently these books cause me to try to explain what the purpose, meaning and words of the Pledge of Allegiance. They laughed at me as I tried to remember the whole thing then sat in awe as I tried to explain it all…The next book had her singing “My Country Tis of Thee” with the words “My country tizzy bee sweet land of liver free.” It took me two classes to remember all the verses correctly. I felt like a bad American.