First snow

Apparently if you're love lasts until the first snow.. it's a good thing.

Well, my love continues to change.

It's intimidating having so many things on the computer and off of it. I want to organize, I want

to simplify.. but there is an extent to which I am happy to keep it diverse and plentiful.

I had the burrito, but no shower cream. It somewhat resembled Chipotle, as I had hoped, but in small department store kiosk form. The dude spoke English very well. I told him I had traveled from Bucheon. He had been to Arizona to import sauce.. and while there he tried Chipotle, he felt that his restaurant was somewhat an imitation.

It was a nice adventure. Up top there, or wherever these silly photos wind up, is a picture of my snow devil, where I ate it hard on the ice. Michelle was right, I am going to have a bruise.

I am considering going to a skin doctor, dermotologist what have you, about my skin issues. They happen to everyone, and Natalia reports that hers cleared up within 2 days of returning to familiar climes. Still, I would prefer to ditch the itchiness, redness, and peeling as soon as possible.

I I I, sheesh, all about me.

Bucheon E.C.C. is starting to piss me off in many ways. I am not trying to publicly berate them, but I have considered as much. I have a coworker who had to spend her vacation day in work today, for what I would estimate was a solid 8+ hours, because her kindergarten students left en masse.

I understand that this is a business and losing students is bad, but our boss doesn't seem to understand that putting teachers under duress does not make teaching the sweethearts and brats any easier. She can deal with business, and she does, poorly. She told a mom, who is an English teacher, to get a second job when the mom had complained she couldn't afford our school.

Fuck bosses on power trips.

So.. my dilemma, is whether to complain. I try to pick my battles, but I can now understand why prior colleagues had not so well. It's stressful, and they will pull the most random b.s. at the most random times. Is putting the name labels on the books a big deal? No. Is it a waste of time? I think so. So Lucy, my lovely co-teacher, informs me (as she often does in lieu of the piss-poor management) that today the stickers need to be on the book. I tell her that I let the kids do that. She says they never do that, that parents MIGHT call and complain about it. I'm sick of hearing what parents might complain about. Let's wait and see what they DO complain about. Sure, I should watch the kids put the stickers on, so they aren't upside down and crooked and crinkled. I can learn to do that. So I walk to the books to help out my lovely co-teachers, all of whom are under more pressure than I am from our Korean managers (literally, sexual harassment, gossip about who is the worst dressed... how bad can you make morale at a place?!). I find that all of the books have been assigned to Korean teachers, so I don't have to put any stickers. Well, luckily Lucy already had done hers, the upside for them is they have many more breaks than I do. I easily helped out Natalie teacher, our most recent Korean teacher, who is on her way out after being assigned the worst classes (3 of which she teaches with me). Hm.. give the newbie the most difficult students with the most demanding parents? Doesn't sound like an equation for success.

So, my thought was upon departing to write a very frank note to my boss, thanking her for the opportunity and her occasional kindness, and explaining how wrong-headed I perceive her operation. Well, I forgot that managers here are also a very bitter lot. We had a very nice and hard-working teacher who fell ill, and told the school she could not come in, despite the demands of management to show up. So they fired her. And in talking to my supervisor's husband, he was under the impression that she had stolen money. ! . She wouldn't, though I would congratulate her if she did. I'm sure my supervisor had been told this as she is an extension of the director, and they both believed it amidst their fuming. Does it feel good to blow steam up your own dress.. especially negative stuff?

Perhaps I don't care what my former employers say about me. If I ever work in Korea, I am going to work for a better boss, and perhaps one that will explain the difficulties of the Korean work culture... not sure. Plus, if I truly do incense my boss, who is going to have a hard time changing her ways as many do, I fear what it might result in for my many colleagues who will remain after me.

Why can't people be nice?

I note that this is getting a bit wordy. I've got some other things to tend to, like personal holiday e-mails, and some studying. I may treat myself to Tron 3d tonight, rather than binging on alcohol.

I'll be back with pictures and improved blogging habits.. maybe. No promises. No regrets.

I love you, I really do, even if my boss is reading this, I want to shower her with love and good things until they run all over her and shoot out of her pores.

I hope your holidays have been and will be nice, this year and many more to come.

In Korea, 새해 복 많이 받으세요

is many good wishes in the new year

good returns. my typing is getting better without the Korean keyboard, but I should become less lazy and use it, since I have it.

pissed off

yes, I should have listened to my Dr. not a pretty friend..

but 4 visits to the Doc in under a week seems excessive.

and the prescription with 4 pills 2 times a day, and 5 at night, that too, excessive.

So I didn't go yesterday. I didn't have an appointment. Apparently Koreans ignore their doctors. Seems like a broken system.

Should have at least filled my prescription. Today, Sunday, the pharmacy is closed. Many of them. I found 2 open ones. They said they could not fill my prescription. I'm sitting there trying to explain that despite whatever bullshit tie-in they have with some hospital to fill their prescriptions, I need antibiotics. It's not about business, yes I will give you too much money for 1 day of pills, please just let me continue my regimen of antibiotics. No dice. Have a nice day.

NO! FUCK YOU KOREAN MEDICAL SYSTEM!

update: So I went back to the first obstinate pharmacy. They had been very helpful when the problem first arose, and gave me the same ocular anti-inflammatory that the young lady at the other pharmacy gave me when I stormed away from this one. I said, ok, where's your Dr. No I think it was unnecessary for him to walk to the front and open the door to point across the street, but I was admittedly in a bad mood. It didn't help that he laughed when I came in.

Am I a joke? I didn't say anything unreasonable. It might have sounded like a rant, but I simply pointed out that it was bullshit that some business restriction was going to take precedent over my need for antibiotics. Well this new Dr. I thought what the heck, they're open on Sunday, I don't mind a second opinion. It's a little crazy in here.. nurses are everywhere. One is coming her hair behind reception. I'm feeling uneasy. I went in to see a Dr. gave him the skinny. He stuck a camera in my ear and took blurry pictures. Said my Otitis is getting better. Asked me how long I wanted a prescription for! Didn't say anything patronizing about not drinking or smoking. A bit of a pain in the tuchus to run me through the system since I don't have a Korean name, but I'm pretty sure I will be returning as Ahn Jo-sep (my idea). And the 3 day prescriptions were cheaper and better explained than the 2 day ones I had been getting.

So I feel a little bit better. But hardly consoled when the dude at the pharmacy asks, "you've had a tough day, eh?" Yes, thanks in part to you.