This leads me to a humorous moment that exemplifies how the Korean tongue makes learning English (and other languages) so difficult. Koreans exhibit considerable confusion over the 'l' sound and the 'r' sound; similarly the 'b' vs. the 'p' vs the'f' vs. the 'v'. Just as I have difficulty with ㅗ, ㅓ and ㅏ.
I am looking at student drawings, reading their labels, and one kid has called the lump of meat on his plate folklips. Read that again. Folklips. There was a time not so long ago when I would have been totally flummoxed. Oh, I would have known he didn't actually mean the labial organs of fellow humans, but I wouldn't have known where to go from there. Now, of course, it's patently obvious to me:
Folklips=Pork ribs
Speaking of pork, I went with my new friend Chris to a restaurant near the Gangseo Saggori where he introduced me to something called 가브리살 gabeurisal:
It is a cut of pork from near the shoulderblade end of the loin, just above the backbone, cf. chine. It is similar to samgyupsal, but much leaner and cut thicker; sweet, tender and delicious. 6,000 W a serving, with lettuce, sesame leaves, samjang and all the panchan, really outstanding!
6 comments:
My apologies if you've already mentioned this but I was wondering which company you're teaching with. Is it EPIK? I'm interested in maybe teaching English in Korea some day but there's so much negative press out there. You, however, seem very pleased with your job. Thanks, I continue to enjoy your adventures.
I work for SMOE and was recruited through koreaconnections.net, Mr Jay Lee.
Negative "press" is to be expected, since most people don't really have that much to say when things are going fine--you only hear the bad stuff.
And some of the bad stuff isn't even that bad--many teachers here are young people who have never had a real job, so they don't know what real jobs, real bosses, are like. They blame everything on "Korea" or "Koreans" when it may well be exactly the same back in their home country.
It's hard for many to adapt to a strange country and culture, a factor which should figure into your calculations.
Good luck!
Thank you, that's very helpful!
Even more fortunately for Tuttle is the fact that he met me straight off the bat. If not for that bit of good fortune, he surely would have had a terrible time.
Drew: Conceited much?
I will repeat though, as I've said before, it is important to have friends or get some as soon as possible.
Folklips? Sounds like Pork Ribs to me... nowadays I wouldn't even bat an eyelid. My student the other day told me that when you flush the toilet, the "poof" goes down. I really liked this one. He even wrote it on the test before I realized he really thought it was an f...
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