Sickly

Went away for the weekend to visit people in Naju (we had a bet) and I got pretty sick while I was there. I should've known--I had this sore throat all week but I just thought it was dehydration or something. And then on Friday when I was sneezing with a runny nose, I thought it was just allergies since I usually get them around this time. But then on Saturday when I felt like absolute sh*t I realized too late it was NOT allergies and most certainly a cold.

This is the second time I've been severely sick in Korea. The first time was last winter when I had the flu. But god, I didn't even realize I had the flu and went to work anyway. I don't know how I managed to move, let alone teach while having the flu but somehow I did. But really, everything from that time is in a fog because I was just so out of it.

I think being sick when you're a teacher is probably the worst thing ever. It actually takes lot of energy and concentration to teach properly. Being sick and teaching leaves you in a particularly vulnerable state--you're not in full control of yourself, let alone your class. And knowing you look like crap and still having to get up in front of a group of people (even if they are just students) is the last thing anyone would want to do. Standing for 50-60 min. at one time is also especially tiring when you don't even feel like moving one inch. And loud students are the last thing you want to hear when your head is pounding and you feel like you've been submerged underwater.

Basically, teaching when you're sick is terrible. I also become short and crabby when I'm sick, not a great side to show my students. However, that's the way they do things here in Korea. Teachers rarely miss a day for sickness. For one, there's inexplicably no substitute teacher system here. When a teacher has to miss school (usually for a funeral), another teacher or two is assigned to cover their classes. Which means for those poor teachers, they have to teach thier own classes and cover a few more.

Most teachers in my office are sick now, actually, but they're all here. Even students when sick are still expected to come to school. My host sister was pretty sick awhile ago and while she did go to the hospital, she went straight to school after her check-up. It's kind of insane. Even though my parents did the same thing and never let me or my brother and sister miss school unless it was for a very,very good reason (sadly, there never was one) if we had even been super sick, they would've let us stay home. (Un)fortunately we never had more than a bad cold.

The silver lining in all of this is that I have off next week for Midterms. Thank god.

Frustrations

My last class of the day--40 students--sat and blinked at me the whole class. And I know they understood me. I explained the activity about 1 million times in about 1 million different ways and yet they still just sat there in dead silence. Makes me want to throw something (not at them of course), just to see if they'll react. Then they complained when I went over time--we went over, dear class, because none of you could be bothered to give me one response to any of my many questions.

Does anyone else feel this way? Or am I just a horrible teacher?

I am starting to suspect I'm not a good teacher. At all.