Saint Patty's Day and My Kiddos!

This year I celebrated Saint Patrick's Day for the first time in the history of my life. Which is ironic, because I'm in Korea. However Seoul has a "huge" Saint Patty's party every year so me and my coworkers decided to trek that way. I've never been a huge Saint Patty's goer, but I think the love that my co-worker Ellen has for the holiday moved me in that direction. We started our festivities at 11am which included (but was not limited to) as many temporary tattoos as I could find room for on  my body (they quickly became an obsession of where I could put them...I haven't done them since I was like, 10) decorating our selves in everything green, and taking pictures. Then around 12:30 we headed to the festival.

Here I am all tatted up!

 We got there and it was actually a fairly small area. However it was PACKED with foreigners and green. There were pretty much zero Koreans. The coolest part about being there, in my opinion, was it helped me see the community and friends I've made during my time here in Korea. It was amazing to see so many people I knew that I had been on trips with, or met out, or who were friends of friends. This reminded me of being out in Bellingham when you walk into a bar and everyone is a familiar face. It was quite nice to see so many familiar faces in such a foreign country and in such a HUGE city.

This is the festival. There was some Irish dancing in the middle and everyone was watching and drinking and talking. 

Green beer!

After that, we moseyed on over to the other main foreigner part of town (Itaewon) where there are a couple Irish pubs, but also mostly just a good time. I experienced my first ever green beer, and did more socializing with friends and coworkers. It was overall a really fun time and I'd like to thank Ellen for loving Saint Patrick's Day so much that I got to fully experience it : )

In other news, the new school year is still extremely difficult and taxing. However we have the CUTEST 5 year olds (although in American age they're 3 and 4 year olds) I have ever seen in my life! They literally make my day every day. EVERY DAY. They are the joys of my teaching. Them and this one kid, Ryan. The other day I was walking with him to his class and I said "Ryan, you are the diamond in the rough." (because our classes really are very rough right now) and he just looked up at me and was like "Teacher, what?" and then Mandy Teacher (that's my co teacher) was like "Ryan, you're like Aladdin." And he was like "oh." and that was it. I have a passion for these students, even if they often refuse to be taught. Sigh. We'll get there soon kids, we will.

My fives playing freeze dance.

 

Playing a name game with our kids in a "circle"

More freeze dance (me and little Andy)

And you guessed it...more freeze dance. (We play a lot of freeze dance because they speak next to no English). 

And these are a couple of my 7's. However the purpose of this picture is to show you my little diamond in the rough, Ryan, in the front wearing blue. Oh how endless their adorableness is. And yet they are so challenging.