Thursday, December 24, 2009
Sunday, December 20, 2009
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
So tonight was the performance of Handel's Messiah! It went swimmingly well. The church was pretty full, the soloists and orchestra sounded beautiful, and save a few trip ups, the choir totally rocked it. For those of you back home who don't quite get it (as my friends here didn't either) this was a legitimate concert. Orchestra, organist, conductor, professional soloists, and us... the choir. Haha... a couple pros, a couple music majors, and then the rest of us amateurs. :) A few ambassadors came including the ambassadors from America, South Africa, and Ghana. The whole place was buzzing after the concert about how we made the American ambassador cry at the end. Glorious. Ryan, the choir director who put this all together is trying to start a music company and this was the first show to see if he could really make it happen. I think it most certainly can. In fact already has.
Highlight of the night for me, singing Hallelujah. (typical) The lights were up in the whole place, (not even dimmed at all) the whole show so I could see everyone's face in the crowd; something I'm not accustomed to when performing. People were falling asleep, looking like they were dying, bored, etc. (some of the worst ones didn't come back after intermission.) It was rather discouraging so I started this game of searching for the people that were actually enjoying it and that was really nice to find the ones that were. Some just had this pleasant smile the whole show. But after Hallelujah, smiles all around. Big smiles. I almost started crying (I'm such a crier). It all made sense at that moment. I'll admit I thought about quitting a few times. I have very precious time away from work and schelpping myself about an hour by subway to reherse for 4 hours and home again an hour every Saturday (and over 8 hours for our 2 intensive rehersals... though I missed a few rehearsals so I can't complain too much) using my break time at work to study music (and admittedly still not totally learning all of the last song, woops) I was like ahh. Why am I doing this to myself!? But then after Hallelujah... That moment happened where it clicks and you actually make the desensitized masses excited for a moment over music. That is the song they sit through the rest of the show to see.
9 people came on my behalf and I'm so grateful. Wish all of my friends and family back home could have seen it but I was glad to have my Korea family there. :) Much thanks!
There was an audio recording of the show, and probably some photos to come too but I just wanted to write about it now before I forgot. Now I'm going to rest my poor tonsilitis throat (perfect timing huh? started a week and a half ago) and sleep the night and day away. That was fun but I'm so glad it's over! Back to my music stuff (well I didn't stop but more practice now!) and maybe studying some Korean again!
앗싸!!
Highlight of the night for me, singing Hallelujah. (typical) The lights were up in the whole place, (not even dimmed at all) the whole show so I could see everyone's face in the crowd; something I'm not accustomed to when performing. People were falling asleep, looking like they were dying, bored, etc. (some of the worst ones didn't come back after intermission.) It was rather discouraging so I started this game of searching for the people that were actually enjoying it and that was really nice to find the ones that were. Some just had this pleasant smile the whole show. But after Hallelujah, smiles all around. Big smiles. I almost started crying (I'm such a crier). It all made sense at that moment. I'll admit I thought about quitting a few times. I have very precious time away from work and schelpping myself about an hour by subway to reherse for 4 hours and home again an hour every Saturday (and over 8 hours for our 2 intensive rehersals... though I missed a few rehearsals so I can't complain too much) using my break time at work to study music (and admittedly still not totally learning all of the last song, woops) I was like ahh. Why am I doing this to myself!? But then after Hallelujah... That moment happened where it clicks and you actually make the desensitized masses excited for a moment over music. That is the song they sit through the rest of the show to see.
9 people came on my behalf and I'm so grateful. Wish all of my friends and family back home could have seen it but I was glad to have my Korea family there. :) Much thanks!
There was an audio recording of the show, and probably some photos to come too but I just wanted to write about it now before I forgot. Now I'm going to rest my poor tonsilitis throat (perfect timing huh? started a week and a half ago) and sleep the night and day away. That was fun but I'm so glad it's over! Back to my music stuff (well I didn't stop but more practice now!) and maybe studying some Korean again!
앗싸!!
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Teaching Moments
Just felt compelled to write real quick blog about a couple little moments I've had teaching in the last few weeks. This week and last I've really been trying to slow down, forget about how much I work, and all the stress, and try to enjoy where I am right now. It's easy to get worked up, stressed out, and miss things in life.
In my kindie class the other day one of my students spilled her water on the table while doing her work. I rushed to get tissues to clean it up and scold her for not closing the lid and she begins to play in it with this huge smile on her face and exclaims "Pretty!" It reminded me of all the times and ways I looked at water and how it moved. Especially long car rides in the rain. I could stare forever at the little pellets of water and how they raced off the edges of my view as the car moved. And I thought... wow why is water such a big deal in such the opposite way now? Why is it always such a "mess" or an annoyance when it used to be so fun and beautiful?
I later in a book store I wandered to by following my instincts (a whole nother story) read a good portion of the follow of book to "Who Moved My Cheese?" called "The Present" and in it an old man was trying to explain to this boy as he's growing over the years what the present is. And he asked the child, as an adult, about a task he had performed. The boy described mowing the lawn and how he really enjoyed it being outside and trimming tight corners, and just the overall feeling of success after a job well done. The old man tried to explain that that is why he was happy. He was completely focused on the now and what he was currently doing at that time.
Seems so simple but I'm trying to adapt that to my life now.
The other moment I wanted to talk about came today. Mondays and Fridays are my worst as far as packed schedules, and rowdy classes. Well in my afternoon class of my oldest kids (pre-middle school) I had only 2 out of the 3 girls today (the one missing being the most talkative of the 3). The last 5 minutes or so of class we were done and they got out their books for the next class to study and one of the vocab words was "rude". So I went to grab my notepad of Korean words and phrases to jot it down because its one I always want at hand to explain to a student when they are not being respectful. In any case one girl took an interest (as they do every time I have it in class) in my notepad and flipped through it, correcting mistakes and explaining things here and there about Korean. Then she said "Teacher you are..." and quickly grabbed her phone to use the dictionary. She showed it to me and it said something like "dedicated to study" and a few other definitions. I said yes... and she confided pointing at herself "Me too. With Japanese." I was baffled... "You go to another hagwon (private academy)?" No, she studies by herself, and made a gesture that kind of made me realize that was part of the meaning of the word she had attempted to translate for me.
It didn't really sink in until later what that meant for her to study on her own. She doesn't leave my school until 8:20 MWF, much later than me, and probably starts studying earlier than I go to school and comes home to mountains of homework. Not to mention regular exams to study for. Where does she find the time? Where does she have the passion left to teach herself something on top of the piles of information squashed into her head every day? I think it was a really nice moment. Its good to show the kids that we are kind of the same in some ways. I think the kids that are old enough to get it appreciate the fact that I'm studying and trying to learn a difficult and foreign language too and I'm not just sitting up on a high horse beacuse I know English. I know teachers are not supposed to try and be friends with students, but we are supposed to be humans.
Today was great. It was a coteacher's birthday and we all went to her house for cake and champagne (though I didn't partake in the latter) and talked about life and politics and cultures. We were so invloved it took the clock going to 12:59 for us all to realize... wow. Time to work tomorrow.
anyway. Just wanted to share!
In my kindie class the other day one of my students spilled her water on the table while doing her work. I rushed to get tissues to clean it up and scold her for not closing the lid and she begins to play in it with this huge smile on her face and exclaims "Pretty!" It reminded me of all the times and ways I looked at water and how it moved. Especially long car rides in the rain. I could stare forever at the little pellets of water and how they raced off the edges of my view as the car moved. And I thought... wow why is water such a big deal in such the opposite way now? Why is it always such a "mess" or an annoyance when it used to be so fun and beautiful?
I later in a book store I wandered to by following my instincts (a whole nother story) read a good portion of the follow of book to "Who Moved My Cheese?" called "The Present" and in it an old man was trying to explain to this boy as he's growing over the years what the present is. And he asked the child, as an adult, about a task he had performed. The boy described mowing the lawn and how he really enjoyed it being outside and trimming tight corners, and just the overall feeling of success after a job well done. The old man tried to explain that that is why he was happy. He was completely focused on the now and what he was currently doing at that time.
Seems so simple but I'm trying to adapt that to my life now.
The other moment I wanted to talk about came today. Mondays and Fridays are my worst as far as packed schedules, and rowdy classes. Well in my afternoon class of my oldest kids (pre-middle school) I had only 2 out of the 3 girls today (the one missing being the most talkative of the 3). The last 5 minutes or so of class we were done and they got out their books for the next class to study and one of the vocab words was "rude". So I went to grab my notepad of Korean words and phrases to jot it down because its one I always want at hand to explain to a student when they are not being respectful. In any case one girl took an interest (as they do every time I have it in class) in my notepad and flipped through it, correcting mistakes and explaining things here and there about Korean. Then she said "Teacher you are..." and quickly grabbed her phone to use the dictionary. She showed it to me and it said something like "dedicated to study" and a few other definitions. I said yes... and she confided pointing at herself "Me too. With Japanese." I was baffled... "You go to another hagwon (private academy)?" No, she studies by herself, and made a gesture that kind of made me realize that was part of the meaning of the word she had attempted to translate for me.
It didn't really sink in until later what that meant for her to study on her own. She doesn't leave my school until 8:20 MWF, much later than me, and probably starts studying earlier than I go to school and comes home to mountains of homework. Not to mention regular exams to study for. Where does she find the time? Where does she have the passion left to teach herself something on top of the piles of information squashed into her head every day? I think it was a really nice moment. Its good to show the kids that we are kind of the same in some ways. I think the kids that are old enough to get it appreciate the fact that I'm studying and trying to learn a difficult and foreign language too and I'm not just sitting up on a high horse beacuse I know English. I know teachers are not supposed to try and be friends with students, but we are supposed to be humans.
Today was great. It was a coteacher's birthday and we all went to her house for cake and champagne (though I didn't partake in the latter) and talked about life and politics and cultures. We were so invloved it took the clock going to 12:59 for us all to realize... wow. Time to work tomorrow.
anyway. Just wanted to share!
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