From the J-Files

The following is an excerpt from the real-life daily lesson book of a real-life English teacher in real-life Koreal.  Korea. 

Class: 7 year olds
Unit: Storybook
This class is a hardworking class of only boys who have interesting and lively dynamics like giving each other nicknames, picking on the shy kid, and drawing defecating dinosaurs on the board.  Recently, I had the opportunity to learn a major cultural difference from them.  Of a story where someONE was lost in translation.  Someones.  You'll see.
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory!  A wonderful example of Western Children's Literature.  Its rags-to-riches story and morality tale (did you know the Bad children and their parents mirror the seven deadly sins?  Rewatch that movie sometime) have for generations been a good influence on children the world over.  Augustus gets too greedy and goes for the chocolate river?  Thanks for playing, sir, your parents can pick you up outside in the losers' room!
But wait.
In the Korean translation, Augustus isn't "going to be fine".  The students were stunned in class, because they'd read the story in Korean.  And when they told me He Is Die, I laughed and pointed to the passage where Wonka reassures his mother that death (however delicious his might've been) didn't await her son.  It seems that THEIR version of the story replaces that passage with the implication that the price for greed is much steeper. 
Sweet dreams, Korean children.


Class:  12 year-olds. 
Unit: Family
Ah the ever-present My Family unit.  Seems to be in every foreign language textbook in every language ever.  Except the Canadian textbooks.  They use Morris the Moose for that unit.
Ahem.
In other text-
WAIT
...Except the Canadian textbooks.  They watch Mighty Ducks instead.
Ok I'm done now.
We discussed who our family members were, what jobs they did, how they looked, and what color eyes and hair they had (and believe me, appearance descriptions took a lot more vocabulary for me than it did for my students).  But when I described my family, and said my mother was a lawyer, the classroom went silent with confusion. 
"lawyer?  really?" 
Was this sexism?  Did they really not believe a woman could be a lawyer.  Time to set the record straight.  I knew they were an old-fashioned culture and all-
"wow, oh, very rich!"  Oh.  I guess being a lawyer must just pay an excessive amount here.  I mean, they do pretty well in America, but with a reaction-
"Teacher!"
One of my students got up and showed me her phone, where she had typed in the job name.
"Lawyer?!"  The phone said: R-O-Y-A-L. 
...Oh right.

(If it's still not clear, tonight at Taekwondo Soccer, the student who shot the winning goal yelled GOOOOOAAAAL!  G! O! A! R!)

There are, in fact, very important reasons I've been imported to teach these children.


Class: 12-13 year-olds
Unit: adverbs of frequency

After discussing with the students how I usually prefer American ramen to Korean lamyun because American ramen comes in chicken, pork, beef, seafood, and asian flavors compared to Korean lamyun's pepper and pepperypepper flavors, I introduced them to the ramen I always like: chicken flavor.  They complained that Korean babies sometimes eat a soup like that, but adults never do.  Today in class, they brought me a lamyun that they said was sweet instead of spicy.
In retrospect, the fact that I was instructed by onlookers to only take a small bite should've clued me in.
Mmmmmm.  Lit sparkler-magma and habanero flavor.
I ran for the fountain.
I let that student finish the bowl alone.  And you can be quite certain that when he asked to go to the water fountain later in class and his salvation from the brimstone he'd consumed was up to me.....
he decided never to pull that trick again.


WARNING.  THIS NEXT CASE FILE CONTAINS EXPLICITLY EXPLICIT LANGUAGE THAT WAS SO EXPLICIT, ENGLISH-SPEAKERS AND KOREAN-SPEAKERS COMBINED WERE UNABLE TO COMPREHEND ITS EXPLICITNESS.  COVER THE EYES OF SMALL CHILDREN AND PETS.

Class: 6 year-olds
Unit: all
My students had often tossed around a term in class.  Usually after playing with Pokemon cards or Beyblade tops, so I thought it nothing but a japanimation-phrase.  Something the pokemon or tops hatch from, perhaps.
Fire Egg.
Offended?
Neither was I.  I joked back with them.  Ok, sure guys.  Fire egg.  Hey look, a fire egg!  Could you toss me that fire egg?  Careful, we don't want to have to call the fire department!
Later that week, a discussion with my fifteen year olds on crazy foods yielded a surprising result.  Did you know that King Sejong of Korea was rumored to enjoy eating Rocky Mountain Oysters- of chicken? 
And more importantly, did you know that the Korean slang term for that part of any animal is a Fire Egg?
I walked into the teachers' office stunned.  I asked my co-teachers: have you heard them say this word?
No, they told me.  What does it mean?
What an awkward thing to have to explain to my female co-workers.  Wanting to be professional about it, I cut the slang and told them as clearly as I could.
"Its....well, I mean. . . What THEY're saying is...it's just the slang term, I think....its...itmeanstesticles."
"Oh."
Relief.  Now they can deal with the students about it, because I'm sure that'd work better in Kor-
"What is testicles?"
Well, when a man and woman hate each other very much and the woman wants to cause the man substatial discomfort while making him cry like a baby, where does she aim her best front snap kick?
Oh.



On a completely related note (related to snapkicks), My Taekwondo teacher is teaching us a routine.  It's a dance and taekwondo number (hereafter referred to as TaekwonDance) that's actually more aerobics than dance.  To the South Africa World Cup cheer song.  I was taken completely by surprise with this one, and I never would've expected anything like it.  I hope you share my astonishment. The implications of this dance-music are nothing short of mind-blowing:



It means there's someone out there who actually pays attention to soccer.


Tune in next time for a special Collector's Edition 14 Hours and a World.  Supplies will be limited, so get yours first!

Marvel always,
Jeff-Teacher