Happy Children’s Day, everyone! May 5th is a recognized public holiday in Korea, which means I get this sunny Monday in Busan off! Yes, the irony of being an English teacher in South Korea and not having to teach on Children’s Day is not wasted on me.
Children’s Day has officially been celebrated since 1970 in Korea, and encourages children to grow and prosper without discrimination, and to hold only wisdom and bravery in their hearts. Toy stores, public parks, and department stores are apparently swarmed with kids, so you better believe I’ll be avoiding those places today!
In celebration of the up-and-coming generation of Koreans, my school hosted a full day event in dedication of the little nuggets this past Friday. This was great news for me because any day when I can derp around with my kindy kids and not teach from the world’s most boring textbooks is a fantastic one!
Each of my fellow foreigner co-teachers and I were responsible for a different station at the event. Shannon and Brandi ran the “Brown Store”. This is a basically a market where students can use the “Brown Bucks” they’ve received over the course of the month for good behaviour, and buy cute little knick-knacks. Brittany and Thomas were responsible for teaching the little noodles about food creation (read: making tiny little burgers). Robert was responsible for creating a balloon hat for each student, and I was tasked with painting all of their faces because “Dylan Teacher, you are such a good artist!” I’m not exactly sure where my head teacher got such an idea, but the misinformed sentiment was a cute one.
That said, I actually did end up having a blast painting my kiddies’ faces. I’m by no means quitting my job to become a professional face-painter, but I don’t think I was totally awful at it. Every single time I would finish, I would take a “poto” of each child’s face to get a sense of their satisfaction level and every single time their face would remain expressionless. I kept on reminding myself that this is a part of Korean culture (not letting your true feelings known through facial expression) and was eventually vindicated when the kids later thanked me for their awesomely painted face.
One of the best (albeit messiest and saddest) moments of the event came when I was painting one of my more rambunctious students’ face. A friend from his class came up to watch me as I attempted to paint a penguin holding an umbrella. I eventually required the yellow paint for the beak. When I reached over to dip my paintbrush in, I noticed that the yellow had disappeared. As I began to say “now, where did I put the yell-” I looked up to find the friend, the whiteboard, the wall, and the floor covered in yellow paint. The poor little noodle was so distraught, but I couldn’t help but giggle as I scolded him for getting too close to my work station. I guess we shouldn’t add “Compassionate Teacher” to my list of school nicknames…
After lunch, we assisted our homeroom classes with creating candy necklaces. Normally, whenever we “assist” our classes with any sort of project like this, it turns into me frantically assembling 12 candy necklaces myself. Thankfully, my class of six year olds are surprisingly resourceful and did it all by themselves. I like to think I’ve contributed to their resourcefulness but ego gets you nowhere.
Once the candy necklaces were done, I was responsible for hosting an “active” game in our auditorium known lovingly as the “Sky Room”. I basically created a version of “Corn Hole” with beanbags and hula hoops, and divided the classes into four colour-coded teams. The Pink Team (that no one initially wanted to be apart of because apparently “pink sucks”) ended up destroying all the other teams. After the game, we sang some classic songs including “Spring is Here”, “We All Go Travelling By”, and my personal favourite, “I Am A Pizza”.
Basically, Children’s Day was a total breeze of a Friday where my kiddies got to have fun without any of the pressures of English learnin’. While I will miss them tomorrow and Tuesday, (which I also have off for Buddha’s birthday, huzzah!), I’m sure their parents will treat them to all of the ddakji and patbingsu their meagre little frames can handle!
Happy Children’s Day to you and yours!
Millennial Abroad 
