Amanda Takes Off...

Reviewing all of the words you learned in December and only having forgotten two of them. Reviewing all of your January words and only having forgotten a handful of them. Suddenly knowing "기억 (하다)" (memory, oh the irony) when it's been in the taekwondo stack since October! Happiness.

Mentally making sentences with a new verb Blue taught you last night (갈아입다/to change clothes) and realizing how it's similar to 갈아타다 (to change trains, planes, etc). Happiness.

Automatically bowing to someone in response to "Hi" and thinking, I just bowed to American Mormon missionaries. I've been here too long. Happiness.

Rushing through the market on the way to class and spying a little kid, crouched down in front of a stack of dead fish, poking their eyes with curiosity dancing on his face. Happiness.

Noticing the man sitting next to you on the subway is wearing a Dallas Stars sweatshirt and thinking, "That used to our team, until they moved." Happiness.

Rereading the reading activity in your Sogang lesson (third time reading it, second time today), completing the written questions, and being able to retell the story based on the picture and a few key words. Happiness.

Walking past the huge glass windows of your favorite neighborhood bakery on your way home and seeing the always friendly owner, sitting behind the counter—asleep. Happiness.

Before class, Brave's Brother helped me with the reading activity in this week's lesson. I read (slowly) aloud and he corrected me or helped me out. He was laughing at my difficulty with "데이트" "스페인." Don't ask me how "date" and "Spain" become three-syllable words.

He also helped me with 려. I have a really hard time with that sound, which is unfortunate for a few reasons. First, my new form is called 고려. I need to know how to say it. Second, the word for "to be difficult" is 어렵다. I couldn't even say it was difficult to say the sound because I couldn't say the sound in the word difficult! (I found this terribly funny.)

Brave's Brother helped me out and I could tell he was getting a little frustrated. So I said, "Say 'rabbit.'" He did, putting his tongue against the roof of his mouth the ways Koreans form their L and R sounds. "No, tongue down! Here, here!" We went back and forth a bit until he laughed and said, "OK! I try, you try."

So Master walked in to find me muttering, "려소리가 어려워요..." (The best way I could think to say The 려 sound is very difficult...)

During the first half of class, we played soccer by choosing teams, which we've never done before. Master was kind and kept me from being picked last, though I really wouldn't've minded. While we were waiting to start, he kicked the soccer ball hard, hitting another kid (with red and black glasses almost exactly like me) on the head hard. It bounced off of him and hit me hard in the face. Master rushed over to see if I was OK. I looked at my glasses and said, "Master, why is there water here?"

He looked at me, looked at Glasses Guy and said, "Amanda! His 땀!" Sweat. Eww. Ewww. Ewwww. I said as much, too.

Soccer was fun. While we were playing, Goalie studied my book for some reason. Master opened it up and used his handphone to look up some words. He seemed frustrated, though I have no idea why. My teammates practiced that 려 sound with me during our out times.

When we played 가위바위보 the boys said something to me. I figured they were telling me we were choosing goalkeep. "Yes, yes," I said.

They repeated themselves. So did I. They seemed really excited and said, "하고 싶어요?" I just learned that verb ending a few weeks ago, meaning to want to do something, but I haven't gotten to use it (or hear it) much. They were asking if I wanted to be goalkeep.

"No! No! 가위바위보!"

I watched Coverboy use his head to bounce the soccer ball against the targets/guards storage area twice in the middle of the game. Another time someone who was playing goalkeep (Grin's Brother, I think?) kicked the ball to keep it away from his goal. His foot got caught in the netting and the goal flew around more than 90 degrees. Yet people paid no mind and kept playing. I was the goalkeep for my team when it happened and Cocky and I couldn't stop laughing. Then we'd look at each other and start laughing again.

During class, Master used a verb tense that I learned recently with me. The first time it didn't register, but then he said, "Amanda, you know 할 수 있다?" and it did. He may have (unknowingly) remembered that I used it Monday night.

He's never had a foreign student and I'm nearly positive he's never had this much interaction with someone learning Korean in any context before. Yet he's very good about adjusting his speech level for me, whether to use the verb forms I've just learned, or to emphasize the confusing transitions, or to use vocabulary I'm studying.

After class I took some photos, because sometimes the mundane is interesting.

Here are the boys "cleaning." The kid who is actually cleaning was on my team tonight. He was jumping up, breathing on the glass, then trying to clean it off before it disappeared. Unfortunately, I didn't get a good shot of it. Note Cocky's reflection in the mirror.

Cocky folding up his dobok after class.

I know it's of his back and not his face, but I liked the empty floor, the jacket. Something about it...

Master was doing something (that I don't want to describe) to this student's forehead with a red ballpoint pen. It made me see all of the people involved in a whole new light. Good or bad light, I haven't decided yet. Maybe just different. Oddly different.

After class, while I was folding my own doboks, Master called everyone in a circle to discuss tomorrow. They're meeting to hand out fliers. I will not be there, but I stayed around to listen to the plan-making and conversation. I rested my head on my hand because I was trying to work out something in my head. He must have thought I was bored. He said, "Oh, Amanda, you can—"

"I know. I'm practicing listening," I said in Korean.

He nodded, smiled, and went on. I was listening, not just for the major thing—9 o'clock, 10 o'clock—but for the other words like morning, afternoon, early, late, time and various Korean markers. And I heard them, or at least I heard more than I usually do. And it didn't take a lot of conscious translating.

Happiness.