One Day Left

The day was insane, but in a good way. There was a never-ending stream of kids into the teachers' room to give me cards and gifts. Only one day of work left--I can't believe it. So far no tears, but I don't know how much more I can take!

Mona helped him, but Tomas wrote:

Dear Beth teacher
Hello Beth
America live Beth to Beth I love Beth
Thank you for teaching me. Don't forget Korea and don't forget
Tomas. My Beth Don't forget USA Beth. a gain meet good bye to your home town bey Beth I love you and Monna take Beth to your homtown surpereg bey pretty (heart) Beth (heart) (Tomas' name in a heart) I'm miss you
From Tomas (another heart)

He obviously hasn't learned punctuation yet! He's one that barely knew the alphabet when I started teaching him--how far he's come! (Me patting myself on the back) He still has his moody days, but has the potential to develop a really high level of English (he's in the 3rd grade now).

The other cards and letters were similar: "I love you," or "I'll miss you," or "Thank you," or "Don't forget me." I wager they'll have me crying before I leave tomorrow. I was pretty close after reading all of the cards from Mona's class!

Mina's 2 PM class (Kate, Danny, Maria, Penny, Clint) came to say goodbye again, with fake tears. At 3 PM the four girls (3rd grade) had gifts for me, and happily received their gifts from me. Ask and you shall receive! They're one of the few classes that asked for gifts, and it's small enough that I could do it. I told them that I didn't buy gifts for the other classes, so it was a secret. I worried about what to buy, but little girls like anything pretty; they were happy with the rings. Ally gave me a pen and a picture frame with a picture of her on the beach; Cindy gave me lip gloss (which Jenny put on me, then they tried out, then they put more on me--I know, Mom, not very sanitary) and a Harry Potter pen; Ju-young came back to school later to give me lip gloss, a cell phone accessory, and a hair band. We did absolutely no study from the book, just talked in an odd mixture of English and Korean. Ally and Jenny performed a play for me that they'd made up before class. Jenny played herself and Ally played me, and it consisted of Jenny begging Ally not to go to the USA and trying to go with her, but then finally saying goodbye. Then when she was 20 years old she came to the USA to see me and I was pregnant and she had to help me to the hospital. I'll miss their silliness.

Later in the day Elaine and Sera (from Mona's class) returned to school with gifts for me: a hair pin, artificial flowers, and huge hat. Mona liked the hat, so I gave it to her--is that terrible? I told her not to tell Sera. It's just too big to get home without squashing it beyond recognition.

The other crazy part of the day was the speaking tests. Even with the big classes I was able to get most of the students finished. I should be able to finish in the 10 minutes between classes tomorrow. I practically ran over to the photo shop to have the pictures developed, then have reprints made so I can give Ally, Jenny, Cindy, and Ju-young their picture tomorrow. I expected the reprints to take longer; the man had me wait, which put me back to school late. Oops! On my next-to-last day when Mr. Kim was there, too!

Mr. Kim signed the letter of recommendation that I wrote for myself, as well as using his name stamp. I had hoped that he wouldn't really look at it, but he read it all. It's embarrassing to "toot your own horn," as Tanya put it. I was busy later and he had to leave so he had Lisa (the secretary) give it to me. She also gave me some school envelopes--that's a nice touch. Matt suggested that perhaps I should have Mr. Kim sign more letters for me since most places want the original letter. I guess I could do that since I have to talk to him tomorrow to find out what to do about the apartment keys and to make sure he pays me early tomorrow so I can go on my 4 PM break and change the money into American cash.

The last adult class was awkward, as none of us was quite sure how to act. Melissa gave me a note and slippers, while Grace gave me a letter. Tanya later told me that Grace's daughter (the university student who Tanya is teaching a special one-on-one class to) called her this morning to ask how to spell my name. Tanya said it sounded like the daughter wrote the whole thing!