Sticks, frogs, roomies, and paychecks.

Well, teaching is... interesting. It's harder and easier than I expected it to be - easier in that for the most part, the kids pretty much automatically accept me as an authority figure, so for the most part they're not too hard to manage. And harder in that the authority figure persona isn't exactly a natural fit for me, and I find it a little draining. Not as much as if I used the wooden clubs sitting beside the photocopier for their intended purpose - to threaten children with. (Just threaten btw, there's no actual corporal punishment at the school...) The draining aspect might also be attributable to the fact that I'm working quite a bit more than I'm used to, and seem to be a bit sick all the time... And there are some glaring exceptions to the not-too-hard-to-manage rule that I outlined above...

All in all though, it's pretty good. We got out first paycheck a little while ago, which was nice, and bigger than we were expecting, given that it included only the first couple days of teaching at the end of October, and a couple weeks of making flashcards before that at 60% pay.

We have a new roomie until the end of the month - her name is Leah, and she's a philosophy grad and a Ween fan, so what can I say... She's from Toronto, and she's very cool, which is good, since we've only met one other group of foreigners since we've been in Paju - check Amie's blog for our first impressions of them. Leah's getting her own place at the end of the month when her boyfriend comes, so it'll be Amie and I with a spare bedroom again, just waiting for some visitors to get their asses out here :)

Our place is basically all set up now, except for some curtains. We even went all out and got a frog-shaped humidifier... It keeps a vigilant watch over the kitchen, with steaming eyes. All we need now is a pool table and we're set!