When I was young, our small town had a bike safety event for all the kids in town and a local bike shop from the next town over would give away a free bike. Every year I either they raffled off a new bike, and every year I never got picked. I came to realize that life just wasn't gonna be like that for me, and I'd just have to work and wait. Things were never just gonna fall in my lap.
But something about it always felt a little off. I used to think it was because I had been gifted many things: a great family, great friends, great wife, great dogs, great career, great experiences, etc. (also, I actually did win a $500 gift card once in a raffle, and in another raffle I won a deck of playing cards, and a distant relative once left me $900 in her will).
But, that explanation didn't seem quite right either, and I think tonight I finally realized what the lesson from that should've been:
You see, at the Richlandtown, PA annual bike safety event, there were like 50-100 kids all wanting that bike. Like any normal human, I had always assumed it was never in the cards for me to win that kind of thing. But the real lesson was that like most humans, it was never in the cards for the vast majority of us to win anything.
I had always thought it was a me thing, but in reality it was a "95% of us" thing. Most people don't win the lottery or get gifted cars/inheritances. For the vast majority of people, they have to work and wait.
The point I'm making isn't about the camaraderie. It's more about the fact that instead of always thinking things like "Oh, I'll never be the one to win at picking the next bitcoin", it's better to just realize that life is like that the vast majority of the time for most people, and that it's not specifically the universe singling me out. It's got much better things to do with its time than focus all its attention on me, but it's hard to realize that as a human.
In 2012 I was an ELL teacher for 5th and 6th grade, and in my class was a boy who's name was very similar to "Ari Mooshyar" but for privacy's sake we'll use this name.
The 6th graders got to go on a camping trip out in the desert, and the 2nd night we had a big campfire and told ghost stories. I don't know what came over me, but this poem just kinda wrote itself. I think it took me all of 20 minutes to write. Before I show you the poem, let me explain a little about Ari.
He was just a really lovely Iranian kid, and he really hated reading and he loved playing games and sports. That's basically it.
Also, Mr. Mayo is me, and the other students at the end are students I had.
Here's the poem:
Last year here at this very spot
Was a group of 6th graders just like you.
Something terrible happened to one of them,
So listen closely and learn, for this story is true.
The 6th graders showed up late Tuesday night.
Their tents were warm, and they went right to sleep.
But one little boy heard noises that night.
He heard whispers and whinings in the darkness so deep.
He knew he should stay in his tent. He must.
But he thought it was fine. He wouldn’t go far.
He crept out of bed and then heard his name. He stopped.
Then he heard it again: "Ari Mooshyar."
"Ari....." it said. But what was that it?
He wanted to know so he wandered about.
He thought that perhaps he'd found a new playmate.
"Play? Time to play?" He had to find out.
(Talking part) Now, you see campers, Ari's one weakness, his one fatal flaw, was that more than anything in the world - more than studying, or exploring, or learning new things; more than TV, candy, sleep, heat, comfort, water, juice...even more than Iranian food - Ari, sweet, kind, innocent little Ari, wanted only.....to PLAY!!!
But I digress.
Ari knew in the back of his mind
He knew that he should stay in his bed.
"Read a book. Go to sleep. No talking, no playing!"
Well, that's what his teacher, Mr. Mayonnaise, had said.
(talking part) Campers, if there's one thing you must understand about Mr. Mayo, it's that he really only had Ari's best interests in mind. He just wanted Ari to learn, and grow, and be the best little reader he could be. Because, as we all know, reading is super important. It's more important than TV, candy, sleep, heat, comfort, water, juice....even Iranian food. Well, maybe not Iranian food, but you get the idea.
Kind-hearted, wise, intelligent, clever, well-rounded, athletic, robust, slightly balding Mr. Mayo wanted only 2 things: for Ari to listen to him, and for Ari to love reading.
Digression complete.
And now, poor Ari, stumbling in the sand,
looking for someone or something to play with,
found a deep cave, right past that hill.
Inside? A ghost witch, with the voice of a sith.
"Play," it said. "It is your destiny."
Ari stepped in past the shriveled old witch.
And guess what he found! Every boy's dream:
A perfect replica of Manchester United's pitch.
Ari played long until morning came.
He never thought once of Mr. Mayo's wise words.
"Would you go home?" the ghost witch said.
"No, I want to play," Ari said. "Do you have any Nerds?" (note: Ari loved the candy Nerds)
One day, and then one more day passed.
And next, and next, and next, and then next.
Soon the ghost witch died and Ari finally stopped playing.
But when he tried to leave, he found a curious text.
Ari picked up the book. It was large, old, and black.
He turned the first page.....and then threw the book away.
"I don't like reading," he said, and then left.
He went back to the ghost's field, and played and played and played.
Ari never saw his mom, dad, brother, or Mr. Mayo again.
For in that black book was the secret way out.
But Ari hated sitting and looking at words,
So he's still stuck on that field, playing, no doubt.
So listen, dear camper, and learn the dark truth
Of a boy who didn't listen, or learn to love reading.
For this may happen to you one day soon,
Especially if your name is Momoka, Sultan, Lex, or Khalid.
Whenever I come across this poem in my files it always makes me laugh. I'm not sure if anyone else saw the genius in it, as a lot of the references were in there for me and my students, but it really was one of the times in my life where I just had a very strong urge to write something and it just kinda exploded out of me, almost as if I was simply the messenger.
Also, I think it was on or near April 1, so some of the teachers played a little joke on the kids and made up bogus "fun" activities that we spent 20 minutes doing:
I feel like there should be an art exhibit of pictures paired with ridiculous sayings people use without thinking. Something like this:
Everything happens for a reason π
And it should be repeated, cause people are stupid enough to think something like "Well, that one guy probably survived and went on to blah blah blah".
So you should just have image after image after image of horrible things, and under every image is the same quote to really drive home the point and prevent people from thinking that if it's just one person then it's ok.
Everything happens for a reason π
And it shouldn't be limited to just one subject like famine victims.
Everything happens for a reason π
It should just be picture after picture. It should be relentless.
I get lots of unprompted off-topic questions from my kids.
I think a lot of teachers hate that and try to redirect by saying things like, "That's a good question but we need to focus on blah blah blah so could you ask me after I explain blah blah blah?" I don't really like doing that.
Kids get bored and their mind wanders. Everyone does it. I think kids just have lower inhibitions so they act on it. They grow out of it eventually, whether Ms. Quentlan redirects their attention or not. Plus, while some might argue that it makes others lose focus, I actually think it's a nice palette cleanser or quick mental recess break. It takes away from the monotony.
Anyways, here's some samples from the past month or so.
Another kid: (in Korean) True, yeah, I saw your last name on our Quizlet (the app they use to study vocabulary).
Me: (in Korean) Yup, that's it. (in English) So, the first player is (spins wheel)...
#3 (This one happens a lot)
Me (gesturing to TV): (in English) Ok, next up is song time. (Pause as I open up the song list (see pic above))....
Random 3rd grade girl: (in Korean) Teacher, last week I went to my grandma's house and the cat there askfjh;as and so I sadklasdlkf;afkjla;sfd with my grandma and then the cat slkdafjhla;fsj and alsdkjhflasdfk so then I sdlkjhalsjdf salkfhlsak sahkalsk ashfdkajs asdfhlaskdj ashfkasd ashlkasdf hsas;fjas haslkjasl
Me: ::doing a mental countdown in my head to the time when I'll just cut them off automatically and continue the lesson::
Same kid: (in Korean) and so we went to the store asdlkf;jas;l sadflhl sadf hasdf ;asfhaksd sadhfklafds; sad;fhaskld
M: :: 6, 5, 4...::
S k: (in Korean) and I didn't know that the salkfj sadfjkhl; asdhasdf asdh;klasdf;lajsl;kasdfjaaslkasj;ladf
M: :: 2, 1::
S k: (in Korean) sadfkj;ladsjf asadf ;lsahjlas sad;fkljh;. (Looks at me expectantly for a reaction)
M: :: cancel mental countdown since the story is finished and strategize how exactly to react. Was it a funny story or interesting story? Random dice flip in my head foosh foosh foosh fooosh heads!::
M: Oh, wow! ::chuckle a bit just in case their story was supposed to be remotely funny:: Ok, the song is Here is the Beehive!
I have nothing to write about, but it's not really my fault.
Nowadays every week is a copy of the previous one. Monday-Friday we teach the kids, on Saturday and Sunday I sit around home and work on various little projects. Walk the dogs a lot. Listen to podcasts and audiobooks. Cook food. Wrestle with GERD (I haven't had a drink in months).
The pandemic and GERD really put a hamper in my social life. I don't really have many friends here, and lack the ability to make new ones due to a continual high focus on fixing my GERD. I've been fighting in for several years now, so I know the drill for the most part. I think I'm coming out the woods slowly but surely, yet until I'm out I can't really make plans with people or hang out (especially in Korea due to most Korean food being off-limits for me, and every social gathering being an excuse to get drunk).
But honestly I'm ok with my life right now. I do 2 minutes of thankfulness meditation every day, and there's a lot to be thankful for. I like my routine. I'm healthy enough to where I can start learning the piano again. I finished learning a more basic version of this song recently:
I don't have the equipment to record my version but maybe in America I can upload something.
I've started to learn coding again. Made a prime number finder the other day that looks something like this:
This program can find really big prime numbers, but my computer's too slow to actually find the prime numbers in a reasonable amount of time. That, and/or I just coded it inefficiently. But I tested it out with smaller numbers and it works alright:
I'm working my way through this book:
It's around 1200 pages long, and there are some online chapters that add on another 500 or so pages. My goal was to finish it by the end of this year but due to GERD I had to take a break for several months so I'm only on page 452 right now. I have yet to learn anything that will impress my wife - no graphics or anything that you can click on and move around.
We've been slowly working through the 12-step process to getting Song's visa ready.
Will we ever get to America? Who knows. WW3 could happen at any moment it seems. Covid seems to slowly be fading away, I guess. Everyone's mostly forgotten about it, but that's mostly just cause people are apathetic and not really because it's less of a problem.
I bought a shirt from Costco but I felt it was kinda big so I was trying to look at the tag on the back to see if maybe I'd bought a size too big. Song was next to me and quickly pointed out, "It's grande large. That's why it's too big!"
A long, long time ago back when tigers smoked and I had hair, it was my first year in Korea. I had just landed in the country a few months prior knowing absolutely no Korean, aside from the word for 'grass' which somebody had told me was 'ν' but even now I'm not really sure if that's the actual name for 'grass' as it's main meaning is 'glue' and usually people I think use 'μλ' for grass but...well, anyways, I didn't know anything.
I was a good little νμ though and studied a lot in my own free time and tried to meet with Koreans and learn about the culture (aka drink) and the language from them (aka go to 2μ°¨ with them, which just means more drinking).
After one long night out, I came home and thought to myself, "Hmm...I could really go for some bacon, eggs, and potatoes in the morning." But, I didn't have potatoes so I walked up to the local 24 hour convenience store that kinda sold a bit of everything. I looked around a bit but they didn't have any potatoes, though I could've sworn that I'd seen some the last time I was there.
I approached the lady who ran the store, a Korean lady in her 50s, and in the best Korean I could muster at the time, I said, "Do you have any namja?" (λ¨μ μμ΄μ?)
She tilted her head a bit and gave me a puzzled look. I was used to this as everyone's accent is atrocious when they first start learning Korean. I repeated the question. "Do you have any namja?"
She replied back to me something that I didn't understand, but her puzzled expression seemed to indicate that she didn't understand what I was saying. I thought about what I was saying. 'Do you' = 'Do you'. Check. 'Have' = 'have'. Check. 'Namja = potatoes'. Check. Grammar order reversed? Check. (Korean tends to have things a bit reversed for English speakers.)
Hmmm. I wondered if maybe I said the phrase slower and enunciated like I was talking to a very dim-witted senile old man who'd lost his hearing aids and relied on lip reading to communicate effectively. "Doooo yooooouuuuu haaaaavvvve annnnyyyy nnnnnnaaaaaaammmmmmmjjjjjjaaaaa?" I said. I tried to pronounce everything clearly while also trying to not sound like I thought she was mentally handicapped which was a hard balance to strike.
She looked at me and gave a fairly affirmative yet questioning, "No?" I could tell she was confused, yet she'd said 'no' so I started to turn around when...AAAAAHHHHHDammmmmiiitttt!
I turn around again and changed the last word from 'namja' to 'gamja': "Sorry sorry sorry sorry....Do you have any gamja?" She showed me where the potatoes were right away as I tried to not die from embarrassment.
There I was, at around 3 in morning, just a stone's throw away from a pretty big red light district, asking the owner of the convenience store repeatedly if she had any men. (namja = man, gamja = potato)
My students always get a kick out of that story when I tell it to them.
