Don't jinx it!
We’re a month into the Spring term. The number of foreign teachers had risen from six to seven, and the number of lessons I teach had dropped from six every day to six, five or even four depending on the day, though I had picked up the ‘Special’ class that meant I now had one later 9:05PM finish a week. For once I was on top of my work, and the new break times I had meant I wasn’t feeling the pinch to come in a little early to get report cards and lesson prep done.
“I don’t want to jinx it” I told one of my new colleagues, “but it’s been a chill month so far.”
Oops.
On Friday myself and two other guys who work on my floor were called in for a meeting with the manager. It turns out that one of the new foreign workers, let’s just call him O, had been clashing with other members of staff from the start, and today would be his last day. As a result of which, she was very sorry to say, we would all have to pick up the slack by taking over his lessons. My new break times on Monday, Wednesday and Friday will be replaced by a lesson, and I’d now have not one but two late finished due to an extra two-hour lesson being tacked onto the end of my Thursday. It’s a lesson I haven’t taught before, which means I have to go through another bout of training to teach it properly.
It was definitely a surprise to me. I’d found O an amiable presence with no hint that anything was up. Despite him having the classroom next to me I didn’t see him for that last day, as we usually have the doors to our classrooms closed. Though as he’s also a member of the Busan Chess club I may still see him again if he decides to stick around in Busan. I almost went this afternoon but instead I have yet another cold that I suspect I caught from my students. I knew the kids in that last class sounded like they were far too sick for school!
I’m also playing O over chess.com and have subscribed to his Youtube channel. I just saw that a few hours ago he released a video to say he’d been fired from his job in South Korea (no, I’m not going to link to it!) so I could easily click on it to hear his side of the story. Is it strange that so far I haven’t felt the temptation to do so? Nor to ask anyone else at work for more details of what went down? Just leave me neutral and out of it.
The next few weeks is going to suck with the increased workload, but ultimately it’s just a temporary problem until a replacement is found. At another time in my life it might have seemed like something worth getting upset over, but I have much more important concerns right now (cryptic I know, all will be revealed in time). As I said to my co-worker with what I hoped sounded like a sufficiently stoic attitude, “it is what it is”.
And that's all there is to it.
“I don’t want to jinx it” I told one of my new colleagues, “but it’s been a chill month so far.”
Oops.
On Friday myself and two other guys who work on my floor were called in for a meeting with the manager. It turns out that one of the new foreign workers, let’s just call him O, had been clashing with other members of staff from the start, and today would be his last day. As a result of which, she was very sorry to say, we would all have to pick up the slack by taking over his lessons. My new break times on Monday, Wednesday and Friday will be replaced by a lesson, and I’d now have not one but two late finished due to an extra two-hour lesson being tacked onto the end of my Thursday. It’s a lesson I haven’t taught before, which means I have to go through another bout of training to teach it properly.
It was definitely a surprise to me. I’d found O an amiable presence with no hint that anything was up. Despite him having the classroom next to me I didn’t see him for that last day, as we usually have the doors to our classrooms closed. Though as he’s also a member of the Busan Chess club I may still see him again if he decides to stick around in Busan. I almost went this afternoon but instead I have yet another cold that I suspect I caught from my students. I knew the kids in that last class sounded like they were far too sick for school!
I’m also playing O over chess.com and have subscribed to his Youtube channel. I just saw that a few hours ago he released a video to say he’d been fired from his job in South Korea (no, I’m not going to link to it!) so I could easily click on it to hear his side of the story. Is it strange that so far I haven’t felt the temptation to do so? Nor to ask anyone else at work for more details of what went down? Just leave me neutral and out of it.
The next few weeks is going to suck with the increased workload, but ultimately it’s just a temporary problem until a replacement is found. At another time in my life it might have seemed like something worth getting upset over, but I have much more important concerns right now (cryptic I know, all will be revealed in time). As I said to my co-worker with what I hoped sounded like a sufficiently stoic attitude, “it is what it is”.
And that's all there is to it.