The Sad King and Other Stories

I've been feeling a little under the weather lately--low-grade fever, touch of bronchitis: a cold. Not bad enough to stay home, but enough to make me sleep for four or five hours when I get home. Fortunately, we're only working half-days during camp. And tonight I woke up tonight feeling much better, so I'm blogging at you from Chicken Mania with a cold ... beer.

About a block from school, a Hansot diner has opened up, which sells snacks and meals--with meat in them!--for cheap. So add it to the bakery, the Toast shop and kimbap nara as snack shacks. I thoughtfully photographed for you, dear readers, the lunch I picked up today: rice, hamburger, two small pieces of chicken, pork cutlet, spoonful of macaroni salad, pickled radish slices, kimchi, sauce, noodles (hidden under the meat), disposable wooden chakarak--all that for 3,000 W!


Camp is going okay. Today, I had each class draw their desks into a circle and played some circle games. To warm up:
1) 1st person names a country; second person must name a country whose first letter is the last letter of previous one; etc. Keep going until it's played out. Repeat with animals, movie stars, whatever you like.
2) "I'm fine. How are you?" Same idea except each player must think of a new adjective to describe himself/his mood. The best one was, "I'm refined." The most honest was, "I'm sleepy." All this is leading up to:
3) Story Circle: I start with a sentence that begins a story, e.g., "Once upon a time, there lived a king in a large castle who had a large kingdom with many subjects ... but he was very sad." Or, "The small boy hid shivering under the covers as the wind whistled outside his bedroom window." Each player must add a new sentence to the story. But not a sentence that could be a logical ending. As the leader, you have to be willing to step in and point out when a new line contradicts what has been established (in other words, the student was not listening or processing the information).

Now, the "advanced class" excelled at this. The King had a contest to find a wife, and the tale was humming along until one kid decided that the beautiful woman who won the contest was really a man. I mean, where do you go from there? Well, the next guy had to make him into a burglar with designs on the king's fortune, but it went downhill. Then the bell rang.

On the tube right now, here in the hof, is the Korean version of The Gong Show. Only there's no gong. And not much show.