My ESL Students Made Me Laugh (#1)

And what they taught me about friendship in Korea.

What started as an article of just three stories quickly ballooned out of control. Over my almost 4 years in Korea, I met a lot of different students.

Turned out, that my students were hilarious.

Instead of publishing a giant 20-minute read, I’ll make each story its own post. They’ll be part of a series but in no particular order.ㅤ

Way #1: Hitting each other all day long.

I don’t mean to exaggerate, but my little 3rd to 6th graders would literally turn into Hulks and clobber each other every day. (And by literally, I mean figuratively.)

Basically, they hit each other a lot.

When someone did something dumb, they got hit. When someone lost a game, they got hit. When they were laughing, they hit each other.

These incredibly violent children would beat each other to pulps all day long. From the time they got up for breakfast to when they went back to the dorms, they’d hit each other and laugh and laugh.

You might see a lot of characters hitting each other if you watch Korean dramas. Could that be why the kids hit each other? Or do the characters hit each other because that’s normal?ㅤ

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When I was a new teacher, I would tell them to stop. No one ever stopped. Eventually, I realized that it was all in good fun and no one minded. It was always on the back or on the arm, never in the face. It was also only between friends. Even Korean adults did it. It’s more affectionate than it would be in the States. As long as it didn’t escalate, I left it alone.

Other lands, other customs. When in Rome, eat the pasta. When in Seoul, beat your friend’s ass. And laugh about it.

By now, you must have this image of these big, tough elementary behemoths with huge muscles and category-5 hurricanes for eyes.

They looked more like this:

Like little cuties.

Even though they’d turn into professional boxers on a daily basis, they were all friends, and no one got hurt.

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Until someone did.

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At least once a month, a student would come to me asking to go to the Nurse Room. We didn’t have a nurse, just a room with two beds for unwell students to lie in, plus a bunch of medicines and first-aid supplies.

“Why, what’s wrong?” I would ask, not expecting anything serious since they weren’t crying.

90% of the time, they would hold up their hand and say, “Pi!” (“피” means “blood” in Korean.)

I would look down and see half a hint of an injury. A little scratch. Perhaps a ripped-off hangnail. Usually, it wasn’t even actively bleeding. And it was never caused by the MMA-type behavior above.

If they were crying, if I could see blood, or if it was a paper cut, I would take it very seriously and give them the best first-aid I could offer. Paper cuts hurt. But normally, these injuries were not paper cuts or any other disaster.

Once, a girl gripped her finger so tightly that it was like she was willing the blood to come out. But all I could see was a tiny, red dot.

“Okay, let’s go to the Nurse Room,” I’d say with an eye-roll/chuckle on the inside. I’d wrap their gaping flesh wound in a band-aid and send them back to class.

I want you to remember what I described at first. Remember the boxing champions I talked about at the beginning?

I want you to imagine a little mini-Mike Tyson coming to you with a scratch and asking you for a band-aid. This is after he just K.O-ed fifteen people in a row with a grin on his face.

Maybe they just wanted to skip class for a moment, maybe they just wanted extra attention, or maybe they were really in pain. It’s just interesting when they choose to go to the Nurse's Room and when they choose to laugh.

When you travel to Korea and people-watch, do not be alarmed if you see friends hitting each other. They’ll do it with a smile, and if you become their friend, they’ll hit you too. ❤

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If you enjoyed this story, there’s another here!