Graduation Day (and a ride in a police car)

Today was Graduation Day at Seosan Elementary. The Grade 6s are moving up to Middle School, while the kindy kids are moving up to... well, Grade 1, I guess.

It was a typical Korean ceremony - men in suits on stage, three different national anthems, endless speeches, bunches of flowers, but also a really different, and nice, graduation format.

Once the kids had all received their diplomas and awards and various gifts, they each, in turn, addressed a family member who was sitting behind them - or their homeroom teacher if, sadly, no family member was present - and said something along the lines of: Thank you, Mom/Dad/Grandma, for supporting me in my studies, I love you. Then, the parent would take the microphone and address the child... It was really really sweet. One of my students, Lee Sang-su, was addressed by his grandmother, and she seemed to be talking about Sang-su's mother - and he was crying, and she was crying, and it was just an interesting experience to have in a country where showing naked emotion is not always a part of the culture.

Song-min rocks his traditional man's hanbok

Little ladies: Kitten and the girl who always asks for a hug show off their very ornate hanbok

In a cute overload moment, the kindy kids, who were all in traditional dress, also addressed their parents. Kitten, who is only 4 years old, was way too shy to speak in the microphone (this is after she bounced up to the dias for her diploma), so her father picked her up and hugged her and she whispered in his ear... I mean, how cute is this?

The audience was made up of the Satan spawn Grade 5 class, and I kept them busy by taking their photos...

Oh suuuure... they look cute, but they are evil...

... and they can smell fear.

... Once the ceremony was over, I was free to go. The new school year starts on March 3, and I've got the next week and a half off. I've decided to use this "free time" to get my passport renewed. First step, was getting my photo taken....something which should have taken all of 15 minutes....

I got the pictures taken, and waited for them to be processed. They gave them to me (with a keychain with the same picture in it for free - how cool!), but I noticed that they'd been retouched - my skin was much lighter than natural, nice even tone... hey! That's not me! I told them that they would have to do it again, and showed them (again) the half-page of regulations that Canada asks for with passport photos, including very specific demands for size of photo, size of face, etc.... They brought me unretouched versions of the pictures, but the size was still wrong - Instead of head and shoulders, it was a full torso, with smaller head/shoulder shots where my head was too small (for regulations) and where it would have been impossible to stamp and sign the back.

Attempting to explain this proved nearly impossible - they didn't want to do the pictures again, and kept insisting that they were okay.... then again, they had photoshopped the first version! I mean, who changes a passport picture? It isn't even legal!

I decided to just ask for my money back (W25,000), which they refused. One of the ajosshis behind the counter just started ranting at me, and said that he would only listen if I spoke to him in Korean. Oooookay. I started again, "Munjae issoyo" (there is a problem) and he flipped out and shouted, "Munjae opsoyo!" (there is no problem), then walked away. Well, so much for Korean....

I walked out of the store and... the police station on the corner caught my eye.... Two minutes later, I was telling what happened to a dozen (I am not kidding... they must have been super-bored because everyone in the cop shop was listening with rapt attention) Korean police officers. One of them came back to the photo place with me and helped me get the pictures that I needed... but not before Mr Ihateforeigners ranted at me a few more times. Fingers crossed that the photos are acceptable to the Canadian Consulate.

Anyway, as we left the photo place, Police Officer Yu asked me where I was going now. And I was like, "Home". A minute later, I was in the front seat of a police car, getting a lift home.

My friend Helen in Suncheon used to call Korea "Uppy-Downy World", and she's 100% right. One second, you're enjoying a completely new experience... the next, you're baffled... the next, you're an 'ugly foreigner'... the next, you're treated to extreme kindness. I can't think of another place where stuff like this happens every day.