So, today is my last official day of CLV (Concordia Language Village) orientation. I got here last Sunday and we will pack up and leave for our camp site tomorrow afternoon.
I'll be working at Sup Sogui Hosu (again) as a Samulnori drumming teacher and counselor. So, before we get to camp we have CLV orientation. Our session had 5 villages (camps) here: Korean, Spanish, Japanese, Arabic, and French. We have whole group meetings as well as individual camp meetings.
We have breakfast from 7:30-8:30 and then various meetings throughout the day until 10ish at night. I think the earliest I went to bed was 1am this entire week. Ugh.
The whole group meetings range from everything from health and safety to conflict resolution strategies. Some of them were helpful and interesting, especially in relation to my education degree, and some were extremely boring...
Our individual site meetings were with all the Korean camp staff. The meetings were all conducted in Korean... wow. at times I was sure my head was going to explode. It was pretty overwhelming and I felt bad because I think it seemed like I wasn't really contributing, but by the time I figured out what was being said and came up with my own thoughts or ideas the moment was long past... Plus, our camp site has a total of 6 other children under the age of 6, so they were often running around (literally) in the middle of the circle of people, which was rather distracting. They were so cute, I would watch them and then realize I wasn't listening anymore. But by that time, I was way lost on the direction of the discussion.
However, we also did fun things (in Korean) like learn new songs and dances, play new games that we plan on teaching villagers, and create skits.
We did have a fun adventure in Bemidji on Thursday. We wanted to go see the movie Inception but our meeting didn't end til 9:45ish. So, we got to the theater about 20 min. after the movie had started. We got there and the doors were locked. There were 8 of us! A few girls knocked on the windows and the girls inside sat there eating popcorn and ignoring us. Finally, a guy came to the door and told us that their ticket machines shutdown at 10pm. What! That's what we get for being in Bemidji. So, we ended up at Applebees.Then we took Bob the construction cone around for a photo shoot in Bemidji.
Overall, its been a fun although tiring experience. I think the immersion aspect of orientation made it rather stressful but also good. At least this time I'm getting paid for doing language immersion instead of having to pay for language immersion.
*pics will come soon
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