What a week!

This week has been a very long week, tomorrow I have what I sincerely hope will be my last open class in Korea. This time both Korean and Native English Speaking teachers are coming along. You would think that seen as this is my fifth open class I would be less nervous - but that's not the case at all.

My co-teachers and I made a seriously cheesy video to go along with the lesson too - if I can get a copy of the video I will post it here. I'm sure Rich and the other native teachers that are coming along will find it hilarous.

Because of the open class and all sorts of other work that has piled up on me (I still have to plan a 1 week summer camp for my extra class and I am not sure where I will find time to do that!) I am incredibly tired right now. The humid heat of the Korean summer isn't helping - although I would take the heat of this summer over a Wellington winter any day!

I also had some bad news in regard to our summer trip to China.

Any foriegner living and working in Korea you must apply for an Alien Resident Card (ARC) to show that you can legally work here and have the correct visa.

I have been in contact with a Korean travel agent over the past little while to book our trip, the agent asked me yesterday how much longer our ARC's were valid for as the Chinese Government is now refusing to grant visa's to foriegn workers from South Korea if their ARC is due to expire in less than six months.

Because our contract finish on 31 August our ARC's will expire on 1 September so we cannot get Chinese visa's and we cannot travel to China.

I feel so disappointed about this, I'm not sure why this decision has been made by Chinese customs either? I have had my heart set on going to China again since winter and I just feel so bummed out about it.

Rich and I have to replan our whole summer vacation which sucks a lot seen as we were hoping to book flights this week. I think now we will go from Vietnam to Hong Kong then back to Korea but I am really not sure - I will keep you all posted. One thing is certain - I will be going to Hong Kong!

However, this week hasn't been all bad, for one thing I got to be a judge an English Language Speech contest. I heard speeches about everything from deep sea creatures, the perils of having little sisters, The Korean War, how Korean can become a multicultural society and the joy of the jijilbang's.

It is incredible how well some of these kids can speak in English, especially the younger kids that are only 8 or 9 years old. I was seriously impressed.

Also, for those of you who don't know, Rich and I are planning on moving to Taiwan later this year. Our contract's will expire here in Korea on 31 August, after that we will go home for a week or two (or possibly longer depending on the new jobs). Then's it's off to live in Taiwan with all kinds of new challenges and adventures.This week, I had a really positive skype interview with a very large Taiwanese school and a couple of other recruiters are also very interested in me. So here's hoping I will have a new job soon!