The Puzzle of My Life

Here it is the end of July already. I am perilously close to finishing my contract here. As of the moment of this writing, I am approximately 111 days away from stepping back onto American soil. Well...not soil per se, because they don't have open fields of dirt at LAX. But you know what I mean.

I'm doing my best to make these last days count. What can I accomplish for myself? What can I accomplish for other people? The guests of English Village? My co-workers? My boss? Etc. I really want to squeeze as much goodness into the remaining days as I can. I tell you this not only so you know what I'm thinking about, but so that you can encourage me to continue in this mindset.

In other news, I do know what I'll be doing once I return to California.

Starting on January 5, 2009, I'll be back in schools presenting interactive history programs for 4-6th graders. My experience in Korea, specifically with the kids, has reinforced my desire to work with kids in some capacity.

It started with camp (nope, not Disneyland--I didn't really work with kids there, and mostly the kids would just scream and whine, so I tended to avoid them).

Me at Disneyland, with mom and dad when they rode my Jungle Cruise--In 2004 I was invited to work at Idyllwild Arts Camp for the summer. I would be working with 13-15 year old boys. I thought it would be awful. But it turned out to be a highlight of my life. I returned every summer for the next 3 years.

Some awesome choir kids (Brett and Eric)--My awesome family for ALL my summers (except the first one because I arrived late)-- Hard at work (no...this was totally staged...I can't save anyone)--
Here you see I'm really not all that different from the campers--
From there, I worked with kids at the Mesa Arts Center in Mesa, Arizona. After moving back to AZ after camp that first summer (and after finishing my horrible experience at a tele-marketing company), I got a job as a teacher's assistant and substitute teacher at the beautiful, new, Mesa Arts Center. It was a very part-time thing, and I only worked a few days a week anyway. It was basically a summer day-care type program for kids interested in artsy stuff. They could take ceramics classes, improv classes, music classes, dance classes, acting classes, etc. It was a blast. Even though I was just an assistant (though I did teach a few acting/improv classes when the teacher was gone), I really bonded with the kids. One of the kids even invited me over to his house to play. It was hilarious. His mother was very nice and invited me for lunch--and then I literally played baseball in the backyard with some of the kids from the program. It was a very short, but very impactful experience.

Some of the kids I worked with; guess which one I got along with??? (duh, the kid making the face, that's Dylan)--Then there was Baton Rouge. Forgive me if you've already heard this story. During the summer of 2006, while working at camp, I met a group of teenagers from New Orleans. They'd lost their homes (and much of their life) in Hurricane Katrina the year before. After hanging out and talking with them for the two weeks of their stay in Idyllwild, I was invited by their sponsors (art therapists who had been hired by Rosie O'Donnell to work with the kids, and this trip to camp was part of their healing process) to join a group of workers in Baton Rouge, Louisiana (my birth state) to be present for the one year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Working not only with the teenagers at camp, but later the younger kids in Baton Rouge forever changed my internal understanding of life and education.

Looking official; notice the raindrops--I'd just helped save the side of this tent which had blown open due to the wind and rain-- The kids were working on art projects in the community tent--
Cute--
I promise I spent a LOT of time working--but here I'm clearly not...drinking my drink from Subway, scratching my head; the kids are showing their projects--
Then there was CWE. This company allowed me the opportunity to move back to California in 2006 (after I'd returned to AZ in 2004 after my first summer in Idyllwild). With my job, I traveled to hundreds of schools and did hundreds of programs for 4th, 5th, and 6th graders. In a year and a half, I got to work with some 12,000 kids. That's a lot. You could be a teacher for 300 years and not teach that many kids! Granted, I didn't get to spend an entire year with them, I only had 2 1/2 hours each time; but you get my point. I had the opportunity to influence, however small, lots of kids.

Some awesome 4th graders after the "Walk Through California"--And now Korea. Like Disneyland, this place is ultimately designed for kids. Adults sometimes like to learn English, too, but they don't usually like to pose for pictures with fuzzy characters like Hippokey, Doony, and the other weird characters at English Village. I've seen lots of kids here. I do have the opportunity to talk to many kids. Lots of kids see our shows.

Daniel and me (he speaks very good English, and is a regular visitor of EV)--I also get to visit kids at the group home/orphanage called Peacetown. Talk about an invaluable, life-changing experience. I just made my 5th visit this past Monday. We played games outside for the entire visit. I brought a frisbee and a beach ball--the ones I got free from buying boxes of various cereals. The kids had a great time outside, and they were rewarded with ice cream (we bought it). It was a great visit, like all the others. Natasha, my coworker who has spearheaded these visits, will be leaving at the end of August. Her contract is finished. From September through the end of my contract, I will be taking over. I will be emailing/calling Peacetown to schedule and plan our monthly visits. Natasha and I are the only ones who have gone EVERY time we've scheduled a visit. I'm looking forward to my small role in this entire thing; and as I've written before, if for no other reason, I am glad I came to Korea just to meet and visit with these kids.

What's remarkable about this entire Korea experience is that most of the kids do not speak English. It's funny, because I have all this various experience working with kids; and a lot of it doesn't even matter here.

Let's assume that I'm good at relating to kids. Who cares? It's a whole new game in Korea. If I say "I like your shirt" or ask "Do you like Mickey Mouse?" here...I get blank stares. The little tricks I learned in all my other experiences have not really helped me here. It's undoubtedly given me a foundation of how to relate to kids (getting down to their level to talk to them, especially if they're nervous or shy, etc.), but I've had to create new ways to get them to understand me.

Learning to communicate non-verbally is incredibly strange. Not necessarily difficult--but it's hard to measure whether you're successful at it or not. "Did the audience understand what I was asking because I spoke clearly or because my wild, animated movements helped them understand?" "Are they all talking over me because they just don't understand English and are bored, or am I not doing enough to captivate them?" It can be quite a headache.

All these experiences, as I've said, have simply reinforced my desire to work more with kids/youth. To some who know me best, this entire "working with kids" thing is hilariously bizarre. Had you asked me 5 years ago whether I'd want to work with kids, nearly exclusively, I would have laughed maliciously at you and then thrown paint at you.

But such is the journey of life...one which I hope I'm not close to finishing. There are many more blogs to write.