Well, at least when they’re not fucking whiners.
I learned something today, instead of just teaching. Korean kids are a lot tougher than the current crop of American kids. When I was home last summer, the kids I saw weren’t how I remembered kids being when I was one. Yes, our memories change over time, and lots of people have an over-idealized version of their childhood, but I don’t think that’s the case here. Most of the kids I encountered last summer were over-indulged, whiny little maggots.
And those were the good ones.
Korean kids, in contrast, are used to some structure in their lives, being told “no,” and understand that they are children and should therefore be left out of the decision-making process.
They’re also not afraid to go out and have fun with whatever’s available to them. No need for a PS2 or a Gameboy, let’s just go find something to play with.
Case in point: yesterday I played baseball with four of my students using a piece of wood for a bat, four more pieces of wood for bases and a crushed soda can for a ball.
And you know what? It was fun!
Now, I’m not suggesting that American parents send their kids rooting through the trash for things to play with, but I’d imagine a good number of suburban soccer moms would be horrified if they found out Skyler or Bethany had done such a thing.
My students didn’t worry about getting cut on the edges of the can (though nobody did) or getting a bit of a splatter from the last few drops of soda in the can when they hit it. There was a short bit of time before the next class and they wanted to make the most of it.Today we weren’t quite so ghetto in our sports equipment. Just the playing field.
One of my students brought a soccer ball today and wanted me to play with them. Sure, I can use the exercise. We headed over to the park half a block from school and I was surprised at their choice of playing field.
A stone pathway about 20 feet wide and 60 feet long. With big stone columns right at the edge every 15 feet or so. And trees in the area all around the walkway. Not really the best place for a soccer match, but what the hell.
We split up in to teams and got to it. Most of them were about as bad as me, but a couple were pretty good. It was pretty much full-contact soccer, with shoving, tripping and kids falling to the ground. (Note: I didn’t do any of that stuff intentionally, but did get tangled up on a couple of occasions and won out due to size and strength.) A few good tumbles happened, but everybody got back up and into the game right away. There were a few cases of grandstanding and calling for a yellow card, but I told ’em to get back up and play. No free kicks in this match. Then disaster struck.
Well, I struck.
I was the goalkeeper for my team and had two of the other team coming towards me with the ball. I got tangled with one and he went down. The other one got the ball and moved to get past me. I go the ball away from him and shot it back up the field to get it away from my goal. Unfortunately the other kid hadn’t gotten back up yet.
I drilled him right in the face.
Again, this was not intentional. I turned and kicked, and right when my foot hit the ball, I knew he was probably going to get pegged. Sure enough, he did. He stayed down and curled up. I went over to him to see how bad it was. He teared up a bit and stayed curled up for a good ten seconds or so, then bounced back up. He wasn’t pissed at me, but put on a show of it. (How do I know he wasn’t pissed? He was laughing when he accused me of doing it on purpose.) Besides, his team got a goal.
The ball had bounced off his face and rolled through my goal.
If I were teaching in the US, this could well have been a serious incident. (Not that it couldn’t have been serious here. He was wearing glasses, after all. I mean serious for what it was, not for what could have happened.) I’m sure there would be angry phone calls from parents and reprimands and whatnot, but that doesn’t really happen here. It was an accident, and everybody knows it, so why make a fuss out of it?
Plus, the kid was really cool about it. Everybody who was playing saw that it was an accident and had kind of a “yeah, stuff like that happens when you play sports” attitude. Which is precisely the attitude they should have.
I’m glad he wasn’t hurt, and I’m sure I’ll be invited back to play more soccer, or ghetto baseball, or whatever else they feel like playing. The reputation made today wasn’t one of “the mean teacher who hurts kids” but one of “the kid who took a shot to the face, got back up and kept playing.” I think that’s pretty fucking cool, and not just because it’s the best outcome for me.
Because it’s the outcome that’s supposed to come from an incident like this.