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MeLiSsAiM
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Name: Melissa
Birthday: 5/20/1984
Interests: playing piano, teaching, sleeping, children, watching korean videos/movies
Expertise: being Miss Im
Occupation: Student
Industry: Education/Research
Message: message meEmail: email me
AIM:  xkoreangirlx
Member Since:
11/24/2002
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| Naughty kid and Naughty parentThis year I have been blessed and my kiddos are sweet, respectable, and just a great bunch! I haven't had much behavioral issues and the parents have been nothing but supportive! I did get a new one this week and he on the other hand is a handful with no ounce of structure in his 5 years of life. It's his first time EVER in a public school so he's having difficulty following directions, sitting still, and how to be social with other kids. Anyway, I encountered for the first time today a situation where I tried to restrain a child. She wasn't a child in my class (thankfully) but I was the one who was dealing with her during recess because I was one of the teachers on duty. There have been lots of crickets out on the grass lately and the kids have been going crazy catching them and trying to smoosh them with their feet. Well we made a rule about no picking up the crickets and killing them and told the kids about it. So today I saw some kiddos trying to catch crickets. I went over and warned them not to touch or catch them. Sure enough, I look again later on and those same kiddos are playing with it again. I asked the two kiddos to go stand out in timeout for not following directions. One student went his way to timeout, the other one did not. So I yelled to her in a loud voice so she could hear me that she needs to go stand in timeout. Well she saw and heard me loud and clear but still chose to ignore me and went her way. I looked at her and called her by name this time and told her to come to me immediately. She just stood there and did nothing. So I started my way towards her and then she started to move further away. Then, as I got closer she started to run away from me and thought it was funny. (I could hear her giggling and saw her smiling.) Well I wasn't about to let her get away with it so I chased after her and finally caught her. As soon as I caught her, she pitched a fit and tried to pull away from me. I did not want her running away from me again so I pulled her back to me and she kept pulling herself away from it. It was like a tug of war for what felt like 5 minutes. I was getting worn out by the pulling and tugging but fortunately the assistant principal came to my rescue and tried to talk to her and calm her down. People who were driving by the street saw what was going on and literally stopped to see it. They probably thought I was a psycho teacher who was hurting the child. Anyway, that student's teacher called her mom to let her know about her temper tantrum and what happened at recess. Instead of being concerned about her child's temper tantrum, she wanted to know why her child could not play with the crickets.  Seriously, sometimes the parents cause more of a headache than the students themselves. No wonder her daughter throws a fit, no wonder her daughter doesn't follow directions and thinks it's ok to ignore what the teacher says. It's not even the student's fault why she is the way she is. It is her mom's fault for not disciplining the child and letting her do whatever she wants. Ugh... if only parents would do their job of disciplining their child and making sure they go the right way, we teachers would have less headaches and white hairs. I just needed to vent! That's all. | | |
| What's wrong with my body?This past week I broke out in hives for the first time because of who knows what. I'm not exactly sure what caused it but I think it's because of the Trail Mix that I ate the day before. Well it lasted for a few days and it was totally gone by yesterday. Well today I thought "ok my hives are gone and I'm back to my normal self". Boy was I wrong... I got food poisoning for the first time! I think it was the pork bulgogi that caused it. Perhaps it wasn't cooked all the way. I'm glad I didn't finish all of it that was on my plate. I'm not sure if I ever want to eat church food again or even eat pork bulgogi. I just hope I don't experience anymore of this again within the same week! Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh  | | |
| So initially we were supposed to have our regular young adult service and a prayer meeting afterwards for the VA tragedy but I received a voicemail saying that it got canceled. I called back one of the members at my church and asked her why it got canceled and she said someone (or it could be more than 1 person.. I don't know.) put a newspaper article about the VA shootings on our church van windshield and wrote "A Korean killed Americans. Why?" At first I thought they vandalized our van by egging it and breaking the windows but I heard the van was fine except there was a message on the windshield. Our pastor decided it would be wise to cancel the service for the sake of our safety since we do have it much later in the evening. I also heard Dallas Korean Schools canceled classes temporarily just to be cautious of the "backlash". Now I can sort of understand how the Muslims might have felt after 9/11. So far I haven't experienced any "backlash" at my work thankfully even though I'm the only Asian teacher at the school. However, one of my former parents asked me where I was from when he ran into me in the hallway. As soon as he asked me that question, I started to feel a little nervous because it was the following day of the VA tragedy. So I initially thought he asked me that because he wanted to know if I was a Korean. Well, he told me he was going to China the next day with his wife for a vacation and wanted to know if I was Chinese. After he said that, I felt kind of silly for actually fearing a "backlash". However, now I feel like maybe my feelings of fear are legitimate after hearing about the message that was posted on our van and the stories of "backlashing" in other Korean communities. I just find it sad that these things are actually happening and hope that it will subside soon. | | |
| North Korea MissionToday, we had a special guest speaker named Dr. Hyun Sik Kim at our church to share his testimony. He is a defector of North Korea, who fled the country in 1993 and was actually a private tutor of Kim Il Sung's children for 20 years. Not only that, but he was a professor at Pyongyang University (which is like the Harvard of N. Korea) and served in the N. Korean army during the Korean War. Having said that, I was very much looking forward to hear him speak about his experiences since I found out about it.
I've definitely heard of the conditions in N. Korea about the people suffering from starvation, lack of medicine, and government oppression, etc but I think it was more moving for some reason (sadly) to hear it directly from a person who experienced it. It's almost as if I didn't really believe that these things were happening until I heard him speak today. He shared how Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il are really revered as "God" in the country and even created their own version of 10 commandments of how they should be revered. When he was sharing about the suffering of the children and people due to poverty, he became very emotional and started to silently cry. Of course I was intrigued and moved to hear about all these things, but I think I was more blessed to hear him share how God guided and protected him every moment of his life to use him today in order to increase awareness of N. Korea. He humbly acknowledged so many times that he is where he is today because of God and not by his own strength. For example, during the war, he got shot in the head (ironically, right after this woman prayed for him) and the bullet somehow missed the brain. However, because of his injury, he no longer had to fight in the war and instead acquired an opportunity to teach in the university as a professor, which later opened the way for him to escape the country. His story was so dramatic and incredible and it was very clear that God allowed everything in his life to happen for a reason. Before he closed with his testimony, he sincerely asked that we pray for the people in N. Korea and the underground churches/Christians that are putting their life at risk for their faith. As I've mentioned earlier, all the things that are happening in N. Korea really "didn't hit home" until today. Being the selfish person that I am, I just kind of thought of it as "Oh... that's sad and heartbreaking." and moved on without really praying for them or even feeling the urgency to try to help them. However, now that I've heard it with my own ears of his testimony, I do feel the desire and need to pray for the people and the nation and I hope that other Christians would join in as well. I mean to be honest we do have it so easy and luxurious here and the least we could do for them is to pray. Maybe one day, if God willing, I can go there for a mission trip.
I know this is really ironic, but did you know that Kim Il Sung's parents were devout Christians and he actually went to church and even served in the choir when he was young? I just thought that was very interesting. | | |
| I have a question that I've been pondering about. I wanted to know what you guys thought so here it is. Do you think God "destined" us for certain things in our lives like school, career, who you get married to, etc or is it simply our choice? Hmmm.... I don't know if my question makes sense. Anyway, hope you guys have a happy Friday!
Edit: The reason why I ask this question is because this is what we discussed about during bible study last week . My pastor basically said the only thing that God predestined is our salvation... other than that, the rest of the things that happen in life are the results of our choice. He said that God gave us free will so we would not be a robot. I don't know.. I guess I was just confused because I can't tell how much of it was really based on my choice. For example, I did NOT want to come to UT for college. UT was the last place I wanted to go but circumstances forced me to choose UT even though I did not want to go there. Do I regret coming to UT? No I do not. I'm actually thankful I came to UT even though I didn't want to initially because I met many wonderful people and an awesome church. People in Dallas actually noticed that I've matured in my faith and saw a difference in me because of that. So when I think and reflect on that, it seems pretty clear to me that God wanted me to be in Austin and He opened the way so that it would happen. So how much of it was really based on my choice? Umm.. I don't know. Yes, I do believe we are capable of choosing (obviously) but I also believe that "everything happens for a reason". | | |
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