Smedals

I've started training for a 5k approximately 394 times since I was in university. Running a 5k has been on my to do list forever, but didn't tell anyone for fear of accountability. It wasn't that running ever really appealed to me. Oh no. It did not. Volleyball is my favorite sport because you don't run after that white striped ball. Nope, you just launch yourself across the floor. I'd rather sacrifice my body screeching across a wooden gym floor than run. See these long legs? Volleyball legs. Meant to be used as a springboard for my arms to block and spike. Running is not my thing. Never. It's not going to happen. And that's what I told myself every time I would fail at the running thing. It was always my excuse for not losing weight too. "If I started running, I'd probably lose so much weight. She started running and now look at her. That could be me." And then I'd sit down and eat chips or chocolate or cookie dough.

But then I came to Korea. Land of lifestyle change. I don't know why, but I tried again for the 395th time to train for a 5k. I downloaded the Couch to 5k running app and started training without telling anybody. Didn't want to fail and have people know! The horror. Then a friend and coworker told me she was running too. We are strictly non-runners. Yet, here we were. Running. Alone.
So we started running together. That was the beginning of September.
We ran our first 5k yesterday.
Booyah.


Night before race meal. Huge bowls of pasta. Mama, please don't judge the  tupperware bowl. I know you raised me better. After eating this, I read online that you're not supposed to have a huge bowl of pasta the night before. And I regret doing it. It sat in my stomach like lead the whole next day. 

Got up at 5:45 am to get the busses to the race location. Next race has GOT  to be closer. 

Pre-race

Pre-race Korean style picture

Finish line

It was extremely cold, and the wind was terrible.

Pre-race everyone stretches together here in Korea. 

No gun was used to signal the start of the race. Just this massive drum.

This was not "I'm in pain face",  just a "victory" face.

After race triumph picture.

We had support! 

And everyone gets a smedal.

Three weeks before the race, my friend and I joked about getting a cold before the race and how much that would suck. The next week we were both in the doctor's office. She had an ear infection and I had a sinus and ear infection. Breathing through my nose was all but impossible and our training halted.

The night before held no sleep for me as it was filled with nightmares of me missing the race. One was so real that I actually got up and sprinted, covers and all, across the room to change only to realize it was 3:30am.

There were only 3 foreigners running the 5k, so we were easily spotted, but people were so encouraging! A group of people were near the halfway point beating drums, waving flags, and cheering complete strangers onwards. It was beautiful. I loved the atmosphere surrounding the stadium  and felt like a minor celebrity because of all the "whoas" we got from Koreans. That's right. I'm running. I'm running past the guys in their Army running uniform, those guys who protect this country. Whoa indeed. 

The day of the race it was the coldest it had been all fall. The wind was brutal and against us in the beginning AND at the half way point it started to rain. I loved it. My first race included storms, wind, a mother of a hill at the end, and I still did it. Ran the whole thing. I didn't meet my original time goal because of the lack of training in the past two weeks. But it doesn't bother me so much because, like I said, I still did it. 

And I got a smedal.

Thank you to my friends who came to the race and supported me, and thanks to all the texts, kakaos, and Facebook love I received. Thank you for recognizing the effort it took to train for months, work really hard, and fight mental battles. It means more than I can say. I am beyond blessed with good friends and family.
I learned so much about myself during my training. I prayed before every run, knowing that I couldn't do it on my own and whatever glory comes has to be returned to the one who gave the strength and courage to do it. I can do nothing without the help of Christ. Every time I go for a run I am reminded of that. I am strongest when I am weak. May I always be weak so the Strongest of all can carry me. 

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go hang my smedal in my room. 

A Quitter

I used to teach high school. I used to make lesson plans that met state and county curriculum and criteria. I used to stay up late grading papers and projects. I used to make phone calls home when a student was being less than helpful. I used to worry about my students; if they were being abused at home, if they were eating, if they would lose it at school the next day. I used to wake up and wonder if I'd have to break up a fight at school that day.

That's what I used to do. Then I moved to Korea.
Now, I teach university students. I make lesson plans that meet only my criteria. I never stay up late grading papers. I answer kakaos and text messages from worried students. I only worry about my students passing the class. I have never thought about breaking up a fight or wondering if a student is going to harm themselves, others, or me in class.

And you know what?
I feel guilty. Like I gave up. I feel like I cheated somehow.
I know all of these absolutely phenomenal men and women in my home state who do.so.much. And while things only get worse for them (politics in education, pay, student behavior, testing standards, etc.) they still come in everyday ready for battle. They don't slack off. It's balls to the wall with them. They go home and worry about their students. They stay up late worrying about things they can't change. They face some dangerous kids everyday. The same kids who would scream "Don't touch me!" when I would touch their arm to wake them up, or the kid who shoved me out of the way to beat some kid's ass. (Don't worry. I grabbed that kid and had him pinned him to the wall before he could beat up anyone.)

And it wasn't always fight and defeat. There were wins. Big wins. Bigger than anything I've ever experienced in Korea or probably ever will again. Days when girls would come into my room at lunch to talk about boys (they never change), when the kid's grandma sent an email to me and my principals on Teacher Appreciation Day saying nothing but praise about me, and the day I got to tell kids who had never passed a state exam that they had passed, and not barely. Big wins people. Makes me want to run back to the classroom and join the ranks again.

But I know I won't. And I feel like a quitter. I know there are a few expats in Korea who were teachers before, and I wonder if they understand. Do they miss the classroom and those kids who you'd fight for? Do they wonder what happened to their old students; if they are even still in school? Do they walk home from their jobs, which is 5x easier than the one they left, and feel like they could be doing more? Do they think of their old co-workers or mentors and say prayers for them? Do they feel like they gave up?

But all of that everyday stuff that got in the way of teaching, of doing the thing we are so good at, and love to do, I hated it. I wanted to teach without politics. I wanted to travel and experience life outside of the usual. And truthfully, I didn't want to wake up dreading my drive to work everyday. I knew I had to make a change. The job was making me depressed and I absolutely hated teaching by the end of every week. And that wasn't me. I love teaching. I love it. I had to leave and take my skills somewhere else. Does that make me, and others like me, brave? Knowing that we wanted something different, and out of such a flawed system. Or did we quit?

Maybe the only way we could actually be quitters is if we came here to teach and stopped caring. Maybe if we were really quitters we wouldn't really be able to call ourselves teachers. But I'm still pretty proud to call that my profession. It's not what I'm doing for a couple of years abroad to pay off debt. It's what I do and I can't really quit.