Oh! My Land!

I've been doing some teaching over the summer to keep busy, and the past two days Andy and I have been working with a kids camp at a place called Oh! My Land! Yesterday we went there, ate a meal with the kids, and then were told that we would watch their singing, acting, and dancing performances, and then judge the competition.

Before that, though, the leader said that we would have 20 minutes for conversation with the children. I thought that meant talking to some kids one-on-one. It turns out it meant that Andy and I would stand up in front of 50 little kids (with minimal English) and try to come up with things to say for 20 minutes.

It took about 3 minutes to get past introducing ourselves and asking them their ages. An actual spotlight came on us as Andy and I looked at eachother and realized we had no clue what to say. Though we had just shared a meal with them, Andy asked "Have you eaten dinner?", which, in his defense, is a good conversation question in Korea. Andy started listing off the things we had eaten...rice...kimchi...bulgogi...grapes, while I racked my brains for possible ideas.

I finally decided that we should just sing a song, so we decided to teach them "If You're Happy and You Know It". Soon the leader strapped a microphone on me, and tied a speaker around my waist as Andy and I serenaded the group with clapping, stomping, and shouting hooray. It was a pretty good time.

Nevertheless, we learned that working with kids isn't so much our forte--thank goodness for kids songs.