Sunday, September 28, 2008

Milk School!

Every day at around 11:00 one of the Korean staff comes by our classrooms with little cups of milk for the kids. Inevitably, one or two children will say "Teacher, my no milk," at which point the milk-deliverer will plead with the child in Korean until they finally take a half-cup.

In an apparent effort to make milk seem fun and delicious, we took a field trip on Friday to Milk School!



The school got us there (about an hour-long ride) in a pretty fancy bus. The kids were pumped to go see the cows.





Of course, organizing over 100 kindergarteners is no easy task, but being super-teachers, we were able to handle ourselves and them quite well :)



They got to take a tractor ride:


And milk a cow:






At one point during the cow-milking presentation, the guide asked the kids a question in Korean, to which all of my students responded by chanting "EmilyTeacher! EmilyTeacher! EmilyTeacher!" This was extremely frightening. I didn't know if he just asked who they wanted to sacrifice to the cow, or who was the coolest teacher :) I found out later that he asked "Which teacher do you think would be the best at milking the cow?" Apparently my kids know I'm from Kansas :)

But really, this was my first time milking a cow:


Then we went to this room where the kids got to make and eat homemade ice cream!





It was at this point when I realized I really don't care much about germs anymore. I had at least 6 different kids feeding me ice cream out of bowls over which they had sneezed, coughed, and not-washed-their-hands-after-milking-cows. Which now sounds disgusting, but at the time, it was just my kids showing me they love me :)

After lunch (SIDENOTE: Lunch was ridiculous. The kids all packed a lunch, and HOLY COW. I remember in gradeschool, when your mom packed a lunch, it was a sandwich, small bag of chips, maybe an apple, and Capri Sun (if you were really lucky, it was a can of soda). These kids had boxes and boxes of food: Gimbap, fruit, chocolates, sandwiches, veggies, two drinks, etc etc. It was nuts)

Ok - anyways, after lunch, they got to bottle feed baby cows and give some hay and grains to grown-up cows (the stink was horrible at this barn!)


Then we left, and I and most of my kids fell asleep on the bus ride home. No rest for the weary, though, as we had to immediately run upstairs and start teaching our afternoon classes. LCI showed us some appreciation and delivered iced coffees to us as we were teaching. It was a really nice gesture, and delicious coffee.

Ok, much more to blog about - soup adventures and live music and Itaewon - STAY TUNED!!!

Love you all!

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Was that a real cow you were milking? It looked so fake! That's crazy. Anyway, not to sound...weird, but aren't most Asians lactose intolerant? I know I'd be all like, "Emily Teacher, my no milk!" and if you made me drink it anyway, it wouldn't be pretty :) OK. Love you. And thanks again for the birthday wishes!!!

Emily Lucille said...

Michele - that was a real cow. I know this for a fact because I tried to pet it, and it slammed my hand between its head and the metal post - I still have a scab on my hand to prove it :)
And yeah - i'd heard about the lactose intolerance thing to... Not sure why it's pushed so hard - maybe LCI has stock in a dairy place :)

Anonymous said...

I wanna go on a milk field trip!!! How cool is that?! Sounds like a total blast! From recycling plants to cow farms, I want to go to your school! Or at least send Jordan there! And I bet I could pack a pretty tasty super lunch, too! Did you feed a baby cow with a bottle? LOVE YOU!

Anonymous said...

You look so cute milking that cow! I never wanted to drink milk, my mom would ask me if I did when I came home from school. I understand their aversion, but I could definately go for some homemade ice cream!