Tanbu Elementary School

Let me tell you about my school. This is where the bus drops me off every morning around 10:55am.

 I then have to walk down this absurdly long driveway. After about 5 more minutes of walking, I will have arrived at my school.

This is the front of my school and the playground. (It's rare to have any grass on the playground. Only the rich schools have it.)

I enter through here. It's in the back of the school. I have to duck when I walk in this entrance. I'm not sure why it's so small, because Koreans really aren't that short.

Ahhh the mighty principal's office. I've only been in here once. He actually has a really fancy message chair.

My wild first and second graders!!

A couple of fifth graders, third graders, and my Korean Co-teacher on the far right.

More third and fifth graders.

I finish teaching at 4:10 everyday. My bus comes at 4:15, so I get to run down this driveway everyday after school with a bunch of little Korean kids who have to catch the same bus.

STORY: One day after school, one of my third grade girls was swinging on the swing set. She had tied her backpack to it at lunch when she was swinging on it then. It was raining a little at lunch. Every time she went up on the swing, the knot got a little tighter.  Well it stopped raining. So all afternoon the knot was drying. It became very tight.
It was about 4:05pm (I got off a little early). I was walking by and all of these little children kept yelling "Tommy Teacher!! Help!!" So I walked over. It was clear that they were trying to untie this backpack. So I started to try to untie it. I could not. At 4:10 I began panicking, because the bus was coming soon, and there were 5 Korean kids yelling at me to hurry up.  At 4:14 we could see the bus coming. I finally got it loose and gave the girl her backpack. We all started sprinting for it down the long driveway. One of the first graders was too slow because his legs were only about 2 inches long. So I picked him up. I was running down this driveway with a small Korean child in one arm and a few other screaming Korean kids around me. I was most definitely laughing the whole time.