Mind Your Manners

Last week my school took our 7-year-old students to the Marriott for a manners luncheon for the low, low price of only 40,000 Won per child. I don't know if I've ever spent that much money on a meal for myself, so it's not surprising that some of my students' parents weren't too impressed by the price tag. Luckily, that meant that my two most manners-challenged students stayed at home in protest and the event wasn't the gong show that I had initially pictured it might be with them there.

At the entrance there was a big ice sculpture made for our school.

At first I thought there were way too many forks on the table, but during the presentation I learned that they were supposed to be there.

Ryan didn't quite get the part of the presentation about playing with your napkin. I looked over and he was waving it like a matador and exclaiming "come on, ox!"

In an excellent display of pomp which I quite appreciated, the servers brought out our food while marching in synchronized patterns through the room. Cream of corn soup was the appetizer. My first instinct after learning the soup's flavor was to push the bowl aside untouched, but when I tried it I thought it was really delicious. It tasted like a cross between popcorn and gravy- amazing!

After my students informed me that the server wouldn't take my soup away until I put my spoon on the right side of the plate, my dish was taken and the main course arrived. I was starting to think that maybe I was learning more about table manners than the kids. My students were served hamburger steak and fries, which I'm pretty sure costs about 5,000 Won in any food court around here, but they seemed happy with what their 40,000 Won had bought them.

Teachers were served some beef with roasted veggies. It was a bit rarer than I like, but it was pretty good. It was a nice touch for them to serve us something different from the kids (though I did steal a few of their fries anyway).

Dessert was ice cream served on white cake with chocolate sauce, a chocolate ribbon, a cookie and whipped cream! I'm pretty sure I was the only one at my table who finished this since we'd already eaten two courses on top of a morning snack 2 hours earlier. It was surely the only time I've ever heard kids moan "I don't want to eat ice cream".

Cheers!

The hotel looked really nice with all of the Christmas decorations. The kids dressed up for the dinner and it was cute. I don't know if they learned anything new, but it was fun to have a different activity to do during the day.

On the way out of the hotel I had a weird sense of deja vu: 10 months ago this was where Mel and I met the rep from my school who took us to our officetel after our flight from Taiwan. What a confusing evening that had been. He wasn't there when we showed up and there was no ice sculpture for us either! There was only one pay phone to use in the hotel and this DOUCHE would not get off of it. We were there for over an hour before our guy showed up, smelling of whiskey. When we left he even took us to the wrong apartment before finding the right place. Then he told me he'd meet me the next morning to show me my new school and he never showed up. Then, a week later he arrived unannounced at 9am. I was in my pajamas and he was all ready to take me to my first day of work.

I liked this trip to the Marriott better.