Compunction Junction

U-School

My elementary school was selected to be part of a pilot program called U-School ("U" being short for "ubiquitous" of course).

Today we have a pant load of classy, classy gentlemen and polite older women wandering around the school suffering to look interested in anything going on.

U-School in itself is pretty harmless: Long story short, there are wires, computer screens, scanners and cameras in every hall, room, nook and locker in this crazy school.

The talks are all pretty dull.  But what I found of great interest was the school ground cum parking lot.  There are 120 cars in soccer field.  There is one blue car, one green car (that seems to be from a garage) and 118 cars that are either black, grey or white. 

It reminded me of when I was poor and living in vancouver.  Anytime I'd seen a grey car go past, regardless of the make, I always thought that it was a classy automobile.  Seeing this crap everywhere though is really getting tiring: I expect Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin to step out of seperate Sonatas and pleasantly shake hands. 

Another thing I would consider strange is that they've hired "professional greeters".  If you have been in Korea longer than say, 3 weeks you've probably noticed pairs of girls in short skirts and skipants (or thick nylons) dancing and talking into microphones that make them sound like little more than a foghorn.  Well, if those dancing girls were to change their hair to a more conservative cut and wear a dress suit instead of booties, you'd have our greeters: two twenty somethings who are so obviously not teachers here I have to wonder why they are here at ALL.  I'm thinking that this is probably the graduation pool for post galbi house dancers.

If you want to keep in touch with current events in, and around South Korea, it's of paramount importance that you keep your reading up to date with the YANGPA:

http://theyangpa.wordpress.com/

11 regular readers can't be wrong!