Before & After

The barren wall of my one-room apartment, just a few weeks after I arrived in Korea...

With a little help from art magazines and photographs taken over the months, this is what it looks like now. It's a happy reminder of some of the things I've seen and done.

Party posters, Jeju island, Theo Jansen posters, mudfest and friendly faces.

My school has undergone a bit of a renovation, too, with my boss adding splashes of colour in the form of plants, stickers and fish. Before, there were pretty much only stickers of flowers and butterflies along the walls as you walk up the stairs.

And these three little recycling trash bins greeted you at the door.

A few months ago, my boss' friend drew pictures like this with a white marker on almost all the glass surfaces in the school. On my door a bird says, "Good morning!" and an owl bids you, "Good night."

Susan decided to make a little "rest" area downstairs at the entrance to the school. She put up stickers that quote: "Wisely and slow. They stumble that run fast." I wonder if she's trying to tell the kids something.

And there's a little bench where you can take a rest.

From this bench, you can watch four little fish playing in a pond.

The orange fish with the black tips is my favourite. And I wonder if the white spotted fish is pregnant. It seems unusually fat. So far, no babies yet.

I enjoy being greeted by the fishies every morning. And the children love them. I just wish I could take a rest at the bench without being terrorised by the kids during my ten-minute breaks~!