Hitting Children

[Korea is finally out of the top headlines in CNN.  Keep those fingers crossed that it stays that way]

My 100th Koreanism.  Drum roll please.  Here we go.

#100.  Koreans confuse the letter "L" and the letter "R" quite often.  Think "A Christmas Story" when they are in the chinese restaurant.  Deck the harrs with bars of rarry.  Fa ra ra ra ra ra ra ra ra.  The movie actually paints a pretty acurate picture of how hard it is for them to pronounce the correct lettter.  Sad but true.

So I was insulted within an inch of my life today.  My supervisor informed me that one of my itty bitties in my late afternoon class told his mother that I hit him.  On the head.  Hard.  Me.  Hitting a child.  I think not.  The mom told the school she didn't believe him because apparently he makes up stories often but she is pulling him out of school anyways.  My school promptly accused me of hitting him.  I repeatedly told them I did not hit him.  They did not believe me.  Super.  Take the word of a tiny child over a grown ass woman who has been around children her ENTIRE life. 

They eventually said they were sorry and that they DID in fact believe me (after asking me to tell the "truth" repeatedly) but the accusation still stings.  I will never understand a culture where it is ok for the Korean teachers to smack the shit out of their kids.  Thankfully this is not the case at my school but in some it gets to the point that the kiddies require hospitalization they are hit so hard.

In Korea the kids get smacked around (sometimes roughly) by teachers but hugs are commonplace in almost every social setting.  In America kids aren't allowed to be touched at all by teachers.  Hugs aren't allowed for fear of a lawsuit.  Isn't there somewhere with a happy medium?

If you know of a magical place where a happy medium exists give me a holla.

Ending this semi-debbie downer post with a picture of Hansu.
One of the cutest itty bitties around.