last day of teaching....

in another hour, i will be on my way to school for my last day of teaching at ecc. i'll be walking to work with mixed feelings of sadness, excitement and thankfulness. i am so grateful for having had the opportunity to work and live in sok'cho and my job working for mrs. kim at ecc was filled with inspiring challenges. i am planning to return to korea for another year of teaching but it will be in a larger city about an hour south of sok'cho called gangneung. i was offered a position at a university there as a visiting professor and although i will be taking a paycut compared to my current salary, the opportunity for extended time off to make trips back to canada and continue my yoga study is more important to me. it also helps that i paid off my student loan a few months ago ;)
on a different note, yesterday greg and i made a trip to the dental hygenist to have our teeth scraped and cleaned before heading out on our travels. the appointment was set up through an adult student from ecc named alice. she is a professor at the local college here which specializes in educating dental technicians and hygenists and graciously offered to let her students hone their cleaning skills on us while we got a thorough check up.
we met alice at dong-u college and she brought us into a very modern-looking room filled with sparkling dental equipment and chattering female students. there was a bit of a rustle that moved through the room when greg and i entered as i imagine foreigners are not common there. alice had a few words with her 'best' students and promptly left us in their hands. i think greg and i were both a bit nervous with the language barrier and all. the hygenists didn't speak much english but managed to convey an important message - raise your hand if it hurts. my anxiety level was raised a bit further when the student draped a soft, blue cloth over my face with only an opening for my mouth. there was something disconcerning about not being able to see but after a while, i found it more relaxing.
the student turned out to be very proficient and professional and was finished very quickly. after removing the cloth, she handed me a mirror, pointed to my back molars and spoke quite a few korean phrases. i nodded my head in concerned understanding, pretending to know what she was saying when i really had no clue (a bad habit i've picked up living in a non-english country but it seems more polite sometimes). she must have seen the question mark forming on my brow as she continued to speak to me, furrowed her own brow and finally came out with 'black!'. sure enough upon closer inspection, i could see some black specs in my teeth indicating cavities. i felt devastated. i haven't had a cavity since i was in primary school and the thought of having them filled overseas frightened me. as she lead me out of the cleaning room to take me back to alice, i pondered over my options; have it filled here, thailand or wait till i made it home to canada.
alice took a look herself at my teeth and agreed with the student. indeed i had two small fissure cavities. alice then had a few more words with the student and i was lead back to the cleaning room once again. they explained that they were going to put a sealer on my teeth as a prevention method. the cavities would be filled and unable to get any bigger plus, the sealer would help any future cavities from forming. i was thankful i had the same proceedure done back in university when i was still covered under my fathers health care so i knew what would be happening. i also knew how expensive this would be since it is an optional thing but considering my options, it would be worth it.
after a few more minutes, it was all over and once again i was chattng with alice, thanking her profusly for the help of her and her students and asking how much the bill was. free. pardon? yes, it was all free as it was done as part of the training course for the students. it turns out that alice actually specializes in preventative dentistry and was happy to let her students practice the sealant proceedure on us. she then took us out for some mountain vegetable rice for lunch and sent us home with new toothbrushes in hand.
alice, if you happen to read this, thank you so much once again.