One of my best friend's names is Beth Hanna. Chances are you know her but maybe not. If you don't you should. But I'm getting off topic. Beth played volleyball at PLU for the past 4 years and I was her coach for three of those years, not that I can take credit for any of her success but I still had to put that in there. Haha. ANYWAYS. She is pretty much one of the most talented volleyball players I have ever seen play the game. Even if you don't know anything about volleyball you would have to agree after seeing her play. She was recruited by some big time universities in high school but chose PLU because of the uniqueness of our program and the smaller size of the school. And she dominated D3 volleyball for four years. Her freshman year she was freshman of the year for the entire country in D3 and a first team all-american. Every year since she's pretty much won about every award there is to win. You're probably wondering why I'm telling you this because she's obviously successful and everyone knows about it. The thing though is that she's way different. She's so atypical compared to athletes today (watching the Lakers the other night made me want to barf...they are such unsportsmanlike dingles. sorry Bri) and not only is she sort of humble, she's hands down the most humble person I've ever met in my life. For reals. And even though I'm not an "athlete" anymore, her humility is such an example that it continues to totally level me when I need it.
Like yesterday.
Im at this conference right now for the International Baccalaureate which is the type of school that I'll be teaching at in Korea next year. Sidenote: if you don't know anything about IB schools and their curriculum look it up. It's amazing. I definitely think the US should let IB take over all schools and curriculums because they actually have the right idea about what education should look like. But anyways, I came out here assuming that there would be a ton of other people from schools outside of the US. But then I forgot that everyone else is in school still and that most people who teach at an international school outside of the US aren't going to fly back here for a conference when they could go to one in their own country. Doi. So everyone here is from Colorado, Michigan, Florida, Nebraska, etc. and when asked to share where I teach the entire conference did one of those cool "no way" gasps when I said I taught in Korea. So the first two days I literally had almost every person come talk to me during breaks and I actually got sick of telling the story of how I taught in a public school last year and then coached volleyball at TCIS and eventually got hired on and that's why I have a 5 month vacation. But I did start to feel really cool. Even being home the last month has been a lot of the same with people wanting to know everything and me feeling kind of neato because I feel cool. Then last night I had a moment where I kind of came to and realized that I'm really not all that cool. At all. And even though I'm sure people don't detect the "I'm cool because I live in Korea" attitude that has crept up, it still doesn't make it ok. Sure, picking up and moving to a foreign country, especially one in Asia is kind of nuts. Really nuts. But nothing to be proud of by any means. If anything, it in itself is such a humbling experience. I started to remember last night some of the times during my first two months there when I was so totally defeated at times. So I guess I just have to keep that in mind and remember what the last year-ish was like...and why I really am staying in Korea, which is to teach at an amazing school and minister to amazing kids.
So I'm thankful for that. And I'm also so thankful for humble friends.
