After a bit of a break, Markus and I were able to volunteer at the woman's shelter again. The families that are at the shelter stay for around six months and then they are phased out. All of the students that I used to teach are all gone. This time around, all the kids were new. At first I was a bit nervous, but it wasn't too long til I grabbed one of the girls hands and we skipped into a new friendship.
One thing that fascinates me about Korea is the amount of children with dyed or permed hair. It's pretty crazy seeing little kids with blue or red hair. While we were at the shelter, I spied the little boy with red hair and said that he was going to be my new bff. I'm happy to say that I was pretty successful because his mom later told me that he liked me. The blue haired kid wasn't part of our group, but I had to get a picture. These crazy haired kids are like Pokemon and I gotta catch em all.
We walked about 15 minutes to a nearby park and practically took over. There was the perfect amount of volunteers to kids. There was face painting, manicuring, see-sawing, climbing and chasing. As much as I loved my old students, these kids really won me over. They were so much fun and really sweet. I spent most of my time playing and talking with them because I couldn't help myself.
Usually, the moms and older siblings don't come with us, but this time they decided to join. Throughout the afternoon, the mom of the little girl in the awesome purple sweater kept looking at me curiously. I couldn't tell if she wanted to talk to me or was just confused. When we were walking back to the shelter, she finally started talking to me. She spoke in really broken English, but she was trying really hard. It was actually a really good conversation. I told her that we were going to try and have a baby soon and she proceeded to tell me what vitamins I needed to take. I think she kept looking at me because she was building up her courage to talk to me. It was the sweetest and cutest thing. It's moments like that that make me feel completely humbled and thankful to be in Korea.