Happy Birthday Eric!

Today we had a birthday celebration in class! For those of you who don't know, Koreans are actually considered to be one when they are born. Everyone is also grouped according to the year they were born. According to Korean age, sometimes someone can be two years older than their actual age! In the Kindergarten classes, the mother of the child who is celebrating their birthday organizes a party and brings in LOTS of food and a present for the children. All the other students in the class also bring a present for the birthday child. Today Eric received everything from new school supplies (crayons, pencil holders, pencils) to toys and even a POLO shirt! Eric gave each student a set of binoculars! The children sang Happy Birthday to Eric in English and Korean, watched him blow out his candles, and then literally shoveled their faces with food. We had chocolate cake, huge chocolate chip cookies, Korean Dukbokki (hot and spicy rice cake, which I actually liked a lot!), tangerines, juice, pop, and of course...fried chicken! Following this celebration, the children were supposed to go to play gym. I vetoed that after Eric (the birthday boy) threw up his birthday meal in the toy basket in our classroom minutes after eating it! Instead we caught up on classwork we got behind on from the party. The children had a blast, and we all can't wait for the next birthday celebration!