My yobo said she wanted English lessons for her birthday. Her English is certainly good enough to get her by, but she feels like she misses out on a lot of the conversation when a group of us native speakers are talking. Also, some folks don’t always understand her, especially upon first meeting. She has a pretty strong accent that takes some getting used to I suppose. Anyway, she is motivated to improve her vocabulary and pronunciation and works every day with an old high school textbook from Korea. We both agree that some focused study with an experienced tutor will help her develop her English language skills much more quickly and effectively.
So, I wasn’t exactly sure where or how to start my quest for a tutor. I wrote to a friend who is in the business up Virginia way and he advised that finding someone local would be more beneficial than attempting lessons via Skype, especially for working on pronunciation. This being the 21st century and all, I decided to see what I could on Craigslist. There really wasn’t a lot. Most of the folks listed were looking to work with school age children on academic subjects. I finally reached an ad that was a couple of weeks old that at least mentioned helping non-native speakers with English. So, I sent an email and was pleasantly surprised when I got an almost immediate response.
Even better, the person who responded (Stephanie) is a kyopo who taught English at Samsung in Seoul before returning to the states three years ago. Also, she lives only about ten minutes away. I had Jee Yeun give her a call and they had a nice chat–in Korean. Stephanie came by the house and took Jee Yeun out for coffee and from all reports they hit it off quite well. The plan is lessons twice a week on Monday and Wednesday afternoons. What are the odds that the first (and only) ad I responded to would be such an apparently perfect fit? I’d call that kismet.
The other reason I’m smiling this morning is that the scale has been kind to me. Down three pounds this week which puts me at 243. And it appears that I’m finally making some progress on my middle. My girth measurement is 45″, down 1 1/2″ from last week. I’ve also had two people I see infrequently comment on my weight loss, a particularly satisfying measurement of progress.
So, twenty weeks into the LCHF diet plan (with a little treadmill on the side) I can report a 35.5 pound overall weight loss and a 6 1/2 inch reduction in the midsection. That’s the way I like it!
Onward and downward! Uh huh uh huh.
“that takes some getting used to I suppose”
Should that be “getting used too”? I actually went and looked up the rule, which says too should be used when expressing excessive (too much) and also.
But that didn’t really help me much. I changed it then I changed it back. And now, neither looks right to me.
Damn it, Kevin Kim. You’ve gotten into my head.
Awesome news about the tutoring and the weight loss, John! I’m glad you were able to find someone local for Jee Yeun.