Front Row

I judged another speech competition before I left for Korea and while this one was basically the same as the other ones I had judged, terrified students reading canned speeches, there are two things I want to share. The first is this photo which shows all six of the judges, or at least in my case my name card. I was sitting in the front row next to a guy who used to be the dean of some department but essentially retired, or was forced out depending on who you ask, but still retains a lot of his pay and status, and the only full professor in the English department. In the back row was Steve with two other teachers. It's just still odd that I have more status as some foreigner with no experience then Steve who's been a teacher for a long time and is, you know, a professional. The former Dean also seemed to have little interest in actually listening to anything that was being said and instead just wrote little notes to me asking me where I was from and what not. With all you hear about Chinese modernization foreigners are still a rare commodity. Also this time I took a video of the competition so you dear reader could get some idea of what judging it is like.