You have to love a woman who can make you laugh at yourself

With her frequent worry about my whereabouts and state of being, as evidenced by the onslaught of queries - "Where are you?" "Are you hungry?" "Are you tired?" "Are you cold?" - and her determination to replace the rice, always absent from my bowl at mealtimes, with half a loaf of bread, I started in the past few days to feel the slightest bit frustrated with my host mom. I'm sure this jaded sentiment came only from the fact that I've been pretty independent (in spirit, if not in reality) for the past three to four years, and any time I felt that constrained sensation, I immediately reminded myself how profound it is that this woman is expressing the same worry and care toward me after only a week that she does toward her own children.

The best moments so far though, the ones that make me feel like part of this family, are not the meals or the checking-on-you text messages, but when my host mom makes me laugh heartily at myself. This came as a bit of a shock to me the first time a few nights ago, when I very discretely and with the help of my phone dictionary explained to my host mom why I would be shortly revisiting the western hospital in Seoul. My attempted secrecy was to no avail, for she nodded vigorously and explained to the whole family about my chronic constipation (hence, the lack of rice on my plate) in Korean, then proceeded to tell me that one of my host sisters suffers the same way, and commenced mimicking said affliction by grasping her buttocks and crying "Oh-Ma, apayo, apayo!" ("Mom, it hurts it hurts!") while the rest of the family, and shortly the mimicked sister and I, cracked up into laughter.

Tonight, we engaged in a brief accent mocking session during dinner - she highlighting my poor ability to pronounce the Korean-style "L" in my school's name, and me jokingly coaching her in her attempts to pronounce "full," which comes out as "puh" - before she started speaking in a bear voice. Apparently, when I speak in Korean (always poorly), my attempts at enthusiasm always come out exaggerated and grizzly, so when I explained that I would go to Daegu this weekend to celebrate an anniversary with Eddie, she threw her hands up in the air and repeated "Ah-ma Daegu kayo! Ah-ma KTX tago kayo" ("Maybe I will go to Daegu, maybe I will take the express train") in this throaty, dramatic bear voice. After a moment of shocked silence, my host sis Ja-Hee and I, again, cracked up at my expense. This is certainly a different way to unwind from a hectic day of teaching, but perhaps I like it because it reminds me of the teasing my own family often dishes out and receives. It's strange how much the opposite experiences of feeling alone among a group of people and feeling very included into a group of people can both make me miss my own people back home.