Monica
I came home tonight to an e-mail telling me one of my students had died. In the course of a year, I had quite a lot of students in my charge. Some were immediately forgettable, some I think of now and then. Others left an indelible mark on me and my life. That was Monica. A truly special woman. For seven months she was in my early afternoon Monday, Wednesday and Friday class. And every time I saw her, I knew Monica would deliver. I think I talked before about how in each class, there was at least one student I could count on to get me out of a tight spot. That was Monica, in spades. Yet she was so much more than even that. Questions about cultural oddities , advise about Korean women, whatever it was, Monica was a load bearing vertebrae in the backbone of my Korean experience.
Monica was enthusiastic and full of life. Her desire to learn English—and determination to have fun while doing so—was almost transcendent. She brought so much joy and positive energy into every bit, of every lesson, the whole class couldn’t help but be uplifted in her world. She was a leader amongst the students for all the right reasons. Despite any shortcomings I had as a teacher, Monica loved me. She was the one who went to the director of my school and let it be known that her, along with the entire class, would stop coming to the hagwon if I was not their teacher at the end of each session. The last e-mail she sent me, maybe a month and a half ago, said how they spend most of each class “singing your praises.” The hahoe masks she bought me are on my family’s mantle. She was loyal and generous in a way that cannot be explained or overstated.
More often than not, she came to class with a gift of some kind. Many students brought things, but Monica ratcheted it up from the typical drink or pre-packaged sweets most people went for. Home made cookies and sweets and bulgogi sandwhiches. Pie, like a whole pie, that she made just for me. And chocolate. Oh my, the chocolate. Monica loved to make truffles and dreamed of opening up her own chocolate making business. She visited Belgium and brought back recipes she discovered. Look back on previous posts and you’ll see that I am not waxing nostalgic or being overtly sentimental when I say she made the BEST chocolates I have ever eaten. White chocolate with green tea filling. Dark chocolate with whiskey in the middle. She brought them by the dozen and on those days, I could scarcely make it through class without eating a few while the students worked.
She set up private lessons between me and her daughter, with whom I became very good friends. When I started reading the e-mail Scarlet sent me this evening, news of her mothers passing was the last thing I expected to hear. She wasn’t old, not in bad health. She was vibrant and happy. She liked to drink beer and eat kalbi and could do both in high volume, able to keep up with any Korean man I know. I don’t really know what happened, but she died suddenly, 10 days before Christmas. They buried her far away from Seoul, on her familie’s small hillside plot. Inside the coffin, Scarlet and her sister placed Monica’s English book “so she can study in heaven”.
Wherever she is now, I know that place is filled with the most mouth watering chocolates on this plane of existence—or any other. She is there, speaking fluent English the way she always wanted and making that place, whatever it is, immeasurably better, with her laugh, her smile and her love.
Rest in peace, Monica. And saranghae.
