RA BEGINNINGS: 1 week OF RA TRAINING
teaser 4 — "Wow I’ve never heard of a handshake that involved lip integration."

The last few days of training had been intense, the amount of information learned surpassed the brain capacity of most of the aspiring RA’s. With only about two weeks to learn everything, from 9am to 9pm they were attending lecture after lecture with a few hour breaks in between. The last few lectures had been of a more serious nature than before such as substance education, ual harassment, coping mechanisms, mental health, eating disorders and more. As the days were winding down they had no time to play around, being an RA wasn’t going to be an easy job and they had to understand how serious and detrimental their job could be. Though not all could easily deal with the time specific schedule that plagued their two week expedition.

“Where’s Wonbin?” Miyoon asked as she looked around the room, the tall black haired male was the only one missing in the small group lecture. “He was with us earlier but disappeared after lunch,” Taekwon piped up.

“Can you go find him please, he needs to be here for this. We’ll wait for you,” Miyoon requested getting a nod in response from Taekwon who shuffled his way out the room. He made his way down the hallway, calling for the other as he did so. He remembered that they exchanged phone numbers earlier that week so he took the opportunity to call him. He heard a ringing in the distance that remained unanswered, he followed the ringing around the back of the building until he saw the man he’d been looking for. His back was facing him with his arm propped up against the wall but he recognized the outfit from earlier.

“Wonbin! Ms. Kim told me to come find you,” Taekwon started as he made his way to the other who wasn’t responding and letting his phone ring. “Though I’d much rather prefer if Anthony came instead it would be rude of me to say no so I came here anyways,” Taekwon blabbed to much of Wonbin’s annoyance who turned to look at him revealing a girl leaning her back against the wall, the two were way too close for comfort according to Taekwon’s standards.

Taekwon looked at the girl then back at Wonbin, “we have to go everyone’s waiting for you upstairs,” he said casually ignoring the woman’s presence.

Wonbin sighed, “Don’t you see I’m busy?”

“Yes but that doesn’t matter because you have more important obligations to attend to,” Taekwon responded bluntly.

Wonbin let out yet another sigh, “I’ll see you later,” he said to the girl who left not without giving Taekwon an annoyed look for interrupting them. Wonbin leaned his back against the wall instead, taking out a pack of cigarettes to light one up and smoke.

“What are you doing? Ms. Kim said she’s waiting for us,” Taekwon said, shifting his position to where the wind wouldn’t blow the smoke in his face.

“Exactly, let her wait,” Wonbin replied in a nonchalant manner looking like he was ready to stand there for at least 10 more minutes.

“But why? Our schedule said we had to be at the lecture by 2 and it’s 2:10. We’re already 10 minutes late, that throws off our whole schedule. What if we don’t learn what we’re supposed to?”

“I’m sure we’d be fine. What are they gonna do? Fire us?”

“Well given the fact that this is a job, yes, they can.”

Wonbin shrugged, he clearly wasn’t in the mood to hear what Taekwon had to say. Let alone talk to him in the first place. But that didn’t stop the other from pestering him further. “What we’re you doing with that girl anyways?” Taekwon continued his round of investigative questioning.

“We we’re practicing a handshake with our lips,” Wonbin said sarcastically before taking a hit of his cigarette and blowing it away from Taekwon. Though he still waved his hands around dramatically the drift the smoke away.

“Wow I’ve never heard of a handshake that involved lip integration,” he paused trying to understand how that would work puckering his lips slightly then shrugging before continuing, “I hope you’re aware that the mouth has over a billion bacteria that range from 500 to 700 different species. Not to discourage your handshake but I’d personally change that part,” he took another pause. “And I must say that smoking is an absolutely disgusting habit to have, I’m sure you know all the possible negative health effects already. I mean, it would be stupid to get into such a dangerously addictive habit and not do your research first but I digress. Even by me just standing next to you I’m exposing myself to the increased possibility of , lung cancer, and coronary heart disease.”

Wonbin groaned and threw the cigarette on the floor then stepped on it with a bit of annoyed aggression that went undetected by Taekwon. “Good, I didn’t want to ask you to get rid of it but I was thinking the same thing.”

Taekwon followed Wonbin who walked quickly inside with his hands in his pocket. The two made their way to the small classroom where everyone was waiting for them. Wonbin sat on the other side of the room from Taekwon and the rest of the Chungsam Hall RAs. “What’s up with him?” Asked Anthony to Taekwon who sat next to him. “It might be because I told him the side effects of smoking and he’s upset because he realized that he should break that revolting habit.”

Anthony looked over at Wonbin who was slumped in his seat with his hat placed over his face like he was about to fall asleep. The lecture started as normal with all attention on Miyoon who was in the front of the room.

“Conflict resolution,” she said once the title page of the PowerPoint popped up on the screen. She went through the presentation full of definitions, statistics and examples. “This is why we use the L.A.R.A method, a general rule for conflict resolution." She went on to explain the meaning of the acronym, L standing for Listen, A for Affirm or Acknowledge, R for Respond, and another A for Add. Though her definition was much longer and sleep inducing. She looked back at the new RA’s and let out a soft sigh at the overwhelmingly boring feel that swept the air, so instead she decided to do an exercise to get them awake again.

“Let’s put this into practice shall we? Someone come up with a fake scenario.”

“A student comes back wasted,” a student called out.

“Okay great, who wants to play the drunk student?”

The room basically echoed crickets so Miyoon called on Haerim. “Now we need an RA,” Miyoon hummed then chose Kyunghee who was shrinking in her seat. “In this scenario Haerim will be a drunk resident and you have to show us what you’d do in that situation,” Miyoon said as the two girls stood up and went to the front of the class.

“And, action.”

Haerim sloppily walked across the room, her acting accurate enough to make you believe that she had that feeling all too often. Kyunghee watched her for a second before springing into action. As she went to her, arms awkwardly extended but not touching her as if she was prepared to catch her like a trust fall exercise, Haerim mumbled incoherently.

“What?” Kyunghee asked softly biting her lip, the realization that this situation might actually come true daunting on her right at that moment.

“Who are youu? Thisisn'the bathroom” Haerim said slurring her words. “Uhm I'm Kyunghee your RA and you’re on campus. I think you should go to your room and rest. Come on let’s go.”

Kyunghee tried to gently guide Haerim with a hand supporting her back but the other stopped in her tracks. “No! I don’t wanna rest…I wanna partyyyy~ woo!” Haerim slurred giving a cheer at the end and turned back around attempting to escape. Kyunghee looked at Miyoon as if she wanted to ask if this is allowed, but Miyoon just motioned for her to continue. Kyunghee followed after Haerim, “I-I don’t think that’s a good idea. You need to rest.”

Kyunghee tried to guide Haerim back though the fellow RA was resisting and whining. She sat on the floor and kicked her feet like she was a baby having a tantrum, “I don’t want to!” She chanted, the tantrum become more intense as she laid on the floor and added arm flails.

Kyunghee scratched her head, do drunk people really act like this? she thought. She looked down at Haerim who was now making snow angels on the floor and took the opportunity to grab her feet, “let’s go to your room, ok?”

She said gently as she dragged Haerim across the floor, the action not quite matching how soft she sounded. Haerim threw her hands in the air like she was on a rollers coaster and let out a long weeeee until Kyunghee reached the wall at the end of the room.

“And scene,” Miyoon chimed in. “Good job you guys. Kyunghee acted right in that situation, the dragging was questionable but it would be best to guide the resident to their room and address the situation tomorrow when they’re sober. Give a round of applause for Haerim and Kyunghee please,”

The room broke out in applause as the two girls made their way to their seats. Next a triplet of students acted out a couple flighting scene that had everyone laughing and a few in their feelings at the realism.

“One last scene, any ideas?” Miyoon asked the class.

“A fight!” Someone called out.

“Okay, how about… Taekwon.”

Taekwon stood up and made his way to the front of the class, “just so you know I would never fight someone so I’m probably the worst candidate for this scene.”

“That’s why it’s called acting,” she smiled Taekwon’s way then scanned the room for another participant. When her eyes landed on Wonbin he had his hand up, “yes Wonbin?”

“I volunteer,” he said. For the first time that whole class he took his hat off his face and sat up. Miyoon blinked a few times clearly flustered at his sudden urge to contribute when he was practically mute, if not asleep, the whole lecture. “Uhm, well okay then, come on up.”

Wonbin made his way to the front as Miyoon called on Anthony to be the RA in this example.

“I know it must be hard to play fight me since we’ve gotten so close recently, but don’t worry I won’t hurt you,” Taekwon reassured him. “Yeah thanks for the heads up,” Wonbin rolled his eyes.

“Don’t hurt the kid,” Anthony whispered to Wonbin who he stood besides, only getting a scoff from the taller individual.

“And actio-“

Before Miyoon could even finish the word Wonbin got behind Taekwon and put him in a chokehold, a smirk forming on his face as the other struggled. “H-hey I wasn’t ready!” Taekwon exclaimed as he tried to pull Wonbin’s arms off of him.

“Wonbin chill,” Anthony said.

“Lee Wonbin-“ Miyoon said warningly as she stood up.

“Calm down I’m not even choking him hard,” he sighed, “but fine.” Wonbin quickly switched positions slipping both arms underneath Taekwon’s armpits from behind and locking his hands behind his neck, pushing Taekwon’s head forward against his chest. “Come on Taekwondo you’re going too easy on me,” Wonbin teased.

“I hate when you call me that!” Taekwon struggled under Wonbin’s new hold, Miyoon sighed and motioned for Anthony to continue with the scene now that Taekwon was no longer in a danger.

“Okay guys let’s calm down and talk about,” Anthony said as he tried to pry Wonbin’s arms off but his grip was too strong.

“I don’t think asking to talk about it would be beneficial in this predicament,” Taekwon said, Wonbin tightened his grip making Taekwon wail even though he wasn’t in pain.

“Okay well whatever it is I’m sure it’s not worth going this far, so let’s just calm down and come to a solution like adults.”

“Make me,” Wonbin teased and Anthony sighed trying to break the two apart but the three boys looked more like a struggling mess instead of an example of successful conflict resolution.

“I’m getting manhandled-“ Taekwon called out as Anthony’s arm somehow got stuck in between the two boys, they circled around as two tried to escape but one made sure neither of them was going anywhere out of pure amusement.

Younggi watched with a concerned expression then whispered to Haerim, “do you think that hurts?”

Unlike Younggi, Haerim was giving them an unimpressed look and shrugged at the question, “who knows, ugh men are so annoying,” she shook her head. Younggi looked over at Kyunghee who was squinting as she watched Wonbin act like the biggest jerk she’d seen in a while.

Miyoon was about to stop the scene but before she could a loud whistle suddenly went off causing the boys to pause in their tracks and some students to cover their ears.

“What the hell Younggi-“ Haerim said, her ears getting most of the damage since she was sitting right beside the girl. All eyes turned to Younggi who was standing up with a sheepish smile. “I was afraid someone would get hurt so i used my emergency whistle, glad to know that it work!”



“Well I guess that’s another form of conflict resolution,” Miyoon commented.

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