The First Weeks

My co-teacher, “mentor” took me out to go shopping. He took me to all these extremely expensive shops like Armani and Gucci. Like I have money… They all know that I was a “stock boka!” While we were out on the town, he gave me some tips. He told me I need to wear lotion, and I need to get a purse. He also told me what books I need to read and showed me where to buy them. He also told me I should brush my teeth after breakfast and after dinner. I also need to shine my shoes. My shoes and teeth are probably better than his! Whatever, it’s kind of funny. I wasn’t sure if this is Korean culture, or just plain weird. Later on I find out that even the Koreans think he’s kind of weird.

Cameron took his advice and got a very nice murse. (Man Purse) I’m using a handbag that I got from Schwab as well. I never thought I’d be going purse shopping in my life. I also never understood the frustration of loosing something in the depths of a purse till now. Every man and woman here has a purse. Men have purses that match their outfits. They have big ones and small ones. Guys love the Louie Vitton as much as the girls. Not everyone has a car. You need something to put your junk in.

I have a 10-minute bus ride to school. I have to be there around 8. The bus ride is very rough. The bus driver has a schedule he needs to keep. He goes from break to pedal-to-the-metal every block. The streets are narrow, and the cars around him are very close. You have to stand most of the time cause the bus is packed during rush hour. I’ve seen old ladies fall twice now. It is hard for me to know what my stop is. When I am standing in the crowded bus, all I can see is the sidewalks. I look for the one with the metal gate and I know that my stop is next. Fortunately there are a lot of students that also take the bus. I know them by the uniforms. I can wait to see when they get off.

I have 17 50-minute classes a week. Work is from 8 to 5. It’s very easy. That’s less than 20 hours of actual class time. The rest of the time I sit at my desk taking naps with the other teachers, typing things like this, learning Korean, etc. My “mentor” gave me a couple books to read that are in Korean. I don’t know how he would ever expect me to read these. It’s important that I look busy though. It’s part of the Korean culture. They work long hours, but they are not working the whole day. It’s very weird. I would rather work the way of the Western world. We get our stuff done as quickly as we can so that we can go home and do more important things.

I work for a public school that is privately owned. Is that confusing? This is the way that America is turning to as well. After hurricane Katrina, some of the schools in New Orleans were restructured in this way as well. There should be a big debate going on about this issue. Is it right to have public institutions privately owned? Is it okay that the Federal Reserve is privately owned?

The owner of the school saved his pennies for a very long time. Eventually he was able to buy this huge school that holds 800 students. He is given money by the government for each student that is placed in the school.

Korea is known for having some of the best education in the world. Students usually go to school 8 to 5, then go home and eat, then go to their second school till about 8 p.m., then go home to study till about 12 or 1 a.m. If they don’t get a 95% or better, they’re very disappointed.

My school is a little different. It’s an all boys school. I have all of the bad kids that didn’t have the chance to go to private after-school. They like to play more than study. It reminds me so much of my own high school Kennedy. Some of these students do study till 1 a.m. at my school, but most are playing video games and gambling. Some of the students make really good money playing their video games. I don’t completely understand it.

Do to political reasons, it is good to show off what you have done with the government’s money. Many schools have one room that is dedicated to this. My school is the “technical high school.” They have one smart room. The windows, air conditioning, lights, doors, and TV are controlled by a computer. There is a model of a factory that ships packages around that is fully functional. You can put a small, fake package on this conveyor belt and control where it goes. They have robots that you can make fight. I’m not sure what this all teaches kids, but it sure looks cool. I can’t even go in with out an escort. I have never seen a student in the room.

The rest of the school is very poor. There is one laptop for the English department for presentations. I have begun to bring my own computer. I can connect it to large flat screen TVs that are in each of the rooms. This is standard for all classrooms in Korea. They don’t like it when I make too many worksheets. I think they are trying to limit the cost of paper.

I can only comment on what I have seen. It makes me wonder if the money granted to schools ever actually makes it to the students. I was told the owner of the school hates to spend money. He is very thrifty. This is how he was able to save enough money to buy a school. I hope he is not pocketing the student’s money!

The English department is in charge of discipline. All day long, kids come to our department for their beatings. If you get caught smoking on school grounds, you come to the English department. You wait till the English teachers are done with their cigarettes, you lay on your stomach, and wait to get wacked by a big stick wrapped in duct tape. Other reasons for being beaten include texting, your hair is too long, talking, being late, missing classes, or being at the wrong place at the wrong time. Attached is a photo of one of the sticks that they use. It’s 2 feet by 6 inches wide.

They call the city, “Dynamic Busan.” This is very true. Every day you see the development of new things. There is construction everywhere, new cars, new technology, new ways of thinking. I can see the changes in the school through the debates the teachers have over the beatings. The old school ways of discipline are eroding away. Of coarse you have the older teachers that feel stuck in their ways. Unfortunately, those ways are now illegal in the country. I don’t feel that it is my duty to try and speed up this natural change. They have asked me to teach them the ways of Western discipline. After a few drinks, my boss told me that he would like me to start disciplining the students. I can be an example to the other teachers, show them alternative ways of punishment. Oh the power… We’ll see if he remembers asking this duty upon me later on.

The teachers are very generous. They have treated me to outings at restaurants and bars many times now. My second week in felt like teacher initiation. Friday I went to a BBQ place. We ate and drank a lot. Then the vice principal and a couple other teachers took me to a German brewery bar. I was the only white guy in this place. There were probably 600 other people at the bar. We got a basket of fries that cost $16 bucks! Not cheap. A band came out to play, it was an all blonde girl band. I’m not sure where they were from, but they spoke English and Korean quite well. They played traditional Korean music as well as Western songs. There were dancing beer bottles too! One started to break dance, pretty cool. We were not done yet. Next, they took me to Norybong. This is karaoke Korean style. I was up till 2 a.m.

The next day I had to meet other teachers for an 8 hour hike at 8 a.m. It was intense, they hike fast and I was extremely tired. The mountains of Korea have some pine trees, but they are mostly trees with leafs. (Whatever you call those.) We saw some waterfalls and a natural spring. It was cool. And, of coarse, there were drinks involved with this hike. We would take a rest on the trail and take a shot. We were still “walking under the limit” though.

At the bottom of the trail was a Buddhist temple. You could here the monks chanting throughout the mountains for the last bit of the trek. It was very rewarding to come upon this peaceful place. It is a tradition to bathe at the temple to cleanse oneself. This consists of someone filling a bucket with ice-cold water. You take your shirt off, stand with your hands on the ground, and let someone dump the cold water on your back. You feel like your going to have a heart attack or something, but then afterwards, you feel extremely relaxed. It was a little weird having my “mentor” washing my back. No homophobia here though!

I was very excited to go get some sleep, but that wasn’t about to happen. We went straight to another BBQ place, then another bar. The drinks were flowing again. It was a good time. I slept very well that night. We’ll see what next week brings.

First Days in South Korea

Training

So we got into Incheon, South Korea at 10 p.m., it was a two-hour plane ride from Taiwan. Not too bad. We met up with hundreds of EPIK teachers in the airport. We found out that our class of new students is 650 strong. There were 2,200 applicants, so I feel pretty lucky to be here. Lots of people came from Canada, South Africa, USA, Scotland, England, and Ireland. There is a total to 7,100 English teachers in South Korea. Koreans really want to learn English! The economy of the country has improved dramatically since the 90’s. Watch, they’re going to beat our economy in the States here soon.

There are no animals in the country. They were so poor for such a long time that they hunted all of their squirrels, birds, deer, tigers, etc. You don’t even hear birds outside. They are slowly repopulating now that the country has money. There are 7 11s everywhere. It’s easier than hunting birds. Ha!

I never thought I would have to relive the first week of college, but here I am. The first night we took over this small university town. (I haven’t figured out where I am yet. Jeonju University, “The Place of Superstars!”) Everyone went out and did Karaoke, and shots of Soju. Soju is this vodka type drink that goes down dangerously smooth. We had a huge buffet feast with lots of entertainment for the teachers. They had dancers and singers perform for us.

Day two consisted of the medical check. They are very concerned with health. They want us to check our temperature and record it twice a day. They gave us X-rays, blood tests, urine test, eye check, hearing, weight, and fill out more forms. It was chill. I just sat and talked to all the people from around the world while waiting in line for the next test.

The 10 days were long, but very fun. Way better than the first 10 days of college. As you grow older, things become easier. I had no problem meeting great people. Reality TV doesn’t know what they’re doing. They need to take hundreds of adventurous people from around the world, throw them in a foreign country living very close to each other, and give them alcohol. Quite entertaining.

First Days In Busan

The day had come when reality was slapping us in the face. No more classes to fall asleep in. Now I had to teach! I was given Kum Jeung Technical High School. I was told that it takes many years before one gets into high school teaching! I wanted elementary school! Did I do something too well? I was happy to have the challenge. I also feel honored that they think I can teach high school kids. What am I getting myself into!?

All 80 of us Busan city people were lined up in a random gym. We just stood there waiting for someone to come along, look at our namtag, and take us to our province. A very serious looking man comes along. No smiles. He went right up to me and signaled me to follow. I thought oh s**t, what is this year going to be like. Now I know him to be a nice man. He just introduced himself as my mentor. In reality, he should be my co-teacher.

He came with one other person that works in the office with the principal. They took me straight to a BBQ restaurant. I thought I was eating steak, but it was actually pork. It was some of the best pork I’ve ever had. This included many shots of Soju, the national drink of Korea. It comes in what looks like beer bottles. It’s made with potatoes. It’s very smooth, and has about 20% alcohol. They only cost about $1.50. The Koreans consume MASS quantities of this stuff.

I was overwhelmed with the amount of rules in table etiquette that I was being taught. If someone hands you a bottle, they don’t want you to fill your drink, they want you to fill theirs. When you fill their drink, you must put one hand on your elbow as a sign of respect. You never fill your own glass. The top dog, either the one that makes the most money, or the eldest, is in charge of paying for the whole meal. The lowest status person is in charge of the cooking of the meat. (Confucianism) At BBQ places, there is a grill in the center of the table and you cook all of your own meat. I was the guest, so I didn’t have to cook. You wrap the meat in either a lettuce leaf of a sesame leaf. You can add hot sauce, soy sauce, and many other things with it. Every meal comes with the national dish, kimchi. This is fermented (pickled) cabbage. They add spices to it to make it very spicy. I had my fill of food, thinking that the meal was done, and then they brought out the biggest bowl of cold noodle soup. I couldn’t eat it all. At this point I was a little buzzed too. They told me that I don’t drink like a girl and that they are proud, so I guess I did okay!

After our meal, they proceeded to take me to my hotel. My apartment was not ready because the last teacher for the school had not left the country yet. I was staying in a love motel! I had a circular bed with stars on the ceiling. There were lots of lotions and porn channels. I heard weird noises from the other rooms as well. I was happy to have a clean bed though. The room came with a very old computer as well. I couldn’t get the computer to speak English, but I was able to still navigate around the web. Through Facebook, I was able to talk to the other teachers including my friend Cameron. That first night no one went out cause we didn’t know where the hell we were!

Monday came around and they picked me up from the hotel to go to my new apartment. I met the last teacher for the high school. He openly said the school sucks in front of the staff. He really scared me. He took me out to lunch to give me a heads up on what I was in for.

He told me the kids hate English class, the teachers hate him, he was always bored, everyone drinks too much… Which all might be true for him. What I realized is that, just like any situation in life, you can focus on the bad or the good. This place is more extreme than his hometown in Canada. There is a ton of great things, and a ton of crappy things. I’m addicted to the chaos. It’s okay that everything is extremely different. Some people get very depressed here, but I’m down for the challenge. I feel more alive here than I have in many years.