The Korean Experience

Weekly Letter Home (10/15)

2007-10-15T21:09:00.000-07:00

Monday, October 15, 2007

Dear family and friends,

Once again I greet you from the East. I hope you are well in whatever you are doing, and if not that you at least can see the light at the end of the tunnel, and if not that you realize that there is in fact a light at the end of the tunnel, you just may have to get around a couple of bends to see it.

Sorry this letter is so long (17 pages, Gasp!), but it does cover two weeks, and the two weeks it covers were quite eventful. School festivals, travels to not-so-exotic locals, little teaching, but a lot of eating. Unfortunately, I didn’t get the specific names of all the foods I ate, but I will find them in the future if I ever go back over this thing and decide to make a book out of it even if I only publish it privately.

One particular post to note is that my maternal grandmother passed away recently. For those who were praying, thank you. Please continue to pray for my family as we remember Grandma’s life. We have confidence that she went on to her heavenly home and look forward to meeting her at the final resurrection and in the life of the world to come.

On a side note, my host brother has taken to saying, “Oh, my God!” recently. I don’t know where he learned this phrase, as I abhor it, and it is starting to get on my nerves. I wonder if it’s worth explaining to my family why I don’t like the phrase and that I would like him to stop. They are Christians, but then again, Koreans (much like Americans, I should note) may not think it out of the ordinary to take the Lord’s name in vain, especially in a foreign language. I’ll probably just let it slide. It’s just abrupt to me because it’s just about the only English I hear out of his mouth. If an English speaker says it, it’s usually in context and I don’t even blink. When he says it, though, it percusses my ear like the snap of a marching snare on a crisp fall day.

Love,

Jeremy

Meeting 정준호 (10/13)

2007-10-13T21:09:00.001-07:00

On Saturday evening my collegiate host sister, who was home for some unknown reason as school is still in session and there are no breaks around now, told me that the family was going out and needed to borrow my digital camera. Why? “We’re going to meet my favorite Korean actor. You can come!” And suddenly the reason for her coming home became crystal clear…

Anyway, apparently the actor, Jeong Jun-ho, is fairly famous in Korea, so everyone is a little confused as to why he was visiting our small county. He knows some English, probably because he calls L.A. his second home, and was able to have a brief conversation with me. I started this conversation in Korean, but when it became clear that he wanted to speak in English, I obliged him. During the conversation, I was asked the following strange question:

Are you Russian?

…and the following awkward question:

How do you like Korean women?

…made all the more awkward by the fact that my available collegiate host sister who understands English was standing right there. I was then encouraged to marry one if I could manage it while I’m here. And yes, I told him I was only here for a year…

At any rate, I suppose now I’ll have to see one of his movies.

Hiking 등산로 (Deung Mountain Trail) (10/13)

2007-10-13T21:09:00.000-07:00

I was finally able to hike the small mountain ridge behind my house on Sunday. It was a pleasant hour’s walk or so that affords a magnificent view of the entire town in places where the trees clear just enough as well as absolute solitude where they don’t. Though, I will say that when you’re on the town side of ridge, the amount of noise pollution from the town and the echoes along the range is mind boggling, so that one is never with a sense of total isolation. Get to the other side of that, though, and one is immersed in absolute silence. A surreal hike, to be sure.

I met the government official I saw at noseongjea the weekend before on that ridge, the one that wanted me to teach the other officials English. He’s offered to take me out to Odesan National Park since he knows now that I like hiking. Perhaps after the Gyeongju conference I can take him up on that.

Coffee, both Black and Bitter! (As Opposed to Brown and Sweet…) (10/13)

2007-10-13T21:08:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago, I received a package from home (I’m not sure I mentioned this or not…). Included in this package was a can of Yuban coffee, and, while it is not the best coffee in the world, I was certainly grateful to have something tangibly ground that would require a filter to brew as opposed to the dehydrated instant coffee that’s Korea’s main caffeinated staple.

But this presented a problem, for whereas I have a coffee maker thanks to my host family buying one in combination with a single slice of toast toaster oven (don’t ask…), I did not have any filters to go with said maker.

So, I asked around a bit and found out that there was an import store that sold both ground coffee and filters. However, wpahen I inquired at the store, which by the way looked like something out of the borrowers what with the variety of paraphernalia (look up the etymology on that word sometime; delightful) available for purchase, I only saw two bags of coffee (both hazelnut flavored) and no filters. Some pantomiming and Konglish later, the ajuma produced some coffee filters from a tin on the shop floor.

So, this Saturday, I popped the seal on the can (that smell… oh, Lord give me strength!) and attempted to brew a cup of coffee. I say attempt because the filter was too big and the coffee ended up spilling everywhere. Some trimming and some light remonstrations from my host mother and I succeeded in brewing a cup of very strong, very black coffee which was delicious. (Or, has my taste grown bad or my addiction too strong?)

The host parents asked where I got the coffee from, and I explained as best I could. My collegiate host-sister who was home for the weekend helped. They then proceeded to brew a couple of cups as well. Well, they didn’t ask, but I’m happy to share my addictions, I mean pleasures with the family. Cultural ambassador and all that. Still, I thought that they might not like it. After all, Korean coffee is usually high in cream and sugar and in the end light in body (all of this in an instant mix packet).

Upon their tasting the coffee, I asked them how they liked it. To my surprise, they said that it tasted the same as Korean coffee. I then noticed that I could practically see through theirs whereas mine was as black as night. They must not have used as much grounds.

Well, I won’t burst their bubble about being able to handle coffee bitter and black. I just hope they never drink from the same pot of coffee I do.

TKD: Frustrated, but Determined (10/12)

2007-10-12T21:08:00.000-07:00

TKD was rough over the last two weeks. I’ve settled into the monotony and routine that is training the body to be a disciplined machine, though I’m sure the sabeonim would protest that TKD is far more spiritual than I give it credit for. As such, there is not much to report about the day-to-day activities. I have run into some difficulties recently, however, that bear noting if only so I will have a marker to look back on when I’ve run my course.

Speaking of running, it turns out that my Saturday run before the Noseonjea festival may have been a bit of a mistake. The whole next week I was working out the tightness in my muscles, and my flexibility, which was laughable before the run despite the 3 months I have trained, went back to a level I had before I began taking TKD. Luckily, it’s returned all the faster. Still, I think I could bear spending one week on just stretching for two hours a night.

I’m also frequently frustrated with the childishness of the children I train with. It is not so bad when we are under the supervision of the sabeonim, but when we break off by belt level for group practice, my fellow green belt cannot focus for more than one minute before he goes off and annoys some red belts until they pick a fight with him. It’s also hard to find someone to train me in the forms I don’t know during these periods. The children are eager to help so long as they don’t have to do the form with me more than once. That’s too boring, I suppose. But I have trouble remembering something I’ve never done before after one viewing, and it’s frustrating when they run off to practice their kicks on each other while the sabeonim is working with other belt levels.

Still, I go everyday that I can, for two hours, to train. It will not always be fun (though it often is), but it is something I need to do. True, I always wanted to take martial arts as a kid (I’m not exactly sure why I couldn’t, but I think it had to do with either money or the fact that I was in Scouts), but now I have a reason. My doctor said I need to lose about 20 lbs to avoid diabetes after all. I haven’t lost any weight really since I’ve arrived, but I’ve certainly toned, and I think that’ll count for something in the end.

But yeah, it’s mostly because I always wanted to do it when I was a kid. Maybe I’ve got a little bit of the childishness that I complain about in those children at the dojang after all.

Teaching: Kangwondo Board of Education Visit (10/12)

2007-10-12T21:07:00.001-07:00

As I said, the school was in a positive bluster preparing for the Kangwondo Board of Education’s visit. Landscaping was redone (the third graders who knew for sure they would graduate were pulled from class for this), school crops were picked, displays were made, music and art demonstrations practiced, and presentations rehearsed. One rehearsal I attended, as it was the main presentation for the BoE visit and included a video made earlier in the semester of me teaching. It was only b-roll footage, meaning no one could hear what I was saying in the clips, but I remember exactly what I was saying in the particular clip they chose.

“I’m sorry about the interruption in your normal schedule, class. This is supposed to be my day off, and I have no idea what’s going on. So let’s make the best of it.”

I’m glad they cut the sound.

What occupied most of my time, however, was helping prepare the special co-teaching class for Friday. Or rather, I wish it had taken up my time. As it was, I sat at my desk while my co-teacher did most of the work, insisting that I could not help at that time.

And then, on that dreadful Thursday, she said that we were not yet done with the preparations even though the class was tomorrow. I sighed inwardly and told her that I’d be willing to stay at school as long as it took to finish the preparations. I stayed until 5:50 pm, rushed home to get my TKD uniform and stayed at the dojang until 8:00 pm, at which point I rode over the H.S. to help finish the class work. She ordered pizza for us (and typically wouldn’t let me help pay), and we spend the evening cutting conversation strips and practicing our dialogues. We also helped make a movie for one of the other English teachers who also had to present the next day. I finally got to go home around 10:40 pm. When I left, the third graders were still there studying for their University entrance exams. They stay until 11:00 pm on a regular basis, apparently.

The next day we practiced again in the morning. She was nervous as all get out, and I hit my nervous spike as usual about 10 minutes before we went on. (I still think of these things in stage terms.) The lesson consisted of a review of “What would you like to have for lunch?” which we never taught them in the first place, which moved on to having a student read the day’s goals, which seemed a bit ambitious, which moved on to having the kids name the top five foods in the hamlet, which we made up, which moved on to the kids drawing a picture that they had to describe to the drawer in English, which went surprisingly well, which moved on to mock dialogues with aprons included, which moved on to the strip story of recipes of Korean foods, which went decently well (One kid noted that the first step in cooking samgyetang is not in fact to clean the chicken, but rather, “Catch the chicken!” This is why I love the country.), which moved on to a brief assessment examination.

Despite the fact that the lesson was ambitions, it went very well. The kids were enthusiastic (We were concerned because it was the usually quiet 1-3 class. The administration made this decision, not us, but we thought the student’s performance admirable.), and the activities went off without a hitch. I might use the picturing drawing idea as an activity in the future. The kids kept telling me how excited they were to do the lesson, and I had to tell them that Phoebe, my co-teacher, had done most of the work.

There is really only one major concern that I have with the demonstration day. The province wanted to see our school because our school does well for a rural public school on national testing. Thus, they wanted to see how we manage our school affairs to bring about such results. But, at least in the English class I took part in, the demonstration in no way represented what actually goes on at the school on a day-to-day basis. We do not co-teach. The English teachers usually use a text book and the foreign teacher usually is not even in sync with the standard syllabus. The entire week I was thinking, “What sort of ideas is the provincial BoE going to get about programs they should be implementing when we do not even implement the programs we’re showing off to them?” Ah, well. This is not my country. I told the English teachers about my confusion, but I did not question their methods. I am a guest here, and an observer. I will stay the course.

Teaching: Week 8 (10/12)

2007-10-12T21:07:00.000-07:00

Week 8 of teaching at the hamlet’s high school was going to prove to be quite busy. First of all, the Kangwondo Board of Education was supposed to visit sometime during the week, so everyone was a little bit on edge and running around like the chickens at my host family’s house when abeoji throws some corn out there for them to eat. (I wanted to avoid the cliché of “chickens with their heads cut off”, but chickens are all I can think of after this much writing, so give me a break.) Secondly, it was going to be my first (nearly) full week of teaching for quite some time. The past few weeks have had various interruptions so that I was never seeing my full compliment of students. Even this week I wouldn’t as it turned out that my 1-4 and 2-3 classes who I usually see without fail were cancelled, one so I could co-teach a special presentation class with Phoebe and the other so the students could have a cleaning period after the BoE’s visit. (Cultural NOTE: There are no janitors at Korean schools. The students do the cleaning. Aside from the fact that it would disemploy a lot of janitors, I think this is an excellent idea. After all, who trashes their school if they have to clean up after it?)

At any rate, the main lesson for my high school classes was a directions lesson Kiehl C., an ATE from last year, left on the program’s forum board. Essentially, it involves getting the students to generate various direction words for use during the activity (e.g. right, left, straight, turn around), as well as some movement verbs (e.g. go, stop, walk, run, dance, hop). After this, the activity is a simple game of “Where’s Waldo?” played in the entire classroom but with one caveat: the searcher is blindfolded and has to rely on the directions of the students. Sometimes, the students would be a bit sadistic in asking the blind searcher to bump into things, and I’ll admit I joined in the fun sometimes, but it was overall a good lesson. The students were able to speak English and genuinely wanted to participate in the activity. One student, who said he was sick at the beginning of class and so he couldn’t sit up front in an empty seat, miraculously got better when he saw how much fun the activity was. Amazing. Another advantage to the lesson was that, on their upcoming mock university entrance exams, I know there is going to be a listening question on directions.

As it is a new month, I’ve given the second graders an extra credit memorization assignment—Shel Silverstein’s “Whatif”. This one is much easier than last month’s Announcer’s Test as it is shorter, repetitive, and rhymes. Hopefully, I’ll have more takers than last month’s two students.

I finally saw my Advanced Adults after two and half weeks of no classes. They were well prepared on their assigned reading at least—Plato’s Allegory of Cave. We talked about that for the first half of class, and for the second half we talked about the Noseongjea Festival and Korean Language Day, which was that day, Tuesday, Oct. 9th. We even arranged a picnic for the week of no classes after the Gyeongju conference with the program. I am apparently to bring nothing, but I was able to understand their Korean enough to figure who among them was bringing what, something that seemed to surprise one of them. I told them that I was learning Korean and that I even had tutoring lessons with a Seoul Natl. University student during the weekends.

“What? You speak Korean? But what can you say? Just annyeonghaseyo.”

I proceeded to introduce myself in Korean, told them that I could order food and bus tickets, find out where the bathroom is, etc. In other words I could tell people who I was and survive. They were impressed and asked me to speak Korean with hamlet residents more often.

I was also questioned about the Korean girl I was seen walking around with at Noseonjea. That would have to be H.W., so I guess I will have to be careful about who sees me where with whom. Wouldn’t want people to get the wrong ideas…

The next day’s lesson was taken from an article in the Korean Herald, an English language newspaper, about a French-English couple who have decided to bike around the world and are currently on the Korean leg of their tour. After some discussion of the article and talking about where we’d like to travel, we decided that for next week’s class, we’d all bring in pictures of our travels and talk about them.

My beginning adults received the brunt end of my grandmother’s death I fear. I was in no mood to teach that morning, so I left the second half of class to somewhat freeform discussion, which revolved around talking about travel once again.

Besides this, the Character was also back in class. He has asked if he may attend the advanced discussion class. I told him yes, and am unsure how I feel about that. I feel like he is probably a great person to talk to one on one, but in a classroom setting he is more of a distraction than a help. He started asking about geographic features in class and would not believe me when I told him that deep could be used for both canyons and oceans, or that canyons were similar to ravines, or that the edge of a canyon was called a cliff…

A third obstacle to my teaching the beginning class on Thursday was that there was another English teacher there who came to “just watch,” but also ended up commenting on my class a bit. She was from the Philippines, which confused me at first because I knew she wasn’t Korean, but couldn’t quite place her. I was hoping to talk with her afterwards both because she is a foreigner and I’m curious as to what she’s doing in the hamlet and also so that I might share strategies with her.

At any rate, the Character ended up giving me a lecture on how Asian foreign English speakers can always understand each other, but can never understand native English speakers nor be understood by them. He also gave me a lecture on how Filipinos apparently speak English with a Spanish accent. Who knew? I, a person who roomed with a Filipino for two semesters, a Spanish minor, and someone who actually paid a great deal of attention to the colonial section of American history in H.S. certainly didn’t. Obviously, I was in no mood to be lectured about the English linguistic patterns of Asian countries, something I’m already fairly well versed in, and smiled politely while I gave him a little lecture in Spanish. To this he just smiled and said, “Yes,” making me think that he confused it for English he did not understand instead. He apparently does not listen, or else is he apparently unwilling to admit not understanding, neither of which is helpful in a conversation class.

There was no beginning adult class on Friday, but luckily my school week didn’t end on that rather sad Thursday note. I had the Kangwondo Board of Education visit to look forward to.

Grandma’s Passing (10/10-12)

2007-10-12T21:06:00.000-07:00

Last week, I began receiving emails from my grandfather and mother concerning the growing seriousness of my maternal grandmother’s condition. Her kidney’s had finally failed. A diagnosis given to her a little over 3 years ago finally came true. And, as the emails affirmed, all that was left for all of us was to wait and pray for Jesus to take her home. For her part, she had been ready to go for a long time. Her last few years were not exactly the most comfortable of her life as her body slowly poisoned itself from Type B Diabetes.

I knew that Grandma could go any day now, so before I came to Korea I flew down to Arizona for a little under a week to say good-bye to her. She never wanted people to come to a funeral, it turns out. She wanted them to come to her while she was still living, so I guess I did right by her.

I was never really close to her. How could I be? We always lived so far apart and rarely talked to each other. Still, I found myself hard hit by the news, first that she only had one day left, and then the final email I read on Thursday morning reporting her death on Wednesday, October 11, 2007 10:00 pm MT in America. Or was it Tuesday? I can’t be sure with the time difference, and that’s somehow all the sadder. What’s even more sad? When people would ask how old she was when she passed, I had no idea.

I wrote her a letter by way of apology and by way of thanks for all that she did for me as my grandmother. It is quoted at the end of this entry. At my lowest moment, I could not call family as they were asleep, so I took a chance that one of my VALPO friends, Isaac, may be awake. He was, and he was actually with another good friend of mine, Jordan, who apparently had quit Disney on Ice and was at VALPO helping the theatre department and celebrating homecoming. (It turns out that I was actually quite lucky to get even Isaac. A couple of days later and he would have been on a sailing vessel for his SEA Semester.)

The three of us talked of the surrealism of talking across continents and oceans and even time. We talked about how VALPO was doing, what news we had of friends, what we had done since we graduated, the quality of American beer vs. its Korean counterparts, of which there is no comparison. We of course talked about Grandma as well, but the conversation served mostly to distract me. It was good to hear their voices again, as I will not see them again in God knows when.

Other friends who knew offered their prayers. In fact, Isaac told the Chapel community at VALPO about what was happening. I told the Program in Christ email list. Prayers are a comfort in times of trouble and efficacious to heal and console by the will of God. Some friends even offered to visit, but I felt that I was not so far low that I would need that.

And of course, I talked with my fellow English teachers who told me that they were sure my grandmother had gone to Heaven. Ironic, considering how religious they are. I tried to tell my host family in Korean on Friday night. I even made a special trip out to the beauty shop after TKD so I could tell them, fearing that I may be too tired when they returned home. Luckily, my collegiate host sister was there (SURPRISE!) to translate.

But it did affect me terribly in terms of teaching. My Thursday morning classes were a disaster. I forgot things right and left for the first class. The beginning adult class I taught that day was monstrous as the Character was there once again, and I pretty well was showed up by a Filipino English teacher who was there “just to watch”. Still, I blame myself for my performance in those classes.

I just wish I could have been home right now. There is no funeral. There will only be a memorial service on Saturday. I will press on. I will miss her, but I am happy for her and will press on.

The letter to Grandma:

For Grandma Howard: A Living Eulogy
“My Thank You Card to You”

My grandma does not like tears. She does not want people to cry over her passing. She does not like funerals, and so she does not want one. She wants people to say what they have to say about her while she’s in her mortal coil. She wants people to visit her while she is still alive. I, who am half a world away in a country where grandparents are celebrated and revered almost as gods, cannot perform this filial duty. And so I, a grandchild now grown, will write what I think and pray that it reaches her in time.

As a grandchild, though now grown, I have only a child’s perspective. I never had the opportunity to talk to my grandmother about what she thought about politics, international affairs, or religion. We never talked about the adult things of life. We never talked about the hard things of life. She talked as a grandmother talks to her grandchildren. When I arrived at her house, she would ask, How was your trip? followed immediately by Are you hungry? When I wasn’t hungry, the question turned to Why aren’t you eating? In winter or at the movie theatres, it was Aren’t you cold? At the beginning of the day, over breakfast, What do you want to do today? And when the day was done, Did you have fun doing what we did today? At night, before bed, How about a story? (That question, when I grew old, became How about some television before bed?) She was a caretaker for me.

My answers were typical of a child answering to a guardian. Good. Yes. I don’t know. No. I don’t know. Yes. Sure, Grandma. Even when I grew older, those answers were all too brief. I should have asked her about herself. What was her life like growing up? Did she have the same fears I did? The same dreams? How did she know to marry Grandpa? What was it like to take care of Mom and Uncle Charlie? And a conversation could develop, and two people could actually know each other past that all too biological and chanced familial bond. My answers were all too brief, my questions all too late, and the visits…

Well, the visits were all too few. My grandma is a wonderful woman who loved her grandchildren even when they could not visit her. Most people, I suppose, imagine becoming grandparents to be like it is in the movies, or at least in the Betty Crocker commercials. Little people skip and run and laugh down the sidewalk as they hurry and rush and clamor to grandmother’s house just down the road from school. Grandma waits at the white picket fence for the children, arms opened wide to receive their loving hugs. Inside, freshly baked goods and lemonade (or hot cocoa in the winter) await all.

Most people probably imagine laughing at and teasing their own children, newly moms and dads, when they see them having trouble raising grandchildren. (As Bill Cosby quipped, “Not as easy as it looks, is it, Son?”) The new parents have to scold the grandchildren who run into the protecting arms of their grandparents whose scolding days are long done.

But my sister and I, and even my cousins, were never close enough to Grandma’s house to traipse there after school days. We were never close enough for Grandma to make fun of Mom and Dad for their parenting techniques (Perhaps we were by telephone, but I doubt that my parents would have thought it my business to know about it), or for my sister and my cousins and I to climb into her lap on a regular basis when Mom and Dad seemed too harsh or scary. We were just never around, and grandma had to be satisfied with the pictures we would send, the occasional phone calls we would make, and the even less frequent thank you cards we would send for Christmas and Birthday presents. (I am getting better at that last one though Grandma, so thank you for being patient with me. It only took me 22 years!)

And those are my regrets. That I did not know my grandma like I could have. That I did not make the extra effort to know her like I should have. That now, if I could do it again, I would have.

She will probably say that I should not have regrets, but regrets are inevitable I think in this life.

And that’s why we have Thank You’s. So, Grandma, if you hear this (or even read this) before you go to see God, know that I am crying about you, but it is only because I love you and I want to thank you. Thank you for being my grandma even when I did not talk to you. Thank you for being my grandma when I did not ask about you. Thank you for being my grandma when I did not visit you. Thank you for being my grandma when it seemed like I did not love you. Because I do love you, Grandma, and I will miss you.

But I am also happy for you. You are going on an adventure. One day I will follow you, and when you ask me on that day, “How was your trip?”, well then we’ll have a lot to talk about.

Eating out with Gomsaem

2007-10-09T21:04:00.000-07:00

I think I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that I may have offended one of the English teachers at the high school when I didn’t remember his name when he called me. For the sake of this post, we’ll call him Gomsaem (Bear Teacher), which is his common moniker at school and partially to blame for my confusion about what his name actually was.

Well, he hadn’t talked to me for a while, and I began to genuinely worry that I had actually offended him. Finally, last Tuesday, I told Phoebe (I gave my co-teacher this English name) about my concern. She assured me that he was naturally a quiet teacher and that everyone was quite busy with preparing for the Kangwondo Board of Education’s visit later that week, so I should not be concerned. I told her that I hoped that was the case because I liked him and would like to hang out with him some more. As I noted before, we seemed to have common interests, namely Japanese popular culture (i.e. Anime).

She must have told him about my concern though, because that evening as soon as I got home I received a call from Gomsaem offering to take me out for bulgogi, Korean’s most famous dish and a hamlet specialty as the beef in the region is particularly good, but a dish of which I had not yet had the pleasure of partaking. We also shared a bottle of 100 year soju, a soju which is less intense, more flavorful, and golden in color compared to the clear watered down vodka variety that is Korea’s staple alcohol. He even told me that I didn’t have to use two hands around him when we poured drinks for each other. This is a fairly big deal and represents the breakdown of hierarchy between two people who may then talk to each other as equals. As an example of how serious this is, I’ve only had one other Korean person tell me to stop using two hands before.

We mostly just talked about the differences in drinking culture between America and Korea. Apparently, this conversation was good enough to warrant second round, however. (NOTE: Second round is when you move from one location to another during the evening. Drinking is usually involved as with most Korean activities, but this is not to be equated with the custom of barhopping in America, during which one only frequents a variety of drinking establishments. Second, third, or even fourth round can just mean everyone goes to a noraebang (singing room) or bowling after having had the previous round.) We ended up at a hof-soju establishment (hof, meaning beer which is not the Korean word for beer nor the English word) and continued the evening from there under the stipulation that I would pay for it since he paid for dinner. (He warned me that’d it’d be expensive, but considering what we consumed—about seven or nine beers between us and an order of chicken—I don’t think $19 was too much money to spend.) Here the conversation moved from American/Korean cultural differences to more political topics—war and abortion really, and which was more abhorrent. (Those who know me can guess where I stood on each issue.) It was actually the first time I’d had a frank discussion on either topic for quite some time, perhaps since even before going to University. Oh, and luckily the Koreans share this custom with the Japanese; whatever is shared over drinks is immediately forgotten the next day. We’re still friends despite our differences. What differences, you ask? Exactly.

Phoebe asked me the next day with a knowing smile whether or not I still thought Gomsaem didn’t like me. It is good to be among friends.

Overnight in 원주

2007-10-07T21:04:00.000-07:00

My friend Lauren G., an ATE in Wonju, was singing in a concert featuring her church choir, so I thought I’d spend Sunday night there and come in to school a little late Monday morning. No big deal. I don’t teach Mondays anyway.

Stacey C., the other ATE assigned to Wonju, was of course there as well, and our friend Jenna N. was also visiting for the concert. I haven’t seen her since Yonsei Day, so it was nice to catch up on homestays and Korean learning and teaching. The nice thing about visiting people in Korea, I’ve found, is it’s not necessary to go out and do a lot of flashy things. Mostly you just want to sit and talk with them, compare notes and experiences and generally catch up. Lauren’s step-cousin was also visiting, and though they’re not related, I thought they looked very much alike.

Lauren had to warm-up and otherwise prepare for the choir performance, so Jenna, the Cous, and I all headed over to Stacey’s apartment for some liquid refreshment (fermented, but non-alcoholic, rice something or rather) and then went out to see a movie. Upon arriving, we found that Borne Supremacy was showing in about 10 minutes. I was super excited about seeing it, as I’d already heard good things from home about it, but it was sold out, so we went late to a showing of The Nanny Diaries. It was actually pretty interesting—an anthropological study of New England high society culture, and if there’s a book, I’m reading it. The fact that it starred Scarlet Johansson (who is my wife from when I played M.A.S.H. with the kids) probably helped my interest level, of course. I did notice that there were a few jokes that were probably only accessible for Americans, as no Koreans laughed at those jokes, or even cracked a smile. In general though, Koreans do not laugh in public preferring a stone-faced smile if something appeals to them, so that may have been the problem instead of the comedy’s efficacy.

After this, we sat at a café and talked until the concert. Lauren’s cousin, who works for a counter terrorism manufacturing company and especially on marketing biometric face recognition systems, picked up the check. We met Hwi Kyun, an RA from our days in Chuncheon, and proceeded to hear beauteous Korean words (and Latin words in the case of Vivaldi’s Gloria) set to traditional Western hymnody. I was actually quite pleased with the selections from Vivaldi’s Gloria section of the performance. Sure, their final consonants were a bit off as one might expect from people trained in a dialect that doesn’t recognize final ‘s’ sounds, but overall the nostalgia for those days when I was singing the Gloria in H.S. displaced any technical musical errors that may have displeased my ears. I actually had to restrain myself from singing along…

It really was a nice concert though. There was even an interpretative dance in the middle that acted as a sweet sherbet to cleanse the pallet in between choral sets.

Afterwards, Lauren’s host family took us out for 샤부샤부 (shabushabu), a combination of Korean beef and seafood served in a soup, followed by 쭉 (jjuk), rice porridge made from the soup’s broth. The host father greatly appreciated having someone to drink with, and I apparently have a standing invitation to visit whenever I like, an invitation which the host mother quickly cautioned me about, since she apparently does not want her husband drinking as often as my visits.

At some point during the meal, Lauren was once again scolded by her host family for not being a good friend, saying that our eating dinner so late was her fault and that if we were Korean friends we would have been very insulted. I told the host mother in Korean that it was different in America, that one’s friendship does not depend upon eating food. In other words, I tried to defend Lauren, but to no avail apparently. Ah, well. Lauren, who speaks Korean decently well as her dad is Korean, told me that she was impressed I had managed to get that much out in Korean though. I was more surprised that the host family had understood me.

I slept at Lauren’s host family’s apartment along with Jenna that night and took the earliest bus out (8:00 am) the next morning proceeding immediately to school. A bus ride was not exactly the way I wanted to start my school week, but for a friend’s concert and good company, it was definitely worth it.

Lazy, but Interesting Saturday : 노성제 (noseongjea) Festival

2007-10-06T21:03:00.000-07:00

This Saturday I decided to take it easy. My host family had informed me that they’d be in Seoul for the weekend so I had no obligations as far as they were concerned, and I was still tired from the Bukhansan hike anyway, having never had an opportunity to properly recover after the hectic Sunday following it and the usual shenanigans during the week.

So, I slept in until some obscene hour, which was actually probably the not so obscene 10:00 am (though for me this is very late). I made myself a couple of cups of dehydrated instant coffee and burned some breakfast on the stove, which the family had left for me to heat up during the different meal intervals of the day. I started some laundry, watched some television, read some. And then I noticed that some hikers were going by the house. A lot of them in fact, in long procession. Some of them even stopped by the house to ask after the family. I told them that they were in Seoul, but I was able to understand that they wanted a refill on water, so I obliged them.

The reason for all the hiking was that there was a festival this weekend celebrating various things concerning the hamlet. One of those things was the defense of a local mountain 노성산 (noseongsan) during the 16th century Hideyoshi Invasion. So, to commemorate this event, people climb the mountain. They also do the other things typical of a festival: watch demonstrations, eat food, see a concert, drink a lot, etc. These latter things I was looking forward to doing later on in the day.

However, first I decided that it might be good to take a bit of a run. I’d had such a lazy day so far after all, and I thought getting out in the fresh air, taking in large gulps of it while I huffed and puffed along the roads of the hamlet, might do me some good. I ran out to the foot traffic bridge, across the river, around the rice paddies to the Rock Park (a predictably self-descriptive name given what is in the park, namely rocks), and back. Along the way, I happened upon a group of 6 or 7 middle school students who wanted to have a chat with the foreigner, so I obliged them. They were actually surprisingly proficient. Granted, I wouldn’t want to talk to them for more than an hour, but for a 10-minute conversation introducing each other, they did quite well.

After the run, I showered, changed out my laundry, and made for the festival on foot. Unfortunately, when I arrived at the festival, it seemed to be in a transitional phase. People were recovering from the afternoon and were not quite ready for the evening rush. Booths were being cleaned out, presentations were being put away, the main stage for that evening’s amateur “trot” singer competition was still being set up and sound checks were being performed. Generally, things in the passive voice occurred. I made my way up to the hamlet’s community center and arena to find things in a similar state. I was able to see some photography in the community center however and one of the photographers, 정 Eugene, struck up a conversation with me about his photographs of Europe and his audiophilia He gave me the name of his speakers even, as if I would have heard of those particular models. (I hadn’t.)

And then he told me those words that I dread to hear from any Korean in Korea who strikes up a conversation with me in English. “I’d like you to teach a class for the hamlet’s government.” Sigh… Immediately, any offer of hospitality becomes suspect. Indeed, he later offered for me to come to his house to listen to music and talk about it, but I can’t help feel that all he wants from me is my English. Granted, I’m fully willing to use my English as a bartering tool, in exchange for Korean lessons for instance, but at the same time I have no desire to sit in someone’s house while they shower me with food and offers of money (the latter which I cannot accept) while we awkwardly try to converse in my native tongue and I am constantly asked, “Is this right? Is that the correct expression?” I teach during the week. The weekends are supposed to be my time off when I can experience Korean culture, not practice my American culture in a Korean context.

At any rate, I politely told him that I was not allowed to teach English outside of my high school’s permission, that I had a contract that I had to abide by, and that if I was discovered in violation of said contract, I would be sent back to America, thus, I could not teach the government class he wanted me to teach. He’d have to talk to the high school about that. We (unfortunately) exchanged telephone numbers. Maybe I will take him up on his offer of a visit, but as I said, I suspect his motives. I am not a fan of the so-called Aristotelian “friendship of utility” and would like to avoid it at all costs.

Though, one positive benefit of all this is that I just had my first opportunity to practice receiving a business card in Korea, something which requires a bit of attention to detail (receive with both hands, examine the card carefully, do not put it away until the person you’re conversing with is distracted, etc.). Once again though, this is a bit of a utilitarian perspective to my having met this man. Sigh…

Upon leaving the community center, I met one of my adult students outside quite by accident. She was talking with some of her friends, so I decided to say hello to her in English and hello to her friends in Korean. This was fortunate as I now had a friend for the evening. I found out from her that she went to seminary at one point, but upon meeting her husband there decided that she’d much rather be a pastor’s wife than a pastor. It seems my advanced adult class abounds with theological persons—one student, a pastor, another, a pastor’s wife, and I, a pastor’s son and perhaps one day a pastor myself.

She eventually introduced me to a poet from the area, 엄기종 (another religious figure, as I believe that all people who devote their lives to poetry believe in some kind of God or at least muse), who ended up treating us all to sam-o-something, a delicious entrée combining the fattiness of samgyeopsal and the chewy-ness of squid. I actually felt rather bohemian during the entire evening. I was after all sharing food and drink with a poet, bleary eyed about life and love and nature and the founding of his hometown. He was a fantastic storyteller (or maybe it was my student who was a fantastic translator of his stories), and it was during this time that I discovered the true meaning of Noseongjea.

There are apparently two stories that accompany this festival, which acts as a sort of founding day for the hamlet. The first story is this:

Hideyoshi, a great Japanese shogun, decided to invade Korea in the 16th century. Korea, at that time, had no standing, organized national army. Why should it? It was not as if invasions happened every day, and most military power was feudally organized so that the king could call on troops if absolutely necessary, but with a benevolent China to the north protecting Korea as a tributary and a “dwarfish” people (the Japanese) safely across the East Sea, the was no reason for the king to ever actually call on them. (A Confucian scholar, however, had warned the king a few decades before the invasion to raise an army of 100,000 troops. The king did not listen.)

Hideyoshi easily overran much of Korea as most of Korea’s soldiers had rested in bellicose idleness (i.e. they’d become farmers). But the magistrate of the hamlet I’m living in decided to try and make a defense. He built a fortress atop Noseongsan and there fought the Japanese to the last man. They lost, of course, but the people of the hamlet still celebrate the event as the county had the will to fight the Japanese, even if they had not the means.

Another story associated with the Noseongjea Festival is one that is fairly similar to many Native American legends, especially that of Princess Wee-no-nah near Winona, Minnesota, in that a woman decides to kill herself to preserve her honor.

Three Japanese generals in Busan had made a wager about which could arrive in Seoul first during the invasion. One of these generals chose to go through my hamlet’s area, though I am unsure if it is the same general that fought the Koreans on Noseongsan in the story above.

Now, the Japanese soldiers were of course enjoying the spoils of war as any invading country did in the 16th century. In particular, they were enjoying the Korean women they had captured at the expense of their and their husbands’ honor. One woman in particular, the most beautiful woman in the county, of course, and the wife of the county magistrate decided that she would not allow her honor to be sullied, however, and instead threw herself from a very high cliff.

Now, the general happened to see this, and was so moved by this woman’s desire to preserve her chastity that he stopped his army in the hamlet to bury her himself. Thus, he lost the bet, but showed honor to the Korean spirit despite the travesties his soldiers wrecked upon the land.

I was also informed during the course of the evening that my hamlet’s name means “Way of Peace” or maybe more accurately, “Gateway to Peace”. (Earlier this year, I had plugged the name into Google Translator and got back “Window of Criticism”. Google Translator for Korean to English is still in BETA, so I guess I can cut it a break.) With such a name, the Poet was of the opinion that the county, which goes by the same name, would be a perfect candidate for the International Winter Sports Competition featuring a flag with five rings, and thus was sure to win the bid for 2018. One can only hope.

It turns out that the Poet ended up being my host for most of the rest of the evening, despite the fact that he could not speak English. We had fun using my phone’s dictionary to learn new words though, especially 뿔꽃 (bbulggot, sparkle) to describe the lone professional singer’s dress. My student and her family dropped us off at the festival where we watched some of the concert. Here, a little girl from church approached me with a dried squid head, which I politely nibbled on until I could throw it in the grass. (It was a little fishy…) My host grandmother saw me with the Poet and we had to assure her that I was alright where I was and didn’t need an escort for the rest of the night.

The Poet was apparently bored with concert and ushered me over to the soju tents where we met some of his friends, my TKD kwanjangnim included. Drinking is apparently the main event at these festivals. Many of my students were around that night, so I told the old men that I could not drink a lot, but I still shared a few shots with them. Eventually, the woman administering drinks noticed that we were neither eating nor drinking, but merely loitering and insisted (politely, I’m sure) that we pay and continue on our way. This we did.

I was a little worried about getting home at this point, as my ride, the Poet, was clearly sloshed. Fortunately, my friend from church H.W. and her sister H.J. came to the festival to meet me. We walked around a bit and talked about our weeks and how I would have to leave early on Sunday afternoon, so the tutoring may seem a bit much. Just idle conversation really. H.J. does not speak very good English, so I practiced a bit of Korean with her. Eventually, we said goodnight and I began my sojourn back to the house on foot, regretting that I had not rode my bike to the festival instead. This gave me an opportunity to talk with Glypie G. about her adventures in Busan at the international film festival—apparently navigating the mainland’s mass transit system is much harder than navigating Jeju Island’s—and the possibility of her visiting the hamlet, which we decided was impossible. Ah, well. I will see her and everyone else at the upcoming Gyeongju Conference.

And then came some unexpected trouble. I knew that my host family would be returning Saturday at some time, but I was not sure when. Since it was past 10:00 pm, their car was predictably in the driveway, but much to my surprise, both locks on the front door were locked. I only have a key for the one. Well, perhaps they’re inside, I thought. They do tend to lock both locks when they’ve gone to sleep, and I’m sure they were tired from the trip to Seoul. So, I knocked on the door. No answer. I knocked again. No answer. I tried the side window and the back door with similar results as well as shouting into the house a very formally polite annyeonghashibnika into the house to no avail. Well, perhaps they went to the festival on foot (parking was a nightmare after all) and chose to lock both locks on their way out for some odd reason. Presumably, they’d have a key for both after all. No ill will towards me, I’m sure. They must’ve just forgot that I don’t have a key for both locks.

Rather than wait outside for their return, I decided to sneak in via my usual path when I’ve forgotten my keys. I’ll not go into the details on the off chance that a hamlet resident is reading, but let’s just say it involves a bit of awkward free climbing. I finally made it into the house, only to discover my host mother and father sleeping soundly on the living room floor.

Well! I never!

At any rate, I retrieved my effects from outside (I’d removed them for the sake of the climbing), and made my way as quietly as I could to my room a little perturbed. The next morning, I surprised the host family quite a bit when I appeared from my room. The mother turned from her hair brushing to exclaim, “Oh! Jeremy! 언제 왔어요? (When did you come?)”

What apparently had happened was this: The host family had thought that I was going to Wonju for the weekend, which was true, but they also thought I’d left Saturday and would return Sunday, which was false. I was still to leave on Sunday and would return on Monday. This may have been my fault however as my days of the week are not nearly as fluent as they could be. I suppose I may have confused 일요일 (ilyoil, Sunday) with 토요일 (toyoil, Saturday) when I was informing the family of my plans for the weekend.

Teaching: Week 5

2007-10-05T21:03:00.000-07:00

This week teaching was pretty boring actually. I sat in the office a lot and did pretty much nothing. The first and second years were having their mid-terms so I didn’t get to teach my first high school class until Thursday, and all but one of my adult classes were cancelled. That class, in itself, warrants its own post, but I’ll include it here as well.

The high school lesson plan was a M.A.S.H. lesson working with the future tense that my friend Glypie G. created. The kids asked each other who’d they marry, what car would they drive, what job would they have, etc. They liked it, but the activity took too long and I didn’t explain it very well. I’m still thinking of using it a later week that’s fuller. I would have had three high school classes this week, but the students had to prepare a presentation for a festival on the weekend, so my Friday afternoon classes were cancelled.

Most of my Advanced Adults ended up showing up on Tuesday because I couldn’t inform them that class was cancelled for the week. I told them that I was very sorry, but we’d have to move our class back. I think some of them may have been disappointed with me or with the school, but I’m not sure. I was worried that they were paying for their lessons and thus were not getting their money’s worth, but I later found out that the lessons are a free service offered by the school to the community at large, and felt better about it then. Still, a month and half without seeing those fine conversants makes me a little sad.

The beginning adult class took me out for lunch on Thursday. The school was still in Midterms, so class was cancelled for the day. We ate samgyeopsal, my favorite Korean dish. This was enjoyable even if we couldn’t really talk to each other a lot.

Beginning Adult class on Friday would have been business as usual. We were going to do a lesson from the text book and then move on to polite expressions. But something unexpected happened.

A man, who will hereafter be described as “The Character”, came to class. His English is probably advanced intermediate level, but he mispronounces things severely and sometimes does not understand how to use a word in a sentence so that the sentence makes sense, so that I can barely understand him most of the time. Well, another student is always welcome, I suppose.

But there is a slight problem with The Character, and that is this: He wants to learn to English through osmosis. In other words, he just wants to talk in class and not learn what I have to teach the class for the day. Thus, he ends up being more of a distraction and occupying more of my time on an individual basis than I would prefer for the classes sake. Besides this, when he does strike up a conversation in class, he is not really listening to what I say. With most students, I repeat back what they say in correct grammar and then they repeat what I just said so they can understand what mistakes they were making. This guy just responds back, “Yes!” to everything I say. He has a superior air about him, and seems to be reticent to learn at the pace the class needs to learn. After all, not everyone is as advanced as he is. (There is one other student in class who is close, perhaps more advanced, but she understands that the others need to work at a slower place.)

Very frustrating, and I fear I may let the frustration get the best of me. If that is the case, I may have to tell him that he needs to “behave” in class, meaning he needs to do the activities along with the rest of us for the sake of the class. If he wants extra work, that’s fine. I’ll give him extra work. But if he insists on being a nuisance we’ll have to work something else out.

Eating with Lauren's Hostfamily

2007-10-04T21:02:00.000-07:00

On Thursday evening, I got a call from Lauren G., a fellow ATE placed in Wonju. Her host family and she were passing through town and wondered if I’d like to grab a quick bite to eat. I said, “Sure,” and after giving them some apparently very confusing directions (in their defense, I don’t know my house’s address and giving bridges as landmarks isn’t all that helpful as there are about 6 or so bridges in my area), they eventually picked me up and we headed into town.

We finally stopped off at a Myeongtae restaurant, which is a fish specialty for the local area apparently. Tasty, but my memory is too far gone to make further remarks on it. I do remember that it was rather expensive though, so it is unlikely that I’ll try it again. If I do, I will leave you know.

The hostfamily carted Lauren off to choir practice before she could meet my family, something which I will have to amend at some point with her. The host family was a little disappointed it seems that she left so early…

Long Term Financial Planning to Meet Long Term Language Goals (10/3)

2007-10-03T17:00:00.000-07:00

I’ve been meaning to make a budget for sometime now so I can know how much money I will have for Winter Break traveling and language classes. On my grant, I receive 1,400,000 won every month. (That’s right! With my first paycheck, I was a millionaire! Booyah! I have a feeling a show like “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” might not work out here…) of that:

+ 1,400,000 won
-TKD 70,000 won
-Cell Phone 30,000 won
-Travel 100,000 won
-Misc. 100,000 won

+ 1,100,000 won

If I can actually manage to pocket that much per month, by winter break I’ll have about 4,400,000 won. By the end of the grant term, if I’m frugal, I could have as much as 9,000,000 won, which, at about $9,837, would be a nice cushion for when I return to the states and allow me to pay down some loans (and buy an iPhone! … Hey! Who said that?). Still, I want to be able to explore Korea a bit (and also have some fun), and I realize that will take some money. I think a more realistic goal for the end of the grant term would be around $5,000, but I do want to try and make that 4,400,000 won goal for Winter Break. Living on my own in a city with only language classes to occupy my time is going to be expensive.

[NOTE: This post is slightly ironic given what I said below about Americans coming to this country for the money...]

Weekly Letter Home - Pauline Turns to Pop Culture

2007-10-03T16:54:00.002-07:00

Dear Family and Friends,

God’s peace be with you! I hope you are well wherever you are. For those of you in school who are tired, I’m praying that God may help you with that, but from my experience it’s a mountain he wants you to climb, not move. Bear with it. For those who are unwell, I am praying for that too (especially you, Grandma!). May God grant you comfort and may you rest secure in that comfort until you find your full rest in Him. For those who have trials of other kinds, please let me here from you.

Of course, if you have joys let me hear those as well! I just miss people in general and would enjoy your correspondence. I promise, my more personal letters are not the tomes I send out on a (semi-)weekly basis.

Speaking of which, below you will find the update for last week, accompanied by the finished account of my friends’ visit from two weekends ago.

Things are going well here. I am tired, of course, but what else is new? I’ve earned my Green Belt, been on a hike up one of the harder climbs in Korea (not the hardest, not yet, at any rate), and met some friends.

One thing that has troubled me (and this may seem silly) is that I’ve lost touch with some great American pastimes. I’m still doing Fantasy Football with my housemates from VALPO, but, without games to watch with them, it’s not nearly as fun. I’ve also missed the season premiere of HEROES, one of my favorite shows on NBC, as well as episode two. I’ll have to just stop in a PC-bang later this week to watch them online.

Luckily, my sister has been keeping me up to date on all of the youtube.com videos of Justice League Unlimited, Batman, and Superman that I could ever hope for. I’ve also rediscovered my love for listening to Five Iron Frenzy albums straight through, which has been far more uplifting than the habit I’d developed here of listening to Linkin Park albums. The music is just as loud, and the screaming from both bands is phenomenal, but the more sonorous tone and jazz keys of Five Iron’s punk-ska sound is just plain happier than Park’s head banging cacophony.

At any rate, enjoy the letter!

Love,

Jeremiah

The Sunday After—Unintended Hiking, Slightly Awkward Tutoring, and Very Little Recuperating

2007-09-30T17:00:00.000-07:00

During my bus trip back to the hamlet, I finished what homework remained for my tutoring lesson. I arrived at my destination around 10:15 am, and instead of troubling my host family, who were probably preparing for service at that point, for a ride, I decided to walk back via the trail. One would think I’d have had enough hiking by now, and my legs certainly complained about it, but it would be sorter than walking by means of the road.

Then, I did something very stupid. I took a look at a fork in the trail and said, “I’ve never been this way before, I wonder if it goes to that footbridge I’ve wanted to get to for a while…” Well, it did, and about forty minutes later, I was in completely unknown territory and an unknown time from my house. So, legs sore, body tired, and lacking water, I started taking trails that would lead me back to the river, if not my house. So much for taking it easy after that Bukhansan hike, but I did gain some valuable knowledge about the deer paths on the mountains, and even found a trail to a peak that I’ll want to try someday.

I stumbled my way into the house, fell asleep for about twenty minutes, changed into something more suitable for church, and, because it looked like rain, began my walk, this time along the flat road. I called my friend, H.W., to tell her I’d be late for tutoring, and she told me to meet her at the parsonage behind the church. I did well on the grammar constructions for tutoring, but need to bone up on my vocabulary, something which has been the bane of my existence with every language I’ve tried to study. The lesson was in her bedroom this time, which was slightly awkward. I don’t want to give anyone at the church the wrong impression, so I’ll have to ask if we can remain in a slightly more public setting next time.

After nearly falling asleep a couple of times in the afternoon service (I was running on about 6 hours of sleep plus a catnap after an all day hike and I couldn’t understand the sermon as it was in the Korean, so my eyes were rather insistent), I walked home. I have a feeling H.W. would have liked to talk for a bit more, but I was really too tired for more socializing. I’ll have to make it up to her next week. After all, if I’m not paying her, we should make this at least a language exchange.

I picked up some bananas on the way home to get some potassium to help with the cramps. There were about fourteen in the bunch, so I ate four on the way home and gave the rest to my host family. At that point, I believe I tried to write some, but I was too tired to do much. (It is Wednesday now, and I still have not recuperated.) I tried reading then. Still to tired. Watching T.V. was also taxing. So, I gave up, bid the family goodnight, and hit the hay. Finally.

(Incidentally, the family is well now. My host brother used improvised sign language to proudly tell me, “Eye! No!” (He pointed at his eye, then waved his arm wildly in a back and forth motion.) I can now touch things again. Hooray!)

Weekend in Seoul – Climbing Bukhansan (9/28-9/30)

2007-09-30T16:57:00.000-07:00

After school on Friday, I biked home as fast as I could and packed for my weekend in Seoul, being very careful about choosing only items I would want to carry with me for the entire weekend as we would not have a place to keep our things during the day. For a couple of weeks now, a fellow ATE, Jon F., and I have been throwing around the idea of going hiking. Originally, we wanted to climb Seoraksan, which is supposedly the most beautiful and most difficult mountain in all of South Korea. (There is one in North Korea on the border with China that is rumored to be even more beautiful.) It’s a two-day hike, but supposedly well worth the time commitment. Both of us have 3-day weekends, so it shouldn’t have been a problem, but unfortunately his 3-day weekends start on Friday and mine end on Monday. We decided to pick another mountain. His communications back to me were fairly sporadic, but he finally discovered a couple of good mountains right outside of Seoul. One was supposed to be a five-hour hike, the other a six-hour, so if we were really ambitious, we could do both in one day!

My trip over was an unexpectedly late one. The bus trip to Seoul takes about three hours (at 12,800 won), and I could’ve sworn there was a 5:45 bus, making my estimated time of arrival about 8:45. (I’d abbreviate estimated time of arrival, but I fear this may be misinterpreted as my job title and thus incur the wrath of the Powers that Be.) Unfortunately, the bus was slotted to leave at 6:45, so I had about an hour and fifteen minutes to kill in the hamlet. During this time, I did some Korean homework, listened to some music I had downloaded to my PDA, and also discovered some surprisingly cheap street food in the marketplace. I usually go there at night when the vendors have closed up shop until tomorrow morning because I’m just making my way from TKD to my host family’s beauty shop. I’ll have to go more often during the day, however, because I picked up some delightfully greasy egg, meat, and pepper silver-dollar sized paddies at five for 1,000 won! It makes me wonder what the other street food is selling for.

I finally arrived at Dong Seoul Bus Terminal around 9:30 pm and met Jon F. at the local subway station, where I discovered that I had left my subway pass card from Yonsei Day at home and had to purchase a new one. We made our way to a jjimjilbang (24-hour Korean bathhouse with common areas for relaxing, entertainment, and sleeping) called Siloam. It was a little on the pricey side for a jjimjilbang (around 10,000 won when most are around 6,000 or 7,000), but it was so nice that we decided to sleep there both nights we would stay in Seoul.

The next day, Saturday, we got a late start, so we decided to pick one of the mountains on our itinerary and save the other for another time. The mountain we chose was Bukhansan, which at its peak becomes very steep, bald-faced rock so that it’s nearly impossible to climb without assistance (i.e. a rope). Now, most hikes to such mountains in America will just bring you to a lookout point so that you can see the mountain even closer, or will bring you to the base of the insurmountable part and have a sign saying, “Welcome to the mountain. You’ve seen it. Now go on your way.”

Not in Korea however. In fact, at the top of this mountain was a decent sized flag, scaffolding, a heavy marble marker, and even a vendor selling Bukhansan handkerchiefs and pins for those fortunate enough to have earned them by making it to the top. All this despite the fact that you practically pull yourself up the mountain by means of a rope and metal posts that have been driven into the rock for the final kilometer or so of the ascent. (If you’ve ever climbed Half Dome at Yosemite National Park in California, you may know what sort of hike I’m talking about. I’ve heard it is similar, at any rate.)

(NOTE: The Ubiquitous Pigeon was at the top as well, which I don’t find nearly impressive, as he can fly, but still slightly impressive in that he chose to fly that high, whereas most pigeons are content to walk on the flat plazas and sidewalks near eating establishments or where people have established themselves temporarily for eating.)

Also typical of Korean hikes, it seems, the trail went straight up the mountainside, the Koreans apparently having never heard of a switchback. Even if there is a “switchback” in the trail, it is usually bypassed in favor of a more direct route. This led my friend Jon to comment that there must be a law somewhere that says Korean trails must be impossible to climb for at least 30% of the population. 60% in the case of foreigners, I added.

Koreans even wear special gear for hiking. They have synthetic fiber clothes designed for wicking away sweat and keeping the body’s temperature normal. They have matching telescoping poles that they use to keep pace and help them up steep soil, and sometimes even a third pole for when they don’t feel like coordinating two hands. They have special gloves, special hats, special bags, special shoes. The only time I have ever seen a Korean person where sunglasses (besides when my host uncle had pinkeye) was during hiking. And I’ve never been hiking while the sun was out! My point is it’s all part of the uniform. We may have all of this in the U.S., but most people will just go in shorts and a t-shirt. Korean people, when they do anything athletic, apparently have to wear the whole outfit. When they bike, there’s an outfit for that. Rollerblading is the same. Hiking is no different. At any rate, I’ve resolved to collect an entire outfit by the time I return home to the states.

These facts in consideration, it makes me think that perhaps the Korean phrase 산책는 곳 is poorly translated to English as “hiking”. It is sometimes even translated as “strolling”. In other words, the sentiment is recreational walking in general.

Given both of my experiences, first at Songnisan and now at Bukhansan, I think “mountain climbing” might be a more appropriate translation, so long as one keeps the idea of rock climbing as a separate category, which, despite the ample amount of rocks in Korea, is not a popular activity.

It was beautiful though, and well worth the climb. In total, the hike took us about 5 hours including breaks. During this time, I don’t think we covered more than 8 kilometers, and certainly not more than 10. As I said, the trails are steep, and not designed for land speed records.

About half way up the trail, we came to the top of the mountain range, where we discovered a king had built a walled fortress and auxiliary palace during the Three Kingdoms period and later to fend off Mongol invasions, which he was not successful at. Just imagining carrying all of that stone to the top of the range made me wonder at the power that king must have wielding. Even if they carried it from the top down, it could not have been easy given the mountain’s steepness.

In fact, we saw some construction workers restoring a portion of the wall, which essentially involved taking perfectly cut stone and chiseling it to make it look jagged and worn. But as for the poor workers who delivered the stone to that site, I imagined this dialogue:

Deliverer: Here’s your stone. Where do you … … want it?
Worker: Oh, just put it down there or something.
Deliverer: Ok. Man, it was hard getting that thing up here! And look at that! Not a scratch on it. Had to be really careful with it to do that! A satisfactory delivery, right?
Worker: Yeah, sure. Whatever.

To be honest though, we did see a helipad at one of the rest stops, so perhaps they just had to carry the stone over, rather than up. Still, admirable.

That evening, we ate at a decent restaurant. I had teriyaki chicken, while my friend had the bibimbop, being the conscientious vegetarian that he is. We actually joked on the trail that his being a vegetarian must give him unlimited strength and endurance, as he was certainly cruising along while I huffed and puffed my lagging way behind. Afterwards, I had coffee and cheesecake at a Starbucks to get my fix of Western food for the next week or so. I never know how long it will be, so I have to stock up like the squirrels in fall preparing themselves for the winter chill.

We decided that it would be a good idea for me to check the time schedule at Dong Seoul Station before tomorrow morning so I could attempt getting back to the hamlet before my weekly tutoring lesson. I couldn’t find my town on the bus schedule, however, so with assurances from a friend over the phone that it was possible to get a ticket directly to my small little village, I made my way over to the ticket booth and said the words that ended any chance of recuperation for the weekend:

Naeil the hamletae gayo. (Tomorrow, I am going to the hamlet.)

They of course gave me a ticket for the first bus out of there at 7:10 am. We calculated the time it took by subway to get to our jjimjilbang and found it to be about one hour, meaning I’d have to wake up at 5:45 am to be safe. Sigh…

We had a little trouble navigating the green line back to the jjimjilbang (We accidentally took a spur off that line instead of the main line.), but our time on the subway had been good for catching up all weekend, so the conversation made the time pass quickly. We did the usual comparing of notes on homestays and schools. His school experience has been vastly different because he teaches elementary students instead of high school. He also told me about a Winter Korean language intensive program in his area that I may attend to bone up on my language skills. We wound up at the jjimjilbang around 10:45 and, after bathing and sitting in the cool room for a while, finally went to sleep around 11:30.

One conversation of note that we had during the weekend was on how it was always a little awkward seeing other expatriates in Korea. One always feels compelled to greet these complete strangers, but then one would be faced with the awkwardness of feeling, “I have no idea who you are, but you’re like me and perhaps have had a similar trouble in adjusting here and I’d really like to just sit and talk with you about it.” It’s also awkward perhaps because in the United States we’re conditioned not to think differently of people just because of outward appearance. Whether this conditioning works or not is up for debate, but most people still at least think to themselves, “It is culturally wrong for me to think of this person as different from any other person based on their skin color.” Thus, I always feel a little ridiculous when I see a fellow foreigner and immediately think to myself, “Friend!” After all, are not the Koreans all around me decently friendly people?

It is different in Korea at least to some extent though. One is surrounded by so much homogeneity that one is immediately drawn to the different, especially if that one grew up in what would be surprising (perhaps even overwhelming) diversity compared to the Korean context. I’m not sure if it’s something I’ll ever get past. Or even want to get past for that matter.

Sunday morning I woke up around 6:00 am, later than I should have, hurriedly changed, said goodbye to Jon, promising each other that we’d do it again sometime, and was out of the jjimjilbang by 6:10.

I was as dignified as possible, of course, but I was also practically running to each subway station in my attempt to get to Dong Seoul Terminal before my bus left at 7:10. I calculated the average time it took between stops to be 2 minutes and examined my subway map to determine when I should arrive at my stop. When I got on the green line, I fervently prayed that I had gotten on the right spur and would not be sent off one stop in the opposite direction before I could correct my mistake. I arrive at Dong Seoul at 7:02, enough time for me to get a 300 won iced coffee from the vending machine. I downed it and ran to the bus. No breakfast, no water, a spoonful of coffee, and two hours to the first resting area, but I was on the bus at 7:05. Five minutes to spare.

Teaching: Week 6—Scheduling Nightmare!!!

2007-09-28T16:57:00.000-07:00

Because of Chuseok this week, I only had two effective teaching days at the High School, Thursday and Friday. Even these turned out to be a bit of a surprise, however.

On Wednesday night, as I was attempting my blog update for September 26th (given their length, they are feats worthy of the word attempt), I received a call from Chongtae. I only risk mentioning his name regardless of the wrath I may incur from the Powers that Be as I so stupidly did not recognize it as the name of one of the English teachers. This was embarrassing when he called and introduced himself, and I owed him a great apology.

(In general, circumstances have not allowed me to get to know this English teacher. His office is in a different teacher’s lounge than mine, and he is one of the few co-teachers that will allow me to have completely full reign of the classroom, probably because his kids are so advanced. It is unfortunate because we share many common interests, our love for movies and animation for instance, and he is the only teacher who has showed interest in my academic research during my undergraduate years. If you remember the “Hello, Kitty” car post, it was his car that brought me so much levity.)

At any rate, Chongtae invited me to teachers’ Chuseok barbeque out by the teachers’ apartment. One of the other English teachers had graciously opened up his ample supply of meat products, and a few teachers were enjoying these as they cooked and charred over an open fire. This is a rarity in Korea, as most meat products are cooked either in soups or in a pan, so that open fire cooking is seen as “Western” style in some way. The teacher who supplied the meat informed me that he preferred meat cooked over charcoal rather than meat cooked in a pan without the extra smoky flavor. (I cannot believe that smoky is spelled correctly, but Word assures me it is. Heaven help us…)

It was at this barbeque that I casually dropped mention of the fact that there were no classes on Thursday morning (the next day) because of examinations. The other teachers who could understand me looked at me with surprise. “Really?” they asked. “Where did you hear that?” At this point, I begin to worry. My co-teacher had told me that on Thursday morning there would be no classes, I explained. We called her, and she said that she had meant that the next Thursday morning there would be no classes. In fact, I eventually discovered that the next week Monday-Thursday morning I would have no classes to teach at all! Mid-terms would be held Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday morning, and Wednesday was Founding Day, a national holiday in remembrance of Tangun (http://www.lifeinkorea.com/information/tangun.cfm), the mythical ancestor of the Korean people.

At this point, I begin to panic. I had not prepared any class plan for Thursday morning, intending to create that week’s lesson during that time so that it would be ready for the afternoon and Friday. After a quick phone call to a fellow ATE, Glypie G., I was a bit calmer. I asked her if she thought a brief Chuseok dialogue might go over well, and she told me that she thought that’d be ok. Well, if she says it’d be ok, it must be, right? Regardless, it did comfort me. The next morning, I hurriedly typed up a brief English dialogue between a foreigner and Korean explaining what Chuseok is. I then gave this lesson to my 1-1 Class in the afternoon.

The other reason I was worried was because the schedule change meant I would have to announce to my Beginning Adult class that class, which I canceled for this Thursday because of the exams, would also have to be cancelled for next week’s Thursday because I didn’t understand the schedule. I relayed this to them on Friday, at which point they graciously forgave me and offered to take me out to lunch that Thursday instead, to which I agreed without hesitation, though I think I should be taking them out to lunch to be honest.

The new schedule also meant I was faced with the embarrassing situation of telling my Advanced Adult class that there would be no class the next week for them as well despite the fact that we’d already not seen each other for a week and half. Now we’d be at over a full half-month without meeting. If they are paying for these classes, I hope the school will refund a portion of their money. At least their Plato assignment should be well-rehearsed for the week after next…

As for the lessons themselves, they were a bit chaotic. The breakdown was as follows:

Thursday 2-2 and 1-1 both practiced the Chuseok dialogue I had prepared. For a warm-up activity, I had them translate 화장실 어디에 있어요? (Where is the bathroom?) to English. Then, I followed the general lesson format of Jacob, two ATE’s back, who often did dialogues with his students, having them memorize each one by the end of class. (I was able to scrounge up his lessons and advice on the school computer’s hard drive thanks to the file path left by Dana. Thanks, Dana!)

On Friday, I explained to the Beginning Adult class the dilemma I was faced with scheduling, and afterwards we began our lesson from English through Teamwork, the text I’ve decided to work through to make sure everyone is on the same page with their speaking abilities. The first topic was predictably easy with them, but I was able to do some role play to make it fun for them. We practiced name introductions, and I even let one brave soul be the teacher for a while. For the second hour of class, we did the Chuseok dialogue I had prepared for my high school students. This constituted survival English for the day, which I think is appropriate. Being able to describe one’s own culture to inquiring souls is something I wish I could do on a daily basis living with my Korean family.

Friday afternoon I was supposed to have two high school classes, 1-4 and 2-3. I decided to forgo the Chuseok dialogue with 1-4 in favor of playing “Go Fish!” with them, an American card game usually taught to small children. They enjoyed this, and I enjoyed teaching it with my co-teacher as it allowed us to reinforce the “Do you have any ____?” expression. By the end of class, I was able to stop the game, and I had each student come up and ask me (acting as a store clerk) if I had different items. Usually, they asked for simple things like paper and pencil, but a few brave souls asked for things like knives and guns, with which they proceeded to rob me (creative little devils). One even asked for a knife, which I gave him, thanked me, gave me my money, and then stabbed me without taking his money back. Laughter ensued. Another more advanced student asked if I had any cigars and liquor. When I said he was too young, he said, “Oh, I left my I.D. in my car!” Fantastic English, and surprising! I showed everyone in class my driver’s license so they’d understand “I.D.” and told the student, “No I.D., no cigars and liquor.”

But why forgo the Chuseok dialogue? I need to keep lessons with 1-4 fairly active somehow. There is a mentally handicapped student in the class who can become bored and disruptive very easily if he isn’t occupied. For past ATEs, he was removed from the classroom, but I want to avoid this if possible. He has approached me on walks home to practice English and will always say, “Hello” to me, so I know he is anxious to learn. Still, I do not want the rest of the class to suffer from having “dumbed down” lessons. My challenge is to find a way to interest and challenge all with the same lesson at different levels. If I do have to remove him at some point (I hope I will not), I hope that I can still give him some sort of private instruction.

My final class, 2-3, would have done the Chuseok dialogue, however, if it were not for the usual teacher for that class. He requested to take the class from me because of the finals coming up next week. As soon as he requested it, I said to him, “It’s yours,” which got a laugh out of him. It was nice to leave school a little early as I had a bus to catch to Seoul for the weekend.

Now, I just need to figure out something to do for next week… Only two days of classes again. That M.A.S.H. lesson that’s floating around the ATE forums is looking mighty tempting…

Host Mother’s Birthday!

2007-09-28T16:56:00.000-07:00

Friday morning, the family celebrated the host mother’s birthday. Unfortunately, I did not make it downstairs in time to sing with them, but I could hear the chorus from the bathroom upstairs, as well as the popping of party streamers. (They use the same Beatles birthday tune that we sing in America, though the words were Koreanized, of course.) In addition to the usual rice and fish soup, we had cake for breakfast. A winning combination, to be sure.

Host Family is Sick!

2007-09-27T16:56:00.000-07:00

It turns out that the pink eye, which my host brother contracted from his uncle, has spread to the rest of the children in the family. I was advised to spend as little time as possible in the first floor’s common area. This actually made asking “permission” to go to Seoul this weekend all the easier. When the host father heard that I wanted to visit a friend there and go hiking, he said, “Yes! Go! Everyone’s sick, so get out of the house!” We all laughed at this. Hopefully they will be well again when I return.

(NOTE: About the “permission” – While I don’t actually ask permission to go places, I always try to check if the family is doing anything that they wanted me to attend with them. I don’t want to be rude, after all. They usually aren’t though, so I get my leave and go ashore, so to speak, by which I mean, I get to go to a city where they brew their coffee instead of mixing it from powder and have a beer selection beyond the Miller High Life-like domestic beers and Budweiser.)

Because of the sickness, my collegiate host sister stayed home from school a little past the Chuseok holiday. A bit of a blessing as she speaks at least decent English, and it made relaying my travel plans all the easier.

TKD: I am a Green Belt! Sorta…

2007-09-27T16:55:00.000-07:00

I found out Thursday that I earned my green belt in TKD. I was a little worried because, after my rather poor performance on the test, I had never received a belt a no one even tried to tell me about it. I also ended up reviewing the second and third forms with a red-black belt all lesson, so that I thought I might need to test those forms again to advance.

To find out, I essentially walked up to the sabeonim after practice and said, “Noranti iaeyo?” (“Am I a yellow belt?”) He assured me that I had earned green belt, and that he would pass out the belts on Friday. I wouldn’t be there Friday, of course, but the knowledge was enough to assuage my fears.

I think that they must take other things into consideration when awarding belt—perhaps dedication, attitude, and willingness to learn. My performance certainly didn’t mean that I had earned the green belt, so it may be these other things that allowed for my success. In any case, I’ll have to be sure that for the next assessment, when I will attempt to earn a blue belt, there is no reason to doubt my receiving it.

Host Brother is Sick!

2007-09-26T19:11:00.000-07:00

An unfortunate result of Chuseok was that, with all the family bonding and sharing of food, my host brother managed to contract pinkeye from one of his uncles. I have been told that I am not allowed to touch him or anything that he has touched. Thus, most of the toys in the house are now off limits, which does not matter at any rate because, more importantly, I have lost my playmate. Tear.*

Chess with Family

2007-09-26T19:10:00.001-07:00

During her stay, Lydia H. was able to use her superior Korean skills to determine that my host brother really wants to learn how to play chess. Joy! So, I gave Rebecca H. a call, and she was gracious enough to purchase a chess set and bring it to me at the Hamlet.

I tried teaching my host brother how to play, but it turned out to be rather difficult so that, while I could get the basic moves down for him, he couldn’t necessarily use strategy, and I’m at a point where I have to think pretty hard to make it an even match between us. Luckily, his collegiate sister also developed an interest, and it wasn’t so bad playing against her. By now, host father also plays with great interest, and he has promised to teach me paduk (also known as go) in exchange. (For those who don’t know the game by either name, it’s in the movie “A Beautiful Mind”; it’s the game they play in the courtyard at Princeton (?). If you still don’t know what I’m talking about, watch the movie. It’s well worth the viewing. Or go to this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paduk.)

Video Games with Host Brother

2007-09-26T19:10:00.000-07:00

One thing I learned about my host brother during Chuseok is that he’s absolutely crazy about video games. I suppose I should’ve realized this earlier. He is eight after all. Anyway, at the grandparents house, he was playing them like crazy with his cousins.

So, I finally broke down and showed him that I have an emulator on my computer with all of the Mario Bros. games. Let the chaos ensue. At any rate, he loves them, but I’m only let him play when I can supervise him. I worry about him breaking my rather expensive little Freya, who already probably needs a maintenance check, which is going to be hard to obtain in Korea. The country does not really cater to Macs.

Chuseok Festivities

2007-09-25T19:09:00.000-07:00

And now, finally, we come to a description of what has kept me out of contact for so long: Chuseok. Chuseok is essentially a day in which Korean’s honor their ancestors by visiting their graves, presenting food, and bowing. This is mostly done for direct ancestor of the eldest patriarch (in most cases a great-grandfather), though in a Confucian hierarchy, other people besides this person may be honored. Koreans celebrate it on the 15th day of the 8th month on the lunar calendar, which fell on September 25th this year. This is also around the time of the rice harvest, and this fact combined with the fact that families consume a lot of food around this time lead Korean’s to translate this holiday as “Thanksgiving Day.” Unlike American Thanksgiving, though, Chuseok is apparently the biggest Korean holiday of the year, according to KBS Global (http://english.kbs.co.kr/news/zoom/1480466_11781.html).

Since the day’s surrounding the holiday are also national legal holidays, I did not have school on Monday through Wednesday. Instead, I spent time with the family which involved a lot of tomb visiting, eating, and sitting around watching television, though at one point, I did go fishing with a few of the children and one uncle. This largely involved the uncle using a small net trap to catch very small fish which we then released, while the children and I skipped stones. They were impressed with my abilities, though to be honest, I was surprised at them. How I got 11 skips out of one rock I’ll never know. I never used to be able to do even four!

One child in particular was a joy to meet. Her name is Nara, and she is actually a student at one of my fellow Entertaining Teachers from America’s schools, Stacey C. Unfortunately, she cannot take classes with Stacey because Stacey only teaches the lower grades and she is in the higher grades. At any rate, Nara (whose English name is Annika—some folks from Soul Purpose should appreciate that) speaks surprisingly good English for a student her age. She’s only 12 years old, Korean age, but already she can talk to me about literature. Granted, our conversation revolved mostly around Harry Potter, but her facility with the language was still impressive, and I’m sure she’ll probably do well in the Korean school system where knowledge of English language is the largest obstacle to advancement.

The first tomb visit, to the patriarch’s tomb, was fairly traditional from what I understand. There was food in front of the grassy mound that constituted the grave. The family members bowed in order of their rank from highest to lowest, getting on their knees, placing their hands in front of them horizontally so that they touched at the finger tips, and then lowering their foreheads to their hands. They performed this ritual twice. Then all (including me) helped eat the food given to the ancestors. (I am reminded of Peter’s and Paul’s discussions in Acts about whether certain foods are clean or unclean. I suppose I must take solace in the words of Christ that it is not what enters the body which is unclean, but that which comes out of it.) Then, my host father and one of his brother’s performed a smaller, but similar ritual for their great-grandmother, who apparently no one else was required to honor. It is also interesting that none of my host aunts nor my host mother accompanied us to the tomb. Also, only the eldest female daughter from each family came with us, while all of the sons were required to come.

After this, the grandmother gave out presents of socks to everyone, once again including me. They are my first pair of argyles, actually, and are quite comfortable. This is apparently a traditional Chuseok gift, or at least a common one, as many of my friends from the Program also received them.

Later on in the day we visited my host mother’s family tomb, this only with my nuclear host family, the others having gone back to Wonju. Her family tomb was quite a bit farther off the beaten path, and we had to walk through a couple of buckwheat fields to reach it. What was interesting here was that, though we presented food (a meager portion, but still an offering), instead of doing the traditional bowing, the family knelt and my youngest host sister prayed to Hananim, the Korean name for God. I think this was just a general prayer of thanks, like we would perform in America around our Thanksgiving. Whereas with the other service I had stood to the side and watched, I felt it would be appropriate for me to pray with the family now. And so, I listened politely until the prayer finished (as I do every Sunday for service), and said the “Amen” with them at the end.

Besides visiting family tombs, another Chuseok tradition is to offer a prayer to the moon. It is a tradition that if one offers a prayer to the full-moon, that prayer will come true. My family, however, just sat on the roof and looked up at it. Perhaps they offered a prayer, but if they did, it was silently. They did sing a traditional Chuseok song about the moon, and they were able to tell me about the image that Koreans see in the moon’s oceans. Whereas we see a face in the west, they see a rabbit at a ddeok (rice cake) churner with a frog hopping out from behind it. It’s a complex picture, and you have to use your imagination, but eventually you can see it. Kinda… (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/9/96/Man_In_The_Moon.jpeg/300px-Man_In_The_Moon.jpeg)

Overall, a good experience. If you’re lucky enough to visit Korea, I hope you’ll be lucky enough to have it. The homestay has really been a blessing in allowing me to participate in these usually more private family cultural events.

Dinner with Pastor’s family and tutoring

2007-09-24T19:08:00.000-07:00

Because of Rebecca H.’s visit on Sunday, H.W. and I decided to postpone my tutoring lesson until Monday evening when I’d be at her father’s house anyway because her mother had invited me over for dinner. Rebecca cautioned me about this. It could be that the mother is trying to set me up with her daughter, but we both agreed that’d be a little weird by Korean standards. For one thing, she’s older than me and more degreed than me, usually a no-no in the Korean dating culture. For another thing, she’s taller than me. This is mostly a no-no even in American culture, though there are always exceptions to the height “rule”, and I’ve had to make them with every girl I’ve dated save two.

However, given that all of the extended family has lived in America for about 30 years and given that H.W. wants to study 18th Century Western Music at a grad school in the states, I think it’s wise to keep my guard up.

Dinner was largely uneventful. It was shared between the Pastor, an elder, H.W. and I. (The mother stayed in the kitchen for some—undoubtedly Confucian holdover-like—reason.) I spoke a tiny bit of Korean. Even they spoke very little in any language. Monday is usually the pastor’s day off, and he was quite tired from Sunday’s services.

After the dinner we all shared some coffee and H.W. and I went into the “pastor’s study to study” (H.W.’s words). I actually learned a few phrases that turned out to be quite useful in my upcoming visit to Seoul, such as “I came by ____insert mode of transportation____,” and “Transfer to ____destination____.”

Friends Visit – Sunday: Lydia returns to Seoul and a Day with Rebecca

2007-09-23T16:54:00.000-07:00

Sunday was fairly uneventful, but seeing as Saturday was so eventful, I didn’t mind so much. Lydia headed out fairly early to catch her bus to Seoul. Rebecca came to church with my host family and me and met my friend/tutor H.W. The whole experience lifted my spirits a bit as for a lot of the morning I had to translate for Rebecca. I did this poorly of course, but it made me realize that I was in fact learning Korean at a bit of an accelerated rate considering I’m not taking classes.

We ate lunch at the church and decided to pass on the afternoon service, opting to walk home through the traveling market instead. The host family, who usually stays home on Sundays, decided to keep the shop open because of the Chuseok holiday, which gave Rebecca and I some quiet time to just talk about our homestays and school and life since orientation in general. There is some concern about her adjustment here. She was a Chinese literature and language major in college (she’s quite proficient, and perhaps borderline fluent), and I think she would have been much happier spending the year there. The problem is that she wants to work with an NGO in rural China, but doesn’t have enough money to begin paying off her student loans. I guess she figured Korea would be close enough for now, but I think she’s finding that Korea is worlds away from China culturally speaking. She’s hoping to go to China for a conference in November over American Thanksgiving. I tried to encourage her as best I could, but I fear that it may not have been enough. She is a wonderful person who has a great outer strength, but I do worry about her sometimes.

I cooked some dinner for us (by which I mean I warmed up whatever was on the stove), and eventually the family came over… with the extended family as well. It was at this point, I believe that I was told by one of the uncles that I look like Russell Crowe. (YES!) I always wanted to look ruggedly handsome and like I had just gotten out of a fight. I think what he meant was that I have a small, flattish nose and can grow a beard, but I’ll take it!

Rebecca and I talked and watched T.V. with the family until it was time to sleep. The next day, Monday the twenty-fourth, the host family drove Rebecca and I to the bus terminal where we waited for her bus. I only put so much emphasis on the date as a way of apology. I forgot that Monday was her birthday and was a bit of a prick therefore in not wishing her a happy one.

Friends Visit – Saturday: Rebecca Arrives, Exploring the Hamlet and Bongpyeong

2007-09-22T16:53:00.000-07:00

Lydia came to watch the TKD testing and was equally confused about my going with the last group. She did come over to translate for a little bit though, but I fear that I was in a mood at that point and may have made her feel unwanted. Also, the sabeonim was giving instructions at that point, not about what she was translating, so I may have been perturbed a bit at her interrupting. At any rate, she told me that the children were reciting a letter to their mothers as part of the test, something I may want to memorize as well since some sort of spoken assessment is part of TKD testing usually. She also told me that the kwanjangnim thinks I’m doing well, but that I need to loosen up and relax my muscles when moving. This is something I’ve had problems with since Chuncheon even, and in general I have trouble relaxing my muscles even when trying to sleep. In fact, since starting TKD, with its emphasis on relaxing the muscles until the point of contact, I’ve noticed that when I close my eyes to go to sleep, I actually squeeze them a bit instead of letting them close naturally. Maybe this is why I’ve had trouble sleeping for… well, gosh, ages! It’s a hard habit to break, at any rate, and if I can’t get my eyes to relax without making a conscious effort, I somehow doubt that getting my legs to relaxing while kicking a target is going to be any easier.

We walked around the hamlet a bit after we mailed Dana’s black belt to Seoul, and she asked what was wrong. I was still in a mood for several reasons. One, the green belt test hadn’t gone well, which was frustrating. Two, I was still tired from last night’s drinking and hadn’t had a shower yet from last night’s TKD practicing, so I generally felt “icky”. Three, Lydia had told me that the family thought Jacob and Dana had picked up Korean faster than me, so they were able to talk to the family about more things. (My co-teachers have since assured me that this is not necessarily true.) This brought me low because one of the main reasons I came to Korea was to learn Korean, and I was having trouble getting actual instruction in the language due to the remoteness of my location. Talking out these frustrations with Lydia helped me, and I think what I have missed most living here is having someone from my own cultural background to talk to who knows how to console me using things from that culture. Even the teacher’s in the lounge kept commenting on how I looked so happy to have a friend in town on Friday. A little silly, I know, but the only other foreigners here aren’t even American, which, as I said in an earlier letter, means that even things like the 60s being the rebellious decade aren’t given cultural commonalities. I have no shared history with anyone within a 50-kilometer radius, and it is taxing.

We met Ryan at the bus terminal to await Rebecca’s arrival. Another happy meeting there with an old friend, and we were off on our tour of the hamlet. We drove to the other end of town and then took a walk out to the rock park out beyond the rice paddies on the East end. The rock park is essentially what it sounds like. A park with a bunch of rocks arranged in different ways, but they are nice to look at. (I mentioned in an earlier post that my host father does something similar on a smaller scale in the house as a hobby. I’ve since learned that this is called suseokhwei.)

By now, though, we were all ready to eat. (I was still in need of a shower, but food took precedence at this point.)

Now, on our way to the park, Ryan had asked about where I went to church in town, and I told him that, while I didn’t know the name, it was near a fairly well-known restaurant in the area called Serenade. He said he didn’t know it.

It was much to my surprise therefore when he suggested that we go to “Saeraenadae” (Serenade, Koreanized). Again, the reason why I was teaching the syllable lesson.

At any rate, Serenade offers what Lydia describes as a Korean-Western blend of menu choices, which she correctly defines as meaning, “They offer both Korean food and Western food.” Against everyone’s better judgment, including mine I ordered the spaghetti. (I wanted to order the sandwich on the menu, but they were out of the vegetables, bread, and lunchmeat…) When the spaghetti arrived, it was snack sized as far as Italian food goes, far too sweet to realistically have had any herbs or garlic in it, and it was topped with cheese. Not parmesian cheese, oh no! But Kraft American cheese, the kind you buy in singles packets from the grocery store to make cheap grilled cheese sandwiches. Fortunately, this less than satisfying entree was supplemented by my friends’ plates, which apparently had too much food on them.

We then played the traditional game of, “Let me pay the bill,” which in this case involved a physical race to the cash register as we attempted to prevent Ryan from paying. This continued throughout the rest of the day. I swear that he would’ve dropped $200 on us if we would have let him.

At this point, we haggled about what to do next (not even I mention the possibility of a shower, however, this going on 29 hours and two sessions of TKD without one) and eventually decide to head out to Bongpyeong to see Lee Hyo Seok’s house (my second visit) and Herbenara, or Herbland, a magical place filled with herbs (my first visit). We told Ryan that we’d help pay for gas, but he wouldn’t allow, following the Korean custom of loathing dutchpay.

Despite its cheesy name, Herbenara actually turned out to be a pleasant garden park. Admission was 5000 won. Classical tunes played with music box simplicity over the loud speakers as we strolled along the scented paths. There were areas to honor kitchen herbs, herbs mentioned in Shakespeare, herbs from the Bible, and other items. Since Rebecca and Lydia knew I had acted, they asked me to recite some of the Shakespeare lines posted on the signs in the Bard’s area. I think Andy White, my director from Romeo & Juliet would have been proud of my aspiration and sense of rhythm. Or embarrassed. We stopped in a greenhouse at some point and drank some hot herbal tea, which was a comfort as it unfortunately had been raining all day. This also caused the herbs to lose some of their scent I’m sure, and I hope to return on a warmer, sunny day when I can absorb their full force through my nasal passages. I have such a poor sense of smell as it is that something needs to be right under my nose to smell it most of the time.

After our adventures in Bongpyeong, we drove back to the hamlet under cover of darkness and ate dinner and shared light drinks at the restaurant I had met Ryan and Lydia at the night before. At some point during the conversation, it came out that Ryan thought that Lydia and Rebecca, who are both Asian (the former being Korean and the latter Chinese-German), were far more American than me. In terms of my attitude towards life, apparently, I’m pretty Korean. Lydia and Rebecca are loud and boisterous and crazy, yet guarded about their opinions, but I’m more of a stoic and relay my sincere feelings so that Ryan felt he could understand me better.

I find this interesting, though I don’t know if I’d agree. I do try to remain stoic about things, with the exception of happiness. (My guffaw offends the ears of those around me if I find something even slightly humorous.) I would also say that I try to be sincere.

At the same time, though, I don’t feel very Korean. There are still a lot of things here that I will never understand and may never even feel fully comfortable with. The physical attention couples show each other, for instance, where a boyfriend will grab his girlfriend’s neck in a choking gesture in order to show affection or the fact that if a girl crosses the threshold of a motel with a guy it means that she has consented to sex. Resistance just becomes part of the game at that point. Public drunkenness and displays of violence as well as people just watch idly by I’m not fully comfortable with either. But these are cultural things, and maybe it’s the fact that I just feel sincerely about them that makes me less American than some other expatriates here. This is not the case with Rebecca and Lydia, but with a lot of Americans in Korea, they’re just here for the money that can be had from “teaching” English. They will not bother to learn the Korean language, nor are they interested in the culture that surrounds them. They just want their money and a good time. A lack of sincere feelings indeed.

I’ll get off the soapbox now…

Ryan paid for the meal about halfway through the meal so that we couldn’t even fight him for the bill. Afterwards, we went to noraebang (karaoke), and we insisted that we pay, although he ended up buying drinks and snacks during the singing anyway. The man just didn’t know when to quit.

This was my first time actually singing at a noraebang, and it was about as enjoyable as I expected. Ah, well. Social activity in community does not always require full enjoyment, just full participation. I did call the night short, however, as I felt it would be inconsiderate to come back to the house much after midnight. Indeed, I felt it would probably be inconsiderate to come back after 11:00, but I wasn’t going to press the point. Lydia and Ryan thought we should stay out, but I reminded them that I have to live with my hostfamily in polite company for the remainder of my grant term. They didn’t have to live with the consequences of possibly offending them or, even I didn’t offend them, of seeming like an inconsiderate, rude American. Cultural ambassadorship and all that.

We said our goodbyes to Ryan (I got his phone number in case he ever returned to the hamlet), and we returned back to the house and composed ourselves for sleep as quietly as possible.

Oh, and I finally got my shower in… 40 hours and two sweat sessions since my last one. Yes!

TKD Testing--Green Belt

2007-09-22T15:00:00.000-07:00

Today was my Tae Kwon Do Green Belt test, which was largely a disaster.

I arrived about one and a half hours early to warm up and to practice my form. Yellow Belts must demonstrate the third form (http://youtube.com/watch?v=q7i9z4ddg7I) before they are allowed to advance to Green Belt. The children also have to memorize something in Korean, but I was luckily spared this. (Here are youtube.com links to the other forms I “know”: First Form-http://youtube.com/watch?v=PZbVi4prqME; Second Form- http://youtube.com/watch?v=Gn6RqtpjzjE.) The problem is, I was taught this form Friday night in a bit of a rush, so I wasn’t quite sure how to do it and thus could not really practice it on Saturday morning. Then, the sabeonim led group warm-ups with the entire dojang. This proved a bit dangerous as the space is not that large. I worried that I might end up kicking one of the little kids in the head, thus rendering them unconscious (or maybe I’m overestimating the force of my kicks; or perhaps the durability of their skulls). It was also the fiercest warm-up I’d ever done for TKD with this dojang, though still not as difficult as the warm-ups in Chuncheon.

Finally, the kwanjangnim arrived. We practiced our bowing and polite language briefly. He told us to move to the back of the dojang so we could sit cross-legged and wait our turn. (Lydia H. also showed up to see me around this time too.)

There’s a slight problem with me sitting cross-legged. I tend to lose what little flexibility I have rather quickly. Still, that shouldn’t have been a problem on this day because we had warmed up a lot and, since I was a yellow belt, I should be going near the beginning of the testing. The kwanjangnim called us up by name. First the white belts, who did a splendid job performing the first form. Then the yellow belts. (Waiting for my name.)

Then the green belts. (Wait? What about me? Losing flexibility.)

Then some green belts and yellow belts. (Oh, I see. He’s mixing levels a bit. Well, that’s fine then. Still waiting. Still losing flexibility.)

Then the blue belts. (Oh, no…)

Then the brown. (It hurts, it hurts.)

Then the red. (At this point, the kids got in trouble for talking, which meant everyone had to do stretching. This was actually a blessing for me… Lydia told me later on that the kwanjangnim scolded the children because I had to stretch even though I wasn’t doing anything. I wish I could have told him, a la Oliver, “Please, sir, I want some more.”)

Then the red-black. (Dang… flexibility’s gone again.) And that should have been the end. I was distraught. Absolutely devastated. Why on earth would they not test me? Maybe they thought that since I had learned it the night before, that I was not worthy of the test yet. It haunted me.

And then, finally, “Jeremy-shi.” Apparently, since two children and I were from different dojang to get our earlier belts, we all had to test together last to prove we were worthy of this dojang. Well, having consumed alcohol the night before (though not too much, see below), having just sat cross-legged on the floor for an hour and fifteen minutes, having just learned the form the night before, having become emotionally distraught over my lack of testing, I did, in a word, horrendously. It was pretty embarrassing, actually, and I doubted whether I achieved the green belt level or not (I found out later that I had).

It was certainly not the way I wanted my first belt test to go at my new dojang.

As an added incentive, though perhaps it was more discouraging than inspiring, I was given the previous ATE’s black belt to mail to him in America. Since shipping would have been horrendous, I ended up sending it to the Power that Be’s office in Seoul instead, with their permission of course. I’m not sure if I’ll be able to accomplish his feat of a blackbelt in a year or not. Perhaps it’s possible. Then again, he is a trim and flexible triathlete. I am a guy who sat in the library for four years eating poorly and developing an addiction to coffee. This guy only exercised twice a month if he was lucky. I’m beginning to doubt my abilities in this area of athleticism, though I’m certainly going to keep taking classes. As my friends who are addicted to World of Warcraft would say, “I’m paid through for the month, after all.”

Friends Visit – Friday: Teaching and a New Friend Made over Drinks

2007-09-21T16:52:00.000-07:00

Lydia came to school with me the next day, having actually slept in my bed the night before, with me on the yo. She graciously agreed to hold my beginning adult class at bay whilst I tested them with individual interviews. This was for two hours, so I’ll have to buy her an iPod or something for keuriseumaseu. (If you’ve forgotten what this means, say it really, really fast and you’ll get Christmas). She sat in on my other two classes and gave me advice on pedagogy and we debated whether some methods would be effective or not. I was also able to give her suggestions for what to do with her more advanced students, things like role-playing or just giving them a discussion topic and asking their opinion about it. More specifically, I recommended a role-play I did for 7th Grade Social Studies called D.C. 3000, for which the class was required to figure out how to survive on an alien planet. It was a team role-play with the class divided by occupations—psychologists, engineers, biologists, and soldiers. Team games seem to be helpful for EFL classes because the students can help each other think of solutions to the problems (and how to speak the English to relay those solutions). As for topics, news articles work fairly well. Have them read a short article about the Six-Party Talks (which are called the Five-Party Talks here, as Korea is one party in the Korean mind, not two). This gives them some accessible vocabulary to use in their discussion since they can usually comprehend what they’re reading. I’m hoping to do something similar to these things with a 3rd grade club class I may get to lead eventually when the 3rd grade is done with their University entrance exams. That or watch Heroes, Season 1 with them.

Lydia came to lunch with my co-teacher and me. We had makgugsu at this delightful open air restaurant. Unfortunately, Lydia is afraid of bugs. Deathly afraid. When she was sleeping in my room, I told her there were ants in the room, but that I had laid out ant traps. That was a mistake in itself. At any rate, while we were eating, a butterfly fluttered into our room. Now, butterflys are usually exempt from the bug-phobia as far as I know, but not for Lydia. She immediately tensed up so that she couldn’t eat and kept watching the butterfly. We explained to my co-teacher her fear and talked about the irrationality of fearing something that is always associated with flowers and generally pretty things.

At any rate, the butterfly fluttered around the room a good 10 feet from us, so Lydia relaxed a bit and stopped keeping track of its every move. It was at that point that the butterfly decided to make its assault and flew right next to Lydia’s head. She freaked out, jumping up from her cross-legged sitting position on the floor, batting at her hair to scare the butterfly away, and then insisting that I chase the butterfly away! Now, there were other people in the room when this happened, and it was rather embarrassing for me to be walking around the room trying to shoo a friendly creature of the pollen. In my shooing, the butterfly made its way back to her, and she ran to one of the other tables where patrons were either awkwardly laughing or frowning. An old man spoke to her in Korean, “The butterfly is attracted to the beautiful flower. Why do you run away?” Marvelous.

The whole scene was rather ridiculous, and I will never let her live it down if I can manage to remember it. Let us hope that I cannot.

That night, I “learned” my third form at the dojang, and during the two hours of my TKD practice, Lydia hung out (hanged out?) with a friend she just met on the bus ride from Seoul to the hamlet. After TKD, they invited me to join them at a nearby restaurant for drinks and dinner (in that order).

Her friend, Lee Kang Hyeon or Ryan, was a friendly guy and spoke fairly good English even. He is a business student in Seoul but was in town for the Chuseok holiday. We spoke about many things, including first impressions. His of me was apparently that seem to be a sincere person, something that he usually doesn’t feel from Americans. I can’t really blame him, but then again, I make a conscious effort to at least seem sincere. Acting comes in handy sometimes, though I usually am sincere. His younger sister is in one of my classes, and says that I am energetic and handsome. Given all the complements, my ego was sufficiently stroked for the evening, and I felt pretty good about myself. Though that could have been the soju and beer talking… Neither of which helped with my TKD test the next day…

Thirsting for Knowledge: Dictionaries and Rosetta Stone

2007-09-21T16:00:00.000-07:00

Tutoring lessons are working out well for me. But they go pretty slow since I can only meet with my tutor once on the weekends. One chapter a week for acquiring language is decent, but I want to learn faster.

One way I’ve done this is to purchase a Korean-English/English-Korean dictionary program for my PDA. Most language dictionaries worth their salt in Korea only go one way, which requires you to buy two dictionaries. This gets pretty heavy to carry around, so I decided to spend the $40 and get one that’s more portable. I would usually just use the internet, but as I don’t have internet access at home, this can prove impractical for when I’m studying at home.

Another way I’m trying to do this is to acquire a copy of Rosetta Stone-Korean, preferably for Mac OS X so I can use it with my laptop. Rosetta Stone is a superb computer language learning program that is used by international businesses and even has the endorsement of the U.S. State Department and Militaries as being an effective way to acquire language relatively quickly.

The problem is, Koreans don’t sell Korean language learning programs on a regular basis. (Yet, it’s relatively easy to find English language programs in the U.S…. Hm…) I’d probably have to go to Seoul to get one. I could just order it on the internet of course, but U.S. sites can’t ship into Korea and to order on Korean sites I need a Korean identification number. (That’s right. Only Koreans can buy online in Korea.)

When I contacted Rosetta Stone customer support from the U.S. site about them shipping it to Korea, they weren’t too helpful. They told me to order it online in Korea (which they apparently don’t know I can’t do as a foreigner) or use the internet version (which is real helpful since I have no internet at home, where I do most of my language studying).

All that’s to say, if you happen to have about $300 to blow on the program and another $30 to blow on shipping, send it on over to me, will you? Just kidding. Don’t. Or if you do, tell me. I don’t want 80 copies of Rosetta Stone. (Then again, I could probably sell them over here…)

Hanja: Finally to words again

2007-09-21T15:30:00.000-07:00

I’ve been studying Hanja (Chinese characters) alongside my Tae Kwon Do class. Essentially, I write out a character about 18 times before I join everyone else for practice. It’s not something I’m required to do, but something that I have chosen to do because 1) the kids have to do it and 2) I might have to pick up Chinese eventually and I know I want to learn Japanese. As both languages use the characters extensively, I figure it’d be good to get a head start on them.

Up until now, though, I’ve just been studying numbers, starting with four as one through three are essentially hash marks. So, I know how to write one through ten, hundred, thousand, ten-thousand (East Asian languages base their big numbers on the ten-thousand instead of the thousand, million, billion system we have). Finally, though, I’m learning actual words again. I’m up to sun and moon (or day and night, not sure…). Future attractions are going to be fire, water, plant, tree.

I will finally be able to understand cryptic Asian writing on American t-shirts! I can’t wait!

Teaching: Week Five

2007-09-21T15:04:00.000-07:00

Teaching this week was an overall enjoyable experience. I picked a relatively simple lesson for my high school students (syllables), but ran into some difficulties with my adult students that I’ve had to brainstorm solutions for. This is an ongoing process. Despite my failings as an instructor, though, the students both young and old still like me (or so I’m told).

For the high school students I decided to teach syllables, as I said. There are two reasons for this, the first being that syllable usage for English in Korea is atrocious. For instance, in Korean, a bisyllabic loan word like Christmas becomes a pentasyllabic Keuriseumaseu (크리스마스). This is the actual word in the Korean language, and they think that it is English and that they know some English if they use this word. And they are right to a certain extent. A native English speaker will understand exactly what a Korean person means because we are used to brutalizing the sounds of our own language to near irrecognizability. But the reverse—that a Korean person may understand when an English speaker says, “Christmas”—is not always the case. Often, if I say a loan word to a Korean person, they won’t have a clue what I’m saying. For instance, if I say the word “love” to one of my students, I may get a blank stare, but if I say “reobeu (러브)”, there is instant comprehension. (See my situation below with the word “Serenade” in the post on my friends visiting.)

(Cultural Note: If I were to speculate on this, I would guess that it has something to do with the way written Korean works. Each ideographic box used to be a Chinese character. Thus, to change one sound in that box or to completely drop boxes from a word is to change the entire meaning of that word. Misspelling or mispronunciation can lead to huge problems in using Korean. I had a friend once (John F.) who accidentally told his cab driver that he enjoyed to eat “penis” on occasion instead of “rice porridge”. (His telling of this story still brings tears of laughter to my eyes.) To be fair, we have the same problem in English at times. My dad once accidentally prayed for “shit” instead of a “ship”. This was from the altar, mind you. Still, the incomprehensibility in Korean language is far more severe.)

The second reason (I almost forgot to include this) is that I’m trying to work my students up to writing haiku, which is a relatively simple poetry structure in any language. Last week we did emotions; this week, syllables; and in the near future, we’ll do seasons.

The lesson itself was inspired by many people in Fulbright, but I mainly used Rebecca H.’s lesson plan and adapted it to my student’s needs. The basic instruction was the same, as were the examples, but instead of having my students sing the song “Lollipop”, I played a game with them. The rules were simple. I’d write an English word on the board. They all had 30 seconds to give me the number of syllables (1 point) and the meaning of that word (1 point). For less advanced classes, they could write the meaning of the word in Korean, but if they could also write the meaning in English, they’d receive an extra point, bringing the possible total to three. To make it more comfortable for them (and honestly more convenient for record keeping), I broke them up into teams. The game went well, as did the class.

As for my adult students, I ran into trouble with both my advanced and beginning classes. As for the advanced, it seems that I may have been overzealous in my appraisal of what I can teach them. I do not mean that their English language skill is lacking in any serious way; my assessment of that is dead on. What I mean is that, though they may be able to talk about philosophy, they do not necessarily want to talk about it.

You see, on Tuesday morning, we reviewed “The Pursuit of Happyness” for the first hour, both conceptually (Is Chris Gardener a good man? Is he responsible? Is he really happy? What makes him so? Etc.) and linguistically (Why is his joke about wearing nice pants funny?). Then, for the second hour, I put one question on the board: Are humans good or evil? A can of worms indeed, but they talked about it. Then, for homework, I assigned Mencius and Hsun Tzu, two Confucian philosophers with differing points of view on the question.

Things were going grandly, or so I thought. The next morning, the first thing I hear from one of my students after the obligatory “Hello, how are you?” is “We don’t want to talk about this.” Oh. Okay…

So we talked about that for a good 20 minutes—the fact that they didn’t want to talk philosophy, and if so, what would they like to talk about. It seems that the pastor loves that I have them reading selections from Confucian classics in English. The housewives want to talk about current events, fashion, or entertainment. It’s not that the readings were hard, rather that talking about them didn’t interest them.

I told them that I brought in the more thought provoking readings because their English is at a level where I can’t just teach them grammar or basic dialogues anymore. So, I bring in a topic to talk about and we talk until they can’t find a way to express something and then we can talk about how to express that in half-way decent English. I also informed them that unless they gave me something specific to talk about, I had to go with what I was interested in talking about. It wouldn’t always be philosophy of course. After all, the first two lessons were on art and music. So, hopefully, they’ll start giving me some kind of prompt for classes. Otherwise, it’s just guesswork on my end, though I’m open to any suggestions on how to talk about the fashion industry.

Incidentally, we did end up talking about Mencius and Hsun Tzu. They had prepared for it after all and didn’t want to talk about something they hadn’t prepared for yet. For homework, I gave them Plato’s Allegory of the Cave and told them to write a page about it, just description. (After all, I had prepared it!) This actually turned out to be a decent assignment for them as I won’t see them again for about a week and a half because of Chuseok. [This absence as since turned into about two and a half weeks because midterms are the week after Chuseok and the school does not like visitors during testing.]

As for my beginning adult class, trouble might be too strong a word. At least, it was an overstatement to say that I had trouble with them this week. The trouble has been in the process of developing before my eyes, and I finally saw fit to nip it in the bud.

The aforementioned trouble is the fact that I’m dealing simultaneously with beginning students, some of whom may as well be working from an actual beginning grammar book, and intermediate students, the highest level of whom I’m tempted to ask to come to my advanced class if they weren’t translating for the beginning students half the time. How to instruct both has been a mystery, which grows more complicated when I consider that, among all of the students, there are gaps in knowledge. For instance, one student may be able to tell me where “Tom” is in a picture while another student can only point, but of these two students, the former cannot tell me what “Tom” is doing while the latter can tell me, “He is running.” Yet another gap is the typical comprehension without being able to speak. They can (mostly) understand what I’m saying, but they speak back to me through one of the intermediate students who translates their responses.

So, I’ve decided to take all of them back to square one using a book that my dad lent me from when he was teaching ESL classes at St. John’s Lutheran in Colton, California—Carlos Reyes Orozco’s English through Teamwork, which the author developed for his high school students in Mexico. That’s right. I’m using an ESL book designed for high school Hispanic students (living in Mexico, not the United States) to teach 40 year old Korean housewives. Cosmopolitanism, thy name is Desperation. The book should still work well because, though the introduction is written entirely in Spanish (which I’m relieved I can still read), the actual text of the book is entirely in English. It’s also brief. At 18 lessons and 109 pages, we should cruise through it fairly quickly since they already comprehend the language.

To keep the more intermediate students entertained, I intend to supplement this with “Survival English” in the second hour of class, meaning I’ll teach them dialogues for finding the bathroom, ordering food, etc, as well as some dialogues on how to explain Korean culture (e.g. Chuseok is like Thanksgiving because Koreans eat a lot of food on it and it happens around harvest time).

On Thursday, we finished watching “The Pursuit of Happyness”, and I assigned them five sentences answering the questions, “Is Chris Gardner happy? Why or why not?” They asked me the question, “Is writing important?” I answered yes and told them about how reading and writing are essential in the U.S. because we don’t have pictures for a lot of our signs and besides which, with text messaging and the internet (which they all use, I think, despite their age), they may be more important than before. At any rate, they turned in their homework Friday. Five sentences, but just generic sentences, not about Chris Gardner’s happiness. (Sigh…) On Friday, I also administered an assessment test since I plan to pair up less advanced students with more advanced students. It was one on one interviews, but luckily, I had a friend visiting, Lydia H., who actually taught them some fairly valuable grammar structures while I was conducting the test. She speaks Korean and was also able to explain to them my game plan for the next couple months.

Here’s hoping it works.

Friends Visit - Thursday: Lydia Arrives

2007-09-20T16:52:00.000-07:00

Of course, the biggest event this last week was receiving a visit from two friends from orientation, Lydia H. and Rebecca H., and making a new friend along the way.

Lydia was first to visit. I knew she was going to be in the hamlet on Friday so she could sit in on some of my classes, but somehow I missed out on the fact that she was going to come into town Thursday night to accomplish this. At any rate, I got a text message from Rebecca saying, “I’m coming on Saturday. Lydia will be on her way in two hours.” But, wait a minute Rebecca, on her way to Seoul or Pyeongchang? “Pyeongchang.” WHA?! says I, and in a flurry of cell phone minutes and kilobytes, I find out that I’m going to have to meet Lydia at the Bus Station around 8:45 pm, a good forty-five minutes after TKD finishes. Oh, well that’s all well and good then.

Her bus arrived early, it turns out, so I hurried over there to meet her. Some of my students noticed that I was hugging a tall, beautiful Korean girl in public and immediately assumed that she was my girlfriend. (She is not, to clarify.) We then introduced her to my hostfamily. She did most of the talking as she can actually speak Korean. This was a theme throughout the weekend, and I feel she probably bonded with my family more in the roughly two days she visited than I have in the two months I’ve lived here. (Jealous much? Yes.) At any rate, after the introductions and meeting some more students in the streets, we were able to finally secure some necessities for her from the local supermarket, my host brother rambunctiously leading the way. He’s lost much of his shyness from when I first visited, though he seemed to regain it as soon as he saw Lydia. He wouldn’t even talk to her in Korean at first! At least now I know it was general shyness, not just because I’m big, mean, and scary with the appearance of a caveman… from his perspective… one would imagine…

Anyway, turns out that Lydia and Rebecca would not need a motel room as we had planned. Instead, my host family graciously offered them room and board at their house. They’d have to sleep on a yo on the floor, but it was far more cost effective than the alternative. It seems that my family has a bit of a strange policy about these things. Since neither girl is my girlfriend, they are allowed to sleep in the house. If either one was, they’d have to sleep in a hotel for the sake of the children. I feel that in America, for most families, either option would be acceptable for staying in the house, though certainly the girlfriend would be allowed to stay, though she might be cloistered somewhere far away in the equivalent of the house’s tallest tower or deepest dungeon, away from the groping claws of her boyfriend which could potentially sully her honor. Again, one would imagine…

Weekly Letter Home

2007-09-17T17:10:00.000-07:00

Dear Family and Friends,

I was tempted to write just a general “Hello, from Korea! I’m still alive,” letter to you all. Sorely tempted. This was a lazy weekend for me in general. I slept for about half of it, and the half I did not sleep I spent either in front of a history book or in front of the television, often times both simultaneously. (For those of you who think that reading a history book isn’t exactly being lazy, consider this: I’m a history major. I kind of miss it actually, and so if it wasn’t lazy it was certainly at least recreational.) I even broke out my over sized baggy khakis which I have to pin up to make them 5 inches shorter than usual so I don’t trip over them.

If you remember from last week, I am simply tired.

My work at the school is keeping me busy, and this is part of the reason for my exhaustion. The weather this week was dismal. It rained for the most part, and the news tells me a typhoon is on the way for Korea. I only know this because I can read a meteorological map when it has a big, swirly cloud on it and because “typhoon” is a loan word and thus easily recognizable despite the fact that the “f” sound escaped the Korean language somehow. All that is to say that I had to work extra hard to keep the kids interested this week in my lesson on expressing emotions. My energy was given to those fine young men and women of my hamlet’s highest educational institution, and I pray they are the better for it.

TKD is also keeping me busy. The children have been preparing a routine set to music as well as some demonstrations of form and different possible moves. I think this is because the dojang is recruiting for next year’s classes. This should give me a break of sorts, as the sabeonim is entirely preoccupied with preparing the children. As it is, however, the kwanjangnim has been stopping in to check on the children’s progress. When he sees me resting, he promptly puts me to work. This means either stretching my inflexible legs (which have always been inflexible, even when I was a child) or having my inflexible legs kick at a padded target for an hour straight. I will be in prime condition after this year, I assure you, but in the meantime I feel it in my eyes and in my muscles.

Oh, yes. Add in the fact that I still don’t know Korean and that my brain is consistently trying to find patterns between language and actions…

Thus, the laziness this weekend. Thus, the temptation to not write what I usually write to you all—even though this is for my own benefit, also, as I would not have a journal otherwise. As you can see, however, I have not given into temptation. (Now, the question arises, may I be delivered from evil?)

Unfortunately, the email will suffer a little. There were several times this week where I thought to myself, “I should make a reminder to record some thoughts about that.” I failed to do this for the most part, however, and my mental notes, which are usually good enough by Sunday night to satisfy at least my desire for breadth of experience and detail, have been less than perfect this week—another symptom of the fatigue, I fear. (I can only hope that those things will inspire me yet again in the ensuing weeks and in a similar or even better manner.) I have done my best however, and the fruits of those labors follow.

With Love,

Jeremy

P.S. To those who are concerned about my fatigue, I am still tired. Thank you for the concern. I press on.

P.P.S. Having written for nigh on five hours now, I have decided that my memory is working just fine despite the fatigue. It seems that writing has dredged up those things that I had forgotten, or else fatigue has made me carefree about how much I actually write. The fact that I’m trying to recalibrate my MacBook’s battery by draining it, which takes a long time using only a word processor, probably helped as well.

P.P.P.S. I find it intriguing that Microsoft Word recognizes Walmart as a spelling mistake and will ask you to change it to Wal-Mart, but MacBook, which I can plainly read on the machine I am using and have positively spelled correctly, is not recognized by the program.

The Host Family

2007-09-16T17:20:00.001-07:00

Nothing too new to report on the condition of the homestay. As we near Korea’s testing period, I see less and less of my middle school host sister. I believe she is preparing for her high school entrance exam. As I’ve been trying to come directly home from TKD now instead of stopping at their beauty shop, I see less and less of everyone in general. And there is another thing…

From the sparse Korean I know, I’ve been able to gather that someone in the family, a grandmother, I think, is sick in the nearest big city, Wonju. Thus, the family has been making regular trips this week out to the city to see her, and I have had to fend for myself. It has offered me opportunity to be helpful, however. I usually try to wash up the dishes now before omeoni returns. I also try to ask nightly after the grandmother, but all I can manage is a “Heomeoni is in Wonju? Is she alright?” to which I receive a brief “Yes.” I’m sure it is difficult to explain her condition in English, and I am not ignorant of the fact that the family may not want me to be concerned with it. What is even harder for the family, I’m sure, is that Chuseok (Korean Thanksgiving Days) is so close. This time is traditionally spent in the houses of the patriarchs of a family, and thus my host family’s grandmother’s generation. I hope for their sake that she will be better soon.

(Sadly, this information about my host family’s grandmother follows news of my own grandmother’s condition, after which I am praying fervently.)

On a lighter note, I have been invited to stay with the family for Chuseok, or rather, I asked what the family was doing for Chuseok. They said they would stay with abeoji’s parents in town. I asked if it was ok if I tagged along. They said, “Yeah, sure!” I hope this will be a time to bond with the family, as I see so little of them as it is, and they are my sure support here. At least, I’d like them to be a sure support. As it stands, they’re just a support. Supports can be strengthened though, and I hope this Thanksgiving holiday will give me the opportunity to do that.

Sleeping (or the lack thereof) and Dreaming (thus, the lack thereof)

2007-09-16T17:19:00.000-07:00

Lately, I have not been sleeping well, something which I am sure is contributing to my fatigue. I believe the lack of sleep is due to various factors—eating late, muscle fatigue, changes in climate which make it hard to get comfortable, and dreaming. But, to reference Paul, the greatest of these (in all probability) is dreaming.

The dreams have been interesting to say the least. Often, they have been brutally violent and thus a little scary. I am not sure what is bringing these on. At times, they include gross images from the day, mostly bugs. This is probably caused by the fact that I actually do have bugs in my room and got stung by a bee for the first time a couple of weeks ago.

The strangest of them, however, have been the bilingual ones. That’s correct. I’ve been dreaming in Korean.

What usually happens is this: I will have a dream in English. The dream will be about school or home life or TKD or some other daily occurrence of no particular significance. I will then wake up, change positions in the bed in such a way that my feet are where my head was and my head is where my feet were, and go back to sleep. During this process, I am completely aware of what is going on, though apparently not fully able to control my ridiculousness. Upon falling back asleep, I dream the exact same dream, but in Korean. I then wake up, perform my strange flipperific routine once more, and dream a new dream in English.

This has happened up to three times in a single night. I’m sure that the Korean is a pseudo-Korean at best (as the English likely is as well) and would be completely useless in the real world. Still, it leads me to one conclusion and one conclusion only. My Korean knowledge must be stored in my feet. Thus, in order to access it, I have to trick my body into thinking my brain is where my feet aught to be.

That, or I’m just going positively mad. Possible. Unlikely, as … … Pardon me.

Walking the Trails

2007-09-16T17:18:00.005-07:00

My Sunday morning ritual usually consists of this: wake-up last, grumble through a breakfast, shower (while showering, the host family leaves for choir practice), watch a little tv, hop on my bike if it is not raining, walk if it is, and get myself to the church on time, to reference My Fair Lady. The biking is not so bad. The walking takes an eternity as the bridges across the river are strategically located at each end of the hamlet. The church is just off the bridge at the west end of town, and so I would naturally take the road that direction. Unfortunately, that bridge requires me to follow the mountain road which is rather hilly and meanders far from the river. Thus, either way can take me upwards of 40 minutes to walk to church.

I have known for some time that there are trails all over these hills, trails that would supposedly offer a more direct route from the bridge to my house, but had yet to find them. Still, I knew there was a trailhead at the bridge I needed to cross. Usually, I do not take this because the family offers to drive me home if I walked to church. Today, however, they drove out to Wonju to see their grandmother, so I had to fend for myself. A perfect opportunity to test my theory.

Well, my theory turned out to be true; the trails are a more direct route. Still, trails in Korea are laughable things. They are literally “footpaths” meaning they are not big enough for even two feet. Certainly nothing you would want to take a pack animal on, nor wear shorts for. They also seem to have forgone the concept of switchbacks. If you need to go up in elevation, you just go straight up.

I might be more inclined to take the trails again in less miserable weather. (The rain made it so there were a couple of washouts where I had to run across the mud a la Sonic the Hedgehog for fear of the dirt falling out from under me. For those who aren’t familiar with Sonic the Hedgehog’s anthology, consider Indiana Jones running across a dirt ledge as the ledge falls away behind him.) Then again, in less miserable weather, I’d probably take my bike.

Tutoring: A Korean Teacher at Last

2007-09-16T17:18:00.003-07:00

I had my first tutoring lesson with H.W. today. We will work with the textbook I used during orientation. Essentially, we will go through the material in each chapter and make sure I have no questions about it. I will then complete the exercises for that chapter during the week and memorize the vocabulary. At this rate, we should almost complete the book before I have my Winter Break, during which I plan on taking Korean classes at a University or language institute for foreigners. My hope is that I will be able to matriculate into an intermediate level class by that time.

Unfortunately, we can only meet on weekends as she goes to school in Seoul. I wanted to travel on the weekends, but I may have to forgo this pleasure for the sake of my language goals. That, or I will have work independently and only see her every other week or so. The next few weeks will be particularly difficult as I have prior engagements already scheduled, but I should be able to clear appointments for the weekends after these.

Culinary Note: Spicy Food--You never can quite tell…

2007-09-16T17:18:00.001-07:00

One of the more common questions waeguk saram (foreigners) like myself get asked is, “Can you eat spicy/hot food?” Note, the question is not a matter of the emphatic “Do”, as in “Do you eat (meaning “prefer” spicy food?”, but “Can”, as in, “Is it even within the remotest realm of possibility for you to consume something which may or may not make fire shoot out of every orifice of your body and from there consume you as a field fire set by a farmer consumes the locust?”

Usually, my answer is a ready, “Yes.” For instance, when my friend, H.W., told me that her family would like to have me over for dinner during Chuseok (Korean Thanksgiving, which is next week. Mark you calendars and eat some kimchi.) and that the traditional food is usually fairly spicy, I usually would immediately say, “Oh, that’s alright. Americans eat spicy food all the time!” Now, though…

What happened is this—On Saturday, abeoji and I were eating pajeon and watching T.V. together. As per usual, the main course was accompanied by various side dishes. Among these side dishes was the ubiquitous green hot pepper.

Now, I’ve had the ubiquitous green hot pepper, and its heat variance is pretty wide. It can knock your socks off or simply taste crisp and clean like the bell peppers back home. In all of my experience, however, they’ve always been at least tolerable. So, I picked out one of the bigger ones and began moving it towards my mouth, anxiously awaiting my surprise.

But then the abeoji stopped me. “Jeremy, no, no, no…” He literally grabbed the pepper from my hand and told me repeatedly in Korean, “Spicy, spicy.” I’ve gotten a little tired by now of Koreans thinking I can’t do something just because I’m foreign, so I told him in Korean that I would be fine. I like spicy food. He smiled and said, “Ok, eat.” And I did.

Not only did the pepper knock my socks off, it darned the holes in them, threw them in the wash, placed them in the rain to dry, and the heat from the pepper still had enough energy to defeat the pull of gravity on the rain and vaporized it as it came down.

I hiccupped. I swore. I wheezed and gasped. (Abeoji and omeoni just laughed about it, as is their custom.) It took a full 30 minutes for my socks to find their way back to my feet and about four glasses of water (we have no milk) later my mouth was back to tasting other things besides smoldering coals.

Now, when someone mentions spicy food, I have to think long and hard. I told my friend what I usually tell people. I think that I’ll continue to say, “Oh, it’s ok. Americans eat spicy food. Thai, Indian, Mexican, Creole, it’s all got spice.” I’ll just have to make sure I have some milk handy in the future…

“She is your friend?”: On being “friends” in Korea

2007-09-16T17:17:00.001-07:00

This week at church I met an interesting character. His name is Jo. He is the uncle of my friend, H.W., and has lived in Chicago for the past 30 years, 25 of which was spent working at a steam factory of some kind. Incidentally, his Chicago accent was so thick and strangely mixed with his Korean that I couldn’t tell where he was from until he told me. I mean, really thick Chicago accent.

One of the first questions he asked me was a question of clarification. Indicating H.W., he asked, “She is your friend?” Now, H.W. is a girl around my age and the pastor’s daughter and knows English and so has been quite helpful to me, so the natural awkwardness of this situation would be an implication that we are dating or at least interested in dating. That is, this would be the natural awkwardness in America.

The natural awkwardness here is the difference in the concepts of “friendship” that Americans and Koreans have. In America, a mere acquaintance can be a “friend”, and thus my answer would be “Yes” according to that idea of friendship. In Korea, it takes a little bit more to be friends. First, the people in question must know each other fairly well and must have known each other for a good amount of time. Second, the two must usually be of the same age, otherwise the person is not called friend but rather by the appropriate familial nomenclature for someone their age. Thus, in Korea, I would probably have to call H.W. nuna (older sister) unless she gave me leave to call her chingu (friend). As it stands, I only have one chingu in Korea, and I’m fortunate that he has said we are chingu as he is quite a bit older than me and we’ve known each other for about two months. (Being a foreigner probably helps us bend the rules a bit.)

The problem was, I didn’t know if Jo was asking me in the American sense or the Korean sense, and as H.W. was right there, I was also concerned about possibly embarrassing her. So, I stuttered a bit, looked at H.W. for confirmation and said, along with her, “Uh… yes. Yes, we’re friends.”

Later on, I explained my hesitation to her. She laughed and said she understood my dilemma. Unfortunately, I forgot to ask her to clarify her position. After all, she had said, “We’re friends” with me. I just have to find out if we’re Korean friends or American friends…

Meeting the Waeguksaram

2007-09-16T17:16:00.001-07:00

I have finally met both of my fellow foreigners in the hamlet. It was just after my haircut. I was walking to the supermarket to buy some milk and cereal as a small snack between school and TKD, when I saw a white, curly brown haired woman. You may not understand this living in America, but when you come to Korea and you live in a town where there are no people who look significantly different from everyone else (I’m talking 0% foreign population), there’s a strange magnetism that one feels upon seeing someone like that. You do not want to follow it because you think to yourself, “This is ridiculous. I come from a liberal (in the historical sense) society where people are people plain and simple and a little different skin tone shouldn’t make a difference.” But you are also powerfully drawn to these people because you think to yourself, “They know English (probably) and are going through some of the same things I am. By all accounts we are commiserates. I want to talk to a commiserate.” For some foreigners, the fact that other foreigners will walk up to them in Korea as if they are long lost friends even though they are positively strangers is an annoyance beyond comparison. I decided to brave it. And made a new friend.

One is an Aussie, the other a Scot, and both teach English at the middle school. We talked of loneliness and what there is to do and how to get around. The Aussie, David, is actually interested in taking TKD with me, and both play tennis, so I might be inclined to join them someday though I can’t return a serve worth the proverbial beans. (Or is it fairy tale-ical?) The Scot’s name is Fiona. They are married. Lucky devils.

We also talked about how well behaved the children are at our schools and compared them to children in our respective countries. Korean children [in this town, I’ve had to edit this as my fellow ATEs have differing experiences with Korean children. Shame on me for generalizing!], if they do not want to learn, usually just go to sleep. Granted, this is a problem, but one I’d much rather deal with than students disrupting class by talking or even fighting. Then the Aussie said something with a knowing smile that positively boggled my mind.

“It’s a bit like the Sixties here, isn’t it?”
“Pardon, like what?”
“You know, the Sixties. Conservative values. Everyone wants to go to school and is anxious about learning. No rebellion.”
“The Sixties?”

The Scot confirmed that the Sixties was the decade of “Leave it to Beaver” in her country as well. The Sixties?! The decade of student protests that shook the government? The decade of Sex, Drugs, and Rock and Roll? The decade of Peace, Drugs, and Hippies? (Notice the common theme of drugs…) That decade.

So, I explained that America usually thinks of the Fifties as the conservative values decade. The sixties and seventies are our wild side. Then I said something about it having something to do with Vietnam. That got awkward really fast…

At any rate, new friends, even if it’ll be awkward now because I pulled out some sort of historical justification for rebellious generations. We’ll have to see how it goes.

A Haircut and a Close Shave Make for a Handsome Miguksaram

2007-09-16T17:15:00.001-07:00

At some point during the last week, I had made up my mind that I would get a haircut. The last time I had cut my hair had been July 4th at about 11:00 pm, the day before my flight to Korea, my three-day Thursday, if you will. The last time I had my hair cut by someone would have been around June 2006. I was interviewing for summer jobs, and so had shaved and cut my hair. Immediately after securing a job I started growing both my beard and my hair for Pirates of Penzance, and after that I bought a set of clippers from Wal-Mart, which recuperated their value within 1.5 uses.

Because the last time I had cut my hair I had merely buzzed it with said clippers, it had all been growing out at about the same length. This made me look fuzzy and friendly, but not very much like a teacher. My beard was also becoming troublesome as I had not been able to even it out since orientation when I borrowed a set of clippers, and it was beginning to require daily combing.

So, I gave myself one objective for my lazy Saturday. Go into town, find a barber pole, peek into the shop to make sure that it was in fact a haircutting establishment (some in Korea offer … other services …), and get a haircut.

Well, I walked into town (for the exercise, as it’s about a half hour…) and started barber pole hunting. Lo, and behold! A barber pole! Both the back door and the front door were missing, and there seemed to be no stairwell to darkened upper rooms, so I could also assume that it was just a good old fashioned barber shop. (The picture of Jesus as the good shepherd was also comforting, but no guarantee. My host family members are clearly practicing Christians, and there are clearly some porno films in the back of their video store…) So, the ubiquitous hand motions and poor Korean/English conversation followed. I got across that I wanted a haircut (Why else would I be there?) and he, the lone barber who smelled heavily of nicotine, especially when he coughed, got across that I should sit down in one of the full sized leather chairs.

And he began to cut as I warily watched him in the mirror. He is a barber of the old school. No clippers. Just a comb, a pair of scissors, and a feel for his trade that can only come from years of experience and the daily pack of cigarettes. One thing I actually missed from the American barbers, though, was the conversation. Some people find this annoying. I like it. (This is probably because barbers generally don’t want to talk about themselves. They want to talk about me, a subject I adore. – Titian, thy name is Jeremiah.)

After the hair cut, which turned out fairly decent considering I couldn’t give him exact instructions, but also turned out very Korean, he asked if I’d like a shave. I indicated, No, just a trim and maybe a shave around the edges. We haggled a bit over clipper settings for the trim (Apparently, not that old school…), he trimmed, I watched when I could and blinked the flying beard hair out of my eyes when I couldn’t, and then he prepared the shave.

The shave that would occur with a straight blade razor and shaving cream that he mixed himself. (Apparently, very old school…) He applied the shaving cream not just around my beard and my cheek bones and neck and the back of head which is where a man is usually shaved if he has an obscene amount (glorious amount, according to one Jordan C.) of hair like I do, but also on my forehead. And I thought to myself, “Do I really have hair on my forehead? And if so, is it really the visible kind that would be necessary to shave with a straight blade razor, which is already a rather dangerous implement and making me nervous as this is the first time it has ever been applied to my epidermal layer even as I pray it will not be the first time it is applied to my jugular vein?” I could only assume that he was performing a traditional Korean act of hospitality—the frontal lobotomy.

I survived the shave, during which I noticed that his pinky fingernail was particularly long. I found out what that was for in the ensuing shampoo and rinse. (My scalp has never felt newer, nor has it ever been in as much pain.) I paid my 12,000 won (expensive for a haircut, but not by American standards, and considering the service, I feel worth it), had the obligatory conversation talking about where I was from and my level of Korean (non-existent), and headed out a newer, handsomer looking (oh, I’ve had compliments!) man.

Yet another daily life obstacle conquered. Now, if I can only bring myself to go back to such an establishment again…

(SIDE NOTE: The barber did one thing during the hair cutting process that I thought ingenious. He pinned the cloth in such a way that it would not only shield me from the falling hair, but also collect the hair from falling on the floor! Amazing, I thought! This man is wise beyond his years (though given his years, perhaps not). He will not have to waste time sweeping the floor when we are finished as he can just dump the hair into the trashcan! That is what I thought. That is, until the hair cut was finished, at which point he promptly dumped the hair on the ground and began sweeping. Sigh…)

Teaching: Week Four

2007-09-14T17:13:00.000-07:00

First off, has it really only been four weeks?! FOUR WEEKS?! Good, Lord, have mercy on my synapses as they attempt to relay the idea that what has felt like eons (by Oxford American Dictionaries’ astronomical and geological definition, never by the general definition) was a mere FOUR WEEKS?! Let me count:

Week 1: Self-Introduction/Class Expectations
Week 2: “Flea, Fly, Mosquito”/TPR 1
Week 3: TPR 2/“The Announcer’s Test”
Week 4: Emotions

I need to sit down…

As I said, this week was on Emotions. I’m a little tired of hearing, “Fine, and you?” to the question, “How are you?” so I thought I’d print up an emotions chart (the kind some American teachers/college students put up on their walls) to give my students as a handout and show them some slides asking them for each one, “How does the picture make you feel?” Then, I would ask them a hard question: “Why?” This allowed them to practice expressing emotions and thoughts. Some took advantage of it to the best of their ability, whether that be single words or full blown sentences. Others were less interested or still too shy to even make an attempt. For the most part, it went well. The students enjoyed the pictures, even if they didn’t feel comfortable talking about them, and I enjoyed teaching the lesson, even if the rainy weather did require a bit more energy out of me to keep their interest than usual. At the end of the slideshow, I showed them a picture of the two Korean flags and asked them how these made them feel and why. I told them that this is what an American actually wanted to know from them, so it would be important for them to learn how to express themselves on the matter of national division and possible reunification. I followed that with something fun, showing a particularly emotional music video, Linkin Park’s “Numb”.

For the second graders, I added in another activity: I gave them a printed copy of “The Announcer’s Test”, which I had presented to them the week before. I told them that it wasn’t homework and it wasn’t a test. It was simply something extra. If they wanted to do it and if they had time, they could memorize—

One hen,
Two ducks,
Three squawking geese,
Four limerick oysters,
Five corpulent porpoises,
Six pairs of Don Alveero’s trousers,
Seven thousand Macedonian soldiers in full battle array,
Eight brass monkeys from the ancient sacred crypts of Egypt,
Nine diabetic, apathetic, sympathetic old men on roller skates with a marked propensity towards procrastination and sloth,
Ten lyrical, spherical, diabolical denizens of the deep whirling, swirling, twirling in the corner of an aquarium seemingly going nowhere.

(Note: This is not the actual “Announcer’s Test,” but an adapted version since even I don’t know the meaning to all the words in the actual version. Being an English teacher, I should probably learn them, however.)

—by September 28 and recite it to me in the teacher’s office, then I would give them a prize. I’ve already had one particularly ambitious student recite it to me. (She started the semester late because she was in Europe on a three week whirlwind tour, has given me a small Korean language exercise book since she knows I’d like to learn her language, and has approached me about learning her name and even given me a mnemonic device to remember it by—her given name sounds like Eugene, as in Eugene O’Neill, whom she has read. She wants to be a diplomat.) I didn’t even have the prize ready for her yet, but have since settled on wafers filled with chocolate, as a couple of others are also close.

(SIDE NOTE: I have a couple of second graders who try to visit me daily, and I appreciate their company as their English is really quite good.)

As for my adult classes, the advanced class watched “The Pursuit of Happyness” starring Will Smith. My bringing in a movie is another result of my being tired, I fear. I had intended to talk about the social issues the movie brings up though. I thought the question of family separation and who should take care of the child (the mother or the father) would have brought out some especially interesting conversation among my Korean audience. Unfortunately, my presence was requested for some filming for the Provincial Brd. of Edu., and I had to cut class short. Next week, though, we will talk about the film until I’ve exhausted it’s usefulness. After that, I want to read Mencius and Hsün Tzu’s views on human nature with them. See how they like discussing philosophy, the good, the true, and the beautiful, and all that sublimity.

With the beginning adult class, I discussed the many ways English speakers use the word “get”, both as a verb in its own right and also as a phrasal verb combined with different prepositions. We also watched “The Pursuit of Happyness” during the second half of our class periods, and thus will still be watching it on Thursday, when next we meet.

The filming for the BoE has actually been fairly annoying, as it is all staged. The BoE is interested in the hamlet’s high school because, despite the fact that it is in a rural area, it does fairly well with testing and university placement. Granted, it’s no science school or language institute, but it does alright by itself every October when the national placement tests come around. Thus, the BoE is going to visit. Thus, we’ve been filming class time to show to our visitors.

But, as I said, what we film is all staged. We filmed me “co-teaching” with two classes. During this co-teaching, I performed lessons I had never even seen before and basically acted out what the camera man told me to. In the end, it ended up being fairly close to what I do in class anyway, but it just seemed… fake. It also didn’t help that this was on a Monday, usually a day off for me where I’m at school but not actually working, and so I was in my Monday clothes—jeans and a polo. I usually wear slacks and a long-sleeved button-down for teaching. Later on in the week, I was asked to videotape for the English Zone, an English only room where students get prizes for performing scripted situational dialogues in English. (This is what interfered with my advanced adult class above.) The problem with this was that, although the high school may have used that room dozens of times, I’d never been there before, and thus had no idea what was going on.

Sigh… staying flexible is key.

Culinary Note: Goat Soup (염소탕)

2007-09-13T17:11:00.000-07:00

In what seems like it will become a weekly ritual costing around 10,000 won, I once again went to the Dog Soup restaurant with my fellow teachers. This week, however, I decided to try the other meat option on the menu: goat. (This was the only other meat option, I might add.) You are what you eat must be true for goats, as it tastes pretty much like garbage. Of course, it is not that bad, but it certainly isn’t dog, nor is it even canned Dinty Moore stew left to burn on the stove. The meat is actually fairly decent, though certainly not worth the extra 2,000 won you have to pay over the other meat option. What one really has to be careful of with goat is the skin. This is grey in color and has the consistency of rubber.

I am clearly still alive, and I’d still recommend goat to the adventurous gourmands out there. I just wouldn’t recommend it if you want to have a good meal, and maybe it would be wise to eat it where you can easily obtain some Baskin Robbins.

Weekly Letter Home: "And then I found $5!"

2007-09-09T17:58:00.000-07:00

Dear Family and Friends,

I’ve crossed the 2-month mark in my stay here in Korea. I’ve learned much and am still learning to be sure. Classes, TKD, and constantly trying to understand what’s going on around me are beginning to take their toll. This weekend, I slept a considerable amount, which I felt was alright since I was staying up a considerable amount during the week. I’m still getting seven hours a night, but I could be getting eight or nine with my schedule, and feel I should given what I’m doing every day. Perhaps this week I shall begin this routine. I’m still adjusting at any rate, staying flexible, which is always a good thing.

I’ve received well wishing from many of you this week. For this I thank you. Your letters and even small Facebook notes make me smile even when things are tough here. I miss you all, but know that I am doing well and certainly have manifold ways of occupying my time if I am not. Distractions are key to coping, I’ve found, and there are lots of ways for me to stay busy, even in a small town like the one I live in.

I’m still seeking adventure here, though, and there is plenty to be had.

P.S. During a break in my updating, I took a stroll around the house. I found 5000 won. So for those of you who are bored by my stories, just remember that in the end I find five dollars.

A Korean Tutor at Last?

2007-09-09T17:57:00.002-07:00

The same friend from church that told me about Seorak Mountain has offered to give me the Korean tutoring I so desire. I am to bring my Korea National University textbook from orientation to church next week so we both have something to work with. I hope it goes well. I really do want to learn the language. I thought being in a rural area like this one would accelerate that learning, but I am finding that ironically no one knows enough English to instruct me. I pick up things through osmosis (more properly called diffusion, but that’s idiom for you) of course, but I’d also like some formal training. Perhaps next semester I can enroll in weekend courses at a larger city, but for now, the tutoring will be appreciated.

A Possible Adventure: Seorak Mountain (설악산)

2007-09-09T17:57:00.001-07:00

I talked with a friend at church today about the possibility of climbing Seoraksan, supposedly one of the toughest climbs in all of Korea. She said it typically takes 10 hours to summit the mountain and perhaps 6-7 hours for the descent. A day trip to be sure, if not a more relaxing two-day trip. There are of course other ways to get to the top of the mountain besides walking, but none so adventurous. It’s definitely going on my to-do list for this year. Any takers?

News about the Family: Culinary Quandaries

2007-09-09T17:56:00.000-07:00

I revealed something to my host family on Sunday last that I should or should not have revealed. I am unsure at this point of the ramifications of my action. It is said that when Mao Tse Tung was asked what the significance of the French Revolution is, he responded, “It is too soon to say.” I feel the same about what I am sure is a less significant event in the grand scheme of things, but immediately far more significant to my person and those the Powers that Be have surrounded me with. Essentially, what happened is this:

I was eating dinner slowly as per usual. To be more exact, I was eating dinner at my usual business like pace, but there was so much food that I seemed to be eating slowly. It is a habit of Koreans, so I’ve been told, to overfeed their guests and often to overfeed everyone except themselves. For instance, my host mother barely eats from what I can tell, but everyone else in the family is served heaping bowlfuls of whatever scrumptious Korean concoction she has come up with. This has much to do with having such a long history of oppression, want, and starvation. (This history, I have discovered, is also the reason Koreans “traditionally” eat dog meat. Apparently, they didn’t start doing this “traditionally” until the 1950s.)

The host mother noticed that I had not yet finished my dinner while everyone else had, and she spoke some Korean to our resident knowledgeable person in English nouns and verbs, my host sister.

“Jeremy. You do not finish?”
“No, I’ll finish. It’s delicious, it’s just so much!”
“It is ok if you do not finish. Dogs hungry.”
“Huh?”
“Dogs hungry.”
“Dogs hungry? The dogs can eat my food?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, good.”

What followed was a lengthy Konglish conversation concerning my eating habits in the United States in which I managed to get across that I rarely ate a full breakfast, and if I eat at all for breakfast, it’s usually a slice of toast and a cup o’ joe or glass of milk, certainly not the dinner like affair that Korean breakfasts consist of. Indeed, growing up I would usually have a protein shake that my American mother made for me. The host mother said it was ok if I ate just bread and coffee for breakfast. “Really?” says I, incredulously, I might add. Yes, really. The family even purchased a combination coffee brewer and toaster.

Well, needless to say I was pleased, and I looked forward to eating Monday morning’s “breakfast” with great anticipation, as I would in fact not be eating it.

That is, until I came down the stairs the next morning to find the family in front of the TV watching Korean drama as usual… and eating bread and apples for breakfast. This continued all week. It is traditional for families to eat together (thus the reason we eat dinner at 9:00 pm). Apparently, this includes any strange breakfast options the Western guest might want. Indeed, bread is permeating many meals now. Dinner tonight, for instance, we had “Ugly Donuts” (pan fried dough covered in brown sugar… delicious) and dumpling-potato soup. I had no intention of changing the family’s eating habits. This could be bad.

The situation is a little awkward to say the least, but by the end of the week the host mother served rice and kimchi again for breakfast. I think we’ve reached an understanding. She may serve whatever she wants for breakfast. If I feel like my stomach can handle it, I’ll eat it. If not, the family can enjoy it while I nibble on a slice of toast.

이효석 Festival and Buckwheat (매밀)

2007-09-08T17:54:00.000-07:00

At some point during the week, I received an email from an extending Entertaining Teacher from America. Turns out she and some other extending ATEs were going to a festival in Bongpyeong commemorating the author Lee Hyo Seok and blooming buckwheat. It’s in my county, so they thought my proximity might interest me. Well, it did, as did the prospect of meeting these ATEs who were not with us during orientation, but I decided to investigate the event’s English website as well. Blooming buckwheat and romantic donkey rides it turns out. Who can’t turn down romantic donkey rides?

So I went. It was fun. I did not ride any donkeys, though I did get my picture taken in the buckwheat fields. I also learned a lot about last year’s group of ATEs. Apparently they were a wild bunch. When I was asked for the “dirt” on this year’s bunch, I had to confess ignorance, partially because I didn’t hang out that much with everyone, at least not in big groups, but mostly because I honestly don’t think there is much dirt to be had on us. Overall, we were a fairly mellow group, especially compared to last year’s legendary status.

For those of my readers who are more interested in literature (cough… Faulkner addicts, cough, cough… BEN!) than my adventures, Lee Hyo Seok is most famous for his short story “When the Buckwheat Blossoms,” which is the inspiration for the festival.

Addendum: Writing Travel Itineraries

2007-09-08T17:53:00.000-07:00

I’ve decided that it will be worthwhile to start recording my travel itineraries complete with mileage/time taken by bus. The reason for this is that I want to remember what bus changes I need to make to get to places like Bongpyeong (There was a bus change in Jangpyeong.), but also because at some point I want to start making bike trips to local sites.

Some trips I’m looking forward to making are to Wonjushi, the nearest big city and home to two other ATEs as well as my RA from orientation, and 공해, the nearest city that also borders the Pacific. Both of these are longer trips (about 63.6 and 101.3 km respectively), but with 3 day weekends will be well worth the time spent, especially now that we are approaching the cool, beautiful Korean fall.

MBC원주 Riverside Concert and Announcement for 2018 Really Big, Five Ringed Flag, International Cold Weather Sporting Event Hopes

2007-09-07T17:53:00.000-07:00

On Thursday night, my host family informed me that I’d have to leave TKD early on Friday night so that I could eat at the beauty shop at 7:00 pm. Why was I eating at the beauty shop at 7:00 pm? It turns out that there was going to be a concert by the river sponsored by MBC원주. (SIDE NOTE: It has frustrated me to no end that the local news stations are run by MBC. Everytime I hear announcements about programming on it, I always think NBC. For all I know, what with America being globally influential, there actually is an NBC station running in South Korea.) The concert was some sort of contest for up and coming trot singers, trot being akin to American country music in terms of social stigma but stylistically more like lounge lizard music.

The concert itself was entertaining enough. I couldn’t understand any of the lyrics, of course, except for the ubiquitous 사랑 (love) that permeated every song. What was more entertaining was the light and pyrotechnic displays that would accompany these songs. I kid you not—not only fireworks, but great balls of fire. Plumes, even, that burst from the stage floor as background dancers shook and shimmied and backup singers moved their arms in coordinated splendor. Really though. Fire? For trot?

It was cool to see some of my students and TKD buddies at the event though. They either blushed or said enthusiastic “Hello”s.

The other big event at this concert was an announcement concerning the 2018 Really Big, Five Ringed Flag, International Cold Sporting Event. (I’ve changed the name for the sake of not revealing my location. Figure out what it means.) Apparently, my hamlet is ready to try its hand at attracting this event for the third time in a row.

I’ve a couple of discussions with locals and concerned ATEs about whether hosting this event would be good or bad for the economy/environment of the area. I think in the short term it would be good, but in the long term… it’s debatable. The economy boost would certainly be considerable in the short term as the area’s tourism would skyrocket and so would the facilities and infrastructure necessary to host that tourism, but I worry about this area damaging its rustic qualities (which it trades heavily on) to such a degree as to make them laughable. I also worry about the area building so many hotels that it essentially becomes a ghost town. After all, once the event leaves, who will come here besides those who have always come? There are already plenty of hotels to house these.

TKD Weekly Update

2007-09-07T17:52:00.000-07:00

TKD this week was a lot of fun. It also kicked my butt. Let me explain.

The first fun thing is that one of my high school students is apparently a black belt and has decided to return to TKD classes at the dojang. Unfortunately, he’s one of my second years whose English is a little iffy. Still, I appreciate his presence. He has brought a friend along who is just starting TKD apparently. I was actually teaching him a form the other night. (Laugh it up.)

The second fun thing is that I’m actually starting to learn the forms in some kind of semblance of order now. As it stands, I can complete Form 1 by myself and Forms 2 and 4 if I’m in a group.

The third fun thing is that I started learning hanja (Chinese characters) this week. I now know how to write mouth, sun, four, and five. At first I was working in a generic ideograph workbook I brought from orientation. I was just copying from the wall charts. But the sabonim gave me an actual TKD/hanja workbook with letters to trace and everything! With each hanja is a factoid about TKD, which is unfortunately in Korean and thus impossible to read.

Add these four to the hanja I can recognize from exposure in Korea and Japan (water, fire, moon, big, mountain, one, two, three, and stop), and I’m well on my way. I feel like it’ll be good to learn hanja for a couple of reasons, or one big reason and two sub-reasons—grad school, the sub-reasons being Chinese and Japanese. I may not know how to pronounce the characters, but at least I’ll be able to read them, and that’s a start. I figure it’ll also help improve my Korean category by degrees.

The fourth fun thing is that I finally met the kwanjangnim. Here’s where the butt kicking starts. With him. Basically, he arrived, he set me up on a target dummy by myself (I’m the only yellow belt), and had me do dulachagi with my left leg for about half an hour. That’s 30 minutes, one leg. Man, I was pooped. Later on in the week for movement drills I had to go against the sabonim. I’ve got the popped blisters to prove it. The good news is my body is recovering faster and faster from fatigue and soreness, and I’m losing the weight my doc said I needed to lose to avoid getting diabetes. Two hours of TKD a night is a lot of exercise, plus all the walking/bike riding I’m doing everyday anyway. I sleep well and long these nights.

Addendum: Speaking of Hanja… Comic Books!

2007-09-07T17:49:00.000-07:00

My host brother, 8, keeps begging his parents to let him take TKD. I think they may be wearing down. They asked me how much lessons were (70,000 won/month). I told them that this includes learning hanja, and to make the point clear, I demonstrated the four hanja I’d already learned. The host father brightened at this.

Apparently the family is fairly seriously about their son learning these characters at an early age. This is evidenced by the fact that in my room (where they keep most of my host brother’s books) is a comic book series, 마법첸자문, which is actually a learning tool for hanja. The main character must learn new ideographs to open up new moves to defeat various bosses who all have their own ideographs. There is even a brand of cookie similar to Nabisco’s Nilla Wafers that includes as a prize (a la Cracker Jacks) a collectible playing card. If I ever learn enough Korean, I’m definitely going to plow through these books. As it is, I might just buy a box of cookies every time I go to the bus station on a trip.

Teaching: Seven Years of English

2007-09-07T16:50:00.000-07:00

Teaching this week was a little hit-and-miss in terms of student interest/participation. The adult classes went fairly smoothly, though I was running out of steam by the end of the week, and I fear my adult beginners may have suffered for it. The high school classes required the most energy as it was hard to get the students excited about the activities I had planned for them. Here’s how the classes broke down:

Grade 1: I had planned on doing a straight TPR lesson with these students working various commands and classroom objects. My first class blew right through it. Luckily, the co-teacher was there and said, “Why don’t you talk about Dog Soup?” Ok. So we talked about Dog Soup. Why do Koreans drink it? Why don’t Americans? What do you think? Explain it to me. Etc., etc., etc. After this, I felt inspired to give them a talking to about how much English they could understand and communicate:

“When did you start taking English?” Third grade, elementary school. “How old were you?” 10 years old. “How old are you now?” 17 years old. “How many years have you been taking English?” 7 years. “Seven years?! SEVEN years? Seven YEARS?! Seven years is a long time. An obscenely long time. Do you understand what I’m saying?” Yes. “You know more English than you know. But you do not talk to me. I thought this commands lesson would be good for your level, but it’s too easy! You guys are geniuses! You can speak in English. You just can’t do it well, yet, but that’s ok. You just need to practice. Just speak English at me, and I’ll help you correct what you’re saying, but please speak English!”

I decided to do that with the rest of the first years, even my troublesome bottom tier class. Seven years is an obscenely long time. They should’ve been talking years ago. They can talk about Dog Soup, after all. It’s excruciatingly slow, but they can do it. I don’t think they need TPR anymore. They need to have someone who’ll make them talk back in English about subjects they might not thought of talking about before. We’ll help each other find the missing vocabulary when necessary.

So, we’ll talk about sports, and feelings, and movies, and girls, and guys, and Americans, and Koreans. At least, I hope we will. I just have to figure out what vocabulary they need to talk about this kind of stuff…

Grade 2: This week, I had the second graders recite “The Announcer’s Test,” a speaking test invented in the 1940s to audition prospective radio talent and made popular as a memory test by comedian Jerry Lewis on The Tonight Show later on. (It’s now a drinking game in a slightly modified version designed to be “funny”.) We used to do it at Arrowhead Lutheran Camp as a time killer before Sunday evening hamburgers. (Man, I could go for a hamburger right now. I mean a real one, not one from Lotteria.) The test utilizes every letter of the alphabet in a variety of ways and also contains all the sounds of the English language. Thus, if you can recite it, you can say pretty much anything in English.

It is, however, very long. This was highly frustrating for the students (something I’m trying to avoid like the plague). I’ve decided to give the students the script for “The Announcer’s Test”. If they can say it to me memorized by the last Friday in September, they can receive a prize. I don’t want this to be stressful for them, just a good way to practice speaking. Plus, if they actually figure out what the vocabulary is on the worksheet, they’re going to have stellar vocab words to pull from. How many Korean students do you know who can use the words “diabetic,” “apathetic,” and “sympathetic” in a sentence? (If you’re ate a language high school or science high school, don’t answer that.)

I think I’m going to try moving Grade 2 back onto the same lesson track as Grade 1. I’m just going to expect more advanced responses from them.

Advanced Adults: Day 1 talked about class sizes and why young people aren’t getting married. Day 2 talked about Better than Ezra’s “A Lifetime” and Norman Rockwell paintings. I love this class.

Beginning Adults: Day 1, more shopping and tongue twisters with the “th” sound. Went to the department store this time. Joy. Day 2, I told them about my foray with Dog Soup. They asked me about it. I told them about it. I asked them about it. Asked about what they all do with their free time. It was freeform discussion, and pretty decent for a beginning class. One of my ladies is also taking Japanese. Apparently she’s becoming quite the cosmopolitan in her old age. She wants to see the world. After the freeform discussion, which included discussion of a couple of proverbs—“Live and let live,” “When in Rome…” and “Less is more”—we worked on pronunciation of the “f/v” and “r/l” sounds.

Still no word on when I’m to begin the Teacher’s Conversation course. We’re still trying to find a time that would be amenable to the three interested parties and myself. They would like to meet on Monday during 7th Period. I’d prefer not to, as Monday is ostensibly my day off, even if I find myself in the 교무실 catching up on email most of the day anyway. I’m willing to work on this day, but I’d rather not, especially as I’m beginning to travel a bit more on the weekends and would appreciate the three-day weekends. Ideally, I’d like them to just come to the Beginning Adult classes when they can. They’d get about four possible hours a week that way anyway instead of the one hour a week they’d get from a separate class just for them. My co-teacher still has to talk things out with them, thus the delay in a schedule decision.

Next week, the advanced adult class will watch a movie, either “The Pursuit of Happyness” starring Will Smith or “The Prince and Pauper” starring Errol Flynn. Both have their strong points in terms of talking about America, though I think “Pursuit” is probably more accessible (“What do you think of homelessness?”) whereas “P and P” lends itself more to questions about American cultural norms (“How does this reflect a Horatio Alger mentality?”). I think all the rest of my classes will go through a lesson on expressing emotion using one of those emotion charts and different images designed to elicit different feelings. Still, I’ve promised the beginning adults something on the uses of “get” in English, so that will take a little extra preparation.

Culinary Note: Dog Soup (영양탕 or 보신탕)

2007-09-06T21:06:00.000-07:00

Dog Soup, in Korean yeongyangtang, which means "nutricious soup" or boshintang, which means "invigorating soup" (영양탕 or 보신탕 respectively), is probably one of the most delicious things I've had yet in Korea. Surprisingly delicious, in fact. I ate it today for lunch with the other English teachers and some other faculty. It has the taste and consistency of beef, but is a little more tender and sweeter. It is served with various vegetables in a dark broth. Despite its fantastic taste, I probably will not be partaking of it very often, as it costs a pretty penny (about 8000 won or $8-9). At the same restaurant, I can also try goat soup, though I will have to wait on this.

But, why Jeremy?! Why? Man's best friend, for crying out loud! Oh, the humanity of eating a canine-ity: For those who are wondering about the ethical implications of this, Dog Soup is made from dogs that have been farmed, not household pets or even stray dogs. Thus, eating it is probably no different from eating a cow. Now, if eating beef causes you an ethical dilemma, then we have something to talk about. Just remember, I didn't eat Fido, today. I ate Bessie, or at least, Bessie's canine equivalent.

[Edit: I have since looked at some articles online about the dogmeat trade in Korea. As far as I can tell, it's actually illegal here. Many websites talk about how the industry has gone underground, though. This is not the case. The idustry is still above ground. The restaurant I went to was not shady. It was out in the open. Thus, I have a feeling it's illegal in Korea sort of the way that jaywalking is illegal in the states. No one's gonna bust your chops over it.]

Hello, Kitty! Mobile

2007-09-06T21:00:00.000-07:00

On the way back to school from eating Dog Soup (If you’re not a vegetarian nor an animal rights activist defending Western cultural norms, try it!), I had the opportunity to ride in one of my fellow English teacher’s vans. I knew he was a family man, supporting a wife and daughter back in Chuncheon, but I had no idea to what extent he was… well, in America we’d call him whipped (sound effect of cracking whip, accompanied by appropriate hand motion). In Korea, I guess he’s just married, and the car is an extension of the decorative control his wife would have at home. At any rate, every upholstered surface of the car was covered in pink Hello, Kitty paraphernalia. Seat covers, steering wheel cover, dash cover, seatbelt straps, gear-shifter, etc. The works. (I should note that, culturally speaking, pink is quite in fashion for both genders in Korea. I applaud this. I think men should wear pink more often. After all, didn’t Don Johnson (“Miami Vice”) and The Duke himself where it?)

As if this wasn’t exciting enough to blog about, as soon as the turned the ignition key, my ears were bombarded by fully pumped out hip-hop. The dichotomy was so overwhelming, I did not know whether to expect a Barbie movie to appear on his in dash display screen or for the car itself to activate it’s hydraulics system as we “bounced” back to the school.

Do you have any Curry Powder?

2007-09-06T20:56:00.000-07:00

In my beginning adult class, we have been learning how to go shopping. I was originally going to do this in one lesson, but I realized that shopping is a pretty big deal, and the vocabulary changes depending on where you are (e.g. aisle : supermarket :: floor : department store). For each lesson, I've been having the students perform the following dialogue (simplified for your reading brevity):

A: Do you have any ______?
B: Yes, ______ is on aisle 5.
A: Thank you.
B: Anything else?
A: Do you have any ______?
B: I'm sorry. We don't have any.
Etc.

I for the blanks, I have the students generate their own vocabulary to use, which I then write on the board and they talk about in Korean for a while to make sure that everyone understands it. When we went shopping in the supermarket for instance, the first two vocabulary items they generated were Curry Powder and Cabbage, thus the dialogue read:

A: Do you have any curry powder?
B: Yes, curry powder is on aisle 5.
A: Thank you.
B: Anything else?
A: Do you have any cabbage?
B: I'm sorry. We don't have any.

This led me to a curious question:

In what dimension does an American supermarket carry curry powder but not cabbage?!

To my knowledge, the above metaphysical quandry did not phase the ajuma in my class in the slightest.

P.S. Today's lesson on department stores could have led itself to similar problems. For instance, what kind of department store carries hammers but not clothing? Luckily, it did not.

A Frustration in Communication Leads to a Realization about Dalkgalbi

2007-09-05T17:47:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday, I went to TKD as per usual, but I was pulled from the class early. The sabonim received a call from persons unknown (at least to me) who he could only describe as “chingu” or friends.

“Ah… Jeremy-shi?” he says to me politely while I’m mid dulachagi. “Yes?” say I, finishing the kick with a rather unsatisfactory plop against the padded target. (It’s supposed to make more of a plablam! sound if you kick it correctly.) “Chingu-rul Mimisa-ei manayo. (Friends meet at Mimisa.) You go.” “Chingu manayo?” I respond in confusion. “Now?” “Yes. Go, ot change-y. (Change your clothes.)”

Now, my confusion was understandable, as there is no one in the hamlet that I can properly call chingu. Everyone is either too young or too old or a colleague or just plain Korean. Because of the social hierarchy, no one would call me a chingu. This led me to all sorts of wild conclusions (and, admittedly, fantasies) about who could be waiting for me at Mimisa. Did one of my fellow entertaining teachers from American happen to come to the hamlet without telling me in order to surprise me? And if so, how on Earth did they know to look at my host mother’s beauty shop? Did they just ask every citizen of this fair city, “Hey! Do you know who the foreign guy in town is staying with? … Which foreign guy? You mean there are two? … Well, what are my options? … Australian or American, huh? The American one then. … The beauty supply shop? This way? Ok, thanks,” until they found me? I could only imagine this scenario as I walked in great anticipation towards my host-mother’s humble shop.

Well, the reality turned out to be much less exciting than the fantasy. As per usual, I suppose. Turns out, my host mother was meeting her friends for dinner. I just needed to tag along if I wanted to eat that night. Ah, disappointment. At least it was followed by food, a lesson in hospitality if I ever heard one: If you’re going to disappoint someone, give them some food to go with it. (One of the Korean proverbs in the back of my phrasebook in fact says, 둘이 먹다가 한 사람 죽어도 모른다 Duri meogdaga han saram jugeodo moreunda (While two are eating, one could die and the other wouldn’t know).

The evening was not a total loss, however, as I realized that one of Chuncheon’s claims to fame, that it serves the best dalkgalbi in the world, is in fact true, at least so far as Chuncheon and my hamlet are concerned. Dalkgalbi here is positively disgusting when compared with Chuncheon’s, and even I, one who has been voted by my fellow ATEs as “Most likely to eat anything,” had trouble finishing it to my aching stomach’s appeasement. I wonder how many of my fellow ATEs have been similarly disappointed outside of Chuncheon, and whether this is pandemic across the country. I thought before that such regional differences in food taste must be exaggerated to the benefice of the city which claimed to have the best item, but I see now the truth of this concerning Chuncheon. Once you’ve had dalkgalbi there, you’ll never go anywhere else.

I bemoan my leaving Korea eventually because of the loss I will feel at leaving Chuncheon’s dalkgalbi forever behind…

On the Streets of the Hamlet: An Encounter with My Students

2007-09-04T17:47:00.000-07:00

I happened upon some of my students while walking from TKD to my host family’s beauty supply shop. We were equally surprised to see each other. Turns out there is a noraebang in the hamlet after all. At any rate, I think if I ever want to practice my Korean and learn new words (i.e. slang), it might be possible to hang out with my students. I think this will definitely happen if I ever shave…

Writing Tutoring

2007-09-02T17:48:00.001-07:00

Today, I got to dust off my writing tutoring skills, which were quite dusty. The pastor’s daughter wanted me to look over a couple of her essays at church, two for the TOEFL and one for the GRE. They were decently written. Certainly not the best English I’d ever seen, but since she has never studied at a native English speaking university where she’d have to learn how to actually write an English language essay, they were actually quite good. She attends Seoul National University, the Harvard of Korea (or the Yale or Stanford or Columbia, depending on your allegiances), so I really expected them to be about what they were. Still, she did have the common problems native Asian-language speakers have with article usage.

Her spoken English is quite good as well, and she has been very helpful in helping me know my way around the church. I was only too happy to oblige. She apparently wants to study 18th century western music at a university in the West, and I hope she can succeed. An American university would be foolish not to take her, to be honest.

Korean Hostages Home

2007-09-02T17:47:00.000-07:00

This morning, I found out that the Korean missionary hostages captured by the Taliban have been returned home. They are hospitalized for the duration of their recovery.

I cried a little when I saw the images on the news. My abeoji was as stoic as ever, but watched intently.

Watching TV

2007-09-02T17:46:00.000-07:00

I’ve found watching television with my host family to be a worthwhile activity. For one thing, it allows me to just relax after a day of teaching, lesson planning, and TKD-ing. For another thing, we’ll usually see something on the TV that will inspire my host mother to ask me something about American culture, thus the following 0.5 to 1.5 hours will be spent trying to explain something relatively simple in a mixture of English, Korean, and improvised hieroglyphics. (For those traveling to a country where you cannot speak the language at all, a pocket-sized sketchpad is a must. You’d be amazed what you can get across about the American education system with a pen, some paper, and a LOT of stick figures.) Most recently, we were watching the World Track and Field Championships hosted in Osaka, Japan, and she noticed that the Jamaican runner crossed himself. My reaction was a silent, “Sweet!” Her reaction was a flustered one. Apparently, Catholics aren’t Christians, or at least are a lesser form of Christians compared to Korean Protestants. When I told her that some people in my church cross themselves too, she immediately became suspicious of my Catholicity. I had to assure her that I am not Catholic and that I am Christian. (Luckily, my Korean isn’t all that good or I might have been kicked out of the house by now in trying to inform my host mom that Catholics are Christians too and that most of my closest friends have a romantic inclination to become Catholics someday, as I do.)

There are a few things I’ve noticed about Korean TV this week however. The first has to do with subtitles. They are both annoying and interesting. Annoying, because people reading the subtitles (i.e. my host family) can get the jokes before they’re even delivered by the actors. They pre-empt my laugh and that makes it less funny for me.

But they are interesting not only because I can sit there trying to figure out what the Korean is saying based on the dialogue, but also because of the slight differences I can already notice despite my lack of Korean. For instance, I watched “The Kid” starring Bruce Willis last night with my abeoji. I was surprised to find that, whereas the 8-year old Russell would refer to the 40-year old Russell by his name on the English language track, the Korean subtitle would have the boy say a more respectful ajeoshi (아저시). Also, whereas Russell’s assistant would refer to Russell as Russell on the English language track, in the subtitles she would refer to him as boss (I can’t remember the Korean for this at the moment).

I think it says something about Korean society (or Disney, depending on who did the subtitling) that they would change the dialogue of the movie to fit their own cultural norms instead of leaving the dialogue as is and letting Korea deal with it on its own. The producers might not have wanted Korean children calling their old men by their first names nor assistants calling their bosses by the same. It is a sort of family film though, so that might have something to do with it.

(The film itself was entertaining, and I would highly recommend it to anyone who wanted something lighthearted to watch. It’s by no means award winning material, but good clean fun to be sure. A coming of age story for the middle aged to childlike audience.)

In watching Korean dramas, I have noticed that sometimes directors get just plain sloppy with their film editing. For instance, in watching one today, the scene was a man racing to a wedding to stop the bride from getting married so he could declare his love to her. He was in convertible, anxiously checking his watch as he sped along the freeway. At least, we were supposed to think he was speeding. Instead of having him actually speed, they just sped up the film so the trees went by quicker. I might not have noticed if it weren’t for the fact that he was in traffic. Apparently, everybody on the freeway in Seoul was also in a rush to get to that wedding…

And a final blurb about Korean television, this time commercials. One advertisement this morning was selling a heated marble bed. That is, the actual part of the bed on which one sleeps was a marble slab with temperature controls. This is supposedly healthy and has been approved by the FDA. Not the Korean FDA mind you. The Miguk FDA. For those of you who don’t habla Korean, that’s the American FDA. Why do Korean advertising agencies think the American FDA is a selling point for a product? I haven’t the foggiest.

Weekly Letter Home

2007-09-02T17:07:00.000-07:00

Dear Family and Friends,

This was a busy week in the town in which I live in the country in which I reside for this yearlong stint that the government, to which I am ever so grateful, has graciously bestowed upon me. (If you’re wondering why the cryptic language, I’ll explain below.) The highlights are these. I had a party with my fellow English teachers and a couple others of the faculty, which ended in disaster for me both that night and the next morning. My school put on a festival showcasing the talents of the students and the willingness to put themselves forward for public ridicule of the teachers and administration. (During a break in the festival, some of the older teachers offered to set me up on a blind date.) I began TKD at the local dojang and have signed up for hanja lessons at the same. I traveled to Wonju, the nearest big city, to meet friends from orientation. Oh, and I managed to teach students somewhere in between all those events as well.

Those were the highlights. The details (and an explanation for the cryptic language) are below.

Cryptic Language: An Explanation

2007-09-02T15:08:00.000-07:00

A disclaimer about my future updates: They will be cryptic. By cryptic, I mean that names associated with my employers, my place of employment, my town, my position, etc. will be omitted in favor of phrases such as “The Powers that Be” in the case of my employers, “The School” in the case of my place of employment, “The Hamlet” in the case of my town, and “Entertaining Teacher from America” (ATE, when I want to abbrv.) in the case of my position. Other titles, I’ll make up as I go along and keep personal notes on them in case I ever want to publish my adventures here in … this country.

But, why the cryptic language? The Powers that Be have determined that some of our blogs within the Entertaining Teacher from America program are hitting a little too close to home in that they are easily searchable and even findable on the Internet. This would not be a problem if not for the fact that we have to maintain good relationships with our places of employment in order to have things like adequate stipends, homestays, two month paid vacations, and generally comfortable positions as we have now. If the place of employment happens upon an Entertaining Teacher from America’s blog, it might not like something it reads, whether that material is good or bad. It might just be information that the school doesn’t want made public. Thus, the Powers that Be want us to disassociate our blogs from the program, our schools, our hamlets, etc.

Now, technically, I do not have to abide by the censoring of this blog (free speech and all that), but I would like to get along with the program and I can understand their position concerning the benefits we receive from the host schools and would like to continue to receive.

Besides the language change in this blog, it also means that the blog will not be up for a while as I have to review old posts and censor them accordingly. I apologize for any confusion the new nomenclature might cause, and I hope it doesn’t make your reading too strenuous.

Trip to Wonju

2007-09-01T17:39:00.000-07:00

This Saturday, I managed to get out to Wonju finally. At a 6,400 won and 1.5 hour bus ride, Wonju is the nearest big city to my hamlet, about 69 km. When I’m in good enough shape and if the weather ever improves (It’s been raining a lot because of monsoon season.), I’ll actually be able to bike there in a few hours. The bus is convenient enough, though, and I was able to procure a ticket by myself. Nothing complicated. I just walked briskly up to the ticket window and said, “I’m going to Wonju. How much is it?”

Wonju is mostly important to me because three of my friends from orientation live there: two other ATEs, one secondary and one elementary, and one of the former RAs for our dormitory. The last of these is at school in Chuncheon however, so he’ll only be in Wonju occasionally.

I met up with my friends, had lunch at one of their homestays (forgot a gift… BAD, Cultural Ambassador! BAD!), and then we went out to see the town. It was raining, so we mostly just did some quick shopping for someone’s upcoming birthday (I won’t say whose, just that she lives in Kirksville) and sat around in a coffee shop catching up on everything good and de-stressing about everything not so good. The former RA had just visited Sapporo, Japan, so he had lots of pictures to share.

(CULTURAL NOTE: To quote the ATE in this hamlet before me, “Koreans do not know how to make coffee.” This is true. They mix their coffee using pre-made packets of instant coffee, sugar, and cream. Though this may be very delicious (노무 맛있어요, learned a new phrase!), it is not coffee and does not have nearly the same effect as a good straight shot of black of French Roast, much less some of the darker blends. The coffee shop we went to Wonju, however, brews their coffee. A strong, dark cup of brewed coffee is a necessity for a college student and probably the greatest comfort to the working person. I am somewhere in between necessity and comfort at this point in my life, so my feelings on this matter are quite strong. I will make several trips to Wonju, if only to partake of this luxury. At 4,000-7,000 won a cup, it is a luxury indeed. I also saw the best beer selection I’ve yet seen in Korea at this establishment. They even had Negro Modelo. I’ll have to return for this as well.)

It’s a fun town. Next time I’ll probably try to spend the night though. My RA friend has offered to host me at his apartment where he lives with his mom. Really quite generous of him. I felt a little rushed getting out of Wonju because the last bus back to the Hamlet leaves around 6:00 pm.

Teaching: Week 2 summary

2007-08-31T17:40:00.000-07:00

This week went decently teaching wise. I know now that most of the students can comprehend the basic commands covered in TPR, but for the lower level classes I will probably press this system for the sake of their growing accustomed to my voice. I’m especially anxious about the first graders because, with the Korean academic year finishing in winter as it does, they are the students I will have until June, and thus the students I can make the most progress with. The second graders will be advancing to third grade where they will begin studying almost exclusively for their university entrance examinations which focus on reading English, not speaking it. Thus, I will probably never see them again. They will be replaced with a new batch of first graders fresh from the hamlet’s Middle School who I will have to start all over with in terms of lessons.

One thing that was a big success this last week with my high school students was the “Flea, Fly, Mosquito” song, a repeat after me song that was always a favorite at Arrowhead Lutheran Camp.

Flea!
Flea, Fly!
Flea, Fly, Mosquito!
Mosquito!
Calamine, calamine, calamine lotion.
Oh, no, no, no, not the lotion!
Itchy, itchy, scratchy, scratchy. Think I’ve got one on my back-y.
Quick! Get the bug spray. Think he went that-a way!
Schzz! Ugh! Got that bug.

The kids really enjoyed the rhythmic aspect of the song (slap, clap, snap, clap on a 4/4 count), and I enjoyed watching their faces grow wide with terror when I began to accelerate the tempo. I’m justifying using these songs in the classroom for two reasons: 1) they will help with pronunciation and recall of vocabulary learned from the songs; 2) they are just plain fun and an easy way to keep the kids awake. As for the first, Korean children have difficulty pronouncing “th” sounds and “l”/“r” sounds (“l” and “r” are a single letter in Korean as in many Asian languages from what I understand). The song offers sufficient opportunities for practicing this without being too frustrating. As for vocabulary, I got to teach the difference between itch and scratch as well as some common North American bugs. Besides, how many Korean kids do you know who ask for calamine lotion if they have an itch (not a scratch). Mine can. (Incidentally, they call flea markets “flea markets” out here. Except in Korean. Go figure.) If I really wanted to focus on the vocabulary and take my time with the song, I could stretch out the lesson so the song took the entire 50-min. This was probably better for some of the slower classes I did this for, anyway.

This was my first week with the adult classes. I have two of them and each meets for two hours a day, two days a week. Can anyone say, “Christ College Seminar”?

I can. And I will. The advanced adult class is actually pretty stinkin’ good with their English. By good I mean that they can read news articles and discuss them fairly fluently. They also wouldn’t mind listening to a couple of songs and interpreting the lyrics. I’m in Heaven! Hopefully I don’t get too excited and ruin everything by throwing Plato at them or something awful like that. It won’t come to that, I promise you, though I am tempted to do the Michael W. version of Romeo & Juliet with them. It’s visually expressive enough that I’m sure they’ll be able to follow it. One concern with doing that though is the presence of a pastor in the group and a couple of housewife mothers. Pastors here tend to be more conservative than in America. Housewife mothers tend to agree with them. I’ll have to be careful.

The beginners/intermediate class (notice the singular-plural switch, as it’s accurate to the class’ demographic) is truly a beginners’ class. They know their alphabet and a few stock phrases, but getting them to talk will be a bear. Since they’re mostly housewives or ajuma, though, I’m teaching them how to go shopping. Last week, we went to the supermarket. Next week, we’ll review that and move on to the department store. Maybe by the end of the semester I can set up a shopping spree activity for them or something…

So, overall a good week. There is a regret, though. Unfortunately, I taught some of the high school classes how to shake hands like Americans. Korean handshakes are very conciliatory and nice and … Well, generally they’re meant to show deference to the person you’re shaking hands with, which is not what you’re going for in a good American handshake. An American handshake should express a kind of friendly strength. Instead of saying, “I am honored to be in your presence, oh social superior of mine,” you’re trying to say, “I’m someone you can depend on when the going gets tough.” Nation of supposed equals and all that.

What was unfortunate about the handshake portion of the lesson is that there was a rash of pink eye going around the school (which Koreans call red eye), and I may have exacerbated the problem as well as infected myself. Live and learn.

(For those who just developed an over-reactive look of terror at the mention of pink eye and me possibly having it, e.g. Claire R. and possibly, though less probably, Mom: The jury’s still out on whether my eyes are a little red because of disease or lack of sleep. Probably a little of both, but they haven’t turned the color of Pepto-Bismol yet, so I’m in the clear for the time being. Incidentally, should Crayola ever hold another color naming contest for an obscenely large crayon box of 5,000 different colors, I’m hoping there’s a good thick pink in there. Pepto-Bismol pink really should be a color in the Crayola opus.)

TKD Week 1 and Hanja lessons

2007-08-31T17:37:00.000-07:00

This was my first week of TaeKwonDo since orientation. It wasn’t even a full week because of the English teachers’ welcome party and the festival, but I certainly did learn a lot. Mostly, I learned that two weeks off of TKD and going to a class with 40 students to start off with isn’t very good for form. In other words, I spend the majority of my first lesson just going over the first kick I learned: apchagi, or front kick. This is a two-hour lesson mind you. This week, I also learned the fourth form, though I’m sure if someone asked me to do it at this point, I’d be slow as molasses. But now I supposed know two forms, first and fourth, so that’s pretty cool.

(CULTURAL NOTE: For those who don’t know, a form is essentially a choreographed routine of different punches, chops, kicks, and blocks. As far as I can tell, you’d never use it in fighting, but it looks pretty darn cool. I believe memorizing forms is one of the main components to advancing through the belt rankings in TKD. As such, just because someone has a black belt in TKD, that doesn’t mean they win a fight. It just means they can look cool in a fight. Most of the black belts in my class would probably get creamed in a brawl. Not that I want to fight them, mind you… Just saying.)

What’s nice about the class is that pretty much everyone in there is a black belt or a red-black belt, so if the sabeonim (sp?), the kwajangnim’s assistant, needs to spend extra time helping me get my form down for a kick or a punch, he can just tell the other students to work on something for a while and then give me some private instruction. So, I’m getting private TKD instruction for about $70 a month. Pretty groovy.

It’s also fun because most of the students are elementary school kids. Thus, they aren’t actually black belts because they need to be 15 or 16 years old for that. They wear the red-black belts instead because they know the forms necessary to have a black belt. But the fun thing is, even though they can show me up anytime on the forms and the drills, they still have to respect me because I’m older than them. Plus, they’re just fun to play around with. Especially in sparing. Every time I spar with one of them, their eyes get wide as they think to themselves, “This guy has a foot of reach on me with his kicks and one of his lunges equals two of mine. How the heck am I supposed to practice with him?!” To be honest, I’m thinking the same thing.

There’s one student that’s a little older though. Still doesn’t have his black belt, but he instructs me when the sabeonim is busy training the others in more advanced forms. He’s the one that taught me the Fourth Form. He smiles at me a lot, and I think he likes having me around, but he can’t speak English. Alas. He’s at the middle school in the Hamlet, I think, so maybe I can ask if he knows one of my host sisters.

At any rate, I speak a little Korean with the kids. Mostly, they ask where I’m from and stare at my eyes and beard. The sabeonim even had me give a little speech in Korean to introduce myself, which went much better than the speech I gave to the high school two weeks earlier.
The dojang I attend also has hanja classes. By hanja, I mean the Chinese characters that still exist in Korean, and by classes, I mean that the TKD students have to write out two characters several times before they can practice. I think I’ll join them. If I go to graduate school, I’ll have to learn the characters anyway, and it will help me bone up on my vocabulary as the pronunciation of the characters is just their Korean equivalent. I’ll just have to bring a dictionary along to translate what I’m writing.

School Festival Highlights and Singing in Korean

2007-08-29T17:36:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday, there was no school, as the students and faculty were putting on a festival of sorts. In America, this would most likely be called an Assembly, or maybe in H.S. it would be called a Variety Show. Parents were invited to attend and so many students participated that it was actually held over two separate two-hour blocks of time so that people could go home and eat. (During the actual school day, community members were invited to come to the school to see student made displays set up in the hallways, like the open houses I remember having in elementary school.)

The festival itself was quite entertaining. One notable act was a beat-boxer who, if he were to post on YouTube.com, would probably become one of the top 10 videos within a week. Another was a dynamic duo who performed a Korean dance-style called “Popping,” which seemed like a combination of the smoother elements of American hip-hop dance and the Robot. There was also a rock session performed by many students dressed in various styles of rock fashion. They would switch off depending on what song they were doing, so it was usually a five-man/woman band. The only song I understood was Avril Lavigne’s (which, I have discovered, no Korean can pronounce) “Sk8er Boi”, but generally the songs were well performed.

Finally, the broadcasting club performed a radio drama, something which I wish would come back in the United States. (I used to listen to old radio shows with my dad on Wednesday nights. KNEX 1070 would broadcast them, and I always like them, especially The Adventures of Pancho and Cisco.) The direction was probably the most interesting part. One person actually conducted all the sound cues and dialogue, including dynamics changes and fade-outs. I could not understand anything that was going on in the actual dialogue, of course, except for at the very end. At that point, I heard a car crash, the words omeo, omeo, omeo (Mother) about a gogooglezillion of times, an ambulance, more omeo’s, a steady beep-beep-beep, one long final beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee… and at last a few more omeo’s. Ah, I thought. Omeo has died. My co-teachers cried. I didn’t have sufficient build-up in the plot to accomplish the same depth of emotion, unfortunately. At least that gave me an opportunity to practice traditional Korean male stoicism.

The teachers and myself also performed. We sang two songs. Actually they sang, and I mumbled loudly and on pitch as both songs were in Korean minus the last line of the second song, which read “Hap-py Bir-th Day to you.” (That’s right, folks. You can apparently sing a “th” according to Korean phonology. I’m learning something new everyday!) We all wore black pants, white button-down shirts, and red bowties. A few high school girls screamed my name. It was a good time.

As I said, there were two sets to the festival, and in between people went home for dinner. The teachers, however, all decided to eat together at a local restaurant, where the teachers I had not eaten with yet asked the ubiquitous questions, “Can you eat hot food?” Spicy food, you mean? “Yes, spicy food.” And also, “You have a girlfriend?” No. (The next part I was not prepared for.) “Can we make a blind date for you?”

A la Moe from The Simpsons: “WHA?!?!”

I said, “Maybe.” Problem is, I’m pretty sure they want to set me up with one of the other English teachers. Despite the fact that she’s very pretty and I get along fairly well with her, I’m not too keen on dating her for a couple of reasons. One, we work together. If things go sour, they could go really sour. Two, she lives in a little separate apartment literally attached to the house I live in, and while that could be fantastic while dating, if things go sour, they could go really sour as in the previous scenario. In truth though, I’m just not too keen on getting attached to anyone this year. Everything about my situation is so temporary that I want to be able to pull up roots if I need to without regrets. (I had to learn that the hard way…)

Party with the yeong-eo seonsaengnim (English teachers) and thoughts on why I came to this country

2007-08-28T17:33:00.000-07:00

My fellow English teachers finally got around to arranging a welcome party for me. Before, a couple of them were away on various engagements, but we were all finally in town at the same time. A few other teachers joined us as well from other departments.

It was a delicious meal. 우리 (duck) served up samgeopsal-style with the normal sides of kimchi and sauced up vegetables. There was also quite a bit of soju being poured. I tried my best to keep up, but this unfortunately meant that I couldn’t keep anything down for the majority of the next day. Luckily, I didn’t have to teach.

I spent most of the evening talking with the most fluent of the English teachers. We discussed many things, among them my honors paper and his interest in Anime. He would like to actually team-teach with me at some point, though I fear that this might require too much work to do over successive weeks. Once or twice properly spaced out would be acceptable to me, though.

And of course the ubiquitous question arose, “Why did you decide to come to Korea?” I’ve been getting this question a lot from various people. Here’s the stock answer: At my school, I studied East Asian history, but my school was too small for me to study Korean history. Thus, I only studied Japanese and Chinese history. I feel this is unfortunate since there are three major players in East Asian history, not two, and if I want to continue studies in this field, I should know about that third player, Korea.

The real answer is more something along the lines of, “Well, my Middle Eastern history professor wanted me to apply for The Program, and I picked the country and research topic (Entertaining Teacher from America) that would require the least amount of work on my part. I accepted the opportunity when it came because who wouldn’t accept a one-year paid vacation to a country half-way around the world?

Not that it’s been a vacation, nor that I thought it would be. Far from it, in fact, but I can’t help but feel a little guilty about my less than pure motivations. Like I’m using these people somehow. Sure they’re getting something out of it, but from what little I know about Korean history, about how they’ve been stomped on by every major power in the world, and used, and torn, stitched… Well, I just feel like I’m a part of that now. A little. When I realize how many people come here to teach just because Korea will pay them a lot of money to come and how many of those people do not bother to learn about Korea or Koreans or Korean and how many of those people do not g.a.r.a. what happens in this country…

For instance, in our last night in Chuncheon, my friends were at a bar. (For those of you who know Korean, you’ll appreciate this. I just typed “our friends” and had to correct it. Man, I’m in it deep now!) They met some Canadians also teaching English in Korea through another program. The other program doesn’t really appreciate our program for some reason, perhaps because it’s U.S. government sponsored (or perhaps because we actually teach by ourselves while they mostly just help out as live tape recorders). At any rate, they were getting a little pushy with my friends, so my friends asked them, “How long have you been in Korea?” A year or so. “And how much Korean do you know?” Korean? Why would we bother to learn that?
That kind of attitude? Well, it makes me feel a little guilty about my own less than pure original motivations for coming here. Luckily, it also motivates me to not become one of those people. Luckily, my original intention for coming here is going out the window, and my desire to actually learn about this unique people is growing everyday.

Weekly Letter Home

2007-08-26T18:13:00.000-07:00

Dear family and friends,

It's that time again. This week's update is actually a bit varied in that I have a word attachment for you to peruse. That's where all the information that went on my blog this week is. I've been trying to catch up on it by doing a little bit from the past and little bit from the present as the mood strikes me, and I still have much to left to do.

I've decided to give you two sections of it in plain text however, as these are the most relevant to an "update". What you should definitely know is that I've finally signed up for TKD and will begin this week. Unfortunately, the time I scheduled it for interferes with a few prior school obligations for this week which I was not aware of ( i.e. a party with the English teachers and a school festival). Language barriers are going to kill me... So, it looks like I will have one class today and then my next class on Thursday.

For those of you who knew I was sick, I am feeling much better now. I've taken my last set of drugs, and I hope I have seen the last of this hamlet's local area virus. We shall see if that is the case.

No classes today, though I am at school to check the internet and say hello to you all. Turns out I missed both fantasy football league drafts I was supposed to partake in this weekend. Silly time difference/not having internet. I had intended to go shopping today when I am done at school, but it is raining, so I might have to postpone that. Luckily, I brought some Korean to study.

Keep me in your prayers. I begin teaching the adult classes tomorrow as well as my first real lesson set with the High School students.

Love,

Jeremy

My Host Family

2007-08-26T17:48:00.000-07:00

The time has finally arrived for me to give you a detailed description about who my host family is, what they do, and what on Earth I have to do with them. I’ve been holding off on this both because of a lack of time, but also because of a lack of knowledge of a few key details (e.g. their family name).

Firstly, as their name implies, they are a family and they are hosting me for the duration of my stay, provided we don’t run into some major potholes down the road. They are Christians and fairly active in their church. They seem to own some land in the hamlet, as we daily have fresh sweet corn to boil.

There is a father, a mother, an elder sister at what used to be called a normal school in the United States (i.e. a school for training teachers), a younger sister in Middle School, and a baby brother, perhaps in his first years of schooling if he goes to school at all.

The father, W. abeoji seems to be in between jobs. [A note on names: W. abeoji is not actually my host father’s name. Rather, W. is the name of his son and abeoji is the Korean word for father. It seems that in familial relations, the parent’s are referred to in relation to the eldest son. Thus, when I talk about W. omeoni (웅진 어머니) below, I am essentially writing “W.’s Mom”.] At one time, he was a florist, at another a tow truck driver, and now he sits at home and studies all day for an exam to become some sort of government official that monitors farming or helps farmers. I’m not exactly clear on what this is, but when I find out, I will let you know. He always has a smile on his face, though, especially when we try to communicate while we are both home alone. This happens often because of the situation the rest of the family is in.

The mother, W. omeoni, runs a beauty/movie rental shop. This keeps her out of the house most of the day from what I can tell, thus W. abeo cooks most of my meals. I was invited to come along to pick W. omeo up from the store once by W. abeo. This usually happens around 9:00 pm when W. omeo closes up shop. While there, I was invited to peruse the video section, and W. omeo began quizzing me on which movies I had already seen. There were quite a few that I hadn’t seen already (mostly ones that had been released in last four years of my life, i.e. college), but she was amazed at how many I had seen. I tried, unsuccessfully, to explain to her that we had a large projection screen at home and about 400 DVDs to boot. W., from what I can tell, spends most of his day with his omeoni, though he may also be going to school during the day.

I also learned on this trip to the shop that R., the youngest sister, usually drops by around the shop around 9:00 pm also to come home from school. Like most Korean children her age, she goes to school for about twelve hours a day, taking breaks for lunch and dinner. Most of this time is spent at public school, but some is spent at a private language institute called a hagwon. This strict educational discipline doesn’t really start until Middle School for most children, as students use their secondary years to prepare for the university entrance exams which will determine much of the rest of their futures.

Thus, I usually do not see the family until late at night, at which point they eat dinner while I watch, having already had mine around 6:00 pm (though with TKD running so late, I will begin eating dinner with them). After this, we usually watch some TV and talk in Konglish about whatever occurs to us. Sometimes, I will play a game with W. using the deck of cards I gave him as a gift. About every night, in fact, I have some sort of dialogue with W. in which he tries to teach me Korean and I teach him a little English. Sometimes, this leads to troublesome remarks from him. This conversation was in the context of a discussion about a former ETA the family had hosted:

W.: (pointing at my face) Olgul!
Me: (surprised, and pointing where he is pointing, i.e. at myself) Ugly?!
W.: (now, smiling with glee) Nae, Olgul!
W. abeo: (noticing my confusion) Olgul. You. Jacob. Same.
Me: Jacob and I are both ugly?!
W. abeo: (trying to correct my pronunciation) Ugly? No, Olgul.
Me: Olgul?
W. abeo: (now circling his face with his chopsticks) Nae, Olgul, olgul!
Me: Oh! Olgul! Face.

At which point, W. abeo gives a nervous chuckle, probably thinking to himself, “I hope the foreigner actually got it, because I have no idea what he just said.”

Communication can also be troublesome as I can only pick out bits and pieces of conversations. For instance, after I had gone upstairs to my room to sleep, I suddenly heard W. abeo and R. get into a heated discussion. All I could hear was the father saying, “Korean people (한국 사람)” and R. saying, “American people (미국 사람)”. What was even more troubling was that I could hear the rest of the conversation, but I couldn’t understand it. As the conversation sounded heated, I of course assumed the worse. “I’m not fitting in here. They want me out. And they hate all Americans now. Only R. can defend me. I have failed as a cultural ambassador and will be sent home in shame.” (I’m probably exaggerating my assumptions, but it’s for effect, so bear with me.)

It was with great trepidation that I descended the stairs the next morning and began eating breakfast with R. As soon as I saw an opening in the conversation, I asked R. what she and her father had talked about last night.

Me: I heard W. abeo and you talking last night, but all I could understand was 미국 사람 and 한국 사람.
R.: (Concentrates hard to figure out what I’m talking about.) I don’t remember. (She then talks hurriedly to her father in Korean. He looks confused and after a while responds. She still looks confused and says) He doesn’t remember.
Me: (lauging nervously) Okay.

It must not have been important then. I’ll just drop the topic, but then…

W. abeo: Oh! (Talks hurriedly in Korean to R.)
R.: Oh! (Thinks for a bit, translating I suppose.) American man. Cool man. Handsome man.
Me: The difference between “cool” and “handsome” for American men?
R.: Yes.
Me: Oh!

I then explain that I think cool is more about attitude, which I translate kibun (기분). A cool man doesn’t have to be handsome, though he certainly can be, because he has, in some way, an appealing way of approaching life. A handsome man is just looks.

So, I guess all that’s to say, I’ve landed in good hands here. I mean, if their heated discussion is about what the difference is between “cool” and “handsome”, then that sounds pretty good to me. Sounds like a family with good priorities, you know? I like discussing language heatedly too!

I do wish I could see my host family more often then I do. I’d like to interact with them more so that I feel less like a boarder and more like someone going through a new experience with them. But they’ve done this before. It’s their third time in fact. To them, I’m probably a little old hat. To me however, it’s just one grand adventure after another.

My First Week Teaching in the Hamlet

2007-08-24T18:47:00.000-07:00

I’ve reached the end of my first teaching week. I’ve met all my high school students, or at least, they’ve all met me. I’ve met all the English faculty (some where gone for various reasons). I’ve had my first taste with an adjusted schedule. I’m feeling good about the rest of the year at this point. Here’s how it went.

Monday. I felt a little sick, but luckily, I didn’t have to teach. Monday is a scheduled day off for me, though because of TKD and a Teacher’s Conversation Class I’ve decided to continue in Dana C. (the last ATE)’s absence, I probably will not use this day to its full traveling potential this semester. At any rate, this Monday, I came into the office for two reasons. First, I wanted to check the internet, which took a fair amount of time. Second, I wanted to finish lesson planning. I had been told my co-teacher that the children are just plain curious about me at this point, so maybe I could just introduce myself for my first lesson. Sounded good to me, although it meant making a PPT about myself, my family, and St. Louis because I wanted to use pictures. This took forever.

On Tuesday, I still feel a little sick. This is not good as Dana C. ended up being sick for six months, my co-teacher informs me, and Jacob, the ATE before Dana, was sick for a couple months, my host family has informed me. At any rate, I promise my co-teacher that I will seek medical attention if the symptoms persist until Thursday. I’ll be ok though, because on Tuesdays I only teach one class anyway. It’s at 8:30 in the morning and then I’m done for the day. I can go home and rest. At least, that’s what I think.

I find out from the English teacher who lives next door to me during the week, and who has graciously offered to give me a ride to school, that there was a schedule change because one of the other English teachers had to go out of town to attend his friend’s dad’s funeral. Oh, ok. That’s fine. So what will I be teaching today? Will I be teaching at all? Can I just go home now? She doesn’t know, but assures me she will find out as soon as we arrive.

[Cultural note: At Korean schools, if a teacher has to take a leave of absence, the powers that be change the teaching schedule, sometimes until it is topsy-turvy. Contrast this with the American system where a substitute teacher is called in. The Korean system has its advantages, of course. You don’t have to worry about someone who is not really qualified to teach a particular subject basically playing baby sitter for an hour. On the other hand, the American system of substitute teachers ends up being a training ground for future educators as well as avoids the administrative hassles that accompany schedule changes. I think, in either case, communication is key, and since I can’t read the daily announcements that pop up so cheerily on my school’s instant messenger, I hope the staff can remember to keep me appraised in the future…]

It turns out I have two classes that day instead of the one I planned on. No biggie. I’m doing the same lesson all week anyway.

Since it was my first day teaching, I got my initial gauge of how good the student’s English is. They may be reading Harry Potter in English, but they sure can’t talk about it, or understand an English speaker if they’re talking about it. “Hello, how are you?” is hard for them. So, it looks like I’ll have to start from square one, speaking wise. Even worse, I’ll have co-teacher supervision for a while. This is because the vice-principal walked in on my class while a couple of students slept, which I took care of as soon as I noticed it. Oh, well. The English teachers will sit in and be bored, unless I can convince them to take part in the activities too.

The rest of the lessons get better as the week goes on and as I get a gauge for how the students are reacting to different parts. This is good, as I felt worse and worse with each one because of the sickness taking hold of my sinuses and bowels. I essentially broke the lesson up into two parts. Part one talked about what I expected from the class and what they could expect from me:

Class Expectations:
1. Speak English.
2. Show respect.
3. Have fun!

Teacher Expectations:
1. Speak English (the alternatives being Korean or, more likely given my training, Spanish).
2. Speak slowly (just in case I get excited).
3. Talk about America (a little bit… they could really use more practice in speaking and listening as far as I’m concerned…)

There were some dismayed faces when I told them it would be an English only class. (Or maybe they were more confused… or stunned that they had a teacher with brown hair, hazel eyes, a red beard, and a short stature and thus somewhat resembling Gimli from The Lord of the Rings Trilogy.) So, I had to explain that practicing speaking English was the only way to get good at it. I’m good at it because I’ve practiced my entire life. They’re good at Korean because they’ve practiced it. I suck at Korean because I haven’t, etc. They understood then. Still, I think I sense some skepticism about their abilities to do this.

As for show "respect," no one knew this word, so I related it to insa. When they saw a teacher in the hall, what did they do? They bowed to the teacher and greeted them using the polite-informal style, of course. This is respect. Being nice to each other. OH! Heads nod.

And “Have fun!”? I included this because, as I told them, English class is hard. There is no way to make it easy on them. It is going to be in essence hard to speak a language that they have never spoken and probably will not practice when they go home. Thus, they need a good attitude about it. If they go into class thinking, I will be angry about learning English because I hate learning English, then class will be very, very, very hard, as it was for me learning Korean. If they come into class thinking, English is hard, but I will try my best and have fun learning it,
then English class will only be hard, and that’s easier than very, very, very hard.

The second part of the presentation was an introduction to myself and my family and my hometown. Here, I could throw in a few jokes. I told them that my dad was fat, but they shouldn’t tell him I said that because it would make him angry. (Incidentally, Dad, if you’re reading this, you are fat, but you have good cholesterol and blood pressure, so I won’t
bother you about that. Sorry for disrespecting you, but thank you for understanding.) I asked them who they thought my mom was. A surprising amount said that she must be my older sister. Then, when I asked about my younger sister, they thought she was also my older
sister, or perhaps my girlfriend, or even, as one very confused and embarrassed boy shouted out, my boyfriend. I told them that, while it’s true that my sister is bigger and taller than me, she is my younger sister. BUT, because she is bigger and taller than me, if we fight, I have to run away. Lots of laughs for that. I still held the higher ground though. I told them that because I am so fast, I can hit her, run away, run back, hit her again, run away, etc. In the end, therefore, “I win.” (Futurama quote. Anyone? Anyone?)

I was also able to incorporate Spanish into every presentation. As I took them on my whirlwind tour of the places I lived in the United States, I told them that many people in Los Angeles speak Spanish, not English, as their primary language. I then rattled off something Spanish, which some the kids liked and others were just plain confused about as they couldn’t understand most of what I said anyway.

Finally, I was able to get a few good reactions out of my “Pirates of Penzance” makeup picture, the Arch, Ted Drewes’, Forest Park being free, and the magnificence that is the Cathedral
Basilica, my favorite attraction in St. Louis. The lessons went well, according to the English
teachers, despite the fact that the students could not understand most of what happened. (They usually preface my lesson with a short Korean speech to the students. I think they’ve been telling the kids, “If you don’t understand him, it’s ok. Listening to the foreign guy is good
practice for you anyway.” In other words, the teachers are just happy to have me around.)

I’m fairly popular with the kids, at any rate. They think I’m funny, and maybe next week
they’ll be more willing to approach me. After all, I’ve already gotten a marriage proposal this week from a student who apparently thinks I’m quite handsome. Hopefully not all of their bravery in the face of the bearded man will be other this type. But the bravery in itself will be a blessing.

I have one goal for this year—to inspire confidence. I do not intend to teach these children anything drastically new. Rather, they have been studying my native tongue for at least three
years, if not more. When I’m through here, I’d like them to be at least willing to try saying what they can already read. If they sound like Koreans, that’s fine. They are, and the idea that some people want perfect diction out these kids is preposterous. (There are more English speakers
in India than in the United States, so if you want to talk about standard dialect, don’t look at U.S.) I just want them trying. They know more than they think. They’re just scared shitless of looking bad. Hopefully, I can make them look “bad”, they’ll realize that it’s not so “bad”, and then they won’t care about looking “bad”. This is my intention.

To do this, I want to use James Asher’s TPR (Total Physical Response). It’s a language education methodology based on the idea that as babies we learn language through performing the correct action for commands and thus receiving affirming praise (e.g. “Smile for Aunt Mildred!”). It worked well for me with Spanish, as I was able, after only one year of instruction, to skip Spanish 2 and enter into Spanish 3. It builds vocabulary like crazy, helps the student gain fluency with the words he or she knows (meaning the ability to comprehend and generate novel
sentences instead of just parroting dialogues), and thus inspires confidence in the student. Apparently, it has a following in South Korea, and one of the ATE extendees actually has been
encouraged time and time again to use it in the classroom. Since I think comprehension is going to have to come for these kids before production, I’ll start with some simple command exercises using TPR and work from there.

Despite a game plan, though, I still have things to be fairly apprehensive about. TPR might flop, for one thing, and I might have to backpedal to something else. That’s just the essence of teaching without any experience I guess. For another thing, I have not seen ALL of my students. As I said earlier, I’m planning on teaching a conversational English class for the
non-English speaking H.S. teachers. I’m assured that this is very casual however. They just want survival English, from what I can tell. Another group of students I have to worry about, though, is the community members who I will have to teach twice a day. There is one class of about 5 advanced students who are able to discuss newspaper articles. (In all seriousness, that should be tremendous fun!) The rest of the classes are lower level than my H.S. students,
so I’ll probably just do TPR with them as well.

It’s unknown territory though, so, girded with my knowledge of English and keen sense of wit, I press onward, hoping that the bright, but flickering light of the Program which I guard will not sputter and die as it shines into the linguistic ignorance of the hamlet's populace. (Homer, eat
your heart out.)

A String of Small Victories to End the Week Well!

2007-08-24T17:46:00.000-07:00

Today was an exceptionally good day. First off, I’m feeling a little better today. I seem to have contracted some sort of viral infection that most foreigners get when they come to the hamlet. If treated properly, it will go away fairly quickly. If left alone, it can last for up to six months before it finally leaves your system. So, I got my drugs from the hospital yesterday and have been taking them at the prescribed intervals. I’m still sick, but a little better goes a long way in teaching. Yesterday was a struggle to keep my energy up. Today was a challenge.

I only had one class today, so that helped my mood a little. Also, since my class was at the end of the day, I could spend most of the day catching up on email and talking with friends on AIM. By the end of the day, I was getting pretty bored though, so I decided to start a couple conversation strings on ATEB and see what happened. In one, I posted my lesson plan for next week as a possible way to teach English conversation to kids who can’t even form the sounds, much less recognize them. It’s been downloaded a few times already, so that felt good too.

But then came the victories. First off, my last class of the week went swimmingly. I had them laughing and nodding their heads and repeating and sometimes even spontaneously talking. One girl in particular (I think she’s one of the many Kim’s (김) I see everywhere in Korea…) was overzealous to show how much she wanted to speak English, and thus kept repeating things by accident when I didn’t want her to repeat them. She was good natured about it though. Oh, and for the record, when I showed my students a family picture, about 25% of my students thought my mom was my sister, 50% thought my sister was older than me (which is fair, as she is bigger), and one particularly embarrassed chap thought my sister was my girlfriend, and another even more embarrassed chap thought my sister was my boyfriend, though I think he just got his genders confused. Korean language doesn’t have them, you know.

The second victory came when I asked some of the 선생님 who were leaving the school if they could give me directions to the Post Office. These 선생님I know cannot speak English. At any rate, they offered to drive me to the Post Office instead. Unfortunately, there was construction, so they just said, some in Korean, some in English, “Get out. Turn right. Post Office on right.” Got it. So, I got to go to the post office by myself and fire off a couple of letters to America. (Mom, Dad, Rach – This means keep an eye out for a letter in an orange envelope. There’s a present inside for you. And, yes, Rach, I sent it to your school address. ^^) Money speaks volumes in a foreign country. If you can say, “How much is it?” you can get by with a lot of things survival wise.

The third victory actually came twice (just like I wish Christmas would, or at least Thanksgiving). I decided that since I had such a long walk home from the Post Office anyway, I would try to find a dojang (도장), a Taekwondo school. Actually, there was one in particular I wanted to find—the one that Dana C., the ATE assigned to the hamlet last year, went to. I figured that they would be used to having a foreigner around, and thus more patient with me when I didn’t understand. (This despite the fact that one of the P.E. teacher’s t-shirts at my school proclaims, “Sport—The Universal Language”. All I have to say to that is, “What the snarf does 앞차기 mean? … What? … Front kick? … Front kick. Oh, ok.) So, as I wandered aimlessly, I ran into one of my host sister's friends riding on her moped, which she proudly announced was an “autobai” (autobike or motorcycle). Oh, Konglish! What would I do without you? Anyway, she asked me where I was going, obviously a little surprised to see me so far from the H.S. or home.

“I’m looking for a dojang.”
“A dojang?! Whiche? Whiche?”
“Well, I’m not sure. I know it’s by a blue church.” Blank stare. “A church with a blue roof.”
“Oh!”

She firmly pointed the opposite direction she was going, and I thanked her.

Well, I followed her firm direction to the other end of town, where I noticed there was no blue church, but there was a dojang. Well, I thought to myself, might as well try this one. I walk in and talk to the instructor who is very excited to see me. I proceed to tell him in a very strange form of Korean that I want to learn TKD. I point to a yellowbelt. Find out what days of the week and at what time TKD meets using a calendar and a lot of repetition of hours on the clock. Tell him that’s too early because I have class then. Okay, a later time will do. Ask how much it is. 70,000 won. Check. Wait! For the month. Yes. Ok, check. By the way, did you know Dana? No. No? No. I see. Thank you.

Well, it’s not Dana’s dojang, but it will do, I think to myself. And begin to walk back towards my homestay. And there it is. The blue church. And there it is. The apartment complex where Dana’s dojang is. I walk in and talk to the assistant instructor. Again, in broken Korean:

“I’m the English teacher at the H.S. Did you know Dana?” Yes. “Oh…” So I go through the whole rigmarole again, and even get across that Dana asked me about when he was going to receive the physical belt from his black belt test. So, now I’m signed up for TKD at two dojang, though hopefully the first will get the message that I’m not doing TKD there. I did leave my phone number though, so maybe I’ll get a phone call in Korean saying, “Why aren’t you coming for classes?!” “I’m sorry, I, uh… don’t speak Korean?”

At any rate, TKD meets five days a week, M-F from 6:00-8:00 pm. I always wondered how Dana got his black belt in a year. Two hours a night will do it for you!

Finally, when I came home, I was able, after about 10 minutes of number recitation in both English and Korean, to tell my host father that I signed up for TKD and when it met. This will actually be better for me as far as my homestay situation is concerned. Previously, I’ve had to eat dinner alone because the family does not make it home until 9:15 pm. Mom is working at the store. Baby brother W. is with her. Middle sister R. is at a language institute. Now that I’ll have TKD until 8:00, the father has asked me to come meet the rest of the family in town when I am finished. “But W. abeoji, I sweat very much!” I indicate with hand motions. Oh, well come to the house, take a shower, then come eat with us. “Okay. I understand.” I get to eat with family again. Can I just say, “Joy!”?

Graduate School Aspirations: Email from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

2007-08-23T18:14:00.000-07:00

As some of you know, I have a broad range of interests for what to do after my sojourn in Korea is over. One of these is graduate school. I sent out a couple of feeler letters this summer to some history professors. One set of dialogues with Ronald P.T. from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign has been particularly promising.

He says that, based on my honors thesis that I wrote for my senior year at VALPO, my writing and my abilities with critical analysis are "unusally" good for someone entering graduate school. These are the hardest abilities to develop, so he thinks I can do well in a Ph.D. program.

My main obstacle in doing history for graduate school, East Asian history in particular, is the language barrier. I was never required to learn Japanese or Chinese to study East Asia at VALPO, but graduate schools want me to be proficient at reading academic articles in at least one East Asian language in my field before entry. My obstacle is that I don't have any at this point. So, basically, I have to spend a couple of years out here learning Korean or start taking some classes. Having Japanese going in would be nice too, but optional. Same for traditional Chinese and random European academic language, say German or French. So, language goals if I go into Grad School:

Before Grad School:
Korean
(Japanese)

During Grad School:
Korean
Japanese
Traditional Chinese
(French or German)

Well, better get cracking. (SLEEPS and SNORES!) ^^

The Hanja Teacher and I

2007-08-23T17:50:00.000-07:00

[First, a message to my loyal readers (Long live the readership!): Believe it or not, I have been updating diligently. Unfortunately, I have been doing this on my laptop at my homestay, which is not connected to the internet. The reason you cannot yet see these updates is that I have neglected to transfer them to my jumpdrive so I can put them up when I get to school. I should really ask my host family about getting that internet access set up...

And now for the post!]

I seem to have curried the favor of a certain instructor here. She teaches Hanja (한자) primarily, which are the Chinese characters still extant in the Korean language. Though few and far between in day to day interactions between Koreans, they are very important for reading novels, newspapers, and especially academic journals. This teacher in particular wants to start offering Chinese courses at the school, and so she is taking Chinese at a local institute. When I heard she is learning Chinese, I showed off a little and said "Hello" and "Thank you" to her in that language. (Btw, it took me an obscenely long time to remember how to say these things, but I want to thank PBS in America for producing the show "Sagwa: The Chinese Siamese Cat", without which I would not be able to produce anything in Chinese.) She thought I could actually speak Chinese after that, and rattled off a string of unintelligible words. At that point, I had to explain that I only knew those two phrases. Oh! She understood then, and I thought that would be the end of that.

But, she seems to have this idea that we can have a trilingual exchange. On Wednesday, she asked me to take a walk with her to the bank and then to the supermarket for some fresh air and a popcicle. I thought, "Oh, great! She doesn't know very much English, so I'll get to practice some Korean and get out of this stuffy gyomushil (teacher's office, 교무실)!" Little did I know, she wanted to also teach me some Chinese. (Rebecca H. will probably be very happy about what follows.) And so begins our trilingual friendship of utility, in which she teaches me two languages, and I teach her one. (Maybe I'm winning?) Every morning, she will walk up to me at some point and say something to me in Chinese, say what it means in Korean, and if there is any confusion, clarify in English. It's a nice daily ritual, and I hope it continues throughout the semester. Though, I also hope the other Korean teachers will not think me ingenuine in my desire to learn Korean, which is still strong (see the post about my email from University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign).

The Inexpensive Hospital Visit

2007-08-23T17:45:00.000-07:00

I regret to inform you that I have fallen ill. I am happy to report that this is entirely normal for people coming to the hamlet. It seems there’s something viral in the water that nearly everyone contracts and builds up an immunity to. Call it Montezuma’s revenge, Korea style, or as my host father put it with R.’s help, “Area sickness. [The hamlet's] area sickness.” Both previous ATEs to this area contracted it to varying degrees of severity. The first was sick for a couple of months. The second for six months, but he refused to go to the hospital until he had to go in to the ER. Even one of the native Korean English teachers, who grew up on the coast, contracted something when she first came here. My case isn’t too serious. A touch of sinus congestion and general discomfort associated with the common cold. A feeling of diarrhea, though only going once a day as per usual. It does come out different colors now though…

At any rate, these symptoms were bad enough for me that I didn’t want to repeat my predecessor’s semester long experience with the area sickness. I called the Powers that Be to tell them I was heading into the hospital and to ask about how to fill out my government insurance forms. They confirmed that my symptoms were the same as the former ATEs and that if I got any worse, I should probably come into Seoul. (That didn’t sound good.) Filled out the insurance forms. Asked my co-teacher to take me to the hospital, which she gladly did having already encouraged me to head in and also now having an excuse to skip a dedication ceremony for the new dormitory that the H.S. just built. So, we went. The doctor didn’t even really check me out. No weight check, height check, nose check, ear check or throat check. He just asked for my symptoms, my co-teacher translated, I was diagnosed with a common cold and a viral infection, prescribed some medicine and I was sent off to the front desk to pay my bill.

I was a little worried about this. I had to pay out of pocket. My bills would be covered by Uncle Sam, of course, but I had to pay them first and then I would be reimbursed. Turns out I didn’t have to be worried one bit. One hospital visit at the Hamlet General costs a whopping,

11,400 RoK won or $12.46.

Really? Yes, really. Oh, well, just put that on the credit card then.

I talked with my co-teacher about this. Turns out, that’s the going rate without insurance. With insurance, what my co-teacher pays, is about $5 a visit. Contrast this with the United States where a routine check-up like this costs around $20 for a co-pay if your insurance policy is decent and about $100 if you can’t afford insurance. (My teacher flipped when I told her about this.) Granted, South Korean medicine isn’t what U.S. medicine is, but for me to come in so I can get an antibiotics prescription from a guy who’s only going to confirm what I already know? $12 sounds a lot better than $100.

Oh, and how much did those drugs cost, again without insurance? The same. 11,400 RoK won or $12.46. I paid this in cash.

So, if you’re in Korea, hospitals are cheap. I wouldn’t want my cancer treated here, but for the routine stuff, it’s a steal.

Small Victories

2007-08-19T17:24:00.000-07:00

A dear friend of mine, Caitlin K., who I knew for too short a time, sent me a letter talking about small victories. She has recently returned to the United States from her time abroad in Germany and told me about how she would try to find the small victories she had everyday. This seemed to help with her cultural adjustment, which she said was difficult despite the fact that she knew so much German already and was in a Western culture. How much more so must mine be, she commented. The example she gave was checking out a library book. My small victory today was even smaller, but I feel just as worthwhile.

I needed to use the restroom today. I remembered where the restroom was from my tour of the school buildings, so I proceeded in that direction. Lo, and behold! Upon arriving at the stall, I noticed there was no toilet paper. So, I proceeded back to the teacher’s lounge and walked boldly up to the first person I saw and said, “In the bathroom, there is no toilet paper.” She understood immediately and helped me procure some. [She also said that I speak very well. I am beginning to understand that this means that what I can say, I say well. It does not have anything to do necessarily with actual facility with the language.] It was a small victory, but a relieving one. I’m just glad I noticed before I sat down. Think of having to ask the first person to come into the bathroom in stilted Korean, “Um… hey, there! You don’t have any toilet paper, do you?”

May I find other victories in the future.

Arrival in the Hamlet

2007-08-19T17:23:00.000-07:00

My family and friends,

Thank you for the letters of encouragement you sent me. Some even brought me to tears, though perhaps they all did as their force built up over the course of the letters. This was a little embarrassing as I have to read them at the High School, there being no internet access at my homestay. They have offered to get it, however, and I may take them up on this. It is not a necessity, but it would be a comfort to be able to communicate with you all that much more easily.

Yesterday I arrived in the Hamlet. I was presented to my principal and co-teacher during a formal ceremony at Yonsei University in Seoul. After this, I ate lunch with them. It was a delicious meal and very fancy. My co-teacher speaks English very well and seems to want to help me in any way she can. Unfortunately, that help will have to wait until Monday, as she is having an operation performed in Chuncheon. She has asked me to call her Sonny or Snow White since this is what the students call her, though I suspect she is also trying to make things a little easier on me. I appreciate this.

Because of the operation, the principal (교장선생님) and I traveled to the hamlet alone. This was a little awkward as he does not speak any English. However, he was very friendly and when I fell asleep a few times (by accident, as I did not want to seem rude) he let me be. The hamlet is about 3-4 hours from Seoul by car. Sonny said at dinner that this is far. I laughed at this a little and told her about what far means in the United States, where road trips for the more adventurous souls can take whole days. The principle and she laughed at this a little.

We arrived in the town safely around 7:00 pm, at which point I met my omeoni (어머니, host-mother), who owns a beauty supply store, the younger daughter R., and two of the teachers. One in particular, Mr. Lee, has been particularly helpful with my adjustment as he is the head English teacher it seems and can speak English fluently. We all went out for samgyeopsal, after which I finally met the rest of my host family. The eldest sister is H., and she is a student learning to be an elementary school teacher. She speaks English better than she will admit, and her presence has been a blessing. Unfortunately, she will be leaving for Chuncheon soon to continue her studies. The youngest brother’s name is W. He is in pre-school, and he apparently watches an English conversation video called “Talk Talk” almost every night.

I stayed up with the family and talked with them about many things, among which was our common faith. I think that they are Presbyterians, something which I may or may not be able to confirm tomorrow when we attend church together. They were talking about John Wesley at any rate. [I have since discovered that they are in fact Methodists. I should know my church leaders a little better...] They asked if American Christians drink. I laughed and told them it depended. I am a Lutheran and Lutherans are notorious for drinking beer, I explained. Many Baptists on the other hand won’t touch any alcohol. I told them about my friends Beth and Ted H. who recently married, one a Baptist, the other a Lutheran respectively, and how at the wedding festivities, the Baptists would hardly drink, while the Lutherans imbibed deeply, even having champagne with their orange juice in the morning. They found this entertaining.

I finally went to bed around 11:00 pm, as I had to wake up early for breakfast at 7:30 am. Breakfast was a rather dinner like affair, as it usually is with Korean cuisine—rice, spicy soup, kimchi and other vegetables. I will have to explain to my host mother that, while I enjoy Korean food, I usually do not eat much for breakfast regardless.

Then, my host father drove Ruri and me to school. I was deposited at the main gate to the H.S. without any indication of where at the school I was supposed to go. Luckily, my students are apparently very glad to see me, and thus were more than happy to point me to the main building. There Mr. Lee met me and showed me to my desk and gave me a tour of the building. There is apparently a wing of the school that is entirely dedicated to English, an English only zone, where the students can come during the lunch period and participate in situational conversations for prizes (e.g. buying plane tickets at the airport, asking for directions to certain landmarks).

Later in the day, I was presented to the entire school in an assembly in which I was given flowers. I gave a rather poor address in Korean, which I tried to supplement with English which was an even bigger disaster. Ah, well. I did get a cheer when I said “Thank you” in Korean. I also received several compliments on my pronunciation with conversational phrases, though my pronunciation of names seems to be a little off.

My schedule will be fairly light. I have 16 classes of about 50 min. each. Eight classes are with the students and the other eight are with various adult community members. The later classes will be smaller and will be more freeform. Apparently, I am just to ask the members what they would like to talk about. We shall see how this goes.

But as for the schedule itself, I will work Tuesday through Friday. I think they will expect me to stay during the entire day, even though I only teach one class on Tuesday, and this early in the morning. This is fine by me. I can move my Korean language textbooks to the school and study there in between my lesson planning. I am glad for the 3-day weekends. They will allow me to explore the area and go hiking. They will also allow for longer trips to other cities should I so desire, though I will have to make sure I have permission from my host family so I do not offend them.

At 12:30, I was told that I should go home, so I loaded my flowers onto my bike and rode away. Many of the students wished me a friendly farewell as I rode back to the house, where I met my abeoji watching television. The rest of the day has been spent taking naps and watching television, unpacking and writing this note home, which I will not be able to send until Monday. During the unpacking, I discovered that one of the apple butter jars I had brought as a gift was damaged during the flight. It was incredibly complicated trying to figure out how to tell the abeoji that I wanted to throw it away. He thought I wanted to eat it! I still need to find a stationary store to buy gift wrap for the presents I brought. Apparently, merely presenting the gift is a no-no.

Seoul / General Update as told in a letter home

2007-08-16T07:32:00.001-07:00

Thus., Aug. 16th, 2007

I should preface the following update by saying the following. I am in Seoul right now. Seoul is a rather large city. I do not care for rather large cities because they are stressful and draining. This is especially true when you cannot speak the native language of the city, and often have no clue what is going on, or at least only a clue, which can be even more frustrating. Also,forgive the rambling.

I would like to write more in the future, and I have compiled a list of things to write about. Some of these I will try to write about very soon, but I’ve been quite busy lately, so I’m afraid an update of all I’ve been doing for the past few weeks will be a long time coming. My time will not get any less busy as tomorrow I am going to the hamlet to meet my homestay family as well as meeting my co-teacher and my principal. (Though my principal may or may not be around.) With this, of course, comes a whole new set of adjustments to make, which I fear will interfere with my blogging/emailing even more than these have been interfered with in the past. Besides which, I have to prepare a speech to give to the school I’m teaching at and my first lesson plan. So many things to do…

I will, however, update you on what has happened since I left 강완대학교 (Kangwan Univ.) and arrived in Seoul. I must vent about this or I fear I shall take my frustrations out on my school officials I’m meeting tomorrow. I have already cried a little about my situation, and I fear doing so again tomorrow. Both the venting and the tears would make a bad impression.

We left Chuncheon on Wednesday (Korean Liberation Day!). I was excited to come to Seoul because, despite the fact that numerous of the other ATEs had already gone on weekends, I had always stayed around the dorm to either rest up, study, or go on one of the more local outings planned for the weekend. We arrived at Yonsei University (one of the top three universities in Korea, and ostensibly Christian) around 11:30 and carted our luggage up some rather steep hills. The guys did this at any rate, the girls’ dorm being right where the luggage truck parked. We were given W 20,000 and a metro transit card worth W10,000 and sent on our merry way to explore the city.

At this point, I met up with some friends and went to have lunch. I wanted to have Mexican food, but ended up settling for Japanese Udong instead. Tasty and filling, but I wasn’t all that interested in having Asian food in such an international city. I would be eating it all year after all.

After this, we hopped on the subway to head up to Kyobo, a huge bookstore with a very nice English language selection, comparable to a small Barnes & Noble in the United States perhaps. Here I purchased a Korean grammar, its accompanying workbook, and a Korean language dictionary. I figure these will be nice to have at my homestay as I will not be able to really develop my reading and writing skills out in the countryside, though my speaking skills should go through the roof.

After this, I went to Myeongdong (the shopping/fashion district) with my friend Jon. He wanted to pick up some pants at a department store he remembered down there. I tagged along for a while, but soon got bored and decided to head back to the dorm where I would meet up with him and some others later for dinner.

And here is where my trouble started. Myeongdong is a rather large place, and because of the generic nature of the street vendors, it’s very easy to get turned around. So I got lost. Give me a map and subway card, and I can get you anywhere in a city, but put me at street level and I’m useless. Not entirely, but I felt that way. At any rate, I finally found the subway station, got on the correct line for Yonsei and got off at my stop.

At this point, I proceeded to walk for ages through the subway until I arrived at the exit which would point me towards Yonsei. Out of this, the signs suddenly stopped and I had to use my Boy Scout intuition (i.e. guess) which direction Yonsei was. I guessed right, but unfortunately the subway lets off on the Front Gate side of Yonsei.

For those who are not familiar with Korean university layouts, there is usually a front gate where administration buildings are and various side and back gates where university housing and class buildings are. My dorm was at North Gate, a good 30 minute walk from Front Gate. Since I didn’t know how to say North Gate, however, I decided that I’d try out the walk. About a minute into said walk, I felt a little pitter patter on my head. “Ah,” thinks I, “It will rain a bit. No matter. My text books are securely wrapped in this paper bag and God granted me skin to repel water. All shall be well.” Cue the lightning. Cue the thunder. Cue the drenching storm. 20 minutes left to go.

So, I walked the 20 minutes to the dorm. Cars passed me right and left, paying me no heed, as an obviously foreign chap wearing a Detroit Tigers hat and drenched from head to foot must obviously love to stroll through torrential rain hunched over a paper bag desperately trying to keep its contents dry. I arrived too late to meet my group. Luckily, the books were mostly dry.

I sauntered over to the girls’ dorm, still wet, to see if anyone was going to dinner. (Note: This was not so I could pick up girls. As the ATEs are mostly girls, the natural place for girls to meet was the girls dorm.) They were and said they would wait for me to change. They didn’t, but, in fairness towards them, I did take a shower. Luckily again, the group I had intended to meet arrived late as well, having gotten their hair done and this taking longer than expected. And so, I proceeded out with them, finally, to get my long awaited Mexican food. It was good, and a definite pick me up, though not like home. Later on, we had 팥빙수 (Patbingsu) with a friend of a friend who lives in Seoul. I had a Sapporro from a local convenience store. And we walked back to the dorm in the warmish weather.

I slept 7 hours solidly and arrived at Thursday morning still exhausted. We were to make our way to the Fulbright Building by 9:15 am somehow. We were given directions, but no times on how long it would take by either bus or taxi. My roommate Matt and I opted for the bus route. A nice Korean man let us know which stop we would need before he got off at his own. We followed his advice, saw many of our fellow ETAs milling around in the area quite confused in their own right, and eventually we all managed to find the The Program Building. The Program in Korea is quite proud of the structure as it is the only Program organization in the world to own its own building. They reminded us of this several times, and it seems to be the legacy that our director has left to the Program, besides being a pioneer for the ATE program in her own right. It is an impressive feat. Owning any land in Seoul seems to demand respect.

There were several meetings. One on diseases in Korea and how to avoid them. This was given by Dr. John L., who works out of Yonsei University’s Severance Hospital and is the ATE program’s primary care physician. Quite informative, though I think I could have passed on the second sexual education talk. Another presentation on the specifics of our contract with our schools. Another on the specifics of what our host families will be like. In between all of these, I was given a prize for a 팥빙수 eating contest I had won at the talent show some of the ATEs put on before we left Chuncheon. It was a green purse filled with random items including a CD, Pepto-Bismol, Motrin, Trident, a hair “scrunchie”, some pencils, etc. Needless to say, I was elated, and proceeded immediately to “regift” (as it is called in Korea) some of the more feminine items to my fellow ATEs.

After all of these meetings, we were told to make our way to the U.S. Ambassador’s residence for a pool party that the Deputy Ambassador was hosting for us. (The Ambassador could not make it himself, as he was still in the states, but he has promised to host a Thanksgiving dinner for us. Given that it will be hard to find Turkey in the hamlet, I am most grateful to him.) While proceeding through the subway, a most peculiar lady began following us. We think she may have been a bit mentally absent. Some of the girls were disturbed by this, but I took the strangeness in good humor. I was with friends after all, and it makes me braver in that kind of situation to have friends around. I feel like I can put on a good face for them.

At any rate, we eventually made it to the Ambassador’s residence. It was “guarded” by Seoul police officers who let us pass through with even asking us any questions. Waegukin priviledge I suppose. The food at the gathering was rather scrumptious. American food. Burgers, hotdogs, cheddar and jack cheeses, Triscuits, Coca-Cola (from Atlanta, GA!), berry pies, Nestle Carnation ice cream sandwiches… Heaven. Say what you want about the McDonaldization of the world, the big corporations pushing out the little guys, but when you’ve grown up on stuff like Nabisco and Coca-Cola and Nestle… when you see that again, and taste it and haven’t had anything familiar for a month and a half? Well, I missed it a great deal. And it was good. A swim in a swimming pool (Koreans don’t like be in the water too much except for bathing.) and good times with friends. A complete homelike experience.

But trouble started again. I lost my Detroit Tigers hat. Those of you who know me know that that hat has not been far from my head for about two years now. I was with a group of friends to go to Insadong to try some Korean teas, but I lost them too trying to make a call with a phone card that for some reason didn’t work. I was trying to call a friend at the Ambassador’s to ask if they had seen my hat. I went to Insadong by myself hoping, just hoping, that I would see my group in a window. No luck. So, tired, I hung my head and started the long journey home. Got off at my Yonsei stop, got a little lost on the street level again, but found my bearings. Got on the number three bus to take me back up to the North Gate (a Power that Be told us which bus would take us up; I was glad for this after last night’s fiasco). Missed my stop, but got off at the next one. By this time feeling incredibly lonely and wanting to either cry or sleep or the former until the latter overtook me. I saw a couple of the Powers that Be at a convenience store, but they didn’t seem like they wanted to talk. Pity, as I could have used a good talking to from someone who had already been through the loneliness factor. Bought a Powerade. Walked up the hill to the dormitory and began typing this.

There are supposedly 5 or 6 odd stages to Cultural Adjustment/Culture Shock. One of these stages is the Crisis stage. In this stage, the expatriot feels lost and frustrated and emotional and isn’t hungry and sleeps a lot and has a high amount of anxiety and, especially, misses home. It can last a couple of days. It can last a week. It can last a month. In the most severe forms of this, the expatriot will lash out at nationals. He or she is usually frustrated that despite the nationals best efforts and his or her own best efforts, communication still proves impossible and certain needs, or at least comforts, cannot be met. I thought I had hit this stage a couple of weeks ago. I thought I had pulled through it. Now I find I am still in the midst of it. I am still coping with the fact that, though I may be smart, and healthy, and sound of mind, my spirit has been broken here and needs mending. This will come with time. It must.

Hopefully, my feelings are symptomatic of my presence here in Seoul, one of the largest metropolises in the world. I hate cities as I said. They only amplify my anxiety and, ironically and as so many smarter people before me have indicated, my loneliness. I hope I will feel better when I come to the Hamlet. It is a farming town, famous for beef. Pop. 3000. People may not be any better at English there, and my Korean certainly won’t be better, at least not at first, but at least I will not be a non-entity there. At least, there, someone will be able to see that I am lonely or at least uncomfortable, and will make an effort to console me.

Do not get me wrong. Besides the getting lost, I have had a decent time here in Seoul. I would like to come back sometime when I do not have meetings to go to and required appointments. I would like to visit the city. Also, several good things have happened since I last wrote to you all. I have graduated from language classes. I have earned my Yellow Belt in TaeKwonDo. I have made a Korean friend who has even told me that we can exchange drinks using only one hand despite his being older than me and in many other respects within Korean hierarchy my superior. He gave me a t-shirt as well. World Without Strangers (WWS). A nice sentiment, and in some ways true. I was that optimistic when I first arrived here. I hope that I can regain that optimism again.

Tomorrow, as I said, I will meet my co-teacher and some school officials from the hamlet. I hope to make a good impression. Tomorrow is Yonsei Day, a national holiday of some kind. I must look my best. And so, good night.

Love,

Jeremiah

Taekwondo: The Final Days

2007-08-09T17:44:00.000-07:00

I have been remiss to mention this, but now that I have admitted my pain in reality’s public, I feel it is ok to admit it on the Internet as well. My feet have been sore ever since we began side kick in TKD. I have been keeping my feet wrapped up because of the blisters on the bottom of my feet, but these have callused for the most part. The real pain comes on the tops of my feet whenever I try to walk or run. The common consensus among our pre-Med ATEs (who really know very little, but the most) is that it’s a muscle cramping which I should just rest. I haven’t been resting them though, and I finally reached a point where I was hobbling no matter what I did. I even took to using an umbrella for support like a cane. For this reason, on the last day of TKD, I basically just watched while others learned two new sweet kicks. And JUMP KICKS even. Ah, well.

Since it was the last day, the kwanjangnim took us out to dalk-kalbi. We bestowed him and his assistant with gifts of libidinous value—a bottle of Jack and Scotch Blue respectively, both very expensive in Korea. A fitting gift, since he came around to each table and made sure we were all partaking of the soju he proffered us.

TKD was probably the most fun part of orientation for me, and definitely the biggest stress reliever. I hope to continue it in the hamlet. For now, however, I will rest my foot so that I won’t have to hobble to bow to my Principal and Co-Teacher.

Final Exam and Reflections on Language Class

2007-08-08T17:43:00.000-07:00

The final exam consisted of four parts. The first part was reading—25 multiple choice questions, some with fill in the blank grammar points, others with comprehension based on short paragraphs. This section, I feel, was very easy, and I may have gotten 100% on it. There was one tricky thing, though. I could not read the instructions for one set of answers in the comprehension section. This was worrisome as the question reoccurred with each paragraph. I was able, however, to determine what the question was asking using the good ol’ noggin. I noticed that, based on the paragraph, 3 of the answers were true and 1 was false. “Ah!” says I. “They want me to pick the false one. I can do that.” At least… I hope that’s what they wanted.

Part two was writing. This was more difficult as I can’t spell in Hangeul worth a lick, but I was able to show off some more complicated grammar structure based on what we had learned. That just means I was able to string some nouns together. Instead of, “The pen is on the table. The hat is one the table. The book is on the table,” I wrote, “The pen, hat, and book are on the table.” This is harder to do in Korean than you might think… but still not really that impressive.

Parts three and four were both conversation. In part three, I randomly chose a partner and we were told to wait our turn outside. Based on the intel from the others who went in before us, we determined that we would be given a situation to dialogue about (e.g. giving directions to the convenience store to a cab driver, or describing our rooms in the United States). My partner and I were each given a card. Mine had 10,000 won written on it, and a list of items of varying quantities. Ah! Grocery shopping. This I can do. Our dialogue commenced:

“Hello!”
“Welcome!”
“Do you have apples?”
“Yes, we have apples.”
“How much are the apples?”
“1,000 won each.”
“Do you have chocolate?”
“Yes, we have chocolate?”
“How much is the chocolate?”
“2,000 won each.”
“Do you have milk?”
“No there is no milk.”
“If so, then given me only apples and chocolate. Give me two apples and one chocolate. How much is that?”
[My partner goes to calculate on the chalkboard. The numbers we actually used were far more complicated.]
“4,000 won.”
“Here is 10,000 won.”
[Some more calculation.]
“Here is 6,000 won.”
“Thank you. Goodbye!”
“Thank you. Goodbye!”

We rocked it.

Part four was an interview with the teacher, which I botched completely. I stuttered out some nouns to indicate that I understood what she was asking me, and I just didn’t know how to respond. Of course it didn’t help that the first thing she said was “Introduce yourself.” In fact, as I recall, she said this English…

All in all, I think I did well, and it certainly wasn’t worth all the stress that a lot of us put into it.

As for the language class, I have a few parting thoughts. Language is hard. Korean is especially hard. When the Department of the Defense or the Foreign Service trains people in foreign languages, they rank the languages based on how long it takes to reach Level 3 proficiency, which they classify as professional level (i.e. you can give an extemporaneous speech in the target language on a variety of subjects and can read a newspaper fairly easily). For most Western languages, this takes six months of immersive study. For Korean, it takes two years.

It’s especially frustrating because, with the other languages I’ve studied, if something sounds familiar, it’s probably a cognate. Thus, I’ve trained my mind to search for the words that sound familiar and work from there. Unfortunately, now my mind tries to find cognates in Korean, and while there are loan words, there are no cognates. The entire first half of my language classes, whenever my teacher would say “next” I would hear “good job,” because, even though it actually sounds nothing like “good job,” by brain latched onto it as a familiar sound. When I hear something and think it’s English, I usually have to tell myself, “Think about the context. There is no way that word fits here, even if it is a cognate. Figure out what the word actually sounds like.”

Loan words are fun though. They give you an idea about what Korea was like before it met Westerners. For instance, “date” is a loan word. There was no concept of “dating”. They had arranged courtship, but not the sort of freeform system we are accustomed to in the west. Another interesting loan word is “juice.” Imagine a world without that! And “bread”, which is actually borrowed from a romance language, I think, as the transliteration is bbang (cf. pan in Spanish), imagine a world without that!

Finally, there is one cultural-anthropological observation I made that’d I’d like to propose a theory for. When referring to the future, the teachers always pointed behind themselves. When referring to the past, they would point ahead of themselves. In the West, I believe, it is usually the opposite. At least, it has always been the case for me that the future is ahead and the past is behind. I think it may have something to do with the way East Asian culture thinks about the best man has to offer, or at least how it thought about it for centuries. Usually in East Asian culture, especially in Confucianism, you are always trying to return to the times of the sages. Those were the days of harmony and prosperity. Thus, when you think of where you want your civilization to go, you always want to go to the past. In other words, you face the past and the past is thus in front of you. The future is behind you. You do not look at it because you want it to be the past. As I am a history major, I can appreciate this point of view, and I have tried to adopt my hand motions to this system, if only for the sake of clarity when I try to explain things to my host family.

Me: “Tomorrow, I need to go to the post office.” (Indicates in front.)
Family: “You went to the post office yesterday?”
Me: (Sighs…)

Procuring Supplies for the Year and TekBae (택배)

2007-08-05T17:41:00.000-07:00

My second Camp Instructor at Camp the Program, Kiehl C., was generous enough to offer me his bike and his cell phone, including accessories, so I won’t not have to buy them when I arrive in the hamlet. Of course, he is asking for some money in return—a cool $75, $50 for the bike and $25 for the phone—but it is a mere pittance compared to what it would cost out in the hamlet. The bike is a 15-speed road bike, something I’ve been coveting for a couple of years now, and comes with tire repair kit, tools, helmet, water bottle, and lights. It does not include the pedals and seat, however, which he is taking to America with him as the pedals have clips specially fitted for his shoes and the seat is Italian leather/Kevlar and cost $200 alone. I will spend maybe 20,000 won for my pedals and seat. The bike itself was about $500 retail. Kiehl also taught me how to repair the inner tubes for the tires, something which will come in handy because road bikes inflate to very high pressures and thus can generate leaks fairly easily.

To get this item to the hamlet, I will be using a Korean courier service called TekBae. This service will get any item anywhere on the peninsula next day. (2-day service for islands off the coast). The amazing part? It only costs 10,000 won (about $10). To ship a bike. Is your mouth on the floor? Mine was.

Taekwondo Yellow Belt Test

2007-08-02T17:40:00.000-07:00

With one week left to go in TKD classes, the Kwanjangnim decided that we are ready for our yellow belt tests. This consisted of performing the three blocks (low, body, and high), three punches (low, body, and high), and four kicks (front, side, roundhouse, and stretching) that we know. Curiously, he did not test our ability with all stances, just riding horse stance. Walking stance and long stance were left amiss.

The long and the short of it is, I passed. It was not difficult, though I did make a huge rookie mistake: I went right when I should have went left. When beginning anything in TKD, it is always to the left, but I went right. Like I said, rookie move.

Next week, we begin to learn our first form. I want to learn this especially well, as I feel it will be essential to making a good impression with the teacher in the hamlet.

Cultural Workshop: Comfort Women

2007-08-01T17:36:00.000-07:00

Throughout orientation, and especially during Camp the Program, the Powers that Be have hosted mini-cultural workshops for us to expand our knowledge about Korea’s history and traditions. Unfortunately, I was too tired to attend any of them except for the one on Comfort Women, given by University of Chicago graduate Dr. Josh P.

Put delicately, comfort women were women collected from the East Asian populace by a variety of means (promises of work, money, or just plain conscription) for the purpose of entertaining the Japanese military in a variety of ways. But bluntly, the Japanese took female slaves and raped them, given that you take a broad view of both slavery (being held against one’s will, whether or not one is paid) and rape (forced intercourse). These were usually girls between the ages of 10 and 16.

Though, to be fair to the Japanese, not all of the conscripted women had to perform sexual acts. Some, perhaps the lucky ones, merely had to dance or sing or laugh at the officers’ jokes, but a good many of them were prostituted out. And, as I said, not all were conscripted. Often a family would not be able to support a daughter if they could not marry her off, so the promise of work from the Japanese army, no questions asked, was appealing to many destitute parents. There is some debate as to which country suffered the most from this conscription, as Japan controlled much of the East Asian sphere in the 1930s, but Koreans of course think that Korea was that country.

Many of the Comfort Women now abide as living testaments to the past at a place called Sharing House (www.nanum.org; www.comfortwomen.wordpress.com). Dr. Josh P. seems to have taken as his mantra “History ignored by books and politics soon will be forgotten if not shared.” True enough. What he has done is to record some of the Comfort Women’s stories and especially the songs that they would sing, which, though seemingly just drivel from popular 1930s melodies, have remarkable undertones when seen in the context of a life of forced sex and occupation by a foreign people.

These women have opened up their lives to him over time. One story was particularly painful. A young Korean girl was torn from her family and sent up to Manchuria. When the Soviets liberated that area, they let her free, but did not tell her where she could go. She could only speak Chinese, as she had lived in Manchuria almost her entire life. Eventually, she made it back to her family in Korea, only to find that she was a stranger to them and worse, a foreigner. She felt alienated, and eventually went back to her new home in Manchuria.

One woman at the Sharing House, however, talks about how she actually fell in love with a Japanese officer who was a regular customer of hers. He was a kamikaze pilot, and he taught her to sing a song in Japanese that poetically describes what he would have to do when he left her. She can still sing it to this day.

It was also strange, even slightly disturbing, to hear about how the Americans treated these women when we liberated Korea. The Americans understood the concept of a brothel, of course, and thus thought that the Japanese had just set up prostitution stations throughout their empire. Before the war was over, but as the Americans took different areas from the Japanese, the Americans would just leave the “brothels” running, never imagining that the Japanese had conscripted these women from their homes. Whenever Dr. P. would talk to one woman in particular, she would say that the Americans were always very nice to her. He later found out that the only reason she thought this was that the Americans would pay her for her services. The Japanese did not.

These days, the women mostly sit around Sharing House and watch television. They receive visits from media people and students and even just curious passersby. Once a week, they go to Seoul to protest at the Japanese embassy because the Japanese government refuses to apologize for the conscriptions. The Japanese view is that reparations paid in accordance with the 1945 treaty was supposed to cover all the atrocities the Japanese military took part in, both known and unknown. Many of the comfort women are still unknown today, in fact. They wait until their husbands die to avoid dishonoring them, and even then they risk being ostracized by the rest of their family if they come forward. Korea is a shame culture, and there is apparently much shame in being a comfort woman, even if you were a victim.

You can visit Sharing House if you ever travel in Korea, and I think I will visit someday this year. They have scheduled times when a translator can be there for those who only speak English. Maybe when I go, though, I will be able to talk a little with these living members of history myself.

Camp the Program Teaching, Part 2

2007-07-31T17:33:00.000-07:00

My second teaching experience with English as a Foreign Language (not Second Language, as there’s a big difference) was quite a bit more successful than my attempt at teaching about American Folktales. There were two major reasons for this, I feel. The first is that the Advanced-Intermediate students were a lot better at English than the Low-Intermediate students I had before. The second is that I tried to dumb the lesson down quite a bit—lowered my expectations on comprehension, left myself enough time to explain things thoroughly, and made my production project fairly simple.

The lesson itself was on circumlocution, and by that I mean, we messed around with riddles. I originally thought that circumlocution would be too hard of a word to even bother trying on EFL students, as some of my Program colleagues didn’t even know what it meant. This class was reading The Giver, though, so I tried it anyway. I don’t know if any of them will remember the word, but they understood it well enough when I said, “It just means to talk around something.” Lots of head nods and “OK!”s to that.

As I said, I did the lesson on riddles. To hook them, I used a couple of movie clips from “Batman Forever”, a movie which none of them had seen. (I’m getting old. First my campers at Arrowhead Lutheran Camp didn’t know the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles theme song, now this…) We then moved on to looking at some “Who am I?” riddles, which were a hit in general. I had some rather smart cookies who got some of the hard ones even, but the hardest ones no one got, mostly I think because of some gaps in language. After this followed a production section in which they were to write their own riddles. If they could stump me, then they would get a prize of a lollypop. Actually, I understood all of their riddles, but I let them think I was stupid for the sake of giving away candy. Maybe Rebecca H. is right… I am a softy. (Again, I’m getting old.) Smiles all around. A successful lesson. Still, my supervisor, Kiehl C. advised me to stay flexible in the future. Usually lessons built around activities tend to flop. This is worrisome, as I intend to be very “activity” based when using TPR in the Hamlet.

EFL vs. ESL: Camp Fulbright Teaching, Part 2 Addendum

2007-07-31T16:35:00.000-07:00

This was explained to the whole ATEs in a lecture given by Dr. Andrew F. earlier in orientation. Dr. F. is a Scottish English teacher who has worked in Korea for a couple of decades now, I believe, and is considered one of the experts on pedagogy for teaching English to Koreans. (I, and number of people at the Program, think his methods are a little optimistic, as they depend on willing students who are paying an obscene amount of money to go to language institutes after 12 hours a day of public education so they can earn high marks on their entrance exams, not students who are actually in compulsory education like ours will be… but whatever.)

He explained that the difference between English as a Foreign Language (EFL) and English as a Second Language (ESL) is huge in terms of pedagogy because in ESL, the student is immersed in English. In other words, when they leave the classroom, they will have to speak English. You can’t assume that in a foreign country, however. In fact, when students in Korea leave the classroom, they will most likely be speaking Korean. Therefore, we must approach the entire process with this aspect of student life in mind. How we are to do this, specifically, he left to our own imaginings.

Greeting from a letter home

2007-07-28T07:41:00.000-07:00

Much of the posts that recently appeared on this blog were cribbed from a recent mass email home. I believe in efficiency (and also in sleep), so I'm updating the blog in this way. There is some original material here, but if you read the mass email already, you probably shouldn't even be trying to find the new stuff below. Here, at any rate, is the greeting from that email:

Dear friends, family, countrymen,

For the loyal readers out there (though I'm not sure how I could have loyal readers after just a couple of emails), I apologize for not getting an update out to you for a couple of weeks now. The intervening time has been rather full of language study, retreat, and general weariness. This week was probably the roughest I've had yet in terms of my feeling equal to the task set before me, and definitely was the lowest point in terms of my emotional state. Still, the intervening time had its high points. Both set of points, high and low, follow, perhaps in order of importance, but more likely in the order I'll remember them.

Placement Info: The Hamlet, Kangwon-do province

2007-07-28T07:40:00.000-07:00

This Wednesday (2007/7/25), the 2007-08 Fulbright Korea ETAs received their placements for the upcoming "academic" year. (It's in quotes because it's the American academic year. The Korean academic year begins and ends in Winter, as I believe Japan's does.) The placements range all over the country. Many ETAs actually were placed quite close to each other. I, however, got my wish of immersive isolation. I have been placed in a rural ski resort village called Pyeongchang, which literally translated means "Window of Criticism". Fancy, huh?

The school I'll be teaching at is a Co-Ed public high school of about 337 students, of which I will actually teach close to 221, far below the expected 400-700 students I informed most of you about when you asked what I actually knew about the school I'd teach at. Like most Korean high schools, it is divided into three grades (the equivalents of Sophomore-Senior/10-12 in the States). Of these, I will only teach the lower two, as the third grade will be studying almost exclusively for their University entrance exam which will decide the rest of their life. I'm not disappointed, however. Far from it, in fact. I might actually be able to learn all of my student's names at this rate!

But I will probably not be having deep conversations with them. I had also told some of you that my students will have had close to four years of English grammar before they arrive in High School. While this will be the case at my school, all English training is geared towards the University entrance exam which is based on reading comprehension and knowledge of obscure grammar conventions. There is no speaking portion and no listening portion. (The Korean Education Dept. is trying to adjust this, but it is hard to get the older, more respected English teachers to teach spoken English as not even they can speak it.) Thus, the students take their English classes entirely in Korean, and most will have never spoken or heard a word of English. The previous ETA assigned to this school wrote the following about my students' level:

The level here is VERY LOW. As in, non-existent. They cannot produce anything so I spent a lot of time having them repeat things I said. Lessons have to be quite simple, and I always found they were too difficult. Specific advice for level and gender: The fact that they had no English at all, and that I was told to use no Korean at all. Not a whole lot of communication, and even less "conversation."

As for class management:

Boredom! Talking to kids in a language they don't understand is not fun for anyone. So naturally they talked in class, but that was it. I never encountered discipline problems beyond that. They really are perfect children by American standards.

Well, at least I won't have to worry about discipline provided there isn't a surge in gangsters in the community. I'll just keep the lessons as simple as possible. My mom used to teach Spanish using a system called TPR (Total Physical Response) which crossed story telling for word association with meaningful physical movement. It allowed me to jump from Spanish II to Spanish III at Winona Senior High School when I was no longer in her class just because of my facility with vocabulary. Hopefully, since these students have already had four years of vocabulary training, they will garner even more from it than I did. It sounds like it will mostly be a matter of getting their mouths to form the words their brains already know. We shall see.

Otherwise, I'm thinking of taking up road biking fairly seriously to keep myself occupied. The town has a population of around 3,000 people, I believe (only 46,000 in the entire county), and there will not be much to do. (Maybe by the end of the year I'll be able to participate in the Tour de France! Right...) There is, as I said, a ski resort there, so I shall have to learn I suppose. My homestay will likely be with a farming family, so I will get to help with traditional farm life, i.e. no tractors or harvesters. Everything will be done by hand or with the help of beasts of burden (the lowly ox, etc.). There is also a TaeKwonDo gym. The last ETA was able to get his black belt in a year, and perhaps I can accomplish the same.

The biggest reason I'm happy about this assignment is that I will have the opportunity to really develop my Korean speaking skills (although reading may lax quite a bit). The regional dialect is slower than the conventional dialect of Seoul (like a drawl, but I hope without the bending of vowels), so I should be able to keep up with it better than if I was placed in an urban environment. There will be no English speakers except for a handful of English teachers (and not even all of them...), so I will be forced to use my Korean. I will probably be able to get 4 day weeks, though, so if I really need to vent in English to someone, I can travel the 30 minutes by bus to the nearest "city" and visit two of the other ETAs placed the closest to me. I will probably need to do this for the first couple months as I adjust.

Incidentally, some of you may have unwittingly heard of Pyeongchang, especially if you follow the Olympic goings on fairly closely in the "off season". It was in the running to host the 2014 Winter Olympic Games, but lost to Russia in the final ballot.

Tae kwon do (태권도)

2007-07-28T07:39:00.001-07:00

I'm unsure if I've mentioned this before (except for the brief blurb above about things to do in Pyeongchang), but I'm currently taking tae kwon do with one of the best masters in Korea. We call him Kwanjangnim, which means he's the head of a Kwan, or specific discipline within the martial art as a whole. It's a fairly high honor, but he likes Fulbright quite a bit. He even gave us our uniforms for free and is only charging $100 for a month's lessons. He hopes to make Taekwondo fun for us so that we will want to continue with it during our year stay. This essentially means that he's going easy on us.

Going easy or not, Taekwondo remains difficult for me. The first obstacle is my lack of flexibility. Taekwondo is a Martial Art that focuses mainly on kicking, and I am having trouble getting my stout dwarf running legs to bend in directions other than directly ahead of me. (For the curious, I believe there are four popular martial arts in the United States. As far as I know, here is what their concentrations are. Taekwondo, kicking; Karate, punching; Kung Fu, misdirection (using an opponents strength against him or her); Judo, throwing.)

Another obstacle is my sweat, which makes the floor beneath me rather slick (we practice barefoot), and thus keeping my balance during drills and sparing becomes a bit of a problem especially during the more "enthusiastic" kicks. The wetness also has given me rather large blisters, especially on my left foot. I recently went to the local department store (Emart) to purchase some bandages, and I hope I can get most of my open blisters to heal before next week Thursday (8/2/2007) when we will test for our Yellow Belts.

The Yellow Belt examination will include our knowledge of and facility with Relaxed, Walking, Long, and Riding Horse stance, as well as our transitions between these; high, body, and low punch; front, straight, roundhouse (not the Chuck Norris kick, if you were wondering; apparently that's a misnomer), and perhaps side kick, though most of us are not up to that yet. We have to know the commands for these in Korean, as there will be no translation. Should be fun!

Last night (Friday, 7/26), Kwanjangnim invited our student translator, our two black belts, and couple others of us out to dinner. He took us to his school where we saw some children who were training. Most are already black belts, and those that aren't already know their black belt forms, but are not allowed to wear a full black belt until they reach sixteen, which I guess is the age they can actually compete in full out tournaments. Essentially, I would not want to fight any of them, although they will be visiting/humiliating us next Tuesday.

Dinner was awesome. He paid, as he is supposed to in the social hierarchy. The meal was a little awkward as we are not yet used to the conventions of this hierarchy. An easy thing was always pouring for those who are higher rank than you. A harder thing was not letting that person see you drink. You have to physically turn your body away. He took us to the best dokgalbi place in Chuncheon (the aforementioned best dokgalbi in the world)--1.5 Dokgalbi.

TKD

Teaching

2007-07-28T07:38:00.000-07:00

This last week was the first week of Camp the Program. Camp the Program is essentially an English immersion experience offered through the Program for children grades 4-9 (American system). As the description indicates, the campers are allowed ZERO Korean, something which frustrates me a little as I want to practice Korean, not English. But the immersion camp is really an ostensible purpose. The real goal is to get us ATEs some teaching experience. As such, I will have to teach two 45-minute classes (or one 90-minute team taught class and one 45-minute class, which I actually opted for), team-lead one club activity (in my case, drama club), and one "Weekend Fun" activity (Ultimate Frisbee). I've already done the team taught class and the club activity, so I'll describe those and save the rest for next week.

As I said, I team taught my first lesson. The Program required lesson plans with a specific template from me and my co-teacher (my roommate, Ray). This was a little annoying, but we got through it okay. We decided that we would teach American Tall Tales to the children. We were teaching about 8 low-intermediate level students, so we figured they'd like the stories and they'd be able to learn a lot from the visuals (a la pictures and video cribbed from YouTube.com). By the end of class, we would ask them to write down some Korean folk tales that they knew and share them with the class.

It actually turned out to be a slight disaster, but we recovered well. The students were a little lower level than we thought they would be in terms of vocabulary, so we ended up doing a LOT of clarification of ideas and vocabulary and so we were only able to get through the American Tall Tales portion. But, that ended up being a nice stopping point anyway, so we were satisfied. The Camp Instructor supervising our session said that I have a "good teaching voice" and overall presence, by which she meant it commanded respect, but was warm enough to be affirming. Somethings I need to work on: transitions, speaking slowly, and using big words, although she did note that the few times I was about to use big words, I caught myself.

Drama Club was more fun than work from my end. We basically played improv games with them. Most were pretty quiet (odd for people who volunteered for Drama Club), but the improv games sort of forced participation out of them. (For you VALPO theatre people, I led Ukaleyla for a movement/voice warmup. The campers loved it, and so did the other ATEs.)

Songnisan

2007-07-28T07:29:00.000-07:00

Last weekend (7/20-22), the Powers that Be in Seoul decided that we needed a break from studying and sent us off to Songnisan National Park for a relaxing couple of days of hiking and exploring in the mountains. (Of course, they planned this not knowing that we had a test on Monday and had to prepare our lessons for the upcoming Camp the Program week, which meant I ended up more tired on Monday than I was on Friday as I crammed and prepared my Sunday night away. They apologized for the scheduling problems and said they'd fix them before next year.)

The trip was fun. There was a buddhist temple there which featured an outdoor bronze buddha dedicated to the reunification of Korea. The hiking was good as well, though it was almost straight up the mountain side. To give you an idea of the difficulty level, the first 3 km took approximately 1 hour. The last 3 km to the summit took 3 hours. We started at 3 a.m., took lots of breaks, and ended up back at our hotel around 1 p.m. Long and hard work which let me sleep soundly that night. Along some Korean hiking trails (the easier ones) there are little cafes where one can get something to drink and eat and sit for a while. Ours had none however, and we were glad that we packed in a small breakfast. On the way down, we stopped at a hermitage with an amazing vista (at least it would have been if it weren't so foggy). The gardeners there said that that particular hermitage boasted a spring with the best water in all of Korea. Miracle water they said it was. It did taste sweet and certainly slaked my thirst.

The hotels were interesting, if only because there was no bed in the room. Instead, we slept on yo which are stuffed comforters, essentially, which can be easily stowed during the day. They are comfortable (I like firm mattresses anyway), but they don't offer much padding, so sleeping on one's side is a little hard on the hips. Water was pumped from a subterranean spring 200 m below the hotel, so it was potable. I ended both nights watching Korean dramas until I fell asleep. My Korean speaking friends would help translate on occasion.

Songnisan is famous for its mushrooms, and during the weekend we had mushroom soups with almost every meal (버섯전골 and 버섯찌게). Both were quite delicious and served with a variety of mountain vegetables and roots. One that I particularly enjoyed was a very spicy pepper encrusted with sugar. The sweetness would hit first, then the spiciness about 30-seconds later. It was almost like a reverse Warhead, those super sour candies I used to devour when I was a kid that would assault the tongue for about 50 seconds before allowing their sweet center to come through.

We were actually told to buy mushrooms as gifts for our Korean teachers if we wanted. The Powers that Be every year tell the ATEs that the mushrooms make a great gift and are highly appreciated by the language teaching staff. There are conflicting reports on this, however, as some teachers apparently blatantly told their students not to buy mushrooms for them, and other students who had more experience in Korea said that food items that require preparation are usually odd gifts for younger people. They might go over better with an older generation, though. Our class played it safe and bought some mushrooms and also a green tea tea set for each of our teachers. I have a feeling we did well in this, as the positive reaction towards the tea set seemed much more genuine than than the positive reaction towards the mushrooms.

EDIT (9/3/2007): I forgot to relate two things in this post that I want to remember. First of all, I didn't finish a rather expensive meal, rather, my table didn't finish a rather expensive meal, thus we were punished through public humiliation--wacks on the head with an inflatable hammer from those who finished the meal for us. Second, I played in the water with the little kiddies. It was by a little dam in the river. It was a blast. I have a feeling the Powers that Be did not appreciate this a whole lot, though, as I was very wet immediately before we had to go home.

Culinary Note: Samgyeopsal (삼겹살)

2007-07-28T05:00:00.000-07:00

Wednesday night I went out to dinner with some friends to celebrate (or drown our sorrows over, depending on the assignment) our placement announcements. My roommate, Ray, recommended that we try samgyeopsal, which is essentially thickly sliced bacon. Because it has so much more meat as compared to American bacon, it tastes much "porkier" than bacon does.

Like dokgalbi, it is served raw on a hot griddle in the middle of the table along with various vegetables, including onions, garlic, and kimchi. Unlike dokgalbi, it usually has no seasoning. If it does, it is usually something simple like an herb blend with salt. Though it is brought out in long strips, this is only so that it can cook. Part way through the cooking process, the customer may take a provided pair of scissors and cut the meat into more manageable, bite-sized slices.

Again like dokgalbi, the pork should be placed in a cool lettuce leaf with whatever condiments one prefers. This meal is one of the few in Korea where it is appropriate to eat with the hands. It tastes best with soju or another non-fruit alcohol (as most salty foods do), but because the meat is not really spicy, I don't feel that soda would interfere with the taste, and might even add a sweetness to the smokey flavor of the meet. Dokgalbi was my second favorite meal thus far. Samgyeopsal is my first.

Struggles in Korea

2007-07-28T04:00:00.000-07:00

Mind you, Korea has not been all culinary delight and easy living. Language courses have been especially brutal. In going over the vocabulary cards I made for the first week of classes, I noticed that the second set of words we received was twice as big as the first set. This exponential model continues, not necessarily in terms of vocabulary, but in terms of grammar and phrases and general language conventions. We've gotten to the point of giving and receiving directions (a la "Donde esta la biblioteca?"), but at this point I just can't process anymore new information. I could really use a week of review and practice, but we press ever onwards towards fluency and we cannot stop to smell the directions to the 화장실.

Another issue I'm dealing with, quite frankly, is the cafeteria food. It really is quite awful and unoriginal. It was interesting at first, of course, when everything was new, but the shine is off the apple by now, and having had off campus food, I realize just how bad the on-campus food is. I've given up on Korean "breakfast" (which is the same as every other meal--kimchi, rice, bland soup, and some kind of meat concoction, usually poorly prepared fish or pork). Fortunately, the school is providing us with toast and milk in a back room, so I've taken to eating this in the morning. Every morning except Tuesday, however, when everyone on campus eats "Western" breakfast, which consists of bread (but no toaster), jam, a salad with oil and tomatoes, and some pork or fish or else eggs mashed with potatoes or pickled eggs. (I thought this might be particular to our cafeteria on campus, but our Songnisan breakfast also had the salad option for "Western" breakfast.) They also occasionally try to put together "Western" lunches and dinners. Today's lunch, for instance, consisted of spaghetti, which was actually strange combination of pasta and slightly spicy sloppy joe mix. It tasted good, but I was really hoping for the spaghetti. Cheese and dairy is almost non-existent here, so if anyone is thinking of sending me something, a nice block of jack cheese would be spectacular.

And then there's the other struggle...

"Cultural Ambassador vs. Cultural Tool"
Many of our workshops here focus on how part of our responsibility as Program ATEs is as cultural ambassadors. As such, we should realize that many things in Korea are just different. For instance, the hierarchy in Korea, although democratized, is still fairly rigid in terms of customs. People still bow to their superiors and use polite formal verb-stem endings when speaking to them. We should accept these differences and live with them, and even embrace them it seems. But sometimes I wonder...

An extending ATE told me about an experience she had with a Middle Schooler during her last year here. The child is a trouble maker, she says, but she is of the opinion that he's just being cute. For instance, he will ask if she is the king of the classroom, and she will respond, as a teacher probably should, "Yes, I am king." Then he will declare a revolution against the king. (He used advanced Korean vocabulary for this, so the other Korean teachers were impressed.) He will also swear at her when singing happy birthday to her, using that foulest word in the English language, and even has a cheat sheet of Korean insults translated into English. These latter insults usually don't come across very well, i.e. "Teacher, you lecture to me very badly," but the sentiment is there. He leads a gang of children at the Middle School. Gangs are mostly harmless here, especially in middle school, and more like groups of friends that just hang out all the time and act angsty.

The above I could just trot up to middle school insolence, especially in a country where children mature much slower compared to American children in terms of maintaining a certain naivete about how the world works. (I have not experienced this immaturity yet, but rely on the good report of those who have come before me.) But then she related an experience with this particular student that troubled me greatly. The student had just come from art class where he had been working with foamboard. He presented his creation to the ATE and said, "Teacher, gift!" She looked at it and found that it was a very artfully recreated scene of the second plane crashing into the WTC on September 11. Then the student gave the ATE a thumbs up and smilingly said, "Teacher! Great day!"

When the ATE related the story, she was laughing about it (I'm not sure why), and said, "What do I say to that? It's good art?" Troubling.

I understand that we're supposed to be cultural ambassadors, that we're supposed to be respectful of a foreign culture, but I'm not exactly sure that means we're supposed to take cultural insults against our country. No matter someone's feelings towards the United States, the WTC incident was a terrible tragedy, not a great day; just as, though I feel we ultimately are doing more good than bad in Iraq, I acknowledge that the war itself is a tragedy of enormous proportion.

So, what would I have done? I probably would have stopped class and made the issue into a teachable moment. There is a shocking lack of respect for foreign cultures and ideas in Korea, and though the Koreans as a nation may choose not to adopt the foreign cultures and may disagree with them, they should at least be respectful of them. Respect is something that I feel should be able to transcend borders, and it should probably be something that is taught throughout primary and secondary education.

It was just shocking is all. I do not think I will be a very good "cultural ambassador" if it means having to take children driving a knife into a wound in my country's history that I still feel quite deeply.

Bible Study

2007-07-28T03:00:00.000-07:00

Some friends and I have started up a Bible study here at orientation to help maintain our spiritual health during this trying (and awesome!) time. Since we only had four weeks left when we started, we decided that we should go through Philippians, both because it has four chapters and because it is rather encouraging, and we could use that right now. The style that my friends are used to is more like what I experienced in Winona at places like Pleasant Valley Ev. Free and sometimes at Summer camp; that is, they are intellectually rather dry, but spiritually quite affirming. It is a big difference from what I am used to at VALPO, and even at Timothy Lutheran Church, but it is helpful to help me keep some perspective on my spiritual "vocation" (shudders at that word...) in a highly secularized environment. And besides, I brought my Greek with me, so I'm able to add some intellectual depth as far as exegesis is concerned, and my friends seem to appreciate this. (I also brought my knowledge of obscure historical fact with me. I'm not sure this is as appreciated as the translation. They seemed to have a vision of Paul suffering in chains quite literally, perhaps even being whipped with cords. They found this encouraging, especially as their suffering seemed so comparatively small. I reminded them much later on in the study that he was a Roman citizen and probably under house arrest at this time, thus his ability to freely communicate. "Oh..." they said. I sighed.)

The Urinals that Insa: A cultural-anthropological theory with help from fellow ETA Trisha L.

2007-07-28T02:00:00.000-07:00

(Original Title: The Urinals that Insa: A cultural-anthropological theory based losely on the tools gained in Christ College's Interpretation of the Social Sciences (a course no longer offered in the form I took it, though I'm told the new form is quite good), with a little help from fellow Entertaining Teacher from America Trisha L.)

Although we can't flush toilet paper here, the urinals in our dormitory (and in most of Korea, as far as I can tell) are all automatic--another instance of the old and new in Korea. Unlike in America, however, the automatic urinals here flush twice: once when one walks up to them; a second time when one leaves, as is convention in the States.

This of course seems strange to those members of our species with the appropriate equipment to use such devices and who have used them in the past, but the strangeness can easily be explained if one has a proper understanding of Korean nunchi, one's ability to sense gibun (or the social feeling of a situation).

For instance, when one is the presence of one's superiors, one should practice good nunchi and realize that the gibun of the situation requires one to use formal language and, upon entering the gibun, to practice insa (or formal greeting by bowing). Let us suppose therefore that the urinal exists in a certain gibun-ic state, that of the hwajangshil, a.k.a. the John. It can exist as it is in this state without doing anything as the gibun does not require anything of it.

Let us then suppose that a superior enters the gibun which the urinal already occupies. Suddenly, that superior brings with him (and it should be a him in this case). As the superior approaches the urinal, therefore, the urinal, being a good Korean urinal made by the Daelim Corporation, must practice good nunchi and perform insa before its superior. In other words, when a bloke, being superior to the machine, walks up to the urinal, the urinal feels obliged to flush. As my colleague Trisha L. has noted, it is not only the urinal which practices good nunchi in this gibun, as the superior in the gibun also performs insa if he looks down to unzip his fly. When the necessary function of the urinal is complete, it performs insa once again (i.e. flushes), the superior performs insa as well (i.e. zips his fly), and the two part company knowing that the gibun of the situation has not been sullied, and both can maintain their respective positions in the hierarchy of Korean democratic society in peace.

If this is the case, perhaps I should take my colleague's advice and begin greeting the urinal with a hearty annyeonghaseyo when I use it in the future.

Closing to a Letter Home

2007-07-28T01:00:00.000-07:00

The end. I hope you enjoyed this little two-part explanation of what's going on out here in the Land of the Morning Calm. I, for one, am finding this a helpful way of keeping a journal of sorts. It gives me perspective on how much I am actually doing and learning when I get discouraged about the monotony of the daily grind of wake, eat, class, eat, class, exercise, eat, study, sleep. Despite all that's written above, that's what my day, everyday, really looks like. The above helps me realize that that's not what my recollected experience will be.

All my love,

Jeremy

Dokgalbi Street infighting at Myong Dong (+ Culinary Note)

2007-07-17T23:47:00.000-07:00

This actually happened during Week 1, but I didn't think of it then, and I haven't had a chance to write about it until now.

On the same day I toured the Jjimjilbang, I went with some friends to the shopping district of Chuncheon known as Myong Dong. It covers a few city blocks on the surface, goes up a few stories into the sky, and even decends beneath the street. (For the curious, Seoul also has a Myong Dong, but it takes up an area about the size of downtown St. Louis, depending on where you draw the boundries of that American district. You actually have to tell the taxi drivers which part of the Myong Dong you want to go to in Seoul or else you'd face a good hour's walk.) Myong Dong features several speciality shops and even more general merchandise shops. Zippos are incredibly expensive here, as is American paraphenalia in general, though cheaper Korean-made brands abound. Myong Dong is also home to Chuncheon's Dokgalbi Street, a side alley which features only one menu option: dokgalbi.

Dokgalbi is a fantastic dish that is a Chuncheon speciality. (I actually ate at the best dokgalbi establishment in Chuncheon recently, not on Dokgalbi Street, and thus have eaten the "best dokgalbi in the world".) Essentially, it is chicken marinated with spicy sauce fried up on a griddle that sits in the middle of the table. Other ingredients include cabbage, rice cakes, onions, and, if one desires, lettuce, garlic and extra spicy paste on the side. It is usually eaten in this way. The chicken will cook slowly, and while it cooks, one may pick at the rice cakes and vegetables. Whatever ingredient is being eaten, it should be picked out of the griddle with chopsticks, placed in a cool lettuce or mint leaf and any extra condiments. This is then wrapped and placed in the mouth. The griddle's ingredients are usually quite hot, and despite the cool leaf will burn the fingers a bit. After most of the meat and vegetables are gone, one can order rice which will be fried on the griddle once again until crispy. It is all quite delicious and one order can stuff up to two starving American stomaches, three moderately hungry ones. This is, incidentally, one of the very few native Korean dishes that one should eat with the fingers, and it is the second best meal I've had in Korea since my arrival. To drink, one usually has soju, a watered down version of vodka, though at this particular instance in the Myong Dong I had Coke. (This was a mistake, as I consumed it during the meal. The sweet flavor of the cola and the carbonation did not mix well with the spicy bouquet of the dokgalbi. Alcohol is to be much prefered, or if one cannot consume this, simple water. The spices are powerful and will not be offended by the sweet nothings of corporate beverages.)

Competition between the Dokgalbi Street establishments is fierce. Restaurant owners will come out to the front of their business to usher people in. They will offer free drinks, free rice, free desert, whatever it will take. (This is slightly odd as a single serving of dokgalbi, which is not very expensive, will feed at least two people and Koreans do not take tips. I wonder where they make their money...) If there are no potential customers to badger, the owners will insult each others' dokgalbi as they assert that theirs is the best ever made and no self-respecting native Korean (or even tourist) would dare even set a toe in anyone else's establishment. It makes for good dinner entertainment, at any rate.

Meeting Children at the Jjimjilbang

2007-07-16T22:54:00.000-07:00

As I said before, last Saturday I went to the jjimjilbang, a Korean bathhouse. Today, I remembered that a rather strange cultural situation presented itself while I was waiting in the common room for the girls to finish in their bathing area. I was watching some sort of game show on TV (If I'm correct, the contestants were put through a series of intelligence tests by professors, and the particular one I was watching at the moment was they had to say a color though the word they were looking at was in a different color.), when these two elementary school girls sat behind me and off to the side. I noticed they were whispering to each other and staring at me, so I smiled at them briefly and kept watching the TV. Then one of them said, "Hi!" and waved to me. "Oh, good," I thought. "They want to talk!" I was just saying, "Hi" back when the other girl hit the girl who had just been so friendly to the alien in a strange land and said something which sounded very chastising. The first girl stared at her friend blankly for a second, when suddenly a light came on in her head. "Oh!" she said, and then, facing me and bowing slightly, "Hello." (This actually sounded more like "Herroh", but 'r's are hard for Koreans.) I laughed to myself a little at this, but we proceeded to have a friendly conversation, I speaking what little Korean I knew, they speaking their considerably greater amount of English.

I just found it humorous. From what I've heard (and now seen), Korea is a land of deep custom. When you address superiors, you are supposed to speak with in a more formal linguistic mood, and this changes the endings of your nouns, adjectives, and verbs entirely. Since I was considerably older than the girls, I suppose the second girl chastised the first for addressing me in so informal a manner, with a simple "Hi" and a wave of the hand. Apparently, a person of my stature deserves a full "Hello" and at least a slight bow.

I've had to learn the difference also and am constantly bowing to teachers who live with us in the dorm. I just didn't imagine (though I should have) that small children, who are quite sincere in learning a new language, would also take along all of their cultural norms with them in using that language with a native speaker, even to the point of modifying a language of significant equality, at least equal in comparison with their own. It didn't occur to me until after I was done talking with them, but someday I hope they learn that in America, the way you show respect is by treating the person you address as an equal. Formality in the U.S., I feel, is for occassion and situation (i.e. ceremonies and at school, or when in the presence of someone particularly important), not everyday usage.

I will not begrudge them the kindness they showed though. They did share their sugared ice with me after all, and they did keep a stranger company while he waited in a place without friends.

Quote of the Day

2007-07-16T06:04:00.001-07:00

This phone smells fantastic! No, seriously! Smell it. SMELL IT!
-Julia Leb