Over at Coming Anarchy, Curzon has started a discussion on how living overseas can spark an “awakening” of your own identity or consciousness.
Since Curzon is encouraging us to share stories, I guess I’ll share mine.
As readers may know, Korea is actually the second foreign nation in which I’ve spent an extended period of time. I spent 1995 — my junior year in university — in the East African nation of Tanzania, a wonderful place you should definitely visit should the opportunity present itself. And thanks to the slower pace of life, the simpler manner of living and lack of many of the distractions you encounter in more economically developed societies, Tanzania was a great place to discover yourself. Or perhaps better put, it was a great place to rediscover one’s humanity and the simple joys of living.
Now, as for a “national awakening,” that would have to wait until I got to Korea. And even then, it’s complex. I came to Korea at the age of 22. I’m now 34, which means I’ve spent the bulk of my adult life here… in Korea. This is where I met my wife and got married. Korea forms my view of normalcy. It’s my home. And it’s a home that, free as it is from Xbox-related shootings*, I wouldn’t trade for my old one.
In fact, having been forced to sit through an episode of “Beauty and the Geek“** last night on AFN, I’m thoroughly convinced of my good fortune that I live here and not there… Sarah the Dental Assistant’s exceptional rack notwithstanding.
That being said, I’ve come to have a deeper awareness and appreciation of what makes me an American and, in the larger scheme of things, a Westerner. I’ve inherited a proud culture firmly planted in the Anglo-Saxon (and, in the case of my family, Catholic) tradition and, stretching back further, Greece and Rome. And it’s a tradition worth preserving and protecting… or better put, it’s a tradition worth preserving and protecting in the West.
I’ve also developed — and this is probably influenced by my host nation — something of a longer historical memory. That is to say, the Battle of Tours and the Fall of Constantinople are more than dates in the history book. They actually mean something.
Anyway, I’m sure you have your tales and insight. Post away.
* It took three — three! — whole days for a certain logistics company to pick up my Xbox360, which I’m finally getting repaired/replaced. Frankly, I could have walked to the factory in Ansan in that time. By the time said company arrived at my office — at 7:15 pm, in fact — even I was on the verge of an Xbox-related shooting. Even if this wasn’t Microsoft’s fault per se, chalk it up as more reason why I’m switching my office computer to Ubuntu Linux.
** It’s also come to my attention that Cher Tenbush, the kinda-Asian chick in Season 2 of “Beauty and the Geek,” is in fact half-Korean. Or more precisely, half-Korean, a quarter German and a quarter Irish. This genetic makeup is sufficiently similar to the one my future children will be forced to endure (1/2 Mongolian, 1/4 Kraut and 1/4 Mick) to give me hope that they will not turn out completely fugly, despite the genetic contribution from their father’s side.
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“….This genetic makeup is sufficiently similar to the one my future children will be forced to endure (1/2 Mongolian, 1/4 Kraut and 1/4 Mick) to give me hope that they will not turn out completely fugly, despite the genetic contribution from their father’s side.”
I urge you to rephrase this final portion. When I first read it I did a somewhat shocked double-take; I had to re-read it to assure myself you meant it in the manner to which I naturally inclined — that is to say, as a compliment to your wife.
I wouldn’t trade my overseas experiences for anything, but I’m very glad I’m back in the USA. No visa hassles, a tenured teaching job with a pension plan, clean air, fresh, organic food and pastured meats directly from local farmers, future home ownership, and much, much better dating prospects for me as a woman.
You live in a country where you “can’t take a shit without flashing your alien residence card.” I live in a country where it is illegal for school personnel to ask about citizenship or visa status.
When you say Korean forms your view of normalcy, wouldn’t it be more correct to say Seoul? Rural life is very different from urban life both in Korea and in the US. Clean air and fresh food can be found in Korea’s countryside, but you’d have to sacrifice cosmopolitian comforts.
What kind of visa do you have? Most waegook visas have a limited number of renewals. Do you want get kicked out of Korea in your forties and have to rebuild your life somewhere else? Ride the wave while it lasts. Seoul is a great city to call home, but you’re still a waegook who has to make annual pilgrimages to Mokdong and who resides in Korea by the good graces of your employer. As you approach 40, you may come to value more highly the importance of long-term stability and security.
I’ve lived in the four biggest cities of Korea and Seoul is by far the best place to live. However, I could and would never call Korea home. If you do that’s cool, good on you. How you could remains a mystery to me.
Hmm, nice interactive thread.
Well, I’m afro-american (but mixed recently, so I look more Indian/light-african), and I have to say that being in Korea has taken way more emphasis off of the “African” part and put it onto the “American” part. In the states, we’re all American enough to focus on the details…but here, outside of my skin color, I really am just a friggin’ Migook. Koreans don’t know that much about Black culture, civil rights, slavery, so they’re missing the baggage that comes along with it. On the one hand, like I said, I am just American here, on the other hand, they feel virtually no shame for having music groups with rollers in their hair wearing black face: but really, that’s a mirror on trans-oceanic cultural interest. For how long have we shown the Japanese as sexy nymphets or harmless nerds…or sexy harmless nerdy nymphets.
Like someone above said, crossing that ocean to really see how people live, takes the dates out of the book and the faces off of the TV and makes them REAL.
So, here, in Korea, I find myself feeling like an American. When I’m in a grocery store, I compare it to how we do it in America…theme parks, department stores, dating, sex, personal relationships…etc. I don’t really think in terms of how “black” people do it, just Americans since “African American” is simply a derivation of the greater culture, and a fairly artificial one at that.
Also, nothing against Marmot since he has such a stake in Korea, but I don’t think I could ever call any place in Northeast Asia “home”. I’ve been here for going on 2 years, have pretty good Korean friends out of work and at work, and have never once been invited for dinner with their family, despite the fact that they basically all live with their parents. In Amerikkka that would have happened within weeks or months of practically any relationship (at least the invitation).
I guess I’m just curious as to the point at which you really *just knew* that a place was home.
I like living in a country that at least pays lip service to enforcing immigration law.
Actually, I spent most of my time here in the provinces, and much of that in the country. And truth be told, I preferred it in the countryside.
Yes, obviously, the visa situation is a hassle, but a) visa regulations will probably change, at least eventually, and b) it’s the price I pay for not taking citizenship.
Thanks for sharing!
I guess the tone of both quotes from the header of the post makes it sound like a “national” awakening is what everyone experiences. But that’s certainly by no means the case. More importantly, the experience of living abroad forces many of us to conduct a core-shaking audit of our identity.
Robert’s thoughts resonate with mine in that living abroad gives one a better perspective of their own country, its virtues and vices. American TV is definitely a vice and, if any person interested in moving to he U.S. watched such, they would probably stay away or not buy a TV. I note the current writer’s strike in the U.S. (like picketing the devil in hell), which will probably see the creation of more “reality” TV which is as interesting as watching the video feeds from a traffic intersection camera.
The current air of paranoia and fascism in the states does not help with the American experience either.
Sonagi’s comments also leave out the money factor. If one has $$, then everything can be fresh in Seoul. The observant can also note the serious lack of public education in health and quality of life related issues is coming back to haunt Korean society now and will cost Koreans more and more, unless changes are made also (a rise in kids smoking, air pollution, etc.). Some things are still almost impossible to buy . . .
I don’t. And part of this, I think, is that like I said, I came here basically straight out of college. Meaning that I really don’t know how a lot of these things work in the States. My 사회생활, so to speak, began here.
I can’t speak for African-Americans who have studied in Africa, obviously, but that appeared to have been the case in Tanzania, as well. This is probably natural. In the States, we concentrate more on what divides us. Overseas, confronted with a distinctly different “other,” our common cultural heritage becomes much more apparent. Or so it would seem.
Well, yes, given how personal relationships are formed in Korea, it’s difficult for people who didn’t have a chance to form an 인맥 early on to built one. It’s tough, no doubt. But I have to wonder if it’s really any different for foreigners moving to the United States. At least I’ve been spared having to work in a green grocer’s or laundromat.
I’m not sure if there was a point. And that “home” might very well change sometime in the future. My wife has a very big say in this, after all, and a major point of concern is education — obviously, shelling out 20 grand a year for schooling (assuming we don’t send ‘em to Korean school) is a bit much. But I’ve been here for over a decade, I feel comfortable here, and I like where I am.
You’re probably regretting having to ask all these questions… but Marmot:
How come you don’t actually get citizenship then, if you feel more at home in Korea? Is it just too hard to do? I know the American citizenship process is long and hard and I don’t blame you if it’s the same there.
It took me years to become a U.S. citizen as a child, and that was back in 1990. I have a luxury though; I was born in Korea, so I have the “golden pass” F-4 visa whenever I go back.
home is where your toothbrush is.
Damn you Marmot, your post is up for a mere two hours and it gets more comments than my post did in a full day! How ever do you do it?!
i am a korean, but until 10 years ago when i last returned to my homeland, my years abroad outnumbered the years i spent here.
most of my childhood and teen years were spent abroad, in the US, latin america, the pacific islands, etc.. the last ten years of my life i spent in korea was the longest i have ever spent in a single place.
as a person who has experienced extremes of different cultures (taking hookah hits at frat parties in college in the US, getting beaten up by kids younger then me when i was doing my two years in the korean army), i never found the right balance that could bring stability to my understanding of my own identity.
i despised korea, and regretted with all my life my decision ten years ago to come back here. not a day would go by when i had to encounter some form of “gook action” (a term my korean friends with similar backgrounds as myself and i used to describe everything we did not like about korea and koreans), whether it was enduring old ladies purposefully sweating on me in the bus during summer because i did not want to give up my seat, or turning on the TV to see 유승준 pretending to be 2Pac saying “west side!!!”
i don’t want to generalize, but i can’t help but saying that most hardcore koreans who bleed kimchi are very provincial in their thinking and very uncreative in the way they live their lives. the choices offered to most koreans are still limited in ways of pursuing a fulfilling life.
hopefully, things will get better, and i’m glad i stuck around long enough to finally see that koreans are starting to wake up and smell the starbucks. the internet has helped a lot.
anyways, i’m rambling, but still have to say one thing about korea to mr. koehler that with all respect, not f’nothing, if his daughters are unattractive growing up in korea, the opportunities presented to them in life will be drastically lower if they don’t get some serious nip/tuck.
Your post echoes a lot of what I’ve been feeling and we’ve lived here just over a year. Korea is the first country I’ve lived in besides the U.S. (not counting a year spent in Germany as a young child while my dad was in the military).
I came here with the sort of unconscious assumption that the U.S. was a melting pot of many different cultures and that Americans don’t really have a “culture” to call their own.
I no longer feel this way. Living here has really awakened in me a sense of being American and a sense of being Western and of understanding, in some way, how fundamentally different some of my most basic assumptions and values are different than those of Korean society. (Valuing independence and assertiveness, for one thing.)
I’m not saying at all that I think one culture is better than the other. They both have their good and bad. It’s just different and in striking ways that run very deep, I think.
Weird. Why don’t I have the Taegukgi next to my name?
I don’t believe it’s all that hard. But citizenship is a very serious matter, and giving up US citizenship is something I’m simply not prepared to do. Moreover, while I certainly feel more comfortable here and probably wouldn’t know what to do with myself if I found myself in the States, I don’t identify myself as a Korean. I am American, and I still maintain a strong sense of loyalty to the flag and the institutions it represents. The fact that I’m blogging in English rather than Korean is, I think, rather indicative of this.
Yup, I feel the same way about my American citizenship even though I’ve now spent almost half my entire life in Korea. I am still very much an American, the way I think and live in the values I hold (though much understanding and respecting the sharply differing ways of Koreans).
I prefer to vote in American elections rather than Korean elections, though it’s often impossible to say that the choices offered are any better (the upcoming presidential elections in both nations being a perfect example).
I have some close friends who are white American guys who took Korean citizenship, and I fully respect their choice, but that path is not for me — even though it now looks likely that I’ll stay here until retirement at 65…
> You live in a country where you “can’t take a shit
> without flashing your alien residence card.”
I really wonder where this quote or idea came from — I haven’t taken that card out of my wallet for anyone except Immigration officials and my Gu office (and when changing jobs) for many many years now. It’s not as if policemen or any businesses ever ask to see it… My wife is a Filipina and you would think she’d be suspected of being an illegal immigrant, but she hasn’t had to show her card to any stranger in years either… What are you talking about here?
You Americans are so charming with your identities based on values, way of life, etc.
It’s much more direct for the Canadians: retain citizenship no matter what, cuz one day you might get sick and have to run home*.
*”home”: the place where health care is free.
“You Americans are so charming with your identities based on values, way of life, etc.
It’s much more direct for the Canadians: retain citizenship no matter what, cuz one day you might get sick and have to run home*.
*”home”: the place where health care is free.”
Guess you could say the same of the British, though I doubt few of them would agree with you either.
I’ve never looked at being a Canadian citizen as being anything other than values, way of life, traditions, culture, etc. I’m happy we have universal health care in Canada, but it wouldn’t be among the main reasons for not considering giving up my citizenship. F-5 is as far as I’m willing to go…
Anyway, were I to return to Canada, I would likely be unable to benefit from health care until I become a resident of the country again, which would likely take a few months. I’ve legally resided here for more than a decade, and haven’t paid taxes in Canada during that time, so fair enough.
I believe Robert used it in an entry once.
Do you really want the Marmot crowd mobbing the relative serenity of your blog?
I call Seoul my second hometown, as I’ve been here for five years. During my first years here in the army, I would spend every waking second traveling the city, and if you are a Korean from another city, odds are I might know this place better than you.
But that’s the thing, despite things like that, I’m never recognized as a competent, equal or knowledgeable member of society. How can I call a place where I am just a white English speaking liability “home”? On the other hand, it is more comfortable for me to live here than to live in the US.
There, you MUST have a car, and waste all your money on car insurance and gas.
There you MUST buy a 200-400k dollar home and live in debt, (anything less is in a crime ridden neighborhood or in an area where there are no jobs).
There you MUST have a credit card to get by, because you are in debt.
It makes no sense. Shouldn’t it be a land of opportunity where you can live your own way? But in many ways, it can be more suffocating and forcing of conformity than here.
Everybody’s in a different situation obviously, but for me, the pros of living in Korea far outweigh the cons too.
I’ve been here since ‘95, in two chunks, spending ‘99-’02 back in the US of A, and I personally have a much more comfortable, fun, and interesting life here than I ever had in the states.
More travel, lower overall cost of living (for my lifestyle), more money in the bank, and I love Korean food. I’ve got tons of friends. Most, but not all, are expats like myself. And my beloved (Korean) spouse, our six-month-old 혼혈아들, and I have no plans to live anywhere else in the foreseeable future.
I had a few complaints the first few years, but a few years back in the states woke me up to the fact that I was complaining about some of the same things there, and more sometimes.
I’ve had good university jobs since I came here that have gotten better and better, with free housing that’s not bad at all. And though we’ve bought a little land, and are saving up for the eventual home purchase here, I’m in no rush with the current strange housing market here.
I’d much rather live here and go to the U.S. for a visit than vice-versa.
Bitch about the smog and the sanitary conditions all you like, it’s better than it was, and getting better all the time. As Koreans get richer and start to care more and more about living comfortably in a cleaner environment with more parks and better recreation, I see many positive changes that make me glad I’m here. And I don’t need to tell anyone about the difference in crime between Seoul and almost any city of its size, not just in the U.S., but virtually anywhere in the world.
Sure I’m considered to be “less than” by many people here, including many of my colleagues at the university, and sometimes small-minded jerks on the subway give us funny looks. But I don’t really care what the jerks think anyway.
Every year, more people here are waking up and seeing there is a world beyond the East Sea of Japan that is not really that concerned about what people in Seoul think about “Korea number one!”
People here are waking up in many ways and I see a future with tenure here as well. In some ways, I don’t really see Americans as being that much more open-minded than many Koreans I know, despite the knee-jerk reaction from most expats here to any (perceived) anti-American slight from any Korean.
I don’t think I’m as much of a patriot as Mr. Marmot, though I’m very glad to have gotten the advantages that came with growing up comfortably and being educated in the U.S. I’m not particularly anti-U.S. either, though I’m not at all sure about what my country’s foreign policy is all about. Another wacky Ron Paul supporter here.
I’m never going to be a Korean, but that’s okay. I’m not trying to be.
And thanks to the wife, I don’t have to worry about that visa crap either!
Yes, no, and no. Save for NYC, it is extremely difficult to get around without a car. Depending on where you live, it is possible to find a house under $200,000 and earn a living to pay for it. My brother paid $150,000 for spacious 4-bedroom in a very nice Houston suburb. I pay off my entire cc balance each month as do other family members. Whether you live in Korea or elsewhere, it is a matter of budgeting and prioritizing between needs and wants.
But Sonagi, NYC is the place to be!
You are right though, you can find very cheap places in lesser populated suburbs. However, if you are looking for a nice Korean community (restaurants, churches, bars, clubs) only the bigger cities (usually the more expensive ones) tend to have such a community.
I also came to Korea as soon as I graduated 7 years ago and have stayed here since, and so I too haven’t experienced “adult life” anywhere else. I have a few more issues about where exactly “home” is though, because I was born and spent my childhood in England, but then moved to New Zealand as a teenager, then Australia, then England, then…New Zealand, where I went to University.
I find Korea a very dynamic and exciting place to study and live in, and couldn’t imagine being anywhere else in my twenties. But now that I’m 32 and with a Korean wife and daughter, then certain realities are beginning to set in that mean that I still have a while to go here, maybe 10 years, but my time here is definitly limited. Trying to be brief, they are:
1. I’m happy for my daughter (and the next child) to go to elementary school here, but NFW is she going to middle school, when students stop learning about life and just learn how to pass the 수능시험 instead.
2. I don’t, and can’t, ever feel like an equal here. I won’t drive because of the crazy accident compensation laws they have here, but laws of any form are so arbitrarily applied here anyway that I feel that I and my family can’t be adequately protected by them in any civil dispute I have with another Korean, and that’s even without the anti-foreigner bias I’ve heard so much about. And these realities remain regardless of how equal and amiably most Koreans treat me on a day to day basis.
3) Finally, related to that is employment. I am now so savvy with the ESL system here that I make 3 times more money for 3 times less work than when I first came in 2000,and working-time and pay-wise probably have one of the best ESL jobs in the country, which is of course great, but my job is an indictment of the whole ESL industry here, for it is a complete and utter waste of time…in a nutshell, even the best teacher in the world could do jack in the job circumstances I’m in.
But then virtually every ESL job I’ve ever had here has been similar, albeit for much less pay and more hours. If I could have advanced in any of my jobs and had a real say how students were taught, and hence made a difference, then of course they would have been much more fulfilling, but then I’m always the lowest, most trivial person in every institution I’ve worked for. I’m 32, and seriously, everyday I turn up to work and feel like a gopher intern. Sure, I could work at a University and be head teacher or something after a few years…but in my experience they don’t have much effective power either, and there are ceilings on their advancement. So what’s the point?
So get out of ESL? Been trying for 5 years…I could talk for hours of course about my qualifications for working in another field, but I won’t bore you further!
Suffice to say, I really love Korea, but I’m being paid a lot to do a completely useless and suicide-inducing job (yet one which 99% of readers here would kill for), find it impossible to break into another field because despite my qualifications many Koreans can’t consider me as anything other than a white clown for their children, and to top it all off I may as well be a kid for all the protection Korean law gives me against Korean adults.
So, sorry for what’s become a rant, but even without my daughter to think about I couldn’t stay in a country that so manifestly refuses to treat me like an adult and give me the employment opportunities I feel I deserve. Yeah I know, so shut up and leave Korea, but I’m got my wife and daughter to provide for, 50%ish tax (with student loans) to look forward to in New Zealand, and Korea is a great place for children. And I sure as hell wish I’d known how limited my non-ESL opportunities would be here back in 2002!
I’d agree with Curzon’s basic thesis (as it’s been paraphrased here) that exposure to Korean culture over a decade has helped to crystallize my sense of who I am.
When I first travelled to Korea, then met my future life, then travelled back there with her the first couple of times, I lacked any deep, distinct sense of my own culture’s history or traditions—either Anglo-Canadian culture, or the European cultures of my ancestors. I jumped gung-ho into learning everything Korean. As I grew older and stepped back, I started coming to terms with my own cultural background, in comparison and contrast to that of my wife’s, and have come out of it with a deeper sense of and respect for where I have come from. Now, I’m just another white guy in Korea, and accept it.
The turning point was probably on the second-last of our semi-annual trips to South Korea. I was considering doing grad studies in the IT field there, and had to meet a couple of professors. My brother-in-law advised me that it would be better to communicate with them in English, rather than try to impress them with my less-than-perfect Korean—because the inter-personal dynamics would be completely different.
On a related linguistic note, a few months later, I took a business trip to Cambridge in the UK for a few days, and for the first time in my life, was conscious of my Canadian accent, in contradistinction to the plethora of London, fenland, Midland, and Oxbridge accents I was hearing all around me. It’s a trivial thing, but that also helped solidify my sense of who I am and where I come from.
I wonder if the Lost Generation in Paris (Hemingway, et al.) underwent a similar transformation?
Hahaha, “When I first travelled to Korea, then met my future wife,” not “life.”
#18 What’s wrong with that? You jealous or something? Maybe you’ve been violated by Canadians somehow? Besides, if it’s my right as a Canadian citizen than why not? Considering I’m half Maliseet, I’m more Canadian than most Canadians and see nothing wrong with going back home when sick. I consider universal health care a privilege to be taken advantage of. Would you stay in Korea and pay for health care when if you could go back home and get it for free? Probably not, it wouldn’t make sense. Also, I’d much rather have Canadian citizenship than Korean citizenship anyday. Like it or lump it.
Not jealous, breaktrack, as my own Canadian citizenship entitles me to ‘take advantage of’ the same priveleges you enjoy. Which makes #18’s obvious tongue-in-cheek tone even more humorous, I thought. Sorry my sense of humor infuriates you so.
Hmmmnnn . . . a Canuck praising the Canadian health care system? You sir, ain’t a Canadian, never lived in Canada and certainly never been to a Canadian hospital (two room office).
#24, you are not trying hard enough. I know many foreigners in Korea working for Korean and foreign companies. Some have great deals and some might start off getting paid less than teachers and working more… but in the long run much more opportunities.
Myself, I took a 9-6pm (sometimes 7 or 8pm) job for a year with a finance company at 2 mill a month. Now I’m enjoying much better pay, overseas travel and future opportunities in HK, Tokyo, Australia and Europe.
I spent a few days in Dar es Salam in late 2005 – Seoul definitely feels safer. But Korea has nothing on the beautiful coasts of Tanzania and Zanzibar. Still, not a place I’d want to spend much time due to malaria, schistosomiasis, and the host of other unpleasant surprises waiting to wreck your health.
I’ve lived one or more years in three countries, and with all other overseas travel have lived outside the States for a little over seven years. Probably the biggest culture shock is coming home and seeing the morbidly obese.
#27 (not #24) excuse me.
#27, nail on the head for most of it. I too made scads of cash for next to no work but at the end of the day I wasn’t going to get any further along unless I opened my own language school. And I’m a little wary about investing in any society where the locals (or at least enough of them to get crowd scenes on the news) are regularly whipped into a nationalistic frenzy by the tabloids - no matter how many friends you have in Korea, you’re still a stranger in a strange land there.
And you STICK OUT LIKE A SORE THUMB too - I’m sure you’ve noticed the phenomenon of “Street people love foreigners” while wandering Seoul’s environs. I think Korea’s one of the safest places I’ve ever even visited, but remembering those GIs on the subway a few years ago, there is SOME risk to living as a visible minority in such a homogenous society. And that poor doctor…
From #27:
Do you mind if I ask how your Korean skills are?
usa is very segregated. NYC subway line is extends a far way, but it’s pretty much known that some stations are delapidated and avoided.
you won’t notice it as much in Los Angeles, but in New York, the demographics get whiter and whiter as you go further away from Manhatten.
every major US city has a center, a prsent day ghetto in what were good residential areas next to the city prior to World War II, immigrant huddle points, and suburbs dominated by rich people who live out there, saying they love nature, but really they don’t like certain races, is why they live out there. They fear they stand out with their skin color, they’ll get shot, robbed, raped, or their family members would. They claim some nonsense about bad school districts, but really, rich neighborhoods fund their own public schools, so a rich neighborhood having a good highschool is quite an obvious result.
USA, you live 30 miles away from a major city, buy a house costing half a million dollars on 30 years of payment, and expect bills to pay every 30 days. Even if you pay off your credit card every 30 days, you can’t deny that you’re basically expecting a system of bills to pay every 30 days. And curse and cheat, and scheme when it comes April.
pensions should be scrapped from America. GM, Ford, Chrysler, are losing too much by paying pensions/medical bills for people who don’t work there or produce anything at present time.
interesting to find that some people prefer to live in Korea because they don’t like their home country’s high taxes.
no one wants to pay, everyone wants benefits. It’s a hypocrisy that bothers me.
Korea is kind of different. Some people may prefer to live in Korea than the US. Given, of course, they have a comfortable income.
i think it’s fully possible to rail every major part of US suburbs and provide extensive public transportation, but it will never be, and US citizens would prefer to drive cars, burn gasoline, buy new cars, drive 60 miles a day, because they live in this system where, by keeping public transportation less available, they keep undesired races out of their neighborhoods.
Rich hoods also have nigh time street signs and lights un-illuminated on purpose.
Check it out yourself.
get invited to a rich guy’s party at night. Prior to navigation, it was a bitch to find his damn house at night.
signs are the size of an index card, street lights sparse, you car’s high beam is the main light source.
keeps theifs away and lost at night, I heard.
face it, US is very race segregated. They need cars and suburbs to do it.
Korea is not like that.
i think US consumption of gasoline to keep racial segregation intact indirectly is kind of a travesty and injustice to the rest of the people in the world. that’s all I have to say for today.
Like Marmot, I came here after college, in my case 1992, and have lived here since, other than time spent in grad school in the States. I’d have to agree with Sonagi about middle age changing perspectives. When I was younger, I enjoyed how stimulating life in Korea can be - there’s never a dull moment, it seems, always people around, and it’s fascinating to be in a place undergoing so much political, social, and economic change. And, being here makes it much easier to keep up language skills. Actually, if I was single, I might still prefer living here. But, we have a two year old, and that changes the situation. On the one hand, Koreans just seem to love little kids,which makes it fun to take the family out. She’s a regular celebrity at the department store. But what will we do a few years from now with school?
Unless you work for a foreign firm, at 20K per year, international school is out of reach. And that’s just one for one kid. And living in a stable, and less exciting place is fine when you have kids to be concerned with. The Korean education problem becomes your problem if you have kids here - wealthy Koreans bidding up the price of international education to the point where it’s unaffordable for international residents. And you’d think they’d like to have their kids going to school with native speakers. I miss Korea when I leave it, and sometimes get tired of it when I’m here. But this is a special place, with its own unique charm, not easy to forget.
My comment #27 was a bit of a sleep-deprived rant, but not too much!
As for my Korean skills Robert (#37), they were good enough to get me my present lucrative teaching job last year, because although my coworkers are English teachers, like usual they’re scared of using English with a native speaker, and so they wanted someone they could deal with in Korean. But ironically after grilling me in Korean for my interview and for most of my first week, in the 18 months since my coworkers and boss have barely needed to talk to me at all! Not quite the 40 hour a week Korean speaking practice nirvana that I anticipated then, but at least getting it was a vindication of all the time I spent studying.
Having said all that, academically speaking I passed level 3 of the TOPIK test last year, but this year, I’m embarrased to say, I merely passed…Level 3 again. Partially because of medical problems on the day, but also because going to bars every other Thursday specifically to practice my Korean with bargirls (no, really - I’m married) has helped my practical skills no end, but had little place in the test. Wish there was a damn speaking component to it.
Like I think you’re hinting at in your comment, I do know it’s pretty naive to expect to find work outside of ESL in Korea if I’m a mere BA (albeit almost MA now) graduate who can’t speak Korean fluently. It took me a good 4-5 years to learn that, but I DID learn it eventually! Because of that, studying Korean wise is about all I do these days, but after 3-4 years of doing that there’s little left to ’study’ per se. Instead, I’m in the position that I think many long-termers here are in: that they could be virtually fluent in 4-6 weeks if they were speaking Korean 8 hours a day, but never getting that chance because we’re teaching English instead…and not being able to speak Korean means we stay stuck in ESL. It’s a bit of Catch-22. If I was younger I could break the cycle by taking a month off and do a course to do just that, but as the male-breadwinner now I just don’t have the luxury.
Anyone else here feel like they’re trapped like this?
As per this last comment, as I understand it, that is a tremendous problem for foreigners here, having an alleged “international” school that has a majority of Korean kids who are not fluent in English, resulting in slowing down or killing a class. The price for this dubious education is amazing as well! No wonder many Korean parents send their kids abroad but now, expatriates should send their kids back as well!
This alone may end up driving many successful expatriates out of Korea in the long run.
Sorry in advance for the errors, I’m typing this on the ancient computer we have at work.
“#27, you are not trying hard enough. I know many foreigners in Korea working for Korean and foreign companies. Some have great deals and some might start off getting paid less than teachers and working more… but in the long run much more opportunities.
Myself, I took a 9-6pm (sometimes 7 or 8pm) job for a year with a finance company at 2 mill a month. Now I’m enjoying much better pay, overseas travel and future opportunities in HK, Tokyo, Australia and Europe”
Baek Du Boy (#33), thanks for the advice, but in all seriousness, Westerners in Korea who are not ESL teachers are like…ahem…feminine lesbians as fare as I’m concerned.
I know they EXIST, I’ve read about them, seen them in videos, and hell, am reading a blog written by one, but like all the lesbians I ever knew back in New Zealand, some of who were friends but who were all so uniformly butch that they could probably have beaten the crap out of me had they so desired, in 7 years here I’ve met precisely ONE person, a Gyopo, who didn’t have a job teaching English here.
Seriously, after banging my head against a brick wall trying for 5 years or so to get a non-ESL job here, I feel like somehow, somewhere there’s this secret cabal of non-ESLers out there, with secret handshakes and party cells and very stringent rules for admitting new members. I don’t know what I’ve been doing wrong, maybe I’m just butt ugly or something, but it’s getting to the stage where I think anyone claiming to have a non-ESL job here is part of some big conspiracy to keep my hopes alive…and then relish in them being crushed so mercilessly. I don’t know, maybe they survive by feeding on my life force or something.
I know, I need to move to Seoul, and am quite happy…oops, I mean prepared…to take a pay cut down to 2.0 million or so but again, with a baby daughter and non-working wife in tow, then I need a job to go to before I do that.
I have a non-ESL job, Brendon Carr has a non-ESL job; Sperwer has a non-ESL job; Robert Koehler has a non-ESL job… I’m sure there are others.
Never had an ESL job — then again English is not my native language anyway
dogbertt, I also said that people with jobs outside of ESL are like feminine lesbians to me…subtle code for “don’t take this comment too seriously.”
Re #44:
James, if this is the nail:
“…in 7 years here I’ve met precisely ONE person, a Gyopo, who didn’t have a job teaching English here.”
…then this is the hammer:
“I know, I need to move to Seoul”
In Seoul, you’ll find plenty of non-ESL expats, myself and my wife included. You may not meet them your first week here, but if you ask around, you’ll find ‘em.
Besides being probably a damned good English Teacher, what are your other professional skills, whether by training or practice ?
I taught English for 2-3 years before getting a Masters overseas, returning to do my thesis and study Korean.
During my thesis I got a great part time job (albeit teaching at a Korean engineering company) for three months. After that I had 6 months of teaching (illegally) at a variety of part time gigs, privates and whatever to make ends meet. These jobs are so fickle, come and go, end without warning, I need 500 words just to get started on the bullshit you have to face..all while studying Korean from 9-1pm everyday and spending more cash on tuition and expenses than what I was earning.
There are plenty of foreigners not working in ESL and I was lucky enough to know a few and managed to get a leg up for an interview into a 1 year entry level position (which did involve some proof reading and abuse of native english skill), I got the job and after learning the business I secured a permanent position - no ESL no proof reading.
The thing is, in Korea you always have teaching as a back up - and that can be a bad thing..and too many foreigners fall in that trap in Korea. Like Australia, US or anywhere, you have to know the right people, have the right skills, and be determined. Someone will see this and give you a chance.
In the corporate world, you will not be competing with other ESL teachers for a job. You will be competing with bilingual Koreans out of Yonsei and Seoul Dae, with other expat workers who have the right experience and education. What value can you add over these people?
My suggestion:
Get specific - what exactly do you want to do?, get specific knowledge and education, get experience (maybe an internship), get to know some people in the specific field or industry.
If all else fails….learn the secret handshake!
And i’m another who started here in ESL (never all that good at it), developed a hobby/interest, got serious about my hobby, found a niche and worked hard at it in “free time”, then turned my hobby into a great non-ESL career… having Fun now.
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