For Better Or Worse

I have noticed that there are several things that function significantly better in Korea, from the mundane to the random.  Here are a few things I've picked up on.

1) Department store escalators are AMAZING in Korea.  Rather than have regular escalators with those weird grocery-cart escalators that make your cart get stuck, they have moving sidewalks that go at an incline.  So you push your cart directly onto the same escalator that you are using.  The escalator floor is also special, and it has a special way that it grips the wheels of the cart so that you don't even have to hold it in place.  It doesn't slide around or anything.  So simple.  So useful.

2) Spicy food.  Most of you probably know that I absolutely hate and essentially refuse to eat most spicy foods back home in the states.  However, spicy food here is different, and I eat it by choice all the time.  In fact, my favorite food in Korea is a really spicy soup.  The difference is that in the U.S. spicy just sets your mouth, lips, tongue and throat on fire without any real benefit.  Sure, there is a little extra flavor, but NOTHING compared to the amount of flavor that comes with spicy Korean food.  Everything here is so incredibly delicious when it's spicy.  I prefer spicy foods to more bland ones here, which is the complete opposite of back home.

3) The postal system.  I ordered a camera online, and I received it in the mail two days later.  The company didn't ship it four business days after the order and I didn't have to wait two weeks after that for it to get to me.  I literally bought it online one afternoon and it was there less than 48 hours later, waiting for me at school.  The post office rarely has heinously long lines like back home, and transactions take all of two minutes maximum, even without speaking the language.  It's one of the easiest bureaucratic things I've ever done in my life.

4) Restaurant style dining.  Everything here is communal, so when you go to a restaurant they bring a bunch of sides and you order for the table.  Restaurants are most specialty foods, so there is no long menu.  You have about five options, and you just order for the number of people you have, and everyone eats together from the same large dish/frying pan in the middle of the table.  They have a lot of different kinds of restaurants, and you have to find the one that serves the food you want.  The best thing about it, however, is the price.  Korean people eat out pretty often, and it is entirely possible to eat out every night of the week (I pretty much do).  Every night my dinner costs between $4 and $7.  On top of that, everything is filling and delicious.  It is essentially the same cost as buying groceries and cooking for yourself.  Added bonus: tipping is actually considered rude here.  So when they say something costs 5,000 won (about $4), it already has service fees, tip, and taxes built in.  AMAZING.

5) Levels of trust.  Parents here sometimes get offended if you aren't affectionate with their children because it means you don't care about them.  You don't get yelled at for hugging kids, or letting them snuggle up with you during storytime.  You don't get in trouble.  Nobody thinks anything evil of you, nobody sues.  Parents trust teachers wholeheartedly.  It's kind of nice not to have to inwardly chastise myself for holding a kid's hand while I walk them to the bathroom, or for wrestling with them during play time, or for picking them up and carrying them around as a joke.  It's really nice to not have to think "Oh god, is that too much touching?" or feel dirty and uncomfortable when there is absolutely nothing dirty about being affection with my kids.  Plus my kids are freaking awesome.

Things that are not better.

1) No one speaks a language I speak.  This is obviously my fault rather than theirs.

2) They wear some UGLY clothes here.  Some of the kids in my class have these weird pants that are jeans in front and sweats in the back.  I have no idea what their purpose is.  It's literally just pants that are made of denim on the front side and sewed to sweat pant fabric on the backside.  Why?  Because they like to.

3) Korea makes me hate Americans because I see so many of them act in awful ways toward Koreans and/or each other.  Last night in Iteawan (the foreigner section of Seoul) we went to a few Halloween parties.  On the way to one of them, there was a young Korean boy riding his bike in front of us.  He was twelve, maybe thirteen.  He was minding his own business, riding his bike down the sidewalk, and out of nowhere some white guy going the opposite direction reaches out and shoves him over sideways into the wall, knocking him off his bike.  The guy didn't even say anything.  He just did it, and then laughed and walked away.  Foreigners here seem to retain the American superiority complex that we have when we're sitting pretty at home.  Somehow they bring it with them, even when they're outnumbered and there are actually faces to put to the people we conceive of as somehow beneath us.  I don't understand that mentality.   I have absolutely no idea how people can be so ignorant as to come here and honestly expect everyone to speak English, and to call them idiots when they don't.  You're in their country, why don't you learn to speak their language?  I feel like a jerk for not speaking it better, and I'm trying to learn as much as possible and already know more than a lot of other foreigners.  And yet, nearly every time I meet foreigners there is one person in the group who calls Koreans idiots, or says something rude, or treats them with disdain.  I am completely at a loss to explain it.  I guess this isn't worse in Korea, but just something about being here that annoys me.  I can't ignore the ignorance of my own countrymen anymore.  My own ignorance was bliss.  I kind of understand why people in other countries hate us sometimes, if this is a common way for Americans to behave abroad.

Sweaty Kids, Fanny Packs, and a Cultural Difference I Can't Wrap My Head Around

This entry is going to be three short things, and then an explanation that COMPLETELY bamboozles me.

1) Ryan is the sweatiest kid I've ever seen in my LIFE.  It's actually kind of funny, but every day during gym he gets so into the games that by the end of the lesson (which is only 30 minutes) he is absolutely pouring sweat.  From about two minutes after stretches end you can see the beads of sweat start to slowly make their bid for freedom from his temples.  But he's so joyful that somehow it isn't even a little bit gross.  I don't know how to explain it.  Today in gym they played robot dance and musical chairs (yeah, that counts as gym-- sad) which is always great to watch.  Dancing to kids the world over seems to be nothing more than jumping up and down and flailing.  Not that it's much more than that with most adults, but still.  Steve is the funniest kid at this, because he just does the robot the whole time, and then some stuff that looks like low-rent karate followed by a little air guitar, all the while with the hugest grin I've ever seen plastered on his face.  Cutest kid in history.  Anyway, Ryan.  He gets so concentrated and into gym.  He's so intense about it that I actually start to worry about him, until he wins a game and breaks out into cheers and falls onto his knees and leans back, closing his eyes and holding up his two fists screaming "Ole!"  which, oddly, is a phrase commonly used by both Korean children and adults due to a funny commercial that featured it.  

2) We found a hookah bar last weekend, which I forgot to write about.  They only had beer or red wine and a bunch of food.  We got a fruit plate, which was FULL of fresh pineapple, Asian pears, honeydew, cherry tomatoes, Korean grapes, and several other fruits which were all perfectly ripe.  It was really good.  They had only one flavor of hookah (blueberry, which isn't a particularly great flavor), but still, it was great to be there.  The decor was really awesome too.  I'll be posting pictures on Facebook.  I'm thinking about getting an account on a photo website for those of you who are Facebook-less.  Thoughts?

3) Cal (in my Grade 2 class) wore a fanny pack today.  It had multiple pockets and cartoon characters on it.  For some reason it reminded me of my dad.  Maybe because he wears fanny packs even when we tell him not to, and whenever we steal or hide them he magically manages to find more as if it's 1992 and they spontaneously sprout from the walls.  Who knows why.

Now, the cultural lesson of the day.

Dating in Korea is extremely strange to me, coming from the Western perspective.  First, the only way to start a relationship with someone is to be set up on a blind date by a mutual friend.  If you like them, you keep seeing them for a few more dates.  Then, if you still like them, you become boyfriend and girlfriend.  Then, and only then, do you kiss for the first time.  There is no kissing frogs to find your prince, no stupid drunken mistakes, NO sex with someone who isn't your partner, no friends with benefits.  There is also no intimate contact of any kind with people who are not your significant other, even if you are single.  Meaning there is no cuddling at the movies with a friend of the opposite sex, no walking with your arms around each other, nothing like that.  You are either together and allowed to touch or you just don't touch at all.  Many of the women in my Korean group are in their late 20s and early 30s and have never really had a boyfriend because none of their blind dates went particularly well.  Can you imagine that?  One of the women is 29 and hasn't gone on a date in 6 YEARS!  She only went on six or seven blind dates in her life, and they never really went beyond seeing each other once or twice.  I'm being polite and haven't asked (I asked her about dating in Korea and she told me all this) but that probably means she is 29 years old and has never been kissed.  I don't understand that at all.  Even if you randomly meet someone and get along well and there's a spark, you don't really exchange numbers and meet up again.  You just have to pray that a mutual friend comes out of the woodwork and sets the two of you up, I guess.  She said sometimes it happens, but not often.   How does anyone ever end up meeting someone they really love?  How does anyone ever end up meeting anyone at all?  Friends and family, I love you but I don't trust you enough to find the love of my life for me.  Sorry.

A Festival, a Parade, a Psychotic Photographer, and a Soccer Game

Yesterday there was a festival at Paldalmun, the south gate of the Suwon fortress, in honor of the fortress.  My teaching partner Young invited me, and so I met her there with Tween, Kristen, Cally, and Erica.  Young's friend Seo ra also met us.  We walked around a bit and went to a huge food festival area, where there were tents with all sorts of foods.  Young got a really yummy beef skewer, which she shared with everyone, and then I got a delectable chicken skewer.  

Here's the weird part.  After I got my skewer, we went off to stand somewhere and eat.  While I was eating, this Korean man with a huge professional camera came running over to me and started taking photos of me eating the skewer.  I was pretty uncomfortable because I hate having my picture taken, but he wouldn't leave me alone.  Then another man saw what he was doing and came over and started taking pictures too.  I was bright red, my face was covered in sauce, all my friends were laughing at me and talking about how much I was blushing, and these men had probably snapped about ten photos each.  I finally just posed for a photo and then, when they didn't stop, literally ran away.  

They chased me.  

Sometimes it's a bit awkward being white in Korea.   I am extraordinarily white here.  My body is shaped very differently from theirs, my hair is much lighter than even most foreigners' hair, and my eyes are big and bright blue.  I seem to be targeted more than Kristen, whose hair is dark brown and straight, or Cally, whose eyes are not as bright blue as mine.  Later, during the parade, another man came up to the table where we were sitting, leaned across the whole thing and waved directly in my face (I was sitting away from the sidewalk).  Even after I said hello he didn't leave, so I turned away toward the street and about thirty seconds later he left.  It's really weird to stand out so much.  Tween and I hang out a lot, and she hates it because she isn't used to people staring at her since she's Vietnamese and blends in more.

After the food we found a spot to sit for the parade.  While we were sitting there, a parade organizer came over and plopped down a large plastic bottle of Hite (one of the main Korean beers) and some paper cups.  For free.  I know that drinking is not necessarily frowned upon in the United States, but here it's almost insulting if you don't drink.  Everyone drinks, at all hours of the day, in the open, behind closed doors, in front of the kids, liquor, beer, wine, whatever.  EVERYONE drinks.  

The parade was really cool, and I took tons of photos.  Because last weekend when we were at Chang Gyung Gung Kristen broke her camera, she took my digital camera and took pictures with it while I used my SLR and took about three rolls of black and white.  Now I just need to find somewhere to develop them all.  After the parade we went up the street and ate some delicious mandoo, which are kind of like potstickers, but with thinner dough.  Essentially they are just amazingly good dumplings.

Then today, Shannon wanted to go to a soccer game, so she, Tonya, Tween and I met up and went to Suwon's World Cup Stadium to watch them play against Ulsan (and no, I don't know where Ulsan is.  In Korea somewhere, I’d imagine).  We found out later it was a semifinal match.  The Suwon team is supposedly the best team in South Korea, so it was pretty entertaining.  We bought a few six packs and just chilled while we watched them WIN!  It was really fun and relaxing.  Soccer is a pretty big deal here.  They have sections for the die hard fans, where it seems you can't sit unless you're wearing the team's colors.  They sing songs there, and do special dances that go with the songs (which is cool to watch since a whole section of people are all moving together) and get really into it.  I enjoyed myself a lot.

It was a busy weekend, but a fun one, too.

Weekend in Hongdae and No More Office

Last weekend all the teachers at the school except Tara went to Hongdae, which is a party section of Seoul near the local university.  We stayed in a hostel, all in one room.  Kristen, Cally, Tween, and I went a bit earlier on Saturday than everyone else because Tonya and Shannon had to work, and we hung out for a bit.  We got some gkalbi and just relaxed and played drinking games.  Then everyone else got there and we got ready to go out (even though we weren't leaving for hours) and played more drinking games.  While we were hanging out, other people who were staying in the hostel showed up and were hanging out in the living room.  We were in the dining room, and a few guys were loitering nearby, and being Kelsey, I yelled at them to come drink with us.  They were a couple of Americans who are here in the army and live like, twenty minutes away from Suwon, where we live.  They ended up being pretty cool, so we invited them out with us, and met up with their friend at a bar down the street.  We started at one bar and then went to a couple of clubs.

The first club SUCKED.  We got downstairs and the entire place was so smoky you couldn't really see anyone's face, and the dance floor was so packed that you weren't so much dancing as just rubbing your butt all over random people.  It was tiny and cramped, and HOT, and I in general hated it.  But I figured, make the best of it and dance for a little while, you know, why not?  

Why not?  Because Korean men do not understand "no I do not want you to grind yourself on me to your hearts content get away from me right now please thank you."  I actually would move away from a guy to a different part of the dance floor and they would follow me.  I shoved one guy because he was getting too handsy, and it didn't deter him even a little.  Tween and I eventually went and sat in a corner of the club and drank water and tried to avoid people altogether.  Finally, everyone was ready to leave.  Shannon, Holly, and Chris all went home because they were tired and it was about 2 a.m. at that point.  We decided to go to another club and had a really good time.  Then, at about 5 a.m., we went home.  Most of us weren't that drunk, though a few were.  When we got back, we hung out with the guys at the hostel for a while before going to bed.  It was fun in general.  I think Kristen stayed up until about 7 a.m.  I wouldn't know.  I was a good girl, and was in bed by 5:45.  

On Monday afternoon, the director of the school came down to meet with us, and informed us that they're converting the basement teacher's offices into a parking lot.  I'm sorry, what?  Right, and then the first floor that is currently a parking lot will become a bank.  Okay.... so where do we go?  We're getting new offices upstairs, and will have to be out of the basement by the end of the day on Tuesday.  Okay, and we move upstairs?  Oh, no, the upstairs was recently a restaurant, but they have to gut the whole thing and do construction to turn it into offices and a library.  It won't be done for at least two weeks, more likely a month.  Okay... so where do we go?  Our classrooms.  No more offices.  The gym room is being taken away to hold the lunches, which used to go downstairs, so we have to have gym in our classrooms.  How, I don't know.  And what about breaks?  What about the 15 minute unpaid break we get in the middle of the day when the kids are still there so that they can work us 29.6 hours and not have to go over 30 hours and pay us overtime?  We take that break in the room.  While the kids are there.  So, really it's not a break.  How do you tell a child whose first language isn't English that you can't play cars with him because you're on your break?  On Monday they told us to plan through next Wednesday.  Then Tuesday, at 11:30 while we are all teaching, they sent us an email.  It's actually going to be at least the next two full weeks that we will need to be planned for, because we won't have internet access or access to printers or copiers for at least that long.  Also, pack up everything in our desks by the end of the day.  This fall under the category of different expectations of staff in Korea, which I spoke about in a previous entry.  Here we are expected to do anything the company says, no matter how absurd, and to not complain.

Then they had the TPs (our Korean teaching partners) move the entire supply room up two floors, and got mad at them when they couldn't finish it in one day.  Mind you, they were supposed to use their break time, not paid time or class time, to do this, meaning they had a regular workload as well as the task of moving and organizing about twenty shelves worth of supplies.

Sometimes it’s hard to work in an environment where administration is unrealistic and deaf to even the most constructive criticisms.