Job Discussion Forums

[anthyp]

[4nic8r]

I can't believe some of the things they talk about on the Korean board. It's like they take any thought, start a topic on it, and then argue.

Some examples:

My shoelaces are untied. Discuss.

A student sneezed on me, what should I do?

Help! I can't get the plastic off my new cd!

It's amazing how many responses they get to those posts though...

[The Great Wall of Whiner]

I did Korea for 3 years.

I consider living in Korea as a love/hate relationship. The problem with Korea is that there are so many new-grads just parachuting into Korea and having massive culture shock.

(The bad manners of Koreans don't help either).

Also, Koreans tend to be quite nationalistic, and can NEVER recieve constructive critisism about anything. They take great offense to the smallest slight.

I'll write more later. I have a hot date and she just arrived.

[schwa]

I'm pleased to see a discussion about Korea over here. These boards were once an inclusive free-for-all but the split seems to have relegated Korea to another planet! Forbidden planet, at that.

In fact Korea is a viable & important option for expat english teachers. Its a prosperous little country with a good standard of living & there are a lot of efl teachers here (10000+ I read recently). Most are living well & saving some serious coin at the same time.

The Korea forums have a personality of their own that bears little resemblance to the reality of living here. Bad news always gets all the press, doesnt it? Useful as a heads-up as to what to watch out for but the happy campers who did their homework before coming are underrepresented. They're otherwise busy enjoying their lives here.

Theres much to like living here, & there can be serious exasperations too. Its largely a choice of focus.

I've had 5 great years here. I spent 2 years at a hagwon (many of them are decent) & 3 years with the public school system now. I love my work. 95% of the foreigners I've known personally here have also done well for themselves.

[buddy bradley]

Korea is right up there with Singapore on the 'most boring places in Asia' list.

I'd rather clean toilets in Cameroon than return to Korea.

[schwa]

Then theres people like buddy who stink up the korea forums.

Keeps it lively!

[hamel]

this post was deleted

[chi-chi-]

There are a couple of reasons why people on the Korean forum post so much:
1. Many Korean jobs will keep you at work 10-12 hours a day, even during meal breaks, and even when you have no classes scheduled ("Don't you have to prep?", etc etc) For many of the teachers, the only saving grace is that there is usually a computer lab or a computer around. Thus, it is easy to post while under the guise of "lesson preparation" (even if you had all of your lessons prepared hours earlier, you still have to "look busy.")
2. Yes there are more younger people, and younger people apparently like to talk online more than the older folks (compare the Korea board to the Japan and Saudi boards, where the ex-pats are much older.)
I wasn't kidding about #1 above....at many schools, there would be teachers having nervous breakdowns if it weren't for the computer lab (and in some cases, the school phone). In many schools, it seems like the only communication with the outside world (especially since there are so many schools where there is only ONE foreign teacher, and everyone else speaks broken English). At my last school, I wasn't fortunate enough to have a computer...the only thing that kept me from going ballistic was the fact that there was a gym in the same building, which I COULD technically use...I wasn't allowed to leave the building but luckily the gym was in it.

[matthews_world]

[zaneth]

Wow, it is wild over there. Check out the thread about the transgender women's cycling champion. And here's a related link:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/siwomen/2002/november/switching_gears/

[chi-chi-]

[quote="matthews_world"][quote="chi-chi-"]
Partially true. Kindergarten jobs start around 10am and go to about 2pm but you aren't actually teaching all that time. Then you'll have elementary kids from say 430-7pm. You're there for a long period of the day but you are still teaching maybe 25 hours a week.

Same for adults. 7am splits are common. Same total hours.

Your straight elem/middle school hagwon hours are 330-9pm, 25 hours per week.

[sanadamushi]

I too was in Korea, 1996-1997. I was very young, right out of uni. What an incredible shock. I was intellectually interested in Korea, wrote my thesis on the student movement, and was coming expecting to find all these freedom fighters, but found society to be materialistic to the extreme, not too much different than home.

The traffic accidents I witnessed almost daily (Economist ranks Korea 4th in world for traffic fatalities), pushing, shoving, spitting, refusal of service because I was a foreigner at times, fights that would break out everywhere.

I was fortunate to teach for ECC, I had many extra work opportunities with them and I still think about some of the students I had. My Korean co-workers were o.k. I can relate to a lot of the stuff on the Korean forum, it should scare some sense into you, but you will come nonetheless because it is just too damn interesting.

[desultude]