Korean Job Discussion Forums

[rmo1127]

Hi,

I'm new here, so please excuse any misinformation or dumb comments/questions. My fiance and I became interested in teaching in Korea a few months ago. After doing some research and networking, we've been offered jobs at the same school in Yongin.

I've tried looking for previously posted info on here, but the only references to Yongin I've seen have been about Everland and the Korean Folk Village.

We would greatly appreciate hearing experiences and opinions of Yongin, as well as photos if anyone has them. I've had a hard time finding much of anything on the city (in English) on Google. Any other advice for a couple of first-timers is also welcome, of course.

Thanks in advance, Bob

[iammac2002]

There's a US army base in Yongin. I spent many weekends there with my then bf. It's a very nice place, although the only place I've been to close to Yongin is Everland and Suwon.

[zappadelta]

Prospective teachers often ask questions like 'How is Yongin?', 'What's it like in Suwon?', 'How is life in Bundang?'

You need to be more specific. If you are looking for an accurate description of where you might be living/teaching for the next year of your life, you need to find out where in Yongin. It's a big city. Some areas are cool (like Jukjeon/Suji), some are God awful (like Shingal).

Sorry OP, don't mean to blast you, but this kind of question comes up all the time.

[PigeonFart]

Satellite imagery can give a rough indication of how rural/urbanized a place is.

Yongin...
http://www.wikimapia.org/#lat=37.278219&lon=127.115078&z=14&l=0&m=b&v=8

[kangnam mafioso]

i worked in the suji area of yongin. a lot of construction was going on and so the air quality wasn't good. pretty boring place really -- apartment building ..pc bang ... sauna... grocery....apartment building ....hogwan...hogwan...hogwan....apartment building ... pc bang... hogwan ... oriental medicine shop ... god awful western fushion restaurant ... apart-uh...sauna.....


hey ... sounds like all of korea, doesn't it?

kangnam, seoul is 40 minutes by bus

[Oreovictim]

I hate Yong-in. I lived on the Yong-in/Bundang border in this horrible apartment complex called Easy View Apartments.

Here's how far away you'll be from Seoul. Go to this link and click on the subway map. Follow the end of the yellow line until you get to "Ori." (Actually, Ori is the last stop in Bundang. It's not on the map, but there's still Jukjeon and maybe one other one in Yong-in, so you'll be even farther away.)

But I've met people who actually like Yong-in, so to each his own.

http://images.search.yahoo.com/images/view?back=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.search.yahoo.com%2Fsearch%2Fimages%3Fp%3Dseoul%2Bsubway%2Bmap%26ei%3DUTF-8%26fr%3Dyfp-t-501%26fr2%3Dtab-web&w=1500&h=1015&imgurl=southkorea.hotel-club-net.com%2Fimages%2Fseoul_subway_map.gif&rurl=http%3A%2F%2Fsouthkorea.hotel-club-net.com%2Fseoul-subway-map.htm&size=283k&name=seoul+subway+map...&p=seoul+subway+map&oid=15ac593d7262596e&fr2=tab-web&no=2&tt=647&sigr=11pjr0shl&sigi=11p08b04i&sigb=1319ud809

[rmo1127]

Zappadelta, I don't feel blasted, so no problem. I'll try to be more specific as to what I do know, and what I don't know. If we go, it won't be until after we get married in April, so we're still trying to research this as much as possible before we agree to anything.

I'll start from the beginning. A family friend introduced me to a Korean woman who lives in my city (Omaha, NE). Her kids grew up in the US, so they speak perfect English. One of her relatives in Korea runs a couple schools, one of which is a montessori school in Yongin called Jayeon Academy. Her son is teaching there right now. We haven't been able to get ahold of him by email yet, but we're trying. He should be able to answer all of our questions about working conditions and that sort of thing, but if anyone is familiar with this school, all comments are welcome. I don't know what area of Yongin the school is located in, nor do I know exactly where we'll be living.

At this point, we're just trying to picture life in Yongin. How is traffic? Is it so small of a city that there are no larger grocery stores? Is there anywhere good for shopping? (for my future wife) Being somewhat of a tourist destination, is food and entertainment expensive compared to the rest of the country? How is public transportation? What else is there to the city aside from Everland and the Folk Village?

Thank you to everyone who has replied so far.

[Oreovictim]

Ask this to the recruiter - wait, forget that - ask the foreign teachers this - "How close is the nearest subway station?" I wouldn't accept if it's more than a 10 minute walk. Even then, as I said, you'll be at the end of the Bundang Line.

[Jane]

I lived in Suji once. I left after 5 days.

[Intrepid]

The city is pretty lousy. The Jukjeon area, of which Suji is a part, is nice.
This thread covered it a while back:
http://forums.eslcafe.com/korea/viewtopic.php?t=151855&highlight=jukjeon

[Illysook]

My recruiter told me that I would be in Yongin and that I would be one half hour from Seoul. Instead, I am 1 and 1/2 to 2 hours from mosts places in Seoul on the border between Yongin and Gwangju City.

Don't believe recruiters. Get the address of the school and do Google maps or some other kind of GIS search...and even that may not be helpful. Korea is very crowded and a place in the middle of nowhere can look like a crowded, trashy, and dirty sort of ghetto.

[doc_ido]

As other posters have pointed out, Yongin is a very big place. It would take you well over two hours to drive from one end (Baegam-myeon) to the other (Suji-gu). If you let us know where this school is, we might be able to be more specific about what you can expect in the area.

[joshua7choi]

about Yongin => http://en.yonginsi.net/

Bus info - part 1
Kyounghi Uni <=> Jamsil Sta (# 1007-1, #5600, 6900 bus, 78min')
Suji <=> Kangnam (#1550, #3001 bus, 37min')
Jukjeon <=> Samsung sta' (#9414 bus, 78 min')

Bus info - part 2
Yongin Express Bus Terminal <=> Kangnam (50min')

I wish above info proves useful
with care
Josh http://soteria.nehard.kr/index.php

[rmo1127]

I've been told that the school is in Suji. The address is 3047-5 Jukjeon-dong Yongin-si. Anyone ever heard good/bad things about Jayeon Academy?