Korean Job Discussion Forums

[LilyOfTheNileValley]

Judging by people's comments on here, one would come to the conclusion that Korea is a racist country where bosses and Korean colleagues are rude to you and you work long hours (30 hours of actual teaching, which could easily amount to 40-50 hours when you include the planning and preparation work).

The thing is, I really wanted to work in Japan but I couldn't find any jobs there - seems like there's fierce competition because it's the land of Manga, sushi and Harajuku - coolness. I then thought about Korea because I could easily get a job there as a recent graduate with less than 1 years' teaching experience. I also thought I could save up more money, travel to Japan during my holidays and even travel to other countries like Thailand, China, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia etc (though I wonder, how much travelling can you actually do if you only have 10 days paid vacation?) And I tried Korean food and loved it and was convinced Korea was probably as good a place as Japan to teach English, as they say, the way to a man's (woman's in my case) heart is through his stomach!

I think I might go no matter how many horror stories I read because the fact of the matter is, I need to work and I need to keep earning money. Is that a good enough reason to go to Korea?

I think I'll have to forget people's comments and hope that I manage to get a nice job with a good school and have friendly and respectful co-workers.

[Goon-Yang]

Happy people are out doing happy things. The bored or the miserable are the ones who need to share their misery with everyone else.

It's human nature. Most people don't share good things, but will moan and groan about the crap that hits them.

Korea can be great. Korea can also be a pile of sh!t. Depends on you, your boss, where you're working...


Don't read Dave's and think this is the norm of Korea. There are about 20,000 foreigners here and only a few 100 post here. All the others have lives and don't bother with Dave's.

I guess I'm somewhere in the middle

[okayden223]

It's worse than people say. Now there are mandatory beatings at the airport when you arrive and they confiscate all of your stuff, including the clothes you are wearing, and put you naked on plane back to where you came from. The flight is nice though.

[asmith]

Korea is actually kind of cool. You just have to have a lot of patience.

[andrewchon]

Why would you want to leave London and come to Korea? If you want to travel then you backpack. If you have EU passport, you can quite easily teach in France, Spain and Eastern Europe. Don't pay attention to okayden223. Better yet come to Korea and find out for yourself why despite all the warning thousands flock to the feast each year.

[okayden223]

Don't pay attention to AndrewChon. There's no money teaching in Europe. Probably a much better time and more to do, but you'll only be making enough to get by. Most places in Eastern Europe don't offer housing, from what I've seen. Also I forgot to say that they shave your head before putting you back on the plane. If you are bald or already have shaved head, they super glue a ridiculous Beatles wig on you. Not the worst experience I've ever had.

[andrewchon]

Do you think people pay attention to what I say? My, am I at a wrong website.

[okayden223]

Nevertheless you are full of good insight from what I have read in the past. I guess I've tired of the "Will I die in Korea?" type posts. Bottom line...luck of the draw my friends...luck of the draw. I feel extremely fortunate every time I read about someone's hagwon closing up shop and refusing to pay what was agreed upon. However I have yet to meet anyone here in person that has had to deal with that directly. Obviously it does happen, but I think it's more the exception than the rule.

[fraukoch]

I would reckon around 50% of foreigners don't last a year here. That says some frightening things about both the country and the people who decide to live here.

[okayden223]

I've met a decent cross section of foreigners teaching English here and, for some reason, I've only known maybe 2 who decided to leave early and both did it for external reasons. One guy had a job offer back in the UK that he couldn't pass up and another had a death in the family. You just have to be mentally strong and unless you're just being completely taken advantage of, you should stick out the year and fulfill your obligation.

[t1m1ty]

From what I got from this forum is that people tend to vent their problems here. So, I guess all the good talk about Korea is just not being said.

[lifeinkorea]

Korean women and food are superior, they are uber

The lack of communication between schools and foreign teacher is not.
The apartment rent issue where you have to put up 5 grand as a security deposit is not.
The language is difficult to learn and therefore not "uberish".
The lack of combs that have a normal shape of a comb is not. I have never seen one in Korea that is normal sized and doesn't have one of those handle things attached to it.

And the big unuberish aspect of coming to Korea is that you are OWNED buddy boy, you are OWNED!!! You cannot work at multiple locations. You have to wait until slave trade time on an E2 visa to work at another school.

So decide, do you want delicious food and beautiful women?

[okayden223]

I have yet to encounter a 5 grand security deposit. I have signed two contracts here, one public and one private, and both were capped at 900k won divided into (3) 300k won installments. If you are being made to put down 5k in US dollars then you are getting jerked.

[okayden223]

The food and the beauty of the women are fantastic though, I have to agree.

[Goon-Yang]