| View previous topic :: View next topic |
| Author |
Message |
adventureman
Joined: 18 Feb 2003
|
 Posted: Mon Apr 05, 2004 11:20 pm Post subject: Does anybody else ever have days where you feel... |
 |
|
..
Last edited by adventureman on Sat Oct 08, 2005 1:35 am; edited 1 time in total |
|
| Back to top |
|
 |
Psy
Joined: 11 Sep 2003
Location: Hongdae
|
| Posted: Mon Apr 05, 2004 11:30 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| I'd recommend lots of alcohol to relieve that pain. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
kangnamdragon
Joined: 17 Jan 2003
Location: Kangnam, Seoul, Korea
|
| Posted: Mon Apr 05, 2004 11:31 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| I wore a cough mask today and nobody looked at me. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Mosley
Joined: 15 Jan 2003
|
| Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 12:03 am Post subject: |
|
|
Sometimes it feels more like Kafka than Orwell.
Soju can only go so far in relieving the pain. Do the best you can in their crap system but at the end of the day let the grief fall on THEM. If the powers that be won't change things(e.g. EPIK) and the natives want to behave like xenophobic hicks, well, so be it. Don't let it drive you mad-look for a better gig in or out of Korea as you please. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
caniff
Joined: 03 Feb 2004
Location: All over the map
|
| Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 12:39 am Post subject: |
|
|
I also get sick of the hundreds of hellos a day. I generally try to hide between classes. Also the constant smiling. My face hurts at the end of the day, but I think it's in my own interest to keep a cheery attitude with the students. Not that I'm a grinning fool (I don't think  ), but the constant greetings during the day provoke this. Anyway, I can relate to pretty much everything adventureman says, although the students at my school are older and perhaps A BIT more adept at English. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
shawner88
Joined: 01 Feb 2003
|
| Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 1:18 am Post subject: |
|
|
Yeah definitely.
Shawn teacher, hello! hello teacher, hello!, game, GAME, GAME! let's play game together, no study, hello, hello!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Seems like the Twilight Zone. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
jajdude
Joined: 18 Jan 2003
|
| Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 7:55 am Post subject: |
|
|
| Sounds a bit like something one can only wish for in Korea.... to be regarded as another person. I think in the minds of most locals, whether they ever verbalize it or not, foreigners are not in the same category. We are more an amusing variety of humans than actual humans. And many, I believe, are just too ignorant to even question this categorization. And many kids are too ignorant to realize how rude they are. And well, perhaps all a sad product of their limited culture. All cultures are limited, but doesn't Korea's seem extraordinarily narrow? |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
kiwiboy_nz_99
Joined: 05 Jul 2003
Location: ...Enlightenment...
|
| Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 10:31 am Post subject: |
|
|
| Quote: |
| All cultures are limited, but doesn't Korea's seem extraordinarily narrow? |
Yes. There's no joy here, they don't know how to create life styles ... |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
djsmnc
Joined: 20 Jan 2003
Location: Dave's ESL Cafe
|
| Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 6:50 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| One thing I enjoy about being in the center of Seoul is that I don't get a single "Hello" like I did outside of the city. Feels kind of good actually. Outsideof the city, people I didn't know knew me, and it felt weird sometimes. Had to privatize my philandering and evening behavior. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Crois
Joined: 18 Aug 2003
Location: You could be next so watch out.
|
| Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 7:10 pm Post subject: |
|
|
I just tell them quickly to dig themselves a hole and jump in it. They get confused and I feel happier than if I had said hello.
I try and teach them funny stuff. Got one class to go up to the other foreign teacher or my flatmate to say Quiet you and point. Funny seeing them do it. Try and get them to be creative. Say where are you going? If they say home say no and point to a map. Ahh teacher may I go to India?
But the hello does piss me off. I just dont listen to it anymore. I just stare back and frown. If it is one of my students and i dont listen they get angry and the next day it's like, teacher no hello yesterday. I'm like i dont give a feck. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Toby
Joined: 15 Jan 2003
Location: Wedded Bliss
|
| Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 7:12 pm Post subject: Re: Does anybody else ever have days where you feel... |
|
|
| adventureman wrote: |
| ....like living in this place is being in a George Orwell novel?...just a random thought...Perhaps the hollywood celebrity/space alien treatment was wearing a little thin on me today...I mean, being the only foreigner in two schools the size of small towns, being shouted "migook-saram!" and "hello!" to 600 times a day but being unable to hold anything resembeling a real conversation with ANY of the students and only one or two teachers, being treated like a novelty by thousands of children everyday, many of whom don't care about english and only know their three or four sentences drilled into them by the national cirriculum (which in itself is flawed and not respective of true native speaker parlance), getting little to no support from home room teachers, many of whom also can't speak english and are slowly quashing the students hopes for ever achieving anything falling outside the realms of 'acceptable' behavior by KOREAN standards in front of my very little eyes, can all get a little wearing at time...Just curious, anybody else in my position (teaching elementary public school in two schools the size of small towns) understand what I am coming from?... Oh well! I suppose nothing comes for free these days, least of all the paycheque on gets every month from being a foreign English teacher in the public elementary schools of Korea...However, today I really did wonder, during my mad dash to one of my twenty two classrooms, holding forty of my 850 completley teacher-centered students, most of whom have no reading writing or speaking ability in English, if Korea will ever advance to the point where I could actually walk into one of my schools and NOT be accorded some kind of special treatment by SOMEBODY becasue I'm not Korean and be treated like an actual HUMAN BEING for once...I guess were still a few hundered years off before Koreans wake up and realize that ultra nationalism is an unaccetable alternative in this era of high-speed globalization..... |
Can you use paragraphs please? |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
adventureman
Joined: 18 Feb 2003
|
| Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 8:25 pm Post subject: |
|
|
..
Last edited by adventureman on Sat Oct 08, 2005 2:16 am; edited 2 times in total |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Toby
Joined: 15 Jan 2003
Location: Wedded Bliss
|
| Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 9:10 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| adventureman wrote: |
Yeah, I know, many people reading this probably just dismissed me off as a grumpy old f*cker with bad spelling (who also happens to be under 24 years old)...and yes i know its just a "different culture".... and I know they don't know any different...and I know they're just being nice, blah blah...and no Korea is not a terrible place by any means...and yes, I have had many positive experiences here...however, being treated like a celebrity/space alien by thousands of little ones everyday in one confined little area (classroom, cafeteria, computer room, teachers room, bathroom, playground, hallway,..there is NO refuge from this kind of treatment), combined with with inability to carry on anything resembling a conversation with anybody all day (sans one or two Koreans), combined with uphill struggle to educate massive classes of elementary students, many of whom are low-level, in english "conversation" whose learning style and education system is in constantly in conflict with what I was raised to believe in (without relegating myself to a tape recorder role), is all starting to take its toll on me a little bit....
Ever wanted to truely view this country from the inside out? Join the EPIK program!!!!
And Mosely, yes I am bored and yes I would ditch my dinky little place if had the chance but unfortunetly I went ahead and got myself into a serious relationship with somebody...and I promised this person I would stay put for at least another year...so now looks like I have to wait another year here in movie star land before I can jump the Good Ship EPIK (dont even want to think about working for a hagwon) and try teaching over in Japan for a year (which is where I would really like to go next now that I have saved lots of dough)  .... |
A little better.
You can still use some more though. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
kangnamdragon
Joined: 17 Jan 2003
Location: Kangnam, Seoul, Korea
|
| Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 9:13 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Yes, sometimes the whole world is just backwards and 180 degrees around. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
|
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Usergroups
Register
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
