Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Chokse]

Come on T-J. Get real. In your first post, you answered the OP's question by saying:

"Korea hands down. Any day of the week and twice on Sunday. No contest."

You did not say, "Well, for my wife and me, we think Korea is the best place to raise our kids and here are the reasons..."

No, you made an emphatic statement claiming that Korea was the best place to raise kids, bar none!

Now you back away from this statement and tell us that you make 5x the average teacher's salary and you have lots of time to spend with your kids, and this is why you want to stay. Fair enough, but neither is a reason to necessarily stay in Korea.

Like you, I make a lot more than the average teacher (much more than 5x), I own an apartment in Korea and a house in the US. I also have more than enough free time to spend with my family.

However, what's the point? No matter how much I make, I will always be stuck in an apartment here in Korea. Unless you have millions and are willing to blow it on an overpriced house with property here in Seoul, you will never be out of the apartments. I hate them. You have people above and below you, next to you, no yard, small, cramped spaces, etc. Not my idea of "living the life."

Even though I have the time to spend with my kid, there's not actually much to do with him here. I want to go out in the yard and play catch, not throw the ball in the street or on a crowded playground! I want to go for bicycle rides around the neighborhood, not dodge cars and hope we survive.

While he's young, I want him to play with his friends after school, to climb a tree, to fish in the lake or river, to build a treehouse, to learn to swim, etc.

When he's older, I want him to have a part-time job, I want him to date, I want him to go to school dances, homecoming, and things like that. I want him to hang out with friends at the pizza joint, play high school sports, join things like the drama club, jazz band, or other school activities. I want to teach him to drive when he reaches that age.

I want him to have a life doing fun and interesting things. I want him to do what he wants to do, and I want him to have options. I don't want him to fall into the system I see here of kids doing nothing but eating, sleeping, and studying.

Maybe you have found a way for your kids to avoid this, but even if I were to raise my kid here, who the hell would he play with and hang out with? The other kids are all off studying at the hagwon.

If I'm not mistaken T-J, you run a hagwon. I find it a bit ironic that you talk about having time to spend with your kids while you run a hagwon. Do you think the kids at your hagwon have lots of time to spend with their parents? No, because they are spending their time outside of school going to your hagwon as well as other hagwons.

[Steelrails]

[flakfizer]

[PatrickGHBusan]

[rainism]

fair answer Patrick.

I actually think "groupthink" and "hierarchy" can be easily grown out of. as a teenager.. or easily ditched when convenient to do so.

I would think it'd be MUCH more difficult the other way around..(aka.. easier to culturally switch to Western, than become Eastern)

maybe that's just my cultural prism talking but that's how I see it.

btw re generation gap.. I think that is MUCH more narrow these days, then how typically used and understood.

The differences in North American generations after the Boomers are quite minimal. The big dividing age was people from the Depression Generation. then you had the boomers.. who underwent the HUGE cultural shift of the late 60's.

but from the X'ers to the Y's/Millenials.. I think the difference is tiny and unless there's another huge cultural shift/swing/event I expect it to stay that way.

the generational gaps remain much more rigid and noticeable in Koreans.. but then the country didn't rapidly start changing until 1990 or so.

p.s. interesting point on baby rearing. I had no idea. How Koreans can survive sleeping and working while abiding to the baby's "schedule" is beyond me though.

[PatrickGHBusan]

[Steelrails]

I'd say that for both Korea and the US, there is a huge gap between people who were raised on records/tapes/CDs, writing letters, wired telephones, basic TV, radio, going to the library, and watching traditional animation and movies with minimal CGI. And more importantly, growing up without Instant Music, email, 500 channels, on-demand music, wikipedia, CGI and whatnot.

I'd also throw in having a vague notion of the Cold War/Apartheid.

That and those that had the full on blast of the PC 90s and the Public Schools' agenda and the "culture wars".

There seems to be a huge gap in work ethic and sense of entitlement between those born around 1987 or before (though it started to manifest itself in those born around 81-82), give or take a year or two, and those born after as well as a general level of a lack in fundamentals and basic knowledge.

[Captain Corea]

I think that anyone coming here and saying Canada is the bomb! Or Korea is #1,1,1 or Don't choose Canada! or No one could ever live in Korea - is obviously missing out on what a lot of parents are saying here ... that being a parent is about trying to make the best choice possible.


For me, this is kind of how I look at it for my situation...

Korea
+Great grandparents
+Apartment complex living
+accommodating to a second language being spoken in public
-Pollution
-crowded
-road safety
-lack of experience with 'mixed' kids
-different areas of focus in Education than I'd prefer
-Health, Ed, general costs of raising a kid

Canada (specifically my home town of Calgary)
+Good network of friends and family
+having a house with a yard
+Having a large(ish) place to live in and grow a family in
+Free Health care
+free decent schools
-the weather
-the weather
-the weather
-Lack of Korean language Ed in schools

Work isn't an issue for me... I feel I succeed in either place.

[Eedoryeong]

I was just looking at the story of the Leiby Kleitz kid in New York and it seems to offer catalysts to each of a two-sided argument that seems to have started here.

Parents' choices obviously matter most but they're not the final word on creating a well-adjusted, productive, compassionate member of society. It does take a village to raise one kid. Denial of this tends to come from people who aren't parents, and often with oversimplified views.

Communities matter too. Sometimes this truth reflects more favorably on Korea in certain ways.

I don't think I've made any personal conclusion on that tragedy but it does touch a nerve that the parents did do all that could be asked of them (they did try to accommodate their kid's desire to walk home alone by carving out a route, and walking through it with them the day before) and the kid still ended up dead. It just cuts to the core, that story.

I just don't have any patience for these people who say it's all on the parents because obviously parents can't control every element of the kid's environment. I really think it's a kind of luxury afforded from a corrosive lifestyle to say that. Choosing your community is so important (and maybe why I was so preachy on this subject). Demons are everywhere but to some extent you can pick which ones you can lock horns with.

It is hindsight and I certainly don't want to come down as second-guessing the parents in this hour. I do think that maybe some safety sign-posts along the way (a familiar dentist's office perhaps, or a shopping mall or a copshop) might be good to incorporate into a similar future plan for another family. That and not letting him pick a way home before the age of 12, maybe. There are places where kids can explore these growing up milestones safely but even the most insular sheltered cul-de-sacs of NY do not seem to qualify as any.

I do so wish that the insight I feel I now have on this subject for a future similar possible request was not obtained at the expense of some Jewish kid's life in NY. R.I.P. Leiby

[Eedoryeong]

[rainism]

[Chokse]

Eedoryeong:

You may be right about future part-time jobs being some kind of online trading or something like that. It certainly seems possible and I guess only time will tell.

The reason I would prefer for my kids to have "traditional" part-time jobs is because I remember how having those kinds of jobs really taught me a sense of responsibility and how hard I had to work to earn money.

Those jobs (delivering newspapers, cutting grass, shoveling snow, working at restaurants and grocery stores) all taught me about responsibility. If I didn't get to work on time, I lost my job. If I didn't do what the boss/manager/customer wanted me to do, I got fired.

And, it took a lot of hours of work to earn any sizable amount of money, so it taught me not to piss money away on unimportant things.

I think there are certain things that "traditional" jobs teach that something like day trading might not teach. I certainly hope these types of jobs do not disappear, as I think they are a fundamental part of growing up and becoming a mature, responsible adult.

[TheUrbanMyth]

[Chokse]

Gladly. 243,000 students in 2009 (according to Chosun Ilbo, YTN, and Yonhap News). Very few families can afford to send more than one kid overseas to study. It is often the first son, or, if they have no sons, the oldest daughter.

If we are talking only families, it is still well over 100,000 and in all likelihood very close to 200,000. Not the 30,000 you claim.

http://www.nuffic.nl/home/news-events/newsletters/neso-e-newsletter/2010/march/market-information/korea/korean-students-spent-20ac-3-billion-on-study-abroad

I've given you a legitimate link to Korean news sources. Now it's your turn. Show me a legitimate link (from major Korean news sources) that shows only 30,000 families sent kids overseas in 2009 or 2010.

[Eedoryeong]