Korean Job Discussion Forums

[mithridates]

I'm in Dandong China now for those who don't know. Internet is cheap but slow, this keyboard is sticky, typing isn't that easy. The computer also froze up after I signed in for the first time in four days and so I don't know which messages I've read and which I haven't...all that precious ESL Cafe knowledge down the drain.
As most people know Dandong is right across the river from Shinuiju, North Korea, which is really really close. I'm from Calgary; imagine North Korea being on the other side of the Bow River. I go down to the river every day and watch people on the other side of the bank through my binoculars, write down the signs I can see on the other side, and also sometimes meet North Korean people.
Last night I went to restaurant I had been to once two days before where a whole host of North Korean girls work. This time I decided that I would ask them a lot of questions so I wrote 31 of them down and went back there to chat. The first time they were a bit shy but last night I was able to chat with them and the owner who is a N. Korean guy for about three hours, until 10pm when it closed.
N. Korean girls are just adorable, by the way. They don't speak a lick of English. They asked me how to say annyonghashimnikka in Canadaese, to which I replied "hi." Oh! Hi! Hi! Hi! "You can also say 'hey' if you're friends." Oh! Hey! Hey! etc.
They're quite interesting to talk to and were quite curious about me as well. I did avoid political subject but they're 21-year old girls and they wouldn't know the answers to questions our English newspapers ask anyway. Best to talk to them about regular things, inconsequential stuff. Well, I did talk to them about reunification. All of them want reuinification as opposed to about 50% of S.Koreans. I told them that I would unfy Korea fior them (half as a joke) and they were very impressed and happy. "Oh, please do! Please do your best and reuinite our country!"
They live here for three years after which they go back to N. Korea to get married. They work every single day and don't make money, but they aren't unhappy. They hit each other for fun like other S.Korean girls and don't seem to serious about anything except their leader. They didn't know how to use my binoculars and kept on looking through the wrong end, though when I asked they said that they did have them in their country.
They each have a pin of Kim-Ilsung and never lose it. I asked them what they would do if they lost it and they said never. It's a piece of their heart. I still think it's possible to lose it but it would probably feel like losing one's wallet with all the cash and credit cards contained inside, ie. soksang hae.
Their Korean's quite different but not too hard to understand, though they use the word sekshi (same pronunciation as sexy) in place of anae for wife. I read that word in a book a year ago which was lucky; otherwise I would be surprised at their brazenness.
I have pictures of myself and my girlfriend which includes small ones to give to friends but they would take it. "Your girlfriend would be so sad! No! Keep it close to your heart!" Even though I explained that the small ones are to give away they wouldn't take it...I also told them that there's always the possibility that we could break up / not get married, to which she replied "No no, you simply must get married to her. No questions asked." I asked her what would happen if she had a boyfriend that had some trait she didn't like, like excessive smoking or whatnot. "That's something a girl has to understand. Girls are supposed to understand when their man has a flaw, don't you know?" I've never been lectured by a girl on the benefits of male chauvanism and found myself strangely attracted to that...
(joking)
It's nice having North Korean friends now; most of them will be here for another few years and so I'll be able to see them again when I come back to Asia. I'll be here in Dandong for another nine days so there's plenty of time to hang out and chat with them some more. The guy who runs the place also knows people in the N.Korean embassy and I might be able to use that if I decide to visit / work there in the future...
This isn't even half of what I learned last night, but I don't want this post to be too long. I suppose this is another benefit of learning Korean. They forgive me whenever I make a mistake like call their leader by the wrong title or talk about dokdo and so on, but I doubt they would with a South Korean and probably wouldn't answer so many prying questions.

[The Lemon]

Great post!

Curious - I know you avoided political subjects, but did they let on that they know more about South Korea than most people from the North are reputed to? For example, do they know that South Korea is one of the world's largest economies, that most people have cars, etc...?

[Pyongshin Sangja]

Wow. Something interesting on the board. Thanks. Did you tell them about what life in South Korea is like? Are they curious? They must be.

[taobenli]

Mithridates-

Really good post! Thanks!

I am VERY interested in the North Korea-China relationship- it's actually what I'm planning to study in grad school (I've just started). I really hope I can get to that part of China in the next few years and learn about that border area and life there.

taobenli

[shawner88]

Great post, I agree. Maybe you can turn it into a short piece for one of the newspapers here.

[Eazy_E]

I'd better start up those Sogang Korean courses again...

[mithridates]

All right, I'm back at the slooooooooow PC Bang. Sometimes I type in an address that just blanks the whole computer. Doesn't seem to like cbc.ca, that one never works. Weird.
Back to the subject: yes, I am planning on turning these into articles. Honestly there really isn't that much to do here, and Dandong is the kind of place that you would never come to if it weren't for North Korea. Today the weather was nice and so I finally decided to take one of the boats that goes across the river and within a few metres of the shore; I think I remember GWOW writing about having done that. The people down by the river seem to really like me so one of them let me ride for 5yuan (625 won) instead of 15, and another one for free, so I actually got to see it two times today up close. One could technically take these boats all day and not break the bank.
On the other side, and I had noticed this through binoculars before, there are signs that say
21����������������屺����!
and
21�������¾�������屺����!
which means, long live the hope of the 21st century, general Kim Jong-Il! And long live the light (sun) of the 21st century, general Kim Jong-il!

I then noticed today that on each and every boat you have the same inscription right in front of the small glass-walled cabin so that when you are on your boat you can read it as well.
I asked the girls about that last night, whether there were just two. They said that there were more than two but since I asked them so suddenly they couldn't recall any others.

Taobenli, are you in Seoul right now? This place is extremely cheap, and very easy to get to. You can take the boat directly from Incheon for 115000 Won each way; it leaves in the afternoon and arrives the next morning. My hotel is run by Chinese Korean people living here and it's only the equivalent of 6000 won a day (ie two cups of coffee...well, not quite two...) which gives me meals and everything else included. A more expensive real hotel right by the river goes for about 20000 won a day which is also quite cheap.

I did tell them a bit about living in Seoul though I specifically avoided comparing it to N. Korea; I just mentioned that English teachers make a lot of money and that I was able to come over here and stay for a long time because of it. I think they know that the S. Korean economy is better, and they didn't try to make N. Korea look any better than the south. They seemed to want to unify the place more than anything and weren't interested in comparing. They don't like hair dying and plastic surgery though. I got in a conversation with the ajosshi that runs the place, I told him that hair dyeing is okay (he didn't agree) because you can cut it and restore it back to normal but with plastic surgery your genes remain the same and when two people who were originally ugly have plastic surgery and have a baby, the baby comes out ugly! He laughed at that...
We did talk about Dokdo a bit as well, and they are completely intrenched on that subject, so I didn't even bother trying to play devil's advocate. Apparently they have a movie called �ǹ��� ���, I think, that is all about that. They were surprised I hadn't heard of it, apparently it's quite famous over there. It's about patriotism and dying for one's country or something...even though dokdo is small, when you have something as small as a pinkie finger, it still hurts when you cut it. That's a proverb. Hence size doesn't matter and she talked about how good it is to protect one's country and if necessary to give up one's life for it.
They seemed a bit shocked that not all S. Koreans support unification...did I mention that? Over there it's 100%.
They also seemed genuinely surprised when I mentioned that N. Korea comes across as a bad country in our English newspapers. I told them about how hard it is to know N. Korea because people that go always have a guide with them and can't go certain places, but they didn't know about that. Apparently they thought foreigners were free to walk about wherever they wanted.
And the way they talk to is so funny...I have Korean on this PC now.
���ڴ� ������ ��� ���� �����ؾ� �ູ���� �ʽ��ϱ�~?
�� �������� �� �Ͻʴϴ�!

Ah, I also just remembered. I was showing them the small wallet I have with the pictures of myself and my girlfriend. On the front it says ��Ÿ ����, Star Wallet, you know, just some meaningless English written in hangul, but they were really curious as to what it meant. I had never thought about it, so I was put on the spot, and
Um...��Ÿ�� ����� '��'�̶�� ���̰�, '����'�� ������ �ƴѰ�? �� �����̶�� ��... (this one means 'star', and the other one means 'wallet', like for money...)
I'm so used to just ignoring all the meaningless English I see in Korean I had forgotten how it looked to them. The man who runs the place told me that he didn't agree with all the English words in the S. Korean language and told me I should say
�ȳ��� instead of ���̵�
������ instead of ���𰡵�
I think it was ������...
I'm probably going back there tomorrow night as they'll have some customers and the girls will probably sing. There's a museum dedicated to the 'fight against the US and support of North Korea' - ��̿����ڹ���...����? and I'll be seeing that in the afternoon.

Ah, lastly, the girls don't think about money. I don't think they care so much about the S. Korean economy because they don't make any money anyway. I asked why they had come all the way to China, whether they make more money here, send it home to their parents or whatnot, but apparently they don't make money. Well then, why do they come? Because they are good at what they do. If they are good at singing and dancing then they work in a place like that. Amazing simplicity. The one I liked talking to the best has only been in China for a month so she has 35 months left which is nice. That means I have that length of time left if I want to change N. Korea and be able to hang out with her after she goes back as well.

[JacktheCat]

I remember the North Koreans I met when I was living in China. So hard to get to know and so very different from the South Koreans I met in Qingdao.

The stories they told of their lives in North Korea were just heart wrenching.

It'll be quiet different when I go back to China as I can now speak some Korean.

If I remember correctly there are over a million North Koreans (or a twentieth of the entire population) living in China right now.

[phaedrus]

This all sounds really cool. Your two posts are the only two long posts I've actually read. Most other long posts are garbage, and I hate reading garbage.

Too bad the 100% of North Koreans that support reunification probably feel that the South needs to realize the genius of the North and join them.

[lastat06513]

Here's one I would like to add since we're on the subject of having contact with N.Koreans.

This happened in late July, 1997, when I was assigned to the UNC in Panmujom.
It was my turn to do rotating watch at a check point that was manned by both Americans and Koreans. Late one night I had to go take a leak, so I called for a brief replacement and walked to the portapoddy that was about 500 or so meters away.
On my way back, I heard a loud whisper; "Hey you!"
I turned to see who is was. not seeing anyone. Then I heard it again, "Hey!....You!". I turned to see a young NKPLA soldier near the fence with his AK slung over his shoulder. Following instinct, I went to the fence. "What's up?" I said.
"Hey, Can I get a ciggarette from you?" He said in perfect Enlgish.
I just padded my body and shrugged my shoulders. He just waved it off and said, "That's ok. See ya' later." and he sprinted off.
I reported the contact to my supervisor (as instructed) who in turned had me go see the S-1 (Intelligence officer) who wrote the report.
I got scared because I thought I could be in trouble for something like "collaborating with the enemy" or something.
But he just said that things like that happened all the time.
The borderguards are fluent in English, Russian and Chinese. They were actually Psychological Specialists whose job was to "persuade" others to cross into "paradise" (so to speak).
They always asked for things like ciggarettes, shoe polish, cola, etc.
I asked if I could give it to them, and he gave me a stern warning that if I was caught, I could be arrested for blackmarketing and so on....

That was the first time I had a positive experience dealing with the N. Koreans until I became a teacher (read my other post about N. Korean students)

[indiercj]

Mithridates.

Great post! Thank you.

[Demophobe]

Wow. Great stuff Mithridates...a fellow Calgarian!

[mysteriousdeltarays]

A very wild and interesting post. I mean it!

I wonder if you weren't a cute 21 year old naive N. Korean girl could anybody pull it off, I mean working for free etc.?

[taobenli]

Mithridates-

No, I'm not in Seoul, I'm in Seattle. I have, in fact, never been in Seoul. However, I'm planning to go to Seoul to study advanced Korean next summer. I hope I'll be able to get back to China, too. I've studied abroad in China (Beijing) for four months and China fascinates me, and I always want to go back. Now North Korea really fascinates me, too- it's like what China wanted to be once (if you don't count the famine, etc.).

[skinhead]

Agreed with everyone on this one. Fascinating posts, Mith. Our man on the spot. You've just provided me the real motivation I need to learn Korean for real this time. Those people must be so innocent and gone. What are the chances of an influx of interested wayguk teachers rolling in over the next few years? I'd hate to see that happen, though I'd love to be in your shoes. Yours is the kind of interaction that brought me back to South Korea to teach. I wonder if we'd all end up bagging the Northerners the way we do the Southerners. Enjoying the innocence in your posts. I reckon that's why the posts are so popular, coz many of us have had that experience of Koreans in the past. Their genuine attitude of generosity and hospitality, and the innocence of the young and old. Love 'em. Haven't seen this kind of freshness for a loooooong time.