Korean Job Discussion Forums

[charlieDD]

One of the favorite rants of one of my colleagues who has been in Korea for six years is that in Korea they'll not think twice about heating a room until you're sweating in the winter and how much that is costing, but will avoid the air conditioner like the plague because "it's expensive." He wants to do a research on it ! How much does it actually cost per BTU or whatever measure to heat versus cool and how much the average Korean office or home spends on heating versus cooling and such. He's convinced the Koreans have some kind of knee jerk reaction to air conditioning based on their history when only the very wealthy could afford to own and operate an airconditioner . . and its reputation as being overly expensive to run has just become an urban legend that they simply live by, whether or not it's true.

[denverdeath]

[Milwaukiedave]

LOL@Denverdeath

maybe he should hire you as a consultant...

[edith]

My hagwon has Individual Air-con machines affixed to the wall in each classroom, some of the Korean teachers think it's unhealthy, but I can't stand the heat.

[ilovebdt]

[Dan The Chainsawman]

Even my cesspit of a school has air conditioning. Beings it has no windows to the outside and my classroom is a tiny little thing with 7 to 9 people at a time in it I use my AC pretty frequently and often have to turn it off when the kids get cold. I had one of them show me how to use the controls and get it past the school preset 23 controls and now can deep freeze the room all the way down to 17. Keeps me nice and cool, and willing to move around more.

[SirFink]

Wow, some of you guys have it rough. I hereby vow to never complain again about my classroom's tiny little a/c that dims the lights and pops a fuse every few days.

[Wishmaster]

Yeah, I've taught classes in July and August without AC...definitely can't recommend it. Try being in a hot and muggy classroom, sweating like fucking hell and trying to teach from the myriad of crappy textbooks that are out there. Not fun...not fun at all. Different now...Enjoy.

[kingplaya4]

I think I'm with the Koreans on this one, I'd rather it be too hot than too cold. My last job in the states my coworkers were always turning the a/c down so low so that it could be 65 degrees. I would quietly turn it back up so that the temp would be about 70 degrees. Then they would start bellyaching about how hot it was. Come on 70 degrees is not hot.

[thegadfly]

An air-conditioner is a deal-maker/breaker for me. It was even one of my questions during my interview -- did I have a/c in my classroom, and could I control the temperature. I even made certain I could run it as cool as I wanted...and I pretty much can. I wouldn't DREAM of working in a school without a/c in Korea...I hates me sum heats, I tells ya whut!

[Rteacher]

Apparently, as a cost-saving measure, the principal at my high school ordered that A/Cs in classrooms shouldn't be used till the end of June.

The teacher who told me that gave in to students whining, I think, and started running it in my classroom since the beginning of last week...

Of greater importance to me, my school bought and installed an a/c in my apartment, which should enable me to dispense with sleeping with ice packs from head to toe (like I did last summer...)

[Qinella]

I find that it's really hard to teach anything when it's hot. The kids can't concentrate, and I find myself not caring about what I say, either.

I asked my boss about the a/c vs. floor heat thing. His explanation was that when it's cold, it gets cold inside, so they use the floor heat. He talked in circles for about three minutes, and that's all I could take away from the conversation. It's really super hard to talk to him about Korea because he's incredibly defensive, so much so that he won't admit true reasons for things if it might sound bad to a western ear.

[Cyrano4747]

My school tries all sorts of little cost saving measures (turning off the AC, no running hot water on our floor, stuff like that) to cut corners. It gets quite hot in the room where I'm at. I just made a point of asking them every day to turn it on. I guess they eventually got tired of seeing me at the desk and left it on.

[Yu_Bum_suk]

It's really been unpleasant at my school lately. They only turn the AC on in the afternoon on very hot days. I'm really animated when I teach and sweat like mad, even though I'm not a heavy guy at all.

Where can you get those human cooling systems that people who can't sweat use? I could really use one of them.

[pet lover]

I'm seeing a huge difference between a working a/c and a non-working a/c. We have a rule that you can't go below 23. Well, last year I routinely set it to 18 (the lowest setting) and everyone was still sweating like mad. It was always hot...horribly so. THis year, the a/c has been fixed and I keep it at 25. Well, I try to...the Korean teacher keeps turning it down. But, it's 18 against 1 there as the kindy kids and I all think 24 is too cold.