Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Tobacco Dreams]

I was 31 years old when I first left America to teach English in Korea.

It seemed an almost impossibly, unimaginably exotic destination at the time.

And yet, there were, unmistakably, premonitions . . .

As a young kid just 7 or 8 years old, I collected stamps and coins. I vividly remember staring for a long, long time at what I now know was a 500-won piece.

Little could I have guessed, at the time, that I would someday work at the Bank of Korea! (I taught English there a few years back, on a part-time basis, contracted out from my hakwon.)

In my early teens, I worked at a toystore in suburban Seattle. A young kid on a skateboard came in one day. Said he was from Korea. Language freak that I've always been, I asked him to teach me some of his language. All that stuck in my head was "Annyeong-haseyo."

Armed with that knowledge, at age 19, I was able to address an ajeosshi walker with "Annyeong-haseyo" while out on a morning jog with my uncle in Anaheim, California--still many years back.

Flash forward . . .

I was an undergrad at a liberal arts college a bit south of Seattle, Washington. A Chinese classmate had asked me out to lunch with her Japanese friend. The menu was in 4 languages: English, Chinese, Japanese, and Korean. Said my Chinese friend: "I hate that Korean king. . . All those little circles and squares." Her Japanese galfriend concurred (deploring the ridiculous appearance of written Korean).

Meanwhile, a middle-aged Korean woman across the street from the campus cut my hair on occasion. I commented on the Korean-language sign in her window (which, of course, I couldn't read . . . all those circles and squares!). She was astonished that I even recognized it as Korean!

Flash forward a couple of years or so to Southern California, where I was in grad school.

In my undergraduate English comp class, there were two Korean students, both with the surname Kwon.

Meanwhile, my one and only real date in the course of an entire year-and-a-half was with a certain "Miss Kim."

I regularly bought beer and cutlets with rice from a Korean-run convenience store round the corner from my apartment.

On our way to a College Bowl match at USC, we got lost in Korea Town. ALL THOSE LITTLE CIRCLES AND SQUARES AGAIN!

And then came the summer of 2000: Kim Dae Jung had flown to Pyongyang, and back, and the front page of the LA Times bore a large full-color photograph of well-wishers posing for his return with banners in . . . that circle-and-square language once again.

I dropped out of grad school. Returned to Seattle.

Took my clothes down to the local dry-cleaners for a wash. The calendar behind the wall was unmistakably in Korean. (Little circles and squares.) I wondered if I should say "Annyeong-haseyo," wondered why Korea and Korean people and the Korean language somehow seemed to keep haunting me.

Each day, back in the relations' basement, I read the want ads.

Finally, I came across the one which read, "TEACH ENGLISH IN KOREA . . ."

And so here I am, now, after all these years.

Was it foretold, preominated, foreshadowed, in all that had gone before?

[Grimalkin]

[OCOKA Dude]

[trinity24651]

I got it, TD!!

[Hosub]

Am I to understand that because I see Jewish owned stores with hebrew scattered that I will work in Israel? ;[