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young_clinton
Joined: 09 Sep 2009
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 Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 6:08 am Post subject: |
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| Setaro wrote: |
I much prefer Korea to the shithole cesspit of humanity that is England, but I guess it depends what your ethics are. |
Add Thailand to that. Think twice before coming to Thailand to teach unless you KNOW you're a Thaiphile. Very difficult place to teach. I have experience in both places. |
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Ribena
Joined: 07 Apr 2011
Location: UK
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| Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 6:21 am Post subject: |
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| oldtrafford wrote: |
And the assertion that there's great variation in towns and cities in England just isn't true. Go to any town or city and you'll see the same things you'd see in any developed country, Pizza Huts, Greggs (imagine a really bad version of Paris Baguette), McD's, the same clothes shops, etc etc, identikit highstreets in almost all towns. Only the historical cities like York or Lincoln will look any different. Pretty much like in Korea.
Your on drugs son!! Pies, sausage rolls, sarnies = Greggs!!
Paris the crap = sweet garlic bread!!! 
Korea can not compete aesthetically speaking when compared to the U.K. And things to do. I've travelled extensively over the years and Korean towns are much the same. The U.K. offers much more in that respect, if you can afford it!!
I agree about the chavs though and the general decline in decency. I'm just waiting for Cameron's lot to shoot the lot of them, and then I'll return. Oh, not forgetting a big pay increase for state school teachers!! |
Surely if we shoot all the chavs then the pay for teachers will go down and there will be an oversupply of teacher since all the chav schools will have to close due to lack of chavs.
I agree thought about the entitled and lazy attitude of the rioters. Taught kids like that in London, wouldn't be surprised if any of them were on of the streets pushing a trolley-load of stolen good out of JD Sport. I have a friend who works at a school in Brixton, and says some of the kinds there are feral. |
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myenglishisno
Joined: 08 Mar 2011
Location: Geumchon
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| Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 6:36 am Post subject: |
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| young_clinton wrote: |
| Setaro wrote: |
I much prefer Korea to the shithole cesspit of humanity that is England, but I guess it depends what your ethics are. |
Add Thailand to that. Think twice before coming to Thailand to teach unless you KNOW you're a Thaiphile. Very difficult place to teach. I have experience in both places. |
I get pissy when people insist that Japan is the holy grail of ESL on these forums while putting Korea down. I did Korea, went to Japan and then came back to Korea because teaching in Japan is awful and there is no chance in hell of any kind of upward momentum. People only teach in Japan to be in Japan. Everything that isn't the JET Programme is utter crap and on average, quite a bit worse than your typical Hagwon/PS job. |
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PatrickGHBusan
Joined: 24 Jun 2008
Location: Busan (1997-2008) Canada 2008 -
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| Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 11:26 am Post subject: |
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| tiger fancini wrote: |
| markhan wrote: |
| KatanaSlash87 wrote: |
| But to me, Hagwons are representative of many problems that encompass Korean culture as a whole: work culture, xenophobia, superficiality, saving face. You learn much about Korean culture through working for a hagwon. |
Above assertion really caught my eyes and it is indicative of many problematic posts in Dave's Forum.
Just picture a worker from South or Central America working for a farm in the US. The worker's whole day revolves around the farm, have friends largely from the same farm, don't speak any English, have superficial relationships with locals, and work in a job that is regarded as menial or non-meaningful and from this background, he/she has suddenly become an expert on society and culture of America.
It is so ridiculous and yet above kind of post is so frequent in Dave that no one questions it anymore. |
That hit the nail on the head as did
Thanks for pointing this out. This is one of my biggest problems with foreigners in Korea, and on Dave's. So many of them are unable to comprehend that there is life and activity outside of their hagwon/school. Their co-teacher/boss/student does or says something, so they compute this as a reflection of the society and culture as a whole.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Make friends with people who are not in any kind of education business. If I didn't have Korean friends, I might just believe half of the tripe that gets written here about Korea and Koreans (although I would hope that my rational thinking skills would prevent this from happening.)
BTW I'm not bashing the OP specifically, but just the general nonsense that was so nicely illustrated by markhan. |
That hit the nail on the head...twice. Well said guys.
What happens is that some people extrapolate from limited personnal experiences and superficial understanding of a limited portion of where they live and pass judgement on the larger group or place, often negative or demeaning judgement laced with condescending comments or absolutes (this is immoral, wrong...).
A year in any place is nothing much and certainly does not make a person an expert. Add to that how many of us go to Korea with the mindset of taking a year or two "off" to pay back loans or travel and you get surface skimmers who form opinions about Korea based on very limited experiences. It is easy to pass judgement, it is typically harder to try and gain deeper understanding of a place.
Take the OP: he stated he enjoed going drinking with his friends on the weekend, fishing, visiting BBQ restaurants. Now whom did he do this with? Did he venture beyond the confy confines of the wayguk local circle? That will defintively paint your experiences and affect how you perceive Korea.
The Hakwon culture comment made in this thread is also interesting because one hakwon can differ so much from the next one... |
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oldtrafford
Joined: 12 Jan 2011
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| Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 2:20 pm Post subject: |
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Surely if we shoot all the chavs then the pay for teachers will go down and there will be an oversupply of teacher since all the chav schools will have to close due to lack of chavs.
I agree thought about the entitled and lazy attitude of the rioters. Taught kids like that in London, wouldn't be surprised if any of them were on of the streets pushing a trolley-load of stolen good out of JD Sport. I have a friend who works at a school in Brixton, and says some of the kinds there are feral.
Do we have that many chavs?!!! |
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Steelrails
Joined: 12 Mar 2009
Location: Earth, Solar System
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| Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 3:06 pm Post subject: |
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| I've said it before, and I'll say it again- Korea does not exist to make you happy. |
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TheUrbanMyth
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Location: Retired
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| Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 3:44 pm Post subject: |
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| shifty wrote: |
| markhan wrote: |
| KatanaSlash87 wrote: |
| But to me, Hagwons are representative of many problems that encompass Korean culture as a whole: work culture, xenophobia, superficiality, saving face. You learn much about Korean culture through working for a hagwon. |
Above assertion really caught my eyes and it is indicative of many problematic posts in Dave's Forum.
Just picture a worker from South or Central America working for a farm in the US. The worker's whole day revolves around the farm, have friends largely from the same farm, don't speak any English, have superficial relationships with locals, and work in a job that is regarded as menial or non-meaningful and from this background, he/she has suddenly become an expert on society and culture of America.
It is so ridiculous and yet above kind of post is so frequent in Dave that no one questions it anymore. |
I think your farm analogy goes way too far.
There is definitely something wrong with last sentence: "It is so ridiculous and yet above kind of post is so frequent on Daves that noone questions it anymore."
What, there is a continuum of brainwashing, that we can't shake away from? Despite the influx of many new posters? |
Yes. If you say anything positive about Korea, there are always a bunch of posters to shout you down.
Not to mention the posters who seemingly scour the news for any negative story about Korea and then post it multiple times.
The farm analogy works well. Also what Mr. Steelrails said. Korea does not exist to make you happy. That falls directly on you.
In the end no one is forcing you to stay here. |
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cj1976
Joined: 26 Oct 2005
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| Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 4:34 pm Post subject: |
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Korea definitely isn't for the faint-of-heart. My first gig here was terrible. Duped by a recruiter, I was dumped in a shitty town, tiny little apartment, working for an unscrupulous cheap asshole.
I tried my best, but after 4 months of being lied to (class sizes double what I was promised, extra hours being tacked on to my day etc), I had a talk/fight with the boss and promptly handed in my notice. At that point, I could have written off Korea as a steaming cesspool because there were days it did feel like that. Instead, I chose to go to Singapore for a few days, take stock and come back for another go.
That turned out to be a good idea because my next job was fantastic, and my view on Korea changed for the better.
A lot of the people who come here and hate it have no life experience outside of uni, and minimal work history so Korea can be a real shock to the system. |
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Adventurer
Joined: 28 Jan 2006
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| Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 4:42 pm Post subject: |
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I feel a sense of compassion for the OP. I mean many of us seasoned teachers in Korea, in many cases, were naive during our first year. Howevever, within a few months of being here, I did ask other foreigners what was going on early on and contacted the government to get my pension and health insurance. You have to know your rights in the beginning and investigate.
Every culture has horrible things about them, and I don't think it's simply hagwon culture, but also part of the Korean culture. Korea has positive things about the culture and horrible things. It's better to work in the US or Western Europe, obviously, if you have a decent paying job rather than work in Korea. I am speaking in general terms when referring to the private sector.
How the OP was treated was horrible, and I hope the Wanjangnim suffers for it. I am not going to be an old-timer who shows no sympathy, but many us fought from the beginning for our rights and found out what they were. That's what people should do even if they didn't do their homework regarding the school. |
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Adventurer
Joined: 28 Jan 2006
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| Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 4:47 pm Post subject: |
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| Steelrails wrote: |
| I've said it before, and I'll say it again- Korea does not exist to make you happy. |
That's true, but if you're an EU citizen working in Italy, you're more likely to have a good experience. You can be shafted in many places besides Korea. That said, I still expect the government to regulate its hagwon industry better.
I have had a bad experience with more than hagwon. One hagwon had me work 37 classes for a while until I protested, and they agreed to let me go because I showed I was totally pissed off, and I didn't have a cooperative attitude; it showed. I can't hide that stuff and smile. |
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Rutherford
Joined: 31 Jul 2007
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| Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 5:01 pm Post subject: |
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Honestly, if you're the kind of person who still writes long posts about why you had a bad time in Korea a year after you left, your personality might have had something to do with it.
Were you hit by a bongo truck and lost the use of your legs? Were you wrongfully imprisoned? Assaulted by a gang of rowdy ajummas? Tricked by a recruiter promising a teaching job only to be forcefully addicted to heroin and forced to pay off your debts working in a massage parlor? These are the sorts of things you should be bitter about a year later.
Good on you for warning prospective teachers about shady bosses. Your story also serves as a warning not to bring dysfunctional relationships abroad. |
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KatanaSlash87
Joined: 27 Jul 2009
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| Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 10:56 pm Post subject: |
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| Rutherford wrote: |
Honestly, if you're the kind of person who still writes long posts about why you had a bad time in Korea a year after you left, your personality might have had something to do with it.
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Wrong assumption. I haven't even been on this board since I left Korea. I don't go writing threads hating on Korea all the time. One reason I did this was because I thought of Dave's the other day and realized I hadn't been on it in a year, not even thought about it, but how much of a crutch it was for me in Korea. The other reason was this was basically just a one year retrospective for me because I realized one year ago how unhappy I was and I was reflecting on how much better my life is and decided to write about my experience. I don't think it was my personality. I'm a very open person to new ideas, people, cultures, etc... if you asked any of my close friends about me. I guess I just got the short end of the stick when it came to my hagwon.
And maybe you guys are right: I shouldn't let my hagwon be completely reflective of all Korean culture and be all encompassing like that. But then again, my story is not that uncommon. And I think this can be construed as Korea needing to have better protection for foreigners and stop treating them as so expendable.
And another wrong assumption is that I only hung out with waygooks. Yes, most of my friends were, but two of my good friends were two young Korean guys from Seoul who opened a bar in Busan and my group of friends and I were at their bar constantly. They would have entire going away parties at the bar when some of us left. They had house parties at their apartments for us all the time. They were great guys. Really open, really caring. Another of my really good friends was a Korean girl who had also been fired from my school. For no reason. They simply didn't like her. And she was in a rut for months because of it.
So please stop assuming that just because I don't like the nation of Korea means that I don't like Korean people, I didn't absorb the culture and befriend the natives and I didn't try. Things aren't that simple. And in return I'll admit that I shouldn't be so harsh on Korea as an entirety.
And CaptainCorea: Sorry I'm wordy. I'm not in real life. I tend to ramble on forums too much. When I'm more serious about what I'm working on and edit myself my writing is much better. |
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shifter2009
Joined: 03 Sep 2006
Location: wisconsin
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| Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 11:57 pm Post subject: |
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| TheUrbanMyth wrote: |
The farm analogy works well. Also what Mr. Steelrails said. Korea does not exist to make you happy. That falls directly on you.
In the end no one is forcing you to stay here. |
No, the analogy does not work well. You are comparing migrant farmers from poorer less developed countries to college educated people who have come from the most developed nations in the world to a lesser or similarly developed nation. It's apples and oranges but it fits your apologist view that most of us teachers come here and develop no connection with Korea and don't speak the language so we have no basis to complain. I also would like to take issue with your notion that no one can post anything positive about Korea without being shouted down. There are is a small army of apologists who come running to Korea's aid the moment you even criticize it a little. (dunkin' dougnuts thread?) Now, I'd say I actually agree with you guys 75% of the time but the idea that you are some put upon minority on this board is laughable. |
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NMonk
Joined: 19 Oct 2009
Location: South Korea
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| Posted: Wed Sep 07, 2011 12:10 am Post subject: |
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O.P I just have one question for you.... If you had loved living with your girlfriend and that hadn't failed so miserably would you still be hating Korea so much?
My personal guess is no.
Things went wrong for you in Korea, that's not necessarily Korea's fault. |
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Savant
Joined: 25 May 2007
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| Posted: Wed Sep 07, 2011 12:24 am Post subject: |
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| Steelrails wrote: |
| I've said it before, and I'll say it again- Korea does not exist to make you happy. |
It tries very hard to not make anyone happy. Korea pats you on the back before immediately kicking you swiftly in the balls.
Now, it's nice to get a pat on the back but there's only so many times that one can take a kick in the balls. |
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