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Korean Job Discussion Forums
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Times30
Joined: 27 Mar 2010
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 Posted: Sun Jun 23, 2013 11:25 pm Post subject: |
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In my own personal experience, I've found the most open minded and flexible people who were culturally Korean, yet not gyopo.... were Doctors and Dentists.
I don't make this correlation because I'm "amazed" by their profession or give them undue credit for having a professional job (but they are definitely worthy of it). Rather, it's an observation made in retrospect.
I made friends with about 3 doctors and 1 dentist.
1 of them was very interested in western music and unique teaching styles.
Another one was deeply interested in logic/ethic debates.
Another one was culturally accepting of all things, including western and eastern cultures, even going as far to travel to Mongolia, Africa, London, etc.
Last one was interested in philosophy and current events. His perspectives usually were balanced and unbiased.
In my own experience, these were the most observant and open people I've met in Korea. |
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Threequalseven
Joined: 08 May 2012
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| Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 2:44 am Post subject: Re: how to meet intelligent, open-minded Koreans? |
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| Steelrails wrote: |
| I'd wager that the person owning the McHagwon is better at the ol' Critical Thinking and Intelligence than the workers. |
That's a silly thing to say. Saving money to open a business doesn't really require critical thinking. In fact, one could argue just the opposite. I doubt this hypothetical McHagwon owner was very critical of the principles behind these cookie-cutter for-profit language institutions. He/She likely just saw a way to make money and went for it. You'll be hard pressed to find any "critical thinkers" in positions of power where critical thought is usually shunned.
As for the OP's question, I think he's just looking for Korean people who think and act outside the mainstream set of expectations (i.e. always wearing a suit, thinking that looks are the only thing that matters in a partner, thinking that money is all that matters in a job, etc). I guess equivalent places to what the OP is looking for in the States would be an independently owned hippie coffee shop (as opposed to a Starbucks) or a craft brewpub (as opposed to Joe's Sportsbar). If this is what your getting at, you're probably not going to find it here. The places where these types of folks do congregate tend not to be very social. People go out to be with friends here, not to chat it up with strangers. Also, a good number of the strangers I have talked to tend to be mostly focused on either money or women or their own opinions. This came as quite a surprise to me, as I wrongfully assumed that everyone outside of the U.S. was filled with bright ideas and intellectual criticism. So having said that, living in Korea forces you to develop your own open-mindedness. Go out and play a game like darts with some strangers and listen to what they have to say. That's basically all I do. Also, I know there's a pretty active punk rock scene in Seoul, but I've never been to any shows. It might be interesting, though, if you're into that. Anecdotally, the least judgmental and most open-minded person I've met here happened to be a guy working at Emart. We talked for nearly a half hour in the beer aisle, had a couple drinks after he finished work that night, and we still talk to this day. |
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Paddycakes
Joined: 05 May 2003
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 2:47 am Post subject: |
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Join a Swingers Club.
I'm sure there is a few in Seoul.
You'll find some gentle and open minded people there. |
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Captain Corea
Joined: 28 Feb 2005
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 3:09 am Post subject: |
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| The ones I've met have been through adult/biz classes. Most of them were educated professionals... many having lived overseas. I keep in contact with many of them years later. Heck, some I still know after a decade. |
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littlelisa
Joined: 12 Jun 2007
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 5:01 am Post subject: |
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Do you speak Korean well? Koreans who speak English well enough to have conversations about things other than everyday things in English most likely HAVE lived abroad because the more intellectual your conversation gets, the higher level language skills you need, generally. Most Koreans with really high levels of English proficiency have lived abroad. Living abroad also helps with the open-mindedness for anyone, not just Koreans.
Now if you can have intellectual conversations in Korean, then I'm sure you'll meet plenty of open-minded intelligent Koreans. I'm not sure that there's a designated place that they all hang out, though.. 
What kind of things do you like doing? Find some hobbies and you'll meet people. There's always a range of people everywhere, so I'm sure you'll eventually meet several open-minded intelligent Koreans who haven't been abroad. |
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PatrickGHBusan
Joined: 24 Jun 2008
Location: Busan (1997-2008) Canada 2008 -
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| Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 5:13 am Post subject: |
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| Everywhere you go, it will be a mixture of the sane and the mad, the intelligent and the stupid, the interesting and the boring - which is the kaleidoscope that is life! |
There you go OP, your thread question was answered wayyy back on page one.
Good luck out there. |
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cdninkorea
Joined: 27 Jan 2006
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 6:09 am Post subject: |
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| Captain Corea wrote: |
| The ones I've met have been through adult/biz classes. Most of them were educated professionals... many having lived overseas. |
I'd say this is true. I used to teach businesspeople who worked in Yeouido, and I had some fascinating conversations with some of the older men and women I taught; they loved to talk about serious, intelligent issues, and because of their age, they had well-developed opinions that they could put into a larger context. If this is important to you, OP, go work at one of the adult hagwons there. |
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javis
Joined: 28 Feb 2013
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| Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 7:15 am Post subject: Re: how to meet intelligent, open-minded Koreans? |
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| Threequalseven wrote: |
| Steelrails wrote: |
| I'd wager that the person owning the McHagwon is better at the ol' Critical Thinking and Intelligence than the workers. |
That's a silly thing to say. Saving money to open a business doesn't really require critical thinking. In fact, one could argue just the opposite. I doubt this hypothetical McHagwon owner was very critical of the principles behind these cookie-cutter for-profit language institutions. He/She likely just saw a way to make money and went for it. You'll be hard pressed to find any "critical thinkers" in positions of power where critical thought is usually shunned. |
Agreed. Worker bees utilize critical thinking to choose their best avenue in life. Bigwigs with charisma make (and lose) the big bucks. |
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optik404
Joined: 24 Jun 2008
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| Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 7:47 am Post subject: |
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| Hang out at indie shows? Most of my Korean friends are really into music, so we go to indie shows and whatever. They're all pretty out there for Korea. They work normal jobs, some own small bars, some are full time musicians, etc. I suppose back home they would be hipsters or hippies or normal. |
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Underwaterbob
Joined: 08 Jan 2005
Location: In Cognito
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| Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 5:13 pm Post subject: |
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| Gee, I don't know, you're in a country of 50'000'000 of them. Say hello to a few? |
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Steelrails
Joined: 12 Mar 2009
Location: Earth, Solar System
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| Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 6:01 pm Post subject: Re: how to meet intelligent, open-minded Koreans? |
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| Threequalseven wrote: |
| Steelrails wrote: |
| I'd wager that the person owning the McHagwon is better at the ol' Critical Thinking and Intelligence than the workers. |
That's a silly thing to say. Saving money to open a business doesn't really require critical thinking. In fact, one could argue just the opposite. I doubt this hypothetical McHagwon owner was very critical of the principles behind these cookie-cutter for-profit language institutions. He/She likely just saw a way to make money and went for it. You'll be hard pressed to find any "critical thinkers" in positions of power where critical thought is usually shunned.
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Actually, being able to think in the long-term when it comes to earning the money to start a business and to envision entrepreneurship requires more day-to-day critical thinking than simply trying to get a job.
If one has a goal, critical thinking is required to achieve that goal. It would seem there are plenty of Hagwon owners (though many are not like this), that are operating an English hagwon as an actual goal of theirs they've had for years. They studied English and took an active interest in it.
How many NET employees had this in mind? You have the education/linguistics and related majors or the people who have had an active interest Korea or at least Asia travel in general, which is a large number to be sure, but you also have people here because they need to pay the bills. Did they really engage in as much critical thinking as their employer?
But many of those types who sneer at their bosses alleged lack of critical thinking don't really know what critical thinking truly is. They're big on the critical, short on the thinking. A large part of critical thinking is focusing away the distracting BS that distracts one from achieving their goal or engaging in petty displays of independence and "not being a tool" to the detriment of their long-term aspirations.
The point is that while some people may have decent critical thinking skills in theory or in academic settings, their skills may not translate into the real world, where some people might not be adept academic critical thinkers but are excellent real-world critical thinkers.
Things like realizing that its fine to live with mom and dad through college and not give a crap what people tease you about and having the savings to open up businesses at a younger age where other people, desperate to "be independent" (drink and screw) move out and assume burdensome debt and then end up being dependent upon you as employees.
Being 100,000 dollars in debt and working your non-dream job for a boss you don't respect has got to be some sort of fail of critical thinking. |
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Threequalseven
Joined: 08 May 2012
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| Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 9:15 pm Post subject: Re: how to meet intelligent, open-minded Koreans? |
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| Steelrails wrote: |
Actually, being able to think in the long-term when it comes to earning the money to start a business and to envision entrepreneurship requires more day-to-day critical thinking than simply trying to get a job.
If one has a goal, critical thinking is required to achieve that goal. It would seem there are plenty of Hagwon owners (though many are not like this), that are operating an English hagwon as an actual goal of theirs they've had for years. They studied English and took an active interest in it.
How many NET employees had this in mind? You have the education/linguistics and related majors or the people who have had an active interest Korea or at least Asia travel in general, which is a large number to be sure, but you also have people here because they need to pay the bills. Did they really engage in as much critical thinking as their employer?
But many of those types who sneer at their bosses alleged lack of critical thinking don't really know what critical thinking truly is. They're big on the critical, short on the thinking. A large part of critical thinking is focusing away the distracting BS that distracts one from achieving their goal or engaging in petty displays of independence and "not being a tool" to the detriment of their long-term aspirations.
The point is that while some people may have decent critical thinking skills in theory or in academic settings, their skills may not translate into the real world, where some people might not be adept academic critical thinkers but are excellent real-world critical thinkers.
Things like realizing that its fine to live with mom and dad through college and not give a crap what people tease you about and having the savings to open up businesses at a younger age where other people, desperate to "be independent" (drink and screw) move out and assume burdensome debt and then end up being dependent upon you as employees.
Being 100,000 dollars in debt and working your non-dream job for a boss you don't respect has got to be some sort of fail of critical thinking. |
First, what you have described requires discipline and a bit of foresight, but it doesn't require critical thinking. It seems as if you've taken a single personal trait, financial success, and used that as a measurement for which all other things can be judged. The majority of Koreans and Americans think in such a way that, if you do A and B, then you'll achieve C. If you save money and work hard, then you can start a business. And while that has everything to do with personal financial gain, it has little to do with critical thinking:
Critical thinking is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action.
What are some questions that require critical thinking?
- What major changes will our economy face as global fossil fuel resources deplete?
- How should cities in developing nations handle an overwhelming influx of homeless people from the countryside?
- What is the role of mass media and the political process in capitalist society?
- What are the main causes of the poverty trap?
- What inevitable class conflicts arise between laborers and property owners?
These are questions that don't have a clear cut A+B=C answer, and they're questions that can't be solved with opinion alone. So, again, while saving money to start a business requires discipline and foresight, it doesn't automatically make you a critical thinker. Critical thinking means challenging the status quo, not indulging in it. An individual who values critical thinking would actually have a difficult time finding a justifiable position for themselves in any business or organization, especially a big money-making position, as they would already understand the ethical, social, and/or environmental consequences of that position. (Sure you're making money, but at what cost to yourself and others? AND, how do your individual actions play into the bigger picture of the world around you?) So, metaphorically, you might as well say that a weightlifter with a great physique is smarter than a Ph.D. with a bit of a pot belly because the weightlifter is more concerned with his own health. You've taken one single personal attribute, and applied it to every other characteristic of that person. |
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