Korean Job Discussion Forums

[jajdude]

Oh what the hell, I'll throw into the ring too.

"We attribute our success to our understanding of other countries. That is why you rarely hear of foreigners being treated badly in our country. Especially those who come from poorer Asian nations. We understand their desire to have a better life, as we were in the same boat not long ago. Therefore we treat them very well and respect their hard work in those dangerous, difficult and dirty jobs that people only do when they cannot do better."

"Our originality and creativity springs from our enlightened educational system, where students are taught to think critically and to question authority. That is also a big factor in our success, and the main reason we have been able to create so many wonderful and innovative products and ideas used throughout the world today."

"You know, you're right. Kimchi really isn't that good. I mean it's OK but not that great, really."

"We really don't have much variety in our foods. I'd love to see more foreign-style foods from various cultures just to have a taste of something different sometimes."

"Our homogenous culture is quite boring. If only there were more diversity we might really become a much better nation."

"Sure, I'd love to see my daughter marry a foreigner. Black or white, I think it would be interesting to see."

And so on....

[waterbaby]

A doggy bag? But that's against food safety regulations...

[Cedar]

Very funny. Nothing to add... not really my style of thread, but very very funny, y'all!

[kiwiboy_nz_99]

...sure, we'll hire you to teach our kids even though you're black, cause we know you're a qualified teacher and will do a great job. We're concerned with quality education, not creating a slick image that will satisfy the mums and keep the money pouring in ...

[billbile]

"Now son, sit down. A word about this new puppy. You must never forget that you are committted to it for the rest of its life. And it may not always be as small or cute as it is now."

"Every Korean is not necessarily automatically inferior to any American, you know."

"I've really got to keep in the closet my anti-social, and quite frankly, my downright bizarre obsessive compulsion to rank everyone and everything."

"Great scott! What next? The Fact that Korea exported more lunch boxes than Japan to the Phillipines is not front-page news. This is ridiculous."

"There's a chance that teacher George from Australia might actually know and even be friends with teacher Harry from America, especially since they work in the same school and share the same office. This is in spite of the fact that they are from different countries."

"Teacher Harry from America might not actually know Stanley, a guy I met whilst in America. Even though they are from the same country."

"My Canadian teacher told me that New Zealanders and Canadians are culturally similar, and that Australians and Americans are culturally similar. The fact that New Zealanders and Australians have different accents to Americans and Canadians are not grounds for me to dismiss such a claim."

"Koreans have trouble understanding English speakers from non-American countries. We should therefore have more non-American teachers."

"It would be quite a good idea to memorise this British English word; I am quite likely to come across it, given that around half of the world's English speakers speak English based on British English. And who knows which country I might end up going to?"

"It doesn't make so much sense to slavishly memorise slang from this era and area. The chances of me living there in the immediate future are quite slim. They will probably understand me if I use more common English anyway. And besides, I can easily focus on picking up local slang wherever I live, when I am there."

[jajdude]

"We no longer harbor an ill feeling toward the Japanese. What they did in the past is over and done. How can we blame the current generation for the mistakes of their grandparents' generation? We are only upset by their government, not the people themselves."

"We really should try a demonstration now and then."

"We get over things easily."

"Of course it was an awful accident when those two girls died. But we are more concerned with the accidents and deaths that occur daily in this country. We are very safety-conscious you know."

"We never cut corners on construction. Who would do such a thing and endanger lives that way?"

"Park Chan ho and the other Korean major leauguers are not really big stars in MLB."

"Chances are, most people in other countries know almost nothing about Korea. It's similar to the way we know little about other countries."

"You know, Korean food isn't nearly as spicy as Thai."

Ok enough already!!!

[GRK]

"I wonder why our students can't speak English?"

"So the translation method is not the best way to teach...belonged to the 1930's?"

"Jimmy's mother called to say you are doing a great job!"

Director - "I understand you know a great deal more than me about teaching English and I appreciate your constructive input on how we can improve the service/teaching we offer to our students and parents. Please feel free to offer more of these comments at our next staff meeting."

"The Korean way is not always best."

"Ahhh - are you from Australia/New Zealand?"

"Many countries have spicey food."

"You can't use chopsticks?"

[billbile]

"No, stay there, wifey dearest. I'll get it."

"Where are you from? Are you a New Zealander? No? Australian? from the UK? South African? No? Gosh, erm... are you European? No?? Heavens above! Just give us a hint!"

"If I went out and got myself a nice healthy deep tan, I would be more attractive."

"I'm going to put this list of countries/people/businesses in a different order than from most powerful to least powerful. I want to test the claim that It'll get you struck by lightning."

"Physical labourers deserve more pay than office workers - especially since their work is so dangerous and nobody wants those jobs, and physical labour is so difficult to find."

"It's okay to criticise and poke fun at authority. In fact, it's healthy."

"Big, square, grey buildings are ugly."

""Having an educated citizenry is more important than having an educated leader - the voters will be able to make good choices, regardless of educational background."

"Whoops! What am I honking the horn for? I'm the one driving on the sidewalk. I'm in the wrong! I better go and apologise to that pedestrian immediately. Damn these mental lapses of mine."

"The last thing I want to be accused of being is normal. Heaven forbid."

"Sometimes, boys can hate sports and girls can like it."

"Baby girls can wear other colours besides pink, as can boys blue."

"Yes, of course you should study philosophy, my child! It'll expand your mind."

"Hey, instead of using ridiculous potions to improve sex, why don't I just treat my wife with more respect? That might, erm, put the grrrr back into the relationship, as it were."

"Wait on - so how exactly does me waking up at 4 AM every day make Korea more powerful than America? Is there necessarily a direct connection?"

"Yunno, in life, I've met many famous and important people. But just for today, I'll try and resist the temptation to tell everyone I see about it, apropos nothing."

"The plumbing in this building is bloody old...time to get it replaced!"

"Do you think the TV audience will eventually become cynical if we use slim, pretty girls with squeaky voices, backed by tinkly, treacly musical jingles, to sell every product? Does everyone enjoy sexy girls as much as we middle-aged adjosshis do? Do we need to shove our preferences down everyones throats always?"

"Hmmmm. It just occurred to me now...maybe one or two people are not fooled by this ridiculous comb-over."

"Folks might still notice my expanding girth, even though I've taken care to belt my trousers around my nipples."

"Maybe experience is a more important quality in a cabin crew, especially in the face of an impending air disaster, than physical appearance?"

[Medic]

Regionalism, or the fact that the country is divided down the middle according to what party the people give their allegiance to, is good for Korea. Korea isn't fully democratic yet so people are going to vote in mass for the person who can give them the most, rather than for party platforms and policies. See Korea is still a backwards democracy, because in civilzed democratic countries the issues to vote for are the parties policies, not wether or not you can gain some advantage from the incumbent candidate.

[The Great Wall of Whiner]

"WOW HONEY!! WE'RE HAVING A GIRL! LETS HAVE A PARTY!!"

"I LOVE A GOOD GAG!"

"PUT MY TOILET PAPER IN THE TRASH CAN?? EW! GROSS!"

"PUTTING OUR FINGERS IN PEOPLES' BUMS AND YELLING 'DDONG CHEEM!' IS NOT FUNNY STUFF!"

"I DON'T LIKE CORN ON MY PIZZA"

"FISH WILL ATTRACT FLIES IF I LEAVE IT SITTING IN THE MARKET'S OPEN-AIR ALL DAY!"

"I WILL SAVE MY LUNG-BUTTER SPIT FOR WHEN I GET TO THE WASHROOM!"

"YES I KNOW HONEY. NO MEANS NO. I WON'T PUSH YOU INTO IT!"



......Sorry...could only think of eight.

[captain kirk]

high heels are the walk of the devil

who cares what others think, I'm ME!

going to take a couple of years to 'find myself', maybe an ashram...

that person doesn't at all look suspicious

why do cars all look the same, it's insane!

designer labels are for weak-willed conformists. if some people care that much about the way i 'don't look', f*ck 'em!

diets DON'T work

the boss saying, "sometimes i vent and talk a lot of sh*t sometimes, but so what, doesn't everyone? I mean, LIGHTEN up!"

korean teacher saying, "yes, i agree, the wonjonim is an absolute jerk sometimes and, like you, i wouldn't kiss his butt with ten foot lips"

favourite is rapier's, page one. and the one that goes 'i'm sure, if i buckle my belt up around my nipples, you won't notice my expanding girth'

[leeroy12]

Can I join?

* Perhaps the reason my English is so bad is because I never speak in class. I shouldn't complain to my teacher about needing more conversation if I sit in a semi-vegetative state all day.

* Hang on! Talking in a squeaky voice while brandishing God knows how many cutesy pink accesories to my exclusively Asian friends is childish and demeaning. The kind of men I attract by doing this are not the sort of calibre I should be looking for.

* Testing my western teacher on their knowledge of obscure grammatical terminology, ultimately, will lead me to a better competence in fluent English.

* Thinking about it, "I am go home now" is not an appropriate thing to say at Upper-Intermediate level.

* Perhaps we should respect people for their qualities, experience and opinion instead of age and gender.

[ersatzprofessor]

This is kind of a witty thread and a lot of the things have some truth to them.

But how about we turn it around for a moment -Here are my top ten things you'd never hear an native speaker say in Korea:

Considering that most people are rarely home, cell phones really are essential here.

People are surprisingly gracious when they find out I've lived here five years and can still barely get past "hello" in Korean


I really shouldn't take advantage of that person's hospitality since I know full well that I will never try to pay it back.

It really isn't a big deal to watch a two year old boy urinate in public and my offense taken at it is more a sign of my own culturally indoctrinated neurosis than anything else.


Despite the terrible education system, a lot of the people I meet are more open minded and cosmopolitan thinking than most of the people I know back home, and are far more curious about learning other ways.

Hey, this is their country and if they have decided that older people should go first and that lining up is optional than I guess I'll just have to adapt to it.

Maybe the reason Koreans don't incessantly thank us for "saving their country" in the Korean war is that they never invited us to come here in the first place.

It could be that the reason they're complaining about my teaching is that I really am doing a poor job at it and they are losing a lot of students because of it.

My parents would also be pretty unhappy if I brought home a potential spouse who knows nothing about their culture, can't speak a word of English, has a crappy job, and on top of it will probably take their child away to another country to live forever.

You know, I think I should take the questions "Isn't Korean food too spicy?" and "Can you use chopsticks?" as sincere expressions of concern for a guest instead as somehow being insults to my intelligence.

If I spent my whole life studying Korean and yet never met one outside the class room, wouldn't I be really tempted to try my Korean out on the first one I saw?

Corn on pizza is different but it really isn't all that bad.

Well, I guess that's twelve, but why the fetish for top tens anyway? I haven't seen Letterman in years.

[chitownesl]

ersatzprof:

not invited to their country? yeah, they should be so dissapointed that they don't depend on rats and dirt like their brothers up north had we not stepped in. not trying to invoke a political argument here, but the people running the country definitely want us. ask of few of the elders, not the 'educated' but rather indoctrined youth. seems like SK has the same problem the U.S does in academia.

[jajdude]

ersatz,

some good points, but the others about what Koreans never say outweigh the reverse by a lot because we are the foreigners I guess, and need to vent etc.. and this is our board.