Korean Job Discussion Forums

[htrain]

I am finishing up my a year here in Korea and I am kind of thinking about everything that has happened. There have been good times and bad, so I am asking myself how I could have minimized the bad. Here is what I've come up with for myself and newbies.

1.) Take a vacation. Make sure it is spelled out in your contract that your vacation days are not assigned haphazardly and that you can take them in blocks. If I were to stay another year I would absolutely force myself to take a vacation in the winter time to assuage my depression from the dark/gloomy weather.

2.) Convert your money every month. Won is unstable, no news here. Send out your money or convert it every month. The people who are bitching about the exchange rate are mainly those who have undiversified savings.

3.) Make goals for yourself. If you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there. Ask yourself what you plan to accomplish in your time here and stick to it. Even a not so great time can be turned into something positive when goals are met. Playing video games and drinking Cass isn't a challenge.

4.) Ask yourself if you can really stand living outside of the city. Just like I realized in Japan, even 15 minutes outside of "Seoul" really is the "countryside." Ask yourself if you can deal with that. I personally couldn't take another year of it; I would have to live in the city. I need to be able to go out and experience the hustle and bustle of busy life or I feel ill at ease. Others would hate this.

I believe if one sticks to these rules, it is possible to reflect on Korea as time well-spent, regardless of your ultimate feeling.

Anybody else have any recommendations?

[Yu_Bum_suk]

Re: #1, also be sure to take as much vacation time as soon as you can. Don't try to 'bank it up' for near the end of a contract. It's much better to take what you're entitled to before the mid-way point of a contract, and if for some reason there's some extra time off, it's gravy. If you bank it and if for some reason there's some urgent requirement to have a FT at school, it may disappear.

[htrain]

[Underwaterbob]

Reverse number 4. If you absolutely must have a large foreign night club scene or decent western food then by all means live in Seoul otherwise there are a load of smaller, cleaner, more polite cities with small, happy expat communities.

However, unless you are hardcore or have been here for a while, I wouldn't recommend living somewhere with less than 50'000 people as it's possible you are the only foreigner in town and the English level in those places is generally pretty low.

[Draz]

[Cthulhu R'lyeh]

If only I had known these things before I arrived. I'm in a little shithole outside of Seoul, (was told before I arrived that it was to be Suwon, but alas, it is Byeung Jeum. 10 minutes away doesn't sound like much but makes for a rather large pain in the proverbial hole) I took the amount of vacation days rather than set ones (my co-worker is having trouble getting them now, if they lay some shit on me about taking the vacation days I'll simply say, "You can either pay me or not pay me for them, either way I'll have an equivalent amount if you don't so might as well pay me for the days I choose.") My boss is a dickweed, he screwed my co-workers out of their pension/healthcare for 8 months before I arrived. It's taken care of now, but really reflects on the depths of shitery these guys are willing to descend to. I really wish I was in Seoul, but hey, this is only my first year here. If I like it enough I'll come back, either to Busan or Seoul.

[ryouga013]

#5 - don't ever let the first low-ball/low-blow be taken lightly. If things change without your consent and you have the power to make these unwanted changes go away, do it. Don't just stand back and say: it won't get worse