Korean Job Discussion Forums

[azzwell]

A Good Run



I first came to these far shores four years ago, in February of 2004. I was young, brash, idealistic, and desperate for cash and much like the generations of Chinese who had referred to California as the land of the golden mountain, Korea became my land of opportunity.
Like a lot of people who come to Asia to work I was fleeing something, actually a few things. I was running from a felony drug record, a broken relationship that I could not get over, and a dead end job that just barley filled my needs for drugs and rent. I wanted something better and Korea seemed the place to get it.
I remember the February morning when I got off the plane at Incheon like it was yesterday. When I went outside the airport and got into the cab to go to Gimpo for my flight to Pohang, the only time I have ever been ripped off by a Korean taxi driver I might add, an orange sun was just rising up over the line of fake palm trees that line the ring road that leads away from the hustle and bustle from the airport and the streets were remarkably clean. I was dead tired but I looked at everything around me with a sense of wonder and fulfillment. I was here now; it was time to do things differently, to change my life.
I watched the billboards shoot by in a never ending stream in a language I could not, and still, understand. I saw the golf courses and the mass industrialization of Incheon city spread over the mud flats that still line the east coast like a grey carpet and pinched myself, still not believing that I was here, finally, in Korea.
That first year was great. I was in a very small town, really a village where everyone knew who I was and made it a point to always look out for me to make sure I was o.k. People would come up to me when I was taking long rambles along back lane roads lined with rice fields and persimmon trees and in broken English, or lightning fast Korean, ask me if I needed a ride. On the occasions when I told them no they looked at me like I was some sort of lunatic for walking alone in the heat of a summer day but on the rare occasions I said yes I was treated like an honored guest who had come from a land far away and taken into their homes to meet their children and eat loads of new and exciting food while I sat in the cool shade of a traditional house or outside in the walled compounds that most older Korean homes in the country still have.


After a short break back home to get some schooling done, I headed back out, this time to --------, where I still am living for a few more short weeks. By this time I knew a little more than I had before so things were not as exciting as they were before but I was able to get the one thing that I had been missing down south in my little town, English speaking friends.
These past few years have really flown by. I have met some really great people here in ------- that I hope I will remain close to for the rest of my life and a lovely girl that I will finally get to the alter next year as we start a new life together. I have incredible memories and pictures of Korea that I will take with me to the grave. Awesome sunsets over the mountains, the snow falling down heavily in the winter, and the park gleaming like jade in the spring, and nights out with friends from all over the world as we stuffed ourselves with fresh caught shellfish or sat outside and ate shitty Korean pork washed down with watery Cass on a hot summer evening. These memories, and people, are precious to me and I will remember them always.
Some people think that I am anti Korea though and it�s just not true. I have lived here a long time and seen a lot of things here in the land of the morning calm and I am anything but negative about the country itself. As a land, Korea is incredible. It is stuffed with thousands of years of history and scenery that can really take your breath away but it�s the people that have really brought me down this last year or so.
The Korea that I imagined I would see does not exist. It is a land filled with natural beauty that is being altered and hemmed in on so many sides. The stunning mountains are being moved and blasted to make ever more roads and the sea shore that I love so much is fast becoming a moving tide of paper and plastic that is threatening to choke all life from it. It is the people who are destroying the wonderful land that is Korea with their appalling lack of respect for law, regulation, and common courtesy that constantly brings out the negativity I feel about Korea.
That being said, Korea has giving me many things. The freedom to do what I want for the next year without worrying about money, great friends, a girl I am in love with, and memories that I will always cherish. It has been a good run, but its time to end.

[poet13]

Cool. I like your attitude. I would have taken the time to get to know you if I had read this first.
Good luck.

[tfunk]

I'll miss you buddy, even though you're not really leaving me, as I already left. You are leaving Korea though, and leaving a big hole in everybody's heart. As they say in Korea: Let's make happy friend forever!

[azzwell]

see you soon tfunk, amsterdam for the new year?

[laserprinter]

i am lingering on the edge of sanity with only the hopes of such an experience

[ciccone_youth]

that was very well-written. thanks for sharing, i liked it.

[Join Me]

[azzwell]

no, I am taking her home to get married if you would have read a little closer you would have been aware of that fact. Also, if you would notice that I have been in Korea since 2004, also in the piece I wrote, you would be aware that I was already here and on a visa before such background checks became necessary, but I see from your join date that you have probably only been here a few months so your ignorance could be excused due to a complete lack of knowledge.

Quote:

[[color=red]quote]lovely girl that I will finally get to the alter next year as we start a new life together.

[Tobias]

I've been waiting to read stories like this, and this one's the first. Thanks for the post, Azz. It's a shame guys like you'll be shown the door, yet others are allowed to stay here. If I were kicked out because I'd been naughty in the past, I'd be especially pissed at two things:

1. Foreigners working here who don't file tax returns and get away with it. That's a misdemeanor in the USA. One may have been convicted 15 years ago, and is now forced out, yet these cats can break the law today and be fine. That shit is definitely going to come to an end, though.

2. Foreigners working here in the future who will bitch and moan about the place, and may cause their Korean hosts endless grief. But those foreigners have clean CRCs, by God.

I think the Koreans are going to soon learn the hard way the ice-cold reality of the new regs.

[UberJRI]

He's not leaving because he's being forced out. He's sick of the land being destroyed by greedy and selfish people, ruining all the beauty he sees and has seen in it. At least, that's the feeling that I got.

[poet13]

Join Me. Lot's of people *beep* up. It's what you do after that that counts. It sounds like the OP made a positive choice in his life. I too "ran away: to Europe when I was younger. I ran away from the life that was going to eventually get me dead. Gangs, dope, being arrested every other friday night for brawling. It was a viscious cycle that I managed to escape from before I acquired a record that would haunt me all my life. That was a long time ago, and I'm glad I made the choices I made. I bet the OP is too.

[Tobias]

No matter. With a felony on his record following him around like a puppy dog, he'll be forced out sooner or later. Probably sooner.

I like your avatar, Uber.

[azzwell]

Tobias, no I won't, record sealed, but thanks for being not nice.

[UberJRI]

[Tobias]

You're welcome, Azz. There's only one problem. Expungement doesn't clean anyone's record. It just hides it from the general public. Law enforcement agencies, such as the FBI, can still see it.

Nice try, though.