Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Ya-ta Boy]

[If we can have a thread by an asshat drunk in Hongdae and someone whining about torn wallpaper, then I think Dave�s has room for this:]

Life on the edge of town can be hell. My school is in Seoul, but my apt is 5 minutes away in Seungnam. The closest grocery store in Seoul is a W5,000 taxi ride away or I can wait for the once an hour bus. There are two more only W1,000 away down in Seungnam, but it takes 30 minutes to get there. The restaurant situation isn�t any better. The small handful of restaurants nearby are average at best. It�s a thirty minute walk to the nearest subway, if you don�t have the patience or good timing to catch the once an hour bus. As you can see, life can be a misery even for ESLers working in Seoul. [Being used and abandoned by a posterette is just more salt on the wound.]

The last couple of weeks have been a rough week administration-wise, so on Thursday I was delighted when 진우said he was organizing another Friday night supper expedition. He and some of the other students had offered to take me to an Indian restaurant in Bundang in return for the roast chicken dinner with garlic soup I had made for them a couple of Sundays back, but I knew that Ganga was too expensive for them, so I suggested 닭갈비or 샤브샤브 (or is it 샤부샤부?). We agreed to meet at 7 Friday evening in front of my apt.

At 6:48 sharp, 진우 showed up in his sleek black Avante, all alone. 진우 is the intense type. Raised by his grandmother who is 86 now, he�s had to work hard to overcome being orphaned and poor. (I�d like to meet Granny. She took on raising her two grandsons when she was 60 something and they were 3 and 7. Apparently, she�s a pretty tough cookie.) 진우 was the most successful of my students last term. He moved up 3 levels. �Where�s everyone else?� I asked him.

�Front gate,� he answered.

I responded, �Make a sentence�. (One of my nicknames is Make a Sentence. 창민 says he even hears it in his dreams.)

He made his sentence and we drove down to the complex gate, but no one was there yet.

A minute later, 승훈 shows up in his long black Tuscany with tinted windows� and wearing shades. With his weight-lifter body, tight T-shirt and sunglasses, he looks like a mafia enforcer. One of his hobbies is kickboxing. He hasn�t been kicked in the mouth yet, because he still has a great smile. Without the shades, you can see the twinkles in his eyes. You just know he was hell on wheels when he was 6.

Right behind him in a third car, a white something, were 진철 and 창민. 진철 started out speaking totally garbled English for 3 weeks, then overnight transformed his sentences into pretty darn good English. Unfortunately, he bombed the big grammar test right before his new grammar kicked in, so he stayed on in our Bottom of the Barrel class, and he�s pleased about it. Since some of the other students got reassigned to higher level classes and are suffering with having to translate 2 or 3 pages of magazine articles every weekend for homework, 진철 has been grinning like the cat who ate the canary. 창민 is the baby of the group at 26, and looks 20. (Add any 2 of their ages together and I�m still the oldest.) He�s also a gunner student. He moved up one level and probably should have moved up two. If anyone is in the market for a boyfriend, know that he�s very good-looking and available. Although if experience is what you�re looking for, 승훈 seems to know the most about what sounded like 부두 girls. (He said it meant �advertisement� girls.)

In the parking lot we decided 닭갈비 was the target for the night, although 창민 held out for 샤브샤브 because I�d made the mistake of saying I hadn�t had any for a long, long time, but I rejected that because he�d had it on Wednesday. (Being their teacher and being older, it�s a bit tricky expressing a liking for something because students will defer to you.)

So off we went in 3 cars (I asked for an explanation for that and the only part I understood was that 승훈 was going to pick up his girlfriend after dinner�why 진철 and 창민 had to have a separate car was incoherent and we were all too hungry to hash out the grammar.) Anyway, off we went to 장지역 in search of a 닭갈비 식탕.

I was riding with 진우 in the �lead unit� and �California Dreamin�� was playing as we set out. When I told him it was a big hit in 1966 when I was in high school, he nearly swerved into the on-coming traffic. We almost clipped the back of a truck when I told him the next song, UB40�s �I Can�t Help Falling In Love With You�, was a remake of an Elvis Presley song from the early 60�s. (I told you he is intense. He kind of over-reacts to things.) �Oh! Really old!� After our discussion of the 30th anniversary of the King�s death on Thursday, I almost lost it because I told him the song playing by then (Patti Page�s Tennessee Waltz) was from the 50�s and he said, �Whoa, do they have music in the 50�s?�

Anyway, we made it to 장지역 without a traffic accident and everyone gets parked without too much trouble. Now the search was on. Where is 닭갈비? We stroll up and down the street and around a couple of corners, but no 닭갈비 anywhere. I suggested someone ask a shop owner, but like many males everywhere, asking for directions is not in the genetic makeup. (I can ask the question, but my Korean isn�t up to understanding the answer, so fruitless.) Finally, 진우 broke down and asked someone. As luck would have it, we were in one of the few neighborhoods in the entire country without 닭갈비. This far out, civilization is a new concept-- I told you life out here on the edge of town can be rough and we suffer.

It seems there is one up the street, not far off, near Rodeo Street. So we pile back into the three cars and go again in search of supper. By now, all three drivers and 창민 have their cell phones out and are in constant communication with each other. As we drove past the 샤브샤브 restaurant, 창민 gave that another try, but by now everyone else agreed with me that only 닭갈비 could be the �menu�.

Rodeo Street of course is a shopping street with no restaurants. Those are in the narrow streets just off it. Three cars in a line trying to stay together, maneuvering through those narrow streets was quite entertaining, what with cars parked on both sides and vans, shiny big cars, bongo trucks and little old ladies with their carts of flattened boxes wanting to go the other direction and our drivers all driving with one hand on the wheel and the other holding the hand phone to one ear, chattering away with each other. This went on for about 45 minutes until they decided it was hopeless and we all headed back to 장지역 for 샤브샤브.

Somewhere in there 진철 in the white car got separated from us dudes in the black cars and we had to wait for him and 창민 to show up. While we were waiting on the street corner, 승훈 spotted a 갈비 restaurant down the street, but not a 닭갈비 식탕. Wanting to spare 창민 from having to eat 샤브샤브 a second time in three days, I decided to exert my elder teacher authority and opted for the non-닭갈비 갈비 restaurant.

It turned out to be a decent choice. We ordered a combo plate that had actual 갈비 with bones (always a surprise), some 오리, some of that 5-layer 오겹살 and some sausages. The ajumma was so thrilled to have a waygookin in the place that she came over about 5 times to ask if it was delicious. I told her it was 아주 and that pleased her enough to give us some 불고기, �service�.

Dinner conversation turned out to be more informative than usual. By late in the second bottle and into the third bottle of 소주 they wanted to know what I thought of our school (they know I�ve had a serious disagreement with the bosses over scheduling) and 진우 asked if there was any way he could come back to my class. At first I thought this was just the usual �We miss you, Ya-ta Boy�, but it wasn�t. He said the two native speakers at his level are �bad teachers� and the students have complained to the bosses. We are supposed to teach about 50 pages in our program each week. He said his teacher has taught only 2 pages. I asked what they did in class if the teachers aren�t teaching the assigned lessons. 진우 said the teachers just talk about themselves. I think he means they just chatter with stories about their lives. He said the only time there is any dialog, it�s between the teacher and the best student in the class. He said everyone has given up on learning anything this 10 week session. He will just do �self-study�. 창민 said he likes his teacher, but that teacher is leaving at the end of this month and the new teacher has taught the class one time�and every single student �dozed� in class, it was so boring. I felt really sorry for my boys. [This is one of the things that really angers me about the Korean English education system. Incompetent teachers are hired and the students suffer�a lot of their future depends on improved English and all too often they are not getting the instruction their teachers were hired to give. Phoney degrees are not the issue. Competency in the classroom is.]

The heavy mood was broken when 진철 told 진우 and 창민 that they should have been 바보 like him and stayed in my class.

이차 turned out to be red plastic chairs outside a hoff since the weather was decent. [Where�s the real summer weather this year?] That�s when 승훈 came in handy. First, as we were sitting down, the ajosshis at the next table looked like they wanted to come over and talk to the waygookin. 승훈 saw this, and wanting to keep the waygookin for his group, gave them a flex of his muscles and a scowl and the ajosshis desisted, soon after wandering off. Then he turned out to be a fount of information. It was at this part of the evening that he explained about the �advertisement girls� and said that the 달런주점 girls are advertisement girls. File that away for future reference if appropriate. To his credit, 승훈�s ears were bright red while he told me about this. He also flashed an embarrassed smile when 진철 said he seemed to know a lot about the topic. [Mysteriously, he never did leave to pick up his girlfriend.] On a related subject, does anyone know who invented condoms? 승훈 wants to know.

In the end, a good time was had by all in spite of the 닭갈비 deficit.

If anyone knows the answer to the above question or the exact location of a 닭갈비 restaurant near Rodeo Street, please post an answer.


The moral of our story: Always have a back up plan.

Going out with students can be painless, fun and informative if you have the good luck to have cool students. They will still drive like ajosshis, all the while insisting that only married men are ajosshis, but it�s their gas (and their country), not yours.

[sammi]