Korea: The good, the bad and the ugly.

So, it is time for me to write a final piece on my time here in Gimhae, South Korea. With only three more days to go I find that I am trying to summarise my feelings on this last year and so I shall write them down and share them with you.


I haven’t had a particularly smooth time since I last updated this blog due to a fall out with my manager which, for once, was not my fault at all. The argument was a build up of a lot of things but I pretty much knew that it would have to happen eventually because my boss told me on one of our meetings that he didn’t like strong women. I am stubborn to the core, am not afraid to fight for my beliefs or to stand up for myself and I hate taking orders from people that don’t know how to do their job properly. So, we were never meant to be. So this argument, which my boss decided to instigate whilst I was in the middle of teaching a class of adult students, has changed our relationship quite drastically. I no longer have any respect for him which he can’t comprehend (especially as I am a younger woman) and he also knows that he stepped totally out of line but doesn’t know how to apologise to me. So, for the last three weeks there has been a lot of tension between us. This incident and the fact that he then moved us into a studio flat with only a single bed for us to share for our remaining two weeks has obviously tainted my view on some things.

But, let me begin with the good and the things that I have enjoyed about being here. The first thing that springs to mind is the mountains. I have absolutely loved living in a mountainous country where I can easily go hiking in the countryside whenever I want. The landscape is dramatic and beautiful and I really admire the way that it changes colours so dramatically during every season; the bare and barren winter where the trees are stripped of any flesh, the golden warmth of autumn where the mountains almost glow, the lush vibrant greens of the summer and the flourishing cherry blossom of spring. Each season has its own assets and I have really enjoyed living in a country where I get to experience the cycle of such definite seasons.

People have also had a significant influence on my opinions and feelings about Korea. I have met both good and bad and they have affected me in different ways. There is no doubt in my mind that the majority of women here in Korea, especially those who are providing a service, are kind, generous, amiable people. Some of them have gone the extra mile for us and have made our time here to be more comfortable than it could have been. The family that I have spent time with in the last six months have been one of the highlights of my time here. They have shown great pride for their country and have wanted us to experience the best parts that it has to offer. They have also shown great interest in our lives and our culture and we have shared opinions on a huge array of topics. Their generosity has been overwhelming and they have been a very positive influence on the way I feel about the last year. I think it is incredibly easy to come to Korea and do the same that you would do in your own country- wake up, go to work, come home, go for a drink, bitch about work, go to bed, repeat. Koreans don’t always make it easy for you to immerse yourself in their culture and the continuous pointing, staring and shouts of “foreigner!” make it difficult for you to be anything more than an alien here. And so I am thankful to the family I met for allowing me to have a genuine experience of Korean life and for treating me as a friend not a foreigner.

As well as the local people here, I have met some wonderful people from other Western countries which I am very thankful for. We have been incredibly lucky to have some really kind, interesting and welcoming western teachers at our school and their friendships have been a fundamental part in the last year. They are people that we hope to keep in touch with and I’m sure our paths will cross again in the future. It was also really great to live close to Sarah and Jake, whom I have missed a lot since their departure at the beginning of March. Friends are very important when you are living in a rather strange world that doesn’t work the way you are used to.

And it has been wonderful to save a substantial amount of money for the first time in my life.

There are, of course, negatives about being here, which I will try not to dwell on too much. I don’t know if I would ever come back to Korea, but if I did, I would NEVER work for a Korean businessman ever again. In my experience, they are sly, dishonest, selfish, manipulative, unappreciative, uncaring, canny, unorganised, unreasonable and ruthless. While I may be tainting all Korean businessmen with one brush, I know of so many people that have had various problems with their managers usually through no fault of their own- myself included. They value money above their staff’s welfare and they will always try to squeeze a little bit more out of you without giving anything back. Never again would I work in a private academy.

I really hate all the concrete here and the endless blocks of drab apartments. The cities are grey and charmless and each and every one looks the same as the last one. I have never really been able to feel the soul of Korea in the cities, they lack character and appeal for me- I find myself longing for the cobbled streets of Dubrovnik or the historic architecture of Rome.

Another thing I despise is K-Pop which I hope I never have to hear again. It really is hollow music, mass produced for all the muppets who idolise the talentless idiots that sing it. Wherever you go, there will always be one shop or market stall playing it. I know that the UK has a whole host of disgusting boy-bands and pop idol winners, but it is very easy to escape it. In Korea, listening to K-Pop isn’t a choice; it is a way of life.

One thing that has really stuck with me about this place is how proud people are of their country and how willing almost everybody is to work for Korea’s future. Whether this is good or bad, I am still not sure, it is almost definitely a mixture of the two, but it is certainly interesting. People here really do care about Korea and its international reputation. They want it to do well and so they do things to ensure that- protectionism is one of them. Korea has recovered from the economic crisis with a vengeance and its future looks positive. People here always buy Korean because that is what is predominately on offer. This means that there is a massive lack of variety, but it helps to strengthen the country’s economy. Everybody here, from the kids to the grandmas will tell you that they are proud to be Korean and they genuinely believe Korea is the best country in the world. Sometimes this frustrates me because it can come from arrogance rather than knowledge, but I do feel that Britain could do with a few spoonfuls of this attitude. The younger generation don’t really care about Britain, they take it for granted. Even worse, some vandalise and destroy it. In Korea, people care about their surroundings- the public exercise parks are undamaged and kids are allowed to run free because the crime rate is so low. So, despite how incredibly frustrated I have felt about the pig-headedness of some Koreans at times, I think there is a thing or two us Brits could learn from them....maybe.

Gimhae in Bloom!

I took these photographs yesterday in Gimhae. It was a beautiful sunny day and the flowers looked gorgeous.

Please click on the photos to see them in their full size as some of them have been cropped in order to fit on the page.

Optimism in the air

I was doing quite well at writing frequent updates, but I am afraid I have been quite busy the last month so I haven't had time to dedicate to writing a new entry. So, apologies that this one is a bit late.

We have four weeks left here now and I have to say I'm feeling quite fond of Korea at the moment. Winter is over and the days are warming up now. The sunshine is bright and it's warm enough to walk around with a light jacket on in the day times. The streets are lined with various different trees all covered in a blanket of  blossom which is a refereshing change to the bleakness of winter. The pearly coloured magnolia is particularly pretty and the scent of the flowers is fresh and strong. It definitely breeds optimism. I have to say that I have really enjoyed living somewhere that experiences four very distinct seasons. I like change and I have found that clear-cut seasons have helped me to feel like things are moving forwards.

We have been hiking every weekend and I'm pleased by how much fitter I feel and how spending time outside can make me feel so positive. For me, nothing beats a long walk in beautiful surroundings on a crisp but sunny day. There are two places that we hike to- both are mountains, though I'm not entirely sure what the difference between a hill and a mountain is. The places we climb have definite summits and are known locally as mountains, so i'll stick with it (mainly because it sounds impressive.) The first one that we climbing is the closest mountain to our house and probably one of the smallest. It's called 'Imho-San' and at the top is a pretty pagoda that you can sit and have a picnic in. I've never had a picnic in it, but the idea is nice. The mountain is densely wooded and half-way up there is an exercise park which always baffles me! It doesn't take long to hike it- we can be up and down in about an hour and a half. The other mountain that we frequently climb has an observatory at the top where you can look at the star constellations at night. Again, I have never been there at night- but it's a nice idea. It's much steeper and longer than Imho-San and I always feel like I've really challenged my body by the time I get to the top of it. It takes us about three hours to get up and down. We normally reach the summit and then make our way across the top of the mountain to a large curved stone wall that was built for a television drama. It's really quite stunning to look at and on a good day you can stand on it and see for miles. Though last week the locals told us it was a popular place to commit suicide which tainted the beautiful view that I saw when I peered over the edge and looked down. We intend to do a lot of walking and hiking on our trip including the Annapurna circuit in Nepal so we want to try and get as fit as possible before hand.

We've started the process of readying ourselves for the next seven months or so. We now have our malaria tablets and have booked various flights and accommodation for our time in Indonesia. I think we'll go with the flow and won't book anything else too far ahead for the remainder of the trip. Indonesia is a bit different as we're covering quite a bit of land whilst we are there and we have to book a flight out to show them that we are leaving in order to obtain a visa. Very much looking forward to spending some time with Josh and being there for his first experience of Asia.

We went to a pottery shop a couple of weekends ago, where you can pick a piece of unfired crockery and paint your design on it and then they will fire and glaze it for you. There was a similar place in Bath, only it's much cheaper in Korea. I painted a teapot and Lee painted a tear-shaped dish. They turned out beautifully so we might go back to do one more piece before we leave.

I am setting up a new blog for the trip and also a website for my photography which I will keep updated. When they are up and running, I shall post the new addresses.

A very Korean day out.

I don't have time to write at the moment but these are some pictures from last weekend. A Korean family that I know took us to Jeollanamdo for the day and these are the results. We went to Odong island (with the camelias), Yeosu (with the fish market and restaurant) and Songgwangsa Buddhist temple. I will write all about it very soon!

Jigsaw falling into place

Our flights are booked! It took a lot of persuasion, constant nagging and rather bullish behaviour to get our boss to book them but he finally did. Well, sort of, he conveniently forgot his credit card so we booked them anyway and made him pay us back. We leave Korea at 1300 hours on Friday April 30th which means our last working day will be April 29th. It's a pretty long and arduous journey- we stop twice in China and then stay overnight in Jakarta before flying to Denpasar in Bali the next morning. When I think about flying in my head it makes me feel excited and I forget how terrified I am of landing, which is a fear I have rather sadly developed in the last couple of years. Old age is setting in, I can feel it- the things that I found exciting when I was a youth now petrify me...and I'm only 24. And it's not just plane travel, I hate fast drivers too and bus rides in Asia that are always stupidly trecherous. I sit in my seat with my fists clenched and my palms sweating praying to something that I will arrive at my destination in one piece. What will I be like when I'm 30? On our flight to Bali we will have four landings in total which is a terrifying thought. The last time I flew on a plane without Lee I had to hold the hand of the lady who was sitting next to me. She didn't seem to mind but I really shouldn't make a habit of it. However, I do love in-flight meals so that makes up for the fear factor of flying. And my brother will be arriving in Indonesia the same day as we do to meet us and spend two wonderful weeks holidaying with us in the tropics.
We have a rough plan...it has changed since the last 'itinerary update' I wrote. We were going to spend time in Bali to begin with, but having spoken to a few discerning people that had been there and read a few bits and pieces, we have decided to head away from the mass of alcohol fueled tourists and head to Lombok and Gili Meno instead. I'm sure there will be abrasive drunken tourists everywhere, but I also think that most of the people searching for an alternative to the Costa del Sol are pretty lazy and won't venture any further than where the first bus drops them. I remember going to beautiful Studland beach in Dorset when I was a kid. All the massive fatties with their Burger King 'meals' used to swarm the first 50 metres of the beach and then there was all this glorious white sand (the bit before the nudy area) where only the healthy and imaginitive ventured. It never made sense to me. Anyway, back to the point- we're heading to Lombok and Gili Meno where there should be the same idyllic beaches but less idiots. Lombok is a Muslim island located in Nusa Tenggara and is the island directly East of Bali. We've booked accommodation at Santai Beach Inn for the three of us when we first arrive. This is in Sengiggi which is on the Western side of the island and we're going to stay here for a few days before taking a ferry to The Sunset Gecko, our accommodation on Gili Meno.
I can't imagine how I am going to feel when I leave South Korea. I've been wondering if there is anything that I will truly miss. I'd say I'm a pretty adaptable person, I enjoy things whilst I have them but I don't normally find myself yearning after them when I'm gone. That goes for most things apart from food. I really have missed the variety of food on offer in the UK and I dream of cheese and coleslaw baguettes from The Butter Pat in Bath daily. I miss cooking. I love cooking so much and I was getting quite good at it before I came here. But now we don't have an oven we can't do any baking and fried and boiled food gets rather tedious after awhile. In terms of missing things in Korea though, and leaving people out of the equation, there isn't a great deal that I will pine for. I will miss my hamsters a lot. And I will miss being surrounded by mountains because they do have an uplifting, almost magical feel to them. But there will be mountains where we are heading... I won't miss teaching in a Hagwon that's for sure and I won't miss Gimhae and all the other concrete cities that exist in Korea. I can't wait to visit a city which isn't made out of concrete. There are some Korean dishes, such as Samgyetang, that I really like- but generally speaking I won't be hankering after Korean cuisine the way I fantasise about eating pasta with bacon and blue cheese, fish n chips, fajitas, chicken korai and, of course, a Cornish pasty. I will miss the weather here, it's been wonderful to live somewhere that experiences four very distinct seasons. Knowing that there will be a warm summer when my toes feel numb with cold is much nicer than wondering if I'll ever experience temperatures over 20 degrees celsius again (the way I used to feel in Britain.) And, of course I will miss being able to not worry about money. Working in Korea has helped my bank balance dramatically and I have been able to live a very comfortable lifestyle here which would be great if I liked my surroundings. Maybe if I was returning to Britain immediatly I would feel a little fonder of Korea, but because I am much more excited about our trip, I just can't wait to leave. And, having been to South East Asia before I know what to expect and I cannot wait. To me, Korea just seems quite bland and sterile compared to the excitement and diversity of somewhere like Vietnam.
Sorry Korea.

Talking 'bout my generation

The winter holiday for Korean students at public schools lasts between Christmas time and the beginning of February. Because Korean parents are intent on forcing their offspring to use every waking hour to study, Hagwons take on extra students during this period. For the last couple of months I have been teaching two separate high school classes. I taught one class every day at 1.30pm and the other class every other day at 6.30pm. When these classes were introduced to me by our manager he promised that the first couple of lessons would be ‘free talking’ –“Just introduce yourself to them, get to know them, share your dreams....” but he guaranteed that he would find a suitable text book for me to use very soon. Unsurprisingly this never happened and therefore it was up to me to come up with a new and interesting topic every day that would grab the attention of a bunch of 19-21 year old Korean students. What made this even more difficult was that one student happened to take both of the classes that I taught so I couldn’t even regurgitate the material we had used in the first class to use it for the second. Therefore, in total, I had to think of about fifty different themes which was tough work for my brain. As expected some things worked very well; love, national holidays, stress and some went terribly; the generation gap, diet and exercise, military service.


The two classes that I taught were distinctly different. The first started off being a group of about twelve students, but as with all classes at our Hagwon, they disintegrated and by the last week I was left with only two. This particular collection of youths could not have been duller. In the first couple of weeks I put their lack of participation down to under confidence and shyness. But when week five started walking my way and they had got to know their fellow classmates pretty well, I realised that it was just because their poor brains had been fried with an overload of study and other people’s myopic opinions. These kids didn’t have anything original to say and couldn’t back up any of their opinions even when I jumped up and down reciting, “give me a reason!! I need a reason!” Their written English ability was good but the most I ever heard come out of their sullen little mouths was ‘Yes’ ‘No’ and ‘Just because’ (the latter was their given reason for everything.) Most of them wanted to be business men or women and were studying that at university which obviously clarifies that they had an extreme lack of imagination and had lost their souls during adolescence. When I asked what sort of business they wanted to run I was told that it did not matter as long as they became rich.

I remember doing an interesting exercise with them a few weeks ago. We had been talking about (or I had been talking about) people’s priorities in life and people’s wants and desires from life. I gave them a list of priorities and asked them to number them from 1-12 (one being the most important) and to give reasons for doing so.

The list included:
A happy long-term relationship
Raising good children
A high level of academic education
World knowledge and wisdom (travel, reading, voluntary work etc)
Friends you can count on
Money
Being famous
Being powerful
Having a fulfilling career
Owning valuable things
Being aesthetically beautiful

I'm not naive, I absolutely expect university students to give responses that focus on themselves in the present rather than things like family. What I didn’t expect was that 90% of the students would give exactly the same response and it would take them less than two minutes to decide (I was hoping it would take up at least ¼ of my lesson). It’s almost as though they are told what their priorities in life must be from a very young age so that by the time they reach 19 or 20 they don’t even have to consider anything, rather like a very easy maths sum. I was also disappointed, though not surprised, that education was very low on their lists (even though they study so much) and world knowledge even lower. Fame, money and beauty was at the top, though I suspect this would be the same if I asked many teenagers anywhere in the world. What confused me was that although ‘money’ was listed in the top three, owning valuable things was about number seven. I asked them why they wanted lots of money if they were not interested in owning nice things and they said that they wanted a swanky car and a big house for show and that was all- they didn’t seem to be interested in the contents. And everyone wanted that big house to be in America. It was like talking to a load of dummies or pre-programmed robots or humans whose brains had been replaced with a potato and a tape recorder that reeled off the same rubbish as all the other potato-brained humans in the room.

Just when I was beginning to think that this generation of Koreans were desperately lacking in spirit, soul, depth, originality and innovation- I met Phoebe (who always signed her name the same way she said it- PB) and Stella. Obviously these were their given English names for the purpose of the class only. These girls attended my evening class and were the life and soul of the party. When I first met them they terrified me- Phoebe was a tall, very skinny girl of 21 who never parted with her five inch heels and short black mini skirt. She wore thick, charcoal black eye make-up and had radiant bronze skin. Her hair was dyed auburn which she always wore in a pony tail that was slicked back against her head. She looked like she had just stepped off the set of a Korean pop music video. Stella was her best friend, much shorter than Phoebe but probably even skinnier. I’m sure I could have fitted my moderately small hands around her waist- she was the width of a can of beans. Like Phoebe, she had thick make-up smothered on to her face but she chose the traditional white face make up that most Koreans opt for. Stella had short cropped hair but sometimes she came to class with a long red wig. They were loud, chatty, outgoing, confident and very funny. Their command of English wasn’t great but they tried at every possibly opportunity. They had a wicked sense of humour and my classes sailed by with the help of their eager participation and general zest for life. The thing that impressed me the most about them was their lack of seriousness and their ability to enjoy being a twenty-something-year-old and not succumb to the pressures that so many teenagers in Korea have to put up with. They didn’t know what their future held, they didn’t really care- they were living for the moment and they were having an awful lot of fun. It was very refreshing to see. But, they were still smart kids and they put the work in where it was needed. We talked about all sorts of things together- from serial killers to cosmetic surgery, relationship troubles to travel. They wanted to know everything about me and likewise I was very keen to find out more about them. They had strong opinions about everything- often differing to most of their class mates and they were always able to give reasons for their views. There was nothing reserved about them and they weren’t afraid to be laughed at which was often the case, though they would laugh along too.

In the corner of that class always sat the same girl- her Anglicized name was Suji and this was a name she had chosen herself, I assume it was based on her Korean name. She was a world away from Phoebe and Stella and I wish I had been able to find out a bit more about her. She was quiet and her body language reminded me of a hermit crab, she would cower away under her oversized woolly hat and big winter coat. She didn’t talk a lot, but she was different to the others and the very few things that she did say suggested that she had a lot of distaste for Korea. During one of my classes we talked about feminism and equality between men and women. I declared I was a liberal feminist and that I believed that equal opportunity and fairness between the sexes was fundamental to a forward thinking society. I asked the class what they thought and most said that they thought that equal rights between men and women in Korea was very prevalent (I disagree entirely but did not voice this.) Suji piped up and stated that she thought that women had a hard time in Korea and were not treated as equals to men, she said she was a feminist too and that Korea was a horrible place for strong minded women. She spoke with real bitterness and looking at her, it was almost as though she was trying to disassociate herself from Korea entirely. Her hair was dyed light brown in a way that looked natural and she had bleached her eyelashes and eyebrows the same colour as if to rid herself of the Korean look. She is the first Korean person I have met to declare a hatred for the awful pop music that we are forced to listen to as residents here and she said that she was a fan of Radiohead. This was pretty shocking as most local people don’t even know who The Beatles are. I felt quite sad for her as she seemed to hold a lot of weight on her shoulders and clearly didn’t fit in with the majority of people her age. It was as though she was waiting for the opportunity to flee this country and as soon as she got one, she would vanish from here and never look back.

Fur Coats And Ripe Strawberries

So far we are coping with the winter weather quite well. It has definitely been cold, but I am sure that it wasn't as bitter as the previous winter that we experienced in the UK. It helps that in Korea we have an apartment that is fully insulated (we have people above and below us) and it is equipped with heating that is effective. The place we lived in Bath had huge Georgian sash windows with no double glazing and the heat seeped out of the house whilst the sub-zero air from outside seeped in. I remember wearing two pairs of socks, pajamas and a warm jumper in bed because it was so cold. So, even if it is cold outside in Korea it's good to know that our home will always offer warmth.

Another way that I have noticed the local people dealing with cold is by wearing fur coats. As soon as the temperature dropped, Korean female teachers started wearing them at our hagwon. I immediately assumed they were synthetic- like the majority of 'fur' coats you see in high street stores across the UK. It hadn't occurred to me otherwise until I remarked on how velvety and soft one felt whilst stroking and admiring my co-workers flaxen fluffy coat- and was told it was once a live animal. Now I realise that all the markets lined with fur coats, tail-like-scarfs, ear muffs and hats were actually selling the real deal with no shame whatsoever. The teacher I talked to at the hagwon was very proud to tell me that her coat was once a mink and was shocked when I told her that the majority of people in the UK thought that wearing real fur for fashion purposes was outrageous. Korea isn't like the middle of nowhere in Russia, fur isn't the only warm option around- it is a choice that they make based on what's seen as fashionable and so many people wear the stuff. The boss’ wife came into work today wearing beige boots with a golden piece of fur stuck on the front of them- I’m sure her feet would have been just as warm without it.

‘Tis the season for strawberries at the moment and the markets are filled with bowls and tubs overflowing with succulent red ripe fruit. They taste absolutely delicious. The one thing that Koreans have got right is fruit- the fruit here really is some of the best I have ever tasted and there is always so much locally grown produce available at the local market for a good price.

I love strawberries so I am hoping that they will be around for a couple of months.

We went to the local horse races on Sunday which was great fun as neither Lee nor I had ever been to see horse racing before. Unlike Britain, it was ridiculously cheap to get in- 800 won, which translates to about 40p. The minimum bet was 100 won (about 5p) so you didn’t have to risk breaking the bank if you didn’t want to. The ground was mainly full of older Korean men smoking their implausibly thin cigarettes and getting very serious about making the right bets but it was amusing to watch and we placed small bets too.

Lunar New Year is February 14th-16th this year and we have four days off of work to celebrate. We're not sure what to do with our time yet as it's difficult to travel around on National holidays. I will endevour to write a blog entry soon after to let you know what we end up doing.

2010- three months to go...

Hello everybody and Happy New Year!

This blog entry will be a little bit frugle with words, but I shall put some photos up for you to browse. January has been pretty quiet so far- not much to report. New Year's eve was pretty uneventful, Korean's tend to celebrate Lunar New Year instead which is a three day celebration that falls in Mid-February this year. Unfortunately most of the public holidays have fallen on weekends in 2009 and they continue to do so in 2010, which means that we have hardly had any holiday time at all. At least we are only here for a year, I really struggle to understand how Korean people manage to survive on about 10 days holiday a year for a lifetime. I figure it must be a contribution to the high suicide rates. However, on the news the other night it suggested that the government may pass a new law that will enable people to take a day off of work on the Monday, should a public holiday fall on a Saturday or Sunday.

Last weekend we went to Busan and stayed overnight. We ate tasty food at a really good Indian restaurant, did some shopping and took a walk on Gwangalli beach.

That's all for now- I will make sure the next update is longer! Please click on the photos to see the full version- for some reason landscape shots are cropped by this website.