Why I like teaching in a public school.

Before coming to Korea, I struggled with whether to take a public or private school job. Ultimately, of course, I decided to go the public school route through EPIK. Every week, I listen to an excellent podcast called Seoul Survivors, by a guy named Carl and a rotating female guest, usually another English teacher. A few weeks ago, they briefly discussed teaching in public schools vs. hagwons (private schools), and they, both only having taught in hagwons, didn't have a lot to say about public schools, and what information they did have was pretty outdated. Here's an email I sent to Carl after listening regarding why I like being a public school teacher.



Hi Carl,

First off, let me say that I really enjoy your podcast. Listening to it in the weeks before I came to Korea really got me excited about living here. I just wanted to expound a little on the email you read last week concerning the EPIK program.

*We did stay at Korea University for orientation, just their branch campus in Jochiwon, which is in fact a small town of only about 30,000. We were fed for free and housed in dorms for a week while given information from veteran english teachers as well as Korean teachers on what to expect in the classroom.

*EPIK does place teachers in large cities. Before 2002, however, public schools had no mandate to place native teachers in schools, so usually public schools who did request teachers were in rural areas where there were no hagwons. Now, EPIK teachers are placed in every city in Korea besides Seoul. Seoul has its own program for placing native English teachers, SMOE (Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education). Teachers I was with during orientation were placed in Incheon, Daegu, Busan, Ulsan, and other places. Of course, there are still plenty of teachers who do not get placed in large cities, but you can request to be placed near or in one. Just like you said though, you don't really have a choice about which city you go to.

*The 11 month contract thing must have ended awhile back, because none of the EPIK vets mentioned it during orientation and all our contracts are definitely 12 month.

Lastly, I just wanted to say that I've really enjoyed being a public school teacher, much more than I think I would have teaching at a hagwon. It depends on what you want, though. I have a lot of friends here in Ulsan that teach at hagwons, and they seem happy with their jobs. Since that's your area of expertise, I'll let you wax poetic about them :) Here are just a few reasons why I chose to go the public school route.

1. Government job, so automatically guaranteed to get paid on time, not have insurance/pension/tax issues with shady hagwon owners.

2. Morning work hours. My hours are 9-5, in which I only teach 4 or 5 classes a day. Of course, many people would list that as a downside, but coming from teaching in the US, I'm used to working during the day and having my afternoons/evenings free. I also don't mind staying at school when I'm not teaching. I just go online and play games, read message boards, listen to podcasts, etc. :) Some hagwon teachers say they'd hate this though, so to each their own.

3. Structured curriculum. I have a little freedom to do things in class, but for the most part, each one of my classes is scripted out for me. A little dialogue, a little freeform conversation, and a little pronunciation. I teach right out of the textbook, which means no planning!

4. Co-teacher. I have a co-teacher who is in the classroom with me that helps with translation and general crowd control. This is identical to English teachers in Japan. Again, this is something that some hagwon teachers say they'd hate, but personally, coming from teaching in the states and being responsible for everything, I'm more than content to sit back and let my coo-teacher handle the discipline (usually with her big stick :) ).

Anyway, I know that this email is a bit long-winded, so feel free to use as much or as little as you'd like on your podcast. I just want to make sure no one is scared away from a public school teaching job based on outdated information.

Your podcast is awesome. Keep up the great work.

John in Ulsan

My baby has a penis.

On Friday afternoons I teach a class for other teachers who are interested in learning more English. Usually we spend about 20 minutes doing a scripted lesson I plan out and the last ten minutes we practice conversation. Today's topic is "What did you do for Chuseok?" Of course, the first thing I expected to hear was the man in our class announce, "My baby has a penis." After several attempts to regain my composure, I was informed by one of the other teachers that he was trying to tell me that he has a son. The thing is, this guy's wife is an English teacher! He can't just say, "I have a son?" Ah well, that's Korea.

My kids are the best

Coming back from vacation is always hard. You have to get up early, trudge to work (I did a little less trudging today-I caught a taxi about halfway to school,) and get ready to start. However, one thing makes it all worthwhile.

*sappy alert*

The students. They're always so happy to see you. Even in the US, coming back from break was always made a little better by seeing all the smiling faces that greet you when you come through the door. Here in Korea, it's even better, because my schedule is so much easier here. I only have two classes today, and on top of that, it's Friday! This Wednesday is a holiday too! You just can't beat that.

Vacation's almost over...

Sorry for the lack of updates this week. Since I've been off for Chuseok, not much was happened. Tomorrow I'll upload some more pics and movies. Today I did have a few firsts though.

*I rode the bus for the first time. Talk about inconvenient! It costs about 5000 won ($5) to get from my apartment to downtown by taxi. The taxi ride takes about 10 minutes. On the way home, I took the bus. I had to wait 40 minutes just for it to arrive, and then the actual ride took 25 minutes! Over an hour! It is only 950 won though, less than a dollar, so if I have the time to kill I may take it instead of a cab.

*I also got my hair cut here today. I look totally stylin' :)

Hanging with other foreigners!

On Friday night I ventured downtown by myself to try and find some of the expat bars around Ulsan. After about an hour walking around, I managed to spot another foreigner, so I was able to get directions to benchwarmers, the best expat bar in the old downtown area. I hung out there for awhile, and then came back on Saturday night. It's a pretty laid-back place. After a couple hours, on Saturday night, who should show up but the guy who gave me directions! He's a pretty cool guy, and after a few more beers at Benchwarmers, he took me over to Ulsan University where the other two expat bars are, Tombstone and Purple Haze.

Hanging out with other foreigners is kind of weird though--it shows me how unique my experience has been so far. Since I teach at a public school, I think I have a much closer relationship with more Korean people than most hagwon teachers, and for a lot of them, all of their socialization comes from talking to other foreigners at these bars. I'm glad I've had a chance to make some Korean friends and go out with them. I didn't come halfway around the world just to make friends with other people not from Korea! Check my pictures and movies for last night's revelry.

My boss is pretty cool, too.

In Korea, the principals (at least at my schools) are not what you'd call really approachable. They have fortress-like offices with private secretaries and are not generally seen walking the halls. It was very surprising to me when the principal stopped in to observe my class today. I guess it went well, because after the class he invited me into his office and handed me a 17-year old bottle of Ballantine's scotch. Without disclosing how much it's worth (do an internet search if you're curious), let me just tell you that it's by far (by, by far) the most expensive liquor I've ever been in possession of.

Chusok time is here....

...and I've decided to stay home. At least for the first couple days. My apartment is in dire need of a good sweeping, and I'm less than happy with my current setup as far as all the wires crisscrossing over the floors.

Last night I met up with my friend Bo for a drink. I met him briefly during orientation, but I hadn't really had a chance to sit down and talk to him. He knows about drum corps, which, as you can imagine, made my day. We talked about that for awhile, ended up going to another bar in hopes of seeing some pretty ladies, but the next bar was just as empty as the first. I guess we didn't go out late enough. He's going to Seoul for Chusok, and he invited me to share a hotel room with him and come to his friend's birthday party, but I feel like I need to take care of stuff here at home first.

Pretty much everybody is going away for the holiday. I won't be lonely, though. After all, I need to give some love to my newly reactivated 360 Live account--Puzzle Fighter, here I come!

You can't tell me that's not the sweetest thing you've ever seen. Sometimes I really want a motorcycle. Then I remember I'm not so hot on a bicycle. Maybe I could just sit on it parked, maybe take up smoking to give me that Marlon Brando from The Wild One look, I dunno. Just look how awesome it is though! And I need a way to blow ten grand!

More observations...

People don't eat grape skins here. Out of all the things they do eat, they don't eat grape skins??

Italian restaurants use ketchup instead of marinara sauce. Pickles are served with every dish. Coke is sometimes an item on the desert menu.

Last night Mi Sung and I went out to dinner--my present to her for carting me around to immigration and all the other stuff she's helped me with. I found this restaurant online called Canta Napoli, but try as we might, once we got downtown, we couldn't find it, nor did anyone we (she) asked about it know anything about it. We settled on some random Italian place instead. It was alright, but again I noticed the abundance of pickles and ketchup. We had a great time though. The worst part for me about being in Korea is having to limit my English to very simple phrases while talking to others at work. Mi Sung is so good at English that I can speak normally to hear and she actually understands, which is awesome. I know, I know, you're thinking, "So? What's the big deal?" Try going a week without saying anything more than "Hello, Good Morning," etc. By the end of the week you'll feel like you just want to pour out your soul to anyone who actually understands what you're saying.

Here's a great article on the PC gaming culture in South Korea. I've done my time in PC bangs during the two weeks I was here without internet in my apartment, and I can say for sure that this article is spot on.

The thing that makes PC bangs so appealing in Korea (as opposed to in the US) is the price. 3,500 won for 5 hours. That's about $3.80. There's nohttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif way I could be on a computer for 5 hours straight (at least without having something else to do like watch tv), so I never ended up using that much time, so the most I ever paid was 1,000 won. Not too shabby, especially since that includes a free drink when you come in.

In other news, happy birthday to :-).

Chusok...what to do?

Next week is Chusok, Korean Thanksgiving. We get a whole week off of school, so I need to figure out what to do. I wish I could remember one of my friend's email addresses near Daegu--then I could go visit him and ride up to the city with Mi Sung. I thought about taking the slow boat to Tokyo, but unlike the slow boat to China, this boat is just as expensive as a plane ticket, and I don't want to blow that much money until after I get paid.

I could always stick around Ulsan, maybe finally overcome my fear of getting lost on the bus. It just seems so sad though, because all my Korean friends are going away for the holiday.

It's still typhoon season here, which means nonstop rain until forever. I keep losing or forgetting my umbrella at school, so now I have a grand total of 3. Nothing says useless like three umbrellas in a bag.

All things considered though, I'm still having a great time here. This is by far the easiest teaching job I've ever had, and so far the kids are still really responsive and eager to learn.

Welcome to Asia

Sad but true: I was officially ttong chim-ed today. I wanted to believe it was all a myth, that Azrael over at Gaijin Smash was making all that kancho stuff up, but no, it's real and its painful. I spun around, but like a flash he was gone like a thief in the night. I have a feeling it was this kid who is obsessed with asking me if I'd like anything to drink. I started to just ignore him completely and this might have been his act of revenge.

Gotta love my recruiter

So I'm going out on a tonight with some of the teachers at my school. My recruiter happened to be online so i asked him for some tips.

Me: so give me some tips for tonight
Sent at 1:57 AM on Friday
Recruiter: well obviously no underwear
keep all conversation light
keep it fun
never ask about family
never ask about ex boyfriends
never talk about money
never talk about ex girlfriends
talk about how wonderful Korea is
anything positive at all you can think of about Korea and Korean people
Me: Sounds good.

Yeah.

I told you I am not making these names up. Check my pictures for a Nino and a SexyYoung.

Rain, Rain, Go Away

I guess there's a typhoon coming today. Woo hoo. I've been here three weeks now, and I'm starting to feel at home--at least in Yeonam-dong. Downtown is still really big and confusing to me. In case you didn't notice, I added some links to pictures, movies, fan death, and a great site I'm using to help improve my Korean over on the right side of the page.

Next week, the after school class I will teach begins. Three 45-minute classes a week, which equals 500,000W (~$500) overtime pay a month. I can deal with that. Plus we have some great books called Side By Side that I can take lessons from.

TGIF!

More awesome English names

God (At first I thought he wrote Gob, and I almost passed out.)
SCV (I swear I had nothing to do with this--I need to take a picture to prove it!)
Another Macguyver! He's got to be on tv here, which is awesome.


New pics today--some nice dinner out with some teachers from Gangdong Middle School and the English Village at a nearby middle school Mi Sung and I went to visit.

Sometimes in Korean dramas, they play instrumental versions of Western music. I was pretty surprised when I heard:

Blue Light, Red Light - Harry Connick, Jr.

Breakfast at Denny's - Combustible Edison (!)

Also during a climactic moment in one drama, I may or may not have heard a haunting rendition of the Inspector Gadget theme song playing softly in the background.

Also, at around 2:30 a.m., Korea turns from ultra-harmless, kid-friendly programming to the all porn network.

Finally!

I got my Alien Registration Card today! Finally I can get internet and a cell phone. You never know how alone you feel until you try going without those things. Just shows how dependent I am on technology :) Anyway, time for more random Korea things:

Many bathrooms in Korea are unisex. Not in the way you can go in and lock the door, one person but can be used for two people kind of unisex, but the full-on, Ally McBeal style. You can be in there doing your thing, and all of a sudden, some girl can walk in on you. I was, naturally, disturbed by this the first time it happened, but the girl had no visible reaction to coming in right in front of a guy at the urinal.

Women here eat. A lot. And they're still rail-thin! I don't understand it. My co-teacher at Gangdong eats about three times as much as me each time we have a meal together, but she's so thin. It's amazing.

Did I mention that a dish of pickles come with pizza? No matter if you get it from Pizza Hut or Pizza Bingo (Korean pizza place), but at Korean pizza places the pizzas come with corn (?) on them too.

More to come!

Awesome English Names

At school, each of my students gets to pick his or her own English name. Most were normal. I even put a few on the board if the students couldn't think of one. No kidding, the first thing a kid asks me;

"How do you spell Macguyver?"

Now keep in mind, this is Korea. And Macguyver has been off the air for at least 10 years. Basically this kid is now my new hero.

Other notable names:

Milk
Whoseain (I think he was trying to spell "Hussein.")
Horror
Boss
BumBum

New pics and photos!

New pictures and photos of my apartment and my district, Yeonam-dong! Scroll down to see the links.

It's the little differences.

All Pulp Fiction references aside, I've noticed a few differences living in a city here vs. a city in the US.

* People take recycling here very seriously. At every fast food place, you seperate your own trash (food waste, paper, plastic) into seperate bins.

* Lots of little resturants. Tons of them. Everywhere. Some sit as few as eight people.

* "Well Being." This is some kind of new fad. You'd think well-being products would be confined to healthy food, but I've even seen well being cigarettes.

* Cigarettes. Tons of people smoke. All over the place. I think it must be like how the US was in the 50's.

* It's safe here. Kids run around everywhere. There is very little crime, and violent crime is almost nonexistant.

* There are two Starcraft channels and a channel that has Go games 24 hours a day.

My Co-teacher is Awesome

Well, finally, orientation is over. I moved into my new apartment in Ulsan and was quite shocked. It actually has four rooms! A kitchen, a bedroom, a living/dining room, a laundry room, and a bathroom! Woo-hoo! As someone who'd prepared himself for just living in a one bedroom/efficiency type place, this was quite the pleasant surprise. Not only that, but also included were all new appliances and a HDTV! Oh yeah! Anyway, my co-teacher has already been very helpful; showing me around and helping me buy some more stuff. Oh, did I mention they're giving me $500 more for other new appliances I might need? Geez Louise, that's awesome! Anyway, I'm about halfway unpacked. No internet yet; I'm typing this from a PC Bang down the street from my apartment. Hopefully I will get internet on Tuesday or Wednesday and I will be able to post some pics and a movie tour of my apartment I made.