No Strings Attached

If there’s one group of people I don’t meet on the road, it’s Americans.

South African-turned-Aussie.

Here’s the list since I jumped the pond:

A bevy of Brazilian college students who took me into their home, cooked for me, made my birthday something special after knowing me less than two days.

One South African-turned-Australian conducting our Great Ocean Road tour.

Four English boys I shared a hostel room with.

A German-turned-Irish girl working in said hostel for her keep.

Two Scottish Gals, a German boy, a Swiss girl, and Chinese girl road-tripping.

A Dutch policewoman taking the night bus to Melbourne from Canberra, backpacking for her holiday.

A Korean girl backpacking to Apollo Bay.

Australian-Asian woman traveling to Hong Kong to visit her sister who watched the tennis with me at the airport.

Four Canadian girls who were mortally offended when I asked if they were Americans.

A German girl on working holiday here in Warkworth, just north of Auckland.

Spend the night for $10!

Why are Canadians appalled to be mistaken for their southern counterpart? Why are folks from every other continent besides ours, getting out and about? Why are their young people so much better traveled than ours? They have courage that Americans don’t have, practical knowledge and practiced wisdom honed by months of uncertainty and flexibility on the road.

Spend time in parks. Places that aren't America have amazing park life.
For instance this one, Federation Square, where hundreds of people
camped out for hours to watch Federer and Murray slug it out.

They travel alone; they travel as couples; they travel in groups. They study abroad; they hitch-hike, they do a working holiday[1]. They live between cultures, learning quickly to accept others’ oddities and the ambiguities of this and that (see what I did there?). They’re young, they’re brave, and they’re open with themselves and with others.

Where are we, America? Holed up in our lovely little U.S. of A. I admit—it’s a great place. I love it; it’s comfortable. I know well that comforting familiarity should never be undervalued, but is it worth the price we pay for becoming, somewhat arrogantly if unintentionally, isolationist?

Time to grow

I don’t mean to deify travelers. To some extent, you’re quite right, you who think we’re wasting time, avoiding careers, slumming it. One of the English boys I met—he was only eighteen—vows that he will always hate work. The German-turned-Irish girl had worked a number of dead-end jobs before her current one and didn’t have much motivation to go anywhere from there. Yes, some people are wandering—but they are very honestly doing so, while many people who wander (Americans, I’m looking at you) keep it buried in dead habits and empty goals.

As Bonheoffer wrote and as a friend of mine reminded me of recently, we ought to “Bravely take hold of the real, no dallying now with what might be. Not in the flight of ideas, but only in action is freedom. Make up your mind and come out into the tempest of living.”

Yay dumb pictures! I'm still not sure what is inevitable in this picture, but I hope it's not
talking about ageing or grey beards but more about the inevitability of me one day picking
Brad Pitt's nose. If wishes were fishes, amiright?

Brighton Beach!

 P.S. I fudged a little. I’ve also met two American girls—one of whom lives in Oz married to an Aussie and the other who works at a coffee stand in Auckland, NZ. But the point still stands—an overwhelming number of Americans utterly fail to travel with no strings attached.

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[1] How many Americans actually know what this is?

In Which a Bear of Little Brain Tries to Celebrate and Ends Up Waffling About As Usual: Anniversary Edition

A preparatory note: I am about to be gleeful.

Happy two-year anniversary to meeeeee!!!!!!!!

Apologies. I had great intentions for an anniversary post. I intended, firstly, to do an anniversary post on my one-year anniversary. Second, I had intended to do it in a classy fashion. Then, once that deadline passed and classy ideas and motivation failed me, I intended to do a 10,000 views celebratory post. But that didn’t happen either.

wheeeeeeeee!

And now, though the two-year anniversary mark has already passed me by on the other side of the world and both classiness and conciseness will undoubtedly escape me, I am following through!

Two years ago I started this blog with this little number about the purgatory of travel time. I invite you to read it and beg you not to mock me for immaturity. It was poorly written when I was—if I recall—head over heels horrified at finding myself alone and friendless in a country whose language I didn’t know well on an ill-planned whim, the validity about which my parents had wisely expressed their doubts.

Poorly crafted though my first blog post was, I hold it close to my heart for the idea that I tried and failed to express. I intend to try again. Bear with me, my bears of little brains!

Travel is a chimera—a Proteus?—but only in the sense that it’s maddeningly difficult for me to wrap my mental hands around. Actually, Travel-land doesn’t change; it does the opposite. The world around it changes—the destination and departure point, the people greeting or goodbye-ing me—but the purgatory of Travel-land remains the same. The rhythm, the people, the signs and walkways. It’s like culture, except more like its antithesis: an anti-culture here on nondescript, uncomfortable chairs, between gates, waiting in snaking lines brimming with luggage and people of all shapes and sizes all going different directions in the same manner.

I can tell I’m failing at this again. Perhaps those of you out there traveling know what I’m trying to say. You, too, breathe a sigh of anxious relief upon approaching the check-in counter. Perhaps you, too, feel happy amidst the sea of Everyone Else going their Own Way. The stress of travel is like the stress of a family reunion, and the airport a sort of homecoming.

But that means that you, too, know that it’s not a place for staying. It’s not a Right place for us. It stays the same—a little ineffable, a little stand-offish—while you are made to constantly change. A stint is fine, enjoyable even, as you fade away from the invisible strength of life’s undertow, but it reeks of aimless waiting.

Intentions of glee one minute and somber nostalgia the next! Perhaps the chimera of travel is me. Perhaps, perhaps perhaps—enough of perhaps! I intend to finish this post on a properly gleeful, celebratory note:

This is a metaphor. Piglet is this blog. Tigger is the universe.

What started as a half-assed supplement to a college core requirement has turned into two years of writing accountability, baffling encouragement, and rewarding connections. Mom, Dad: I know you skim when I get wordy but someday I’ll be able to pare down the extra words; I promise. Some of you have been with me from the beginning (I’m looking at you, Pennings, you wonderful) and a great many of you have been a such an encouragement to me (whoever is reading in Latvia, for instance, and Russia). You gorgeous people in Singapore and Germany and Thailand:

Thank you.

Blessings.

Really—Blessings.

I pray with all my heart that our God of both justice and mercy grants you and me the joy of humility, the peace of patience, and the hope of His Word.

Blast. That was another tone shift, wasn't it? Chimera: me.

A Concert for my Subway Car

            I hate the subways. On the other hand, most people think alighting the steps of a Busan Bus is comparable to crossing the Rubicon to dance with Damocles’ sword. It’s a melee where the last man standing is sometimes a hand-cart toting ahjumma or a smelly, staring ahjusshi but it is never a foreigner clutching her bus pass and crying out to God for the lost innocence of her personal space.

            Every criticism against the bus is well-deserved, earned by a myriad of late and crowded Daewoos careening through the streets with little respect for the human life both inside and outside its walls[1]. But at least they have fresh air coming through the constantly opening doors. At least they have windows.

The subways only have blank glares, stale air, and advertisements plastered over door, windows, and wall—advertisements for plastic surgery, for clearing my skin, perfecting my hair. There are no windows, only rows of frowners, people who jostle and steal your seat and cough on you. Doors open only to admit the hordes of overly perfumed women, smelly men, and dull-eyed students—batches of automatons politely ignoring everyone else’s existence. Headphones, smartphones, and i-somethings appear from nowhere: tiny, electronic shields. No one smiles.

I don’t often take the subway during to-and-from-work times, but today I had to drop my violin off at its babysitter’s, so I hauled myself out of bed, skipped Bible study and joined the masses in the tube of disappointed dreams and despair.

Okay, I promise I’m finished being maudlin. That was the last one.

I had gone through my Bible memory verses on the bus and so attempted to pray on the subway. No dice. I’m not a good prayer at the best of times, but without a pen in my hand or even the hint of a skyline I’m hopeless. I patted my violin case in consolation and suddenly realized I was going to miss my little fiddle. Two months is a long time apart and we’ve been through a lot together—All State nerves, symphony and scholarship auditions, concerto performances, and that time when I was awarded a scholarship violin that was way better and my heart wandered for a semester or three . . .

A song floated into my mind—

            Come thou font of every blessing

            Tune my heart to sing thy grace

            Streams of mercy, never ceasing,

            Call for songs of loudest praise

            Teach me some melodious sonnet

            Sung by flaming tongues above—!

            Praise the mount! I’m fixed upon it,

            Mount of Thy redeeming love.

Prone to wander in prayer, prone to leave my focus behind and chase after rabbit trails of thought instead of the God I love, I was grateful for the hymn. It haunted my mind, prayer-like, until my fingers itched to share it. I patted my violin case one more time.

“Not now,” I told it quietly, even as my heart thudded with excitement. “I’m on the subway and people stare enough at the foreigner. It’s scary to be different and we already sang on Sunday. It’s time for goodbye, not worship.”

But the idea grew like the thump, thump, thump of the Telltale Heart, and I had to work hard to consider the logistics. No room, too many people, too many disapproving stares, and too many stops of embarrassment to go before I could escape. But my fingers itched, my heart thumped and I knew that within, courage and fear within were tapping their toes to the beat I would play.

In the first car on the subway, there’s a small extra space for standing. I moved there with seven stops to go, unzipping the outer case, leaving the lock untouched. With six stops to go, I took off my scarf and the fingerless glove on my left hand. I set my purse down behind me and my case next to it. I stooped and sprung the lock. A finger brushed across the strings—still in tune—a look at the bridge—still straight. Tightened my bow. Took a deep breath. The eyes of all in the car were on me, but still I faced the wall.

With five stops to go, the subway emerges from the earth’s depths and becomes an elevated train. It was then—mountains and buildings flew by; the sun peaked in the windows, past the advertisements about fixing my skin, my nose, my eyes, obscuring the screens of the i-somethings—time to begin. I slipped my puffy coat off my left shoulder and turned to my audience.

The song was raw. My fingers shook, my legs wobbled, and I worried about the jolting starts and stops as we passed through the stations. Come Thou Font, simple; Amazing Grace, timeless; Flowers of Edinburgh, a toe-tapper.

I saw one head bob with the beat, but didn’t catch anyone’s eyes. I couldn’t smile. I looked out at the sun, facing my body toward the window and my violin’s sound down the long, metallic aisle and played as best my trembling fingers could manage.

It was at once a temporary farewell to Korea, a fist-pump of fighting! to the dull-eyed students, a thumbed nose at the glaring, staring, judging anti-toe tappers frowning at me. It was a timid cry for a revolution of joy and quirkiness, a suggestion to look up from their phones, a hope that the day would be brighter than an average, pushy subway ride. It was a little song of praise, too—wobbly and raw—to God, who has grown me to the point where I have the courage to stand up in a subway car full of grey, slumped shoulders and sing.

With one stop to go, I ended on an impertinent little g-chord and packed up. I pulled my left glove back on, slipped my arm back into my coat, and wound my scarf around my neck. Violin strapped to my left side, purse hanging on my right. I checked my cell phone, readied my subway card, and stepped into the cold, cold morning. 

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[1] Today my bus driver pull a three-point 360 on a 30% incline, backtracking faster than the Millenium Falcon in order to avoid an ephemeral traffic jam. It was impressive, terrifying, and needless.

An Attempt at Maturity (Failed)

Sometimes it’s really difficult not to think of Koreans as children.

Even though my students seem so young. It would be better if I could blame it on the make-up the girls wear or the boyish style popular for men right now. Surely that plays a part—that and their healthy diet of kimchi making their skin positively glow with youthfulness.

I wish I were judging on appearances because it’s easy to know how wrong that is. Instead I often judge on social norms:

Girls scream in the hallways, giggle in the classroom, shuffle around cute boys like they’ve never yet conceived the idea of talking to them like human beings instead of shrieking at or hitting them as a form of flirtation. Boys whine and skulk and rarely make friends with girls.

No one has a car; most still live with their parents. Students seem to have no long-range processing abilities, taking very little initiative in their education or future. They can’t problem-solve and only a very few understand why that might be useful. Students tend to have a flat, naïve view of alcohol and smoking and their views on politics are usually centered on what everyone else thinks. Everyone is scared to raise their hand, think for themselves, or act alone. Pimples are the devil.

In short, Korea is horribly reminiscent of American middle school. Koreans bear a harsh resemblance to the hesitant, wariness I remember marked the lives of my classmates and I ten years ago.

I have to fight not to treat my students like the age they act. I can’t condescend, because their actions—the giggling, the interdependence, the lack of originality—are not indicators of immaturity. Maturity is a completely different matter here than in the states. Individual responsibility and ingenuity are not prized—why would my students try to attain Western ideals when their culture breathes their antithesis? Duty is important here, not creativity. Respect not pride. Concentration, not passion.

MoonSung, my tutee, said a middle school student recently asked her why he should study.

“What did you say?” I asked her.

“I said—” she pointed her finger imperiously. “You just do it. We say when you get to college, your agony will be ended.”

I did my best not to look horrified, but in my head I was doing a small tarantella of concern. Just do it? Mindlessly? Hopelessly? Without passion or enjoyment? With nothing but the intangible promise that someday the agony will be over—but, unless you are incredibly successful—a new agony, one of guilt and shame and disappointed dreams and, finally, resignation to a lower-level life, will begin? I see the shame that weighs around my students’ shoulders when they all explain why they entered Kosin University. “I messed up,” they say. “My tests were not good. I played too much when I was younger.” In short: “I enjoyed life too much, coveted freedom and did not do my duty.” These are the regrets of kids in their early twenties!

I’ve heard that this is the crux of all differences between Western and Eastern education. Westerners want students to start with passion—a love for their subject that will fuel them to perform well. Passion, we believe, will instill in us a blindness to hard work so much so that we don’t even notice the hours, days, and years of difficulty because to us, it isn’t a chore, but a blissful labor of love.

In the East, it’s flipped. Just do it, they say, and the passion will follow. Tiger Moms are mothers who force their children to study, practice, perfect a million different skills and subjects in order to drive their offspring to future glory. The world is terrified of Tiger Moms (many of whom are Asian) partly because they’re insane, but partly because they get shit done without any of that “enjoy your life” nonsense.

Do it, they tell their children. You don’t like it now—it’s hell to work hard while your friends aren’t—but when you’re older and you can speak three languages, play Gershwin and Tchaikovsky like a piano pro, and enter the top university in the country, you’ll love it. Tiger Moms are the hard-core image of all that Eastern education encourages.

Where Westerners say “Find your passion,” the Easterners declare, “Passion follows practice.” In the West we say, “When you’ve matured, we’ll listen to you,” and the Easterners laugh. “If you are younger, you will never be listened to.”

In the West we have millions of kids who, since their only passion is playing video games and even that isn’t much more than lack of apathy, don’t pursue anything at all. Or maybe they pursue something for a year or two, but when the passion fades, they divorce him or quit that or simply shrug and “follow their heart” for the next however long until their heart changes once again and they look around years later with nothing that lasts. On the other hand, the people that do find their passion, excel and become innovators, hard workers, and happy, functioning members of society.

In the East, millions of kids pursue exactly what their parents tell them to pursue, and after the rigors of high school and middle school, their childhood lost, they have also lost the ability to think for themselves and enjoy the interests they may have once had. Some commit suicide, but most resign themselves to lives of “quiet desperation” in which they could never identify the bitter longing for something they’ve never had. On the other hand, those that achieved everything their parents hoped they would attain honor and happiness and become rich and powerful functioning members of society.

Which is better? Or worse? Can they be melded together? How is it that I see the benefits of both, but despise the idea of the one I didn’t grow up with? How can my cultural inclinations be plasticized that I might truly seek after something great rather than something ingrained?

I find it almost impossible to see the benefits of what appears to be immaturity until I look at the Bible. Jesus says, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” (Matt 18:3)

There are many aspects of Christianity I like to wrinkle my nose at—tradition, submission, and humility for instance—but I like this mandate perhaps least of all. God tells us to have faith like a child, to see the world simply. He asks us to believe in him, to know the world is beautiful and that we are safe and loved and that, ultimately, someone else is in charge and that is actually where our joy and the beauty of this world come from.

There are some things about Koreans that I love, but their ability to believe in authority and to unquestioningly carry the torch of traditional thought like children accepting everything their elders say is most definitely not one of them.

In Helplessness Blues, a song by one of my new favorite bands Fleet Foxes, it says, “I was raised up believing I was somehow unique. Like a snowflake distinct among snowflakes, unique in each way you can see.” I’m special and my individual thoughts and criticisms are important; they are what make me worthwhile, someone to listen to, a mature adult.

But maybe the Bible agrees more with the Korean way of humbly accepting the wisdom of those older, putting their heads down and doing as God has designed. “I was raised up believing,” Helplessness Blues says, “that I was somehow unique. Like a snowflake distinct among snowflakes, unique in each way you can see. And now after some thinking I’d say I’d rather be a functioning cog in some great machinery serving something beyond me.”

I think that’s what I’m supposed to want, but I’m not Korean and maybe—just like when I can’t speak the language or when I have to get my visa renewed or fight for my pension—that holds me back. It would be better, perhaps, if I reverted in some ways back to my middle school self, or even earlier. It would be better if I didn’t believe I was quite so important to the world. After all:

All people are like grass and

All their glory is like the flowers in the field.

The grass withers and the flowers fall because

The breath of the Lord blows on them.

Surely all people are like grass.

The grass withers and the flowers fall

But the word of our God stands forever.” (Isaiah 40)

So where does that leave me? If Eastern culture is right in this instance (an if nearly impossible for me to accept), surely Western culture has some major facet going for it. Right?

Still I like my culture better. Sorry Asia, but America does a lot of things better. (Dessert, for instance. Also, driving. And feminism.) I like questioning authority, arguing, criticizing, analyzing. They are my strengths and they are so useful in today’s world of scientific improvement where logic wins at all costs. But in the moral sphere, in the type of growth that God calls us toward, I can’t really think of any inherent superiority the West has over the East. Discernment? Crafty as serpents? Anyone have any ideas?

I Medical

Sometimes I view my job here in Korea as a form of glorified cheerleading.

Me: How can you ask for a favor?

Freshmen: *cough* *pretend to look for a pencil* *glare balefully at the world*

Me: Look in the book—you can do it! “Would you mind…”

Freshmen: Would you mind . . . . mumblemumblemumble . . .

Me: Would you mind what?

Bill: Would you mind . . .open . . . window. . . mumbleshamefacedmumble

Me: Great, Bill! That’s it! Keep it up!

Bill: Would you mind window mumblemumbleducksheadmumble open me?

Me: Not really—but good job! John?

John: hurple?

Me: Almost! Would you mind opening . . . *point to the window*

John: win . . . dow?

Me: the window, but yes! Great job! Go team!!!!! *double thumbs up, smile, nod encouragingly*

I’ve found myself naturally adopting this cheerleading mentality with every Korean who talks to me. I nod. I smile. I throw thumbs up left right and center. Everyone needs more encouragement, right?

Wrong.

Remember my soccer buddy who is made of awesome and all things sweet? He came back the other day and took me to soccer, which was excellent fun. I wowed the little boys, got some exercise and a ride home from a guy called Young Boom.

Soccer buddy (in Korean): Do you have an English nickname?

YoungBoom: Ahhhhhh TIGER!!! YA!

Soccer buddy (to me):  “Boom” means “tiger.”

Me: I’m not calling him Tiger.

Soccer buddy: Okay, bye!

BoomTiger: Do you like . . . ummmm . . . cheekin?

Me: Um, yeah! Chickin’s good. *thumbs up*

I abhor chicken. It is greasy and makes my stomach feel like it’s hosting an unhappy but high on ecstasy amoeba party.

BoomTiger: Team. Cheekin. Eat?

Me: Um, no. I have to go home and study. Don't worry! I can take the subway.

BoomTiger: No! No! I drive. I medical. Me.

Me: I see. Cool. *thumbs up, smile*

BoomTiger: Gum?

Me: Sure! *anything-to-make-the-awkwardness-go-away smile*

It will take at least twenty minutes to get home. I ask questions—short, not scary questions—I chatter. I try to be a friendly, appreciative passenger. BoomTiger doesn’t know much English, but he asks questions, too.

BoomTiger: You like pizza? Chickin? Pasta?

BoomTiger: I drive car. You like?

BoomTiger: You like alcohol?

BoomTiger: You like music?

BoomTiger: Do you know ghjdiicsak? Music?

BoomTiger: Are you hungry? Food by Kosin eat?

I tried. I really did. I tried to stay encouraging. But when he said “Michael Jackson” and proceeded to belt a sampling of some incomprehensible rendition, wobbling his head back and forth like a mating peacock,[1] I shifted irreversibly into “polite.” Finally, as I was wondering what might possess someone to be quite so confident in their inabilities, he finished his warbling.

 BoomTiger: Shim shim? Do you know shim shim?

My phone dictionary displayed gratitude, heartfelt thanks.

Me: Yes. I shim shim. Thank you for the ride home.

BoomTiger: You. Phone.

Me: Hmm. Phone. Yes?

BoomTiger: Shim shim. Call!

Me: Ye-es.

I decided to check my phone again where I see the secondary meaning of shim shim. Bored. Meanwhile, BoomTiger has figured this out as well by calling a friend to ask him for the translation. I nodded and smiled, applauding the kind of efforts I rarely see even in my most dedicated students. Good job, BoomTiger! You tried really hard! Keep it up! Work on your verbs! I was already nodding and smiling when BoomTiger said, triumphantly:

BoomTiger: You bored. Call. Me!

Me: Oh. 

Oh please no. 

BoomTiger: Bored, yes. You? Me. Call!

Me: Oh, yes, bored, but--phone?

BoomTiger: You call. We food place. Eat. Alcohol. Okay?

Oh, be still my fluttering heart.

What went wrong? What could possibly make a boy think that, after sitting in the same car for ten minutes struggling to communicate the simplest banalities (even if she didn't already do that for a job), a girl would want to voluntarily sign up to do it again? Did I miss something? On the bright side, I've now got "medical insurance."

BoomTiger: You sick? Me call! I medical.

Oh good.

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[1] Or rather, how I imagine mating peacocks do as they spread their useless but beautiful plumage.

Intimidated by Joy

The other day I was editing my novel (don’t laugh and don’t ask to see it because at this stage it’s laughable) and I discovered that most of the scenes I’d written were downers. Even the scenes that were supposed to be happy carried this dour, cynical certainty that things were going to get worse pretty soon. And I realized:

I don’t think people will believe me when I write about happiness and joy.

So much so that nothing I write—and usually nothing I say in conversation—ever conveys the unbridled joy that I know. Always, always I try to reign it in with a more believable frown.

The implications make me gag a little. It’s as if we all believe that true joy is a delusion at worst and an illusion at best. But I also realized:

My joys are much more personal than my sorrows. The situations, the people, the thoughts that make me truly happy mean so much to me that I try to hug them tight to my chest because if someone were to see them and to disbelieve them, ignore them, or, God forbid, laugh at them, that joy might be lost forever. Besides, if joy is so personal, can I possibly write it in such a way that you don’t gag from sentimentality?

It’s a tall order. It terrifies me to try. But “For us there is only the trying. The rest is not our business.” So:

Every Wednesday I take a two-bus commute across the city to a little apartment situated on the fourth floor, above the third-floor Nore-bang.[1] When I open the door faces turn and laughter pours out into the hallway before I can slip the door closed. Shoes spill over the entryway, into the tiny, over-warm living room packed tight with twelve or so of us. I yank my shoes off quickly, tight-roping over stretched legs and sprawled conversations into my usual corner, sinking into our circle. Two hours later, the circle stretches wide as we go our separate ways—by bus, subway, scooter, and foot. We’ll meet again next week.

That’s the best I can do until I grow up a little more. The happiest moments of my life have been when I disappear into the heartbeat of a group like that. It’s been a long time since that’s happened to me on the soccer field or in an orchestra: shared passion, shared goals.[2] Here in Busan it’s difficult to disappear. As a foreign teacher I stand apart—naturally excluded from my students both by nationality and occupation. It is inevitable, understandable, an interesting part of the expat lifestyle to be apart in a culture obsessed with togetherness.

And it makes my Wednesday nights all the more joyful.

To be honest, I'm still not completely sure what we were doing in this picture since we were supposed to "make a
Downton Abbey face" and I've only watched one episode. Still, I think it gives a decent insight into the group.
Squirrels notwithstanding.

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[1] Karaoke room, for you non-expat waygooks.

[2] Punny!

Feeling Korean

On Thursday, our English department head told us, laughing, that English department heads always get cancer because foreigners give them so much stress. Maybe, she added, I’ll get breast cancer. Ha! Ha! Ha!

            We tried to smile politely because, being veterans of Korea, we know sometimes things are lost in translation. But still we’re not sure if it’s a joke or what the joke is or why our department head is both laughing and why she thinks the very simple issues we’ve raised are nuisance enough to kill her. Surely it’s more stressful for a foreigner to live in Korea than a Korean to interact with a couple foreigners. Surely our requests for our contract to be honored are reasonable. Surely.

Surely?

            The longer I’m in Korea, the more I see and feel Korean. Not only do I finally notice my small face and high nose; I’m happy to have them. Although a medically dubious claim, our department head’s stress to the point of cancer is beginning to make a lot more sense to me.

            When Koreans are told to work overtime, they do it. And they do it without overtime pay, incentives, or ill-will toward their company. Overtime isn’t good news to them, but there’s no furrowing of the brows that says, “Why should I? Is this the best way to increase productivity? Have you thought about x, y, and z?”

            Time is not yours to arbitrate in Korea; you are too far down on the totem pole for that. You may want more time to sleep or to be with friends, but you are a student now: time is dictated by your professors. Now you’re a company worker: time is given to you by that company. You have to earn time; it is not an essential right. Right now the company is busy, so, company employee, you stay until 11 each night instead of the tacitly assumed 9:30 and, for fun, we’ll have a mandatory company retreat on Saturday and Sunday. We’ll play games and drink soju and it will increase productivity through team spirit. You will not experience more stress.

            Why don’t you quit? I asked my friend. She works in a hospital, and for about two months every year they work three hours overtime every day without pay. She shrugged.

            “There’s more work for the hospital at that time,” she explained. “And if I quit . . . other companies are worse.” She laughed. “I finish work at seven or eight on a bad day but on Facebook I see my friends at Seoul writing ‘Early day’ and like that when they finish work so early.”

            Here at Kosin, while we foreigners are dragging our feet on some random government or school stipulation, weighing the benefits for our students and the logic behind the decision, the Korean teachers don’t bat an eye. They certainly don’t raise questions like, “Is it ethical for a Christian school to violate a contract—taking away pensions and severance—in order to save money?”

            Our department head blinks at us when we do. “Everyone is taking a pay cut. No one gets a pension anymore. Even Korean teachers. Actually, three art teachers were changed to part time recently.”

            “In violation of their contract?” We are horrified.

            She didn’t understand why. The next issue—getting into the English department office when the secretary locks us out—was similarly thorny.

“Our secretary . . . I cannot convince her. She is stubborn. The secretary wants extra pay for coming to extra events,” our department chair said, shaking her head in disappointed frustration.

Now it was our turn to be baffled. Convince her? Of what? Why shouldn’t she get pay for extra work?

Photo unrelated except as evidence to my parents that I'm still alive.

It all makes me hate those geography textbooks we had growing up that covered every spare inch of their spreads with colorful pictures of cultural dress and drama and transportation methods of other cultures to explain their differences with America: windmills for the Dutch, yellow and blue-jerseyed Soccer players for Brazil; the Nutcracker for Russia; Sushi and chopsticks for Japan. The unknown and unheard-of traditions. As if those things separated us; as if any of the unknown clothes, language, dancing, chopsticks—were the barrier that kept us from understanding one another.

As if it weren’t the known—the assumptions, the unquestioned—that was the real problem. 

The Korean Spirit

On the wrong day, Koreans piss me off. Sometimes it’s for “good[1]” reasons like my Korean girl students turning their backs to me and playing on their cell phones during class, or because sidewalks are chaos, ahjummas are pushy, and ajhusshis are handsy and smell like old, old, old sweat. Koreans gawk, but cute Korean boys are scared of Western women, possibly because we have hips and refuse to engage in “egyo” to make their skinniness seem manlier than it could ever be.

Other times it’s for “bad[2]” reasons such as Koreans’ inability to understand sarcasm or pronounce “zombie.” Koreans act and talk like children, sometimes on purpose (to look cute), sometimes because that’s how their dialect sounds compared with English, and sometimes because they are looking for freedom after their high school exams. They’re obsessed with appearance; they don’t have garbage cans. They can’t abide confrontation, are bureaucratic, and their views on women’s abilities and social roles are outdated enough to make my grandparents look like radical progressives.

At the end of these days, the wrong days—when Koreans can do nothing right—I watch American t.v. shows, eat peanut butter, and try to create a cocoon of anti-Korea. Ask any ex-pat who has been here for more than a year and I think they’d agree: this country wears on you. And sometimes even the anti-Korean cocoon doesn’t help.

So I run. On days when I work out in the gym, it’s a power trip. While everyone else is strolling on treadmills while talking on the phone, and generally soaking up “work-out atmosphere” without all that nasty business of perspiration, I am huffing and puffing, putting the treadmill through its paces, smelly and sweating. RAWR! I feel like the Hulk in a puppy shop (in a good way).

It is running outdoors, though, that really brings me back to peace with Korea. Sometime in the past two days, sunny summer slipped and broke into a chill autumn without letting me know and despite the subsequent cold I’ve contracted, the weather is perfect for exercise. Yesterday I ran for two hours and by the end I was so tired I could barely remember which country I was in or why I was in it or what could possibly be frustrating about Korea.

Every time I’ve gone running outside, at least one person—usually a genial older gentleman-type—gives me a huge smile and thumbs up. If the same man gave me a thumbs up when I’m wearing a skirt and make-up, I’d be running for home to form the anti-Korea cocoon. But when my face is the unattractive color of an overly-pesticided Fuji apple, I feel a surge of affection for the Korean people. There is something in them that loves to encourage the downtrodden. Their natural inclination to cheer and fist pump a person into “Fighting!” mode is an impulse Americans lack and it is one I find most admirable. One of the few phrases that most Koreans know is “cheer up.” That is what I try to remember when an ahjumma shoves me into a wall while exiting the subway.

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[1] By this I mean that I would nod sympathetically if someone else were complaining about this.

[2] By this I mean that I would remind people that these sorts of things are what they sign up for when they live/travel abroad. These two distinctions are extremely arbitrary and subject to abrupt changes of heart based on mood and menstrual cycle.