- NOV. 25: Abyssinia, Cindy
- NOV. 20: Today's travel tip: Mark sure your hostel is open for business
- NOV. 18: North Korean refugees and the world's most dangerous par 3
- NOV. 11: Small world in Grand Bahama
- NOV. 1: Abyssinia ... me!
NOV. 25: ABYSSINIA, CINDY
When I asked myself how I'd describe Cindy Boyes for this entry, the words "true professional" popped into my head more than once.
Cindy came from Canada to South Korea with a teaching background. She showed up early, planned her tests and progress reports ahead of time, and always had an answer when I approached her and said. "I'm stuck. Help." She also made an effort to gobble up as much Korean culture as possible. She and her boyfriend Brett visited small towns while most of us yukked it up in bigger cities. She stayed overnight at a Buddhist temple. She took Korean lessons.
That's why I knew that when I (belatedly, as usual) sent her questions to answer about her stay in Korea, she'd give some thoughtful answers. She's back in Canada with her boyfriend, Brett, who is also a teacher. I hope I have the story right: A few years ago Cindy went to Australia for a teacher exchangee (that Kongelish was for you, Cindy). She met Brett. They fell in love, etc. etc. They came to Korea together to teach at Yale. And Brett is with her in Canada, teaching at a university. Here's a photo of the happy couple that I stole from their blog:
Photo courtesy of Cindy Boyes.
And now, Cindy Boyes talks about her year in South Korea:
1. Why did you come to Korea? Brett made me. His crazy friends had a great time. I am always looking for something new to do.
2. What are your future plans? Currently teaching grade one and two in a severely underfunded public elementary school in a nasty area of town. Good times! Near future ... who knows. Stripper?
3. Name something (or things) you're glad you did here that you could not have done anywhere else. I'm glad I drank alcohol from a Ziploc bag, ate unidentifiable dishes, and had whole conversations using body language.
4. What were the most pleasant and least pleasant surprises about Korea? Unpleasant = They are cruel to animals. Pleasant = My apartment was not a cardboard box under a bridge.
5. You will miss ... having so much free time during the day, eating great food, funky bars, complete strangers sharing food with me because I happen to be walking by. I really miss some of the hilarious things the Korean kids came out with, and how cute they are. I miss the drive by "hello" that I used to hear daily.
6. You won't miss ... teaching from the same stupid books everyday. And the annoying man in the next apartment building who did huge spits all night.
7. Complete this sentence: If I had to do it over again, I would ... bring more clothes ... stupid tiny korean sizes. I would take better advantage of my free time.
9. Because you have teaching a background: The major differences between teaching English in Korea and handling children in your (for lack of better term) normal teaching jobs. In my teaching job here I am everything- teacher, doctor, therapist, provider of food, parent, entertainer, magician, finder of lost items, and nose-wiper, to name a few. It feels like a marathon everyday. I hate Thursdays because I don't get to pee. But ... it is more rewarding. I teach all subjects, am the boss of my own world, hear kids giggle all day long, watch them soak up information like a sponge, and can always read them a story or pause to pretend we are all submarines ... and there is no camera watching my every move. We are less stressed and have way more fun. But I am there at 7:30 a.m. and leave at around 5:30. Oh- and the parents call me....no middle man. BUT...I truly miss my free time! (Editor's note: At Yale, the parents call the Korean teachers and the Korean teachers speak to the parents. We never make or receive those calls. For obvious reasons.)
9. Anything else you want to say that the questions don't cover? You will miss kimchi, so eat it while you can! Oh, and nobody here will understand "strangey" no matter how many times you explain it.
You can read Cindy and Brett's Korea blog, Canaussie Karaoke, by clicking here. Given their love for Korean singing rooms I am not surprised by the title. Anyway, they posted about two entries per week and it's a good mix of anecdotes, history and photos.
Questions, comments, demands or suggestions can be sent here, or leave a comment on the Mark Fitzhenry's "Korea Blogging!" page here.
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NOV. 20: TODAY'S TRAVEL TRIP: MAKE SURE YOUR HOSTEL IS OPEN FOR BUSINESS
I returned from Montreal about an hour ago and would like to tell you how smoothly my first hour went there.
I rolled into town just after 2 p.m. The drive went as smoothly as a 4 1/2-hour trip through Vermont and Quebec could go. I passed through Customs without creating an international incident, obeyed the Canadian speed limits, successfully hit the right exits, even enjoyed the drive over the Pont Champlain into Montreal. Having followed my directions to a T, I turned right down Rue Mackay, home of the highly regarded hostel I booked online, looked to the left about one-fifth of a mile down, and ... couldn't find it.
So I drove around the block, looked again, and couldn't find it again.
Then I drove further, wound up back on the highway, and after a gigantic rectangular drive around the inadvertently bigger block, decided to park illegally. I walked up to 1425 Rue Mackay, found the door with three Auberge L'Apero posters on the door and thought, "Wow, this place looks abandoned." And then I pulled on the door. It was locked.
I walked around the building. No other entrance.
I asked a tourist if there was a hidden entrance or something that's commonly used in Montreal. Nope.
I called the hostel's number. No answer. Not even a ring.
After consulting with one more tourist, I headed to a hostel down the street called Auberge de Jeunesse. Apero, de Jeunesse, same thing, I figured. "I have a reservation," I told the clerk, even though I didn't. But they had a bed, and so, hooray, 60 minutes and two illegal parkings later, it's a happy ending for me.
When I parked my car at a local lot, one of the workers told me what happened to Auberge L'Apero. It's been shut down for reasons it can't control. One of the walls on the building next door was in danger of collapsing, so on Oct. 26, a fire department inspector gave the hostel's owner 10 minutes to leave the building. It has yet to re-open and the owner is piling up credit card debt until he can re-open. The Montreal Gazette story is here.
Meanwhile, here are some facts I collected during my overnight trip there. And when I say "facts" I mean "things people told me that I may or may not have fact-checked."
-- No building is allowed to be taller than the peak of Mont Royal, the mountain for which the city is named. At 764 feet above sea level, Mont Royal is hardly what most of us would consider a mountain, but I think we can all agree that Hill Royal would be a stupid name for a city (though not as stupid as this one).
-- A restaurant where I ate breakfast Friday, Eggspectations, fresh-squeezes its orange juice. A worker there told me the restaurant uses 10,000 boxes of oranges per year, and about five bartenders quit a year becuase they have something better to do than juice box after box of oranges.
-- I also received peanut butter and jelly to spread on my already-buttered toast.
-- Small world. My hostel hosted a pub crawl Thursday night, and one of the guests went to my alma mater, American University. Ally is a chef in D.C. and was on the crew team.
-- Reuben's, a restaurant on St. Catharine's Street, has a "Hall of Fame" in which various Canadian celebrities have signed plates that are hung on the wall. Members include baseball players Julio Franco, Steve Rogers and Tim Raines; former Expos GM Omar Minaya, and Pat Patterson, who as you all know was WWE's first Intercontinental champion (he signed his plate, "The best, from the best, Pat Patterson WWE").
-- Cotton-top taramins usually bear twins when they have children. They have multiple sets, so the older twins can help with the younger twins as practice for when they become old enough to raise their own. Can you tell I visited here?
Questions, comments, demands or suggestions can be sent here, or leave a comment on the Mark Fitzhenry's "Korea Blogging!" page here.
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NOV. 18: NORTH KOREAN REFUGEES AND THE WORLD'S MOST DANGEROUS PAR 3
Just wanted to post a couple of links to Korea-related stories.
CNN posted this one today. It's about the 17,000 or so North Korean refugees who escape to South Korea via China, Laos and Thailand. Here is a quote from a teacher whose job is to help North Koreans: "When you explain what the Internet is and what you can do with it, they have no idea, because they only have one TV channel, things like that. It's really mind-blowing. Suddenly they are thrown into one of the most high-tech, wired cities in the world (Seoul) and many can't cope."
On the lighter side, U.S. sports channel ESPN did this story on the par-3 golf hole at Camp Bonifas in the Demilitarized Zone, the 4-kilometer wide buffer that separates North and South Korea (which, just to remind you, remain technically at war). Here is the lede of the written story, done by an ESPN employee who plays the hole: "We've all hit tee shots that could be described as 'dangerous.' Tight fairways. Intimidating water hazards. Thick fescue. All of these make for 'dangerous' conditions. But I've never hit a tee shot with the North Korean army just a mulligan away." There's a written story and video.
Questions, comments, demands or suggestions can be sent here, or leave a comment on the Mark Fitzhenry's "Korea Blogging!" page here.
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NOV. 11: SMALL WORLD IN GRAND BAHAMA
I am in the Bahamas, and I had no intention of updating this blog until I returned home. But I must share this story, because it's not often that two strangers who live in Daegu meet on a remote part of a Caribbean island.
I was standing in the ocean, wondering when I would actually start swimming, when a man who had been doing the butterfly stroke asked me: "Where are you from?" I should have known by that point he was from South Korea, given that the list of standard questions from Korean students are as follows: 1. Where are you from? 2. How old are you? 3. Are you married? 3a. Do you have girlfriend? 3b. Why don't you have girlfriend? 3c. Teacher, you have white hair.
I told the man I was from the U.S., then asked what he called home. Imagine my mild surprise when he said, "South Korea." Imagine my genuine surprise when he said he lives in "Taegu." There are so many levels of shock here. First, most Koreans simply say "Korea" and do not specify the "South" part. Second, I almost never hear or see Daegu pronounced with a "T," which is the result of a previous Romanization. And third, how the hell is someone who lives in Daegu vacationing on the same Bahamas beach as me?
Anyway, his name is Jason. He is an interpreter for a church. He's in the Bahamas visiting a friend, who is the only Korean on the island. Jason met my mom and had his friend take a photo of him next to me and my mom. We also exchanged email addresses and cell phone numbers. He also taught me how to say "Take care" in Korean, and naturally, I have forgotten it already. But I did write it down. Anyway, not only have I filed this under "small world" but also under "to be continued." Strangee.
Programming note: I plan to file two entries upon my return to the States. Former Yale teacher Cindy Boyes has answered my questions about her year in Korea, so we will soon read a very much delayed "Abyssinia" post with her thoughtful responses. Also, I'll talk about culture shock in regard to returning to your home country after spending a year abroad. But I have a massage in less than half an hour. Not to rub it in or anything.
Questions, comments, demands or suggestions can be sent here, or leave a comment on the Mark Fitzhenry's "Korea Blogging!" page here.
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NOV. 1: ABYSSINIA ... ME!
In about three hours, Baldy and I will begin our journey to the U.S. I'm coming back, so I don't want to be too sentimental. But I also want to post something fitting as a farewell.
So leave it up to former co-worker Andrew Lancaster to provide the answer. I've done "Abyssinia" posts for departing teachers, so why not one for me? My answer, of course, is that I'm coming back. But the more I thought about it, I didn't have any better ideas. I hope you appreciate the irony of this: In April or May, I sent Andrew questions for him to answer, and he never did. But a good idea is a good idea, even if it comes from a lazy bastard. And I say that out of love, Andrew.
So here they are, although out of disclosure I reserve the right to say I misquoted myself.
1. Why did you come to Korea? Three co-workers -- two from a newspaper, one from a call center -- did this before I did. Each time I heard about it, I told myself what a cool adventure it sounded like. In July 2008 I got laid off from work, and I needed something to just shake up my life. And here I am. To read about my thought process in full, read this post from September.
2. What are your future plans? See friends and family, relax in the Bahamas, watch the Patriots pummel the Jets, celebrate Thanksgiving and Christmas in a three-day span, and teach here for another year.
3. Name something (or things) you're glad you did here that you could not have done anywhere else. When it comes right down to it, there isn't a place in the world like the DMZ.
4. What were the most pleasant and least pleasant surprises about Korea? Pleasant = over-the-counter sleeping pills at 10 for $1; Korean children who gasp in utter surprise when I say "thank you" in Hangul; fall foliage that rivals New England's; cab drivers who make me feel safe despite violating every traffic law, including some that probably aren't even written; the sheer quantity of taxis that make it easy to go almost anywhere. Unpleasant = cab drivers who won't pick me up (small minority, but still...), people who don't know how to park.
5. What does Korea do so well that the rest of the world should emulate it? Their commitment to affordable high-speed rail travel. I want to say bus travel too, but given that South Korea is about the size of Indiana, to compare the system here to that of the States seems like apples and oranges.
6. You will miss ... easily accessible public transport, rice and jjigae, not having to wake up to watch the English Premier League.
7. You won't miss ... the terrible air quality, a product of living in a valley and a system where people leave their trash on the sidewalks to be picked up one or two mornings later.
8. Complete this sentence: If I had to do it over again, I would __________. ... go out of my way to learn more Korean, and quicker. Luckily for me, I do get to do it over again. So I need to do more often what I did last April. When I got tired of people running for the hills upon the sight of Baldy, I asked two customers at my favorite coffee shop how to tell people that Baldy was a good dog. Upon my return, I must be less shy about asking Koreans I know to provide me with more phrases, and I must be more diligent in writing them down and remembering them.
9. Did it feel like 12 months? This will sound really dumb, but it's been long enough to feel comfortable and get a routine, but not so long that it dragged. So, the best answer is, I don't know.
10. Anything else you want to say that the questions don't cover? Go Phillies.
Questions, comments, demands or suggestions can be sent here, or leave a comment on the Mark Fitzhenry's "Korea Blogging!" page here.
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