Introverts and Extroverts

In Korea, teachers are expected to automatically have a certain personality.  If they are out-going, active, fun to listen to, and so many more qualities of an extrovert, then they are considered a good teacher.  The quieter you are, less "bubbly" so to speak, then the less good of a teacher you are.

Students are expected to be the introverts.  The only exception seems to be in classes where the teacher is a foreigner.  Then the students should be active.  In general though, the students should not be what could be considered disruptive.

I find it interesting that we would ask children raised on one standard to suddenly switch  to another.  Yet this is practiced in America as well.  Only in America everyone is expected to an Extrovert and if you are not, then you need special classes to help you become one.

I'm reading a book called Quiet at the moment.  This book was written on the backs of years of research done by a great many people.  As a historian, I was particularly excited to see where our culture changed from one that valued a good character to one that prefers a salesman personality.  It is a bit scary, but does explain why Americans have the views that they have.  It is also easy to see how American culture's influence has effected South Korea, a country that wishes to model themselves after America so much.

Animal Shelters and Foster Care

In Korea, there are a lot of strays.  Some people purposefully collect and neuter any stray they can to help with the population of animals without homes.  I saw a dead kitten outside our trash bins last spring so understand why controlling the babies is important.  The animal shelters here have a law that they must all follow.  If there is an animal in the shelter after 10 days, the animal must be put down.

In response to this, a growing movement called foster homes is being started.  People take in animals instead of sending them to the shelters.  They help the animals settle down, learn to trust humans again, and to find themselves.  These people keep updates on the animal on websites, and from there find homes for them.  It is a good thing that is going on.

New Books!

A friend has moved from Daegu to Seoul.  He is converting his book collection from the physical to the digital.  Guess who bought a lot of books off of him.  Have some real treasures now that as a historian are priceless for learning and researching.  These are just a few from the list he had.  I have these and a few others.  I've underlined some real treasures.

(1) Messy Spirituality
(2) Living Free in Christ
(3) Inside Out
(4) Bradshaw on: The Family
(5) The Isle of Stone
(6) Claudius the God
(7) Mere Christianity and The Screwtape Letters
(8) Reviving Ophelia: Saving the Selves of Adolescent Girls
(9) The Audacity of Hope by Barack Obama
(10) Last Look
(11) Exodus
(12) The Death of Innocents
(13) Son of Hamas
(14) Blood and Gold
(15) Still Life with Rice
(16) 1,000 Places to See Before You Die
(17) The Quran
(18) Where is God When It Hurts
(19) The Drama of the Gifted Child
(20) For This I Was Born
(21) Making Jesus Lord


(54) Eusebius: The Church History
(55) The Annals and The Histories – Tacitus
(56) The Devil in the White City
(57) Gandhi: An Autobiography
(58) Making Peace with Conflict

(62) On Natural Selection – Charles Darwin (these are small books)
(63) The Origin of Species – Charles Darwin
(64) Common Sense – Thomas Paine (these are small books)
(65) Herodotus The Histories
(66) What Paul Really Said About Women
(67) The Tales of Rabbi Nachman
(68) The Care of Creation

(71) Survival in Auschwitz

(77) What You Need to Know About Islam and Muslims
(78) Answering Jewish Objections to Jesus: Volume Three: Messianic Prophecy Objections
(79) Reasoning from the Scriptures with Muslims
(80) The World’s Wisdom
(81) C. S. Lewis Remembered

(83) Before You Say I Do ( new version)
(84) Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt
(85) Who Made God?

Only In Korea

This is a common phrase among foreigners who live here.  Apple milk, yogurt drinks, men who wear purses and make-up, and sun umbrellas are as common and a part of life as the shining sun.  We see something that is not something likely to be experienced back home and we smile, "Only in Korea."

Below is a list of different things that I found online, but are absolutely true, of life here.  Things that are super common but that foreigners are taken aback by when they first arrive.

1. You are immune to the smell of "the kimchi breath."
2. You no longer come to a complete stop at the stop sign and you never yield the right-of-way.
3. You can pick up a single strand of noodles with chopsticks.
4. You ask for more "ko-chu" because the kimchi-chige soup is not hot enough.
5. You enjoy slurping your noodles as loudly as you can.
6. Your back is sore from bowing.
7. You walk down the street holding hands with your buddy.
8. You ask your wife to stand outside with a baseball bat to protect your public parking space in front of the house.
9. You can eat barefooted in a restaurant with a foot in your lap.
10. You can cut in at the front of the line of waiting people with the best of them.
11. You look forward to winter in your off post housing so you can store beer and frozen foods in your bedroom or bathroom.
12. You can fall asleep on the city bus and wake up at your stop.
13. You can shovel in an entire bowl of rice and half a course of Bulkogi into your mouth before you swallow.
14. You rather watch local TV than AFKN.
15. You can make a left turn looking only to the right.
16. You can convert any US unit measurements into metric measurements in your head.
17. You look forward to Chusok and the Lunar New Year each year.
18. You think that Korea's greatest natural resource is good looking young women.
19. You only lock your door if there are lots of "Mi-gooks" around.
20. People ask if you want to go by car and you respond, "No, I'm in a hurry."
21. Someone says, "Bed," and you think "Yol."
22. You realize that it is safer to "J" walk than use a pedestrian crosswalk.
23. You wear white socks with a dark suit.
24. You can use a public bathroom for both genders and think nothing of it.
25. You know every interchange on the Seoul-Pusan Expressway by heart.
26. You know all the words to the Korean National Anthem and you enjoy singing it.
27. You don't need a restroom to relieve yourself.
28. You crawl back into your house to get your coat, rather than take your shoes back off and walk on the floor with shoes on.
29. You bow at inanimate objects.
30. You walk around humming the tune the crosswalk signal lights play.
31. You enjoy shopping at a local open market place more than Main PX or Commissary.
32. Someone says breakfast, you think of "fish, soup and seaweed."
33. You'd rather sit on the floor than in a chair.
34. You start believing that you can blend into a large crowd of Koreans.
35. All your shoes are bent flat in the back.
36. You let your eyes be drawn towards any female whose hair isn't black.
37. You answer the phone by saying "yoboseyo," and sometimes even at the office.
38. Someone says "mansion" and you think of a two bedroom flat in a 400-unit apartment building.
39. You mutter "Aigu" when lifting a heavy objects.
40. You suck in air through your teeth before saying "no" to anything.
41. You start growling and spitting inside your mouth to add emphasis to what you are about to say.
42. You can convert Hangul into English without repeating it to yourself first.
43. You always wave your left hand to signal you are going to cut in front of another driver without looking first.
44. You select shoes based on how easily you can get them on and off.
45. You answer "Nhe" even when speaking English to non-Korean friends.
46. You carry chopsticks in your back pocket.
47. You enjoy putting lots of red pepper sauce on your salads or French-fries.
48. You don't freak out when the salad arrives with octopus legs still wiggling on top of it.
49. You are not embarrassed when old ladies are standing in a bus while you are sitting down.
50. You like OB or Crown better than Bud or Miller.

There is more though.  I found this on another site.  And these ones are just as amusing.  Honestly, when we teachers look at these, we bust up laughing because they are true and a great part of this culture.

You know you’ve been teaching English in Korea too long when…

1.  You think 10pm is a reasonable hour for a ten year old to come home from school.

2.  You automatically answer ‘Why?’ in an annoying high pitched squeaky voice when someone asks your name.

3.  You regularly complain about the lack of quality ajumma service in McDonalds.

4.  You no longer casually text or notice something interesting in another cosmetic shop/realtor/mobile phone store when you spot another non-Korean in the crowd, you just blatantly ignore the person.

5.  You find yourself staring at non-Koreans who obviously aren’t English teachers.

6.  Dongshim references aren’t funny anymore.

7.  You sneer at the quality of English material the person on the subway is suggestively angling in your direction.

8.  You find yourself casually humming the theme tune to some beginner phonics book you taught three years ago.

9.  When in your home country you can’t understand why you can’t buy booze in the local shop at 5am and then drink on their veranda outside.

10.  You think that the new variety of Cass out this week really is ‘an improvement’.

11.  You are not afraid of taking the bus.

12.  You ride a scooter.

13.  Twelve months in a hagwon is more than enough experience for every other teaching job in Korea.

There are many good points about teaching English in Korea.

14.  You don’t drink soju … any more.

15.  You have a faultless built in rubric for judging the quality of noraebang, Chuseok presents and countryside love motels.

16.  All things considered, “electronic manic supersonic bionic energy” is a good song lyric.

17.  You can distinguish the flavours in kimchi.

18.  The material in your textbooks is inspiring.

19.  Not without trying, you still can’t remember the point in your childhood when you proudly declared, ‘when I grow up, I want to teach English in South Korea!’

20.  You love stationary shops.

21.  Using the ‘team soap’ at the gym doesn’t bother you.

22.  You’ve forgotten how to use an oven.

23.  You’ve never learned Korean because everyone in your world speaks English anyway.

24.  You just turn up for the buffet at your friend’s wedding.

25.  You prefer red-bean to whipped cream.

26.  You smile politely when someone talks about their job, and then ask for their favourite porn site to rapidly change the subject.

27.  You get all excited when you sit in a car that isn’t a taxi/police car.

28.  You refuse to associate yourself with newbies who talk about their job all the time, drink to much, can’t speak Kor…oh wait…

29.  Forget friends and family, you go home once a year to buy new clothes.

30.  The first year you spent teaching in Korea is still the best year.

31.  You cover your face from the sun.

32.  The magnetism of the English language section in the bookshop is unavoidable.

33.  You didn’t notice that two of the last words in the last point were spelled wrong.

34.  You had to check.

35.  Stopping drinking really isn’t an option anymore.

36.  You now complain about people who complain about complainers.

37.  You don’t go to Hooker Hill any more … except for last weekend because it was someone’s birthday.

38.  The infomercials on AFN are now quite informative.

39.  After taking a shower, you dry your private parts in front of the mirror with a hairdryer for ten minutes.

40.  K-Pop doesn’t bother you.

41.  Being stared doesn’t bother you.

42.  You know the ‘nice’ immigration officers.

43.  You don’t roll on the floor laughing at t-shirt prints anymore.

A Milf Bar? You know you've been in Korea too long when the signs on buildings don't make you laugh as much!

44.  Burger King will always be located opposite Geckos.

45.  You have a sixth sense for spotting new imported products in Emart.

46.  You don’t mind waiting to celebrate Paddy’s Day/July 4^th/Canada Day etc. at the weekend.

47.  You could write a better text book than the one you’ve been told to teach.

48.  After this year you’re definitely moving to Japan.

49.  You don’t know what TOEFL, TOEIC, TEPS or any other English test acronym, stand for.

50.  You would probably get a lower score than most twelve year-old Korean kids in any of the above tests, but thank yourself daily that fortunately you’ll never have to!

 by Conor O’Reilly

Idiot Proofing: These comments are observations not assertions. That means that they may not relate to you, and if they do well then I know that we probably have something in common. Isn’t that lovely?

Also, I know people will copy and paste and email this, don’t be afraid to include my name at the end of it. Most of it is original and inspired by real experiences. Share it around, get a few laughs and also a few moaners who can be torn apart.

Sound!

God's Hand: Paying Forward

Some friends of Teacher Willis were working to downsize to prepare to move from Daegu to Seoul.  Also they are trying to pay off some debts.  I figured I would help them out by getting some stuff from their "garage" sale.  More like facebook sale.  Went through and chose several items.  Then we got to talking and before I knew what happened, things that they were sad about throwing away were instead placed in Mindy's Pile.  I got three big bags full of nifty kitchen things, hair things, clothes, posters for school, a space heater, a big brown pillow that perfectly matches my big brown bear, cleaning supplies, RAIN BOOTS, a cute pink trash can, a small shelf, a single shelf box, and a really nice pink and purple blanket.  So many wonderful things.  I wish I could have paid them more.

In Korea when people move on, they sell what they can at really low prices, and give away the rest.  Foreigners take care of those that they leave behind.  Doing these good deeds for others is paying forward what someone has done for you.  Simple as that.  My apartment could still use a good sized shelf for the kitchen things or cleaning supplies, either one.  However this is good.  My life is good.  I know I am blessed.  God takes care of everyone, it is just a matter of being willing to see that.  It comes down to being your choice.

Clothes Shopping

I am getting better and understanding which stores' styles or brands generally fit me.  Which is a good thing since in order to have more clothes (a suitcase can only hold so much) I am shopping online.  I thought about what I am allowed to wear at school, what I have that works as a teacher here, what I can wear in winter versus summer, and then went to find items to supplement that.  Once I have the address, I will order them and have them shipped to someone who is coming to South Korea to visit for a few days.  Saves on the international shipping costs which is definitely higher.  Also, I am starting to prefer nicer clothes than jeans and t-shirts.  Being a teacher is having it's side effects.

Summer at School

Well I have plenty of free time this summer.  Went to the Philippines (will blog that soon, I promise) and now am at school.  I work three days a week which is really nice.  Expected to be at the school, making worksheets and doing things that help me be better prepared for next semester.  At least I can do this.  The Korean teachers that do not have summer classes to teach are bored, sitting at their computers watching movies and reading comics online.  I rather prefer making worksheets.  Movies get extremely boring after awhile and lose their entertainment value.

I have completed a series of vocabulary material for my freshmen with their next story in literature.  They are not going to like me being so well prepared since it means more work and studying for them.  Mwuahahaha.  My students are going to learn more English and there is nothing they can do about it!  HAHAHAHAHa.  Moment of self-entertainment done.  Back to work I go.  Actually, going to my spiritual blog next, and then back to work I go.