Korea PS teaching stories

[Cornfed]

Read this whole thread, front to back. All your anecdotes, Cornfed, and it just makes me a little sad. It sounded like you were having the time of your life in Korea and would have surely succeeded romantically had you stayed put a little longer. Of course it's been years, things change, people change... but don't you ever feel that itch to come back, give it another go? I mean it's been almost 7 years but 2013 Cornfed sounds... a lot more fun!

My entire job was eliminated, not just for me but for everyone. The GEPIK budget for middle and high school teachers was largely cancelled. I can't stand up against the way the world is going. I doubt I would get a similar job these days, but if I did I would be fired pretty quickly.

[Cornfed]

Read this whole thread, front to back. All your anecdotes, Cornfed, and it just makes me a little sad. It sounded like you were having the time of your life in Korea and would have surely succeeded romantically had you stayed put a little longer. Of course it's been years, things change, people change... but don't you ever feel that itch to come back, give it another go? I mean it's been almost 7 years but 2013 Cornfed sounds... a lot more fun!

Revisiting this, we know my time in Korea wasn’t so great, right? The first couple of months, I was literally physically shaking in front of some classes and didn’t have a clue what to do. Later when I got myself together and carved out a job for myself, it was tolerable, but generally stressful and boring, just like any other job.

About the anecdotes, yes they are good to tell later, but at the time, they sucked. The chocopuff incident was a complete disaster. If a school inspector were coming round at the time I would have been fired on the spot, and with good cause. When I physically ejected that student, that could have gone pear shaped for any number of reasons.

Would I have romantically succeeded? Yes, absolutely, if I could have had a chance of permanently making a living , but I didn’t.

[cheesesweat]

@Cornfed Wowman, you certainly had seems crazy experiences teaching in Korea. As much as I like the country I heard that the work environment can be really crappy and difficult.

[Cornfed]

@Cornfed Wowman, you certainly had seems crazy experiences teaching in Korea. As much as I like the country I heard that the work environment can be really crappy and difficult.

Yeah in terms of paperwork, there seem to be a tendency to make the work environment difficult, but I generally avoided that by being generally despondent, whining about any paperwork or outright telling them to go f**k themselves. You could get away with that in those days. Unless you are a blonde bombshell, you would be fired for that now. Of course Korean classes are big and somewhat stressful and difficult to control, but there is not much that can be done about that. It annoyed me that they were hiding behind the system to prevent me from using violence to control them, but in hindsight they could say the same thing about me times a hundred..

[cheesesweat]

@Cornfed Wowman, you certainly had seems crazy experiences teaching in Korea. As much as I like the country I heard that the work environment can be really crappy and difficult.

Yeah in terms of paperwork, there seem to be a tendency to make the work environment difficult, but I generally avoided that by being generally despondent, whining about any paperwork or outright telling them to go f**k themselves. You could get away with that in those days. Unless you are a blonde bombshell, you would be fired for that now. Of course Korean classes are big and somewhat stressful and difficult to control, but there is not much that can be done about that. It annoyed me that they were hiding behind the system to prevent me from using violence to control them, but in hindsight they could say the same thing about me times a hundred..

One thing that I’ve noticed in Korea these days is that the magic of being a foreigner has worn off. A few years ago it was still so rare for Koreans to see a foreigner that they’d want to talk with you, practice English, perhaps buy you a drink and stuff. But I think there’s enough foreigners now that it really doesn’t mean anything to them anymore. They see you more and more by your class, wealth, education, country of origin etc.. kind of like what they do to each other.

I’ve also noticed that Koreans follow their own rules more and they are more enforced. Seemed like nobody gave a damn about the traffic lights before, but now they’ll get ticketed way more for those infractions. Especially when we were in the military we drove through red lights and stuff like crazy. People would fudge paperwork for you if they liked you and it made their life easier. I see that’s becoming less and less the case. I liked the old days more, lol.

[Cornfed]

@Cornfed Wowman, you certainly had seems crazy experiences teaching in Korea. As much as I like the country I heard that the work environment can be really crappy and difficult.

Yeah in terms of paperwork, there seem to be a tendency to make the work environment difficult, but I generally avoided that by being generally despondent, whining about any paperwork or outright telling them to go f**k themselves. You could get away with that in those days. Unless you are a blonde bombshell, you would be fired for that now. Of course Korean classes are big and somewhat stressful and difficult to control, but there is not much that can be done about that. It annoyed me that they were hiding behind the system to prevent me from using violence to control them, but in hindsight they could say the same thing about me times a hundred..

One thing that I’ve noticed in Korea these days is that the magic of being a foreigner has worn off. A few years ago it was still so rare for Koreans to see a foreigner that they’d want to talk with you, practice English, perhaps buy you a drink and stuff. But I think there’s enough foreigners now that it really doesn’t mean anything to them anymore. They see you more and more by your class, wealth, education, country of origin etc.. kind of like what they do to each other.

I’ve also noticed that Koreans follow their own rules more and they are more enforced. Seemed like nobody gave a damn about the traffic lights before, but now they’ll get ticketed way more for those infractions. Especially when we were in the military we drove through red lights and stuff like crazy. People would fudge paperwork for you if they liked you and it made their life easier. I see that’s becoming less and less the case. I liked the old days more, lol.

It has been almost a decade since I set foot in Korea, but at a guess I fully agree.