Hello!!!

Nearly everyday some adorable kid walking down the street will say “Hello!” Sometimes it’s a kid on their own, other times a parent has encouraged forced their child to speak. In general, kids prefer to travel in packs. It’s from these small swarms of kids that I get the most hellos. I can see these kids from a block away. The whole pack sees me and gets visibly excited. I hear words in Korean like “foreigner, look, and American.” There are other words too, and I imagine that they are daring each other to speak to me.

Eventually the moment comes when we are actually passing each other and the bravest kid lets out a big “HELLO!” I always return the greeting at which point everyone giggles. Sometimes the rest of the pack is emboldened by the ‘hello initiator’ and a whole chorus of hellos follows the first.

If I’m standing next to a group of social kids at a cross walk or some such place, then I continue the conversation. I ask “What’s your name?” and say “Nice to meet you.” or “Have a good day!” Some kids look around in total panic as if they are thinking, “WHY? Why did I say hello?” A really confident kid might ask “Where are you from?” When I say, “I’m from the United States.” The pack of kids erupts with “Ah! USA, USA, migook!”

This is usually the furthest extent of a conversation with kids on the street. It always makes me laugh. Even though I don’t know them, I’m a little proud of the kids for taking the initiative to have a spontaneous interaction. I can also identify with their happy giggles. It’s exciting to speak a foreign language in an authentic situation for the first time. I’m always overcome with a feeling that I’ve pulled off a feat. “It works! These words actually work!” It’s like learning a password that everyone around me knows, and I’ve been let in on the secret.

Back at School

It’s been a wonderful and successful first few weeks back at school for the 2012 school year. Lots of the kids grew, and some of them seem a bit more mature. It’s exciting to see how they change. The kids are more comfortable with me and have repeatedly used the extent of their vocabulary and gestures to communicate the important things they think about.

I was most proud and happy when one of my students who was challenging at the beginning uttered the phrase, “Teacher! Help me!” Hahaha. It’s the first full English sentence ever spoke to me without being coached. Another teacher was dragging him off for something he didn’t want to do. This kid is alienated by school. He has learning difficulties and is behind in all subjects. He did his utmost to derail the class for the first month. It took a lot of strategizing to build a positive relationship with him, so it was really satisfying to hear him communicating with me.

The first few chapters for every grade varied in difficulty for the same theme of names, introductions, and greetings. In several of the classes I used hand shaking in the activities as a way to share US culture. Bowing is the traditional Korean greeting. Hand shaking is new and occurs most often amongst men. If hand shaking does occur, then the person in the higher station (principal, elder, mayor, etc) offers their hand first. The kids were squirmy and giggly at shaking my hand. The kids who were very polite were so uncomfortable with hand shaking that they would bow and touch their left hand to their right wrist as they shook hands.

In Korea it is polite to touch your left hand to your right wrist when, shaking, exchanging items or making a purchase. This custom stems from holding back the long sleeves on traditional clothing to prevent spills etc.

Observations on Sickness

One thing I’ve learned through traveling, and through working at Sea Mar, is that medicine, is as influenced by culture and policy as it is by science. Case in point, Master Oh thought I should go to the hospital when I had the 24 hour stomach bug. In my mind going to a hospital for a stomach bug is out of the question. The I.V. would keep me hydrated and potentially speed my recovery, but the stress of being poked with a needle and staying in a strange bed surrounded by other sick people could slow recovery. The individualist culture ingrained in me responds indignantly to going to the hospital for a stomach bug. I don’t need an MD to tell me what I already know; I clearly had a stomach flu. Furthermore, even though I’ve been lucky enough to always have health insurance, I can probably count every doctor visit I’ve ever had. Most visits were for sports physicals, routine vaccinations, and female annual exams. People from the United States don’t go to the doctor. Insurance or not, doctors are expensive and a huge time suck.

In the Korean mind, the previous paragraph is unthinkable. Due to the value of education in Korea, and the importance of hierarchy, doctors are highly respected. Koreans are far less likely than someone from the United States to suspect a doctor of mistakes. In Korea, doctors and medicine are very affordable and accessible; even to the most low income citizens. On page two of the Wall Street Journal article “Who Lives the Longest – Countries with the Most and Least Effective Health Care” Korea ranks fifth most effective. Affordability compared to life expectancy was a major criterion.

People go to the doctor and the hospital all the time in Korea. When I first got here, and heard a kid was in the hospital, I got really worried. Nobody could tell me why he was there beyond, “He is sick.” Since I’m from the Unite States, I imagined grave illness. But when I saw that same kid in school the next day, and asked them how they were, they were confused by my level of concern. Slowly I stopped caring as much because kids just kept going to hospital, and mostly kept being alright shortly thereafter. In general I think parents take their kids to the hospital quicker than they’ll go themselves.

Despite the general enthusiasm for hospital visits, I’ve never been to a place where so many people come to work and school looking completely miserable. When people are sick they wear a face mask and carry on. Basically, unless you’re in the hospital, or dying there is no reason to miss work or school in Korea. I’ve seen kids exhausted with fevers, sleeping on their desks instead of eating lunch. Occasionally my co-workers have looked suspiciously like zombies. Kids even come to school with all kinds of gross eye crud, including pink-eye. I don’t know why people push it so hard when they’re sick. Maybe it’s because they aren’t so worried about being bankrupted by a hospital stay?

To end on a random note, it isn’t polite to publicly blow your nose in Korea. Thanks for reading!

Sick

I awoke at 4am last Sunday morning to my body completely evacuating the diner I put into it Saturday night. My first thought as I was leaning over the toilet was that I had poisoned Mike and my co-teacher, who we invited over to diner. I stumbled back to bed and decided not to seek sympathy from Mike just in case he was going down with me. After four increasingly painful and noisy visits to the bathroom, Mike still slept soundly, so I gained hope that I had caught my annual 24 hour stomach bug. (four years in a row)

When Mike got up around nine feeling fine, and completely unaware of my hours of misery (sorry for the drama) I decided to call my co-teacher for help. He said he was feeling well, and agreed to speak with the local pharmacist about giving Mike some stomach medicine.

Mike paid the equivalent of two dollars, and this is what he came home with. I must have been really delirious but I was hoping for trusty yet disgusting Pepto-Bismol.

Mike spent hours and went all around Seogwipo trying to figure out how much of this medicine I was supposed to take. First he tried google translate, then he went to a café where the proprietor speaks English really well. Unfortunately the café owner wasn’t in, so we called several people who might have been helpful, none of whom were answering. Mike went back to speak with the pharmacist who seemed to tell him using drawings and numbers that I was meant to take all of the medicine. Please keep in mind that the photo above only shows the left over pills that I didn’t take.

As you can see this is a lot of medicine. It seems sketchy to consume so much medicine, but dosage aside, it was logistically impossible for me as I wasn’t even holding down water. Furthermore, of what Mike was able to translate it seemed as if the consumer was intended to take two spoonfuls three times a day. The pill dosage and the hours lapsing was unclear via google translate. Feeling like there was still a misunderstanding we finally got a hold of Master Oh from Kuk Sool. Mike went across town again where Master Oh looked over the medicine, gave his best guess of what I should take, and wondered why I didn’t go to the hospital. Finally at 1pm Mike and I decided that I probably wouldn’t overdose if I took a few pills with a few swallows of the liquid. I repeated the process four other times, and felt increasingly better as the hours wore on.

Despite feeling awful, I just kept thinking that I was so happy to be with Mike, and that he was spending so much of his day figuring out what and how much medicine I should take.

As you can see the medicine looks really different here. One time we picked up cold medicine from the pharmacy. The cold medicine was really cheap, and looked like sugar tablets. Since we couldn’t read the label, the two of us had a hard time thinking of it as real medicine. It is real medicine of course; a whole country uses it. But the medicine is so different than what we’re accustomed to that it’s not very comforting when you’re feeling sick. Stay tuned for the next blog about observations I’ve made about sickness during our stay in Korea.

Schedule Changes

Vacation is over and we are back at school, so I thought I would create a few more posts about school life. Something to be expected on any given week is a schedule change. Usually these schedule changes are last minute.

Mostly the change is that a class was canceled due to sports day rehearsal, graduation rehearsal, exam studying, or special programming. When a class is canceled I just tuck the lesson away and plan future lessons with my new found time. Sometimes my co-teachers will let me know in advance that classes will be canceled. Even if this forewarning occurs, I always have a plan in hand because it’s also possible that the cancelation will be voided and teaching will be expected.

Mostly it’s harmless that schedules get changed last minute. How could it be upsetting to do less work than planned? But sometimes these changes are as disappointing as they are thrilling. The disappointments come when I plan something extra special like Halloween, or a graduation party. I ask permission in advance and follow up with constant reminders, yet schedule changes may still swoop in. Halloween carried on with a little added stress, but the graduation party has been reduced to, “Have a snack! Congratulations!”

These “surprise” schedule changes are part of the school culture in Korea, but it’s exasperated by the language barrier. Mostly I smile with a shrug and carry on. At the end of the day it really doesn’t matter.

Here is a photo from Wednesdays schedule change. The fourth grade teacher recommended that instead of English, we throw snowballs at each other. It’s the last week of the school year, I couldn’t be a downer. Fortunately when the play resulted in a giant rip in my slacks he had extra sweats for me to wear. Thanks for reading!

Fire Festival

On Saturday we went to the Fire Festival with our Kook Sul master, and several other foreigners who practice with us. We had heard lots of good things about the festival, and it did not disappoint.

We got there around 4:15pm, but unfortunately it was too late to climb the small hill that was later lit on fire. So we had a look around, and then went to a tent for diner. Master Oh explained that the fire festival stems from farming culture. Farmers used to light their fields on fire in the late winter to fertilize, and kill any bugs before spring planting.

This tradition is honored by song, dance, fireworks, and lighting a hill on fire. First in the video you see woman wearing traditional dress called hambok. I assume they are singing traditional songs. Every time I see a woman wearing hambok and singing it is captivating. Unfortunately my camera doesn't convey the magic as well.

After hay stacks were burned and things appeared to calm down the hill suddenly blew up. Fireworks laying on the side of the mountain caused explosions, accompanied by more aerials. I didn't catch that initial explosion, but the whole thing made me think about war instantly.

After you see Mike, you see some of our friends dancing. At the end is a short clip of traditional circle dancing.

Enjoy!

Manjanggul Lava Tubes

The Manjanggul Lava Tubes is a one of the UNESCO World Heritage sites that Jeju is so proud of. They are an hour and forty minutes from our house via the east coastal bus.

It as a challenge to take photos in such dim lighting, but the location is absolutely beautiful. The tubes feel cold, wet and a little mysterious. Sometimes the space between the floor and ceiling is so big it seemes like nature's cathedral.

Later we discovered another opening to the tubes. There was a huge sturdy ladder leading into a dark hole. It seemed like workers were scouting new places to open for visitors. Each of you can form your own opinion about whether we did a little unauthorized exploring.


These are the stairs leading into the part of the tubes open to visitors.


This is is the lava formation at the end of section open to the public.