My new class at the start of a new school year in March 2013.
I've wanted to create this post for a while, but I've been struggling with how to write it. In fact, I had a previously written post that sat around as a draft for a while, but I pushed it aside and eventually just deleted it. Why? Because I think it's kind of challenging to touch on the not so great parts of living and working here in South Korea, without giving the impression that it's a horrible idea and you're doomed if you think you should try it. Rather, I would like to impress upon anyone interested that while going to South Korea is sure to be an adventure, there are also many aspects (particularly employment aspects) that can really influence your experience. It might sound kind of silly to mention it since it's why you're here, but teaching is going to influence the rest of your everyday life too.
In addition, while it may be challenging to accurately portray and address the reality, I feel as though it's unfair to have a blog that is pretty much just highlighting the positive parts of the experiences we've had here without touching on the less-than-great ones. It's something I'm not a huge fan of emphasizing, but it would be a disservice for any other internet browsing sleuths wanting more information about teaching in South Korea. I know that I prefer to have the whole picture, or at least most of it so that I can mentally prepare and maybe even plan ahead for potential situations that might pop up.
So, without any further delay, I will just take some time to talk about some of the challenges, inconveniences, and pains-in-the-a** that I know can and may happen to anyone. We're more than willing to help answer questions if anyone would have them as well (related to our personal experiences), so feel free to drop a line.
--- The contract. It's good to find a good one, but don't rely on your director/employer following it like you expect. This is something I'm sure comes up rather frequently. It's important when you start this whole thing (especially in terms of hagwons) to carefully read over your contract before signing it, but don't expect it to be followed to a T by any means. Off the top of my head I can think of at least 5 or 6 contract violations to varying degrees by our boss, but it's probably more than that if we would sit down and get right to it. We're talking about violations ranging from payday changes, health insurance, pension, overtime pay, hours worked, and others. It's infuriating to know that this is standard, but I can personally think of several people that have really gotten the short end of the stick because their director has not followed the contract or was dishonest in some way. Violations can be followed up with the Labor Board, but I feel like this is something where you need to evaluate your options and do some research before moving forward.
--- Working hours. Expect these to change at a whim, be violated, and make no sense. This in part goes along with the contract violations. It's an employers market over here in South Korea and you can expect directors to try and squeeze every last cent out of you and by that I mean your time. Every month of our time here thus far has seen me getting jilted for overpay time, and it varies for Zach from month to month because our director has been sending him to other hagwons to work part time too because it's extra money to line her pockets. The standard is 120 teaching hours per month, but I can't think of a time when I've seen that except for briefly during the school break period in winter and I'm honestly surprised she didn't dock my pay. Long hours without breaks are not a surprising thing.
-- Teaching materials and expectations. I like to think of teaching here in South Korea as a dual responsibility, from my perspective anyway. On one hand you're here to look pretty and foreign, to be that piece of prestige for your school that indicates that they're reaching out to make the school one of the best and take care of the children during their time at the school. On the other hand you're here to teach English. I sometimes think that the latter is secondary to the former. What does this have to do with teaching materials and expectations? Well, there is the expectation that you're supposed to look good and be kind and make the kids and thus their parents happy. This is one thing that can be made difficult by your teaching materials or lack of said teaching materials. Our school is bigger on workbooks to get through the day, while some schools have more emphasis on more technologically advanced things. Each child in our school averages 4 workbooks or so at any given time. So it's a matter of figuring out what workbook goes into which time slot during which day of the week. Easy enough, but that's the most support we've really been given as far as teaching. "Here, use this book according to this schedule. Bye!" is the typical way it goes. Our director (whose poor English is no big surprise at this point) will also pick story books that are inappropriate for the class age/level and I just shake my head and pick something more appropriate. Things are different in public schools and other hagwons, of course, but I know that lack of support is definitely not uncommon here either.
-- Winter can be somewhat unpleasant. As far as living here goes, we eased into fall pretty well, but winter was absolutely terrible for us. Due to our location and being a bit farther out from the city, we found ourselves trapped inside a lot due to the bitter cold record temperatures with little to do. I know a lot of people tend to drink in the winter since there isn't a lot else to do here, but if you have some sort of crafting hobby, enjoy video/computer games, reading, and other things, by all means make sure you have them for winter. School schedules also get crazy during wintertime so be prepared! Many schools have a Christmas program which may put big demands on you for a month or two, same with graduation programs at the end of February. Christmas had us working on songs and practicing reading books while February had us struggling to help our kids understand and perform plays and songs for the graduation ceremony. The short days and long nights made things very depressing on top of the stress and demands of making these performances acceptable and getting through the icky cold and flu season (which kids bring to school with them, don't be surprised if you have ill kids in your class or kids getting sick, not fun!) while also being away from home. There is a light at the end of the tunnel with this one though and things seem to improve after the hectic winter season with the holidays and graduation, plus you get some extra time off for the New Year and the Lunar New Year which slightly sweetens the deal (now if only it would be warmer out so you can enjoy it).
-- Communication challenges. This one is probably a given, but expect the unexpected when it comes to channels of communication. Be prepared that some things that you thought you understood when they were explained may not be exactly that, or they may possibly be the complete opposite. This, of course, depends on your ability to tease out the answer you're looking for and the English skills of the person/director that you're talking to. I recently had a conversation with our director regarding a change of class placement for one of our elementary kids, Carley, and it did not go as I had planned at all. My understanding of the conversation was that Carley, who was in my class, was going to be changing to Zach's class instead, but then I confirmed with her not once, but three times, that she would be staying in my class with her former kindy classmates. Okay, that works. The next thing I know the Korean teacher here at the school tells me that no, Carley will in fact be going to Zach's class. I mention to her the communication issue and she just kind of chuckles because she understands how poor our director's English is. Another example is today I was told by the director to bring down the supplies for two of my kindy kids, Daniel and Jun (brothers), when all she meant was that she had supplies for them that she wanted me to take upstairs. Confusing, no? The moral of the story is if you have questions, go and ask them. They might not be a fan of you asking (it's kind of looked down upon here to question your elders/authority figures), but trust me when I say that you knowing what's going on will probably make you feel better about life, the universe, and everything.
-- Being in the spotlight. Taking a break from the primarily work based critique, this commentary is more general and also has a touch of the positive too. South Korea is fairly homogeneous and while the bigger cities see more foreigners in and out, you're still pretty interesting. It's not uncommon to walk down the street and have people staring, moreso the older population. The children generally have more mixed reactions, but they are the most likely to grin and say "hello" and you can watch their glee at using their English and having a foreigner respond back positively. It's very cute. I think our current record for children greeting us in one day has probably been 3, a number I suspect will go up once the weather becomes nicer. The old ajummas and ajosshis are a bit different in that aspect. I'm fairly tall for a woman, so I think that attracts a few gazes, but one of the more interesting experiences I've had with this has been the old woman that literally stopped walking to stare as we walked past her, even watching and turning as we kept walking away. Some of the men have stared at me too, it's kind of unnerving. In that sense I will say that I kind of look forward to going home so that I can just be one of the group again without people staring fairly frequently. I will say that it's given me some perspective regarding being someone sort of on the outside looking in, something I don't want to go into here, but I hope it's something I can take with me always to give me greater compassion and understanding of those around me.
There are several other things, but these seem to be the main "negatives"-- if you will as far as working and living here. Even then some of these can be taken with a grain of salt, but that depends on the way things are. I will admit to being dissatisfied with the management of the school we're at, the complete chaos at times, and wonder just how she even keeps things "together". I can't really talk about things like co-teachers since our only Korean teacher, who was formerly here all day, is only here part time and she's less of a co-teacher and just teaches her own English classes. For her part though, she's been fantastic and very helpful. Her English is definitely better than the boss lady and we sometimes find her essentially translating for us what she wants/expects.
These things are also admittedly the worst right around the time that they are brought up because we're just so overwhelmed by the expectations and lack of rationale behind the decisions. We've been frustrated, angry, upset, depressed, and other emotions as we tried to figure out the best way to deal with things that have just been sprung on us randomly. The best way we found is to deal with it one day at a time and have a goal, whether it's buying something fun or nice, going out for a nice meal or a drink, looking forward to the next week or month and better weather, or talking to people from home.
All that aside, being here is an experience and I'm glad that it's one we decided to undertake, but our expectation of things not going as we planned has been pushed above and beyond at times. So if you're considering teaching English abroad, at least in South Korea, it's best to expect that things will more than likely not be exactly as you planned. Some things may be nicer than planned, but expect the crazy and not so amusing along the way too.
