A walk around my 'hood

As I've already mentioned on here, there's been a bit of a change in my surroundings recently - a change for the more urban to say the least. I've spent many a megabyte cataloging some of the more beautiful parts of korea on this blog, so I thought for this post, I'd show of one of the less scenic locations - Siheung City's Jeongwang-dong.

One of my colleagues, upon looking out of her 18th floor window at endless batteries of apartments, remarked that "It all looks like it's been copy-pasted." She was right too, and not just in Jeongwang, but all over Korea. One of the things that I enjoy about London is the diversity of its architecture. Korea of course doesn't have the advantage of historic buildings, being a very recently developed country, and having had almost everything historic flattened in the Korean war. Even so, modern buildings are not so much function over form, as built to be as ugly as possible, though this may be a cultural thing I'm missing.

However, looking into wider Korean culture it becomes clear how important image and appearance is here. I don't know if there's ever been a study done, but I'd be willing to bet that korea has one if the highest mirrors per person figures in the world, and you only need to pop into a korean restaurant to see how well food is presented here. Another confusing point is that most of my students are excellent and creative artists. Maybe it gets drummed out of them in architect school. Whatever happens, urban korea can be a pretty miserable place sometimes, and I wonder if it's urban centers have anything to do with the fact that South Korea often ranks among the unhappiest countries on earth. I'm sure that having some of the longest working hours on earth is a pretty big factor, but doing it in some of the least inspiring buildings on earth can't help either.

As a language teacher you come to learn that showing is often better than telling, so without further ado, I present a walk through Jeongwang-dong from my university to the subway station:

 We start with a walk through campus, past the 6-a-side pitch...

...and the climbing wall.

 Casting a glance back at the Techno Innovation 'Park' (TIP, where I live work, work out, shop, eat etc.). My room is on the right hand side of the top floor as you look at it in this photo.

There is an attempt to put some green on campus... 

...but the buildings are still pretty horrible.

Leaving university grounds, we head into the entertainments district. 

At night, this is all neon. 

Two staples of Korean urban nightlife, the barbecue restaurant... 

...and the chicken and beer shop. 

 See, this says 'pub' but I guarantee you'll rarely have been in less pub-like places.

My unofficial study suggests that there are three mobile phone stores for every person in Korea. 

Following his banning from the USA, Pororo fell on hard times.

 Looking back through the entertainment district.

 And around from on the bridge.

 Inspiring, huh?

 An attempt to tip the scales?

... 

... 

...

The local high school. 

 ...

And finally, the subway station.

The strange thing is, I'm feeling remarkably positive about my new living situation, and life in general. It's always tough changing teaching contexts, and getting used to new students, guidelines and routines, but I'm definitely feeling more like I've cracked it recently. My Korean's improving since I moved to the big city too - turns out there's more people to talk to here - who knew? I might also be flexing some old indie muscles occasionally: I'm going to see a story about a mythical North Korean punk rock icon performed by SK punk bands on Friday - I have no idea what to expect, but may try to report back sometime soon.

Until then,

A

Friends

At the end of summer vacation I resolved to study Korean a lot harder. The time I spent schlepping around Korea brought home just how much I didn't know, and so I set myself a target of 6 hours study a week. I've kept to it, and my Korean has now jumped up a level from "serviceable in a restaurant" to "basic conversational". I still only understand about 20% of what anyone says to me, but I am at least able to say quite a lot these days.

The fact that I can now hold up one end of a basic conversation means that I've made the odd non-English speaking friend, as well as surprising old ladies in shops occasionally. By far the best of these is Jae-yeong, one of the Jinbu footballers. I say Jae-yeong, but when I remember I call him "Hyeong", which is Korean for older brother. In Korea names are rarely used for people older than you. Familial or professional titles are used instead, so all my colleagues at school are "Seon-saeng-nim" (teacher) rather than their names. It does have the advantage of meaning I never have to remember anyone's name.

Jae-yeong and his wife have a daughter, Se-ah who may be the cutest child I have ever met. Stacy and I have become her uncle and aunt (she has many of these) and now spend as much time as possible spoiling her and making her wink for us. The child is a born flirt and favours dancing and pretending things are telephones. She doesn't speak English yet, though I'm working on it.

Here are some of the photos of everyone.

The above are from the Sol Beach Hotel, a swanky resort on the coast near Yangyang. Apparently it's a favourite Korean celebrity hang out. Jaeyeong and I are thinking of hiring the whole place out for our shared birthday, though it seems like it might be a little expensive.

Like I said, Se-ah enjoys pretending that things are telephones. In the case of the above photo, it's my camera case.

These were taken at my apartment after we'd been out for dinner. I think that Se-ah is going to be a K-pop star when she grows up. As proof, there's a video below of her dancing. Sadly, some halfwit is drunkenly singing My Way in the background, so you'd best watch it with the sound turned down.

I think that more or less covers it for this post. More adventures coming soon.

A

What am I up to right now?

So it's been a little while since I actually wrote anything about what I'm doing, as opposed to what I've done. Life's been pretty exciting of late, with lots of travelling and visitors, and so school life hasn't seemed very noteworthy, especially as the semester was winding down, classes were being cancelled and both my students and I were flagging a little, especially in the sweltering Korean summer.

Anyway, right now I'm sat on my bed relaxing and writing this, with half an eye on The Hills Have Eyes 2 (You take what you can get in English on Korean TV). It's been a productive day, in a productive week. I spent the morning lesson planning at school, had lunch out with the teachers, did some more planning before going home and studying Korean for an hour. Then I popped out for a two hour bike ride, and found perhaps the greatest cycling road in Korea, a beautiful tight twisting descent down which one can do a passable impression of Valentino Rossi. It's a bit of a pain that you have to cycle up it first, but it's well worth the effort. I came back past Jinbu's new coffee shop and then cooked myself a pretty tasty bibimbap in my new dolsot, then did another hour of Korean study before winding up where I am now, and still managing to be vaguely productive.

At the moment the school is on summer break, which in Korea is not exactly what you might expect. I'd say at least a third of the students come in every day for supplementary classes, and study for pretty much the entire day. As for the teachers, the ones who don't have to come in are all off on residential training courses for the summer. Part of being a native-speaker English teacher here is "desk-warming" (as it's referred to by the pond-life that frequents the forums at Dave's ESL cafe), being obliged to come to school even though you don't have classes. Personally I don't see what the problem is - it's pretty much the same in any job in the UK or the US (except, ironically, teaching) and if you put it to use you can make your life a lot easier. It helps that my school is pretty great and let's me go home after lunch, but that still leaves plenty of time in the mornings to get set up for the next semester. Compared to my poor Korean colleagues, I have it pretty easy.

I find working in this kind of environment quite inspiring, and I'm feeling pretty good about teaching at the moment (perhaps as I'm not actually doing it). Having some time off has given me a chance to review what I did last semester, and I've come to the conclusion that while I did OK last semester, I can do a lot better this one. Motivating the students is never easy here (my class is worth nothing in terms of grades or exam preparation, which is the only currency for a Korean high school student) so it has to be 제미 ("jaemi" - the Korean word which means fun and interesting at the same time). I surveyed my students to find out what they wanted to learn, and they overwhelmingly said music and movies, so next semester is going to kick off with music week which will hopefully leave my students able to understand the second conditional with Beyonce's help, rap like Will Smith and tell the difference between rock and alternative music (I'm not sure I can do this myself, but ho hum). I'm also starting to think about ESL teaching long term, and investigating weekend CELTA courses and maybe even a masters. I've also joined the ranks of KOTESOL, the association for English teachers here in the hope of learning a little more about teaching English, and maybe making a few useful contacts while I'm at it.

So really, life is pretty good in Korea at the moment. Aside from a bruised big toe which has kept me out of football this week, everything's going really well. Let's hope it continues that way. For anyone who's wondering, I'm almost certainly staying here for two years now, but if this semester goes as fast as the last one did, I'll be back for my winter break in England in no time.

Anyway, bedtime I think. Please excuse the slightly self-indulgent post, but we'll be back to the holiday snaps pretty soon.

Until then,

A

Stuff that doesn't really merit a blog post to itself.

New Bike

When I moved here I inherited a bike from the previous incumbent. It sat out all winter in the snow and I didn't think to move it until the weather cheered up. When I did I found that what I'd inherited was a heap of junk. It couldn't me taken higher than the third cog on the rear gear shift without the chain slipping almost constantly, and even then I had to be fairly careful of putting too much pressure on the pedals. The front cog was also stuck on the lowest cog, so I ended up cycling around the town with my legs going much faster than I was.

I decided that I'd shell out and get something decent. I live in a beautiful part of the world here and there a plenty of wonderful (if mountainous) cycling opportunities. So here she is, my as yet unnamed new machine. Isn't she beautiful? If you have any name suggestions please feel free to leave them in the comments section.

New camera

You may notice a slight increase in both the quality (as in megapixels rather than the skill of the photographer) and quantity of photos on here. That's because I also bought a new camera to go with my new bike, the plan being to cycle off into the Korean wilderness and bring back lots of lovely digital images for you. Here are some to start with.

Further up the valley.

Field in the hills to the East of Jinbu

Korean chickens. Hope you like them Mum.

Trees on Trucks

This is a curious phenomenon in my part of Korea. Most days I see at least one lorry carrying a decent sized pine tree to one place or another. I'm not quite sure what's happening, but it can be rather dangerous. The trees swing out from the back of the lorries when they corner, and the drivers seem to be oblivious to this fact. Following a caravan of four tree lorries along a twisty road I saw more than one car almost wiped out my a fast moving cloud of pine needles. Korea: mental.

Gyeongpo beach and the Dome House

On Saturday I took my first proper trip to the beach. I put my feet in the East Sea / Sea of Japan for the first time, and found it to be almost unbearably cold. Still, the sand and the sunshine was nice. I also ate lunch at The Dome House, which turned out to be rather disappointing from a food point of view, and the fact that they didn't have a basil plant for sale. Still, an interesting setting. Here be the photos:

Looking North from Gyeongpo

Out to sea.

Pine tree on the beach.

The Dome House from the road.

The dome house interior.

Korean Lesson

It's late, and I don't have time to delve into the phrasebook, so here's a useful Korean word for you:

자전고

Ja-jeon-go

Bicyle

Toodle-oo,

A

A

How is learning Korean going?

It's very, very difficult. At least for me it is. Things that are difficult about Korean (so far):

1. Politeness levels. There are five different levels of politeness in Korean, from informal to honorific. All the verbs and pronouns change quite significantly between them too, so even if you can work out how you should address them, by the time you have you've probably forgotten how you should be conjugating the verb.

2. Number of words. For example, when dealing with family, there are entirely separate words for brother and sister, depending on whether you are a boy or a girl, and whether they are older or younger than you. None of them seem to have much of a link between them either.

3. Not having an alphabet to remember words in. I (if you believe in classroom intelligences) am a visual learner. I remember words by picturing the letters in my head. This worked OK for Spanish, as the alphabet was the same. In Korean however, I don't have that inbuilt alphabet to visualise the words (I can read and write, but very slowly). This means that I'm stuck with remembering sounds, which disappear out of my head almost as quickly as they arrive.

4. A complete new grammar. Korean uses a system of particles. Syllables added to words to denote subject, object, contrast, possession and suchlike. Word order is not so important as in English (though the verb always comes last in a sentence). Adjectives also get conjugated, though this kind of makes sense. It seems to be only for things like "the dog is big", where the "to be" part just becomes a part of the adjective. Finally, and this really blew my mind, verbs are also conjugated according to the conjunction that would follow. This means that the concept of and, but, then etc. is also contained in the verb. I am, eventually, going to really enjoy dealing with Korean grammar, but it's a long steep road ahead.

5. My pronunciation is terrible. It's terrible in Spanish too. I'm really past the age where I can train my mouth to form new sounds easily. Still, I try, but asking for stuff in shops still usually meets with a blank stare. I do wonder whether it's slightly that people assume that I don't speak Korean, but I suspect it's more because I'm mangling the words, not least because speaking it makes me really nervous.

Still, there is a bit of light at the end of the tunnel. I am beginning to pick out the odd word in what people say to me, and my student' minds are blown that I can say some things in Korean. I also have a posse of teachers (I'm at a loss as to what the correct collective noun is here), ranging from the Chinese teacher at my school to my fifth grade students at elementary school. With them, Rosetta Stone and the internet I might just get there. I also bought a new learning tool on Sunday. Here is a picture:

Disturbingly, this is not the first book I've seen here that has misspelled English on the front cover. I could fill another entire blog (and people have) with examples of dreadful translation I see here, but you would think that getting the subject of the book spelt correctly on the cover might not be too difficult. Anyway, I theorise that while the English may be awful, the Korean is probably OK, so I'm going to learn a few phrases from here, and so are you:

일자리가 있습니까

Iljarika iseumnida?

Do you have any openings?

I sincerely hope it's talking about jobs.

Good night.

A