This is the second of my posts about ESL teaching in Korea. ( The first is here.)

What sparked my desire to write these was a friend saying they were considering teaching abroad. What follows came out of that conversation and like most advice it comes from having made mistakes. This part will focus on the application process and the second part will focus on the first six months.

A few things to state up front: I’m a straight, American, Caucasian male, in my mid-30s, posted to a rural county, and without an education or teaching background. I’m married to a Korean woman who has herself lived abroad for close to twenty years. I enjoy taking long walks, Fritz Leiber novels, and . . . er, wait, what? OK, back to my point, all of the previous colors my perspective on teaching in Korea. I don’t know how my situation would be different if I were a woman or from another English-speaking country or of non-white ancestry or if I lived in a city.

I teach at three Elementary schools, and my largest class is about 30 students. My smallest class has two students. I also live in the town where my main school is. Every teacher’s experience here is different, but I’ve tried to take into account what other teachers have told me of their experiences.

The one decision that’s likely to make the most difference is whether you decide to take a Rural or Urban post (and by saying, “It doesn’t matter, I’ll teach anywhere”, you are pretty much saying, “Yes, please, I’d like that rural post.”)

Since I have a rural post, here’s what I’ve found that to mean:

- In the EPIK program you are paid more if you decide to take a rural post over an urban one. I’m not sure how EPIK determines rural/urban, but if there’s one thing that happens pretty quick is that you learn to tell the difference between a village of 300 and a village of 5,000 despite both being labeled rural (“But, wait, how can you call your town small? You have a Paris Baguette and everything”).

- In a rural post your classes will be smaller, but this can be a drawback since you might then be called upon to teach at more than one school (the most I’ve hear of is 10, which the guy oddly didn’t mind).

- As in most countries there’s a prejudice against the countryside with those who live in rural places being considered backwards and stupid. (The standard mentality of “If they were smarter they wouldn’t live there”.) A number of my students live with their grandparents because their parents work in one of the bigger cities. You might be the first foreigner to either teach at the school or live in the town. There are two big drawbacks to this. One, which I'll touch on in the next post, is the fact that the people will have nothing but stereotypes to base your character upon and, frankly, these can be pretty racist. The second is that your fellow teachers might not know what to do with you and would rather you weren’t there because they perceive your presence as somehow disturbing the “good thing” they have going on.

- If you wind up living in the small town where you teach, you’re likely to become something of a celebrity. This’ll mean students might follow you home, people will ask where you’re going, you will see your students and their parents everyday outside of school, and the mailman will track you down to hand you your mail personally instead of leaving it at your home. Parts of this can be uncomfortable (being asked to go to church), but there are some perks. Ask yourself how much being THE FOREIGNER bothers you. (If you don’t live in the town where you teach you need to ask yourself if you mind a 45-minute bus ride each way everyday. On the plus side you might then be in a city and be able to enjoy those benefits.) Ultimately being THE FOREIGNER means paying attention to what you say and do in town at all times. If you've never lived with this, can you?

Other things to consider:
- If you want to have a social life and hang out with other foreigners, you might want to select an urban post.

- Worship. I’m an atheist, and I find the particular brand of Charismatic Christianity that’s prevalent in Korea to be unnerving. I admit this might be a personal hang-up. But if being devout in your religious practice is important to you, you might look into where there are places of worship that offer an English language service (or simply where such places of worship exist).

- If you’re a vegetarian, every meal you eat at school or with your coworkers or neighbors will require that you explain yourself. Actually, maybe not so much at school after the first few weeks, if you’re cafeteria crew winds up being anything like mine, they’d make something special for you or at least insure that there’s enough for you to eat. (I’d say the same if you wanted to keep Kosher, but you might have more options.) Koreans pride themselves on their food. Unfortunately almost all of it has meat in it. An urban post is likely to have the same problem, however if the city is big enough you may be lucky to have a vegetarian restaurant (though it might be cult affiliated) or a daily market with a great selection of produce.

- Eat the kimchi. If you’re even considering teaching in Korea next year, start eating kimchi now. Learn to like it.

- Along with the above learn Hangul, the Korean alphabet. It’s fairly easy to learn as it was designed for ease of use and it has a cool history. In the decades after Sejong the Great implemented it, most of the Confucian scholars were upset because the populace was using it to write dirty limericks and pulp novels.

- Plan for the worst. I’ll go into this more in the next installment, but seriously: Plan for the worst. The glimpse of what to expect during the training courses can be very different from what your reality turns out to be. Think of worst-case scenarios and what to do if/when you encounter them.

That's it for now. Next installment is going to focus on the first six months.

I have moved from the pasture to the townhouse, where the food is more abundant and delicious, the company more worldly, but ruder, and the cat more bold. I have returned like Prospero to Venice, like Orsino from Arcadia. I’ve left the greenwoods of Barnesdale for the cobbles of Nottingham, like Robin going to the party in disguise.

This is NC Wyeth’s classic endpaper illustration for the Paul Creswick Robin Hood of 1903, which is available in its entirety (except of course for shiny dustcover, lovely old-glue smell, cloth binding and old timey faux-cut pages) at Sacred Texts of all places–folklore passing into myth, myth into religion?

This is Boston from Peter’s Hill, at the south end of the Arboretum. In the middleground is the conifers section, I think: larches from Europe, Douglas firs, even a couple of dawn redwoods from China, mixed in with our local hemlocks and pines.

The availability of green space, to my surprise, is not all that much diminished. Instead of Mt. Sugarloaf, I’ve got the Arboretum. The Blue Hills replace the Holyoke Range. Instead of Mt. Toby, the Emerald Necklace. Of course, it’s all rather more well-traveled than I’m used to, and the forage isn’t nearly as good, what with all the groundwater being contaminated with oily city ick. But I’ll manage, I think.

I don’t get nearly as many weird looks as I’d have expected for walking around town with a big stick. No more than I did in the Valley, anyhow.

Maize God, like Count Dracula, can travel the world only with his feet planted firmly in a fragment of his native soil.

This is about half of what I potted and brought to live on my new front porch: basil, rosemary, sage, wormwood, lemon balm, lavender, and one habañero pepper.

This is the first in a (at least three part) series of posts on teaching English in Korea.

When I told one of my closest friends I planned on moving to South Korea, her first reaction was to call me crazy, her second was to say: "People like you don't do that." That's when I knew I was making a good decision.

Travel’s not the answer. It’s too easy to travel and never leave one’s comfort zone, to stay on the tour bus, going from sanctioned tourist site, to sanctioned restaurant, and back again. The comfort zone never breached; the new experience never encountered except within a sanitized boundary where it can be limited, made safe, and consumed.

Travel can become an inoculation against having an open mind. We can see the world and remain as mired in our own preconceptions as before. Possibly even more so: “Been there, done that. I’m glad I don’t have to live there.”

The real answer is to get beyond the comfort zone. To go beyond one’s assumptions and safe spaces and enter that area where the boundaries aren’t fixed and there’s no scaffolding supporting our preconceptions. A space where we’re likely to grow but we’re also likely to get burnt.

It can be painful to watch our preconceived notions crumble beneath the weight of their own unsupported crufted-on bullshit.

Some people come away from the experience lessened, still attached to the broken pieces of their assumptions but unable to trust them again. Bitterness and cynicism set in, and a wounded pride takes over. For others it can be a weight removed, a pressure done away with, not collapse but liberation.

The goal is not to travel. It’s not to have “adventures” or “see the world”. These can be too easily transformed into consumables, the stereotypical endlessly backpacking globetrotter. Rootlessness and the excitement of new places can be as deep a rut as the familiar treadmill. But the ruts aren’t deepest in our environment, they're deepest in our own heads.

Travel and living abroad are two ways to encounter the unknown. They’re not the only ways. Nor is the comfort zone to be made an enemy. Our desire for a place where we can feel safe is hardwired, but like much that’s hardwired, it can be made a luxury and abused. When that place starts to resemble a cage, we need to find our way out and stretch past its confines.

I used to haul around this Francis Bacon quote which I unfortunately can’t source but will nevertheless paraphrase: “One’s mind should be broadened to meet the grandeur of the mysteries, and not the mysteries shrunk to fit the narrowness of the mind.”

That’s the perspective required. Travel’s one way to learn it, but it’s not the only way.

(The painting's by Nicholas Roerich.)

There’s this one house with a big garden I pass on my way to and from work. Every now and then I see the old couple that lives there. The old woman in particular has a way of sneaking up on me. I’ll be walking along when suddenly I'll hear someone laughing at me, and the old woman will be standing less than four feet away from me.

Today on my way home I found the woman standing in the middle of the road with a green squash in her hand. She held it out to me and gestured that I should take it. So I did. I was a little worried that maybe the squash was haunted (Kidding aside, I'm more worried the woman might have dementia), but later when I was on my way to the mart I saw the woman again. She laughed, as usual, held up her bag, saying “Soju” (Korean hard liquor), and walked away.

Really, if she were a ghost I wouldn’t mind.

A veritable loot bag of good news coming out of Ridlerville:

My pulptacular adventure story "The Last Mountie" is up at Crossed Genres. Enjoy an action story inspired by Joe Lansdale, Dudley DoRight, and a desire to set a post-apocalyptic story set in an abandoned amusement park.

http://crossedgenres.com/archives/021/the-last-mountie-by-jason-s-ridler/

And that's just for starters!

My lusty kung fu fable, "4x0 Killers" is also now up at M-Brane SF. Editor Chris Fletcher had this blurb for the story:

"A tale of two young men who have been best friends for years and their previously unaddressed resentment toward one another, [4x40 Killers is] a bit erotic, quite funny, a little bit creepy and balls-out weird."

That comment had me smiling all day! So true! So, if your 18+, and you dare to have your image of me as sweet and innocent challenged, check out the story here:

http://www.box.net/shared/8svx915ze1

But wait, there's more!

I sold two stories over the weekend. "Showing Light," a near future tale of the dark side of the rasslin business, will be published in the 2020 Visions, edited by Rick Novy and published by M-Bane SF. Thanks to Rick and Chris for buying the story.

And, that's not all!

"Saving Pandora," a noirish tale of romantic love in a scuzzy world of fallen Hollywood starlets will be published by Little Death of Crossed Genres. Cheers to Jayme Gates for buying it.

That makes eleven sales this year thus far. That ties my record for last year. And that means only the Godfather of Soul can tell you how I feel-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgDrJ5Z2rKw

Cheers!

JSR

Read my pulpy post-disaster action story at Crossed Genres, featuring Wade Mackenzie- "The Last Mountie"!

http://crossedgenres.com/archives/021/the-last-mountie-by-jason-s-ridler/

Part Dudley Do-right, part Jack Burton, all Mountie!

JSR

I’m back from the annual Odyssey workshop alumni week, where we lecture and critique and live in steamy dorms again. Highlights included reading my story from the Homeless Moon 3 chapbook, “NEW! The ‘Gearwork Rose’(TM) Automated Gratification Engine,” aloud at the Barnes & Noble reading, learning more about writerly promotion and how to read aloud, and (as always) drinking fine and eclectic beers with Mike DeLuca.

Another big highlight for me was a couple long conversations with several people about a point I’ve reached in my writing. For several years now, I’ve been consistently getting my stories passed up by slush readers but not bought by the head editors. These stories are as good as I know how to make them, but I still haven’t been able to crack through.

So I’ve arrived at a crossroads. And unlike in the fine Southern mythical tradition, the devil was not waiting there to cut a deal with me. But hashing out some possible new projects and tweaks to my approach, with several supremely supportive and insightful writers, showed me a few really neat new paths to explore.

Although the drinking of fine beers is one of the main reasons I go, the writerly insight and discussion is right up there too. It’s a lot like hashing over scientific problems with a research group–arriving at insight by both talking and listening, an individual insight that’s a product of the group whole. Of course, the process is only as good as those other people you’re hashing with, and these were some of the best I know. It truly does take a whole foulburg.

.

(”Foulburg” is supposed to be a term that means the shanty-town outside the walls of a medieval city, but from googling I fear that it originated with 80s epic fantasy author Raymond E. Feist and isn’t an actual recognized term. But why let the truth get in the way of a cool line? :) )

Go enjoy a two fisted fable rooted in my love of hyperbolic and melodramatic action storytelling!

http://www.brainharvestmag.com/2010/07/grudge-match/

And I love the comment at the bottom. Please feel free to leave your own!

Cheers!

JSR