"get ready, 'cause here i come"

In Korea, babies suck their thumbs; children play in puddles; girls play hard-to-get; and everyone scratches mosquito bites... It's been reassuring to know some things are the same everywhere, or at least the same here as at home. I've found in many ways Korea's not that foreign. After all, we're all human.


i'm very observant:

-tv
There are special channels on television that teach you English, all day long, every day. They range between professors teaching college-level material and Dora-the-Explorer-esque characters teaching phonics. They love American crime shows, maybe because there's no crime in Korea. They play every crime show that you can think of from home, but the advertisements for the English shows are written by Koreans and super funny.


-kids:
Korean kids endure an unimaginable amount of schooling. We know this. (I told you before.) Knowing how much time they spend at school and how strict their parents are about so many things, one might think they would have strict bedtimes as well. Not so. The children in my neighborhood are up and kickin' it in the streets 'til just about when I go to bed, and I'm a night owl. I don't mean teenagers. I've never seen teens out that late, but little kids, between five and ten years old, outside runnin' around until 10, 11, even 12 o'clock. Craziness.

I've asked my students to calculate how many hours of sleep they get per night. It's far less than I was getting at their age, some around 6 hours a night. Little tiny kids! "Hmm," you may wonder, "maybe they're on to something. They seem fine. Maybe our kids don't need as much sleep as we think they do in the U.S." I disagree, and not just because I love to sleep. Here's why:

Part of our daily routine at school is to ask how everyone's doing in the morning. Everyone always says some variation of tired. Most common answer the past few months: "I feel exhausted and happy." (I taught them the word "exhausted," because they kept saying "very, very, very, very, very tired.") They're five years old. It's kind of funny to hear a five-year-old say they're exhausted, but not like funny-haha, like funny-weird. When they're tired at the start of a new day, it's a bit disturbing. Little kids should be full of energy in the morning, don't you think? If they are getting enough sleep, that is. Clearly, they're not. On that note, I've seen TV advertisements directed at selling coffee to children, to help them stay awake while they study, of course.


-his and hers:
I've noticed Korean husbands and wives do their socializing generally in groups of same-sex friends. Women go to cafés and restaurants with their female friends, and men with their male friends. Even when out together with other couples, they segregate themselves by gender. I saw a group of eight adults, four couples, at a restaurant. All the women sat together on one end of the table and all the men sat together at the other end. I kept staring at them. It took me a while to figure out what I found so odd about that. At home you don't often see a group of adults socializing together without their significant others. Generally, as I recall, husbands and wives hang out with other couples or you see the occasional woman or man hanging out with one other friend.

I like the Korean style in some ways. I know many couples back home who get married or even are just dating and have no other friends, particularly the men. I think it's important to keep these friendships when you're in a couple and that it can serve to strengthen your relationship if for no other reason than you each can have some time apart.

Having coffee without your spouse is one thing. Heavy drinking is quite another. I must say I've seen far more men drinking with the friends until the sun comes up than women. I wonder how the women feel about their husbands drinking all night with their buddies far into old age. I've seen grandfather-aged men in the park at 9am still drunk from the night before. I've also seen old women beat men on the street that are too drunk to stand up.


-pda:
Public displays of affection are not very common among Korean couples, at least they weren't until the last two years or so. You may see older couples holding hands now, but young Korean couples, kids in high school and college, will hang off each other and make-out in public. According to people here, this is a brand-new phenomenon. It can be cute, but then again, annoying too, just like at home. This brings me to my annoyances.


the things i won't miss:

I won't miss the whining. Korean girls must be the whiniest girls on the earth. I know women can be pretty whiny at home too, but, man, oh man... The sounds that come out of them here, it's like nails on a chalkboard. I pinch my face and cover my ears. I can't type out exactly how it sounds, but I can do a pretty good impression for ya when I get back.

I won't miss the communication difficulty one has here, especially when trying to do the simplest of tasks like finding an item in the store or looking up movie times. At first, it kind of adds to the appeal of living in a foreign country, everything is an adventure. But now it's just frustrating.

I won't miss being pushed and shoved all the time. It's maddening lately. I get so pissed trying to get off the bus. Everyone will stand up to get off at the same stop and they all shove past you as if you're not getting off there too. I feel they are particularly rude to foreigners on the bus too. I imagine them all conspiring, "Don't let the white girl off the bus." Of course, I'm sure that's not true but it sure feels like it sometimes.

I won't miss being shushed all the time, even when we're talking in normal voices. (I swear they're normal.) Koreans like quiet bus rides. Could you imagine shushing someone back home talking to their friends on a bus or subway? They act like they're on vacation or in a spa or something and need absolute peace. Ridiculous. I say, if you don't like it, drive your damn car.

I won't miss rice. I don't want to eat white rice again for a long, long time.

I won't miss my job.


the things i will miss:

-cheap everything
-cheap street food
-super cheap taxis
-Family Mart, the convenience store we hang out at next to my house
-Korean commercials, hilarious
-bowing as a greeting, a thank you, a good-bye
-walking four minutes to work
-taking clean, cheap public transportation everywhere
-being alone with your thoughts because it's impossible to listen in on anyone's conversations
-korean barbecue, delicious
-having my rent paid and a place to live
-a $4 pizza place two blocks from my house
-being able to say, "because i said so, that's why"
-constant reminders to appreciate home
-fun high-top sneakers everywhere, (i'm the proud owner of two pairs)
-my friends here


When I left, I wanted so badly to be out of the U.S... and now all I want, more than anything, is to go back. I left mostly to experience somewhere new, to be a part of something else, anything else. Despite my strong urge to flee, I wasn't completely disillusioned about leaving. I knew there was a chance I wouldn't love it, but hoped if that were the case, that it would help me appreciate home again. It has. And there is no doubt my time here has been "something else." Although I wouldn't say I loved Korea, I am not cured of my traveling itch just yet. I still want to go more places, but I'm all set with Asia for a while.