Therapy Session

Warning – This blog post is a form of therapy for me at the current moment, so I apologize ahead of time if it's hard to follow as it most likely will be a complete run-on sentence of my thoughts pouring out of my brain onto the screen. (This blog was written over the course of a few weeks so it's a bit all over the place)

I've recently hit a significant road block in my time in Korea. I've still been struggling with the personal aspect of being here, feeling lonely, missing home, etc. To further add to the struggle, I now am dealing with issues at work. Disclaimer – I was fully aware of the risk I took coming here and working in a private school (hagwon in Korean). There are multiple horror stories of foreigners working in hagwons that include not getting paid, terrible bosses, companies going out of business mid-contract, etc. My experience isn't at the top of the outrageously terrible list, but it's definitely something that holds merit in my heart and has made me question being here.

Some information you need to know ahead of time:

1. Teaching contracts in Korea are always one year in length
2. The school year is March to March here
3. Korean parents are crazy about their childrens' education and will go to great lengths to ensure they receive the best

Basically to hopefully shorten a lengthy story, a business woman, let's just call her Cruella DeVille for the remainder of this post, bought into the company I work for and is now the most prominent board member. Therefore, she has decided to come in and take a look around and decide what, if anything, needs to be 'fixed' or 'cleaned up'. Cruella and the CEO of the company met with all the remaining teachers that have contracts ending this year. They basically made us feel like we suck at our jobs and that we don't matter at the school. They then proceeded to give us an ultimatum to either sign an extended contract through March 2013 or there was the possibility we would get fired. They then rewrote our original contracts (which is illegal) and told us we either need to sign the extended contract or the revised original contract. There was a lot of back and forth meetings that never led to anything and also a lot of 'he said she said' BS. Koreans are very passive about confrontations and they are never direct with how they speak to you or handle situations. The principal at my school has no clue how to manage people or talk to people. Every time I met with him on this situation he wouldn't look me in the eye, he would mumble and spend most of the time silent. The last straw for me was during a meeting with the principal and he basically called me a liar and yeah you can all imagine the rage inside me at this point. At this point the school is seriously falling a part. Multiple Korean staff are leaving in March at the end of the school year because they are treated poorly by the principal and overworked by the CEO. It's just a really toxic environment and no one enjoys being at work.

I have a huge decision to make, because part of me just wants to come home and be done with this place. The other part of me says I should just suck it up and finish my contract.

Things I've learned:

1. No matter what I do in my life I always want to be close to my friends and family and the people that really matter most in my life. It's not easy when I want to talk to my best friend, but I can't just call her because it's actually 2am where she lives.
2. Life is too short!! This is a cliché statement, but I think I've finally understood the weight of this saying and how true it is.
3. I'm not getting any younger.
4. I'm currently going through a mid-twenties life crisis. It's stressful, annoying, painful, etc. However, it is exciting, because I kind of live in this world of unknown as I have no idea what I will do here in Korea, I don't know what I will do when I come home and I don't know what the future has in store for me. I don't ever want to settle in my life and I really hold that at high value.
5. Lists are helpful.
6. I will make traveling a main priority for the rest of my life. I think it really is important to get out and see the world, whether for a short or long time. No matter what it will always have an impact on you and change you in some way.
7. Change is good. Change is hard. Change is amazingly difficult and amazingly awesome.

Decision Time – I've decided to come home. After a lot of deliberation I've concluded it's the best decision for myself and the school if I just cut ties and leave in peace. I gave a 30 day notice the other week and my final day will be March 9^th. After I decided to do some traveling so I've booked a flight from Seoul to Rome and am going to wander the streets of Italy and Paris for two weeks before officially touching down in Portland. I figured I could eat my weight in gelato, be in a beautiful place, fulfill a life long dream to go to Europe and clear my head of any negative thoughts of this Korea experience before coming back to reality and putting my life back together.

Will I regret leaving Korea early? I'm not sure. I'm not sure I will know until I come home. I think part of me will feel defeated as I didn't complete something I said I would do. However, like I've said before, I refuse to settle and life is too short to be unhappy. Yes I went against my word so to speak (from signing the contract), but I followed my instinct and made the decision that made me happy.

Here comes the bride....Korean wedding!

I attended my first Korean wedding this past Saturday and it was definitely an experience. It was the wedding of my Korean co-worker Denise. Her and her fiance (now husband) have been together for over 10 years. All of the foreigners at my school were invited and luckily the school provided us a shuttle bus to take us and some other Korean staff to the wedding as we had no clue where it was. The wedding started at 12:30 so we all met up around 11am to get on the bus. I wasn't quite sure what to wear to the wedding and I was told two different things. One of my co-workers who has been to several Korean weddings told me that you can dress casual and it doesn't really matter. Someone else told me that you should dress pretty nice. So I went with black slacks and a nice top. I really don't have a lot of nice things with me in Korea as the whole point of coming here was to be able to wear jeans and t-shirts and Toms all day everyday!

Anyway, we arrived at the wedding hall which is exactly that. It's a giant building with multiple floors with multiple weddings happening all day. There was a sign up that listed out all the weddings and they were all 2 hours a part. Koreans are all business all the time.

For Korean wedding gifts all you give is money. They had special envelopes already there for you to put the money in and write your name and special note on the side. Apparently you can only give odd amounts starting at 30,000won up to however much you want to give, because even amounts are consider superstitious. You give an amount of money based on how close you are to the couple. Therefore, my cheapbutt only gave 30,000won which was the consensus among all the foreign staff so I didn't feel too bad.

The wedding ceremony only lasted about 30 minutes. It was pretty quick and to the point. We all sang a song (well I didn't because it was in Korean, I just mumbled sounds) and the priest read from the Bible. Then the bride and groom read their 'vows'. This part was somewhat disturbing to me because it felt very stiff and not loving, but I think it's just how things are done in Korea. The bride and groom each held up a piece of paper for each other to read off of and they both spoke in such a monotone fashion that it felt like you were at a military event or something like it. Then there was a Korean singer who sang the 'first dance' song minus the dancing. The bride and groom both turned and faced the singer and stood completely still during the entire song. Then it was over.

Millions of photos were taken after the ceremony as well as during. There was constantly a 'helper' woman following the bride around and fixing her veil, her dress, her hair, etc. Every photo was so staged. They don't like candid photos apparently. Also instead of throwing the bouquet to all the unmarried women at the event, the bride picks one woman who is next in line to get married and they stage a photo of the bride 'throwing' the bouquet to her. There's also superstition around this that if you are the woman picked you have to get married in 6 months or else you will have bad luck and won't get married for 6 years. Koreans are superstitious about many many things.

Food time! We were all super excited about the buffet because we were absolutely starving at this point. So after taking a million pictures we were shuffled outside to walk a few blocks to another building. This building was a giant dining hall where we would be eating. We entered the building and proceeded down the escalator to the 'dining hall'. Wow. I had never seen anything like it. It was a giant cafeteria hall crowded with hundreds of Koreans all fighting for seats and food in the buffet lines. Basically this is typical of Korean weddings. All of the weddings during the day gather in this dining hall and eat the buffet food. It was delicious food, don't get me wrong, just once again no intimate feeling or anything. I felt like we were just sheep in the herd and we were just moving through, eating, and heading out. After we had almost finished eating we spotted the bride and groom. They had changed into normal clothes and were wandering around trying to find people from their wedding. It was almost comical, because the place was just packed of people. We finished eating and that was that. Back on the bus, back to our town. Done and done. Happily Married :)

The beautiful Mia.  She had her guitar, because she had to go sing at another Korean wedding later that day. 

Foreigner co-workers.  Andy, Kelly, Courtney and Emily :)

This was an area set up before the wedding.  The bride and groom were taking pictures with everyone.  So the bride and groom had already seen each other before the wedding ceremony... :(

The mothers of the bride and groom were dressed in traditional Hanbok which is the traditional Korean dress.  It's always brightly colored and looks slightly uncomfortable.

This was the wedding program handed out to everyone.  Couldn't read any of it, but it looked nice.



The row of Ajammas....aka fierce older Korean women with high perms, fur coats, and sharp elbows for pushing you out of the way.



Inside the wedding hall. The priest.

The beautiful bride Denise walking down the isle!

Here they are reading their 'vows'.

Here they are standing and watching as the singer sings their 'first dance' song.

Here is the singer.  Slightly awkward to have everyone just standing and staring at you.

Many pictures with family, friends, etc. were taken after the ceremony.

This was the only picture I got of the 'dining hall' aka cafeteria.  The food was pretty delicious though!

Just Dance - Gonna be ok

A few months ago during one of my many insomniatic (is that a word?) moments, I decided to google and see if there were any dance studios in Seoul or Bundang.  As I expected it wasn't that simple, however, I did find a link to a girl's blog that mentioned a dance studio in Bundang.  It mentioned the name, EZ Dance Studio and it's location 'Ori Station, Exit 3, above the pizza hut'.  It was a Saturday morning and I decided to brave the elements (Korean Hangul, uncertainty about how to get home, the usual) and go seek out this elusive dance studio.   I found the pizza hut and proceeded to ascend the staircase, up, up, up, up.  Finally, I reached the roof (literally) and I felt like I had walked into a garden oasis.  The walls all around me were painted bright green and I walked through these doors out onto the roof that had a stone walkway with pebbles all around, an outdoor patio set, lots of plants and more green paint.  On the opposite side of the roof was the glass door to the studio.  I could see people dancing inside with hardwood floors and wall-to-wall mirrors...just like dance studios at home!!  I walked in, took off my shoes, and walked in.  I was instantly greated by a lady named Yoojin who is the studio manager.  Luckily she speaks a bit of English and she saw me staring at her like a deer in headlights and rushed me into her office. 

Once in her office I was like a kid in a candy store.  She was showing me the list of dance classes offered, showing me dance videos on the company website of styles they teach, etc.  I was so excited!!  It was extremely similar to the dance studios I went to back home and I was beyond myself happy.  I told her I would come back after payday and check out a class.

A few weeks later I returned with my friend Courtney, who I dragged along even though she's not a dancer, but she was a great sport.  We tried a hip hop class.  I left feeling exhilirated.  I hadn't been that happy since I came to Korea.  There's just something about dancing that gets me, it makes me feel like I can do anything.  So I decided to sign up for a month package and start going 3 times a week!
I had only been dancing at EZ for a few days when Yoojin asked me to join their dance performance.  I figured, what the hell do I have to lose?  So I joined Soonae's dance group, which was myself and 9 other girls performing to a Korean Pop song by the Wonder Girls called 'Be My Baby'.  I wasn't 100% thrilled about the cutesy KPOP song, but was in it for the story and the chance to perform on stage for the first time since high school!   We rehearsed for the next month and I felt pretty prepared.  We had a lot of late night rehearsals which were a bit exhausting, but was a great experience because there were only a few people that spoke English so most of the time I had no idea what was going on.  It's an interesting expereience to be in a room full of people who are talking, but you can't understand anything.  You get the chance to sit in silence with your thoughts.  I remember one night we were rehearsing till 1am and then someone had gone out and bought friend chicken for everyone.  Side Note - Fried chicken is eaten a lot in Korea.  There are fried chicken restaurants everywhere.  It's actually really good here, and I don't ever eat it back home so I think that's saying something.  Or maybe I just enjoy eating familiar things in Korea so they seem to taste better...I don't know.   It was so cool to just be sitting around the table eating friend chicken during the wee hours of the morning with all these Koreans who cared that I was there.  Pretty great feeling.

The day of the performance was a chilly Saturday morning.  I was picked up by a few of my dance buddies and we drove to the performance venue.  We had to get there pretty early to have a dress rehearsal on stage and get ready.  Rehearsal went well and I was dressed in my outfit, make-up on and I was feeling pumped.  Then it was about 20 minutes till show time and I went outside and saw my group of friends that had come to support me.  I had 10 friends from work/outside of work come and watch me, which was the coolest thing ever!  One of the best moments I've had in Korea, because I felt so special that I had only been in Korea for 2 1/2 months at this point, but all these people were willing to trek out and see me. 

Let the show begin!

This was the sign hanging above the stage.  My name was also put in the program!! I felt pretty special.

Getting ready backstage.  All done up in my Korean style dress, sparkly tights, make-up, etc.  And don't forget the Korean peace sign!

All of us hanging out during dress rehearsals.

This is my teacher and the choreographer of my dance, Soonae.  She's an amazing hip hop dancer. She doesn't speak any English, but she's still awesome and we have a great time.

One of the dance acts.  There was actually another foreign girl in this dance for only a few seconds.  I didn't get a chance to talk to her though as it was super hectic and crazy.

The Belly Dancers.  Not sure I would ever wear that outfit in public, but who am I to judge. 

The Korean teeny boppers.  These girls are all in my weekly dance class and they are so cute.  One of them always comes up to me and bows everytime she sees me at the dance studio.



These girls were extremely young and scantily clad.  It was like a scene from Toddlers and Tiaras.  They did a great job just should have been wearing more clothes and removed the pound of make-up on their faces.



This was a guest hip hop group.  They were phenomenal. 

Some of us after the show taking pics!! 

Our whole group and Soonae!

The entire group at the end taking pictures. 

So I can't get the video to upload and the Korean internet laws won't let me upload the video to youtube so I can give the link.  Soooooo if you want to see the video it's on my Facebook, or I can email it to you!
Overall one of the greatest memories I will take with me from Korea.  I have continued dancing since, and Yoojin mentioned to me they might do a summer performance and she wants me to be a part of it if that happens.  I love dancing!