It's been a shade over two months since I got to Korea and it's high time that I give everybody back home (and around the world) an update on how life in Korea has been treating me this time around. Despite having near two years of experience with this confusing and sometimes frustrating corner of the world, Korea has managed to dish up plenty of fresh challenges for me in my third stint in the land of the morning calm.

 

The School

My new school has been vastly different to anything I experienced during my two years in Gwangju. The hogwan (private academy) gig has often been a lauded as the 'lazier' of the two options, with less attention paid to what you're teaching and how you're teaching it. While it's true I dealt with nosy co-teachers at my first job and a more rigorous documentation of my lesson plans at the second, I've never been under the same level of intense security I 'enjoy' at my current gig. Teachers peering through windows to be sure I'm teaching, constant harassment over whether I've assigned the correct homework, and an anal level of reliance on poorly written and worded teacher's manuals have dogged my every day. I arrive for work two hours early for preparation time and, with no sign of the fifty minute break I am promised in my contract, I've started just disappearing for fifty minutes of this time to soak up free WiFi at Tom & Toms while eating a deliciously unhealthy stuffed pretzel.

 

 

Class wise - I teach six fifty minute classes a day with a five minute break between each. My youngest students are a foursome of eight and nine year olds with little to no experience with English, and my oldest class is a pair of sixteen year old girls who spend the majority of our class together alternating between texting friends on their phones and asking me about my romantic life and my travels. It's actually a fun class when I can get them to put their phones aside for a few minutes. My worst classes are comprised of bratty early teen boys who think they're hilarious and who I can't really discipline due to my school being populated entirely by women who are marginally more intimidating than the prospect of being made to write fifty lines for homework.

 

My experience here has largely been one of miscommunication and frustration. Little things that never came up at previous jobs seem to have gone from molehills to mountains in record time here. Having been left in charge of organizing my alien card (necessary for things such as insurance, having a phone in my name, and internet connection) - I decided to do it at my leisure. I already had a phone and an active internet connection, and so when my boss started to nag me about it I assured her it was 'under control' and assumed she'd leave it. Cue a dozen frantic texts and missed calls one Monday morning that forced me out of bed and off to immigration. When my boss found out I was only now handing in my paperwork she was furious - accused me of deliberately deceiving her and the like. Maybe I did - but when you hand all of your responsibilities off to somebody to do in their free time - you accept that they will do it when they are ready. If she had wanted it done by a certain time - she could have organized it herself or she could have allowed me to do it in my excess preparation time.

 

Other little things have caused issue. I toy with my iPhone during quiet moments of prep time and that has been frowned upon. I am charged with marking reams of homework in subjects I am not employed to teach (Math being a particular qualm of mine) and then dragged over coals if there are any mistakes at all. I've taken to keeping homework for an inordinate amount of time, marking it over the course of a fortnight, and handing it back to them when I am 100% sure it's done).

 

All told - I dislike my work environment. The kids are great and the majority of them love me, but being the sole male and the sole Westerner in my workplace basically means I get to spend my days either in silence or engaging in conversations with students. Attempting to make small talk with the trio of women I share an office with varies from attempting to pull teeth to halting conversations that never really satisfy. I prefer to just work in quiet now.

 

The City

Work might suck, but I love Busan. Gwangju will always hold a very special place in my heart - but there's a lot to be loved about Korea's second largest city. My last entry was about the spectacular Gwangalli Beach region and with spring finally hitting us here on the peninsula, my visits to areas like Gwangalli and Haeundae are only going to increase in frequency. There's the promise of camping trips on islands such as Bigeumdo and Oaedaldo on the horizon as well. I live for the beach.

 

The night life here is something else. Where Gwangju has a half dozen night spots, most of which are crammed together in the downtown area, Busan has four distinct night life regions that are worthy of merit. The nearest to me is Seomyeon which boasts bars such as Thursday Party and Metal City; PNU boasts a more Korean night life due to its promimity to the university; Haeundae has the beach and foreigner haunts such as The Wolfhound, Sharkies, Geckos, and Rock & Roll Bar; and KSU (my personal favorite) boasts Eva's, Ol' 55, Vinyl Underground, Thursday Party, HQ, and the always sleazy Kino Eye. I'll do a more in depth on Busan's bar scene in the not too distant future.

 

I've managed to get a casual game of Dungeons & Dragons going on a fortnightly basis; gotten in touch with some theatrically minded people about doing some productions; joined a book club that inexplicably doubles as a knitting club; gotten back into work on my novel; and met a swathe of cool new people and groovy characters that I'm sure will grace these pages again sometime soon.

 

The Girl

And there's a girl! My old friends Liz and CJ (who tied the knot in Vegas last year) messaged me shortly after I returned to Korea to inform me they were 'sending me a girl' - the best friend of CJ's sister. I agreed to help her settle in and things kind of went from there. This isn't the venue for a blow by blow of our relationship or how it came to be, but suffice to say I got to play knight in shining armor a few times for a damsel in distress and now we're as official as two people can get - Facebook official. She's even a blogger! You can check out her amusing tales here at Travels with Kimberly.

 

We're off to a Cherry Blossom Festival in Jinhae this weekend and two weeks later we'll be doing some sight-seeing in Seoul as my parents are in the country as a part of a cultural scholarship they won. Beyond that there's a 10k I'll be running in May; the infamous Mud Festival in July; the Jeju half marathon around the same time; and a whole swag of other exciting trips in the future.

 

I'm contemplating visiting Beijing in my summer vacation, and a Japanese junket is not out of the question for when Korean Thanksgiving rolls around. Here's hoping Tokyo Disney is still in one piece after the recent tragic events in the region.

 

My Philippines scuba trip is still on the cards for the New Year and there's day-dreaming about a six week tour of Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Bali sometime next year if money allows. Exciting times and hopefully that will make for exciting reading!

If you’ve done any searching for teaching jobs in Korea, you’ve probably seen a lot of postings that say, “No Experience Required!” Sounds too good to be true right? It’s not. The truth is that, while teaching experience is always a valuable asset, most of the time it is not a requirement.

Will I Be Able To Get a Good Job in Korea Without Experience?

While the job market is certainly tougher than it has been in the past, it is still entirely possible to land a good teaching job in Korea without experience. In fact, the large majority of ESL teachers in Korea did not have any professional teaching experience when they got their jobs. The keys to standing out as an applicant (in a good way!) will be in how well you present yourself in your resume and interviews, and whether you are on top of gathering your visa documents. So, if you are a native English speaker with a bachelor’s degree, you probably already have all the qualifications you need to begin your job hunt (check out our list of qualifications for teaching English in Korea).

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So there I am in PNU, starving, possibly about to eat my own arm. My friends are getting restless too. We were at a Lotte Giants game, and afterwards went to PNU for some shopping. However, we made the mistake of putting off our meal until now, and the situation has become dire.

One of us knows about a place that he heard about. “I think it’s this way,” he says, completely unsure of himself. Another one of my friends hisses at him. We don’t have time to wander.

“Okay everyone, look up for a restaurant!” someone says. I’m not sure who, and I’m in no state to question. I look up and some obscure sushi place is right in front of me. The pictures feature lumps of rice smothered in mayo. It looks disgusting; I start dry heaving right there.

“Pizza! Pasta!” someone else yells. Again I don’t know who is yelling (maybe my fiance?). I’m blinded by hunger by this point, so I just walk in the general direction of the voice and feel a group of people: my friends, hopefully. We shuffle into the door and go up the stairs to the main seating area of the place and sit down. Bread and butter is put in front of us, and I shove it in my mouth. My eyesight is partially restored. It’s interesting bread: warm and blue (you know, like the corn chips) and delicious.

Now that my senses have come back to me, I look around. We’re in a restaurant called Sale n Pepe, and it’s an Italian restaurant. The interior is industrial-chic, with polished concrete floors and ceilings, painted brick walls and hanging lighting fixtures. It’s comfortable at the same time, though, with padded benches and chairs.

The menu has titles in English, but the descriptions are all in Korean, so some of what you get will be a mystery (surprise: mussels!). They have a good range of pasta dishes that you’ve heard of (classic cream spaghetti) and some you might haven’t (Shanghai style spaghetti?). All the pasta that we ordered was spaghetti, so I question if they have anything else. Pizzas are excellent, especially the gorgonzola (8,000) and the four-cheese (11,000). Pasta dishes range from 9 – 11,000 as well. One thing that I appreciated was the presentation of the food. The pasta is served in a small tin frying pan, handle and all, which was pretty cool.

Location-wise, as I mentioned before, it’s right in the shopping area outside the subway, a block over from the Starbucks. Having been to a few restaurants immediately around the shopping area, I can say that this is probably the best one in terms of quality that you’ll find.

Directions: PNU metro exit 1. Walk straight out 1.5 blocks. You’ll see Sale n Pepe on the second floor on your right.

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Have you seen the drama Secret Garden? Do you know of the boy band "Big Bang"? Then why not watch this mind bender!