Hello and a hearty greeting from our second arrival here in Korea. hint: fly Korean Air, we had a much better experience than our past flights with Air Canada!
PLEASE NOTE: COPIED EMAIL FROM Wed, Apr 19 2006
For those of you who I failed to see or talk to when we were in Canada for the past couple of weeks, I'll give you a very brief update.
In February we left our job early with a couple of bonuses due to wrongful dismissal (I'd call it hush money on their part really). REally its a long story (please email me if you want the total details- to be honest, for the sake of finishing this email, I just don't want to go into it right now. ) It was a bitter experience, but Bryce and I had felt like we had not finished our time here nor had we fulfilled the dreams we had had of living in Korea. (btw: forgive me if I am babbling, I am entirely jetlagged and delirious). So we applied for, were interviewed for, and accepted a job on the other side of KOrea within a couple of days. After a few weeks in Canada, and after fulfilling many of the 'back home in Canada' fantasies we had while away (friends and coffees, family dinners,. hiking, canoeing, breadfast out, great coffee, and a variety of food in our diet), we left Easter Sunday and arrived at 2:30 Tuesday morning. Already, this contract lookks incredibly promising. We are working for the public school system this time, which is one of the prime contracts here in Korea- less hours, lots of vacation time and a very secure (albeit beaurocratic) contract. Unlike the business of private English schools (aka 'Hogwans'), with not real job security and no staff support.
We arrived with a group of other teachers from Canada, and met up with the other teachers under our same contract who had just arrived from New Zealand, Australia and the UK. We are staying in quite a nice hotel for a week, meals included in order to have our orientation and training for our jobs. We even have this nifty computer in our room to keep in contact with y'all!
Have spent some good time with the other teachers and they are all fine and intereseting folkds, with a lot of enthusiasm for what they'll be doing and for being in Kroea in general. Its incredibly refreshing sinc eth las titme we were dropped into our apartment at 11 pm by the privatye school owner and were drected to start work the next morning with none of the training that was promised in our contract nor any of the rest time needed. It is wonderful to have a group of prople to meet that we can share ideas and experiences with while we will be working here (we all head off to our repective towns and schools next Wed., but are kept in contact the whole time). Very unlike the isolation we felt last time.
Which is good, since Bryce and I have discovered a little about our upcoming job that is making me a little nervous. It will be a very different challenge than before. We are staying in a village of about 20000 (very small for Kroea), and working at two different schools. Bryce is working at different schools and at somewhat of a community center where he will conduct free english classses for people from all around this rural community. I know, cool hey?? Me? Well, they thought I would work out well at a BOYS MIDDLE SCHOOL. Apparently, harsh discipline (corporal punishment) is the norm since they are teenage boys with raging hormones, and the type of punishment 'is the korean way'. The teacher who was there before me had such a hard time seeing these episodes that he had to leave. I'll definitely be the only foreign teacher, and a different past teacher has told me that it won't be an easy placement. Well, bring it on, thats what I say! (and please remember my brave words for when you get my next teary and wimpy email that I want to go home!)
There are some great things abour being so far away from all the others. We will likely learn more Korean this time; we will be in ght emiddle of a beautiful National Park, next to the highest mountain in Korea; we can go hiking in the mountains daily; and we will have a much more intensive cultural experience, which we both craved before. There is even a farm that we are in contact with that is in full growing season as of now, that we can get involved with!
So, we'll see- so far, it feels great!
I will keep in touch this time the whole time ( this is in response to those of you who assumed that I had 'taken you off the list' when you stopped getting emails when I got just too tired and depressed in my old contract to write any).
Fair thee well,
Lana
ps- our dear family members: we are looking for phone cards everywhere- you'll get a call soon I promise!
PLEASE NOTE: COPIED EMAIL FROM Wed, Apr 19 2006
For those of you who I failed to see or talk to when we were in Canada for the past couple of weeks, I'll give you a very brief update.
In February we left our job early with a couple of bonuses due to wrongful dismissal (I'd call it hush money on their part really). REally its a long story (please email me if you want the total details- to be honest, for the sake of finishing this email, I just don't want to go into it right now. ) It was a bitter experience, but Bryce and I had felt like we had not finished our time here nor had we fulfilled the dreams we had had of living in Korea. (btw: forgive me if I am babbling, I am entirely jetlagged and delirious). So we applied for, were interviewed for, and accepted a job on the other side of KOrea within a couple of days. After a few weeks in Canada, and after fulfilling many of the 'back home in Canada' fantasies we had while away (friends and coffees, family dinners,. hiking, canoeing, breadfast out, great coffee, and a variety of food in our diet), we left Easter Sunday and arrived at 2:30 Tuesday morning. Already, this contract lookks incredibly promising. We are working for the public school system this time, which is one of the prime contracts here in Korea- less hours, lots of vacation time and a very secure (albeit beaurocratic) contract. Unlike the business of private English schools (aka 'Hogwans'), with not real job security and no staff support.
We arrived with a group of other teachers from Canada, and met up with the other teachers under our same contract who had just arrived from New Zealand, Australia and the UK. We are staying in quite a nice hotel for a week, meals included in order to have our orientation and training for our jobs. We even have this nifty computer in our room to keep in contact with y'all!
Have spent some good time with the other teachers and they are all fine and intereseting folkds, with a lot of enthusiasm for what they'll be doing and for being in Kroea in general. Its incredibly refreshing sinc eth las titme we were dropped into our apartment at 11 pm by the privatye school owner and were drected to start work the next morning with none of the training that was promised in our contract nor any of the rest time needed. It is wonderful to have a group of prople to meet that we can share ideas and experiences with while we will be working here (we all head off to our repective towns and schools next Wed., but are kept in contact the whole time). Very unlike the isolation we felt last time.
Which is good, since Bryce and I have discovered a little about our upcoming job that is making me a little nervous. It will be a very different challenge than before. We are staying in a village of about 20000 (very small for Kroea), and working at two different schools. Bryce is working at different schools and at somewhat of a community center where he will conduct free english classses for people from all around this rural community. I know, cool hey?? Me? Well, they thought I would work out well at a BOYS MIDDLE SCHOOL. Apparently, harsh discipline (corporal punishment) is the norm since they are teenage boys with raging hormones, and the type of punishment 'is the korean way'. The teacher who was there before me had such a hard time seeing these episodes that he had to leave. I'll definitely be the only foreign teacher, and a different past teacher has told me that it won't be an easy placement. Well, bring it on, thats what I say! (and please remember my brave words for when you get my next teary and wimpy email that I want to go home!)
There are some great things abour being so far away from all the others. We will likely learn more Korean this time; we will be in ght emiddle of a beautiful National Park, next to the highest mountain in Korea; we can go hiking in the mountains daily; and we will have a much more intensive cultural experience, which we both craved before. There is even a farm that we are in contact with that is in full growing season as of now, that we can get involved with!
So, we'll see- so far, it feels great!
I will keep in touch this time the whole time ( this is in response to those of you who assumed that I had 'taken you off the list' when you stopped getting emails when I got just too tired and depressed in my old contract to write any).
Fair thee well,
Lana
ps- our dear family members: we are looking for phone cards everywhere- you'll get a call soon I promise!
posted by Lana at 1:35 p.m.
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