Boys and Girls: Comparing teenagers in Moscow and Ulsan

In Moscow, on vacation, watching teenage girls and boys interact outside of the Starbucks on Old Arbat Street, I was reminded of how teenagers can be. They hugged. They kissed. They chatted comfortably about life. They enjoyed themselves. As I watched them, I sighed. It was a breath of fresh air.

It seemed more natural and more normal than the lives of teens in Korea.

In Korea I have hardly ever seen groups of teens out and about with idle time, just hanging out. Where are they? and what are they doing? I assume they are wasting away inside an Internet café or in front of a computer or television at home, obsessed with computer games, television shows, and admiring the latest pop groups. Alternatively, they are studying like mad for the next exam or locked inside an academy.

Of course, freedom isn’t always a good thing. Without adult supervision, Russian teens smoke on the street. They gather at public squares, chat, goof-off, and, yes, drink.

What a bunch of hooligans.

Russian boys and girls make-out in the metro. They talk and interact.

Life is good. They appreciate it. They feel it.

They fall in love. They get hurt. They recover.

Korea attempts to avoid all this drama and deliquency, which is why teens are separated, stressed over exams, and under lock and key.

Angela, just graduated from elementary (which ends after 6^th grade here), and she is now headed to middle school. This should be an exciting point in her life. A new school. New possibilities. The ability to redefine who she is, who her friends are, and where she wants to go in life. Most other places, she might also be excited about meeting new boys …

But, she lives in Korea.

Talking to Angela the other day and reading other students’ diaries, I discovered that Korean middle schools aim to make “perfect” teenagers. It’s important to conform and not much value is placed on individuality.

Since Angela’s hair is naturally a lighter shade, a brown instead of a black, she will have to dye it. Additionally, she will have to cut her hair to shoulder length, like all the rest of the girls. The uniform she wears will be the same dull gray as everyone else’s. She will wear the same stockings and possibly close to the same shoes as all the other girls.

When it comes to boys … Angela’s public middle school will be an all girls school, which will reinforce her unwillingness to work with boys. Luckily because she plays computer games where she can interact anonymously, in a virtual world, she will not be completely cut off. Even when she is not on the computer, she will continue to interact with some boys, via text messages, but face-to-face interaction will be severely limited and restricted.

Teenagers in Korea do not hang out in mixed groups of boys and girls, that I have seen. Their schools are separate. Their friends are separate. They are separate, except at academy where they usually refuse to work together.

Russian teens stand in stark contrast to this. They flirt. They usually only pretend not to want to work with the opposite sex. Often they need to be separated just so they can concentrate. In the classroom they seem to provide good evidence for why Korea has developed a culture of division. But having girls and boys separate leads to increased shyness and awkwardness when the two groups are forced to work together.

Before Korea and even a couple months into working here, I might have supported the segregation of boys and girls, but after returning to Moscow and seeing the contrast, I realized there’s something special about being a teen and growing up with peers that are both girls AND boys.

There is a precarious balance created by interactions of girls and boys. And being a teenager seems to be, in part, about indulging in emotions of love and heartache. Making value judgments and choices. And just living.

Polar opposites: A Russian pop video censored on Korean YouTube

Growing up in Idaho hardly ever exposed me to the overt hyperfemininity I found when I arrived in Moscow. At first, I was overwhelmed.

Shocked.

Amazed.

Agog.

I felt embarrassed by the amount of cleavage I saw, from young and old alike. I stared in awe at women walking gracefully in stilettos on ice.

“How could they not be in pain?!”

I shook my head at crocheted shirts with only a bra, no camisole, underneath. My jaw dropped when I saw women without bras in the summer. I stared in envy at long legs exposed by “too short” skirts. I admired perfect makeup, Dior, Gucci, Dolce & Gabbana, and Chanel adorning the bodies of my students.

After a few months of viewing women’s bodies on display in videos, on the streets, and as go-go dancers, I became quite immune. No longer did I stare in shock. In fact, often I tuned it out.

But before I became immune to women on display, in the fall of 2008, DJ Smash’s “Волна” (“Volna” which means wave) blanketed the club scene.

The video showcases scantily clad women eating junk food in sexually provocative ways, and as one of the top pop songs in Moscow, it was viewable everywhere:

In clubs and bars.

On televisions and computers.

And even in malls and restaurants.

In short, it was in eye-shot of everyone at every age.

While there is nothing overtly sexual going on, the messages implicit in the women’s body language can be quite alarming to the sheltered eyes of someone who grew up in Conservative Land (aka Idaho). I knew if the video was plastered everywhere in the States, like it was in Moscow, parents and church leaders would go into hysterics.

Now, I occasionally listen to Russian pop for the dance beat or to get a kick out of what was popular in Moscow two years ago. My perception has changed, and I no longer think scantily clad women are that big of a deal.

A couple nights ago, while enjoying the eccentricity that is tektonik, I recalled Russian pop, flipped back to “Volna” and saw that YouTube had censored the video. On normal “safe” mode, this video is no longer viewable. Even a month ago, this was not true.

YouTube, in Korea anyway, has suddenly deemed the video unfit for eyes under the age of 19, stating, “In compliance with the Youth Protection Act, this video cannot be seen by a person under the age of 19 years.”

Hilarious.

I googled “Youth Protection Act” and came up basically empty handed. This has got to be Korean censorship.

Regardless, young people should not watch a sexy woman in little more than a bathing suit eat an ice cream cone … or a hot dog … or a lollypop … or a hamburger…?

Maybe it’s the swinging hips that are offensive.

Or that the only Asian girl in the video makes eating with chopsticks sexy.

Or maybe it's just the word sexy that can be applied to the video.

I would love to hear impressions from “fresh”, “unadulterated” eyes.

I have gone from a culture that inundates the public with images like these, to one that is intent on sheltering the public from them.

Why Korean English students have English names

In Korea, it is common practice to use English names for students at English academies and in English class at the public schools. Unlike in Russia, where it is a choice of the student who might “Englishize” his or her own name, Kate instead of Katya, for example, the school picks the name.

Usually, the English name has absolutely no relation to their real name. Hye-Lim becomes “Angela.” Su-Bin becomes “Amie.” Occasionally, a student gets lucky and Ji-Oon becomes, “June.”

When I first asked about students having English names, the response was, “Foreigners can’t remember Korean names.”

Um, ok. Way to give us credit.

While, I admit, it might be difficult to do at first, with some effort, any foreigner could learn Korean names. But in an extreme underestimation of the abilities of foreigners, the “easy way out” is given. So, in class, the students use their “English names,” and when you meet a Korean in their twenties who took English, they will introduce themselves with their English name, which is only a first name.

This is all fine and dandy until, as a foreign teacher, you run into something concerning first names and last names.

In English Time, the book series my academy picked out for the foreigner teacher, there is a unit that starts with “What’s your first name?” “What’s your last name?” When I first encountered this, I was unprepared. It was during my first week of classes, when I had absolutely no schedule, so I couldn’t plan my classes.

I stumbled through the lesson.

With role plays, I usually have students change some information, and this one seemed easy. Insert your own name.

The problem I hadn’t anticipated: they only have “first names” in English.

“Teacher, Korean name?!” They asked this in a way that made me feel like they had been threatened NEVER to use their Korean names.

After I thought for two seconds, realized they only had a first name in English, and then said, “Yes, use your Korean name,” a bit of chaos ensued.

The students looked baffled and then, because of the order of their names in Korean, last name first, got even more confused.

I tried to explain group by group, “First name in Korean is last name in the West.”

How confusing is that?!

Finally, it dawned on me.

I wrote my own name on the board, and I got everyone’s attention. Then I said, “Cochrane is my family name. Last name and family name are the same.”

If question marks could appear above heads, they would have.

I repeated, “Cochrane is my family name. My dad is Milton Cochrane. My mom is Debbie Cochrane. My sister is Nichole Cochrane. My brother is Nathan Cochrane … Cochrane is my family name.”

Light bulbs started flickering on.

“In the West we put family names last, so it’s last name. Kimberly is my given name, my first name.”

Overload and the light bulbs went out for most students, but after a bit more work with their Korean names, which they kept trying to tell me their Korean teacher said they couldn’t use, my students finally got it.

Now the question occurs to me, why in the world would a book, made specifically for Korean students, use the words “first name and last name” not “given name and family name or surname” …?

My second encounter with this lesson happened earlier this week, and I was prepared. Before the students even opened their books, we talked about family names.

I had the students tell me their Korean names, and (this is where the story comes full circle) as I attempted to repeat their names with correct pronunciation and intonation, they giggled and insisted I was mispronouncing their names. They had me repeat after them over and over until a classmate asked them to quit, and they shook their heads in disgust.

In the end, it seems English names are preferred by Koreans because they don’t like the way it sounds when a foreigner slaughters their name.

A Korean Christmas: as told by 13 year olds.

In Moscow many of my students had no idea that December 25^th is a huge holiday in the West. A few, select students, had celebrated Western Christmas before, but most of them looked forward to New Years, where they decorate a "Christmas" tree, exchange presents, eat an amazing assortment of foods, watch the Kremlin clock strike midnight, and enjoy the 10 day break that follows.

So, being in Korea for Christmas was quite a different experience. My students knew what Christmas was, and many of them received presents. Christmas songs played everywhere on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, but before they were virtually non-existent. In my experience, Christmas has been about atmosphere with Christmas songs beginning, and lights going up, immediately after Thanksgiving (at the end of November). Additionally, Christmas was about spending time with family, going to church, and opening presents. For Korean students Christmas seemed mainly about presents, but possibly about spending time at an amusement park or with friends.

Because my students had some idea about Christmas on December 25^th, I took advantage of this. For a whole week, after the lesson, when my students insisted on a “game”, I had them create Christmas cards. In the more advanced classes, they wrote Christmas stories. First we brainstormed a list of words that had to do with Christmas, then they worked in groups to make a story using ten of the words.

I encouraged them to be creative and funny with their stories … here is the most entertaining result of this exercise. Written and illustrated by Wendy, Terra, and Sally.

One day Santa went to the house, but Santa is fat.

Rudolph kicked him.

Santa, "If I get out of [this] chimney. You will die."

Santa was [turned] black!

Santa's clothes started burning next to the tree.

Santa, "My face hair is burning!"

Santa became [turned into] ash.

So ... "I'm a deer Santa," Rudolph.

[Rudolph became Santa]

Kind [good] children's present[s].

Rudolph Santa, "See you next Christmas!"

The ghost of Santa, "Deer! I don't like you!"

Swearing: No training prepares you for this

It was near the end of class and I was reviewing the language used in “Go fish!” with my students, when a student said, “Teacher look.”

He showed me his phone background and then said, “Mario, fuck you.”

“What?!”

Wait.

Back up.

As a child, I thought one of the worst things that could come out of my mouth was “the F word”. I never said it, and I would never even have imagined saying it in front of an adult, especially in class.

Teaching English outside of the United States I have realized something about swear words.

English swear words don’t hold the taboo that they do to a native speaker. (Maybe you already knew that.) In fact, apparently swearing in a language that is not your own is supposed to be “cool” … though to the many speakers of that language it comes across as quite crass because it is often used without appropriate intonation or situation.

In Moscow, the F word was scrawled on walls inside stairwells and on outdoor walls. Like swearing in English, English graffiti seemed to be “cool” and even the authorities didn’t seem to care to clean it up. “Musturbation” (yes, it was misspelled), “Я love my BaBy”, “Sex”, and “Fuck police” are some of the more memorable graffiti I saw in Moscow.

While crude language was all around, if a student used the F word in class, all I had to do was stop, give him a look, and say in a stern voice that he shouldn’t say “that” word again. Then, it would never happen again, at least not in that class. There was an understanding that some language shouldn’t be used in a classroom of younger students. (Adults were a different story …)

In Ulsan, Korea, things work a bit differently. There is a bit of graffiti on the walls of the stairwell, but places where you would think there should be graffiti, under bridges for example, are clean. Most of the graffiti in stairwells is stylized middle fingers with hardly any English words, but it’s the classroom situation that is the most different. Perhaps because I’m teaching kids, not teenagers and adults.

Students aren’t supposed to have cell phones in class. Yet, they usually take them out toward the end of class to check the time, and I have started to ignore it. They aren’t texting during class like Russian teenagers, so I cut them some slack.

One student, eight years old, has prided himself on the image he has on the background of his phone and likes to show me when he gets a new one. Usually the images seem silly, but not that shocking. Wednesday, this student very proudly showed me the picture on his phone, and then said, “Mario, fuck you.”

I know I didn’t react properly. He wasn’t being malicious. He was smiling, thinking it was cute, maybe, and my shocked face doesn’t even begin to explain my reaction. I couldn’t believe what I had just heard coming out of this child’s mouth. Yes, the picture was Mario flipping me off, which I think I would have ignored on its own, but a small child, a good student, uttering the F word, threw me.

An audible, “What?!” jumped from my mouth.

Of course, my intonation was lost on these children, and my, “What?!” was promptly followed by all the children saying “fuck you” in unison. Like I had just said, “What?” in a nice calm manner, or had just initiated a say and repeat. I tried to follow that by a, “No. You shouldn’t say that,” and a serious tone, but I was simply bewildered by the situation. I had never encountered anything like this before.

How inexperienced of me, I know.

After thinking about this a bit. All children repeating, in unison, what you wish they didn’t even know must happen accidentally in Kindergartens across the States, but this was the first time it happened to me.

Did I react properly? I don’t know. Probably not. I mumbled a bit and went back to the language used in “Go fish.”

As an end note on this:

Students saying something shocking in a totally innocent way happened in Moscow as well.

The F word, teenagers understood. They caught my tone. They whispered it hoping I wouldn’t hear. A word they uttered with no idea the baggage and consequences was the N word … yes, the one that rhymes with Tigger. They actually were shocked when I told them that we never, never, NEVER use this word as white folk. NEVER! And they were even more shocked when I said they could use the word “black” to talk about someone with dark skin because translated, this word has negative associations.

Korea's inappropriate soundscapes

Imagine this.

You get off the bus in a concrete jungle, without even trees to break up the cement, pavement, steel and glass. You walk to the park, with the express purpose of taking a mini-break from urban culture only to find that the sounds of nature have been overlaid with pop music.

Assumption number one: parks exist as green spaces to break up the urban landscape and serve as an accessible extension of nature and the sounds that accompany it.

At first, this assumption rings true, but soon the reality of Ulsan’s manmade nature sinks in. Music is blaring from speakers, two on each lamp post, and regardless of where I go in the park, I cannot hear the uninhibited “sounds of nature.”

Nature encompasses me. A river flows through the park, grass and trees on either side. A great blue heron stands in the water, gracefully waiting … for what, I have no idea, but waiting none-the-less. Ducks sleep or dive to eat, and jumping fish plop back into the water, seemingly with no worries about predators. Observing nature, I am nearly drawn in. I see the beauty that Asian artists have painted for centuries, the trees that grow in seemingly effortless, beautifully curved lines that beg to be replicated.

Yet, as I walk, I’m wrenched out of this contemplative mood by blaring club beats.

The soundscape of nature has been co-opted by pumping rhythm. Like an art gallery displaying too many sound-art pieces together, the overlapping themes clash. The juxtaposition feels off. Rather than gleening the expected inner calm from nature, I am distracted and wondering at the logic of such created experiences. Suddenly, I have moved in my mind from nature, to the bar or club from the previous evening, and I am reminded of the electronics shop I walked by on the way to the bus stop.

Assumption number two: music in an outdoor setting should be controlled by the listener.

While in a grocery store, at a club or restaurant, or basically anywhere indoors, I have come to accept music as a part of my daily experience. Many times I tune it out or cover it up with my own music via iPod, but, perhaps because I was raised in Idaho where nature usually means uninhabited space, I have always taken it for granted that a public, outdoor space will generally be music free, barring obvious exceptions.

That being said, public outdoor music is not completely new to me. I remember feeling like I was in the middle of nowhere, deep in a forest in Moscow when music interrupted the mood and crowded the soundscape, but the ability to escape from the music made it tolerable.

In Ulsan, at the greenbelt, it is nearly impossible to escape. Each bench lines up with a light post to which two speakers are attached. As soon as I think I’ve reached the point at which the next step will bring me far enough away from the speaker so the sound cannot reach me, the next set of speakers takes over. The city obviously invested money in the research and development of this soundscape because there does not exist an escape from it, but that’s exactly the problem.

As a visitor to this bit of nature, there is no choice but to listen to music. This begs the question why? What is the purpose of a greenbelt with constant music playing?

I have not yet found an answer to this question, and I challenge anyone to find a reasonable argument for such outdoor, public soundscapes.

Comparing attitudes toward cheating in Korea and Russia

When I first arrived in Moscow, one of the things that stuck out the most was my students' attitude toward cheating. In Ulsan, Korea I am surprised by the lack of cheating and the amount of tattle-telling that goes on.

In Moscow cheating was all around, not only in the English classroom, but I heard stories about cheating at University. I met students who had no problem with plagiarism and were perplexed when I confronted them. At first I was shocked. Then as I came to understand Russian culture a bit, and discovered the pressure put on students, especially at University, I became more lax myself. I still discouraged cheating but no longer saw it as fundamentally wrong. I encouraged my students to do their own work, if only to see how well they knew English. My goal was not to punish them if they didn’t know the English we had gone over, but to assess how well I had taught the subject matter. In order to understand this, an honest test, with no cheating was necessary. Yet, I also discovered that sometimes by “cheating” students are actually helping each other out and possibly learning something, as long as it’s not the blind cheating that happens under the intense pressure of the Russian University system. (Please see the recent comment on my previous post on cheating, Kimberly in Russian: Китберли)

Like Russians, Korean children are under insane pressure to do well. They go to school in the morning, and when they are done with school, they go to a private academy for one subject, then another, then another and hardly have time for a proper night’s sleep, let alone homework. Yet, when it comes to cheating, in Korea the opposite of Russia seems to be true.

Given the stress Korean students face, they seem overly sensitive about cheating, especially after my experience in Moscow. Many students cover their tests with books or papers as they complete them to hide them from other students, and they don’t hesitate to tell on each other for the smallest amounts of cheating. I have been blown away by how serious Korean students take cheating. Even during a game my students will complain, “Teacher, he’s cheating!” Additionally, I have had students come tell me, in the teacher’s room, before class has even started, that another student didn’t finish their homework. I try to discourage this kind of peer pressure. While the Korean teachers push these students to the max, as their culture expects, as the foreign teacher, I have the flexibility to be more lenient and more forgiving. Also, I do not see any value in tattle-telling.

Of course, my personal philosophy on cheating has also changed since the first time I walked into a classroom in Moscow. At first I refused to accept any cheating. I had constant conversations with my students about it. I talked to them about the feeling in the pit of my stomach when I cheated and was confounded that they did not have this same gut reaction. Now, I nearly participate in cheating. As long as homework is done by the time I walk around to check it, I accept it. I usually ignore if a student is hurriedly copying homework from someone else for another teacher. When the students are taking a test, while I discourage them from copying off of each other, I walk around and point to areas that need work and freely answer questions about spelling and grammar. Rather than being strict and feeling like cheating is morally wrong, I want to give students confidence and create a relaxed environment, where they can enjoy learning English, even if it means accepting cheating now and then.

Music enables a comparison of apartments and cultures

It’s nowhere near the first of September, the first day of school for Russian children, and I’m in Ulsan, Korea miles away from Moscow. Yet, from somewhere outside, there is music emanating into my apartment, dredging up memories of those early days in September 2009 when I awoke to children’s speeches and patriotic Russian hymns.

At the beginning of the school year, Russian schools hold ceremonies to welcome the students back. The music at these first of September events usually was performed live by children, but the music in this case feels like it’s coming from a record being proudly played into the streets. While I have no idea what they are singing about, and wouldn’t even if it was in English, because it is not quite that clear, the orchestral background to the singing makes me think of patriotic anthems.

It’s early morning, the sun is shining in my window, and while it’s two months later and 10 degrees colder, the memory-pulling this music is causing is a bit unreal.

Suddenly, I can remember very clearly my dingy little apartment in a rundown part of Moscow, where the vacuum cleaner put more dust on the floor than it picked up, and where my room was basically a small partitioned off part of my roommate’s giant room – an afterthought. While we had separate entrances, the wall separating our rooms was paper thin. The entire apartment smelt old and very well used. The floor in the kitchen hadn’t been cleaned for years, so any attempt left the water dingy and the floor still dirty with caked on grim.

Because I lived in this apartment for nearly six months but never had people over because of my embarrassment, it is relegated to a different memory box, which isn’t negative, but is deemed as a “cultural” experience. It was a true, Soviet style apartment. It had not undergone any European remodel or facelift but was probably exactly the way it had been nearly 40 years before I lived there. The electric wiring had issues. The security to get into the apartment was insane. A key code on the outside of the building, which seems fairly standard around the world, a giant double steel plate door with a skeleton key to get into our hallway, and finally a double door into our apartment. The itty-bitty kitchen held our washer, refrigerator, stove, and a dining room table which barely constituted a table. It was a rickety, makeshift thing about a meter squared, covered in a nappy, old, plastic tablecloth and two wobbly stools. Because I lived there, I made feeble attempts to clean or make the apartment not feel as grungy and worn out, but many things, like the worn-out porcelain in the bathtub which absorbed the strange color of the water, were just old. It was a true, post-Stalin era, Soviet apartment building and felt like it was going to collapse.

It’s difficult to even compare the apartment I am currently sitting in with this older apartment, and the two cultures which created them are two entirely different beasts. The Soviet era apartment was rough, old, ragged, but served its purpose. Like the attitudes in Moscow, it did not mince words or attempt to sugar coat the reality of it. It was what it was, a small little abode on the top floor of a rundown building in a rundown section of Moscow. My Korean apartment is brand new, streamlined and efficient with niceties I never would have dreamed of at my old apartment in Moscow, heated floors, control of the hot water temperature, but it’s in an industrial section of the city, with no green space. Like my first encounters with Korean people, first impressions of my apartment were wonderful. It’s only when the weather gets colder and wear starts to show that the bugs are forced out, but even then, they remain shy and elusive.

The frustrating experience of not knowing enough of the language to make yourself understood in an efficient way.

For some reason, this week has been abnormally busy, and I have been abnormally hungry. Perhaps it is the preparations for Halloween. Perhaps it is the way the week began. Perhaps it’s the weather which has suddenly turned colder. Whatever the case, I have not been able to or made the effort to prepare my dinner before work like usual.

Not having dinner made has meant I have been eating sandwiches from the local bread shop. Koreans do not consider a sandwich a real or healthy meal because it does not involve rice or kimchi and Russians considered sandwiches junk food because they don’t take much time to prepare. These perspectives seem a bit perplexing to me even though I know them because in Idaho, a sandwich, homemade or otherwise is viewed as a much better choice than some of the other options out there for a quick meal on the go. But, this is perhaps the crux of the issue. Americans want quick food on the go, and in both Russia and Korea, each meal is viewed as a time to sit and relax, not just stuff your face with food.

A couple days I have been chilled to the bone and decided a “cold lunch” consisting of a sandwich was not going to cut it.

One of these days I had instant noodles, which I consider junk food – most contain 89% of your daily value of sodium, which is honestly ridiculous.

The other day, I grabbed Korean fast food across the street from the school. When I walked into the restaurant, all the women looked up and stood up and rushed to help me, or so it seemed. I started saying the word for the soup I wanted, and the woman helping me interrupted and finished the word for me. Seriously, the best way to shut down a language beginner is to jump in too quickly. I nodded in agreement with what she said, and then tried to express that I needed it to go. I had no idea how to do this, so I motioned toward the school. The woman then told me I needed to order two servings for this. Then asked, "Where?"

I was confused.

She wanted to know the name of my hagwon (academy), and I realized that she thought I wanted it delivered.

I was hungry, had been shut down in my attempt to ask for the food, and a bit frustrated. I needed the food quickly. I only have half an hour for dinner, and I was starving. I tried not to show my frustration, but anyone who knows me will know that for some reason I have never been able to succeed in the endeavor to hide emotions.

While I told the woman the name of my hagwon, after I realized the situation, I gave up on Korean and said, “No, no … I will take it.” Motioning to myself and motioning that I would take it. After I repeated this in as many different ways as my starving brain could muster and was about to give up, the woman finally said, “Oooh, take out?” Ha! Figures. Koreans use the English phrase, and I hadn’t even thought to try it. In fact, those words hadn’t even crossed my mind. I nodded in agreement, lit back up, and jumped back to what Korean I know, saying, “Neeeey.” Which means, “Yes.”

As I was sitting and waiting for my food, one of the women talked about me in Korean. She wondered if I knew Korean. You would think by the ridiculous performance that had just occurred, she would understand that if I knew any Korean, it definitely wasn’t enough to help me get by yet. Then she asked in English, “Do you know Korean?” I replied, “No. Well … a little, chogum.”

These women talked to me and about me a bit more, were pleased when I told them I wanted kimchi, adeptly wrapped my food in plastic wrap, and smilingly said “Bye-bye” as I walked out the door.

While the experience was frustrating at first, their efforts and attitudes make me want to go back and explore fumbling around with Korean some more and maybe even try some new foods.

Speaking Russian in Korea: A cure for homesickness

Sunday when I woke up it was rainy, dreary, and the leaves were beginning to change colors and drop from the trees onto the damp ground, creating a soggy mess of what should be fall. Homesickness began to bud, so I decided to dwell in it and make pancakes. By early afternoon this nurtured bud had flowered into a lump. Everywhere else but here, it seemed, fall is crisp with red and green and gold leaves. Recently, I saw pictures of Muscovites at the park with huge, dry, crisp, colored maple leaves. Imagining the smell of dry autumn leaves, the feel of the sun, warm on my face, and a slight chill in the air, I put on a sweater and almost heard the crunch of leaves underfoot. As I delved deeper into my memories and imagination and further away from Ulsan, I imagined hot chocolate, a fireplace in the evening, maybe a bit of vodka and some Russian. I was in heaven. When I walked outside into the mild, wet weather, reality hit.

My heart dropped.

This is not the fall I love. Missing Russia and Idaho, I sulked.

After my day of fighting homesickness and missing Russia I had an interestingly serendipitous moment.

As if I had stumbled into a dream.

It began with a search for material for my Halloween costume. I ventured over to Ulsan’s old downtown via bus. While on the bus, I derived brief satisfaction from understanding the Korean announcement of my stop, and I briefly compared it to understanding the metro in Moscow. I know I’m finally making progress with language skills when small battles like these are won. I hopped off the bus at my stop and began walking in the general direction of where I remembered seeing a fabric shop. I hadn’t walked ten steps from the bus stop, when I noticed a group of foreign guys. They stuck out, as we non-Asians always do. A bit nervous about the seemingly inevitable encounter, I momentarily entertained the idea of darting across the street to avoid talking to them. Again, this is the Kim that is shy and sometimes doesn’t make an effort to say hello to people she knows. My hesitation to make a run for it meant that suddenly they were in front of me.

With a heartwarmingly genuine smile on his face, a man I would later know as Dima said, «Ты русская?» “You’re Russian?” In shock, but on my game with the Russian that is always swimming in my head, I laughed and answered in Russian, «Ниет. Я американка.» “No, I’m American.” They gaffed and laughed and insisted that I was Russian. I laughed more and was so relieved after my day of homesickness to run into a group of Russians that felt so familiar and friendly that I felt in a dream. They were equally blown away and confused to find an American girl in Korea that spoke some Russian. Even after I told them I had spent two years in Moscow teaching English, they continued to follow the regular Russian line, which is that I cannot be American, I must be Russian because of my style and weight and my language skills.

As our conversation continued, I couldn’t stop laughing at how fortuitous the whole situation was. What are the chances? I enjoyed the familiar Russian accent of Yuri’s and Dima’s English, and while the two younger guys talked to me, the older men stood back and watched. Occasionally interjecting something amiable but generally indecipherable.

Due to our limited knowledge of each other’s language, my broken Russian and their broken English, our conversation was not as poetic as I would like to imagine, but the overall feeling was one of genuine relief and happiness. I could not believe that I was speaking Russian to people who understood it, and they seemed to feel the same way.

A great cure for homesickness, I only hope that I will run into Russians again, though hopefully they will be longer stayed than one day.

How being in Korea has made me miss Moscow

While some things were expected, missing the metro, it's efficiency, the ease of transportation as well as extremely affordable cost, there are some things I didn't expect to miss about Moscow. Number one being the weather. While I like winter, it often seemed to drag on and on, but now that fall and the leaves changing still hasn't even close to hit Ulsan, I'm starting to realize that I miss putting on layer upon layer and walking out into the brisk Moscow air, pollution or no.

Of course, I miss students. I miss the level of proficiency and how many of my teens had already adjusted to me and my teaching style. A new school, let alone a new culture and country would have been a bit difficult. While I really can't compare too much because I taught mainly teens and adults in Russia and in Korea I teach children and teens, if I dare make the comparison, Russians seem more adventuresome. More willing to make fools of themselves. Of course, there were occasional classes of shy students. Students who were scared to make mistakes, and perhaps it's the classroom set up or the different sense of humor or the different levels, but Koreans on the whole seem shier. They are not as willing to just pull me aside and ask a hundred questions about where I'm from or why I'm here. They just accept that I'm a foreigner, move on, and leave it at that.

While Koreans on the whole seem friendlier, I think Russians on the whole were more interested in getting to know me, establishing a friendship or comradery, while in Korea, because of the culture and the hierarchy, I assume, many students put a distance between teacher and student. I would like to break this down, but it seems as soon as I think I'm establishing a friendship, where I can rely on the student to back me up in class because we are "friendly" they turn. Peer pressure or shyness or culture or something takes over, and they revert back to refusing to speak English and refusing to work with other students. While Russians may not have liked it, they nearly always followed directions. They put an effort into the mingle activities I organized, were willing to make fools of themselves and so was I, but Koreans sometimes won't even give it a try, which in turn makes me more reserved at times. They are used to being allowed to "opt out" perhaps ... whatever the case, it makes things frustrating because as soon as one student "opts out" the rest of the group feels uncomfortable.

I need to just have a talk with them. When speaking a new language, you are going to feel like a fool at times ...

Assumptions about the produce section

Like in Russia, shopping for groceries has been one of the more challenging things. As a consumer, when I know the language written on packaging, I like to look at ingredients, calorie content, and the like. By the time I left Russia, I knew enough of the language that I was almost back to how I shopped in the States, but in Korea, I am starting from scratch. As I am just learning the alphabet, it is difficult to sound out the ingredients, let alone understand the words I’m sounding out. Yet, through it all, I have managed to avoid mistakes similar to those I made in Russia. When I bought milk, I actually bought milk … But a whole new set of issues has arisen.

So far, most of my grocery shopping has been in large hypermarkets, comparable to a super Wal-Mart. Finding products in the store can be a challenge, simply because the place is huge. Also, signage in English doesn’t always lead me to the right place. I saw a sign that read “Fresh Dairy” and in the case under the sign were processed meat products. It made me wonder why they even had English signage!

Surprisingly, through it all, one of the most confusing things has been the produce section of the grocery store. In Russia this was a bit confusing as well, but in a different way.

Generally in Russia there were loose bins of produce, whether it be apples, potatoes, carrots, bananas, etc. Like in the States, you grab a plastic bag and fill it with your selected amount of produce, but unlike the States, the produce is not weighed by the cashier at check out. Instead, you should take your produce to a scale – sometimes there is a person to weigh and label it for you and sometimes you have to weigh and label it yourself. Overall, the Russian system was only a bit intimidating, with the major question being, do I need to weigh this myself or is there someone to weigh it for me?

In Korea, at a hypermarket, things are a bit different. Almost all produce is pre-bagged, though there are some loose things – like potatoes, occasionally onions, and the like. The loose produce obviously needs to be weighed, and there is a woman who will weigh it for you. The pre-bagged produce with prices is also no trouble. It is the pre-bagged produce without prices marked that is the confusing and intimidating part. In Russia, these needed to be weighed along with everything else, so that was my assumption. In order to avoid the confusing ordeal of being at the cashier and having to go get something weighed, I went to the lady by the scale and gave her my pre-bagged broccoli. She took it, walked over to where the broccoli was displayed, and put it away.

Fail.

Because I was a bit embarrassed about this result, I didn’t go pick up the broccoli again. I just decided that I didn’t really need it and continued walking around the produce section a bit thrown.

The next time I went to the grocery store I found things were not as confusing as I had made them. Anything pre-bagged with a UPC has a set price and the cashier just scans it like any other product. It turns out in this case that my experience in Russia actually hindered my understanding.

A tracking device that squeaks

Parents occasionally lose children and children parents. They get separated in stores and markets for various reasons. Usually the consumer goods and marketing surrounding parents and children pull them apart. So far this seems to be universal. Kids get lost, it happens. The difference between cultures seems to be how to prevent this … In Moscow, the solution seemed to be to leave children at home or hold their hand tightly. In the States, one solution is the ridiculous contraption of a child leash, which securely tethers a parent to their child via a “cute” backpack that the child wants to wear. In Korea, I have yet to see how most parents prevent losing children, but one solution made me laugh.

As I sat with the director of my school, eating fastfood/junk from Korea’s version of McDonald’s, Lotteria, waiting for my passport photos to develop, I heard a slightly obnoxious ‘squeaky, squeak, squeeak’. I thought, what in the world is that?! It sounded like someone had a dog toy and was just trying to be annoying with it. I looked up and saw a small boy bouncing on his shoes … ‘squeak, squeak’ with each step he took, this squeak occurred. I couldn’t help but giggle. At first I thought this must have been a cruel joke played by a family friend. Give the child some squeaky shoes to aggravate his parents. Then, as I talked to my director, and she made the comment that you sure wouldn’t lose your child that way, I realized she was right. What a hilarious tracking device.

The boy especially enjoyed the amused faces of people around him when they noticed he was making the noise. Looks of surprise, smiles, and laughter were the reaction, and he responded to this amusement accordingly by making louder squeaks, longer squeaks, and running around more than needed. While in some circumstances this noise would have caused much annoyance, the idea that this little kid squeaked with every step continued to make me laugh. Something tickled a funny bone, and I couldn’t help but laughing the entire time the child was around. What a great solution to keeping track of a wandering child. Though I guess the parent would need to be prepared to endure performances of squeaking!

Ridiculous comparison number three: Parking

In the U.S. we are used to organized, orderly parking. In fact, we are near obsessed with it. We have meter maids whose sole job is to make sure no one’s car has overstayed its welcome in a particular parking space or even a particular block. Nearly everyone has a story about themselves or someone they know who has parked temporarily in a place they shouldn’t have, gone inside for “just a second” only to find their car gone (towed and impounded) when they return.

In Moscow parking seemed to be a competitive, nerve-racking sport. Who can be the most creative with their parking? Who can squeeze into that last little bit of curb, even if it is on the corner of an intersection. Who can take up just the right amount of the sidewalk? How long can you double park? Multiple times I had students tell me at the beginning of class that they may have to leave to go move their car if they get a phone call. And when a car accident was heard outside, my students would jump to the window and look down to see if their car had survived. Aside from accidents which are unpredictable and a part of everyday life in Moscow, the policy was, if you don’t want a dent or worse in your car from double parking, leave your number on the windshield of your car. That way you can easily be contacted. What did people do before cell phones?!

So far in Ulsan, parking has impressed me. Not only are people fairly courteous to drivers who are waiting for a parking place, but even “scary” drivers seem to be able to squeeze into the smallest parking places. Parking spaces in parking lots are smaller than in Russia and the U.S. and maybe they have to be. Korea does have a relatively small landmass. It makes me wonder how the parking section of driver’s ed goes in Korea … if there even is driver’s ed! While there seem to be slight differences between parking in Moscow and in Ulsan, the surprising thing is that leaving a phone number is fairly common practice … only Koreas have come up with a twist on leaving a phone number.

When I got picked up from the airport, I noticed a funny little cross-stitched pillow on the driver’s side of the dash board. It was visible from the road and all around, and I thought, “Huh, that’s sort of a silly little pillow.” It reminded me of cars in the U.S. that are decorated with all sorts of things inside, from fuzzy dice to dancing hoola ladies to expensive, collectable stickers. Only, this pillow stood out because it was the only kitschy thing inside this van. Other than the pillow, there wasn’t any collection of things or junk on the dashboard or elsewhere in the van. I took a small mental note, and didn’t consider it again until I went out to find the bus the next morning. That’s when I saw another car with a small pillow on the driver’s side of the dashboard. When I got closer, I noticed it had a phone number. I thought, “Brilliant! Rather than leaving a crumby handwritten note that could be washed away by the rain or easily dismissed as an advertisement, Korean drivers have embroidered pillows with their phone number.” Wow. While the presentation isn’t something I would prefer, the idea is fabulous. After that, I kept noticing these “contact pillows” everyone’s was unique and some had “Sorry”, yes, written in English on them.

Perhaps we should adapt this practice of double parking and leaving a number in the U.S. Of course you would have to convince the government that there may be a better way to spend public funds than meter maids, and you definitely would have to be in a larger city than Blackfoot … but it’s an idea ;)

Comparing chicken in three countries

Summary:

Russia: Small, lean, whole chickens

America: Giant, fatty, hormone injected chickens

Korea: ?? I have yet to find out. So far, I have only been able to find precut, prepackaged chicken breasts or thighs.

When I got back to Idaho in June and went grocery shopping with my father, one aspect of reverse culture shock began to sink in, and it had to do with chicken. This shock is continuing in Ulsan.

In Moscow, I ate a lot of chicken. So much so, that the when I visited my parents the first summer after living in Moscow, I didn’t want anything to do with it. I didn’t want to look at it and didn’t want to taste it. After another year of living in Moscow, where I developed fond memories connected to purchasing chicken, and learned how to butcher a whole chicken, I had gotten used to the size of chickens in Moscow, the freshness, how much fat they usually had on them, and so forth.

So, at the grocery store in Blackfoot, Idaho I was surprised to find, it’s nearly impossible to find a fresh, whole chicken. In Moscow the stores seemed to get daily shipments of fresh whole chickens, weighed them, bagged them and put them on the shelf. It actually could be a bit appalling how many chickens where on the shelf early in the day. In Blackfoot, a whole chicken could be found, but it would have been prepackaged and frozen, then shipped to the store. Additionally, I was shocked, disgusted and blown away by the mere SIZE of the chicken in the United States. They are huge!! Twice the size of a Russian chicken, they made me think of a small turkey with a lot more fat.

Chicken breasts are back to a reasonable size here in Ulsan, but I have yet to find a whole chicken. When I bought chicken at the giant hypermarket, which was larger than a Super Wal*Mart, all I could find was a package of about 12 pre-cut, pre-packaged, previously frozen chicken breasts or thighs … I will keep looking, but perhaps chicken isn’t big here or people prefer not to cut their own meat.