Concluding Thoughts

It's been a while since I've had time to make an entry here, but I had meant to finish with some final thoughts and so forth back in September.

I've mentioned living in Korea to quite a few people by now, both here and back in the States. When they ask about what it was like, I always tell them it's a really nice place to live, which I still believe. The first thing that always comes to mind is that they have a really good public transportation system, possibly because I was so dependent on it, and it seems to be a good partial measure of how livable a place is. I didn't like living in Maine and LA, both of which one must usually depend on cars to get around, but loved Boulder, CO, where the bus system was very convenient, and am really enjoying Brighton, where I take the bus about five days a week, and have taken the train several times.

I also mention that Korea has a lot of great nature--amazing city, provincial, and national parks; pretty, sandy beaches; lots of mountains, rivers, and lakes. In retrospect, I probably should have taken more advantage of that, though I did go to several parks and beaches and did some hiking while there. The thing that I'm missing possibly most about Korea is the bathhouses. It was good to have a place to go for cheap to relax and get really clean and engage in a cultural event that I would never get at home. They have bathhouses here in Europe, but all I've seen advertised have prices that are several times what I'd pay in Korea, and with time limits that make the value in Korea 100 times greater than in Europe. It's ridiculous.

I also sometimes mention how nice and helpful Koreans are, and how safe it is there. I've never felt particularly unsafe anywhere I've lived or visited, but there have been places like Kenya and other third world countries, and even LA, where I needed to take precautions for my safety. In Korea you can still accept rides from strangers--which I did a couple times--and there may not even be any need to ask or stick your thumb out in the road. The two strangers who gave me rides both offered out of the blue, took me right to where I wanted to go, and in once case, helped me put in and take out my bags from his trunk. And people are just generally helpful and kind anyway, even if it's just giving directions, translating, or replacing the nose bits on your glasses for free.

When people ask about the food, I say I like the barbecue and the meats in general, as well as the soups and the veggie and rice dishes, like bibimbap. I hate kimchi, and I often don't like the red pepper they use in everything. I also find that dried squid that they tend to love eating in enclosed spaces with no ventilation to be absolutely disgusting. I'm not big on sashimi. I never tried whale or dog or shark.

When they ask about that job, I say that teaching in Korea is probably one of the best deals out there in terms of teaching English as a foreign language. Japan's package is comparable: they pay higher salaries generally (at least for the JET program), but most people's rent is at most only partially subsidized, so I think in terms of saving, it ends up being about the same amount of money going home. The Middle East seems like an excellent place to go to make tons of cash, but there seem to be more drawbacks--culture that might be stifling to some, longer contracts, and most of the time you have to either be certified to teach in your home country, or you need a TESOL certificate of some kind. Which is why I chose Korea to begin with. Although there were a few drawbacks to my job, like longer hours and more homework to correct (many teachers have none), my pay was quite a bit higher than average, and my bosses took really good care of the teachers for the most part. Some people go there and get easy jobs, but have constant problems with their bosses being sketchy, schedules changing constantly, miscommunications, and the like, and may even have to handle not being able to sit down during class and being under video surveillance in the classroom. I could never deal.

When people ask about the things I didn't like about Korea, the first thing I think of is the lack of personal space. I could never really get used to standing in the middle of a giant open space, and still getting brushed or jostled by people who didn't even consider going around me. Or having to spend  lots of time in big crowds of people who don't even notice the crowd, or being followed by customer service vultures in the stores. Other than that, it's really just minor things like hardly any trashcans in public areas and things that you can't avoid anywhere.

My major bit of advice to people teaching in Korea or thinking of going there to teach is to be extremely cautious about teaching in any other situation beyond what your visa says. Private tutoring and teaching part time at other English schools is quite prevalent in most parts of Korea, and is really lucrative. But it's not without risk. I'm dealing with this personally right now. During my second contract in Korea, I worked a couple days a week for a few months at a preschool/kindergarten. On my last day of work there, an official showed up from the education office to do a random check of the school, to ensure accordance with the law. In Korea, preschools are not allowed to hire foreign English teachers, and of course any teacher at a kindergarten must be only employed by that one school. The manager of the kindergarten convinced the official that it was my last day there, and they would not be replacing me (though the other foreign teacher who worked the rest of the week wasn't mentioned, and perhaps was never discovered). My visa details were taken, but I did not get in trouble, and I'm sure there was some bribery involved to avoid any major trouble for me or the school. I was quite lucky, as this was a deportable offense. In any case, I never heard about the situation again, and was even able to leave Korea to go to Taipei, come back for two days, and leave again without any trouble. I thought I was okay.

However, in September, I got an email from my boss saying that two of the other teachers at my school had been accused of illegally doing private tutoring, which resulted in an investigation in the school, which turned my name up as having taught illegally, as well. This looks to the education office like my boss had allowed most of her teachers do work on the side and does not bode well for her business. I had of course never told her about this work, both because it violated my contract and because I wanted her to be able to deny knowledge of my extra work and save herself from trouble if I were caught. When she was told about this, she was extremely surprised and pissed off, since she trusted me and I was her favorite teacher and so on.

The investigation is ongoing, as far as I know. Six weeks after I first heard of it, almost three months ago, I emailed Heather to check in, because I thought something would have happened by then. I also hadn't gotten paid for my last month of work and my severance pay, so I was curious about that, because she had seemed to imply might have to pay a fine through her with my remaining salary, and I wanted to get a receipt or some sort of evidence of the fine and the payment if that were true. This pissed her off even more, and since she emailed me back to tell me off and say that nothing had happened, I haven't heard from her.

A violation like this would normally result in deportation of the teacher, as I said, if caught while in Korea. I've heard that it also might result in up to three years prison or a fine of up to around $20,000. But of course they're not going to put teachers in jail or fine them that much; they'd never get any more teachers coming to the country. There's also no way they'll come after me for money, although there still exists the possibility that my former employer will be responsible for paying some sort of fine on my behalf, as well as her own fine for "allowing" her teachers to work illegally. I can deal with losing about three thousand dollars to either the Korean government for breaking the law, or to Heather for breaching our contract, but what I'm more concerned about is how this will affect my teaching in other countries. Heather has mentioned that I might be put on a "blacklist" of teachers who have violated their visas and are no longer allowed to teach in Korea. This might not be so bad, since I may never wish to teach there again in favor of new places and/or a change in career later, but if I am applying to teach in other countries, particularly Asian countries, it's possible they will want to check into my activity in Korea, or at the least want a professional reference. I'm not sure how such a situation would turn out, as Heather may not be inclined to give me a positive reference anymore, and a background check might turn up my illegal activity.

Anyway, to reiterate, my advice to others going to Korea is to be very careful about such things. The Korean government is stepping up their enforcement of illegal teaching, and are doing checks of schools and I think I've even heard of sting operations in Seoul, at least. So teaching on the side at a proper school is the riskiest activity, since you can be caught any time. Private tutoring is less risky, since it would be done at the student's home usually, and the only way to be caught is if the family themselves rat you out. This is uncommon, I'm sure, but if you wrong someone, they may retaliate by informing the police. The student/family is not culpable in the case of private tutoring, as far as I know, so they have nothing to lose. I've also heard of holding this over the tutor's head to get the tutor to lower the rate or agree to unreasonable conditions, but I'm sure this is quite rare, too, considering the general culture. However, if doing private tutoring, taking clients from your regular school is probably unwise, since it may be hard for a student to keep quiet about it, and if the employer found out it would be big trouble for everyone involved. If a student at your school wants private tutoring, just go through the school. They'll take half the fee, but you still get paid extra money and it becomes legal that way. If you tutor others, try to only deal with people who you already know or who are connected to you by people you know. Koreans wanting a tutor will sometimes just stop random foreigners on the street, asking if they want to tutor or know anyone who does. This happened to me at least twice. Although it's unlikely to be a cop, you never know, and it seems like that might be more likely in coming years.

I'll update the blog if I ever find out what happens with the investigation, and if I get penalized officially, but it's possible I'll never hear about it again. If the situation gets resolved without any government penalties, Heather may just not want to deal with me anymore and consider the three and a halfish million won she owes me to cover her personal penalty for my violation of contract and be done with it. We'll see what happens.



Teach in Korea!