UNESCO Cultural Exchange Camp

Over the weekend, I travelled to a small town outside of Gwangju to participate in the UNESCO cultural exchange camp. About 50 foreigners (some teachers, some university students) and 150 middle school Korean students were there. I was assigned 3 buddies who were the coolest kids ever! They informed me that their names were Tyson, Angelina Jolie and Orangutang. When we arrived at the camp, we were given a true celebrity's welcome with an aisle made up of screaming, clapping teenagers holding up signs declaring their love for us. I'm disappointed that I didn't have my camera out. I'll have to check and see if I can find someone who took some. It's THAT worth it.
The weekend was pretty slow paced. The first thing we did was have a cooking competition where people planned to make a recipe from their countries and prepared it for the group. The Canadian and American groups made poutine, homemade doughnuts, fajitas, omelets, Cajun shrimp, French toast, and grilled cheese. There were also groups there from Nepal, Zimbabwe and China. Delicious! After supper, we were entertained by a Korean cultural show which had violinists, ballerinas, and kids doing Taekwando. The next day, we went on a 2-hour long hike, made mosaics and had a concert where each group presented their culture. Unfortunately, they didn't inform the Canadians about this until like 2 hours beforehand. We ended up singing The Hockey Song by Stompin' Tom Connors and O Canada. It was a lot of fun!
Check out my website for pictures.

Gwangju Biennale

New pics are added to my Gwangju album which can be found at the Picasa link on the left side.

Today my school headed off to Gwangju to visit the Biennale. Obviously I was HELLA excited to go and it was an all around good day. 

On the bus ride there, Mrs. Lee and I got into a conversation about music that we like. She said that she likes (and I quote) "R&B...black music...music that brings the soul." Gahahaha. What a woman!  

Trista Teacher

After a month and a bit of teaching, I am pretty amazed at how much I have come to learn. The most important lesson, I would say, has been (no matter how mad I get) to not yell "shut up" to my students. Not because it's too mean and they don't deserve it (because they do) but because, despite all my efforts to get them to speak practical English, they will sense that this is rude and will be far too eager to shout it back. 

One of my grade 6 classes in particular is quite rotten. Last week I escorted two of my students from that class to their homeroom teacher and explained to him how they ripped up a textbook that was leant to them by a classmate. I even tried to make them tape it back together. Which they did. Upside down. 

Almost every day I get frustrated to tears and I usually write it off as cultural differences. Things that I think are extremely rude (like the textbook thing) aren't necessarily so in Korean culture. I was so pissed off about the textbook that I couldn't even bring myself to do anything about it. I left it up to their homeroom teacher. One of my fellow English teachers has taught me the value of the homeroom teacher. They have  real control of the class and can put the fear in them. Obviously I admire this power and next week I have arranged to sit in on some regular Korean classes with my worst classes (5s and 6s) to try to learn for myself what behaviour is ignored and what behaviour is punished. And how. 

My students kick me in the ass everyday but watch out! Trista Teacher's got a brand new bag. 

I picked a major I like and someday I will live in a box

My goal this weekend is to figure out my plans for post-graduate studies. The obvious choice is to become a teacher... I can't really decipher is this is the most obvious choice because it's the right one or if it's because I have an arts degree that doesn't lead me in any particular direction. 

I can't decide if it's what I like or just what I always end up doing. 

One field that I do love but is totally useless in Canada is museum studies. I spent one summer working at an art gallery at Queen's and really loved it. I even worked there a bit as a volunteer during 3rd and 4th year. I've done a bit of research on working in museums/galleries and you pretty much need a PhD in order to work in any of the big galleries (plus be bilingual in French and English and fluent in a 2nd modern language). 

What about museum education, you ask?

Being a museum educator would be my dream job but there is just no work in Canada and with Harper  back in, this isn't likely to change any time soon. Universities and colleges have even started closing some of their museum studies programs because there are no jobs in Canada. In a museum studies course I took in 4th year, we discussed how museum education is always the department to get poo-pooed on first and they are not interested in hiring educators, but people with degrees that will look good on a roster. GAWD! 

My tentative plan is to either get my teaching license or an MA in museum studies and work in the United Kingdom. Teaching jobs and museum work are easier to come by there.  

THE plan is to someday work my way around Europe. 

Any advice or ideas would be greatly appreciated. 

Let's go Mokpo has gone public

Many people have been having trouble accessing my blog so I've decided to make it public. You shouldn't have to sign in to read it anymore. Because I can no longer control who is reading it, I have taken some things off and will continue to edit it a bit.

ENJOY!

Can you call it racism?

Technically, I don't think you can apply the term "racism" to any racial prejudices that white people may feel at the hand of another race. However, for nearly the first time in my life, I've started to experience prejudice against me on account of my race (and being a foreigner and not speaking Korean). For instance, many foreign teachers, myself included, have had a hell of a time trying to buy cellphones. Every cellphone shop is run differently, so there aren't company-wide rules that apply everywhere so one cellphone shop will tell you that foreigners cannot get pay-as-you-go plans and others will say that we can't get contracts. When I went on a 3-hour long outing to get a cellphone, you would not have believed the double-standards that applied to me because I am not Korean. For instance, one shop said I could have this particular plan but that I would have to pay an addition $100 for the phone "because I am a foreigner". On-the-fly rules like this are an everyday occurance. Sometimes it is very very difficult to get a taxi to stop for you. If it's dark, they may slow down until they realize you're white, then keep on going, this is usually accompanied by a "friendly" wave. Even the screening process to become a teacher in Korea holds different standards for their foreign teachers than it does for its Korean teachers. When we arrive, we have to have have a drug and HIV test which Koreans are not subject to. If you test positive, your visa is revoked and you must leave. But only if you are foreign. It's not that I think that teachers shouldn't have drug tests, but why only the foreign ones?

I think white males are worse off than females because Koreans seem to have this idea that foreign teachers (especially Canadians) have poor sexual mores and are pedophiles. One male, Canadian teacher that I know was sat down recently (and he's been here for a year already) and made to watch a anime film about not touching female students. He then had to sign a form saying he had his "Korean sexual more education". To be fair, there was a Canadian teacher caught last year of pedophelia in Korea, but I would venture to guess that many more Korean teachers are involved in illegal sexual acts with students than foreigners. It's certainly not foreign teachers rubbing their students' behinds, telling them that they love them, blowing kisses, and getting massages (which are all things that my English teacher friends have seen). It's just covered up to save face when it's a Korean at fault.

The more I think about this behaviour, the more I realize that it's not unique to Korea (who are, somewhat ironically, stereotyped as being racists). I don't think you could get away with giving teachers mandatory HIV tests with thier jobs at risk, but indivudals in Canada are just as racist as they are here. It's certainly a popular belief that middle easterns are smelly and dirty, or that black people are dangerous (not that I think this but I know too many people who do).

I guess your awareness of your own stereotyping increases when you're suddenly a second class citizen because you're not the right colour.

comment option IS working again. thanks, whitney!

Can you fart in North Korea?

This past weekend I travelled to Seoul with some other foreign teachers. I was super-excited to visit Seoul and the highlight was staying in an area of the city called Itaewan or the "Foreigners District". It was totally mind-blowing to be able to walk down the street and address questions in English to just about anyone. It easily could have been downtown Toronto.

Itaewan wasn't a nice part of Seoul by any stretch of the imagination. We didn't book a hotel, so when we arrived late on Thursday night, we had to walk around and find a place. This wandering lead us to a place called "Hooker Hill" (which really explains it all). I never thought I would ever see Korean transvestites, but that just goes to show how full of surprises Seoul is! It was extremely comforting, though, to see white people and names that I recognized (Starbucks, Quiznos, Subway, Outback Steakhouse, and so on). 

Our first day there some of us went to Changdeokgung Palace. It was originally constructed between 1405 and 1412 and it was Korea's centre of power from 1618 to 1896. I think that the highlight of the palace was the Secret Garden. 

On the second day, we went to Panmunjon at the Demilitarized Zone. This is the only area of the DMZ where tourists are permitted. The DMZ is a strip of land 4km wide and 248km long adn divides the two Koreas in half. It is one of (if not the) most heavily fortified borders in the world. 

On the tour, we were able to enter the UN's Blue Building where talks between the two countries take place. We were accompanied by a South Korean soldier the entire time (known as ROK soldiers which stands for Republic of Korea, the official name of South Korea). The rules were pretty strict, for instance, we could only take photos in certain areas and we even had to put them away at certain points. We couldn't point or motion to the North side, we had to walk in lines two people wide, we had a dress code, we couldn't touch or lean up against anything, nor could we walk behind or touch any soldiers. We were also recorded while inside the Blue Building. At one point, we weren't allowed off the bus because we were being watched by 90 North Korean soldiers and we didn't have enough ROK soldiers with us to protect us. 

It was such a strange experience. For a Canadian, I think it's hard to really understand that you may be in real danger or that you're that close to real danger. The threat of North Korea remains a big issue in the region and conflicts flare up from time to time. Shots were most recently fired in 2001 and 2006. Also, some of you may remember hearing that a boat of North Koreans made it to South Korea, were sent back to the North and were killed. In addition,  a tourist was shot in North Korea very recently when she accidentally wandered into a restricted area while on a morning hike. 

Many Korean that I've talked to wish to reunite someday. I think that they don't distinguish between "North Korean" and "South Korean". However, the new President of South Korea is not interested in reunification so only time will tell.