The adventures of "Jumpin' January!" and "나는 많은 한극어 공부해요"

With three free weeks in January, a penny-pinching budget (saving for Thailand and New Zealand later), and many friends gone off a-travelin', I spent a fair amount of the month reading and watching the Korean drama "Secret Garden" (this gets its own entry later), but my sporadic jaunts out into the world beyond my apartment, or as they say in Konglish, "ah-pah-te," were varied and eye-opening.

I went to stay with the lovely Jillian Moga at her home-stay in Cheongju for a  few days to help her teach part of her school's winter camp. It was fun to team teach again and see how each others' styles had developed and changed since we taught together during Camp Fulbright back in July, and working with such a small group of students - 8 to 12 - was a treat. Her host mom, Adero, and siblings, James, Kevin, and Kristen, were super welcoming. We went out to celebrate our Fulbright friend Amy's birthday with Indian food and, in true Korean party style, noraebang (karaoke). Noraebangs always come with a song list packed with Korean pop and traditional songs, along with a few dozen pages of English and American songs, tambourines, beer and soju to order, and bizarre music videos that play behind the lyrics and absolutely never correspond to the song.

Jillian and I before going out for Amy's party!

My host sisters threw a surprise 20th anniversary party for my host parents, and I helped blow up the balloons they stuck to the ceiling and covered the floor with. Damhee decorated a sweet potato cream cake with chocolate and fruit for the occasion.

I went back to Cheongju to visit Jillian and her host family again, and Jillian and I went to see Adero's English kindergarten's winter performance. This school provides a well-rounded education for 3-5 year olds, with Taekwondo, mini violin lessons, dance, and more than three hours of English instruction, all for the modest fee of $800 per month. The show put on by these renaissance toddlers felt like a trip to Wonka's chocolate factory or Munchikinland with it's black and white checkered stage and at least 3 costume changes for each class of tiny people. The audience was packed with beaming parents toting glitter-covered bouquets for their star children.

 

I've been thinking a lot about Korean education lately, especially after a thoughtful forum Fulbright organized to showcase the research of grantee Michael Alison Chandler, a Washington Post writer who has spent part of the last year researching the education system here. Her blog provides a concise and informative look at the situation. Most students, perhaps after a misleadingly kaleidoscopic introduction to school life like the one pictured above, settle into study regime around the age of 10, dedicating hours more than their American counterparts to the school day and hours on top of that in private cram schools called hagwons. Most of the curriculum is based around rote fact memorization with very little critical thinking or creative expression. Most students do not know how to compose an essay in their own language.

From the perspective of a girl who grew up with long summers spent playing kickball in the street and hunting fireflies, the ability to choose classes and extracurriculars according to her interests, and a slight tendency towards laziness and procrastination, it seems most Korean children are robbed of a childhood. So when Jillian and I were heading out to go ice skating and Adero asked us to take Kevin and James (both in elementary school), we agreed. I admit I was reluctant for my "girls' fun afternoon" to turn into babysitting. That evening, after a day of zooming and shuffling around the rink, spending part of their taxi money on video games, and devouring a plate of tteokbokki, a spicy winter street-food that they rarely get at home, the usually quiet and docile boys skipped and giggled their way to the taxi, and Jillian and I were both so glad to have contributed to a day of good plain fun for them.

A few days later, I left Cheonan again for the Onyang hot springs. I met up with some fellow Fulbrighters, and we spent the day steaming and boiling ourselves in the herb and nutrient infused waters of the spa. We all got scrubbed, which is basically when you lay on a massage table and have your skin attacked by a woman wearing two abrasive, cloth mitts. There is no room for a shy attitude when getting a scrub, because that woman is determined to rid your entire body of dead skin, which comes off in little grey-white bits (gross, huh?) The next day, with our newly smooth baby skin, we headed to Boryeong for the sea-parting on Muchangpo Beach. Once a year, the tide goes out so far that a path to a small island becomes exposed, and we were ready to pull a 'Moses' and hike on out to it, except that our information was a year out of date, and the sea did not part. Bummer. Really though, it was awesome to see a snow-covered beach, and we took advantage of the famous Boryeong mud in yet another spa before heading home.

Now I'm settled back into the marble palace, a.k.a. Jungwon University, for my crazy-intense Korean class. Our first day was great, and my eyes didn't start to glaze over until after the 5th hour of class. My teachers seem very patient and fun, so as long as I can make myself study enough to keep up with 36 hours of new material each week, it should be a pretty darn productive month!

P.S. that second part of the title says "I study much Korean."  : )