I am currently in Jeonju, a city most famous for its culture and delicious foods. More specifically, I am in a PC room (a huge computer lab which you pay to mainly play computer games, but in my case exploit 1. the air-conditioning 2. the fast internet connection 3. some alone time).
So let me just begin where I feel is right.
I. Jeonju Friends
I just got back from spending time with Micah and Clint, two of the three other ETAs who are in my city. We went downtown and met for some coffee, just to see each others' faces and reacquaint ourselves with the familiar. We really only spent 2.5 hours with each other, but I can honestly say it was energizing and really rejuvenating, just to be in the same room with them. Clint has an attic to himself, and Micah has her own place in a guest house. Both of them met Alec, my good friend and fellow Pomona + Fulbright Korea alumnus. Alec, if you're reading this, I'm sorry we didn't get to meet up. It's amazing how much good friends and acquaintances can do for you, even for just a couple of hours.
II. The Family
But how has my time here been? Overall I feel very lucky. Let me tell you about my family.
First, they are all very good people. The 15 year-old high school freshman, the 12 year-old elementary 6th grader, and the older parents are all kind and reasonable human beings, something which pleasantly surprised me since I expected something stranger than this.
The father and mother do not look their ages. They are in their 50's but the father exercises religiously, and both are very health-conscious (especially the father). The brothers seem to have a very typical big brother-little brother dynamic, though they seem to get away with more than my brother and I ever did when we grew up. That said, our parents had the honor of being reputed as very strict (I say that without resentment).
In any case, the intrafamilial relationships and principles have been delightfully akin to those within my family. Each person is accorded his/her individual responsibilities and privileges, and afforded the independence not unlike a typical American family. The children know what they have to do, so the parents trust them to do the homework, go to hakwons (학원: private after-school academies), play/exercise with friends. The parents in turn like to spend time on their own as well; the father would sit in front of his laptop to work in silence, while the mother naps/reads in the master bedroom. Meal times are also very individual; you help yourself and eat when you need to because each person has his/her own schedule and errands/tasks to complete. Such an environment has actually been so eerily familiar to my own home dynamics that I've been second-guessing a lot of situations for fear that I'm misreading or missing some subtlety or deeper truth. But I think they are as "chill" and similar to my family as they present themselves to be. This is the reason I feel comfortable sitting here among strangers and not in my house. Besides, my family does not turn on the giant air-conditioning machine in the house because its fumes are supposedly unhealthy for you.
So how have I, the foreigner/newcomer been fitting into this picture?
The children I think have been slowly adapting to my presence. I've noticed the past couple of days that they have started to loosen up a bit, smiling more and joking around with me more. Apparently I can give off a very intimidating vibe at first, so perhaps they got wind of that a bit. I've been playing cards and basketball with them at night, so I think they've been getting more comfortable. I do sometimes wonder if I should be much more proactive in getting to know them and spending time with them, but sometimes they just have their doors closed or are spending time with parents in the master bedroom, so I wouldn't want to intrude. This has been an issue I'm still trying to negotiate since 1. I don't want to be nosy but 2. I also don't want to be the aloof stranger in the house that doesn't become a family member and who ultimately gives the family a less-than-rewarding experience in undertaking this. My aim, after all, is to treat and be treated as a family member. I still feel like a guest, and I can sense that my family still feels similarly. That said, it's only been a few days though. Also, maybe I shouldn't feel like I should "owe" anyone anything.
III. Teaching
All this aside, tomorrow is my first day teaching. My co-teacher (he who is responsible for my welfare, adjustment, and success at school throughout the year) just read the Fulbright contract last night, and admitted to me that he didn't realize there were so many things he needed to have ready for me (bank, cell phone, schedule, etc.). I hope these things get resolved sooner than later.
The nice thing is that my host brother attends the school and I'll probably be teaching him, and he has already begun to provide some insider tips and views on the school: the student body, classroom dynamics and teachers.
I will probably teach about 15 classes of ~40 students each per week, in addition to a couple of teachers' workshops and an English club for advanced students. I still don't know what my lesson will look like tomorrow, but that will be tonight's project.
I am planning to be uncomfortably strict with my students though. I wasn't able to pull that off the first time I taught (at Camp Fulbright), and I quickly saw the consequences in the second class. I hope I can really make good on my promise to be strict, because otherwise classroom management--especially with unmotivated students who apparently are common--my year will be a very long one. Apparently I already can give a very intimidating vibe, so I'll play that up but also be willing and able to stick to my guns and be stern. I can loosen up later, but the first couple of weeks I will have to be strict. Wish me luck, because I often am more willing to observe and watch others interact than to take a group of people by the throat and control them. I am nervous, excited, and anxious.
I also hope I get a good schedule; one that affords me some afternoon time and extends my unofficial weekend even by a few hours.
IV. Music
Other than that, I really hope I find some musical venue very soon to get back into playing music on a regular basis and with a community of musicians. I e-mailed a former teacher of mine (who plays for the top orchestra in Korea) and am looking around at the Jeonju Symphony Orchestra for opportunities, but I hope I find something soon because that will be a great way to really begin living rather than just come home after I teach and...what, read a book?! I mean, that is something I've been wanting to do but I came to Korea for more than simply to teach and read good American books.
So that's what is currently preoccuping my thoughts. Here is a quick retrospective of the past couple of weeks.
V. Saying Goodbyes Sucks
I arrived in Jeonju with my co-teachers and met my host family on Thursday late afternoon at around 4:30/5:00PM. What preceded that can be deduced from the section title.
Clearly I had underestimated the just how close I had become with my fellow ETAs over the past few weeks. Clearly I had underestimated just how difficult parting with these once-in-a-lifetime individuals would really be that day. Clearly I had overestimated my emotional fortitude.
I don't mean to dramatize this, because I did not break down and bawl or sob. And I'm sorry if that was anticlimactic for you. But I can tell you leaving them was much more emotionally draining than I had assumed it would be.
All Wednesday we have our "field day" of games and "fun" physical activities with our regional ETAs and other extendees. We spend Wednesday evening trying to have some last-evening quality times with each other, but knowing that we'll have at least some time Thursday to say our goodbyes.
Thursday comes, everyone is dressed to impress, and we begin the goodbye process in the morning. Late morning we meet our teachers and principals; some arrive with gifts to welcome the ETAs, others don't (mine didn't). While we have lunch with them, and I learn that my teachers need to get back to Jeonju ASAP for an evening workshop at which they must be present. I start getting nervous because I assumed I would have time to say goodbye to the unquantifiably wonderful human beings I've met here and wish to bring back to Jeonju with me.
The afternoon comes, and I have to be one of the first to leave. The teachers don't attend the workshop and ask that I get my bags and get ready to book it. I buy some time since we have our own ETA meeting, but I feel helpless and weak, so much so that when Grace reads me like a book and comes over to talk I act so strangely that I piss her off. I told her later that I acted so strangely because I was fighting tears.
I felt rushed, stressed, and flustered. I felt torn between my obligation to not keep the teachers waiting and making the quickest exit possible possible and paying my thanks and saying my goodbyes to these incredible human beings whom I'm not sure when I'll see again. So when all these thoughts and feelings became embroiled into a boiling level, it was too late and I was visibly upset. I could feel the heat in my face, and began to notice other ETAs noticing my discomfort. I couldn't help but show some twinkling of tears to these people with whom I had clearly grown much more than I ever imagined. I told this to Grace who I pissed off earlier, and she was gracious enough to understand (no pun intended).
As I hugged each person, I couldn't help but notice something profound, and deeply anchored in each handshake or hug. I felt among all these hugs and goodbyes was an immense strength, a tremendous gravity and magnetism that refused to let me tear away from these characters. I can still recall that gut feeling so viscerally.
I was moved. I am moved. As I tried to compose myself for the first ten minutes of the car ride with the teachers, I couldn't help but be grateful for the chance to have met this group of individuals. I couldn't help but thank life and the opportunities I have had to get to even feel this level of simultaneous connection and fragility. That said, I also couldn't help but remember that all I had been doing the past few months, it seems, has been saying goodbyes.
Was this all because I was "pampered" or not "independent" enough or "clingy" or "weak?" Was this because I am too "sensitive," "emotional" or "incompetent?" I don't think so, 1. because I know I wasn't the only one moved and 2. I think it points to something else.
Obviously I'm biased in framing my emotional responses this way because who wants to portray himself as a weak emotional unstable being, but I think that what I felt and how I behaved that day is, at least in part, a testament to what I consider important in my life and what I derive from it: people.
What makes this world both so beautiful and so tragic is the people. We learn to live together through dialogue, engagement, argument, and reconciliation. There is wonder in our interactions, there is fantasy in our disagreements, there is sanctity in the joys we share. Through the ironies and paradoxes of evil and holy juxtaposed, each living moment is a constant struggle to stay alive in the trenches of every day life. That we can survive and brave the sufferings we do and live to see another day is a product of never only our individual strength, but always also the existence, support, and work of others around us. We need each other. Together we experience fear, sorrow, joy. Together we survive, and together we move forward.
Such is my conviction, and with a deeply seated core that sustains me I would like to think that the things I felt that day were justified. Of course emotional response can never -- not even through neuroscience much less psychology -- really be rationalized or explicated so one could say I'm undercutting my own argument, but if one were to take me seriously I think my internal convictions merit some credibility.
Okay, I still have to catch up on the weeks prior, so maybe I'll continue that tonight when I get some time.
More to come, thanks for reading.
Best,
YK
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