Korea Life Blog - Korea Headlines


Awhile back I started cutting out some odd snippets from the Korea Herald. Similar to Jay Leno's headlines, there is something peculiar, something just a little off about each one. Well I finally had a chance to get them scanned, (thanks to Julie who has a scanner now in her office). Have a look at the first series of Korea Headlines.



Urgent! Wanted for Assistant Director: 0 person! Nobody need apply! Notice what the applicant has to include: a 3 page essay on how to promote sales and license in the world. What the hell does "promoting license mean?" Ok, here I go. Double space, BIG FONT: "Promoting license in the world is important. Very important. Very, very, very important. License is something people need to drive a car and it's very important but it's also necessary for sales and..." Though they require qualified English for the job, apparently it wasn't a requirement for writing the job ad.



Are there that many foreigners in Seoul familiar with great Italian wines? What the hell is Pasqua Valpolicella Classico Sup. DOC. That and Pasqua Sove Classico DOC? - The prices are unbelievable and so are the names!



Apparently they don't think to highly of their applicants. Hey, who you calling "it?"



OK, I'm sure the food here is good, but isn't this just a bit of an exaggeration? The sea...the sun...la Provence in your plate! Just who do they have there cooking the food? "Ok, Jesus, one order of the sea and sun, table 7."



I had no idea there were so many awards for the international moving industry. I don't know, though. "The First Accredited ISO 9002 of Internation Moving in Korea"? - "The Quality Worldwide Door-to-Door moving under FIDI Network"? - "The Fist FAIM/ISO Quality Standard in Korea"? Just whose giving out these awards anyway?



I'm not even going say anything about this article. You just read it for yourself. Shocking, truly shocking...especially the last paragraph in the center column.



This one cracked me up. Here is some event by humanitarians calling on the government to help the poor. I think the camera man is missing the point. "What's going on here? Oh, I see. Cabbage! Wow! What a story!"



Another one that made me laugh. (Click on the picture to see it full size). Here we are at Ewha Womans University. Wait a minute, that female student there in the circle looks a little odd. Hey, isn't that Charles Barkley, the basketball star? What's he doing there? Security!



Here's an ad for another moving company. I love this: you'll have your own supervisor during moving - he remind you of every work process from start to end. "OK, Mr.Smith. Now you wrap all your dishes in newspaper. After that, carry the sofa onto the truck. Don't forget to pack your toothbrush. Come on now, hurry up, move! move! move!" Also, I think they had a little too much space to fill in this ad. Golden Black Box! Professionally made, unlike those other boxes made by unprofessionals. And wow, they come in various sizes! Whoo hoo! Their company provides their own skilled staffs! No wonder they are members of HHAFFA, KIFFA & CBAFF.



I don't mean to belittle the seriousness of the crime, but this just sounds ridiculous: "...the policeman shot the man because of his lack of hospitality." "What? No tea? Why, you...blam blam blam!" I might expect that to happen in England, but here in Korea?





The Oakwood Premier - This place delivers everything you'd expect of a 5 star hotel...including Pizza Hut pizzas! Wow! - now that's fancy. Notice who they're quoting, by the way. It's Mr. In Soo Cho, that's right managing director of Pizza Hut!



Now this has to be the most tasteless concept I've ever seen in my life. Sexy porcelain? That's just plain disgusting. Hmm, wait a minute. Maybe I'll get a set and surprise Julie with a romantic dinner.


Well, there you have it, Korea Headlines. Many thanks go out to Konglish and the Korea Herald..also to Julie for scanning these for me.

written by shawn matthews    -|link

Korea Life Blog - Barbecue Chicken in Song Nae

I've said it before and I'll say it again. Americans love fried chicken. Americans also love beer. I don't know why simple chicken and beer restaurants aren't popular there (though I'm not sure if they are or not in the southern states). They certainly are popular in Korea with one on every other corner practically. They're so much fun and a lot better than any KFC or Popeyes, in my opinion. I just think it's fun to eat fried chicken and drink beer, especially outside on a nice summer evening. I say fried because up until we found this place in Song nae, I usually didn't like the yang yeom barbecued chicken. But that has since changed. Check out this extremely popular restaurant.



Here it is, in the heart of Song Nae. We first found it about a month ago at night. As we were standing around scratching our heads and trying to decide what to eat, Julie suggested the McDonald's next door. Meanwhile this restaurant was jam packed. I convinced her to give it a shot. Everyone was ordering the barbecue chicken, which we couldn't figure out. We decided to order half and half (half fried, half bbq). That's when we discovered the fried chicken was terrible but that the barbecued chicken was absolutely fantastic, unlike any kind we'd had before.



As you can see, even before evening the place is bustling. In fact, eveytime we go by here the place is full. It must be the most popular restaurant in the area.



Another reason I love it here: 1000cc (1 liter - yes, how kind of me to translate the metric system into the metric system) draft beers. One of these goes perfect with the meal. At first I felt a little embarrassed by the size. I was the only one I could see with one. Julie couldn't stop laughing. Everyone else was downing 500cc glasses, though, one after another, or glass after glass from huge pitchers, so what's the difference? I just like the big size because it makes me feel like a bad-ass barbarian from medieval times. (I'm writing all this in hopes my readers focus on the huge beer, not on the less than flattering hair cut, thanks Julie).

It looks even bigger in comparison with Julie (had a picture here but she made me delete the picture probably because she was wearing her glasses). She couldn't even lift the glass with one hand. Though I can drink all of it and feel pretty much nothing but a long belch, Julie would probably die. I've only seen her drink a few times. I gave her a small glass of wine way back when and a few minutes after drinking it she turned red, started to rock back and forth, then fell fast asleep until morning. Needless to say, she prefers cola.



Here it is, the main dish. Like I said, the chicken at this restaurant is unique, though it's hard to tell exactly from this picture. It tastes a lot better than it looks anyway. The sauce is delicious, rich but not too thick, hot and spicy. Ah, what a great time. Hanging out drinking beer and eating delicious barbecue chicken, relaxing after a long day of lounging around in my yeogwan watching movies and writing, listening to music, etc...



Bonus picture! Look closely at the table (not at the cute little girl that would make Coca Cola executives swell with pride). That boy was eating dokbokki with his fried chicken! Wahahah!

written by shawn matthews    -|link

Korea Life Blog - A Tough Man


Julie got a love letter a few days ago from one of her Kindergarten students. Needless to say it didn't bother me. Have a look:



If you can't read Korean, it says on the outside: Julie, I love you, letter.



Now on the inside: Julie, thank you for teaching me English. Julie, very pretty.



I don't care. It's just a love letter from some little punk kindergarten kid. I'm not jealous at all, I swear. Nope not me. So what if he's so damn cute, and he's a perfect student, and she utterly adores him...he better watch his back on the playground, that's all I know.

written by shawn matthews    -|link

Korea Life Blog - PC Bang Woes


I came to update my blog today and had a floppy disk with several pictures on it. For some reason the pics didn't save right and they won't transfer to the PC. I tried on several computers. I'd better invest in a CD-RW disk if I can find a place around here to get one. I noticed before that at the PC bangs the floppy drives are often broken. The CD drives always work though, thanks to Star Craft and company.

I guess I'll have to save that update for tomorrow. I should start doing something with my time off, though. Part of me wants to travel but part of me wants to sit around and do absolutely nothing. What a great feeling that is, though I learned when I broke my arm that lounging around day in and day out can make it very hard to get motivated again. I guess I should also look for a job, hurray. Looking for a job is overwhelming here because there are just too many choices and almost every one seems dubious in one way or another.

Up until the end of it, I had a pretty decent job for the last year and am hoping to find something like that again. A good schedule, small class sizes, etc. Having now 6 years of teaching experiences between here and America, and having a BA in English Education you'd think I could find something decent but it's not easy. Hagwons are all kind of hit or miss. If anyone knows of an exceptionally good one please send me an e-mail with a description. Maybe I should just apply to another University. Hell, I got hired at Jang An Univeristy after just a ten minute interview. I kind of wonder what my life would be like had I taken that. It just didn't feel right at the time. Oh well, I don't really regret that. Maybe I should just start a taco stand and hang out in Hongdae. Or get the Geoje-do book translated and sell it to ajummas on the train. Or use the guitar to make a hit song about deokboki. Oh the endless possibilites.

For now I guess I'll head back to the cave-won, I mean yeogwan, and watch Seabiscuit. Julie and I spent about an hour trying to decide what movie to rent last night, then we got that and didn't have chance to see it. Instead we watched Cheaters again and then she made me endure 2 episodes of Sex and the City (Season 5 - what an awful torture). The best part about watching TV here is the commercial ratio. I hate to rub it in to anyone living in the states, but here these shows come without them here, or a very short break once during the show. Most of the commercials come before and after programming. Back in the states there's at least 3-4 minutes for every 10-15 minutes of showtime.

Well, I decided instead to go meet Julie again. She's going to regret finding me a place so close to her, hehe. If all goes well I will use her roommates scanner. If so, prepare for a funny update tomorrow.

written by shawn matthews    -|link

Korea Life Blog - Yeogwan


I thought I'd stop off quickly to check my e-mail and post a few shots of the yeogwan I'm staying in for the next month. It's really not a bad deal at 350,000 won (about $275) for a month. It's small but has an ice cold Samsung air conditioner and new TV/VCR. There is a downside though. Because they built the motels on this street so close together, there is no view and actually no sunlight. The window opens to the concrete of the next building. I feel like I'm living in a cave, or some kind of weird time warp. The first time I realized it was Saturday. I called James to see what he was up to. I thought it was dark and rainy outside. He told me it was a beautiful sunny day. Today I woke up at noon but I thought it was 3 or 4 in the morning.



Here's Julie hanging out and watching an extremely old episode of America's Funniest Home Videos. I never could figure out how the host of that show made the big time. What a stupid geek! Anyway, Julie has me hooked on some show called Cheaters. It's an American reality show, but I had never seen it before. Some guy helps people find out if they're being cheated on (they always are), then they confront the cheater in the act. My favorite one was when they caught this woman's husband in a hotel room being whipped by a black transvestite. Ah, what a great impression we must be making on the world with these shows.



A decent size bed. There's my guitar in the case over there to the right for quick access. Never know when I'll need to set things straight with a quick G-Am-C chord progression and apologetic verse.



The bathroom. Nothing special. No bathtub, but that's OK. I'm usually too tall to fit into any Korean bathtub anyway.



One last shot. You can see I have my weights there for my exercises. There's just about enough room to do pushups on the floor. Notice I have my own water cooler too. It's like my own personal office and Julie's my secretary. Speaking of that, did you see the movie, Secretary? Hmm...

If you notice, Julie's wearing a Levi's shirt. There's a stand right near the motel with a load of imitation t-shirs like that. We got 4 of them for 15,000 won ($12). I considered doing the old "freeze, FBI" gag while flashing my wallet, but decided against it.

written by shawn matthews    -|link

Korea Life Blog - Seoul Shawn


Well, here I am back in Seoul. The guy to my left is chain smoking and playing Star Craft. The guy to my right is asleep, a cigarette burning in his ashtray. Yay! Sure is good to be back at the ole PC bangs.

I left Nowhere-dong for a few reasons. The first was that the town is extremely boring, of course. The second, though my job was laid back, my boss was a real scrooge. About a month before my contract was to finish, I tried to schedule a meeting with him about my severance pay and to see if he wanted me to stay on. Since the Korean English teachers at the school couldn't speak English well, I was to have Julie translate. Well he gave us the run-around for the next 2 weeks or more. Finally he called Julie. When she asked him to verify the bonus pay, the boss began his worm routine, crying poverty. Julie lit into him for it, saying he had been damn lucky to have me without having to give the usual benefits and that he promised the bonus pay and better come through on it. He called her back a few days later. If I could move out of my apartment he could get his deposit back, pay my bonus, and then I should get my own place and he would pay some of the rent (350,000 /month).

Even though I wanted to move anyway, it made me angry I had to keep asking him to get what he promised in the first place. However, the job wasn't bad, my co-workers were pretty nice, and I had a pretty good relationship with the students. I did want to stay for a while longer.

I got my bonus and pay but he subtracted 150,000 won for "etc expenditures" which is a load of crap. He also failed to give me a month's rent on a new place. I was not about to ask him for another meeting about it. Despite the fact HE was the one being greedy, it would only appear that I was so. Then came the final blow. I had to be out of my apartment on Saturday. Since I had only missed one day of work during the past year (and only had 3 days vacation), I decided I would take Friday off to find a place to stay for a month and start moving. Julie called him to let him know why I wouldn't be in. He flipped his lid and started yelling at her about it. In return she yelled at him for shorting me on my pay and never giving me any benefits, kicking me out of my apartment, not even trying to offer to help me find a place or help move my stuff, etc etc. After the conversation though, I knew I would never work for him again.

He came to my home later and tried to be angry again about me missing work. Then he tried to play it down, likely sensing he was going to lose his teacher and have to pay real money for a new one, and said I could stay in the apartment for another year. His main concern however was the DSL modem which he asked about several times. By this point all my stuff was packed and I had already paid for a yeogwan. I told him I'd think it over, about staying...just to avoid trying to explain everything in Konglish. (A little while later he came back, not to see what my decision was, but to let me know someone would be picking up the modem at 10AM.)

Now instead of having just paid me what he said he would and not raised a fuss over one day, he is out a teacher and will likely have to pay a recruiter and full time benefits.

For me it worked out pretty good anyway. I am positive I wouldn't have gotten the bonus had he not thought I would stay another year. Now I have no job, but I am lucky. I am really happy to be back in Seoul. I am also free for the moment to do whatever I want, and that's a great feeling. I think I'll head off now and get an ice cream and take a walk. It's a beautiful afternoon.

written by shawn matthews    -|link