#Common EPIK Questions

[jikookuntold]

The Untold Truth of "Letter"

Back in 2021, 2022, or even early 2023, if someone had told me about the possibility of JK having vocal credits in Jimin's solo album, I would have called it wishful thinking at best. But it happened, and we got the song "Letter" (AKA Dear Army) as a hidden track in Jimin's first solo album, FACE, with back vocals by JK, and his name written invisibly in the album book.

The perfectly matching vocals of Jikook, with the heartfelt lyrics and soft instruments, undoubtedly made one of the most beautiful songs of the year, which could break many records for Jimin and his album if it was released in the streaming and buying services. The release of Letter as a hidden track in Jimin's solo album raised many questions and debates among Jikookers, and as someone who barely scrolls in the Tumblr app, I know I'm a bit late for the party, but I may or may not have some notes to add to the already made discussions. FYI, these are my analytic views and speculations, I am fully aware that this song has been named "Dear Army", and Jimin called it a "Fan song" on different occasions. So, I do not intend to ignore that and diminish Jimin's expression of love for his fans.

What's a Hidden Track?

Before getting into "Letter", we need to understand what a hidden track is. Well, the definition is pretty clear; When a song is not listed in the official track-list of a music album, but it exists in (some versions of) the physical printed CD, cassette, or LP, it's called a "hidden track". 

Hidden Tracks of BTS

There are several techniques and reasons to "hide" a track in an album, but in the case of BTS discography, the hidden tracks exist for a specific reason, and I'm going to explain it with the only examples we have. The debut album (2013) and Love Yourself: Her (2017), are the only BTS albums including hidden tracks, and if we ignore the skits in each album, "Path" and "Sea" are the only hidden songs BTS ever released. So, these two songs must have something(s) in common and different from the other BTS tracks that caused them to end up as a hidden track. To find that common factor, we need to check their lyrics first:

Path

[Intro: RM] Yeah, wassup? You know, time flows like stars (Check it, check, check, check, check it out) [Verse 1: RM] I started from imitating Eminem, Garion, Epik High To writing my own raps Now I see that I’m already at Hongdae My lyrics back then were all (****) Bossy But we dunno, we dunno When I dreamed without anyone to stop me Reality tied me down and trapped me inside Oh, my youth trapped me My hot heart lost to my cold mind (Damn) As I blindly told myself my decision was right I don’t know whether it’s an angel or a devil, but it says to me "Do you really have any plans to rap properly?" (Yes or no?) I didn’t have more time to hesitate and didn’t want to be stupid So I came here and three years passed by Some say art is long, life is short But for now, art is life Life is sports, just do it, uh [Chorus] If I had chosen a different path, would have I been any different? If I stopped and looked back (Oh hey ya, hey ya) What will I see at the end of this road? Where you should’ve been standing? (Oh hey ya, hey ya) [Verse 2: Suga, Suga & Jungkook] A long time passed and by 2013, I was a trainee for three years I was a high school student who grew overnight (I became a child) White hair grew from my desires and one by one my many friends (Parted ways with me) I spent my time in Seoul alone without a family (That was my third spring) I thought my worries would disappear with my debut ahead of me I closed my eyes to the present that had nothing to change But the reality was different, even as my family and friends tried to stop me I walked into the tunnels that shed no light on my own I thought I would be alone (Why?) As it turns out, there weren’t seven bare feet but we were wearing the shoe named Bangtan We’ll have to go forward, take one more step, become newer And that’s how I spent my fourth spring in Seoul (Whoa) [Chorus] If I had chosen a different path, would have I been any different? (Hey) If I stopped and looked back (Hey) Oh hey ya, hey ya What will I see at the end of this road? Where you should’ve been standing? (Oh hey ya, hey ya) [Verse 3: J-Hope] 2010, the year I walked towards Seoul! I just loved to dance, and now I’m standing on top of the stage Until then, I overcame many pains and scars to prepare myself I survived with my belief to bend, not break, and ran for three years Let the stars inside my heart shine! Now shine on me differently Write “Bangtan” on the paper world I walk my future with more lights on Give a smile to that far future (Ha, ha)

As you can see, the lyrics are simple and self-explanatory, so I guess we don't need any lyrics analysis, and the description section of the Genius translation I used here, says it all:

“길 (Road/Path) follows the member’s decisions to become idols in the Korean music industry. They recall their different upbringings from listening to hip hop in school to the hard years of being trainees under BigHit Entertainment. BTS pose the questions of how their lives would be different if they made a different decision, and they ask themselves what the future entails. A very introspective track about their career for a debut album, BTS display their thought processes as they enter the music scene.”

Sea

[Intro: Jungkook] Oh, ah, yeah [Verse 1: Rap Monster] I just started walking and ended up at the sea I'm looking at the coast from here There's endless sand and the rough wind I'm still looking at a desert I wanted to have the sea so I swallowed you up But I'm even thirstier than before Is what I know really the ocean? Or a blue desert? [Refrain: J-Hope] I don't know, I don't know If I'm feeling the waves right now, yeah I don't know, I don't know If I'm being chased by the sand wind, yeah I don't know, I don't know Is this the sea or the desert? Is this hope or despair? Is this real or fake? Shit [Pre-Chorus: J-Hope] I know, I know, my hardship right now I know, I know, I'll overcome I know, I know, open me up It's the place I can rely on Think positive, I'm swallowing my dry spit Even if I'm nervous, even if I'm in a desert I'm in the beautiful Namib Desert [Chorus: Jimin, Jin] Where there is hope, there is always trial (4) [Hook: V, Jungkook] Where there is hope You know, you know You know, yeah yeah (2) [Verse 2: Suga] I thought this was the ocean but it's a desert A medium-sized, ordinary idol was my second name Countless people get cut from broadcast But someone's empty spot is our dream They say some of these kids can't make it cuz their agency is too small I know, I know, I know too Times when the seven of us had to sleep in one room With foolish hope that tomorrow will be different before we fell asleep We saw the mirage in the desert but we couldn't grasp it Praying that we'll remain in this desert till the end Praying that this isn't truly our reality [Verse 3: Suga] In the end, we reached the mirage and it became our reality The scary desert became the ocean with our blood, sweat and tears But why is there this fear in between the happiness? Because we know too well that this place is really a desert [Refrain 2: Suga] I don't wanna cry I don't wanna rest No, who cares if we rest a little? No no no I don't wanna lose It's always a desert I told you everything Then I'll just be more depressed [Chorus: Jungkook, V] Where there is hope, there is always trial (2) [Hook: Jimin, Jin] Where there is hope You know, you know You know, yeah yeah (2) [Bridge: Rap Monster] Ocean, desert, the world Everything, the same thing Different name I see ocean, l see desert I see the world Everything's, the same thing With a different name It's life again [Hook: V, Jungkook] Where there is hope You know you know you know yeah (2) [Chorus] Where there is hope, there is always trial

Compared to “Path”, we have more innuendos and metaphors in “Sea” because of Namjoon’s lyricism (it was supposed to be in his mixtape at first), but as the description says:

"It discusses the hardships BTS has experienced since debut, particularly struggling to compete with groups from other, larger agencies. In this song, BTS reflects on these hardships, fearing that their global fame and success could leave as suddenly as it arrived."

Common Denominator

These two lyrics have one big thing in common, and it's the topic they are discussing. They talk about the members' struggles, fears, hopes, and dreams career-wise. I was thinking maybe these issues are something they can only share with their longtime fans, not the general public, therefore, they decided to release them as hidden tracks in the physical album for their real fans who buy them, something like the difference between Weverse and Instagram, I guess? Then I realized that’s something Namjoon has mentioned himself to Billboard Magazine, in LYS: Her interview:

And if fans are so lucky to own the physical album, they’ll hear two hidden tracks at the very. Why keep them secretive?

"I think they’re hidden because you have to be a real fan of BTS to understand them. Otherwise, you won’t. Otherwise, you’d like to be, “Why are they feeling so confused about things? They’re good?!? They’re No. 1 somewhere, they have so much stuff, why are they worried?” People always talk about that. But if you are a true fan of BTS and you buy the album and you listen to the hidden track — if you are an Army and we spent time together from 2013, 2014 — they could understand. It’s kind of more special, more closer, to our true hearts"

What about "Letter"?

In conclusion, hidden tracks for BTS, are something between them and their real fans who know about the path they have wended, therefore they can open up to them through lyrics and talk about their fears and struggles and ambitions without being judged or misunderstood. Also, we have to debunk some of the misconceptions going around (especially after the release of FACE) about hidden tracks. For example, some claimed that Letter is made for fans because hidden tracks are always supposed to be “gifts” for fans. This claim obviously can’t be true when you are able to listen to a hidden track legally, only by purchasing the physical album. Gifts are supposed to be free of charge, like Promise, Still with You, Christmas Love, My You, and so on. 

Then what about “Letter”? Why this song is a hidden track in Jimin’s first solo album? Did Jimin want to say something by hiding this track in FACE? To answer this questions, we need to pay attention to the lyrics and how the song was made:

 [Verse 1] What should I say? And how should I convey it? I'm really not getting my words right I know it sounds so clichéd So that it's not taken lightly Let me say it to you properly [Chorus] I say oh-oh, I hope you can be happier You, who stretched your hand out to me whenever I fell I say oh-oh, I'll hold it now (I'll hold it) So when you feel like crying, you won’t fall [Verse 2] After all this time has passed Will we still be the same? Just like we were when we first met, hmm-mmm If we are together, even the desert could turn to a sеa Just like how we were then, oh-hoo-ooh [Chorus] I say oh-oh, I really hope that it’ll last forever You, who felt like a warm spring to me in a cold winter I say oh-oh, I'll always cherish it All those moments between you and I [Refrain] Baby, don't leave Just stay by my side, yeah To you, who see me bigger than what my little self is (to you) So that I can give as much as I’ve received (oh-oh) So that I can keep my word (oh-oh) Don't worry, just stay by my side, yeah (Yeah) We don’t know what the future holds (holds, yeah) And that’s scary and makes us afraid (oh-oh) But don’t forget that we’re always together (don't forget) [Outro] I know it sounds so clichéd So that it's not taken lightly Let me say it to you properly

The Feelings

If you compare these lyrics to "Path" and "Sea" you can clearly see the differences, and except a mention of "sea and desert" there's nothing in common between them. Letter is not a monologue about career issues, it's a romantic song. These lyrics are expressing the feelings and addresses them to an audience and appreciates them. But how was this song made?

According to Jimin, at first, SMF Pt2 was supposed to be the last track of his solo album, but in their YTC promotion and recording era when they announced that they have planned to put their group activities on rest, Jimin decided to express his feelings of the moment through a letter, and turned that letter to song lyrics. Producers liked the song so much and decided to add it in his album and that’s how “Letter” was born. Although Jimin didn’t explain much about those “feelings” and left the conclusion to us like a true artist, we all know that this song is totally different from the other tracks in his album.

All the tracks of FACE are dark and sad. Jimin’s first album is all about himself, and he talks about the painful emotions he had as an artist and a person in the past few year, but with “Letter” there is a different story. Recording Academy admitted this and wrote:

“Though the EP is technically only six songs, the physical version has an additional “hidden” track called “Letter”. The song provides an intimacy that stands out from the other FACE tracks, capturing Jimin in his best form. The lyrics are poignant and vulnerable as Jimin pleads for someone to stay (“Baby, don't leave Just stay by my side, yeah”) The biggest surprise though? Fellow BTS member Jungkook contributes vocals to harmonize with Jimin.”  

A Fan Song?

“Letter” being a “Fan Song” is a stated fact by Park Jimin himself, and there can’t be any arguments about it, but that fact doesn’t mean Jimin made this song with the thought of fans in his head and all about them. In one of my old posts, I said that a faceless crowd can’t be the muse for a romantic song, especially when that song has a "standing-out intimacy".

Another reason for calling "Letter" a fan song, is the fact that it starts at 6:13 of the album, the numbers that remind us of the debut date of BTS. We can't call this a coincidence because we know how thoughtful and punctual Jimin is. But don’t forget that 6.13 is more of BTS time than ARMY time. So, as much as you call this track a song for fans, it can be called a song for his fellow BTS members.

Why JK?

Now, let’s address the elephant in the room. Why JK was a part of this song? Did it mean something for Jimin, or did he have no other options? Jimin said that FACE is an album about himself, and he didn’t feel right about featuring other artists in it, that’s why he decided to record SMF Pt2 all alone and do all the rap parts by himself instead of featuring Yoongi in it. He collaborated with several producers and songwriters (including Namjoon), but there was no featured artist in the whole album.

About the background vocals of the album, he did most parts by himself, and for the other parts, he worked with artists who already had credits in his album, such as BLVSH, Sumin, and James Keys. But JK didn’t have anything to do with Jimin’s album. Jimin was fully capable of doing the background vocals of Letter by himself, as he did for the first parts of the song. Jimin never really explained why he decided to have JK in the song, other than saying their voices match. This known fact doesn’t give us much information, but we can have our speculations. 

Closer Than This?

Another thing that questions the idea of “Letter" being inspired by fans, is the existence of “Closer Than This”. The newest release of Jimin is the exact definition of a fan song, the lyrics are straightforward and directly address the fans and leave no place for speculation. If CTT is the result of Jimin getting inspired by his fans, then “Letter” must be inspired by something different because these two songs are not comparable. 

The difference becomes more obvious when we look at the initial version of the Letter lyrics in Jimin’s drafts. I wonder what the Grammy journalist who called the final lyrics of “Letter” intimate would have said if they read this: 

You hugged me tightly Only you who protected me Hold my hand, hold my hand tightly You who reached out my hand You held out your hand to me

We don’t know what was going on in Jimin’s mind when he wrote these, but we can see that the initial lyrics have been moderated, and the intimate parts, which clearly refer to a person, didn’t end up in the final lyrics. FYI, I’m doing a lyric analysis here, and this is not a complaint or conspiracy theory because Jimin said that he liked the way the final version came out, and it's all that matters.

For Fans, Not About Fans

So far we made it clear that "hidden tracks" are not about fans, they are for fans like any other BTS song, but the hidden tracks are a secret between the artist and the fan, something that only the true and dedicated fan can understand, and this applies to Jimin's "Letter".

Jimin gave up on many records for streaming and buying by releasing this song as a hidden track in his album. So, there must be an important message in this song that he wanted to convey to the true fans. He did his share of being thankful to fans by CTT, and I don't think he needed to do it twice in a year.

Maybe you prefer to think Jimin just made this song for ARMY and hid it in the album as a surprise or because it didn’t match with the whole concept of FACE, and you might not be wrong about any of that. But, don’t forget that he didn’t explain anything about this, and we both are just making assumtions.

Yes, maybe Jimin didn't acknowledge JK being a part of Letter in his promotion era, but JK did everything he could for his share. A few hours before the release of FACE, he started a live and played a part of it with his guitar, and months later, he watched Jimin's live performance for Festa while harmonizing with it and reminding us that he knows the lyrics very well. In Jimin's documentary he was very supportive and even teased for a live performance with him in future.

Why Just Jikook?

Jimin and Jungkook are not the only members of BTS. But I don't know why everytime Jimin or JK do something with romantic undertones, the fans (OT7 ARMYs, to be more specific) immediately try to label it as "About ARMY". I usually don't see this energy with the other five members. I'm perfectly sure they are also very grateful for ARMY, they have released several songs about them, and they would have loved to collaborate in a fan song with Jimin, too.

Then why Jimin only included JK in Letter? Why he wanted to sing for "ARMY" with him? Unless we assume Jimin's gratitude towards ARMY has connections with JK, and I don’t even want to bring up 2019 "I am army" jokes. But "Letter" is the song the most optimistic Jikookers didn't expect to exist. You may try to ignore and normalize it, but you can't deny the fact that Letter proved Jikook's unbreakable connection as two harmonic colleages, long time friends, and inseparable souls.

[btsqualityy]

A question for Mason Kim!

I know you're a very successful producer of kpop music but I was wondering if classical music has been part of your background and if it helped you in some ways. Or any other genre of music that is not kpop or close to that. I hope I explained myself🥰

“I like classical music but it’s not necessarily my favorite. I usually only look to it if I’m looking to produce a song that’s a ballad or something like that. As for different genres though, I grew up listening to a lot of rap artists like Epik High, Nas, and Common so I think that shows in a lot of my music.”

[techforevil-er]

04/12-11/12/2022

Firebreak, Christmas activities and dinners (pt 1), how to work when I'm temporary (but not really).

The programme had the firebreak this week, and despite one of my teams carrying on as normal I had some time to contribute. \o/ I chose to join a group thinking how our product, which recently had its 10th birthday, would be different if it was set up now. I ran a short visioning session where everyone in the group sketched Crazy 8s and a more refined idea and merged them in small groups until it combined all the ideas. I also extracted some principles that were common to all the visions and made a quick service map w/ unanswered questions, building on a session ran by the PM who pitched the idea in the first place. Overall, it was fun but not as different as messing around with a prototype kit that one time. :)

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Team 1 wasn't working together during the firebreak but I had a random reflection on how they're doing icebreakers every day during standup mostly willingly. All it took is a point system and a vague promise of a reward at the end of the quarter. ;)

Big thanks to that Slack I don't go to anymore for recommending The Daily Stand-up Challenge cards. Some of them don't work so well for walking the board and remote so I make new ones as we go.

I need to think what I can improve when joining a team from how things have been going with Team 2. tl;dr - when I started about a month and a half ago it was meant to be a temporary situation while someone was on sick leave and/or another contractor was being recruited. Additionally, for the first two weeks I was waiting for a PM, who then left after the next two weeks. Overall I think I'm the 4th DM the Team's had in the last 6 months. So personally, I've felt a tension between not wanting to mess with the team, seeing stuff that can/needs to be iterated, and being reluctant to take up the team's time with additional process improvement activities (when another DM may want to do things differently...). I think it's generally not helped by the retros only happening monthly but the main lesson for myself when in this situation is... don't wait, and assume you'll be around indefinitely. And just do the PM things if there isn't one around. -\(-__-)/-

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Some work social things happened! Darts, which I inexplicably suck at despite an early lead in some games, and Postal Museum trip including the Mail Rail train ride - which was super fun and you should go on! The postcodes part of the exhibit only lasts until end of December if that's your thing, but I'm sure they'll replace it with something equally fun and geeky. I also bought the most DMy magnet from the museum shop.

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In pottery, I picked up my bowls with cat figurine, dog, and a snake planter that looks like a big poo. 🤨 Goddamn you terracotta, I wish I painted ya!

I learned a new technique, called nerikomi which is working with differently coloured clay instead (or in addition) to using glaze. I made a little bowl with an abstract pattern (which Bella the Cat can use as a water bowl), and a bigger bowl with orange pattern which I am super excited to see! I also made a big platter and a small side plate with different types of 'normal' clay - where terracotta tried to fuck me over by running and being a mare to tidy. Here's hoping it calms down in the glazing and doesn't just look dirty....

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I went to Yauatcha with a friend. It was decent (any place that even serves prawn + beancurd cheung fun is ok in my book) but the desserts were definitely the high point.

I've been watching The Traitors - as a game it's... mediocre. But the casting is amazing. What I really want to do now is play Blood on the Clocktower, let's hope we can at the next xgov games! >:3c

The soundtrack is so camp, I lost my shit when this started playing in ep1.

Oh, and I got the exact Epik High ticket I wanted. \o/

NEXT WEEK

Taking notes at User Research sessions. Hearing insights from a popup research day. Visiting THREE departments (apart from the one I work at). At least two Christmas dinners. Eating all my advent calendar cheeses?! And the Witcher 3 remaster comes out!! \o/

[wheresanne]

Common Teaching in Korea Questions

Exactly a year ago, an old friend told me about the opportunity to go live overseas, travel often, and make money at the same time. 🌍 I asked, “How long will you be gone? What do you do if you don’t like it there? What will you do with your car?”

After a hundred more questions, tons of research, financial planning, organizing the right qualifications, and knowing myself enough to know if I was truly ready for this experience, here I am.

Here are some of the most common teaching English in South Korea questions that I had and most people may have.

If you have any questions about EPIK program or life in Korea, feel free to comment or message me. 

1. What would be your list of pros and cons?

Cons would be the language barrier and culture work environment is different compared to the US. Preparing to return back home sounds difficult so make sure you continue working on your future career so you don't have a gap on your resume.

2. Tips for the application process?

For the application process, use the Internet and search for possible lesson plans and read others’ experiences of teaching and living abroad. I wasn’t originally a teacher, but I often reflect and remember some of my influential teachers, then apply that to my style of teaching. 

3. Tips for the interview process?

For the interview process, since it will most likely be a video chat interview through Skype, remember that the video chat might be a few seconds of the audio delay, so try not to cut off the interviewer’s talking. You should dress nicely and smile a lot since you’ll be seen as a role model and working with children. Keep your answers to one or two full sentences. Talk confidently. Again, do some research online for example questions and answers.

4. Do I have to take the TEFL if I’m going to major in early childhood education with a concentration in English as a second language? (Very important question)

To teach in Korea, you have to be a native English speaker. To teach early childhood education in Korea, you must have a TEFL certificate and you are supposed to have a real education degree.

5. How can you send money back home for cheap? Is the transfer costs very expensive?

Depending on your home country, for example, if your home country is the US, you could send money back home through an American Citi Bank account for a small transaction fee. Your home country bank might charge extra fees. My personal American bank, USAA, charged me $70 when it received $1,000 home.  

6. What are each of your teaching schedules like? (I know they differ) Do you have free time?

I teach 22 hours or classes per week, I talk more about this in my "What is my job in Korea?" YouTube video. I have to be at work 8:30-4:30 M-F. Besides those 22 hours, I'm sitting at my desk preparing for future classes or whatever I want to do.   

Since I teach about 550 students in my middle school, I only visit the 1st and 2nd graders every-other-week and then I teach the 3rd graders every week. 

7. Where was/are you placed? Do you like it there?

Through EPIK Program, I was placed in an Innocity in Naju in Jeollanam province in the south. I love it. Great food and good location.

8. What are your classes like? Elementary, Middle, High? Big? Small?

I teach middle school in a new city. I have about 550 students in total and about 15 to 25 students in each class. 

I also teach an after-school club class, where we video chat Australian students about Korean culture, landmarks, etc.

9. What is your EPIK apartment like? Is it as small as I’ve seen online? (Not that is matters much about size!) And is your bills pretty cheap?

Before coming to Korea, I was expecting to be placed in an older apartment, possibly with mold or cockroaches. 

Through EPIK, I was thankfully placed in the new Innocity in Naju county in Jeollanam province. I love it here because there are tons of fitness centers, tons of cafes, restaurants, a library, Lake Park, and it's a new city with lots of transportation and modern buildings.

My EPIK apartment is a studio office-tel style, so it's in a massive building where I pay $50 a month for the building utilities and then about $20 for my utilities.

10. How long have you been living in Korea?

I've been living in Korea since June 2018 and I was in the August 2018 EPIK intake.

11. If you can speak Korean, will more employers want to hire you?

answer

12. Do any of you have a permanent residency visa? If so, what’s it like? Is it less stressful?

I don’t. I’m on the yearly F2 visa. 

After watching Megan Bowen and World of Dave on YouTube, who have been in South Korea for nearly 10 years now, it seems that sometimes people or Koreans still think they're a foreigner.

13. How many vacation days do you get? Are they flexible or not very flexible?

Vacation days are only allowed around the winter and summer camp schedules, Your contract will say you have 25 paid-leave days total (contracts are slightly different depending on the province you're in) in the contract year.

14. What advice would you give to anyone moving to Korea for the first time?

For anyone moving to Korea for the first time, do lots of research online, come with an open mind, don't forget you're representing your country, and remember why you're coming here. You're not coming here to party, coming here to teach and grow.

15. What are your co-teachers like? Are they helpful?

I have 7 co-teachers since I teach at a bigger sized school. They are so kind and helpful. I’m a fairly independent person and haven’t had many issues, so I don’t often “bug” them, but I know they would help me if needed. At work, they don't ask to see my lesson plans or games. After classes, we often talk for a moment as a way to quickly review how the lesson or class reacted to the lesson. We work together when a speaking test is coming up.

16. Do you make enough to live comfortably? And to save?

I live very comfortably. I barely go shopping for clothing or home decorations, since I’m a very minimal person. I just have the essentials. Also, I don't have to stress about repairing my apartment or my car maintenance. 

17. Do you make your own lesson plans or do you have to teach by a book?

My middle school has a textbook where I teach the Listen and Speak sections with my own extra "real life" examples and then we play a review game. 

18. Do you teach at more than 1 school? If so how many? And is it really stressful?

I only teach at one school. 

19. Can you remember all your students' names? What are some fun ways to memorize all their names?

Since I have many students, my first semester was about memorizing their faces, behaviors, and levels of English in class. By the second semester, I asked for a student-list and tried to take attendance before each class. Since I see most of the students every-other-week, it has taken me almost two semesters to learn their names.

If I ever see them outside of the school in my neighborhood, I ask them “How are you, what’s your name again?” as a good way to practice their English too. 

Some students have English names, perhaps from their English hagwon academies. If they don’t have an English name, at the beginning of the semester, I offer them a list of popular English names from their 2006-8 birth years.

I remember their names by remembering somethings similar in English. 유빈 Yoo-bin sounds like "You Bin"

20. Is your commute to work long?

I bought a bicycle from an online Facebook flea market group and then I every day I ride my bike for about 10-15 minutes. I could walk for 30 minutes, or I could take a bus but that'll cost me about 2,000 won every day.

21. What is the most rewarding part of teaching in Korea?

I really like the comfortable life here.

22. What are some culture do’s and don’ts that are important to know?

Culture do's would be to remember it's not your country. Make friends with almost everyone, but remember your boundaries.

23. How do you deal with homesickness and stress?

For homesickness or stress, I often go for a walk or bike ride in nature, which reminds me of my hometown or eat pizza or a hamburger. And catch up with family and old friends via Facebook.

24. How have you changed since living in Korea?

Living completely alone can be difficult and different for some people. I have so much free time here. I think my sense of fashion style has changed too.

25. Do you have a Korean phone plan? How much is it a month?

I pay $70 a month for my 100GB phone data plan for my iPhone bc I often travel around Korea so data is important to me.

You can get the Korean phone plan after you get your ARC number, almost a month after living here. You can easily get a SIM card from the convenience stores or from the airport. 

26. Last but not least, what are some encouraging words you would give to those who want to teach in Korea!? 

Only teach if you actually like kids and are a patient person. If you don't get accepted through EPIK, or JLP, or TaLK, don't forget to apply through hagwons!  

[namchyoon]

This is a very serious and deep question,” says RM, the 26-year-old leader of the world’s biggest band. He pauses to think. We’re talking about utopian and dystopian futures, about how the boundary-smashing, hegemony-overturning global success of his group, the wildly talented seven-member South Korean juggernaut BTS, feels like a glimpse of a new and better world, of an interconnected 21st century actually living up to its promise. 

BTS’ downright magical levels of charisma, their genre-defying, sleek-but-personal music, even their casually nontoxic, skin-care-intensive brand of masculinity — every bit of it feels like a visitation from some brighter, more hopeful timeline. What RM is currently pondering, however, is how all of it contrasts with a darker landscape all around them, particularly the horrifying recent wave of anti-Asian violence and discrimination across a global diaspora.

“We are outliers,” says RM, “and we came into the American music market and enjoyed this incredible success.” In 2020, seven years into their career, BTS’ first English-language single, the irresistible “Dynamite,” hit Number One, an achievement so singular it prompted a congratulatory statement from South Korea’s president, Moon Jae-in. The nation has long been deeply invested in its outsize cultural success beyond its borders, known as the Korean Wave.

“Now, of course, there is no utopia,” RM continues. “There’s a light side; there’s always going to be a dark side. The way we think is that everything that we do, and our existence itself, is contributing to the hope for leaving this xenophobia, these negative things, behind. It’s our hope, too, that people in the minority will draw some energy and strength from our existence. Yes, there’s xenophobia, but there are also a lot of people who are very accepting. . . . The fact that we have faced success in the United States is very meaningful in and of itself.”

At the moment, RM is in an acoustically treated room at his label’s headquarters in Seoul, wearing a white medical mask to protect a nearby translator. a black bucket hat, and a black hoodie from the Los Angeles luxury label Fear of God. As RM has had to explain too many times on U.S. talk shows, he taught himself his fluent English via bingeing Friends DVDs. Still, he makes understandable use of the interpreter when the conversation gets complex.

RM is a fan of complexity. He was on a path toward an elite university education before a love of hip-hop, first sparked by a Korean group, Epik High, detoured him into superstardom. Bang Si-hyuk, the cerebral, intense-yet-avuncular mogul-producer who founded BTS’ record company, Big Hit Entertainment (now HYBE), signed RM first, in 2010, and gradually formed BTS around the rapper’s talent and magnetism. “When I first met RM,” says Si-hyuk, “I felt a sense of duty that I must help him grow to become a great artist after acknowledging his musical talents and ways of thinking.”

RM carries himself with a level of gravitas that was perhaps incongruent with his initial stage name of Rap Monster, officially shortened in 2017. He drops quotes from Nietzsche and the abstract artist Kim Whan-ki in interviews, and celebrated his 26th birthday by donating nearly $85,000 to a museum foundation to support the reprinting of rare fine-art books. He and Suga fill their rhymes with double- and triple-entendres that would impress U.S. hip-hop heads who’ve never thought much about BTS.

It’s not uncommon for the members of BTS to shed a tear or two while they’re addressing fans onstage. Along with their comfort with makeup and iridescent hair dye, it all plays into their instinctive rejection of rigid conceptions of masculinity. “The labels of what being masculine is, is an outdated concept,” says RM. “It is not our intention to break it down. But if we are making a positive impact, we are very thankful. We live in an age where we shouldn’t have those labels or have those restrictions.”

“When we wrote those songs, and those messages, of course, it wasn’t from some knowledge or awareness of the education system in the United States or anywhere else,” says RM. “We were teenagers at that time. There were things we were able to say, from what we felt and from our experiences about the unreasonableness of school, or the uncertainties and the fears and anxieties that teens have. And a common thought and a common emotion resonated with youth, not just in Korea, but in the United States, and the West.”

In 2018, BTS negotiated a renewal of their contract with Si-hyuk’s company, committing to another seven years as a band. In the process, they were given a financial stake in HYBE. “It’s very meaningful,” says RM, “for us and also the company, that we admit and recognize each other as true partners. Now Big Hit’s success is our success, and our success is Big Hit’s success.” It also meant a multimillion-dollar windfall for the group when HYBE went public last year. “That’s very important,” RM says with a grin.

[0613magazine]

221101 Rolling Stone

‘What If I Don’t Like Music Anymore?’: A Wildly Honest Conversation Between BTS’ RM and Pharrell Williams

BTS and Pharrell have a secret collab coming — and that's just one of the revelations from this meeting of two superstars

AT THIS POINT in their reign as the world’s biggest band, the members of BTS are accustomed to hero worship and nervous fans. But as that group’s leader, RM, sits across from Pharrell Williams in early September, onstage in an empty, secured auditorium at Los Angeles’ Museum of Contemporary Art, he’s unnerved to find himself on the other side of the equation. It feels “embarrassing,” RM says with a smile, to talk about his artistic journey in front of “my own idol.”

Williams, eternally youthful and smooth-skinned (needless to say), is relaxed and full of small talk, in a leather jacket, matching leather shorts, boots, and a blinding array of ice-studded jewelry on one wrist. RM, in a Bottega Veneta double-breasted brown suit, is quieter, seemingly shuffling through the many questions he’s prepared in his head. 

For all these two men have in common, thousands of miles and a couple of decades separated their coming of age. From the distance of Virginia Beach in the Eighties, a young Williams was able to observe the growth of hip-hop almost from its birth, before becoming a key force in that genre and many others as one half of the Neptunes and on his own. When RM was growing up outside of Seoul, rap had already gone global, to the point where Nas, Eminem, and local groups like Epik High could seduce a studious South Korean kid into devoting his life to music — which, after some twists and turns, led him to BTS instead of the underground hip-hop career he imagined.

Both artists move between behind-the-scenes work and performing. In addition to producing and writing for BTS, RM has done the same for songs by many other South Korean artists; Williams has been striking that balance like no one else since the Clinton administration — this year alone, he’s produced tracks for Kendrick Lamar, Pusha T, and Rosalía, while enlisting 21 Savage and Tyler, the Creator for his own single “Cash In Cash Out.”

Even before this conversation, Williams and RM joined forces. As Williams reveals, he recently recorded a song with BTS, working remotely, for his next album. RM has a debut solo album of his own on the way, and during their conversation, Williams makes him an enticing offer related to it.  A few weeks after this conversation, BTS’ label, Hybe, announces that the group’s members will be serving mandatory military service and will focus on solo work before reuniting in 2025. Today, RM is frank about the fact that he and BTS are at a crossroads in their lives and career, and he’s unafraid to ask for Yoda-style advice from someone whose nonstop shape-shifting has been rewarded with unmatched, decade-spanning success.

RM: I just want to point out [your 2006 solo song] “Take It Off (Dim the Lights).” Because that was on one of my playlists. I even translated it into Korean and recorded it once when I was an amateur.

Williams: Whoa! That’s crazy.

RM: These days genre doesn’t mean anything. But at that time, I think some rappers criticized the rappers who sing or use Auto-Tune. Sometimes you sing, sometimes you rap, sometimes you just sing the hook. So how do you position yourself when you participate in a song as a performer?

Williams: Wow. First of all, no one’s ever asked me that, believe it or not. I make decisions based off feeling. I don’t make them based off of convention.

Listen to the ‘Musicians on Musicians’ podcast featuring RM and Pharrell Williams

RM: “I got to rap.” “I got to sing.”

Williams: Yeah, no. It’s just whatever it feels like it needs. And I’m going to channel it as best as I can, because I’m trying to tell somebody else who’s better than me to do it. Oftentimes, what would happen was artists will be like, “Nah, we want you to stay on there.” And I’ll be like, “No, but it’s for this person.” I channel what I feel like is missing, and I forget that it’s going to be me. Because if I think that it’s going to be me, then it won’t be as good, and I won’t be as confident. For example, there’s a record that I did with Mystikal a long time ago—

RM: Wow!

Williams: Yeah. “Shake Ya Ass.” Right? Chad [Hugo] and I produced it together. But when I was writing that hook, I was pretending that Eddie Kendricks from the Temptations could do it. I remember saying to them, “Oh, man, we’re going to get the guy from the Temptations to do it.” And they were like, “Nah, no. The record company wants you to stay on there.” It was this weird thing where I started to realize that my sweet spot is when I channel other people and I surrender to what the music needs and not let my ego or my feelings get involved.

RM: As a team, we’ve been to the U.N., and we also met President Biden. We never thought these things [would happen], but I think naturally we became one of the representatives from the Asian community. I’m always thinking to myself, “Am I that good? Do I deserve all the responsibilities?” And I’m really doubting myself. I’ve heard that you do a lot of stuff for the community. So I wonder how you deal with all the responsibilities to be good and moral.

Williams: I mean, the [charity] work that I do, there’s always a circumstance. Either I’d say some dumb shit and then regret it later, or there’s been a time when I have a record that sort of affected a certain portion of a demographic. So then it made me think about things differently. And then I go set up a [nonprofit] and act against the ignorance that I was a part of. And educate myself, enlighten myself. Then other times, I also do it because of what you just said. 

When you ask yourself, “Man, am I good enough?” Or, “Do I deserve all this?” I think what makes it easier for me to sleep at night is when I go do that work. It helps answer those questions. It’s like, wherever there was a deficit in your confidence of you deserving to be here or getting that kind of awe from the fans, wherever the minus is, this adds to it. 

RM: I hope all of my confusion and these stupid thoughts will help my life get better, [and I can] be a better grown-up for the fans.

Williams: What people don’t realize is when you have literally hundreds of millions of fans and you encounter them 100,000 at a time . . .

RM: Can’t notice a single face. It’s just a mass.

Williams: It is a massive energy coming at you, and you say, “Jump.”

RM: Then they jump.

Williams: Then they jump. And you sing, and they sing every word. And you can feel through their voices that so many of their lives have been affected and changed because of something you’ve done. I don’t know how you do that. Because I’ve had a couple songs do that, and then when I get out there and go sing it, that would make me cry because it was too much of a responsibility. Man, every time I get that close to that, I always step back.

RM: Why? Is it too heavy?

Williams: It’s too heavy, man. It’s too much of a responsibility. That’s why I really revere people like yourself and your band members and other artists like Bey and Jay and even Kanye — like, man, what y’all go out there and go face every night on that stage? It is humbling and it’s overwhelming. And sometimes your nervous system has got to be built for that. Let me ask you this, how do you deal after you come off the stage, feeling electrified and shocked every night, how do you decompress?

“I’m a human and I really get nervous and I sometimes get depressed by, and even get swallowed by, all the energies,” RM says. “But I try to deal with it because I love the music.”

RM: My first performance was in front of 10 people in some small clubs when I was, like, 15. And I forgot most of the lyrics. So at that time I realized, “Oh, I’m not a star type. I’m not one of these frontmen who could enjoy all this shit like Kurt Cobain or Mick Jagger.” I’m just a human who loves writing music.

For example, we had these stadium shows in Las Vegas last April. It was four nights. But every night is a challenge. After we finish the first three songs and then we take out the earphones and we’re like, “We’re fucking back” — from that moment, there’s a different persona, a different me for the next two hours and a half. But before that, from the rehearsal and even in the plane, I got really, really nervous and [feel] so responsible, because I really am aware that fans buy the tickets and they come from Brazil, from Japan, Korea, from everywhere. They come there for just that one night.

So it fills me, like I have to pay back. I have to offer them the best night ever in their lives. So it’s a mess, and it’s too much energy. I’m a human and I really get nervous and I really sometimes get depressed by, and even get swallowed by, all the energies. But I try to deal with it because I love the music. I love their love. Because I think love is really happening when we give to somebody, not when we take. So I just want to give back to them. They brought us from just a small city in Korea, all the way back to the heart of this music industry, Las Vegas, L.A., New York. Me having an interview with Pharrell, it could happen because of fans all over the world. I’m just always grateful and I don’t want to disappoint them. 

BTS are currently in what your bandmate SUGA described as an “offseason” — which got mistranslated as a “hiatus” — with more focus on solo work for the moment. RM, you’ve said that to a certain extent, you feel like you’ve lost a sense of direction for the group.

Williams: I definitely had my struggles with having a lack of a sense of purpose.

RM: When?

Williams: Right around [2006], when I put out In My Mind. As soon as it didn’t do what I wanted it to do — I mean, culturally it made an impression, but egotistically it didn’t perform the way I wanted it to. It just didn’t do what I was used to at that time, and that really hit me hard. So that made me start to think about purpose and things having real true DNA and not just aesthetic purpose, but real true meaning and something that could be meaningful to people, but at the same time, still fun. And I’ve always loved the girls, so that was always going to be a part of it [laughs]. 

So I understand what that is. I know what it’s like to hit that place in your career for whatever reason — and you guys are doing fine, but I think from what I’m hearing and what I’m understanding, you guys, you hit a place where you were like, “What are we doing? Who are we? Are we who we said we were?”

RM: Right.

Williams: And as you think about who you are and you think about what you mean and what your intentions are, it’s also kind of determining who you want to be. I mean, how’s that feel? Like, where are you in that process right now? Because you’re working on a solo record, right?

RM: Yes. Like 90 percent of the work is done. I’ve released some mixtapes as one of the members of the band, but it was just an experiment. I think this time it’s maybe my official first solo album. But it’s been, like, 10 years since we had our debut as a team. K-pop is all about the band and the groups. And as I told you, I personally started my career as a rapper and as a poet. So that was a tricky part actually, because K-pop is like a mix. It’s the mix of American pop music, other visuals, Korea, and social media and stuff. It’s really intense and really hectic. So it has some pros and cons of its own. 

After 10 years, I think it was not our intention, but we actually became a sort of a social figure, and we took it. So a K-pop band going to have a speech at the U.N. or meeting the president, I think I was really confused and I’m like, “What am I, a diplomat or what?”

Williams: Right, yeah.

RM: I was just a small rapper and lyricist when I was young. So it was 10 years, really intense as a team. And I actually was in charge of almost all of the interviews and representing the team in front of the other members. That was my role, I guess. I think I got really . . . I don’t know, “Yo, I got to stop this for a bit. I got to shut it down and fall away from it and then just see what’s going on,” making my mind really calm down. That’s how I got to concentrate on my solo [album]. These days I really have been thinking about when I first listened to you, the first feeling and the vibe, and the reason why I started, why I chose music for my whole life, I guess.

When I started my music, I was like 14, and now I’m 28. So I’m in that process. It’s really tricky and confusing, and I just don’t know what’s going to happen. So if you could give me any advice, because it’s different from the K-pop, but you’ve done a lot of projects, like, N.E.R.D, Neptunes, and of course your solo work. So any thoughts about . . . ?

Williams: Being in the Neptunes, being in N.E.R.D, and having a solo record really helped me, because you do one thing and then you take a break. You do another thing, then you take a break. And it allows me to put on different hats and put on different masks. So I understand that, and I know having that departure is going to make it really fresh for you. I think it’s good for you to do that because then when you come back to it, to the group—

RM: To the team.

Williams: Yeah, I think it’s going to be super fresh. Who are the producers on your solo record?

RM: Sometimes we do our stuff on our own, and there’s an in-house team always working with us in the label. Sometimes we get our songs from outside too. It’s flexible. You produce maybe sometimes with Chad or just on your own, right? Is that a lot of work?

Williams: For me, it’s like Michelangelo when he was making sculptures. He’s just . . . and I’m going to screw this up, but his whole thing was he was just getting rid of the rocks that were in the way of the sculpture, something to that effect. It’s the same thing. I’m just carving away at it and adding layers until I feel like it’s right. And then if I feel like I need some help, then I’ll reach out to somebody. My ego would get in the way when I was younger, but now my loyalty is not to my ego.

RM: What is it to?

Williams: It’s to the song. It’s how do we make the song the absolute best? That’s where I’m at now.

And I don’t want to do anything that just feels like, “Oh, that’s cool, that’ll fit.” No, I don’t want to fit. I want to knock the wall down and want to set the whole entire block on fire. Not one room, the block. Not the house, the block on fire. I want it to be on the news at night. Listen: “Block on fire.”

RM: Block on fire. B.O.F., block on fire. That’s a cool name for a brand, actually. 

Sometimes as I grow up — and I’m between my chapter one and two, like I said, the group and solo; maybe I’m between music and maybe [visual] art, between that. So sometimes I really feel afraid, like, “What if I don’t like music anymore?” I love art. But it’s somewhat different.

Williams: It is.

RM: It is. Music is like, it’s everywhere. I’m sad, but it’s everywhere. Sometimes I really feel afraid — like, music, it’s not my first thing anymore, sort of like that.

Williams: Yeah. That’s temporary.

RM: Oh, really? I’m relieved.

Williams: Yeah. Then all of a sudden you go, “Whoa. It’s the only thing I want to think about.” It’ll happen.

RM: What do you get from visual art, fine art?

“How do we make the song the absolute best?” Williams says. “I don’t want to do anything that just feels like, ‘Oh, that’ll fit.’ No, I don’t want to fit. I want to set the whole entire block on fire.”

Williams: I think for every modality that we have, every submodality that we have, meaning visual, olfactory, gustatory, kinesthetic, auditory, it’s pretty much all the same. Like with food, something can taste sweet or sour. Things can smell sweet or sour. Visually we can see something that looks sweet to us and something that’s sour. With the auditory, we can hear something that is so sweet and so pleasant, and then we can hear something that’s like, “Ooh, sour,” you know? 

And so I really get enjoyment by working with artists in different artistic disciplines to determine where the congruence is. Like, “Oh, wow, that’s your sweet. Oh, that’s your sour.” You know? 

RM: A fun thing for me with visual art is that when I listen to some great music, I’m blown away, but still, sometimes I feel really jealous. It [can be] really, really painful. So it’s funny, right? But for visual art, I just won’t draw a single line because I want to remain as an outsider. But I’m a lover. I’m a fan. I’m a maniac. So when I look at all the paintings and maybe sculptures, I just feel really relieved because I can love it as much as I can.

Williams: That’s awesome.

RM: Any new projects coming up for you?

Williams: Well, my project, it’s called . . . it’s [under] my name, and the title of the album is Phriends. It’s the volume one. You guys [BTS] are on there, obviously. And I’m actually talking about this way more than I’m supposed to, but it’s a song from my album that [BTS] sang and it’s amazing, and I’m super grateful.

RM: I just love this song.

Williams: I love it too.

RM: Fuck, yeah.

Williams: Everyone that hears it is like, “Whoa.”

RM: I fucking love it.

Williams: I love it, love it, love it. But I’m just going to put this out there. You said you’re 90 percent done with your solo album. But if within that last 10 percent, if you need — you don’t need me, but I mean . . . 

RM: I always needed you, for 15 years.

Williams: OK, well, if you want to do something, we can actually do it.

RM: Please.

Williams: Yeah, and you tell me what you want. Uptempo? We go uptempo.

RM: I’m honored and grateful.

Pharrell, any final words of advice for RM?

Williams: You know what? I would just say continue to move forward. Continue to be curious. And don’t put any kind of pressure on what it is that you do by saying . . . No absolutes, like “Oh, I will never do music again,” or “I will never . . . ” I wouldn’t do any of that. I would just—

RM: No nevers.

Williams: No nevers. Just stay along for the ride. Just keep going.

RM: Cruising.

Williams: Yeah. And just see where you end up. Because it’s really interesting.

Source: Rolling Stone

[commajade]

random question but do you have any thoughts to share about remakes of older korean songs? some that come to mind for me are dahye's poison, txt's fairy of shampoo, big naughty's girl at the coffee shop (remake of tobacco shop lady)... personally I have no attachment to the original songs (although it's nice to discover new music this way) so I was wondering what your perspective may be (also are there any songs you'd like to see given a new spin?)

i made a little post about it here!

here's the text from it it was originally tags on an audio post:

and i can't find the post i made but lee sunhee said that she feels like her songs aren't alive until someone else sings them too and that's a very good explanation of korean music and remakes. covers being made means the songs are still alive and it's a very specific artform for a performer to be good at selecting a song to cover and reinvent.

i love remakes and i love remake albums especially! girls generation by snsd is possibly the best kpop remake of all time i can't believe a man wrote that song. and there's a lot of remakes that r so good people associate the song with the second artist more than the first. brown eyed girls' entire revive album was amazing. i think my faves r a common love story (yoon sang) and sorrow (g.o.d). i love iu's flower bookmark albums. be natural by red velvet being an s.e.s. remake was very unexpected it was my fave besides automatic in the early reve days. sunset glow by big bang is unfortunately still iconic. and epik high's eyes nose lips iconic. all of ohhyuk's remakes.

i want chungha to do a harisu remake, red velvet to do red angel by s.e.s. i want onew to duet with lena park again but it's you in my arms by yoo jaeha. i honestly love covers and remakes and want lots and lots of them?

[koreanstudytips]

Talk To Me In Korean

Since I’m always talking about Talk To Me In Korean, I figured I’d do a more in-depth post about them.

Grammar Text Books:

These books are based off of their online lessons and podcasts. As of now, only levels 1-5 are available. Every book has between 25 and 30 lessons. Each lesson includes some information about the topic, plenty of examples, a sample dialogue, and a quick exercise to review what you learned. Also, there is a free audio download for any text that is highlighted in purple.

Here’s an inside look for levels 1-4:

Level 1 / Level 2 / Level 3 / Level 4

Work Books:

The work books are designed to be used in conjunction with the audio lessons and/or the text books. They help to review and reinforce what you learned.

Here’s an inside look for levels 1-3:

Hangeul Master Book:

This book is designed to help you read and write Hangeul, the Korean alphabet. It also offers pronunciation tips. I found this  book especially helpful for reading and writing Hangeul like Native Koreans do. The book is also offered in Spanish.

The Korean Verbs Guide:

This is a bundle of two books with 50 verbs in each. These books are designed to help you understand how commonly used verbs are conjugated and used.

Here’s an inside look at the books.

My Weekly Korean Vocabulary:

There are two books in this series. Each is designed to be used over the course of 12 weeks. Everyday you will learn new vocabulary word along with 20 additional phrases. 

Here’s an inside look at the books.

Korean Q&A Sentence Patterns:

This books introduces some commonly used sentence patterns for interview questions and everyday life. There are 50 questions, divided into 10 different categories, and each question is followed by 3 more similar questions. Each sample answer is also followed by 3 more possible answers. Most questions have a sample dialogue and study notes.

Here’s an inside look of the book.

Other Books:

Survival Korean: Essential phrases you need to know while traveling or living in Korea.

Korean Phrasebook For Travelers: Designed for those traveling in Korea.

My Daily Routine In Korean:   A picture dictionary designed to help you learn everyday Korean words and expressions through convenient visual aids.

Korean Slang Expressions: Learn Korean slang expressions that are used on a daily basis in South Korea.

Everyday Korean Idiomatic Expressions: This book is designed to help you make sense of some of the idiomatic expressions often used by Koreans and give you the know-how to be able to use the expressions yourself in your conversations in Korean. 

My First 500 Korean Words: “Each word is accompanied by many related words and expressions, so in the end you will be learning thousands of useful Korean expressions, in context.”

Real Life Korean Conversations for Beginners: “Going to a wedding? Want to see that new movie? Starting a budding romance? Once you’ve studied with this book, you’ll have no problem doing those things in Korean! Real Life Korean Conversations for Beginners includes 80 different dialogues taken from real life so you can navigate through social situations in Korean with ease.”

Recommended Reading: 

Can I Call The Police? (신고해도 되나요?): An award winning, elementary level Korean story. 

Penguin Loves Mev: Comic books based off of a popular webtoon. There are two books that can be purchased as a set or separately.

Blonote (Korean Edition + English Edition Set) + 1CD by TABLO From Epik High: Blonote by Tablo comes with both a Korean and English version along with a CD and a downloadable vocabulary book.

My Korean Husband: A comic book based off online cartoons. The book is in both Korean and English.

보통의 존재 - Common Being: Short stories expressing the author's thoughts and experiences about various topics: life, love, work, death, food, etc.

If you are planning to purchase any of these books, I have a 10% off referral code for your first purchase. Disclaimer: when the code is used I receive 50 rewards points.

[favekdramas]

I've seen that you did EPIK at one point or another. Did you have to know a considerable amount of Korean before going? I have applied and I am thinking about difficulties with immersion and daily life since I speak very little to no Korean.

Hi, @roidecheveux!

Thanks for the question! That’s exciting that you’ve applied! I’m actually still in Korea teaching; my contract is from August to August. 

Anyway, my Korean skills were quite low when I applied, but I did study the alphabet, common expressions, and started learning some grammatical points. I highly recommend you at least learn the alphabet…it’ll help a lot! But there are plenty of people with little to no language ability here and they seem to be fine. I think it’s also a matter of respect that if you’re living and working here for a year, we should try and learn some of the language so we aren’t always speaking English to people. Plus, if you’re placed super rural like me, a lot of people don’t speak English.

I would suggest you use Talk to Me in Korean to study. Their podcasts are short and help you get down the pronunciation. They also have textbooks!

To learn the alphabet, I used Korean from Zero, which has a free online textbook. You can also purchase a physical copy.

 I also used dramas as listening activities to see if I could hear the words/sentences/grammar points that I’d be studying.

If you want to get really into it, How to Study Korean is an amazingly comprehensive online study resource focusing on grammar.

Good luck, and let me know if you have any questions!! :D (And let me know where you get placed!)

[kaitlinmcandrews]

Hello friends and family! This post isn’t for you haha. Sorry.  I suppose you can read it, but I really wanted to give information to people applying to teach in Asia; specifically, Japan and Korea.

Before Pat and I applied anywhere, I couldn’t find any information on which country would suit us better. So, before I continue, this is entirely my own experience. Take what I write in here with a grain of salt. The smallest things can not only change your experience, but what I value may drastically differ from what you might find important.

I’ll try to break it down into the following categories so skip ahead to the points that interest you if you don’t want to read this whole thing haha. (You can press the link in the table of contents to jump to that point.)

Teaching English – Our Experience

Qualifications  (general)

Application

Schedule

Teaching style

Holidays and days off

Pay

Daily life

Cost of Living

Food

Toilets

Language

English

Fashion

Attitude towards foreigners

Travel

Teaching English

This entire post is mostly catered to those that will be coming over to teach English. It is the most common way that people are able to live over here. I have no knowledge about other ways to get a job in either country, so I can’t really comment on that.

There are essentially 2 different paths you can take for each country; you can teach at a private school or public school. We have taught at a private school in both countries and for a public school in Japan. We are currently applying for a public school in Korea.

The common public school options for Korea are EPIK and GEPIK. For Japan, it’s Interac or JET. The JET programme is the highest paying, but the most difficult to get.

https://www.epik.go.kr:8080/index.do

http://gepik-tek.weebly.com/

http://www.interacnetwork.com/recruit/global.html

http://jetprogramme.ca/ (Canada), https://jetprogramusa.org/ (USA)

  Qualifications and Applying

To teach in Korea or Japan, it was necessary that you have a 4 year bachelor’s degree in anything. I took an Applied Business Degree with a major in accounting. Patrick took a Bachelor of Arts with a major in history. The reason it is mandatory has to do with the Visa requirements. If you come on a holiday visa or spousal visa, you may be able to get a job at a private school, but it is quite rare (personally, I haven’t heard of anyone doing this so it may not even be possible.)

If you are looking to teach at a public school, it is most definitely a requirement. The 4 year degree can be in anything. You don’t have to major in Asian studies, teaching, or anything like that. Some places will pay higher if you have your teaching license or a master’s in education.

Secondly, you should take a TEFL/TESL/TESOL course. They are all the same thing. There is no official requirement for this certificate, but it helps. Some schools do require it, so you may as well get it. Again, some places will pay higher if you have it.

We took the 100 hour TESL course with Oxford Seminars. 60hours of it was classroom time and 40 hours was an online grammar component. The course was really good. We had class for 10hours on Saturday and Sunday for 3 weeks. Our teacher was someone who had taught ESL, so she was able to give us a lot of useful information and was able to answer any questions or concerns we had about the process.

Lastly, there are some documents that you will need to get once you have started your application process. You will most likely send in an application form along with picture ID and a resume. When we applied to EPIK, we needed 2 reference letters at this time. At other places, they were needed later. If you are worried about not getting the correct documents, I recommend going through a recruiter. We used Oxford (the school we took our TEFL certificate with) to help us find our private school positions.

Once you have been accepted for the job most schools, or recruiting agencies, will require a notarized copy/apostille of your degree, your TEFL certificate, your passport, and your criminal record check. FYI, the criminal record check needs to be the national one (it sounds like common sense, but trust me, it’s easy to make the mistake…) and it can take a long time. You cannot travel without it, so get it done quickly. It needs to be less than 6 months old, so don’t get it too early either. You will also need to send in your original transcripts, your signed contract with the school and any additional documents they request.

Okay, that’s about all I’m going to talk about for the general stuff. From here on it is what I experienced at each step of the way. As you will see, I can’t speak about the JET Programme or any of the Korean Public school system.

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~Our Application~

The first place we applied to was JET. Unfortunately, my husband got on the waiting list, but I didn’t even make it to the interview. So, I really can’t give much information on the JET programme except that it is a lot of paperwork and starts really early. You start the process in October to start in the following September. So, nearly a year early!

*Warning* Applications for the September start are basically over by March. So, if you apply for the JET program, apply for other places as well. You don’t get your results until late February or early March.

Around the time we were aware that we weren’t going to be part of the JET programme, our choices were extremely limited. We utilized the career search option that Oxford Seminars offered. We were able to get a position in Korea at a hagwon (a private school).

As for applying for Korea, the process is not too bad. We had a phone interview with the director of the school. We had an awkward 3-way call, but it went alright. When we found out we received the job, we were sent our contract and had a chance to review it, sign it and send it back. From there, the visa process took place. We needed to send our TESL certificates, bachelor’s degrees, criminal record checks, transcripts, passport copies, and the hagwon contracts to the Korean embassy in Vancouver. Since we are pretty far from Vancouver, we had to send notarized copies of all our documents by mail with the visa application form.

Once the visa application was accepted, we had to send our passports to the embassy. They put the visa in the passport and sent it back. Once that is all settled, you will organize when they want you to arrive. Depending on your school or agency, you may pay for the flight and they will reimburse you OR they will purchase the flight for you. The schools in Korea usually pay for the flight (and return flight when you finish) and your accommodation. Schools in Japan, apart from JET, usually don’t.

While we were finishing our contract at the hagwon, we needed to decide what we were doing for the next school year. We planned on staying at our school, but certain circumstances prevented that from happening. Once again, we were in a time crunch. We didn’t know that we weren’t staying until around April. We really weren’t interested in working for another private school (they can be kind of risky… I’ll talk about that later). Desperate, we contacted Oxford to help us out to find a position in a public school in Japan or Korea.

We tried to apply to GEPIK, but due to the fact that we were applying as a married couple AND we were applying late (applications open in February), we were told that we probably wouldn’t get placed together. That obviously would not have been ideal so we cancelled our application. At this point, it was around June or so. We asked our recruiter at Oxford to find anything in Japan for us, even private school.

Japan is quite difficult to apply to and they are very specific and picky. Most companies would only interview you, in person, in your home country or in Japan. If you weren’t living in Japan, you couldn’t interview in Japan. We obviously weren’t going to fly all the way back to Canada to do an interview. There was one company willing to do a skype interview. One. Again, if we applied earlier this wouldn’t have been such an issue, maybe.

We gave our application form, an essay about why we wanted to teach in Japan and a resume to the recruiter. For some reason, we didn’t need a criminal record check or notarized copies. I had scanned versions of our degrees, TEFL certificate and passports. That seemed to be sufficient for this company. It took a while to get our visas finalized.  We had a skype interview with a representative first and then once that was successful, we had an interview with the company. We were working in Korea at the time so the paperwork was absolutely awful. There were a lot of documents that had to be mailed, filled out, signed, and mailed back. The process took a long time. I think if you were applying from Canada, you would have an easier time honestly.

To make matters worse, we had to leave our home at the end of August. We took a 1 month vacation in Thailand while we waited for everything to get sorted out. Once the visa documents came in, we flew back to Korea and went to the Japanese Embassy in Seoul. It was difficult and frustrating because of the language barrier and such, but we made it. This company was one of the few that pays for your flight so that was nice.

Now, again, I think we had a unique experience so I doubt anyone will have quite the same experience. But I’ll talk about it anyways. The first thing I did when we applied was look up the company on Google. Now, of course, there will always be more bad reviews than positive, but don’t take them lightly. Really see what people are complaining about and it will help you with the interview process. For example, this particular company had many negative reviews regarding travel, so I was able to ask about the travel. Some things are more important to some people and may not be important to you, so do your research.

Okay, sorry, that was a tangent. But, both of these private schools had some pretty negative comments online and we experienced a lot of the same negative situations, so just be aware. After 8 months at this school, we changed again. This time, because we really didn’t enjoy where we worked. I’ll talk about that in more detail later as well. We applied to Interac; a public school company in Japan. It isn’t run by the government, but placements are in public schools. Since we already had a Japanese visa, we really didn’t have to do a lot of paperwork at all. We needed to give an application form and our scanned copies of our documents. Before we could work, we had to change our visa type. This was a simple process of bringing the required documents from Interac to the immigration office with our residence card. It was annoying, but easily doable.

Lastly, this brings us to present day. We are currently applying to EPIK. We miss Korea and would love to go back before we head back to Canada. Applications open in February and they take applications on a first come first serve basis. When you apply, you need to fill out an application form, attach a passport photo and 2 recommendation letters from past employers or professors. If you are a student, one of the letters needs to be from a professor. That’s as far as we got with that. Unfortunately, we didn’t make it to the interview stage, so I can’t comment much on EPIK. Sorry.

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~Schedule~

Private schools will be different at every school. Everyone will have a different story to tell.

Our first private school in Korea is what’s known as a Kindy-hagwon. This basically means that a good portion of your day will be with kindergarteners. Now, the reason that this is different than the majority of hagwons is because of the hours. Our school was was from 9:30am – 6:30 pm. We taught the kindergarteners (aged 4, 5, and 6 years old) from 9:20 to 2:30. Then, from 2:20 to 6:30 we had the elementary and young junior high school students (aged 7 -13 years old). Most hagwons are after school hours (So from around 2pm-10pm or so). Students go to the hagwons in the evening when they are done public school and their other after school clubs or activities. They are also known as cram schools.

Our schedule was the same every week, which was nice. It was a busy schedule and we were truly exhausted. I can’t remember what it looked like exactly, but here is a rendition of what it kind of looked like.

But! I do know that there were 5 or 6 blocks in the morning and we usually had one or two of those blocks free. We had 2 different kindergarten classes. We didn’t just teach English, we taught normal kindergarten classes in English. For example, we would have an arts and craft or easy science project taught in English.

In the afternoon, the classes were strictly English classes. I mostly taught the intro level classes, but my husband taught more of the medium level classes and our other foreign co-worker taught the higher level students.

As you could see, we didn’t have that much time off in the day. I guess, by law, the hagwons can’t have you teach more than 30hours a week. We worked around 28-29 hours a week. The extra 10 hours in the week were spent doing lesson planning and paperwork for the company. We were required to plan out the entire month for every class. The kindergarten classes were the hardest since there were so many classes and books that we needed to plan out. These schedules needed to be made carefully because they were given to the parents. The parents needed to be able to see what their kid would be learning and when.

I would say that private schools in Japan aren’t as prevalent as they are in Korea. I mean, there are a lot here, but in Korea there are so so many. There are probably 3 on every block. It’s crazy.

We were once again placed at a school that taught preschool and elementary school students. But, we had the additional class of babies, so that was interesting. The first class of the day was usually the baby class. We had students from age 0-3 years old alongside with their parent. This school, and many eikaiwa’s, are not as frequent of a thing for the students as they are in Korea. In Korea we saw the kindergarteners every day. We saw the elementary students 2 or 3 times a week. We were really able to get to know the kids. Here, however, we saw the students every two weeks. It was quite difficult to create a relationship with them at all. In addition, their English level was much lower. It was difficult for them to remember what was taught to them 2 weeks prior.

The schedule at our particular company was quite odd. We didn’t go to the same school every day. Actually, we basically had a 2 week repeating schedule in which we would go to a different school each day. The hours were 10am – 7pm. Again, since we are teaching the babies and preschoolers, the classes are much earlier. If you are placed in an eikaiwa that teaches elementary, junior high, or high school (or even adult classes are popular in Japan), you will likely have the afternoon shift.

We didn’t have weekends off. Actually, weekends were our busiest days. Saturdays were mandatory working days since they had the most classes and students. We didn’t get national holidays off. If the classes were cancelled, we were required to do some marketing (handing out flyers or balloons) in the malls that the classes were located in or attend meetings.

As for regular days off, since we didn’t get weekends off, as long as we had 8 days off within the month and didn’t work more than 14 days in a row, our days off were scattered throughout the month and rarely regular. This meant that there were multiple times were I needed to work something like this: 7-9 days in a row, get one day off, work another 5 days, get one day off, work 1 day and get another day off. It was incredibly frustrating and exhausting. As a single person, this may be great as you can do stuff during the day when most people are at work.  As a married couple, this was the worst type of place to work. We rarely had days off together and essentially never had 2 consecutive days off. We couldn’t explore Japan and felt exhausted.

Okay, so I can’t quite make the same type of schedule as the other school since it’s so bizarre, but I’ll try. They don’t have blocks like our other school did. The Japanese teacher at the school chooses times for each class and every classroom has a different teacher so this is just an example.

The free time is to be used for preparing for class or learning Japanese. The disadvantage at this particular school was that it was placed in a Mall. People could easily peer through the window so you needed to always act professionally and appear to be working. We weren’t given a computer or any machines to help make materials. If you needed to print, laminate, or photocopy things, it needed to be done on your own time outside of working hours.

For the most part, the public schools aren’t going to change much. They are generally Monday to Friday and have an 8:30 – 4:30 schedule. You can teach anywhere from 10 to 25 classes per week. Currently, at Interac, I have 11 classes a week. Patrick works at a Junior high school and has about 16 every week. For both of us, our classes are 50 min long. If you teach elementary or preschool, I believe the class times are shorter. This schedule is based from Interac’s website, so it has 20 classes. I think many of the junior high schools have about 20 classes or so.

There is a lot of free time that can be utilized to learn Japanese or prepare materials for class. You will likely have a desk in the teacher’s room with a computer and a printer. It is easy to make worksheets and talk to your fellow coworkers.

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~Teaching Style~

At the hagwon in Korea, we taught our classes on our own. It was quite rare that the Korean teacher would join us in the classroom, except for the really young class (the 3 and 4 year olds) where the Korean teacher was with them the entire time. There were definitely a lot of difficulties without a Korean teacher there to help, but I think it was beneficial for the students. It really forced them to use English for any question they had and simple tasks like going to the bathroom or needing tissue/pencils/erasers etc. Since this was our first time teaching, it was a bit overwhelming, but I think we have become much better teachers because of it.

The way this school was set up was that the students had half of their classes with the foreign teacher and the other half with their Korean teacher. For the afternoon classes, the Korean teacher time was used to talk about complex English grammar in Korean. Then, when they came to the foreign teachers’ class, they would be practising speaking, listening, or writing using those grammar concepts. We used a textbook that they were required to finish by the end of the year. How we taught the material was up to us. We could use any additional materials such as songs, worksheets, or games to reinforce the concept that they needed in order to fill in their workbook.

As long as their workbooks were filled out and the kids had fun, the parents were happy. If the parents were happy, the director was happy.

This brings me to the interesting situation of private schools. The parents are the customers and the private school is a business. Before it is a school, it is a business. This means that the teachers have to be very careful about what happens in and outside of the classroom. As a foreign teacher, you will never deal with the parents directly (well, you shouldn’t), so it’s not really something you have to worry about. Just be aware.

When we went to the private school in Japan, we had a very different experience. The school we were at was extremely structured. In training, we were told exactly how they wanted their class ran. Basically every minute was accounted for. For example, for a 45 minute preschool class:

Sign their attendance book and give a sticker.

Sing a song

Do basic questions. Ask students in a circle for their name, age, favourite colour, etc.

Sing another song

Show and repeat flashcards for month’s topic.

Play a small game

Do some tracing or colouring in their workbook

Sing a song

Say goodbye.

The only freedom we had was what game we wanted to play. Even the songs were based around their monthly topic. You would do the exact same thing for every preschool class you had for the 2 weeks. The last 2 weeks would be a different game because you don’t want to play the same game twice. As you can imagine, this was quite tiring and boring after the 10th time you have taught it. That being said, this would have been a perfect starting job.

These classes utilized what’s known as team-teaching. This means that you and the Japanese are teaching the class together. She may do some translating for the students and help with behaviour. This made it easy for the kids to only communicate in Japanese and really didn’t give them the motivation to speak English at all.

In the public school, it will vary at every school. Generally, there will be a textbook to follow. The lesson plans are usually completely up to you, but some schools use their foreign teachers as tape recorders. What I mean is that some teachers literally don’t teach at all. They are used for pronunciation and grammar checks. At my high school, we follow a textbook quite loosely. We use the topic and key words and grammar points, but don’t necessarily use the book itself. I am in charge of the lesson plan and how I want to teach the concept. Generally, we have a worksheet and a speaking activity. Our school focuses on public speaking and using English for communication. In other words, we show them how to use things in real life situations in addition to giving them the confidence to speak English with their peers.

Patrick teaches at a Junior High school so the focus is a bit different. They are trying to teach vocabulary, easy grammar and have fun with English. Pat plays a lot more games with his students than I do.

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~Holidays and Days Off~

Okay, I think the last thing that I want to cover is holidays.

I don’t think I mention it earlier, but at the private school in Korea, we had a regular schedule from Monday to Friday and we had every Korean public holiday off. We had 10 days holiday for the year. We weren’t able to choose when those 10 days would be. We had 5 days off around Christmas and 5 days off in the summer. Luckily, they were paid days off so we didn’t have to worry about having a smaller pay check the next month.

We had 3 sick days for the year. They were pretty strict and needed a pretty good reason to miss work. Actually, fun story, our foreign co-worker was so sick one day and had to go the bathroom to barf like every 30 minutes. Everyone knew what was happening. Everyone could hear him. Everyone could see the paleness in his face, yet nobody said anything. If he wanted to go home, he would have had to go to the doctor, get checked out, get a doctor’s note, come back and they he could leave. So, instead he just toughed it out. So, it was a bit of a culture shock for us.

Also, we didn’t have any additional days off for the year, so we had to be aware of that when our family wanted to visit. They had to plan around OUR schedule. We had no wiggle room. At all.  Since hagwons are private schools, the parents are paying money for their kids to go to this school. If the foreign teacher isn’t there, they would complain. Seriously.

A similar situation happened for us at the private school in Japan. We had 10 days of holidays that were predetermined. Since we didn’t get weekends or public holidays off, we really did get 5 days off at a time. At the hagwon, we would have the weekend, 5 day, then weekend again. This gave us 9 days in a row that we had off. At this private school in Japan, it felt like we had less time off because of that.

We also had 10 days of paid holiday that we could take. It sounds like it would be basically impossible to get those all at once. Many people would use them to get stat holidays off with their family or to make their predetermined holiday a bit longer. Since we saw the students every 2 weeks, it was a bit easier for the company to juggle us around and not shock the parents. They were able to change which school you went to since the curriculum was the same for every single class. So, if someone took a day off, I might fill in for them at their school and vice versa.

We also had sick days that we could use a lot easier. I think we had 6 or something? I don’t remember. We didn’t have to get a doctor’s note or anything. I do have a horror story, if you will, about this as well. I had the stomach flu. I taught the baby class in the morning and started to not feel well. My stomach was in a lot of pain. It got worse as the day went on. I had 4 hours before my next class, but I didn’t know if I could make it. I emailed my boss. Well, the response was not what I expected.

He said “Well, the school needs to have XX amount of classes with a foreign teacher for the year and if you aren’t there, than we can’t fulfill that promise. It is too late of notice to have someone fill in for you.” So, because they didn’t have enough classes with foreign teachers earlier in the year, I have to stay? When I said I would tough it out, but I didn’t know if I could go in the next day he said “well, Friday is one of our busier days. If you miss tomorrow, no one can cover you. The parents are expecting a foreign teacher tomorrow.” I was obviously not happy. My stomach flu did not get better. It got worse. I worked for 4 days before I was able to go to the doctor. He said that my intestines were very inflamed and I should have come in earlier. So, once again, the business is more important that a person’s health.

Okay, so now at Interac, the situation is much better. Not only do I have weekends and public holidays off, but I also have a good amount of vacation days. They are fixed because it is a regular school… We follow the school system’s days off. Currently, it is spring break. I have 2 weeks off. In the summer, we have 3 weeks off. In the winter we have 2 weeks off. We have 5 days for paid personal leave that can be used to cover sick days. If you don’t use your personal day, you just don’t get paid for your sick day.

It is really nice to have so much time off, but unfortunately, most of this is unpaid. This means that In September, you have a very small pay check. In the winter, we had 1 week of our holiday paid, and I believe it will be the same for August.

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~Pay and Benefits~

The general rule is that private schools pay higher than public school. Except for JET, this is true.

In Korea, we got paid 2.1 million won (~$2500) per month. We also received health benefits, but I don’t know what was included in that. I only ever used our health insurance once and it was to go to the dentist.

In addition, your flight to and from Korea is paid for. Housing is also provided. Our housing was furnished and we didn’t have to pay for anything except gas and electricity I think. When we left, we were given a severance pay of around one month’s salary.

The starting wage if you work for EPIK is 1.8 million (~$2150) per month if you don’t have TEFL and 2.0 million (~$2400) per month if you do.  The EPIK website says that medical insurance is provided and 50% is paid by the employer.

Similarly, they pay for your flight there and back, provide housing and give a severance pay at the end of the contract. In addition, you receive a renewal allowance of one month’s salary if you stay for an additional year.

The salary we received at the Eikaiwa was 250,000yen (~$3000) per month.

Our private school in Japan paid for our flight, but I heard that is quite rare. Housing was not included. Actually, housing was quite expensive here. You have to pay one month’s rent worth for a deposit and some places require key money. Key money is a gift to the landlord that you do not get back.

This company did provide medical insurance. Again, I don’t know the details. I used it for when I went to the hospital for my stomach flu. Since I’m used to paying nothing in Canada, I can’t even comment on if it was cheap or not…

The salary we receive at Interac is a bit lower, at 230,000yen (~$2750) per month.

I’m fairly certain that Interac does not pay for your flight. We were already living in Japan, so it wasn’t an issue for us. Since this company is not technically a full-time position, health insurance is not included. We were required to get that on our own with the government. Also, it is required. It isn’t an optional thing. If you don’t get it, they will eventually just take it out of your pay check. It happened to a friend of mine.

I think that’s all I wanted to say about teaching English. There are some things I’d like to talk about in regards to just living in both countries.

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Living in Japan vs. Korea

I want to give you an idea of what it is like to live in the country regardless of why you come here. I keep thinking of new things to add, so this may be an ever-changing blog. There are of course a lot of interesting cultural differences from North America, but there are also differences between the two countries. I think that there is a misconception that all Eastern Asian countries are very similar, but I think that isn’t really fair. They are their own countries with their own history and unique way of living.

~Cost of living~

Well, since I was just talking about money, why not continue?

On the surface, you may think that Japan is where you will make more money. You would be quite wrong. Not only will you have to pay for the flight and housing fees before you even see your first pay check, most things in Japan are pricier than in Korea.

Don’t just believe me, please look at this website!

https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/compare_cities.jsp?country1=Japan&country2=South+Korea&city1=Tokyo&city2=Seoul&tracking=getDispatchComparison

First, is rent. As I mentioned before, rent is covered for both public and private schools. If you are in a situation where you need to find your own housing, I’ve heard it is around $400 – $500 per month in a rural part of, well, not Seoul. In Kyoto, we paid about $800. In Kawasaki, we pay about $950. We pay more because we are foreigners and don’t have a guarantor. Most apartments in Japan require a guarantor.

If your company won’t act as a guarantor, your rent will likely be much higher. If you can, go to a realtor. They will help negotiate and communicate in Japanese. I wish we had done that, but both times we looked for housing we were so far. For example, when we looked for a place to live in Kyoto, we were living and working in Nagoya. When we looked for a place in Kawasaki, we were living and working in Kyoto. Trying to find housing while away is a bit more difficult. You don’t have the option of looking at the place or going to a realtor in person.

Next, is the cost of food. For someone like me, food cost is very important. I don’t like cooking so I eat out often. For lunch food like kimbab or bibimbap, it usually costs around 5,000 won ($5). For dinner, it ranges from 5,000 to 12,000 won. Even something like bbq is not badly priced. I think it was like 8,000 won for 200g of meat. We were able to justify going for bbq once a week or once every 2 weeks.

In Japan, there isn’t much for less than 1,000yen ($10). You can get gyodon (meat and rice bowl) for fairly cheap, but it is definitely not healthy or the best quality. Prices in Japan seem very similar to those in Canada. I’d say most people cook at home here. That being said, you can eat for cheap here, but there aren’t as many options.

That brings me to an interesting point. Buying groceries in Japan is slightly cheaper than eating out. In Korea, I felt like groceries were more expensive. Unless you went to a market, it wasn’t worth buying groceries.

Drinking is the next important thing on my list. Drinking domestically is much much cheaper in Korea. Buying domestic beer and Soju is incredibly cheap. If you want any imported drinks, it was much more expensive. In Japan, domestic stuff is slightly cheaper than imported, but not by a significant amount.

Those are the costs to matter to me, so please do your own research for things that you find important.

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~Food~

As I said before, I eat out a lot. This will obviously be a preference thing so I’ll try not to be bias. I already talked about the price, but let’s look at they types of food available. Also, remember that if you are in Seoul or Tokyo, these things will probably not apply.

In Korea, they have a very large variety of Korean foods (duh!). Foreign food, however, is harder to find and not as well done as it is in Japan. So, if you like Korean food, you will love eating in Korea (sounds obvious, but I don’t know how else to explain this). If you are someone that needs American, Mexican, Italian, etc food, you will prefer living in Japan. Korean food is generally quite spicy. If you aren’t good with spice, don’t let that deter you. Before I left for Korea, I honestly thought that I’d starve. I didn’t. I actually loooved the food.

Korea has a few more “interesting” types of food. Since Korea was a third world country not so long ago, there are a few things that may seem really shocking. The first that I can think of is called bundangi. It is a silkworm pupae. Not my thing. This is often served as a side dish or sometimes you can see it as a street food. The second is chicken feet. They are crazy spicy and are full of bones and cartilage. I didn’t mind the texture, but the spice was death worthy. It was seriously the spiciest thing I’ve ever tried.  Third, is my favourite food. It’s called makchang. Makchang is pig intestine that you would grill, just like samgyeopsal. It is chewy and fatty, but I like it!

How about eating culture?

In Korea, there are many restaurants that are meant for groups. It is not as common to do things by yourself in Korea. Of course you can, but it isn’t really that common. People drink and eat in groups. Also, a lot of restaurants require you to cook your food at the table. It is cooked at the table in a single pot and you share from that pot. Double dipping is really not a thing there. Because of this, sometimes it can be difficult to find a place to eat if you’re on your own. For example, if you love dalkgalbi, you may not be able to find a restaurant that will have a single order of it.

I love Korean food and, when we were thee, we rarely felt the need to eat foreign food. There was enough that we could eat something different every day. The price point made it easier to try many things without feeling like you were wasting money. I could be wrong, but I feel like Koreans eat out more often so there are more options. There are definitely more restaurants physically available. Their culture is a bit more social, so it could just be that there are more places to meet with each other.

Also, Korea has a lot of street food. I love street food in Korea. It’s so great. It is also everywhere.

I hope that makes sense…

Food is very much a personal opinion so I can’t really convey what I mean.

Personally, I only really like a few types of Japanese food (like sushi, ramen and curry) and find the variety to be lacking. Since everything is a bit pricier, I am not as willing to try as many different types of food. I often crave foreign foods here. Also, it seems that there are fewer healthy food options. If you want to eat healthy, you eat at home (it’s the same in Canada, tbh.)

Japanese food is a bit more recognized world wide so there are definitely the foods that you will recognize. Sushi is amazing here and is not so expensive. Well, actually, that’s not entirely true. You CAN get it for cheap, but you can also find expensive places as well. Also, I’m not sure if this is accurate for everyone, but it seems that the serving sizes are smaller here than in Korea. It’s fine for me, but sometimes Pat needs to get a snack later. It depends where you go.

As for weird foods, there aren’t as many. You can find intestine as well, but generally in soup. Some yakiniku places have it. It is good here, too, but not as good as Korean style (in my opinion). Another weird thing we like is beef tongue. It is a bit tough and salty. It’s good. There is also a lot of seafood here. So, you can find squid, octopus, and even jellyfish.

As for street food, it is really good, but you don’t see it as often. I have really only seen street food at festivals.

Lastly, opposite from Korea, a lot of places cater to single people. It is easy to do things on your own and not feel weird. There are a few “standing” restaurants where you can go in, eat and leave in less than 10 minutes. Now, that’s what I call fast food. You will often see business men go into a ramen shop, udon/soba place, or gyudon place and finish their meal in less than 10 minutes. It’s crazy. They will inhale boiling hot ramen like air.

Here are some food pictures! ( I have apparently taken less food photos in Japan… I don’t know why… sorry about that!

Korea – Jjimdalk

Korea – Makchang (pig intestine)

Korea – Chicken feet

Korea -Hwae (Korean Sashimi)

Korea – Samgyeopsal

Korea – Street food potato

Japan – Eel

Japan – Beef tongue

Japan – Okonomiyaki

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~Toilets~

I’m only talking about toilets because they are different than in North America. You may not think this is a place you would experience culture shock, but you would be wrong.

In Korea, the toilets are hit or miss and everything in between. They range from what I call a squatty potty to Japanese style ones with bidets and seat warmers. Now, what makes them so interesting is that you never know what you’re going to get. It’s always a surprise.

I remember at one pub we went to, you opened the door to the bathroom and had to climb a set up stairs to a squatty potty. There was no girls or boys toilet. It was a urinal and a squatty potty in a stall. I could literally pee at the same time as Pat. So weird.

Another time, we were eating in a fairly fancy Vietnamese restaurant. You go through the toilet door and suddenly, you are outside. Outside! You walk along this outside path to essentially an outhouse.

Another place was like a strip mall? There were many restaurants lined up together. You go to the toilet exit and you were in a secret hallway that ALL the restaurants were connected to. You walk along this hallway to a regular public toilet.

Lastly, one time I went to the toilet when we were partying outside. A building that was part of the university was open. After getting lost in this closed University building (that was obviously only opened for the toilet) you gind the toilet. The toilets were heated, played music, and even had a bidet.

Japan is also interesting, but there are really only 2 types. Fancy or squatty potty. But, unlike Korea, it was pretty easy to guess what you were going to get. Restaurant, bar, mall, etc will definitely have a fancy toilet. If you are in a park or train station there will definitely be a squatty potty. Sometimes, there is a very basic American style toilet, but even with those, there will always be a squatty potty as well.

~Language~

Obviously, the two countries have their own languages. This may seem like a silly thing, but before deciding where you want to go, listen to the languages. If you find one to be irritating or bothersome, don’t come. Seriously. You will hear it constantly around you. Also, be a cool guy and learn at least how to say hello and thank you. The locals will appreciate it and you won’t give foreigners image of being ignorant.

Secondly, you may be interested in learning the language. Well, in that case, I want to give you some pointers I suppose.

The Korean writing system is quite easy to learn and will help with your daily life a lot. It is a phonetic alphabet. This means that even if you don’t know the meaning, you can sound out the word. If you can read it, you can read all signs and menus without a problem. If you want to learn Korea, I recommend Talk to Me in Korean. They are a (mostly) free resource with a TON of information. http://talktomeinkorean.com/

Hangul:

(Hangul is like building blocks. Each piece represents one sound. You put them together in a block to make a syllable. Example: ㄱ=g ,ㅏ=a ,ㅁ=m, so 감 = gam. Pretty easy. My name = 캐이틀린 = Kae-i-teul-lin)

The Japanese writing system consists of two phonetic alphabets and one with Chinese characters. The two phonetic alphabets aren’t too difficult, but will take some practice. Kanji, the Chinese characters, on the other hand are very very difficult. They have many meanings and pronunciations associated with each of them. There are kanji you will see on a daily basis (there are about 2000 basic ones.) All three are used on signs and on menus.

Katakana:

Hiragana:

(Both of these writing systems have one symbol that represents a consonant and a vowel together. n and the vowels are the only exception. This makes writing foreign words really strange since vowels are often added in the middle of words. My name = ケイトリン = Ke-i-to-ri-n)

Kanji:

(this is just a sample. There are thousands of kanji. In use, sometimes their meaning don’t really mean anything. Example: 金曜日= Friday. 金=gold, 曜= day of the week,日=day)

I recommend taking classes once you come over. I took a Korean class after living there for 8 months and I regretted not taking them sooner. I would have taken Japanese classes, but the hours that I worked at the private school were horrible. Now that I’m at the public school, I am taking classes. It helps a lot. It really makes getting around easier and it makes you not feel so alienated. It’s easy to feel lonely when coming abroad. If you have even a little bit of the language, it will be easier to make friends and feel more connected with the community.

Also, I hate to be this person, but if you don’t learn any of the language, you really give ALL foreigners a bad image. Remember, you may be the only foreigner that a local has interacted with. If you don’t even try to speak the language, you give ALL foreigners living there a bad image. They will make assumptions about how we are lazy, ignorant, or don’t care about their culture. Just, try. Even just the basics. Hello, thank you. That’s all.

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~English usage~

Speaking of language…

If you live in Seoul or Tokyo, language probably won’t be an issue. There is English everywhere. The farther you get from the big city, the less English you will see and hear. When I go to Tokyo, I’m always surprised that the staff will speak to me in English or that English menus are available. I didn’t go to Seoul too often, but it seemed to also have a lot more English than anywhere else.

This sort of brings me back to teaching. The English education system is quite different in both countries. It seems to be taken much more seriously in Korea than in Japan. At the private school in Korea, my students were basically in a English-Immersion type of environment. I could have conversations with these children and they would answer fairly well. They would of course miss articles like “the, a, an” etc, but they could form the majority of their sentence on their own.

In the private school in Japan, they memorized words or phrases, but had no concept on how to make a sentence of their own. If I asked them any variation of the phrase they memorized, they had no idea what I was saying. At my high school, it isn’t too much better. They can communicate, but usually the sentence structure needs to be given to them. Their writing is quite good, but their spoken language is quite broken and difficult to understand. My 4 year olds in Korea spoke better English that the 16 year olds at my high school in Japan.

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~Fashion~

This may not be important to most people, but I figured I should add it in. Fashion in both countries is quite different. I’m going to generalize, so you know, this doesn’t apply to EVERYONE… okay?

Okay, so from pure observation, I would say that Koreans care about their appearance much more that Japanese people. But, like, almost too much. Even the men in Korea are generally very stylish and look put together. They don’t wear makeup like the internet would like you to believe. Some men MIGHT wear bb cream, but it isn’t common.

Unless you are in Seoul, the entire stereotype about Koreans all having plastic surgery is also false. The most common procedure is to get an eyelid surgery so they can have what is known as a double-eyelid, but I would not say the majority of people are getting procedures. This one in particular is a very small procedure with a short healing time, so it isn’t as crazy as people think. The problem with this fabricated statistic is that cosmetic things like mole removal or laser hair removal are also considered plastic surgery and up that stat. Anyways, Seoul does not represent the entire country, so please don’t think that everyone is getting these procedures done. While living in Daegu, I didn’t meet anyone that got any plastic surgery.

Okay, now that that’s out of the way…

Fashion in Korea really follows trends. If something is trendy, I swear, everyone is doing it. When we lived there, overall style skirts were popular. So many girls wore them. Even hairstyles follow trends. I can seriously spot a Korean man in Japan just by his haircut. The last trendy thing is makeup. Their makeup style is all very similar. They go for a fairly pale skin tone with a gradient lip that is bright red or pink. They have subtle eye makeup that is really supposed to just enhance their natural look.

Speaking of makeup, in Korea, makeup brands each have their own store. In Canada or Japan, you buy makeup at a drug store and all brands of makeup are there. In Korea, you go to the brand that you like. For example, if I want an Etude House lipstick, I need to go to Etude House. I can’t just go to the drugstore. The same is true for skin care. Also, A lot of makeup and skin care in Korea is Korean. You will rarely see foreign make up brands. I mean, how could they when they don’t have makeup in one store?

Japan is a bit more like Canada. It varies a lot. People wear what they want. Usually you see business men in suits and they are the majority. Dyed hair is really uncommon here. You will see many girls with a brown hair colour but that’s about it. It is so rare to see blonde, red, or any funky colours. I haven’t noticed a trend with clothing, but there are some makeup trends. It is quite trendy with young girls/high school girls to have very bright blush right under their eye. Even though it is a trend, you would never see a woman rocking that on her way to work.

I would say that both countries are very well dressed and care about their appearance. Japan seems to be a bit more conservative with their style, and Korea seems to follow trends a lot more. Nobody is leaving the house in sweats or pjs like I used to do in Canada.

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~Attitudes towards foreigners~

This may be a bit of a sensitive topic because I don’t really want to generalize an entire country of people. That really isn’t fair.

Hmm..

Well, let’s just say that there is a bit a spectrum of how people react to foreigners.

Used to foreigners – usually a positive outlook

Had a bad experience – have a reason to hate foreigners

Oblivious – No interaction or predisposed reaction towards foreigners

You will see number one in the bigger cities, especially in Japan. You will see number 3 in the smaller towns. In this case, you may literally be the first foreigner they have interacted with. It is you that will change them into a one or two, so you know, be nice. Number 2 seems to be in certain touristy places or military run areas. They deal with foreigners that don’t care about their culture at all. They have met or interacted with rude, loud, and disrespectful foreigners. Unfortunately, I think Seoul has many of these types of people. The only rudeness me and Pat ever experienced was in Seoul. Daegu was mostly number 3. People were so excited to see us. They called me cute, or Pat handsome. They were genuinely so excited that I could speak some Korean. If I spoke Korean at a small restaurant, I would get free things, like pop or side dishes. I haven’t experienced that in Japan really.

The smaller the area, the more you will find the oblivious people. Most people are very friendly, regardless of what their experience with foreigners is. I think that people in Korea and Japan are so friendly and helpful.

Also, I want to let you know, I am a white Canadian. I have the advantage of being Caucasian and being from “basically America”. People of colour, LGBTQ people, Muslims, or any other “visible minority” (for N.American standards) may have a different experience that I have no idea about.

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~Travel~

Travelling in both countries have their own set of advantages and challenges.

Let’s start with Korea. Korea is a pretty small country. There aren’t too many places to visit. In addition, there really isn’t much information in English. That being said, you have a lot more money to travel and transportation is much cheaper. The KTX (the high speed bullet train) is not badly priced and hits the major cities in Korea. To go anywhere else, you need to figure out how to use the highway busses. Word of warning, if you need to get around, I recommend using Naver. It is the Korean version of google. Google in Korea, other than Seoul, doesn’t allow street view and is sometimes inaccurate. Naver is great, but is only in Korean. Learn your hangul and use Naver instead of Google. Trust me, it is so much better.

Japan is actually a lot bigger than I thought. There is a lot to see. There are so many touristy things that you can see across the entire country. The problem is that you will likely have less money and travelling costs more. The shinkansen (the high speed bullet train) can reach most places in Japan, but is quite expensive. It can be around the same price as flying!

Since Japan is quite used to having foreigners, it is easy to find travel information. It is usually fairly easy to find what bus to take or what you can expect to see. Once you get there, though, it will likely be crowded. You will see foreigners at all the famous spots. Personally, it bothered me because tourists generally don’t know how to act appropriately. They don’t respect the culture and really give foreigners a bad name (haha, do you see a theme? I’m obviously bitter about this… seriously though. I hate that I’m judged because of what ignorant tourists do.. ugh). This can turn a number 1 into a number 2 (from above) pretty fast. This means that in these heavily touristy areas, service staff isn’t as chipper and accommodating as they usually are. But, Japanese people have incredible service so it usually isn’t an issue.

Lastly, this sort of has to do with travel. Festivals. Festivals in both countries are great. They are so interesting and I really recommend attending one. In Korea, we went to a cherry blossom festival and a chicken and beer festival. In Japan, we have been to cherry blossom festivals and some parades. I recommend just googling “Festivals in Korea/Japan 2017” and see what interests you.

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Well, whichever country you choose to go to, both are great. They both have their advantages and disadvantages. They are also quite close to each other so it is quite easy to visit both.

Basically, if you are looking to make money, go to Korea.

If you are looking to  see a lot of different places and things, go to Japan.

If you love eating out and drinking alcohol on a budget, go to Korea.

If you need variety in the food and drinks available, regardless of the cost, go to Japan.

**If you have been to either country and think that I have misrepresented anything, let me know! This was my experience, but I want to be as accurate as possible**

Teaching English in Japan vs. Korea Hello friends and family! This post isn’t for you haha. Sorry.  I suppose you can read it, but I really wanted to give information to people applying to teach in Asia; specifically, Japan and Korea.

[idolizerp]

LOADING INFORMATION ON POIZN’S MAIN RAP, LEAD VOCAL JEON DOYOON...

IDOL DETAILS

STAGENAME: j.dean CURRENT AGE: 29 DEBUT AGE: 21 TRAINEE SINCE AGE:15 COMPANY: 99 SECONDARY SKILL: Lyric writing

IDOL PROFILE

NICKNAME(S): 

korean homer: this embarrassing nickname was thrusted onto him in the early days of POIZN since 99 media played him as this rising, prodigal songwriter. ( the nickname is, obviously, used as a joke )

yoonie bear: mostly used by female fans when they saw the stark contrast between his stage persona as a looming and intimidating figure, and his real self who is soft like a teddy bear.

INSPIRATION: doyoon had dreamed to become an artist who could tell his own story and was heavily influenced by korean hip-hop artists such as yoon mirae, tiger jk, and epik high, and he thought being an idol would be the best way to get his name out there. SPECIAL TALENTS:

playing the piano with his feet

nail art

NOTABLE FACTS:

lived in montana, usa for seven years and returned to korea with his grandparents at 12 to become a k-pop idol

was a pianist in his church band

his mother gave him the english name james-dean because she is a big fan of the actor

had numerous part time jobs while he was a trainee to financially support himself

started writing songs and lyrics since he was eight. his first song was about his pet rabbit

IDOL GOALS

SHORT-TERM GOALS:

doyoon hopes to regain the trust he had lost with 99, so he can regain the possibility of the solo opportunity they had given him years ago. to do that, he is trying to soften the public perception of him as one of the “scandal-clad screw ups of 99,” and finally reclaim his debut as a solo artist.

LONG-TERM GOALS:

doyoon has realized time and time again that being an idol is hard, and he is somewhat sick of the lifestyle. so he wants to quickly transition out of that idol title he holds and become an artist that he desperately wants to be by being recognized as someone who writes and produces songs — either for himself, his group, or other artist both in and out of 99.

IDOL IMAGE

as if by fate, 99 knew exactly what they wanted doyoon to be ever since they laid their eyes on him. from a visual standpoint, doyoon seemed to have been born just so he could be a part of POIZN with his sharp eyes, intimidating glare, and baritone voice. 99 sets him out to be a bad boy – not exactly a wild, partying bad boy, but as the classic “hollywood” bad boy ( most likely due to his american upbringing. ) while he initially played the role of a rambunctious young blood, doyoon gradually brings it down and became reserved the more he played his role into what 99 wanted him to be.

he is neither loud nor boisterous – loudness is not what doyoon excels at. he is the old school, quiet but strong candidate, a quiet flame in the background that flickers steadily, refusing to burn out. silent, resilient and intense — these are what 99 wanted to convey, and doyoon became the perfect representative of that image.

now doyoon, left alone and away from 99’s packaging, is unrecognizable. his POIZN persona is on one spectrum, and doyoon stands on the exact opposite end of that spectrum. POIZN’s doyoon is boiling lava while jeon doyoon the person is one of the many kindling on the hearth warming your home – gentle, patient, and meek. so the people have always been surprised to hear about the great divide between the mask and the person that lies beneath it, because doyoon was a breath of fresh air; one of the few POIZN boys who had lived his idol life scandal-free due to his hard work behind the scenes, locked up behind studio doors collaborating with producers to help POIZN rise in the ranks.

it played out in their favor, at first.

but who’s to say that this surprising revelation wasn’t media play itself?

IDOL HISTORY

tw: implied alcoholism, dubious consent.

life is full of choices and doyoon seems to be always picking the wrong ones.

v.

the first choice that changed his life wasn’t necessary his choice to make, nor was he given a voice in the matter. he was only five, after all, and the opinions of a five year-old do not really matter, right? he’s given a new life in a new city that belonged to a new country with a new name and a new sibling.

james-dean jeon is his new name – not just ‘james’ and not ‘dean.’ it’s a mouthful, especially because he’s only five and can barely speak the language.

“i promise you’ll have a better life here, doyoon. you can make your dreams come true here!”

that’s what his parents tell him the night before he starts his first day of american kindergarten. but the thing is: he’s had a great life back in korea. he even had a pet rabbit named pony. oh how he missed pony. but he doesn’t question them further. he smiles and nods to let his parents go to bed because, like him, they too have a busy day of work the next day.

vii.

it’s not that he doesn’t like going to church – it’s just that he doesn’t like waking up at 7 o’clock on sundays to go to a church about 40 minutes away from his home when there are plenty of churches in the neighborhood.

“you know grandpa and grandma aren’t very good at english, and you have to immerse yourself in your culture.”

and his parents are right…to a certain degree.

he should be more understanding of his grandparents needs, since he actually goes out into society – all grandpa and grandma have are each other and the rest of the koreans in their city in montana ( which just happens to be the rest of the family. ) so he shouldn’t get so frustrated when they want to be with the people they have in common.

but did doyoon have to leave korea ( and pony and his other friends ) just to immerse himself into his culture?

he doesn’t say anymore, but he does think about it on his way to church.

x.

rap – it’s what his grandparents and the majority of the grown-ups in his church refer to it as ‘the devil’s music.’ it’s what the older kids at his school and church thought was the best thing in the world. and doyoon thought it was one of the best things – next to drawing stick figures and his two new sisters.

at school, he listens to what he and others know – american rappers and hip-hop artists. while at church, he was introduced to korean hip-hop. doyoon has always been fond of music – that’s why he deliberately stays late after church: to get piano lessons and participate in the church band – and he’s found something that he could love ( even more than pony. boy, he still missed her. )

xii.

call him a silly child all you want, but nothing is stopping him from becoming who he wants to be.

unfortunately for his parents, america is not a place where his dream will come true.

he’s figured out a few years ago that this place isn’t as great as people claim it to be – there are countless iron walls blocking his way, and no matter how high he jumps, he can never go over it like a simple hurdle.

so he decides to be a little selfish.

he goes back to korea with his grandparents, leaving his family and friends behind.

despite his nationality and his blood all originating from korea, the country feels foreign to him – and so does the language, unfortunately. but he’s still growing and he regains the vocabulary as he reincorporates himself into his birthplace.

xv.

there’s an unexplainable distance between his classmates and doyoon – possibly because he spends most of his time at a music academy than at socializing with his peers. he needs to build his skills, because what was the point of coming back to korea if he wasn’t going to work hard?

apparently he’s pretty good at singing ( all those years in the church choir must have paid off ), and he’s come so far in his rapping and dancing skills. the teachers at his academy suggest agencies he should audition in because he might have the potential to become famous.

“just mention us when you hit big, kiddo.”

there is only one agency that takes him in, though ( though he didn’t show it on his face, he was shocked that he passed only one out of six auditions. )

xix.

he manages to finish high school, but he doesn’t get that sweet taste of freedom like the other students do: he practices all day and works all night, partaking in late night shifts at convenience stores.

he will admit that initially, he was ignorant about idols. he didn’t know they had to endure years of training, years of criticism and years of rivalry to debut.

they say his singing is decent, lyrics original and well-crafted, and that he has the right tone and look to be a rapper, but his overall dancing ability is utter garbage. they tell him to either: get better or leave.

no matter how much he practices, they want more – more improvement, more soul, and more blood.

it is a savage world, but it is the world that he chose to belong in.

…

does he belong in it?

xxiii.

doyoon works hard – anyone can see that, and he’s present.

he tries to make POIZN become better and stronger; make it rise to the top like their opponents. so he sits in on the meetings, engages with the producers, and offers his two-cents on certain affairs.

maybe it isn’t his place to say such things, and maybe he’s being too selfish but POIZN and his members are like family to him.

xv.

he is clean – cleaner than bleach, and maybe that’s why 99 is so taken with him.

a solo opportunity is given to him. though it wasn’t handed to him on a silver platter like he had hoped, he takes it without a second thought. even though he wants to dedicate his all to POIZN, POIZN is…well…poison. and doyoon wants to separate himself from that image as soon as possible.

99 offers him some creative control over his content, because they know he won’t screw up.

because doyoon never screws up.

xxvi.

doyoon spends his nights in the studio – a yellow legal notepad on his right and a bottle of whisky. art isn’t something that is created overnight. it is a struggle that takes months – even years to complete.

but doyoon is tired, so tired.

from other work to this, he doesn’t know if he can keep up the burning desire anymore.

is this fine? does this sound good? no. none of this sound good.

not even acceptable.

he doesn’t want to be selfish but he wants something better, something more.

xvii.

99 is ruthless, but he’s sure other companies are just as ruthless.

a picture – not a harmless before an after of a false accusation of cosmetic surgery—

[ +400, -31 ] ㅋㅋㅋ what are they saying? it’s totally him. bye bye loser~ > [ +25, -299 ] how are you so sure it’s him? > [ +450, -19 ] his tattoos, you delulu ㅋㅋㅋ

—but a scandalous picture.

he can’t remember the night well, only fragments of it – all hazy. but he does know that he needed comfort and a night to release his inhibitions.

that night, he remembers two choices:

1)      a long night with a bottle with a flavor that he recognizes all too well, or

2)     spending time with the person sitting across from him.

xxix.

the big opportunity is stripped from him as soon as the pictures leak, and he’s back to square one – a trainee, trying to prove his worth to the ones high in the clouds. but they still feed on him – feed on his words, his work, his mind, his melodies, his art. that’s the real poison here, but doyoon still craves that attention that small acknowledgement that says, ‘at least you’re doing this right.’

and that is better than nothing.

[teacherjoy]

Best EPIK Flight to Jeju

THE FLIGHT YOU WANT TO BOOK If you will be teaching on Jeju Island, then you will want to book a one-way ticket to Incheon International Airport (ICN) with a connection from Gimpo International (GMP) to Jeju International (CJU). Why one way? Because it’s actually pretty common for guest teachers to quit before their contract ends and it’s also pretty common for guest teachers to do some traveling with their new found fellow foreigner friends around asia, where flights are pretty affordable on a teacher’s salary.

WHEN TO BOOK YOUR EPIK FLIGHT

Honestly, my situation was a little unique. Because I hit multiple road blocks with my application (with the FBI rejecting my fingerprints and EPIK rejecting one of my letter of recommendations) I ended up having to waitlist for the mid-school year intake. It got down to the wire and I had almost given up hope, but I managed to get a placement on Jeju (which was my first choice) on the very last day of placement offers. Here’s the thing–the later you receive your placement, the more you’ll have to scramble. As soon as you receive your placement confirmation in the mail, you need to drive immediately to the consulate and apply for your visa. You can't apply for a visa at the consulate until you receive the official employment offer (NOA). Only after the Consulate has issued you a visa, should you book a flight. I booked mine only a week before the flight and paid around $710.

Luckily, EPIK will provide some kind of flight reimbursement or “entrance allowance”. Upon arriving to Korea, if you submit your original boarding pass (yes, the actual hard copy) to your designated office of education, EPIK will reimburse your flight up to 1,300,000 KRW ($1,200 USD).

KOREAN AIR PROS I flew with Korean Air Lines and I’m so glad I did. Although I flew economy, it was a somewhat comfortable 13-hour flight. Here are the reasons why I flew Korean Air Lines:

If you’ve ever had airplane food, you know it can be awful, but Korean Airline food is delicious. Get the bibimbap! The gochujang (red chili paste) gives the bibimbap so much flavor. The one they serve with your meal is mildly spicy, salty, and savory.

The seats are have plenty of leg room, but the 13-hour flight from California to Incheon was uncomfortable for me. My back and butt were definitely feeling it by the sixth hour. But, then again, what 13-hour flight isn’t uncomfortable?

Every passenger gets their own personal movie screen with free movies

Every passenger seat has a USB charge port so you can charge your devices

If there are horrific delays, they are very apologetic and do provide some kind of food voucher or air line credit

The flight attendants are attentive and friendly

KOREAN AIR CONS The worst thing about my flight experience was transferring from an international flight to a domestic flight. When you arrive in Korea and transfer to another Korean domestic flight, there is NO AUTOMATIC TRANSFER. You will need to claim your baggage and check it in again for your next flight. Domestic Baggage allowance and overweight fees DO NOT APPLY if you are connecting from an International Flight. However, if you have a connecting itinerary to Busan with a Korean Air transit domestic flight, then your baggage will automatically be transferred.

MY ITINERARY LAX  >  ICN 11:30 PM - 4:40 AM (13 hours) GMP > CJU 7:20 AM  - 8:30 AM (1 hour)

TANSFER RECOMMENDATION If you are not Korean or your Korean is limited, I highly recommend at least a 4-5 hour transfer window! I know that sounds long, but listen... I had almost a 3-hour window, but somehow the stars aligned against my favor.

My flight from LAX to ICN was delayed about an hour. Then upon arriving in Korea, I was detained by customs. Apparently, I have the face of a criminal. A customs official kept looking at me as if he was struggling to read my polygraph while conducting a nonverbal interrogation. After waiting in the long “I’m a Foreigner” line, the customs official who conducted some failed telepathic lie detector test on me, had me kindly escorted to a restricted room. As I sat there patiently awaiting to miss my connecting flight, I was asked some very basic questions by a different customs officer. “Where are you from? When is your birthday? Where are you going? Who is your employer?” It was more like a survey than an interrogation if you ask me. If I was a criminal, I’d still pass with flying colors. When they realized they had no reason to detain me, they decided to conduct some digital fingerprinting (eye roll). Another 5 minutes wasted. By the time they let me go, I had less than 40 minutes and let’s be real, I’m no speedster.

I ran down the nearest escalators and sprinted to baggage claim to find that it had already stopped running. “Uhhh… great. Where’d my bags go?” The baggage conveyor belt was empty. My baggage was MISSING! I figured it had been dragged off on some trolly, because no one had claimed it. I ran around the airport until I found some guy hauling my luggage away. Thank GOD I got my 80 pounds back. It was really a lose lose at this point. I was in Korea for less than an hour and already, I knew, we had started on the wrong foot. But there was no time to panic, I was ready for this, “Bring it on SK.” But then I couldn’t find the train (which is the faster route to Gimpo), so I had to take a 40-minute bus ride from Incheon to Gimpo. Definitely, didn’t make the connecting flight. Luckily, while I was waiting patiently for the wrong bus to appear, a Korean flight attendant struck a conversation with me. She spoke a little English and I explained to her my situation. She quickly directed me to the right bus line and boarded with me. She told me the airport was on her way home, so she didn’t mind helping me get my flight changed. I felt such gratitude towards her. I couldn’t believe her kindness. We arrived at Gimpo and she helped me exchange my ticket for the next flight. It was literally departing in 10 minutes. I swear, everything was one exhausting rush from one place to another. It’s like one of those days where you’re late to EVERYTHING because the universe is toying with you. 

KOREAN AIR BAGGAGE ALLOWANCE The most up-to-date baggage policy can be found directly on their website: Flying to/from America Flying to/from Europe, Middle East, Africa, Oceania If your flight has a transfer where you’ll need to transfer your baggage manually, I highly recommend packing only 1 large check-in luggage and 1 large carry-on bag. I had 2 check-ins and 1 large carry-on. It was so ridiculous trying to transfer my baggages myself. As soon as the flight attendant let me go off on my own, I fell down the escalators at in Gimpo Airport. With all of my strength, I was trying so hard to balance 2 pieces of luggage and my carry-on up the escalator. As soon as I got half way up, the weight of the luggage and the wheels caused me to lose balance. It felt like I was free falling in slow motion. Probably the most humiliating that’s happened to me in public. Don’t do it. Pack lightly. You can have things shipped to you later. Yes, it’s expensive, but missing your connecting flight is not worth the trouble.

[chaeyouing]

I’m sorry if it’s common knowledge or if you’ve posted it before but what groups do you listen to!!

ahh i don’t think i have actually!!i think i’d consider myself a multi stan. i stan so many groups (so so many), but even if i don’t necessarily stan a certain group i still enjoy listening to their music!! so while i would consider day6, bts, red velvet, exo & blackpink my ult groups or whatever, i really love me some k.a.r.d, block b, bigbang, gfriend, f(x), ikon, clc, winner, knk, epik high, shinee, monsta x, momoland, seventeen, twice, exid, got7, nct, sf9, a.c.e, b.a.p……..the list goes on and on!! i could never stick to listening to one group or a few groups only tbh

anonymously (or not) ask me any question you’d like to know about me 🌷

[crystalzhou-blog1]

South Korea Pop Cultural Analyses

IAT206

Anti-Fandom in Kpop cultural

Introduction

In the world of South Korea, popular music fandom or K-Pop cultural, the radicals are those who overly obsessed or abhorred. Like in Korean fandom cultural, there are a lot of fans who crazily love and support their idols, who are known as Sasaeng fan. However, there are also a small group of people who distress or even hate the idols, known as anti-fans.

Anti-fan phenomenon is common in the Korean fandom cultural, defining anti-fan is a little bit complex. Opposed and yet in some ways similar to the fan is the anti-fan, he or she who actively and vocally hates or dislikes a given text, personality, or genre. (Gray,2005) People produce great uproar and antagonism toward idols due to some notorious incidents, misunderstanding between fans or other private reasons. These antagonisms cause individuals malicious attack on idols mainly online and sometimes in the reality world. People with different opinions attack each other in the comment sections on the forums or other related websites and sometimes cause wars. They attack verbally and/or physically celebrities they hate or anybody with negative or even different opinion about their favorite star. As such, this article studies anti-fandom, and particularly its engagement with discourses of morality, at the online forum discussion area.  

These behaviors not only affect fans’ life but also seriously affects idols’ daily activities. During Tablo’s interview, who is a talented rapper in Korea, he said he can barely trust anyone and hard to figure out who’s the enemy or who’s his supporters when he was involved in the fabricate academic credentials rumor. In a survey of 240 actors, nearly 40 percent replied that they suffer from some level of depression, and have considered suicide. 20 percent took specific steps toward committing suicide, such as purchasing drugs. (T.K. Korean!, 2010).

According to Gray (2005), anti-fandom can involve densely constructed performances and can in its own way be just as productive as fandom. From one standpoint, we could easily say anti-fans as “bad” audiences, they do not or rarely watch working pieces. However, regardless of whether they are “right” or “wrong,” non-fans’ and anti-fans’ readings and consumption can become sociologically relevant and important, as the controversy surrounding Crash amply illustrated. (Gray, 2005) Though anti-fans cause various arguments and tensions in society, however, it has the own positive influence which makes the whole industry more productive.

Anti-fans phenomenon is extremely serious in Korea due to the special ethnic condition. The development of this phenomenon in Korea is caused by firmly interconnected between the special ethnic and the online disinhibition effect. However, this condition brings huge inconvenience for the public figures and also negatively influences the Kpop industry. Researchers on anti-fans group will be conducted by using psychoanalysis and ethnographic which specifically netnography methodologies.

Antifandom

First, I want to introduce the background of K-pop cultural, fandom cultural and anti-fandom phenomenon. Kpop industry is a kingdom produces many various artists, produced by different companies every year. Hence, competition and pressure between each group or each individual are incredibly intense. In order to support their own idols and preventing them fade out from the audience, fans have to gather together, vote during the TV shows and organize events for their idols. Individual fans need to participate in fan tribes, find connections with each other and consolidating a fixed set of fandom practices. Due to the huge amount of idols, they have to share stages or do collaborations, fan activities often overlap. Fans believe their own idols are supreme and better than other groups, arguments, and conflicts caused which lead to the birth of anti-fans. In another word, the behaviour causes the fan tribes go to war. (Beers, 2015)

This phenomenon firstly appeared back to the beginning of the corporate-produced boy/girl bands in the late 1990s. What we know the most famous case of anti-fans involves Gan Mi-Yeon, a member of a girl group called Baby VOX. She was targeted with extra intensity because she was rumored to be dating with a popular member of a boy band. In a recent interview, Gan said throughout 1999 she received scores of "fan mails" filled with razors, after she opened them, along with pictures of her with her eyes taken out or letters were written in blood. Moreover, extreme fans even do physical attack towards the idols. In 2000, Yoon Gye-Sang, a member of a boy band called G.O.D. received a soda injected with bleach. Yoon's mother drank it instead and had to be hospitalized. Similarly, in 2006, U-know who belongs to Dongbangshinki received a soda injected with industrial glue and has to be hospitalized. Moreover, a note writing “Your dances are the dump and your groups are disgusting, I want to kill you.” are given with the beverage to the victim.

Table who is a member of a group called Epik High was really popular in South Korea. He as a main vocal and rapper was called genius in Korean pop culture. Also, he was talented in literature and good at writing songs. He studied English literature at Stanford since 1998 and graduate in advance due to the excellent grade. However, he was involved in a fabricate academic credentials rumor in May 2010. A group of Internet users created an online forum titled "We Request the Truth from Tablo,”. The members of the group participated anonymously and attacked Lee from behind user names such as Whatbecomes and Spongebobo. Entertainment gossip sites reported the existence of the anti-Tablo site and membership swelled to nearly 200,000, many of whom launched their own investigations into Lee's past. Tobias Wolff and Stanford registrar Thomas Black were barraged by emails from Koreans who questioned Lee's educational background. Black alone received 133 emails on the subject. Everybody wanted to know one thing: Was Lee lying?These rumors make him hard to live in the entertainment industry and also make he and his family hard to live peacefully in Korea.(n.d.2017)

Intense and Interconnected

Moreover, anti-fandom is not a local phenomenon but also a globalized product that breaks national boards. Idol groups also have many proximate fans in another area of Asia and even America. For example, Justin Bieber and Britney Spears have a lot of fans since their coming out, rumours oppose did not decrease until nowadays. As of this moment, 52,728 people "like" the "I HATE LADY GAGA" Facebook page. This may caused by the advent of the internet and its ability to compress geographical distance. However, anti-fandom is extremely serious in Korea due to the special ethnic condition, Koreans are intense and interconnected. For instance, if you as an American hate Lady Gaga due to her exaggerate performance and behavior, it’s hard to do anything hurt her personally except leaving comments at the discussion area.

However, all of those conditions are different in Korea. First of all, Korea is physically interconnected. It is a 50 million people country and nearly 20 million people live in Seoul metro area. Everything important like political, cultural, financial is located in Seoul, which means anyone who wants more opportunities and to be success lives in Seoul. The second point is Korea is relationally interconnected. In Asia, it’s your responsibility to be nice and friendly with surroundings, you are expected to be friends with everyone in the group. This does not happen all the time, but it definitely happens frequently. People tends to gather together a lot, aims to build more personal bonds. During every state of individual’s life, classmates, relatives, and colleges dine out a lot. In practicality, this means that without even trying very hard, Koreans get to know a lot more people personally. Finally, Korea is virtually interconnected. Korea is one of the earliest adopters of high-speed Internet. The Internet works in astounding speed, smartphones are widespread. And nearly everyone is willing and affordable to use and abuse the Internet. Anti-fans can organize over the Internet, further escalate their hate through social medias and even schedule flash mob meetings at the current location of a celebrity instantly.

Hence, due to the special ethnic spirit and social condition, anti-fandom is a common phenomenon in Korea.

Network and Netnography

People follow the particular idols since they appreciate their abilities, however, they also attack idols malevolent due to their behaviors or other reasons.  This may vary from having previously watched the show and having found it intolerable; to having a dislike for its genre, director or stars; to having seen previews or ads, or seen or heard unfavorable reviews.(Gray, 2003) As seen from lots of examples, it is often about rivalry and jealousy. But a worrisome number of anti-fans seem to hate celebrities only because the amount of blind hatred in the form of doctored pictures, baseless rumors and vile death wishes is simply stunning. (T.K. Korean!, 2010) Since it is convenient to get information in current society, the Internet makes people lazy to finding truth by themselves. People are so lazy to figure out the truth and easily trust the untrustworthy rumors. There is also someone who attempt to give a rational reason (for example, one commenter at a Girls' Generation anti-fan site apparently hated the group because they were untalented). However, those people are few, and the stated reasons are wildly disproportionate to the intensity of hate expressed on those sites.

“Netnography,” or ethnography on the Internet, is a new qualitative research methodology that adapts ethnographic research techniques to the study of cultures and communities emerging through computer-mediated communications. As a research technique, “netnography” uses the information publicly available in online forums to identify and understand the needs and motivations of the online group of people. (Robert,2002) 70% percent of participants of the online questionnaires claimed that they seldom or never double check the reliability after seeing the report. Fake news is everywhere on the Internet, it is easy to instigate or advocate one unreal information among the Internet.

Morality

Thirdly, I want to talk about the conscious or unconscious motivation behind their behaviors. People dislike particularly items normally due to it’s opposite to their values and cultures. However, different does not mean bad, people who are able to think critically should have their own ideas and also able to accept others’ opinions.

People attack others online due to the online disinhibition effect, researchers and clinicians observed how people may behave online in ways compared with their usual offline acts. Sometimes people reveal suppressed emotions, fears, and wishes, they show unusual acts of kindness and generosity or go out of their way to help others. These behavior are called “benign disinhibition”. On the other hand, people may be rude, critical, angry, hateful, and threatening or they visit places of perversion, crime, and violence. We may call this “toxic disinhibition.”

One of the reason causes this bad emotion is anonymity. While online, one’s identity can be partially or completely hidden. Usernames and emails can be visible but may not relevant to the real information. For the most part, others only know what a person tells them but they have no idea who that person is. For example, Wikipedia is a website let anyone edit information. Most of the entries are edited by experts, however, some of them are subjective and may have bias due to different people, like political or aesthetics. Information online is various and moves fast, a large amount of online information is unreliable. When people have the opportunity to separate their actions online from their in-person life and identity, they feel less vulnerable and constraints. In the case of expressed hostilities or other deviant acts, the person can evade responsibility, almost as if superego restrictions have been temporarily suspended from the online psyche.  They don’t need to worry about being punished and sometimes people might even convince themselves that those online behaviors “aren’t me at all.” (Suler,2005) Hence, individuals acting online won’t be the same as they in the real world, they think they do not need to be responsible for their actions.

Positive anti-fandom

From one standpoint, we could easily say anti-fans as “bad” audiences, be act due to they do not or rarely watch working pieces. However, regardless of whether they are “right” or “wrong,” non-fans’ and anti-fans’ readings and consumption can become sociologically relevant and important. Behind dislike, after all, there are always expectations. Of what a TV show should be like or what an actress act. To study anti-fan, it’s also to study what expectations and what value structure media consumption. Anti-fans is also a motivation encouraging the public figures being better. For example, Suzy as a popular member of K-pop group missA was known as pretty when she firstly debut. After she tried to develop to the acting direction, she was criticized for her bad acting skills. Reports are strict with titles like “She own nothing but a pretty face.” evaluating her performance in her first drama in 2010. After so many negative evaluations, she started training her performance and ask senior actors for advice. In 2016, she’ was the main actress in the new release drama and achieved a good reputation. Learning from this, when we think of the audience or idols in everyday life, are vary we can see openness and fluidity of media as strengths of anti-fandom.

Conclusion

Anti-fandom is a phenomenon extremely serious in Korea due to it’s special ethnic condition.  The origins of anti are varied but bring huge influence to both fans and idols. Koreans are firmly physically, virtually and relatively connected, which makes anti-fandom well-organized and developed in Korea. Also, rapidly development of Internet makes it easier getting information, so that people are lazy to check or think information by themselves is another elements. Due to the online disinhibition effect, people don’t they are responsible for their actions online.Though anti-fandom brings positive effect to the career of idols or the development of whole industry, it is still no doubt anti-fandom bring huge negative effect to the idol’s daily life and the rest of the society.

References:

E., Adrienne. (2014). Desperately seeking methods: new directions in fan studies research. Participations, 11(2). Retrieved from https://curve.coventry.ac.uk/open/file/4aa65a26-18a2-4ab5-af83-67de9c89d838/1/Fan%20studies.pdf.

Gray, J. (2005). Antifandom and the Moral Text. American Behavioral Scientist, 840-858. Retrieved from http://journals.sagepub.com.proxy.lib.sfu.ca/doi/abs/10.1177/0002764204273171

Gray, J.. (2003). New audiences, new textualities Anti-fans and non-fans. INTERNATIONAL journal of CULTURAL studies, 64-81. Retrieved from http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1367877903006001004

Jung, S., & Y., Hirata. (2012). K-pop Idol Girl Group Flows in Japan in the Era of Web 2.0. Ejcjs, 12(2). Retrieved from http://japanesestudies.org.uk/ejcjs/vol12/iss2/jung.html

Korean!), T. (. (2010,October 11). Anti-Fan Death is Real? Retrieved February 16, 2017, from http://askakorean.blogspot.ca/2010/10/anti-fan-death.html

M., Hills. (2002). Fan cultures. New York: Routledge.

N.D.(2017)The Persecution of Daniel Lee. from https://alumni.stanford.edu/get/page/magazine/article/?article_id=40913

R., Beers. (2015). Disidentifying with Fan Culture Narratives: A Case Study on EXO Anti-fans in K-pop Fandom in the Digital Era. Disidentifying with Fan Culture Narratives: A Case Study on EXO Anti-fans in K-pop Fandom in the Digital Era. Retrieved from https://openaccess.leidenuniv.nl/handle/1887/35139.

Robert V. Kozinets (2002) The Field Behind the Screen: Using Netnography for Marketing Research in Online Communities. Journal of Marketing Research: February 2002, Vol. 39, No. 1, pp. 61-72.

Suler,J. (2005) CyberPsychology & Behavior. 7(3): 321-326. dos 10.1089/1094931041291295.

[teach-english-in-korea-blog]

Private Vs. Public Schools in Korea & The Death of EPIK

When applying to teach English in South Korea, most people are confused when comparing private vs. public schools in Korea. There are many varying opinions online so it difficult to know which is better.

Many people from the US and Canada believe that a government-run program of any kind is more reliable and trustworthy than a private program. Why? Because it’s the government! This way of thinking, however, does not carry over to Korea, especially when it comes to the public school program EPIK (English Program In Korea).

We have outlined below the reasons why EPIK is no longer as safe an option as it used to be.

The Original Goal of EPIK (That Failed)

EPIK was first created to stop parents from paying high fees that private schools (hagwans) were charging. It aimed to eliminate the need for private schools by providing proper English lessons (taught by foreign English teachers) at public schools. While the intention was noble, the results have been disappointing.

EPIK is dying a slow death thanks to less government funding (a result of families having fewer children), poorly created curricula and subpar teaching.

Why Public School (EPIK) Positions May Seem Better but Are Not

All too often, people looking to teach in Korea are too focused on things like location, working hours and vacation time. EPIK, for the most part, offers better vacation than private schools (about 5-7 days per year more). Location, however, is not guaranteed (even though you are told that before arriving in Korea), and daytime hours are now being offered by most private schools.

What people forget, though, are the most important aspects of a job. This includes job security, satisfaction and their personal life in Korea. EPIK’s massive system treats each teacher as just a number. No real concern is given to the individual and their overall well-being while they’re in Korea.

Why the EPIK Program has Failed

Korean parents sacrifice everything for their kids and their future. Accordingly, they want the best of the best when it comes to English lessons. This is because speaking English offers many opportunities for Koreans. The curriculum that EPIK provides is very generic in nature, so children with medium to high levels of English learn nothing they don’t already know. Conversely, the kids with little or no knowledge learn only the very basics.

Lessons are taught to 40 students at a time (often with only 1 teacher!). As a result, there is no individual focus on speaking. On the other hand, private schools offer extensive individual practice because class sizes are typically 8-12 students. Also, students are grouped by ability so there are never large discrepancies between students.

As parents realized that their children were receiving mediocre English lessons at public schools, enrollment in private schools skyrocketed.

Why Teaching Through EPIK Isn’t a Safe Option for Teachers

At first, we at Travel and Teach wanted to offer both private and public school positions to our teachers. That way, people could make a decision depending on individual preferences. We therefore worked with EPIK for 4 years before multiple problems started happening. Eventually, it got to the point that we no longer felt comfortable and safe sending our teachers through EPIK.

Problem #1: The application process requires applicants to apply 6 months in advance. In fact, they are forced to apply even before they have the necessary documents ready to apply for the visa. This resulted in lost jobs when documents were not produced in time. Applicants then had to start their job search all over, by which time most private schools had completed their hiring. At best, this caused many people to go to Korea 3-6 months after they originally wanted to. At worst, it caused many to not go at all because they didn’t want to through the process again.

Problem #2:  EPIK hires twice the number of people they need. For one intake, EPIK will ‘hire’ around 2,000 teachers for 1,000 positions. This is so that there aren’t any teaching positions that are not filled. The ‘first come, first served’ way of recruiting results in hired teachers losing their jobs after completing most of the required steps. They then have to start all over.

Problem #3: EPIK promises that if you send your visa documents to Korea in a hurry, you will secure your desired location. Unfortunately, this is not always the case. We had multiple reports of teachers being promised positions in large metropolitan cities. When they arrived at EPIK orientation, however, they were given placements in rural areas. They were then told that they could either accept that position or return home on their own dime.

Problem #4: Government cutbacks started to be a common occurrence, as schools could no longer afford to employ foreign teachers. While losing your job before getting to Korea is a problem, losing your job while in Korea is infinitely worse. At that point, the entire visa process needs to be redone, and you must do this all on your own.

Problem #5: Teacher support through EPIK is essentially non-existent. EPIK teachers commonly complain that there is a serious lack of support. Whether it is from EPIK representatives or within the school, there is often no support structure. At private schools, you have managers, directors and co-teachers who can assist you or answer your questions.

Why Travel and Teach Stopped Working with EPIK

In addition to the problems outlined above, in late 2009, EPIK cut 150 jobs 1 month before those positions began. For Travel and Teach alone, we recruited 35 of those teachers. We then had to inform them that they were jobless, even though they had already completed the visa process and purchased plane tickets.

Once we realized that we essentially had no control over the security of our teachers’ positions, we stopped working with EPIK once and for all.

The Misconception of Private Schools (Hagwans)

Is it true that some private schools will not pay you on time, add on extra teaching hours or fire you in the 11th month of your contract to save on severance and plane ticket payout? Unfortunately, we still hear stories like this. However, these stories are usually from people who have either 1) been hired directly through a school or 2) been placed through a Korean recruiting agency. While not all schools that hire directly are bad, nor are all Korean recruiting agencies, the fact is once you have a visa sponsorship with a school in Korea and are unhappy, your only two options are to 1) quit, go home and do the visa process all over again or 2) stay put and deal with the poor working conditions or treatment.

Unlike what the so called ‘pundits’ of the teaching industry in Korea say online on Dave’s ESL Café or other online forums, the majority of private schools are well-run institutions that would not risk their reputation for the sake of saving some money by not paying a teacher what they are owed.

At Travel and Teach, we have always been very picky about which schools we work with. This gives us full confidence when we send teachers to these schools year after year. We have partnered with many of these schools since 2001. Therefore, we pass on extensive information to prospective teachers so they know exactly what they are getting into. And if there are any issues or miscommunications, we are there to help figure everything out. This is the Travel and Teach Guarantee.

Once people are informed of the differences between private vs. public schools in Korea, the choice seems pretty clear.