You Can Never Go Home

Soundtrack: hit play and start reading.
Tom Waits: "Pony"
Tom Waits sings about home like a man who's been lost a long time.




"I lived on nothin' but dreams and train smoke
Somehow my watch and chain
Got lost...

I hope my Pony, I hope my pony knows the way back home"

-Tom Waits 'Pony'

"I remember that time you told me, you said, 'love is touching souls'
Surely you touched mine,
'Cause part of you pours out of me in these lines from time to time"
-Joni Mitchell, 'A Case of You'

I mentioned earlier that at 8:15 (or so) every Friday morning, I'm on TBS radio (101.3), yamming about the topics that have been catching blog column-space, and commenter love (where applicable). This week, as Christmas approaches, maybe it's appropriate to talk about home: December's the month I always feel the most homesick, the month I hanker hard for the foods and friends I left behind me in Canada, and the last Christmas I had in Canada was the hardest, but most intimate and intense Christmas my family experienced, or likely ever will: the first one after Mom had received a terminal prognosis for her stomach cancer.

This week, Chris in South Korea had a guest post from "Gone Seoul Searching" about reverse culture shock, and Bathhouse Ballads talked about why he dreads going back to his home in England. Gone Seoul Searching writes about missing trips to Daiso and kimbap, and the accidental "got back from Korea" blunders, where you refill your friend's drink with two hands, or bow when you meet someone, ultimately seeking out Koreatown: "anything Korean felt like home to me in a strange world that was not my own." Gone Seoul Searching clearly still has one foot in Korea, planning to return perhaps, and reaching out to her former students through facebook and email. Meanwhile, Bathhouse Ballads talks about the comfort and ease of living in Korea, and does not look forward to going to a country where restaurants and taxis are way more expensive, and the streets simply feel less safe: "Going back to the UK is a massive step down in terms of lifestyle, cultural opportunities and quality of life and even the massive hike in terms of pay can’t compensate for living in an expensive, insular little enclave surrounded by a cultural wilderness," he writes.

I have experienced this myself, most powerfully when I spent seven months in Canada taking care of my sick mom: I craved the jimjilbang (I have no idea what it says about me that I missed opportunities for public nudity so poignantly), and spicy food - I once went to a Thai restaurant and ordered the spiciest thing on the menu, just to remember. My heart still races to remember that meal. When I first got back, or when I vacation in Canada, I find myself being far too chatty with waiters and store clerks, because they can speak English! or being sullen and non-communicative, as is my habit here, so I don't have to tax the clerks' English ability, or their ability to understand poorly-pronounced Korean (and my ability to form it). My hand reaches for the not-present kimchi dish several times a meal, and when I am out socially, I fall into the habit of starting every third sentence with "You know, in Korea..." as my own, world-traveller version of "This one time... at band camp..."



The smell of world travel doesn't leave me, or other people. I can spot, in some odd way, people who have lived outside their home cultures, and those who haven't. This is also true of the Koreans I meet: the ones who have lived abroad speak (and I don't mean pronunciation) and think differently, for the most part, than the Korean Koreans I meet. They bring back interests and knowledge that simply don't arrive in Korea through the usual channels - their favorite western artists are Fleet Foxes and Frightened Rabbit, rather than Abba and Beyonce.


And maybe not everybody who goes overseas experiences this personal shift: maybe there are people who manage to live here (or elsewhere), tottering, without ever planting a foot here, by hunkering in expat enclaves, avoiding the activities and foods and places that would make Korea a part of them. Perhaps that is possible. I've met a few who tried, but I'm not sure how it turned out for them, because I didn't seek out their company, once I saw that they'd hit the reject button, and were utterly uninterested in hearing about my attempts to engage with the culture and people here. I don't know how I'd relate to such people anymore, even if I once could, or wanted to.

And this is what it is like to live with one foot in two different cultures. Does it make me better, smarter, and wiser? Not than other people (how could I compare?) but perhaps than myself when I was the product of only one culture, and lacked the self-awareness to spot what of my beliefs were the prejudices of my upbringing, and what were actually my earned and owned self. Travel is certainly not the only way to identify those distinctions, though I might have trouble understanding the journey of someone who had done it through some other route.

On the other hand, the sacrifice I must make is that I never quite belong anywhere, except perhaps with others who have feet planted in more than one place: other long-term expats, whose roots stretch entirely across oceans. Koreans all ask me about Canada, though it's been nine years since I lived there, and I can't relate to a lot of the things my Canadian friends want to tell me about anymore, unless I ask them for tiresome explanations, and I can't explain things without that same long-winded background.

This is why I say that you can never go home: part stays behind, and part hankers for pieces of that other place. You have reference points that you didn't have before, and will always have them.

So, readers, in Korea or Canada or elsewhere, where have you lived, and what footprints have those places left on you? What did you miss of the place you went to, once you came back home, and is it possible to come home again?

How to make EBS's Racism Video Mean Something

Update: for two great views on this topic, please read these pieces side by side:

The Metropolitician: "Be White"
Adeel "Taking the Metropolitician Challenge"



You've seen this video, if you read the K-blogs. It's been discussed elsewhere...

1. This video is from May -- which pleases me. This video was made by Koreans, for Koreans -- unlike "banning" dog meat during the olympics, this video isn't a performance for a foreign audience. It's Koreans trying to start an earnest discussion. We expat bloggers and viewers didn't figure into it at all. I like that Koreans are deciding to start these kinds of conversations.

2. It's only two guys, and a 5 minute video: who knows what story the original footage told. I'd be surprised if the narrative was as clean as it's presented to be.

It's impossible to make a general statement about whether Koreans are racist or not, just from this. Absolutely impossible. (Though the youtube commenters have been quick to do exactly that.)

So...

Here's a research proposal of sorts: How to Make This Experiment Actually Tell Us Something About Racism in Korea.

(soundtrack: Mashup-Germany - Top of the Pops, 2011. Love these year-end mashup things.)


A. Count the number of passersby in the full hour of filming, or film until a set number of pedestrians pass by. Or until the subject of the experiment (the white guy, or the SEAsian guy) has approached and spoken to a set number of people (say 200, or 500). Send them out so they spend an equal amount of time approaching strangers on the weekend, the daytime, the afternoon, the evening, and lunch break.

B. Make a few categories of responses, say:

1. stops longer than ten seconds and helps
2. gives less than ten seconds of help
3. passive negative response - averts eyes, moves to other side of sidewalk, walks faster, etc.
4. active negative response - says "no" or responds with hostility
and maybe
5. does not notice

Log the responses from video footage, so that different subjects can be compared in terms of their rate of the different types of responses.

C. Train the subjects to use the exact same wording and body language in their approaches.  If you have the budget, have one set of subjects being more direct, and another set being less direct... in the exact same way, with the same wordings and gestures, as much as possible.

D. Ensure there are equal numbers of male and female, good-looking and unattractive, tall and short subjects in each group.

E. Find that variety of subjects across more than two races: South-east Asian, South-Asian, Middle-Eastern, North-African, Central-African, Caucasian, Latino/Hispanic, and East-Asian.

F. Repeat the experiment using similar groups, similarly trained, or the same group in:
1. a residential area
2. a busy downtown area
3. a popular tourist area

or/and in

1. a big city
2. a medium-sized city
3. a tourist town/area

G. If possible, have an equal number of subjects approaching people speaking Korean (the local language) and English (a commonly spoken cosmopolitain language).

H. Repeat the exact same experiment, as closely as possible, in several major cities on each continent, or in a big city, a medium-sized city, and a tourst town/area in several countries on each continent/region of the world.

Gather statistics. Crunch numbers. Compare.

IF, across all those factors, Koreans still treat the white guy more favorably than the dark guy, TO A GREATER EXTENT THAN the average of all the groups of people, from all the places, in all the data we've gathered... and far enough above the average that it can't be accounted for with the margin of error inherent in gathering statistics...

we can say that this video shows Koreans are more racist than other countries.

SMOE to Phase Out Native English Teachers: Turnover, Gatekeepers, and Alternate Sources

Long post, so... SOUNDTRACK TIME!
Hit play and start reading: Suckers: "2 Eyes 2 C"


So SMOE is talking about getting rid of its high school English teachers, which has, of course, sparked outrage and shock in all the familiar places. Talking about education in Korea is always a sure way to get tongues (or keyboard fingers) wagging, and the K-blogosphere has been true to form, with every bit of grist flying off the mill in every direction (try here, for starters). Much of what's being said now has been said before (some just a few days before) so I'd like to tie together what happened on one blog post, with some of the talk about the new SMOE decision, and toss a few ideas out there for the sake of discussion.

The Context


On Tumblr, a blog post titled (at the time) "What do Koreans Really  Think About Native English Teachers" asked one Korean. A new title helps the post make more sense, but it kicked off a storm of 80+ comments: Girl and the World probably didn't expect this. She's been conscientious about responding to comments on and off her blog (here, for example), and clearly underestimated the hornet's nest she'd stirred up. So go easy on her.

I linked this comment on her piece, which tells a story I've heard too often: awesome, dedicated, well-liked teacher... leaving Korea. There are different reasons:  bureaucracy, coworker crap, people in the street giving the stank-eye, curriculum insultingly beneath their training, coteachers embarrassingly unprepared to work with an NET, age discrimination, gender discrimination, race discrimination, a terribly low ceiling for advancement and pay increase, and even education office foreigner-handlers treating them like backpackers, idiots and criminals... bottom line: great teachers are leaving Korea. Too many great teachers are leaving Korea. And Korean education policy makers need to figure out why, and stanch the bleeding.

The Tumblr link prompted a conversation between Burndog (Korea's most famous blogger, and an indefatigable dragon-slayer in his own right) and a few others, which you can read here, here, and here. (It's a little hard to keep track of Tumblr conversations if you're not used to the format. It might be hard or confusing for all you wordpress users. Hint: scroll down.)


The Commentary

This Chosun English article has been linked the most, and it cites the cost-benefit of NETs.   That article mentions a survey: "A survey conducted for us showed that Korean teachers with outstanding English and teaching skills are more effective in the long term." If that survey is this survey... "Parents prefer 'Capable Korean Teachers' over Native Speakers" Burndog rightfully points out, no shit, sherlock. Anybody'll take an awesome capable teacher, all things being equal... but are the Korean teachers who'd replace NET's the English teachers described in the survey? Not necessarily. I want to know the wording of their description of a Native Teacher. Meanwhile, this report on that same survey gives contradictory results  -- "60 percent of students were happy with native speakers' lessons, compared to 55.3 percent said for Korean English teachers" -- so while people would like to have those mythical high-fluency, well-trained, proficient and awesome Korean English teachers... that's not who they seem to be getting.

Forming educational policy based on surveys make me uncomfortable... especially surveys that have possibly loaded questions like "Would you rather have a capable, highly fluent Korean teacher or a  foreigner who knows fuck-all about teaching in your class?" -- which probably isn't exactly how the question was phrased, but I'd nevertheless appreciate some transparency on how that survey was worded, if SMOE is going to make a radical decision like phasing out native teachers in high schools, based on it.

And really, I'd rather educational policy were developed in consultation with education experts, through analysis and research, not through populism and polls of people who know nothing about pedagogy and language learning, or who are thinking about the College Entrance Exam rather than the global marketplace, when they state their preference for Korean teachers.


January Wedding: by The Avett Brothers. I like this one. It's sweet.


The Turnover

I want to highlight I'm No Picasso's post in response to Girl And The World's interview, because most of it totally fits this topic as well. The first seven paragraphs pertain more to the "Girl and the World"  interview, so if you're not invested in that, skip it. But once INP gets into it, she's makes her point beautifully, and I recommend you go read her whole post, "On Being a Foreign Teacher"

Here are some of her best parts, but you really should go read the whole thing:

But the part that I just really cannot abide is this notion that foreign English teachers are pointless. I am so sick of hearing that, from both sides. I'm so sick of hearing foreign English teachers talk about how they are made useless in their classrooms, and I'm sick of hearing it out of the Korean media...

Take any teacher in the world in their first year of real live classroom experience. No matter their qualifications or degrees or certificates. Observe the mistakes they make, and how utterly inefficient they are bound to be at times. Now, take a group of teachers who primarily exist within that realm, and judge them by that reputation. What does that end up looking like?

If fully qualified, 100% fluent Korean English teachers were rotated in and out as quickly as foreign English teachers are, the entire system would probably be in shambles.

And it would be so amazing if Korea could afford to just kick out every inefficient foreign teacher in the mix, and carry on with some kind of imaginary abundance of grade A educators. It would also be amazing to see a lot of the terrible Korean teachers I've worked with get the boot, as well. But it's not going to happen. Because this world has more students than it does good teachers.

...come sit in on my class sometime, and I'll show you what I really do. Until then, I don't want to hear what you have to say about it anymore.

If the average Native English teacher in Korea stays less than two years, it's no surprise Native English Teaching is a mess: the first two years, and especially the first year of teaching are where people take their lumps and learn from their mistakes. Obviously, if the system is not paying enough to hire teachers with experience away from their teaching jobs elsewhere, or keeping them here once they come, we're going to get that revolving door of incompetence, near-competence, finally-competent-but-about-to-leave-and-be-replaced-by-another-incompetent.

Would paying a little more and offering full teacher status, rather than assistant teacher status, and a little job security, and maybe opportunity for promotion, really ultimately cost the system more than the recruiting and training of a constant flow of new teachers does? Hard to say. Has that possibility even been looked into?


My Questions

From here we can talk in circles for a long time (and have), here are my questions, and then my solution:

I apologize for using "Korea" here as if all Koreans and Korean bureaucrats were a monolithic, one-minded mass.

1. What are Korea's goals for having Native Teachers in high school - or any - classrooms?
(note this quote: "Personally, I think Korean teachers are more helpful in preparing for exams" - if that's their purpose, fire whitey. They'll never compare with Koreans for teaching the test.)

2. Is Korea willing to pay market value for the competitive teachers they seem to want in classrooms, and complain about not having? Enough to lure them away from their teaching jobs in other countries? I bet Saudi Arabia has some great English teachers, and keeps them for as long as those teachers are willing to live overseas, because the pay is off the hook there. So far Korea seems content to settle for warm bodies who are willing to teach for the lowest of lowballs they can offer.

3. Who are the gatekeepers choosing cheaper, less experienced and qualified teachers? Who is holding them accountable, or why are they not being held accountable? As Teachacrajy says, on NET's being blamed for ruining Korean education with their unqualifiediness: "Who the hell hired us?"

Feist: Gatekeeper


4. If native teachers disappear from high schools, how will SMOE and the Seoul government help less-advantaged kids, who can't afford hagwons (which will doubtless pick up the slack here) get exposure to native speakers of English, and the benefits that come from exposure to other cultures? Because the underprivileged are going to be the ones missing out on the Native Teacher experience (if we agree that the native teacher experience is an inherently valuable experience).

I mean, if they don't care about those benefits, just be honest enough to admit it.

My general assessment: not enough culpability is put on the gatekeepers, and in general, with English native instructors in Korea, as with anything, you get what you pay for.

My Solution (Pie in the Sky)


And finally, my solution... hold onto your hat. And to qualify: I've never taught in a public school... so you're welcome to ignore everything I say. I'll even kick off the comments to that effect.

Yes, Korea should work to retain the kickass teachers that are in the system. And incentivize teaching in such a way that it's worth it for good teachers to stay -- that they can imagine having a career, and even a family, and have a respected role in Korean society, through teaching in public schools, as Korean teachers do. Make it rigorous to qualify for that stream (it is for Korean teachers)... but make it worth the rigors. Right now, many people find the just visa rigmarole too much trouble to bother staying longer, much less think of building a life here.

Expats and native speakers should be put in charge of the curriculum native teachers have to teach, and native teachers should be training the other native teachers. What they do shouldn't be on the CSAT test, and Native English class time should be sacrosanct: you can't steal the English class to practice the school concert or do extra test prep. That there's never again a "training seminar" where a Korean bureaucrat with poor pronunciation a manual out loud, word for word, to a room full of teachers who vary from completely new to years-veteran. That part of the curriculum should be kept separate from the test stuff the Korean English teacher is doing.

And (sorry, guys, but...) yeah. Get rid of the marginal teachers. The ones who were hired because SMOE, or GEPIK, or whoever, needs to fill a quota of warm bodies. Send them back home, or into the hagwon system. If they don't have training in English, Linguistics, TESL, or Education, if they can't even spell the word "pedagogy" and they've never taught a class before, if they can't pick an intransitive verb out of a list or spot a comma splice, they have no place in Korea's public schools sullying the reputation of the teachers who are good at what they do, and give a damn.

And to fill those spaces?

Bring in trained, native speaking TESL educators from the Phillipines, from India, from the Middle-East, from English speaking countries in Africa, and other non-first-world countries. The hagwons and the demanding moms will make sure that whitey always has his/her place in Korean English education, but the variety of skin colors and accents in public schools will give kids a perspective on English as a global language that nobody in Korea gets right now, without traveling abroad. They'll probably take less pay - maybe quite a bit less - than the marginal native teachers they're replacing, and still be doing way better than the job they'd have had in the Phillipines, or India, or Nigeria (all countries with generations of first-language native English speakers), as well as teaching better than some greenear with no background in language or education... and probably act a little less entitled to boot, which I'm sure would suit the school administrators just fine. Have them be trained and managed by the kickass teachers three paragraphs ago, who'd have the power to decide that this or that school doesn't get a native instructor next year, if they start pulling funny stuff on those teachers. Rotate teachers among schools, so that students get a year of an Indian accent, a year of a Scottish accent, and a year of a Farsi accent during middle school. And make the benefits, promotions and pay available to Western teachers for being awesome, and staying, available to those teachers, too. For the same pay, once you become a manager... the system will flood with EXTREMELY good educators from those countries, pitching for that kind of a position.

Kids get the qualified teachers they want, administrators save in the budget, Korean students get a totally new look at what it really means for English to be a world language, teachers get trained and managed by people who understand their issues, and have a reason to stay longer, so that native English classes aren't so often a gong-show of first-year mistakes. Everybody wins.

And to any Ministry of Education officials who read this: you have my permission to steal my idea and take credit for it, which, as we all know, is the last element missing from this plan, in order to actually get it implemented.

63 Years On - Screening on Sunday

I got an e-mail from a buddy named Shannon, who's a heck of a lady, and who's associated with the "House of Sharing" home for comfort women.

On Sunday, December 4, from 2-4pm in the theatre of Jogye Temple, one street over from Insadong, there's going to be a screening of a documentary film about the lives of these women, which I think you should go and see.

The poster: (click for full size)

the Facebook event page.

The press release ('coz I'm lazy)

‘Comfort women’ tell their story in a documentary film 

The documentary film “63 Years On” will be shown at a free screening at Jogyesa Temple Theatre on Sunday,  December 4th 2011.

This is an opportunity for both the Korean and International communities to further engage with the ‘Comfort women’ issue and to support the continuing fight for justice.

A brief Question & Answer session will take place after the film, an opportunity for those who wish to share their thoughts on the film and ask any questions to members of the House of Sharing’s International Outreach Team.

In this film, award-winning Korean director Kim Dong Won presents the harrowing experiences of 5 international survivors of Japanese Military Sexual Slavery during World War II. The very personal telling of their experiences is supported by excellent research and archival footage to create a powerfully honest, determined, and often heartbreaking documentary. While this gripping film may evoke great sadness and anger, the bravery displayed will truly inspire all who see it. The House of Sharing’s International Outreach Team works to raise awareness of the issue of Japanese military sexual slavery during World War II and to support the survivors, called Halmoni, in their on-going struggle for historical reconciliation and justice.  The team is composed of both foreign and local volunteers who lead English tours to the House of Sharing and the onsite Museum of Sexual Slavery by the Japanese Military.

The House of Sharing’s International Outreach Team also works to highlight continuing crimes against humanity, including the form of sexual violence during war and international sexual trafficking, that women and children across the world continue to experience on a daily basis. This screening provides a window to an episode of Asian and International history which has been willfully ignored by so many for more than 63 years. You are invited to join the House of Sharing and show your support to the survivors who continue the fight for justice.

Two Quick Bits: Crazy Tow Truck and Othering

This video of a towtruck driver trying to be the first to the accident site (and thereby winning the tow) is pretty shocking. It's making the rounds right now.


THe thing that bugs me most about it is the illegal siren: I've seen REAL ambulances caught in a snare of cars that won't pull over, because so many tow trucks and veterinarian hospital house visit vans have illegal sirens on them, that nobody trusts a siren to actually indicate a pull-over-worthy emergency...and that puts people in danger.

Second:
The Three Wise Monkeys, who have been putting out good stuff lately, has a really interesting article about "otherness" -- a topic I've been thinking about lately, and plan to write about soon.

Go read it.