Aunt Dottie

Nana,
My means to calling home, skype, has been unavailable lately. It is 12:15am April the 1st. HAPPY BIRTHDAY. I'm sorry that I haven't been in contact with you or the rest of the Southern family. I hope everyone is doing well. I miss you all.
Love,
-Michael

Korean Funeral

In Pohang, there is Sunlin College and Sunlin Hospital. The hospital was formed first. It was founded by President Chun’s father-in-law and some missionaries. Later, President Chun’s father founded this college. The day that I left for my northern trip, the founder passed away at the age of 95. He had been bedridden at Sunlin Hospital for awhile.
After another day of being on the road all day, we, the faculty of the international school stopped by the service held at the hospital. Seemingly, the hospital had an entire floor dedicated for such services. There was a long hallway filled with thousands of white flowers, some just thrown on the floor. There were many Chinese characters that I couldn’t read. When we got to the main alter, we were each given a white flower. We placed them in front of a large picture of the man that I had never met. We turned to our right where President Chun, his wife, and another family member were standing. We bowed to them and gave our condolences.
After leaving the main alter area, we placed our shoes back on, took a few steps to a dinning area, where we removed our shoes again. The tables were the usual three feet high. Fresh food was and drinks were brought out. We were tired, had been sitting all day, and had all-ready eaten, but this didn’t matter. This was a time to sit, eat and discuss his life.
President Chun’s son sat down next to us. He had gone to school with Jared in Kansas. He was very nice. We talked with him for awhile. He and his father both, didn’t sleep the night before.
We left and made it home. I slept for 11 hours. In the morning, there were tons of students in the entrance area and in front of the President’s building. Everyone was wearing black and many made black ribbons with two Chinese characters on them. When the President arrived, there were many other people. He had a podium and a huge crowd in front of him. He talked and prayed for awhile in Korean and that was it. All the people went back to their lives.I do not know the next step in the process. Perhaps there will be a burial service with close friends and family. He most likely will be buries in the traditional manner, under a huge mound and with a plaque similar to a headstone.

The Way Home

Tuesday evening
The two day trip is almost over. We stopped by a beach town and also a naval ship museum. On display, there was a USN destroyer. It was built 1945 and in 1972 was sold to the Koreans. It was nice to tour it with Paul. I’m pretty sure that he was a commander of a ship, but it’s hard to be sure about too many things here with the language barrier. Nevertheless, the ship represented us: prior military, Korean, and American. Also, worn out. By the time I arrive back to the college I will have spent 20 hours on a bus within 2 days.Right now they are playing horrible fast paced music loudly. There are words to go along with it if anyone wanted to sing. However, most people are sleeping. I don’t think that anyone likes this music either. There are calm soothing pictures on the large screen that also shows the lyrics which match the mood of the passengers but not the loud fast music. It’s really weird, but doesn’t seem to be weird to anyone else. Possibly it’s the driver’s pay back for the noise all night and morning and a method to staying awake.

Crazy Koreans

Tuesday morning
I don’t know what the biggest factor is here, being Christian or being Asian. It is now 6a.m. and the students still have not gone to sleep. They have been up all night playing games that involve clapping, shouting, and the occasional beating of someone. There are some people sleeping, including the driver of our bus. The driver is right next to where everyone is shouting. The majority are up playing strange games. There is not much for me to do. The computer here is now broken and my computer wont connect to the internet here. It’s too loud to sleep and too dark to run. A girl just lots this game now people are slapping her wrist. I’d rather be sleeping.

Arrival

Monday evening
Another crazy journey. I just arrived to my final destination for the day. We spent 11 hours traveling along the Eastern Coast. We stopped at the 38th parallel and then continued north of there. After the Korean War, territory north of the parallel was acquired. Paul (the head of the International school) was also a naval commander. We ended up stopping by his last duty station. The students went and listened to a presentation while I went with Paul and the current commander.
This is the northern most military post of South Korea and I was on my way to having tea with the commander in his office. Actually, he had coffee and I had tea. He showed us his computer screen which had the real-time position of all North and South Korean ships. The North Korean military and fishing ships were of course marked in red.
From there, we proceeded north to the demilitarized zone where we could see North Korea and further off were North Korean military posts.
Now we are at a cabin that we rented for the night and the students are cooking us dinner. Half of them have a cold. It’s only a matter of time. They never cover their mouth! That’s the life of a teacher I guess. For the rest of the night, I will probably be staring at the wall while everyone will talk in Korean.

Public Baths and beds

Though I am still illiterate here, I am beginning to recognize symbols. One of which is the symbol for public baths. They seem to be everywhere. I haven’t been yet, and don’t think that I want to go. You pay a couple of dollars and can stay as long as you want. There are showers, a cafeteria, gym, and different baths. The thing that seems to excite the Koreans most is the fact that there is hot water and you can sleep there. But as Jared put it, you are allowed to sleep there, but can’t. The sleeping room is filled with people coming and going. And the designated place to sleep is the floor. This is all a great experience for the Koreans. The place that I am going to for the night is a three story house with two beds. The department rented it for the night to “initiate” the students into the program. So, 40 people : two beds. I, the spoiled American, guaranteed myself a bed before agreeing to go.I don’t know what my point is here. Just be thankful for your hot water and soft beds.

Energy Use

The Koreans are quite efficient when it comes to energy use, sometimes in a backwards way. Their fuel costs are similar to what you may find in Latin America or Europe. I believe that it is about 6 dollars a gallon (1400won/ltr) and they of course have a much lower average income. Again, similar to everywhere else in the world but nations North of Mexico, the cars here are compact. There are actually a few number of SUVs, but the majority of vehicles on the road are scooters, compact cars, and public buses.
Possibly also directly related to the high cost of fuel, they are very cautious about heating costs. In the main building, where my classes and office are, the hallways are cold. Each room is cold until someone comes into the room to use it and turns on the individual heater for each room. I saw an extreme version of this in China. We saw endless sky rise apartments all with individual air conditioning unities sticking out every window. An ugly and surprisingly individualistic sight. Oh, and speaking of the Chinese and saving energy. They often turn off their headlights when driving at night. Not just when stopped and not just the main headlights, but often cars and scooters turn off all lights. They think that it saves fuel. Crazy! I think that the probability of an accident would out weigh any conceivable savings from turning off your lights. I can’t even get into a conversation about an alternator with them. I just laugh and am extremely careful when walking (even on a sidewalk). The Koreans do it too
Another thing they do hear to save on energy costs is seriously limit the supply of hot water. In all the dorms, they turn off the hot water from 10am until 11pm. At least, that’s what they say. But in a huge dorm, the supply runs out quickly. Monday through Friday there is hot water from midnight until 7:30am. In most public bathrooms, there isn’t ever hot water. It is motivation to wake up early and also to take quick showers. It’s pretty effective in an authoritative way.Because of this, public baths are very popular. I see them everywhere. I think I should explain them in another section. I’m still on the bus toward the border, and there is still nothing but fight scenes on the TV. I thought that American TV was supposed to be extremely violent. We’re definitely not the worst.

The students

So, more about the students. In the last entry I said that they are not as respectable as I or others might have expected. Well, that’s true, but it’s not to say that they are disrespectful. My point was that Koreans seem to not be as respectful as the students of the surrounding countries, China and Japan. They’d come late, if the department wasn’t so tough on attendance this semester. They turn in their homework late and often in an unpresentable form.
It’s funny. Korea is supposedly the most Confucian culture and the language has the most hierarchal systems out of all languages. To take a line out of a book I am reading, the language “was designed to reveal and maintain social status of the speakers rather than to communicate clearly” I guess the past 60 years of a tight relationship with US has change some of that and I am teaching at a 2 year college in the International School (i.e., American school).
This department is designed to give students an opportunity to get a Bachelors degree from an American school. They study for two years here. Afterwards they have the opportunity to transfer to NPU or a Kansas university.
This has also attracted a few international students to the department. There are two Cambodians, four Chinese, and a girl from Kyrgyzstan. They are much better students than the Koreans. But, I think being international students they may feel much more luck to be apart of the program and committed to it. Also, their English is among the best in Pohang and their Korean is poor. Thus, they are not in class to socialize as much. But the Chinese are a bit of a counter example. Their English is extremely poor and they have a social network. However, they don’t socialize in class. Overall, they are bad students because they don’t understand what I say and therefore don’t turn in assignments. But as far as respect goes, they are the most respectful. They are typically next to their friends in class and don’t have a clue as to what is going on. They must be so bored, but they sit still and quite. Usually flipping through their dictionaries. Meanwhile the Koreans are talking or sleeping.
To give an example of how appreciative the international students are of the opportunity to study in the United States I’ll give you a quote from one of the Cambodian students. Yesterday I was talking with him about different majors, specifically business and economics majors. He said
“I think that it is kind of difficult. If you want to be a businessman you need to have a lot of money to start a business.”
“I heard that in America some people don’t have enough money to start a business so they will work for a company and then become the boss. Amazing”
He was shocked about our level of opportunity. I wrote down the quote right after he said it.

Right now I am on a bus with all 36 of my students. I have been driving along the Eastern coast line for about two hors now. They are watching a Korean film. There is a crooked politician, his gang, and the lone-tattooed-hero. Every scene includes a pointless brutal beating of at least one person. The moral of the film seems to be that life will leave you beaten, bloody, and dead in a lawless world. Typing here and listening to my iPod help block out this painful film. Oh, I think it just ended and yes, in the last scene all the women were dead and the main character was near death. I’ll take my Hollywood, happy ending films.

38th//

I'm leaving right now on a 5-6 hour bus ride. I will be staying near the border of North Korea. I will even be able to see military outposts of both North and South Korea.
Be back tomorrow with some stories.

The Classroom

The building in which I teach is right next to the dorm that I live in. The building is 4 stories tall and there is also a basement that has a small gym, pool & ping pong room, plus a café (noodle shop). In the center of the building is a large marble staircase. No elevator.

It has been awhile since I’ve seen an elevator. I know that they have them here. There was a beautiful one in the Inchon airport; I didn’t recognize it as an elevator. Nearly every aspect of it was glass. I think that was the last one I saw. Korea just doesn’t respect the disabled like America does, but few countries do. Korea, relatively, isn’t that bad. There are a few ramps and handicapped parking spots. Also, I do see a few people in wheel chairs or walkers. It’s comforting to see once you start thinking about it. In Spain I saw very few. It was quite a socialist country but if you were disabled you could leave the house. I don’t know how a disabled person could survive in Madrid.

Back to the building, the third floor is where the International school has its classrooms and above that is the NPU office. It’s pretty nice, the only thing on the top floor is our office. I have my desk with my name on it, plus an old computer with pirated software on it. I walk up those large stairs about five times a day. Haven’t fallen yet.

The classroom is pretty nice too: stylish desks and chairs, good computer hooked up to a flat screen and a projector, nice lighting and white board… It’s set up for about 30 students. In the sophomore class, there are 10 students and in the freshman class there are 27. They’re all pretty friendly and not very formal with me like I kind of hoped for. It’d be nice to be this great respected professor and they listen and write down every word that I say. Oh well, maybe in China.

I’ll talk more about the school later. There’s a lot to say. I also want to write about their efficiency with energy use. Though I’m busy planning for my upcoming courses and the trip to China, I’ll probably get to it soon. There’s lots of surprise holidays coming my way.

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OK just to be clear, the students are respectful to the school and instructors but not much more than I was right after high school.

Spontaneous Combustion

Another example of how spontaneous the Koreans are:
Fred gave a presentation to President Chun about a school he would like to open in Dubai last night. Pretty interesting, it's a nursing school. Today he has classes all day and tonight is a big event for his class. In his freshman management class he had them coordinate a party.
But late last night after the Dubai presentation the president ask him to give a lecture to all the faculty about leadership. I forget the exact topic, but he agreed and has done such seminars many times. Still, the night before he was asked to give a presentation to 40 faculty members on leadership at 7:30a.m. So, he had to wake up at 2a.m. to prepare for the presentation and his classes.
This is an everyday occurrence. Little planning. They like spontaneity not set written schedules. This is why I will tend to hide out. While it can keep things interesting, I do not want to be caught up in any more responsibilities. Not to sound irresponsible, I know if I hang around they will continually change my schedule. Since one my classes ends next week and Fred Dalili is leaving they are likely to ask me to continue my class for another month. Despite me being prepared to give my final exam Thursday, they would still do that.
Things are laid back here, not very stressful. It's just funny.

Typical Example

Real quick, I have a good example of how rigid the planning at this university is. The "initiation ceremony" was a better example, but this is a smaller everyday thing.
Today I was announcing exams and final projects as a reminder, since one class ends in one week and the Macroecon will be halfway finished. Next class will be the review and the following class will be the midterm (T.-review; Th.-midterm). Then one of the students tells me that "we don't have class on Tuesday." It's the founding day of the college and there is no class. Great, ok, so, I change the schedule moving every back a day. Then they tell me that one of the following days will be a day off of class too! But, they themselves aren't even sure. So, now I have a conflict with both classes, not just that, but a midterm and a final. Now the students start suggesting other days that I could give a review. They're trying to change my schedule so that I can teach on a different day! Not even thinking that I have another class. "No way, you're not going to add days to my schedule. We'll figure it out."
At break, I go up to the office and Paul says to me "Oh, Michael uhh this Tuesday there will not be class."
"Yeah, I just found out. What about any other days?"
He points to the following week, when I will now have my midterm. "Probably this whole week we will have some events and... no class."
"No class!?"
"Yeah, I have to talk to the students and see what they feel like."
I can't believe it. This is the head of the International School Dept. This is a large, beautiful, thriving college. Is this how they do business? They are making huge schedule decisions last minute.
I shrug it off and prepare for anything. Dr Hsieh would always tell me about how flexible Pops is with scheduling and how important it is. He is so right.
I'll let you know how things pan out.

Sunlin College part one: the American presence

The other day I mentioned to the President (Chun) that I wanted to buy a Sunlin pin that many of the faculty wear. It's pretty nice. I wanted to have it as a memento. He told me to stop by his office and he would give me and the other two Americans an honorary pin.
On Monday I saw him and he told me that he was busy, but on the following day there will be a "ceremony". Again the term is used broadly; I laugh to myself -knowing the extent of what that could mean. It turned out to be mainly a large faculty meeting, but we were respectfully given our pins and that was that.
But more on the other Americans here
I came here with Pops' university, NPU. For the first three week period, I am here with a Professor Fred Dalili. Throughout my stay here there will be NPU professors cycled in and out. I am an asset to the Sunlin-NPU relationship because I am willing to stay here, really. Not that it's bad here, just established people with masters and PhDs can't leave their lives in the Silicon Valley for too long.
Professor Dalili, Fred, is a pretty interesting guy. At first I thought he was just an old grouchy guy, and I was right. But there is more to his character than just being a picky, hard-to-please guy. He lived for the first 25 years of his life in Iran, where he was born. He left as an Iranian diplomat and went to Germany. He traveled for quite some time after that and never returned to live in his "home country". Eventually he moved to the U.S. where he has lived for the past 20 years. I have three of his business cards, all say President and CEO. I don't know how successful he is with his consulting firms, but he is headed to South Africa and Geneva to speak with the UN (I think UNDEP) in a few months about cross-cultural cooperation.
He says that he spends 70% of his time, however, on his organization: Red Flags Help. It's a suicide prevention organization. He is the head of the west coast operations. Right now he is trying to get state funding. All in Sacramento support it, just not the funding part.
Here he is teaching public speaking and a management course. He, like I am, is frustrated with the poor English ability from the students. But, he is leaving next Friday to give a speech in SF Saturday. I will definitely be leaving a resume with him.
Some other characters that I have to cover at some point are Jared Dittmer (he's the one from Kansas), also the two missionaries that just arrived. Pretty interesting guys. One is from Canada and the other, Netherlands. They're traveling all around the world on a ship selling Bibles. They have some pretty interesting stories. But, maybe some other time.
I had six hours of lecture today and am pretty tired.

2nd post

Last Friday was my first full Friday here, making it exactly one week here. I didn't have class but I was told that there was a "freshman initiation ceremony" and that I will go with them.
Before I go any further, I must say that with coordinating any event in Asia or in any region with a thick language barrier is always full of the unexpected. Luckily I have two other lost white guys here with me.
So, I was told Wednesday that I will go on this "initiation" event. I am told that it is in an old city and that I will stay over night. That is all. I have no idea where, why, of what I will do when I get there. I'm thinking that I probably wont have internet and may possibly be camping out even. And trying to getting further information is usually a task not worthwhile. I am happy with the advanced notice of my transplantation. Thursday I am told that I probably wont stay the night; I will go out "there" for the day and come back Friday night. That was comforting, less of an adventure, but I knew where I was going to sleep.
Friday lunchtime, I talk to Prof. Kim (head of NPU-Sunlin relations, coincidently went to the same church as Mom) to try to get some more info. He told me that we wouldn't leave until 5pm. "We will just go for dinner and maybe a quick speech and then I will drive you guys (3 white guys) back."
I finally got some solid information. I learned the basics about the time of departure, what was happening, and I got the feel that it wasn't as far away as I had thought.
Come 3pm, I talked to Jared. He is 24, from Kansas and has been here for 6 months teaching English. He lives across the hall from me. He told me that he had just talked to Prof. Kim and that we are leaving at 4!
So, I began to get ready. I sensed that it was a casual event by the fact that the event had only been subtly mentioned to me on a few occasions. I put on jeans and a casual shirt and left to see if Jared and the third white guy (NPU Prof. Dalili, Iranian, 55yrs) were ready. Jared was wearing a sport coat; Dalili was casual too. Jared said that after prying, Prof. Kim had hinted that he should wear a jacket.
I had seen this before in China. I got out of my jeans and put on a nice suit and tie. We met Prof. Kim. He giggled and said "noooo" when I told him that I was wearing jeans 10 minutes ago. We drove about 1 hour to an ancient city with many above-ground tombs that turn a field into a series of rolling mounds. Then we drove up to the Hyundai Hotel. Though owned by one of the Korean Chaebol / oligarchs (more later), the place was extremely western and modern -lots of marble and chandeliers. It was right on a man-made lake..beautiful. We first went into a banquet room that the university reserved for our buffet. I got three mounded plates of an assortment of sushi and sashimi, incredible soups, calamari, salmon, pastries, etc... Incredible food, but typical to Korean, no beverage was served. Hidden in the corner was a coffee pot with transparent coffee. Koreans don't seem to have a drink with meals. At least this place had coffee. Instant coffee is easy to find but not the real thing.
After eating, they said that we had better get to the ceremony. Now, the word ceremony could have meant anything. It could've been 5 people presenting one certificate to someone. This wasn't the case.
This event was to celebrate the beginning of the school year and the entering students. The spring semester is the first semester here. And following the Asian value system -education is respected and honored (though not always seen in the Korean classroom).
I walked into a huge convention hall. There were a little over a thousand people, 90% students. A croquet [sic.] of about 10 flowers was placed on me and I was directed toward the stage where there were about 25 chairs. As I walked on stage I met and shook the hand of the local mayor. I grabbed a seat toward the rear of the stage.
I'm glad I did, because a minute later the event started and a large group of spot lights were turned on and the two television cameras did too!
The Sunlin Pres. and mayor gave a speech; there was a flag ceremony, and then they introduced the people on stage. The whole time I can't read or understand anything. But Prof. Kim lets me know when I am introduced and I walk to the front where most took a bow. I received a flattering roar a much louder than the other faculty and returned to my seat.
It was funny to think that I could've been up there in blue jeans giving an American wave and it wouldn't have made much of a difference. When I sat back down, the chair of the nursing department said that I should teach in her department, commenting on my popularity. (I'll talk later about the many opportunities here).
We took a few pictures and as promised, we were driven home.

Pohang, week 1

Well, I've been here in Pohang, South Korea for a little over a week now. A few days ago I looked at the calendar, wondering what day it was and how long I had been here. I was thinking that it was nearing a month! Jet lag has done wonders to me. Never before had it hit me while traveling west, but communicating constantly with people back at home has made it harder.

So, what have I learned or experienced in one week of Korea? I try to answer that in the next few posts.
First off, I am staying in a visiting faculty dorm room. It is the bottom floor of the women's dorm. I have a large room and my own bathroom, nothing too exciting. I do have a view of a large fountain right outside my porch. It often freezes over at night. Next door is the building that has my office, classrooms, and the cafeteria that I eat most of my meals in ($3/meal).
The school, Sunlin, is a two year college with about 2,500 students. It's located in a nice, semi-rural area, 15 minutes outside of the large Pohang downtown area. I like the location. It is sorrounded by rice fields yet very close to a large city and the beach. The weather, however, has been cold and windy most of the time. The coming months should be very nice though.