Selfie with Professor Jin, 간송미술관

Prologue

Human memories are so fleeting. I think that’s what I’m starting to realize after 4 weeks in Korea. So much has happened, and while I remember having experienced all the feels, I don’t quite remember what those feels were. And that begs the question, why can’t I remember? Are these experiences so overwhelming that I haven’t properly processed them, or are they, in reality, more underwhelming than I had originally thought? OR... is it the lack of sleep? 

TL;DR: We wrapped up our work at the Jiguchon school this week and are currently trying to make the most of our weekend in Seoul before we head to Yeoju tomorrow. 

The Sun’ll Come Out Tomorrow

Saturday was a happy day after an emotionally hectic week. I guess when I started this week’s blog, I wanted to talk about the happy things first before I dive into the craziness of the last week at the Jiguchon school, so if you must read in chronological order, please start at the bottom of this post. Otherwise, carry on.

It was our last weekend in Seoul before leaving for a more rural part of Korea, so everyone was trying their best to make the most of it. I met up with Professor Jin and we enjoyed a nice, relaxing day together. We first went to the National Museum of Korea, then she drove me to her lovely home where we had a nice meal together, discussed some research for a book she’s working on, and finally, we went to another museum before wrapping up the day with a nice dinner. It was an Anh-paced day, for which I was very grateful for after essentially experiencing 4 weeks of intense big city life.  Below are pictures of some fun things I saw. I don’t think they’re factually important, but if they’ve made it into the blog, I probably found them quite amusing. I also apologize for these lackluster captions; I was having too much fun staring at things to properly study the plates.

National Museum of Korea

Permanent Exhibit: Prehistory and Ancient History; Medieval and Early Modern History

                                                              Roof-end Tile

                 Shell from prehistoric (?) Korea. This was for my own amusement.

              Spoon and chopsticks. I (have a problem) really like looking at utensils. 

                 Iron-cast Buddha statue - favorite picture from the museum

Special Exhibit: New Scientific Revelations about the Gold Crown from Seobongchong Tomb

                                   Shiny gold crown from a tomb somewhere

I really wished others had been there to enjoy the experience as well, but if I’m being perfectly honest, I’m not sure it would have been fun for anyone else. One of the best parts about the museum trip for me was getting to see artifacts I’ve only seen in photographs with my own eyes. I’m not sure I would have appreciated the exhibits as much had I not previously studied them. I remember when I was learning about the gold crowns from the Silla(?) period, I would think to myself, “Oh, that’s pretty cool” and that would be it. As a person who has an extremely strong preference for silver over gold, I was shocked at how much I liked looking at the crowns in real life. It was really really really shiny. And magnificent. And beautiful. And so so luminous. Need I go on?

Special Exhibit: Patrons of the Buddhist Art

                                    Long scroll with gold writing on silk (?)

   The biggest sesame leaf I’ve ever held. Hooray for people with green thumbs!

At the second museum, we weren’t allowed to take any pictures unfortunately. The exhibit featured paintings of the Four Gracious Plants (plum-blossom, orchid, chrysanthemum, and bamboo). If you’ve ever seen a Korean drama where these old men in elaborate robes very ceremoniously draw 4 lines (aka leaf blades) and nod satisfactorily at their work before proceeding to write a short poem and stamping the painting, you might have asked yourself, “How hard could that have possibly been?” Let me tell you, it’s ridiculously difficult. When I walked through this exhibit, I found myself thinking, “Wow. Look at that brushstroke - exquisite,” quite often. That was the first time I realized how important failure can be in informing one’s perspective. Needless to say, without having spent hours in Professor Jin’s calligraphy class failing to paint any of the four plants, I don’t think I would have been able to appreciate the artistic value of what I saw at this museum.

While we’ve done a lot of field trips that pertained to Korean culture, today was one of my favorite days. After walking through the exhibits of Korean art through time, I felt much closer to the place I’m in than I had in 3 weeks. 

KBS

After our last day at the school on Thursday, we went on a field trip to the KBS broadcasting station. There, we met a reporter who specializes in North Korea. She held a Q&A session and told us her story, which was interesting and very different to say the least. Up to this point, it seems like we’ve only read refugee stories that corroborate our impression of the terrible lives we believe most North Koreans lead. What is most interesting to me is, for many situations, we always try to consider multiple points of view. When it comes to North Korea, however, it seems like most of the emphasis is focused on the victimization of the general population. It would seem unfathomable to most people that a North Korean defector would ever want to go back to North Korea, but I think we often underestimate the power of our homing instincts. Our reporter’s account of her experiences and her life in North Korea was actually a glowing one. She never “defected” in the conventional way we think of the word. Rather, she was approved to go to China (for a reason I don’t recall), but when she tried to return to North Korea, she was detained in China for some time. She was afraid that if she went back to North Korea, the government would not believe that she was legitimately detained in China, so she “defected”.   

For me personally, the most striking comment she shared was that if given a choice/given a chance to go back in time, she would not have chosen South Korea over North Korea. Some people our group inferred that since she lived in Pyeongyang (the capital), she probably lived a much better life than most North Koreans, which would explain her positive portrayal of her homeland. I, on the other hand, can’t even express the elation I felt when we were able to hear her story. A long-time concern of mine is that our attitude towards North Korea is similar to the White Man’s Burden philosophy of the past. North Korea might be the oppressive and poor rogue country we hear about in the news, but North Korea is still a place where people are capable of experiencing pockets of happiness. For me, I question whether it’s the rest of the world’s place to tell North Korea that its citizens are incapable of leading a happy life. Of course those who defected have provided important testimonies to the unhappiness that exists for many in North Korea, but talking with the reporter was a reminder not to overgeneralize/assume things about groups of people. In her case, even though she has a good job and seems well settled in South Korea, North Korea is where she grew up, where some of her family still lives, her home. She also mentioned the differences in mindset between the two countries. North Korea is community-centered, South Korea individual-oriented. Apparently, when you call in sick in North Korea, everyone is concerned for you and people help take care of your duties until you can return to your job. In South Korea, due to the intense competitive nature of the workplace, you are constantly worried about being able to keep your job. You have to look out for yourself because no one will look out for you. After having been in Seoul for a month, I will say that life here is a bit too fast for my comfort.

As someone who also grew up under the influence of a community-centered mindset, I also find it difficult to understand the actions of many people around me when I’m in the US. It troubles me when “X number of countries are now democratic” is a statistics proudly presented in academic settings, as if democracy and capitalism is the standard everyone should try to reach. When we’re taught in school that capitalism and individuality are somehow “more favorable” than communism/socialism and community, I would ask, “Why is that the case?” Of course the answer was always some variation of “freedom is the most important possession a human could own,” but for me, the more important question is what is the cost of that freedom? To be truly free, are we not simply animals no longer bound by the rules of interaction in a society? Are we truly less capable of living a worthwhile life without these “freedoms”? I don’t know. Obviously Tumblr is not an appropriate platform to have this discussion, but if you’ve somehow made it this far in the blog and would like speak about this in a less public sphere, we can definitely talk about this in more detail if you already happen to know me personally. If you don’t, leave a comment and we can find some way to communicate? Can you leave comments on Tumblr? I don’t know that either. Errr… those who knows how to do this, I leave this in your hands.

                                           Group photo after Q&A session

After the Q&A, we got a tour of KBS. Fun mirrors, prop room, weather room, etc. etc. See pictures below. 

                                                           Tall and pretty

                       This mirror made us look short and ugly; we didn’t like it.

                                                   The weather room

Oh yeah, we weren’t allowed to take pictures, but we saw SHINEE.

Last week at the Jiguchon school

Due to my poor blogging, I guess I haven’t said anything about the Jiguchon school up to this point. It’s unfortunate that this blog is going to go up before I can write last week’s blog. Anyhow, when I get around to last week’s blog, I’ll write more about our day-to-day life at the school, but for now, I want to spend some time reflecting on the experience from the last week at the school.

Basically at the beginning of the week, I was feeling more or less very regretful. Thursday was to be our last day, and as we were planning for the party that day, I realized how different my experience was from what I had envisioned. To summarize, I felt that because I had spent most of my time in class in the back of the room, with the more quiet students, not being able to speak much Korean, that most of the students didn’t get to know me well (or at all) or vice-versa. I didn’t even know any of the homeroom teachers’ names! When I thought about these things Sunday night as we gear up for the week, I couldn’t help but question what I had actually managed to do at this school in the past two weeks.

                 Taking precautions against MERS on subway ride to work 

On Monday, I met three more Vietnamese students. It was such an exciting yet bittersweet meeting. I’ve seen these students in class for two weeks, and we just completely missed each other. Apparently I didn’t introduced myself as Vietnamese, and I looked too much like a Korean for them to think otherwise. The students either had Korean names or I missed their introduction for whatever reason, so I had no idea they existed. I think for all of Monday, we were lamenting over the missed opportunities and the time we might have been able to spend together had we known. Still, we were really excited to have at least met one another, and being able to talk to them and really connect with them using Vietnamese was, beyond a doubt, one of the brightest memories I’ll treasure from this experience.

Thursday was an overwhelming day. Most of us were running around trying to make sure the party was ready to go while also trying to make cards or little special mementos for the kids. I regretted not having spent enough time on writing notes and making cards for some of my favorite students. I realize favoritism is frowned upon, but special connections should be acknowledged for what they are. Anyhow, I spent most of Thursday huffing and puffing trying to make all of 4 cards (I only had time to make 3, unfortunately). Sadly, the 3 cards all had the same message as well; due to my poor time management and crappy Vietnamese spelling skills, the card making process was quite comical. I was drawing cards while dictating my message to one of the Vietnamese girl to spell out on scrap paper as the other two Viet kids corrected some of her spelling. After I finished drawing the cards, I copied the dictated message into 2 of the cards, while one of the girls copied the note into the 3rd card. Long story short, I fail at life. Looking back, I’m really grateful to have this memory as a hectic but meaningful farewell exchange, considering what followed.

It was finally the end of the school day (the aforementioned huffing and puffing was a result of the time crunch of the final bell). The teachers at the school said goodbye to us, shook hands, hugs, and thanked us for our dedication. That was when the students started to cry. Then some of us started to cry. I managed to avoid all the criers up to that point, but I really wanted to say goodbye to the girl that didn’t get a card because I didn’t have time to make it. She was always smiling and goofing around in class, and she always tried even though she didn’t like English and found it difficult. We waved goodbye happily, but then she ran away and started to cry -___-. So of course I started to cry. Then more crying. Lots and lots of crying happened that day. When I got home, I found a note she wrote for me (the kids also made us cards). She had thanked me for remembering her name.

If you would like to read more about our last week and see more pictures of the final performances, please check out our group blog here.

                                  Photo of the huffers and puffers

                                   Me and Trung - we met the first day

                                    The class that made everyone cry

Later that night as Josh and I recalled bits and pieces of our day while eating these strange (but apparently normal) Korean grapes, we started crying again. At 2 AM. So much has happened in the course of the past 3 weeks, and I don’t think I fully grasped the depth of that experience until we finally said goodbye. That day, I got cards from cards I don’t even remember teaching, though I’m sure they were from the back of the classroom. I just always assumed that because I didn’t know them that they wouldn’t know me, but I guess perhaps what they appreciated was not being ignored just because they sat in the back. I didn’t realize how much the little things mattered, like remembering someone’s name. Or showing concern when someone got pencil lead in his finger. Or worrying about a girl’s foot when she limped around after doing a stunt her friends dared her to. I really wished we could have stuck around much longer; I think we all felt there was still a lot we could have given and a lot we could have learned from them.

Epilogue

We are moving on to Yeoju! I’m not sure how we would take to the rural life, but perhaps a change in pace is exactly what we need. Seoul life, while exciting, is taxing on the mind and body. My respiratory system has not appreciated the air pollution in Seoul, so I’m sure it will be thrilled to be near trees and fresh air. With MERS going around, we heard that some of the students at our new school had been pulled out and went home with their parents. To those who are concerned and are reading this blog, getting away from Seoul is the best thing we could possibly be doing to get away from MERS. All is well, and much anticipation is building as we make our way to Yeoju.