My Culture/Language Shock Experience Living in Korea

Living in Korea has become something I am very used to and somewhat enjoying. But this has not been the case for my first six months here. As we know, Korea is a very conservative place and for someone from a very liberal background like myself, I found it extremely hard adjusting to living here.

My first experience of language/culture shock experience was my first day in the language school. The best word to describe the day is “awful”. I felt like I was in a wrong country, a wrong place at the wrong time. I understood nothing that was being taught (although the teacher did not teach in English, other students seem to understand). Looking at the writings on the text book and board, it felt like it was art and I thought I needed to be an artist to read and or write the language.

The food was nothing to write home about as well. During my first week living in Korea, I ate chicken from KFC and burger every single day twice a day. I could not say a simple word like “hi” in Korean let alone try ordering home from a restaurant. I was by myself and had no friend for the first one week and it was extremely difficult to adjust considering my state of mind at that time.

Moving to a different part of the world, thousands of miles away from home where I know the culture is different is enough shock on its own, coupled with the fact that English is not the first language here made it worse for me. I had experienced a very sad event a year prior before the year I arrived here, and thus, I completely felt like I was in a pool of water, I did not know how to swim and was without a life jacket. Metaphorically speaking, I almost drowned in this pool called Korea and thought I had moved to the wrong country.

I can happily say today that is not the case today. I was motivated to study more during my time at the language school, I can go around on my own without the help of a native, I can eat some of the food, and I am almost completely adjusted to life here. Although I would love for some things to change, things like being stared at a lot because of the colour of my skin, the natives learning how to say “I am sorry” and “excuse me”, being bumped into around, stepped on and racial discrimination.

But overall, I am enjoying my time here at the moment and would be getting my masters degree in Korea, which means living here for at least 3-5 more years.

Dating Scam

People desperate for a partner online are usually the target for the type of scam. Lonely women often fall prey. But these scammers do not care if you're a man or woman as long as you have what they want; money. Again, i got an email from a ''Russian'' girl who says she wants to come live with me in my country. Its funny right? My country! They have absolutely no idea where in the world the recepient of the email is, which is me. Like usual, i decided to go with the flow. I believe i still have the messages we sent each other, however, unless upon request, i'll just be briefly talking about it.

The first message came with a picture of a lady who says she wants to get to know me blah blah blah. Wondering how they know im a male? Well, I had an ad on craigslist, on the tv/show section, and posted as a male model looking for an agent. That's how they found me. How i know that's how? their first message was a craigslist reply, saying ''i went through your post and decided to reply you''. Usually, the first message doesnt say much. They just want to make sure its a working email address, not some bot. We got started. I replied and they sent me a long message full of grammar errors saying she's learning english and not really good at it. She would like to come to my country come live with me, get married and stuffs like that. They have no idea where ''my country'' is, and i told them im in Tokyo, Japan. I played along. and they kept writing, attaching pictures with every single message. Until the time for money came.

They sent a VERY fake passport page of the lady(you almost cannot tell its fake) saying she wants to go get her visa, and i should tell her the nearest airport close to me so she can arrange to land there. Along the line like it always is, she ran out of money and wanted me to send $700 to her through Western Union for emergency stuffs and fixing her flight ticket problems. I closed my eyes and ramdomly pressed the number keys on my computer until i pressed 10 of them(MTCN are usually 10 digits). I sent them this number and told them i sent more than they requested cos i'd like to see her asap. LOL. They were hopping from bank to bank trying to withdraw $1k i never sent. They replied within hours and said the number wasnt right. I told them i made a mistake and removed the last number for another one. Of course they had same thing. They requested i scan the receipt, and i told them i couldnt find it that i never keep western union receipts since i've never had problems with it. They emailed back and forth until they got tired.

I was having so much laugh emailing them. I really feel sorry for people falling for these types of scams. For some of us, its surprising how people fall for these scams. There are still people who fall for these cheap scams and they need to read blogs/articles like this one to enlighten them.

A number of ways of identifying a dating scam; they send you pictures almost with every email, they're quick to ''love'' you and there's always an excuse for one to send money to them.

Watch out for these people. DON'T BE A VICTIM!

A Marriage is a Partnership

I took a course last semester called social problems. Now that my class has come to an end, I can definitively say that my view marriage has changed drastically. Like most my age/generation, I think I had the romantic interpretation of what a marriage is made of: two people in love. Though my mind remains unchanged that love is the most essential element in a successful and long lasting marriage, I now know that many other components must be in harmony. It’s only in the movies that one can live happily ever after; in reality, we have to deal with just that: reality. The factors such as personality differences, financial and economic conditions, infidelity, or perhaps most traumatic: physical or verbal abuse; these factors are all reasons that a marriage may not last. The maturation of society’s view of women may be the most paramount factor.

The source of my sentimental view of marriage lies within my own home. My parents, married for 27 years, showed love for the family and love for each other every single day. My dad would always take us out on trips during the holidays, and because he worked outside our state and comes home every weekend, we(my siblings) would always expect sometime nice from him(like a gift), and he never fails to bring us one.

My mother and father had a mutual understanding and respect for each other. I grew up thinking this is how it was with every family. Perhaps worldwide we grow up with the same utopian perspective: every story we hear as children and throughout our formative years ends with, “…….and they lived happily ever after.” Most Disney films we see growing up maintain this same ending. Most major motion pictures we see end with the two main characters finding and falling in love with each other. We rarely see what happens the day after the dreamy couple gets married: there must be a mutual understanding and coordinated plan. From the beginning, my mom and dad agreed that she would be the one to take care of the home and the children, but that she would also keep her job and work. Because my parents constantly and effectively communicated with each other, their marriage lasted. According to our class statistics, almost 50% of married couples aren’t as fortunate and end in divorce.

During class discussion, one common factor cited among the reasons for divorce is the evolving status of women in society. Demonstrative of this are the class discussed points such as, “The unwillingness of some men to accept the changing status of women,” and “more women have become economically self sufficient,” and, “the rate of divorce involving women age 45-54 has increased, especially in Korea”

It is an antiquated notion that upon marriage, a woman’s only duties are to clean the home and clothe and feed the family. Even if two people were to enter a marriage with this archaic mindset, things soon would change because the world is in a different place. One hundred years ago, it would take all day for a wife to prepare the family meal: she has to find coal or firewood for the oven, she has to make every recipe from scratch, and the ingredients used in said recipe also made from scratch. She has to hand-wash all the laundry, she is responsible for the children getting to and from school on time, she must make sure her husband stays well fed, healthy, and happy, so that he can continue to work, as well as provide for the family, and the family can maintain the home they have. With the advances made in modern technology, a home maker now has running water, a gas or electric stove, washing machine, maybe even a washing service or house keeper, the home maker has parent carpools, readily prepared meals: there’s no need for her to surrender all her time and energy to the home. Time may be made available for personal development: once considered selfish for a housewife, now very helpful, so to speak.

Even outside of these logistical issues, the sphere of contemporary society does not coordinate with the idea that a woman should, as outlined in her wedding vows; love, honour and obey her husband. She has education and her own opinion, and though in the past it was considered disrespectful for her to voice it, there is little reason for her not to now. She need not fear the consequence of an irate husband who may threaten to leave her. Today’s woman is financially secure, or has the skills to enter the workforce and support herself if need be, therefore the need to have a husband as provider is also antiquated.

In the class, we learnt that in the last several years, the opportunities made available for women have increased dramatically.

In these contemporary times, people, women in particular, do not feel the obligation to stay in, as labelled in our class, an “empty shell” marriage. Our Social Problems class noted that the divorce rate in 1978 was a mere 0.5%. Compare this with the divorce to marriage ratio of 47.4% in 2002. These numbers are the proof that people no longer feel they have to stay married.

Even Korea is not immune: in this, a homogenous society where custom and traditions are highly revered; Korea now has one of the world’s highest divorce rates. According to our class notes, the rate of divorce in Korea has jumped 10 times in the last 30 years. With the changing status of women, the number does not seem likely to decrease soon.