In this post I will go into detail of why I actually chose South Korea as my first foray into living abroad, by myself, and without knowing anyone, except my recruiter.
So!
I was finishing up Uni and hadn't really figured out what I wanted to do. I didn't want to do more schooling at the time because due to health reasons in an earlier year, I wasn't able to do full course loads each semester, so I graduated a little later than planned. At the time I had been working on and off (working during summer and winter vacations from school) at a liquor store in town and the owner was Korean. We started chatting about what my plans were for after I would finish school and he was actually the one to give me the idea of teaching English overseas and he recommended South Korea to me. He figured since he liked me as an employee, everyone over in South Korea would like me just as much if I was an English teacher.
So I decided to do some research and learned that if you wanted to struggle less as a teacher abroad, you would want either a teaching certificate from your home country or a TEFL certificate from a reputable place. So I started digging into TEFL Certificate courses here in Canada and abroad, and I found an amazing one, after I started courses for the U of C TEFL Certification. The U of C certificate program would take me around 2 years of online courses whereas the abroad company I found would be fully immersive for 4 weeks and promised teaching Czech people of all different levels so as to help develop your TT (aka teacher talk). So I booked a spot and flew over the summer after finishing Uni and I knew it was the right way forward; I learned more in just the first week of classes and teaching than I had in the 4 months of courses I had already taken with U of C.
After coming back to Canada, I researched the best kind of job to have over in SK, because there are 2 different systems you could go into; either public or private. I went with public since I had read horror stories of private institutions and the conditions that teachers had to deal with.
I found a great recruiter and set off to the smaller Southern city of Yeosu in February of 2012. I chose Yeosu not just for the perks of the Language Program, but also because it would be the city that would host the 2012 World Expo. When would another chance at living in the city a World Expo was held come up again?! So I flew off, only knowing my recruiter, and then meeting with the other new teachers in my intake group.
What followed was a great year and a great middle school; I had numerous co-teachers who could speak English as well as multiple other co-workers who could as well, AND a principal who spoke English to boot; an outlier this far from Seoul, for sure. My kids were hilarious, and I started fairly strict, but was able to ease off the punishments (burpees or soccer sits), after a month. The only drawback of my school was how far away from the capital it was; because that was where I went to dance! Korea was (and still is, I think) obsessed with salsa. (The dance, not the condiment). I had a little bit of salsa knowledge since I took a social ballroom dance class in college once and also was part of the U of S ballroom dance club. I had rudimentary skills, but a lot of trust for my lead, regardless of the situation.
While my classes were super cut and dry, the summer of World Expo was fantastic. I went pretty much every single day I could, saw lots of kpop groups doing concerts every night and met such great people that I am still friends with today.
I had great vacations and even got an extra week in summer because it was too hot for the kids to come back...so off to Jeju with another teacher friend.
I was very lucky with the school and co-teachers I was put with; I thank the higher powers because I know I could have gotten stuck with differing degrees of WTF.
While I was asked to re-contract, I didn't like being so far away from the hobbies I had developed, so I had to decline. I moved to another school much, much closer to Seoul for my second year of teaching, but that is a story for another post!
Check out my accompanying video on YT for other tidbits of info and random stories related to my first year teaching abroad!
Peace out, Girlscouts
Kristina
Youtube video link!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvI4MNT_xnM
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