Goodbye Beopwon-eup
My apartment was free, that might have been the thing that got me interested in teaching in Korea. I dare not say it, as being that honest would reveal what a fraudulent teacher I was at the time. But there’s no reason to hide that fact now, it’s no longer my full-time job. I had a romantic idea of living in the countryside after teaching in more urbanized areas in Korea. I wouldn’t have to deal with other foreigners and their clingy ways. I would be able to better learn the language immersed in a town without any English speakers around. No more distractions by peer pressure and boozy nights out. I would find myself I thought. I walked up and down the street many times in Beopwon, a small quaint town that was 8 kilometers from my school. I amused myself: I took photos of the small houses, I ate at all the restaurants I wanted to try and even tried on clothes at the used clothing stores. Yet the boredom came despite these efforts. In a sense, my romantic idea did come true but far from romance. I did learn more about the language, mainly through the internet. The people in rural Paju were mainly going about their own lives unless they were particularly lonely. There was a woman we met once to practice English; she said very little and appeared scared when I asked “Do you have a hobby?” she didn’t reply to my follow up message. I met a man from a language exchange app, we had chicken once and he never wanted to talk again. Then there was a soldier, he said many times how he wanted to be my friend and talked about his rank and nothing else. He would call me unannounced, make demands, and treated me like an underling so we stopped talking. As I twiddled my thumbs on weekends I found myself going to Seoul every week. Beopwon-eup is a pretty remote place. The public buses take at least 40 minutes to reach anywhere populated. The city of Paju is a vast area of factories, farms, and a few places where more people live. I would spend hours taking buses to random sights in Paju. Each minute riding two or three buses to another place I thought about how much time driving a car here would save. Thus exploring Paju was far more time intensive than I liked. Besides, my experience befriending a soldier didn’t get very far. So I went to Seoul often, Like my middle school students and co-workers who would often ride the train down to Seoul. A long and grueling trip I’ve done so many times. Seeing things like live music, Korean films with English subtitles and even a small video game convention made the journey worth it. Everything that interested me was in Seoul. Only my room and job lived in Paju, only a low flying army helicopter to keep me company. The biggest problem I had teaching English in Paju was that I wasn’t motivated to do my job...at least for the elementary school. If you find yourself as an English teaching in a foreign country, you have to learn a few things immediately. The most important of which is that if you have no test to study for, your class is a joke. Think of this as a camp counselor job, where you make glitter alphabets, and not try to upset the lower level students. I found myself so tired of trying to come up with things to do for the 3 hours I had to teach alone each week. After weeks of making so many arts and crafts. I simply made my students do crossword worksheets, give them answers after a half hour, and then play gym games for that time. And yet according to my school that was not entertaining enough. They expected a clown and were disappointed I didn’t sing and dance enough to their liking. Or they were upset that I would dare to leave my desk unclean for an eternal 20 minutes. The day they told me I wouldn’t come back for another year, I was disappointed that I couldn’t save another chunk of change. It was sad that according to the school I didn’t win the approval of my students, but I stopped mourning quickly. My students were fun but I couldn’t be a camp counselor forever. Perhaps I could have spent time visiting their homes and trying to connect with their parents. That would have made me irreplaceable then my dismissal would be town news. But I couldn’t make myself do any of that; at the end of the day teaching English was always a secondary concern to me. I preferred to explore nooks and crannies in Korea, write fiction interactive and non-interactive, learn how to subtitle videos, and learn Korean. This led me to move to Seoul, and learn the language in a college full time. So I say farewell to Beopwon. I will remember the little details: the odd little resort town in the mountains, the many military helicopters flying above, and the fear of being recognized by everyone in the town. I did find myself there, I found myself running out of excuses to not do what I want instead of what saves me money. Without any more anxieties or reasons to not find a job that I enjoy. Though, If I have to tutor someone to get my bills paid let’s get the English exam books out. The name beopwon means “Court” in Korean. There weren’t many courthouses in the Court township(Beopwon-eup).
