This is the photograph that I sent off with my CV to Korea. I don't really like it though... 

...because I like this one much better! 

Two bottles of Sake! 

An Orange Wonderland

After a full day with no Korea phone talks, I got another call from the girl at Orange Recruiting, "Stephen" Cho. She called to make sure that I'd gotten the revised contract(again?! We'd just talked about this a couple of days ago and I had confirmed to her that I had it!) and to tell me that "Jennifer" would be calling me soon. Hmmm...that was kind of pointless.

Before I go on, I'll explain why I put "Stephen" and "Jennifer" into quotations. Many Asians have two names that they use; the name that they were given at birth(Hyunkyung, Aikiko, Li Ming, etc.) that they use at home and with everything Asian, and an "English name" that they use with everything English or foreign. That is why, even though these two girls that I'm in contact with Korean, they're named Stephen and Jennifer. As far as I understand, they choose their own English names. I wonder if Stephen realizes that her name is often a boy's name?

Back to the main topic...

Jennifer called me not too long after Stephen did, sounding happy and giggly. This was not much different then when I talked to her a couple of days ago. Cute. She only talked to me for about five minutes, but she did give me the phone number of a girl named Dianna(who's from eastern Canada) so I could talk to her. She told me one other thing too. I asked her why I was talking to her and not to the owner. She told me that the owner could not speak very good English. Well, that explains that.

Within an hour, I had another call from Stephen. She called just to tell me that Dianna was going to call me. Great... Was that 30 second call really necessary? Come on now.

So, sure enough I get a phone call from Dianna...with A LOT of noisy kids in the background. It was the kindergarten lunch break. I think that there must have been at least 600,000 kids there! Anyway, what she told me was that the hours were generally from 9-9:30 until 7-7:30. At least that beats the 16+ hour days that I used to work at fishing camps! I can deal with a ten hour day. She told me that Tuedays and Thursdays were finished earlier in the afternoons and confirmed for me that there was indeed plently of opportunities to work overtime and make 2.x won a month(she said that she's able to make another $600 more). Dianna informed me that this was her second year in Korea teaching ESL and that she enjoyed this job much more than the first. One person, she said, had worked there for six years. Because of that, even though she swore that she'd never work at a Wonderland franchise because of their often bad reputation, she took the job there. She says that she doesn't regret it at all. Around this point, I asked if I would be able to speak to any other employees. She gave the phone to Scott. He'd been there for seven months and had worked in China previously as a teacher. Like his co-worker, he told me that he enjoyed it there and that it was a good school to work for. I asked them both if they had ever heard of anyone being fired and they both said that they hadn't. Scott told me about a couple of people who'd quit to move on to something else(what that was, I don't know). He said that he knew one of them and that he'd received everything that was due to him at the end of his contract. He gave me his e-mail address, after I'd asked for it, and that was pretty much the conversation. At this point, I was feeling very re-assured about this place.

A bit of information of the Wonderland franchise:
This is a franchise with literally hundreds of Hagwans(English schools) across Korea. Each Hagwan owner pays for the right to use the Wonderland name and does not have to answer to any superiors(to the best of my understanding). Therefore, it's not impossible for an owner to act rather...questionably. However, because they have to invest a lot of money to get any foreigner over to Korea, they are likely to treat a teacher fairly(a very general term). Of course, there's always exceptions. I'm under the impression that these exceptions are in the minority.


I do think that this job would work out okay, but I'm still curious if I can get a few more contract offers to compare this with. I can say that I'm happy that I've talked to a couple of teachers and I'm now more interested in this job.

Ahhhh....the joys of interviews with young Korean girls...

Today was...interesting.

My Korean experience today started out with a phone call from the good folks at CanadianswithSeouls.com. I can't say anything except nice things about these guys. They were extremely helpful and friendly on the phone. The guy basically asked me what type of job I was looking for and talked to me for well over an hour; answering any questions that I had. If anyone is actually reading this and is considering teaching English in South Korea...do not hesitate! Go to www.canadianswithseoul.com and apply. They are really awesome.

Later this evening, I got a phone call with my Korean recruiter friend again. She switched jobs on me. This time it's a job in Ansan; a subburb of Seoul of about 1 million people and on the Seoul subway line system. It is south of Seoul, unlike Ilsan which is northwest. She talked to me for about a half hour or so and answered my questions as best as she could. I had some concerns about the contract that she sent me from the Ansan Wonderland school. She happily altered the contract to my apparent liking... in other words, she rephrased the contract and really changed nothing. Oh well. What did I expect. She then informed me that I would have an interview with Jennifer, a girl from the school, in about an hour(about 9:00 CST). I got a call from the recruiter at about 10:00 saying that Jennifer was busy and would call me in about an hour. Right....here we go, eh? At around midnight, or 3:00pm Seoul time, she called me. To my dismay, I found out that she was not the boss; but was an assistant teacher who has only been working there since December. At least her English was pretty good! I had no problems understanding her. Come to think of it, she sounded extremely attractive. I think I'm going to really like being in Korea... Oh yes... She told me that she thought that the four foreign teachers that worked there liked their jobs very much(3 are Canadians). I asked for their phone numbers and e-mails. She said that she didn't have them, but would call me again on Monday and try to give me them then. To be honest, I was more excited about hearing this girls voice on the phone agian. She sounds that sweet. Anyway, that will be the determining factor for me teaching at this school or not; the opinions of these that work there. That's assuming that I can actually get their phone numbers and e-mail addresses. I'd love to get a hold of some former teachers too.

All in all, I'm very surprised at how fast things seem to be progressing with this. They must really want a lot of ESL teachers in Korea!

Who wants to walk on this sidewalk? 

Well, the dog seems to enjoy the snow. If I can only convince her to shovel the driveway...

So...much...snow... 

In the beginning...

An Introduction:

(added on May 22, 2006)

In March 2005, after living in limbo after graduating from university, I joined the wandering masses of 20-somethings and embarked on a career (long or short, I don't know.) teaching English around the world. Originally, I ended up in South Korea. Now, I find myself as in Japan as a Christian missionary who drinks too much beer (or am I an ESL teacher who doesn't drink enough beer)?

This is my online journal of my experiences. This is not a Christian site where I'm going to be talking about the merits of Jesus (although I do on occasion), nor is it a site where I try to chronicle all of my wild experiences that no Christian (or anyone!) should even think of attempting (just many of them). This is just an account of the parts of my life that I wish to share with anyone who will read. I hope that anyone who reads this (whether it be family, friends, strangers or enemies) gets something out of this; be it insight into my life, discovering the meaning of life (FYI, the answer is always Jesus. There is no debate), or just some entertainment.

Have fun!

LOAD "BLOG START" ,8 ,1...




In the holy tradition of new ESLers fleeing their homeland in search of adventure in South Korea, I am following suit and creating my own internet blog! Welcome to Blakesworld...the very same name that I use at my geocities site that I never update(www.geocities.com/mrcheslock).

Today marked the first day that began applying for jobs. I e-mailed my information to a half a dozen or so schools that were listed at www.eslcafe.com. I then went to this site: http://www.efl-law.org/recruiters.php, and filled out applications with about half a dozen of the "blue" recruiters. Apparently if they are coloured blue, they are "professional, reliable and honest". That description seemed a lot better than the "red" colour, which means that the site needs "further and beter information" on that recruiter or even that I should "Beware" and "avoid doing business with Recruiter". Ironically, I had applied to one recruiter before I had checked that site. It was a "black" coloured recruiter, which means that "we have not got to that site yet to make an assessment or are awaiting feedback from that recruiter". Well, that's not necessarily so bad. Of course, it was that "black" recruiter that gave me my very first phone call from Korea to set up a phone interview for Monday of next week. Here's how it went:

The phone call came at about 10:40pm, CST. It helps knowing here that I was to pick my mum up from her work at 11:00. This is how I remember it:




*Ring, Ring*
Me: Hi mum!

Female speaking in a thick Korean accent: Helwo, I speak to Bake Cteslock?

Me: Hello, this is Blake. How are you?

Recruiter: Good. I am cawing for Owange Wecwuting. You sent appwication to us. You want to teach Engwiss in South Kowea?

Me: Oh yes, I just sent you an application a few hours ago. Thank you for responding so fast!

Recruiter: Can you teach kindergarten and ewementewy childwen?

Me: Yes, absolutely! I'd love to.

Recruiter: I see you have experwience with childwen. You tawt kids church in 2004? What was wat?

Me: Oh.(crap, I'm thinking. This was basically teaching a grade 4 Sunday school class, except it was Fridays after school got out. I taught it twice until I started working and had to give it up. Legit experience, just extremely limited. BS switch=ON) I don't remember what I said exactly. I told her basically what that it was teaching Christian kids about the Bible. I said that it was a very good experience to work with children and that I enjoyed working with them a lot and that I looked forward to working with children again soon.

Recruiter: Yes, vewy good. That's good. You Cwistian?

Me: Well, yes I am. Do you need a Christian teacher for this job? Does my religion matter?

Recruiter: No, weligion is Ok. Doesn't matter. Cwistian vewy good. (sigh of relief from me.) I see that you were supervisuw for kids also. Good. You like work wif childwen?

Me: (What the fudge? Didn't I just answer this?) Yes, I love children.

Recruiter: Childwen very lots of enewgy. Is That OK?

Me: Yes. I'm very used to it(Revelation 21:8 pops into my head here. It says that liars will burn in hell. I suppose I've just confirmed my eternal destination with this phone call.) Children have tons of energy and can be very loud, but I love being around them. They are so fun.

Recruiter: Yes, can be fun. Have lots of enewgy. I have good job fow wu.




Here's what I figured out:
The job is in Ilsan, which I've gathered is a satalite city just west of Seoul. It's Monday to Friday. They have four foreign workers already there. The pay is 2.1 million won and the school is called "Kidsclub".

Given that information, this sounds like a pretty good job. I'll have to find out, when they call back on Monday, what exactly the hours are and try to get them to e-mail me all of the information. At least at first glace it looks alright. 2.1 million seems to be the average wage, or just slightly above the average wage.

That was about the extent of the conversation. We said goodbye and she promised that she would call me on Monday. I had a difficult time understanding everything that she said, given her think accent. Hopefully she was able to understand me alright.

Right away, I ran up to my parents room and woke up my sleeping father to tell him what had just happened. I think he sort of understood what I was rambling on about. I think he fell back to sleep right away. He must've burnt himself out curling(one sweet Canadian sport). After that, I checked my Gmail account to see if I had any more potential job offers. I sort of did. I got an e-mail from www.canadianswithseoul.com. That is one of the "blue" recruiters from the other website. This site has a sister site called "Kiwis with Seoul". Good I thought. They wanted my resume, a photo of my password and a personal photo. I was just about to send everything to them when the phone rang. "Wow! This must be another job offer!", I was thinking. The time was 11:10:






*ring, ring*
Me: Hello! This is Blake Cheslock.
Mum: Blake! Where are you!?! (oh shit! I was supposed to pick her up from her work.)
Me: Sorry mum! I'm coming! Sorry I'm late, I was distracted.
Mum: You forgot about me?(said in a schoolgirl voice. I felt terrible.)
Me: I love you mum. I'll tell you all about why I'm late in a minute.






All went well with her after I told her about my phone call...sort of. I think she's going to say everything that she can possibly think of for me to stay. I guess I must've satisfied her with some sweet talking, because she decided to look up Ilsan on the internet. She settled on finding a bunch of cool pictures of Seoul.

Wow. It's a city of 10,000 identical looking apartement complexes and a river. How lovely...


And so ends my first day experiencing the wonderful world of ESL.