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.