That's MISTER Disch To You.

Welcome back, friends and strangers! When last I left you I was railing against parts of the Western culture here in Korea and giving you the skinny on the EPIK orientation. Well, it’s time to shift gears and talk about the real reason I’m here: teaching. GASP! Yes, I know that between all the talk of botched itineraries, mountains, beer, and hips that you probably forgot that I’m here to do a job, and that job is to ensure that the students at my school can speak English to the best of their ability.
Let me be clear: until this week I had not actually taught in a classroom. My previous experience in working with kids has always been in a less formal setting, whether talking about social ills with Project LEGOS in Minneapolis or working with the local children’s theatre in my hometown in Wisconsin. So this is my first time teaching real students in a real classroom with a real desk and a really huge TV connected up to the computer in the classroom so I can let Youtube teach my lesson for me while I eat the candy meant as a reward for good students. Which is not something I would do. Anyways, before my first day I asked Sookhee (if you don’t know who that is, then you haven’t been paying attention and need to do your EMA homework) what I should have the students call me. I know some foreign teachers in Korea go by their first name, followed by “Teacher”, which would make me Jake-seonsangnim (sun-sang-neem). But Sookhee advised that because the students are used to family names being the norm, and because they may take calling me by my first name as a sign that they have the right to mess with me however they choose, that maybe I should go with Mr. Disch.
So students, when I ask you what my name is you will say, “Mister Disch,” okay? What is my name? (Mister Disch-ee!) Thank you, students! That’s right, I’ve finally graduated from “Jake” to “Mr. Disch”, which means that half the time I’d be looking around for my dad if it weren’t for the fact that most students still just call me “Teacher”. As in “Hello, teacher!”, “I love you, teacher!”, and “Handsome guy, teacher!” Yes, my students call me Handsome Guy, too. Don’t worry, though, I’m well aware that when I get back to the States I’ll be mediocre at best once again.
So how is teaching English as a foreign language here in Daejeon? Well aside from the novelty of being called handsome and having students bow to me in the hallway (both of which are quite entertaining), I don’t know. I have three co-teachers, one of whom is always in the classroom with me. Sookhee and Seonmi are two of them, but I haven’t spent much time outside of the room with the third. This first week has all been one lesson, over and over: it’s my egomaniacal lesson wherein I tell the students all about me and where I’m from. I thought long and hard about how to present this, and I decided that maybe trying to explain why cheese is amazing (when Korean students think of cheese they generally think of Kraft singles, since decent real cheese is very hard to come by here) or why the Packers are awesome might go over their heads. So I went with Minnesota, and have so far taught my kids about Bob Dylan, Prince, Juicy Lucy Burgers (there’s always at least one kid in the class who looks painfully hungry when I explain that one), and hot dish. So far the kids know that I love Bob Dylan, that I majored in English and Theatre, and that I love to write. All of them can tell you that I lived in Saint Paul, Minnesota before coming to South Korea, that my sister’s name is Hilary and that one time she met Obama (this last one was probably what they were all most interested in, other than that SPAM was invented in Minnesota).
Another thing I have to mention before beginning the day’s story is the one thing that has me most excited for this coming semester: Seonmi and I will be the instructors for the English Acting Club. This means that up to twenty students will meet with us to rehearse scenes from established Western plays and perform these scenes in a citywide competition. And you can bet your ass that it’s a competition we will win. After all, how many other club instructors are going to start off each rehearsal with jumping lala’s and a round of Peel Banana? Auditions happen this Thursday, so I’ll have more to say about this next time.
Anyways, this post’s story is less of a story and more of a rumination on the fabled culture shock. It will be a relatively short affair entitled, oddly enough:

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WELCOME TO CULTURE SHOCK
In orientation they told us to expect to be angered, frustrated, and confused for awhile. They told us that we would go through a bout of depression and homesickness, and that there would be no way to avoid it. I had readied myself for it from the moment I stepped off the bus near EXPO Park in Daejeon; hell, I was so ready for it I was almost looking forward to it. But something funny happened: it didn’t hit me. It still hasn’t, although I’ve been here for over a week. Maybe this fabled culture shock will come, or maybe for me it has manifested itself in a different way.
I was leaving the school after the Friday “extra period” and found myself amongst a river of students. I’d put my headphones on, hoping to avoid setting the world record for Most Times Uttering “Hello” in a Three Block Radius, but there was no stopping it. From the second I stepped out of the school my students were waving.

“Hello!” from my right.
“Hello, teacher!” from my left.
“Hello teacher!”, then “I love you!”, then “You are handsome!” from behind me, followed quickly by a chorus of giggling.

This is my culture shock. Rather than being frustrated with not knowing the language or how to get around, I have found the overwhelming outpouring of friendliness from my students to be the strangest thing about this place. Back in America, I’d been running some “social change and justice workshops” with elementary school students last year. There the more common expressions were, “I hate you,” “I want to go home,” and “Try calling my mom, she’ll be on my side ‘cause she hates white people and I do, too.” Okay, that last one only happened once, but there were more such little outbursts with much stronger language. But here in Daejeon, my students wave, shout hello with great gusto, and bow deeply when I pass them in the hallway.
This is my culture shock. And the truth is, we’re not this nice in America. Where I’m from, people don’t even know how to receive compliments. A “Good job!” generally results in me grinning sheepishly, saying “Thanks,” and scurrying off like I don’t appreciate the attention. So imagine how many sheepish grins I’ve been doling out in a school where kids I’ve never met just want to give me a hug.
This is my culture shock. Nice people. And it’s not just the students, either. My co-teachers, calling my landlord and driving me around in search of a cell phone contract that comes with a free phone and taking me to the English bookstore in the new downtown; all of this time taken out of their day to help me is something nearly unheard of in America. I feel bad because everyone is so nice to me. I feel embarrassed because people keep waving to me, smiling at me, and generally making me feel better than my sense of cynicism says I deserve to feel, ever.
As I walked down the street away from school on Friday evening to a chorus of, “Hello,” “Goodbye,” and “Thank you, teacher,” I wondered to myself how long it would take for this particular iteration of culture shock to last. How long before I started taking all this for granted? Or how long before I was no longer a novelty, my students realized they didn’t love me and I wasn’t handsome, and my co-teachers got sick of spending time with me? And then I thought that thinking about it made me more cynical about it. Sometimes these days I almost find myself missing being surrounded by people who keep their heads down, silently thinking the worst about everyone around them. Sometimes I miss the cynicism, and this is my culture shock.
“The students here are sensitive and love to be loved by their teachers,” the information on the handout I got about my school back at orientation said. No shit, I thought to myself as I left the school on Friday.

“Hello, teacher! I love you!” a giggling girl screamed as she ran past me, now four blocks from school.

“Have a good weekend,” I said, smiling sheepishly and waving.

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So that’s it for this post. As you can tell, things could be a whole lot worse. But it’s been almost too easy so far. So naturally, dear readers, I’m getting suspicious.

Next time on English Major Away, I get my ass kicked by a big ol’ mountain and find out how long it takes before my students start hating me like middle school students are supposed to. I think it starts with rejecting a few of them after English Acting Club auditions.