Duncan says you shouldn't blog when drunk. I say bah! I'm in a PC room right now, a little tipsy (ie drunk). I am messengering with my friend Ernst in Amsterdam (the internet is great). Ryan (whom I'm living with) just messaged me too. Ernst is going back to Calgary for the summer. Luck Ernst. I will miss summer fun in Alberta. Ooh, that reminds me, I have a plan to save the Alberta beef industry. Must blog about it when sober. We had a Korean lesson tonight with Jjuni. Went to Hard Core and had some beer and then went to Psycho. Much beer was had. I'm at the PC room because Barb is playing pool with the girls at S-Bar. Hopefully she gets here soon. I think I may be getting drunker. Is drunker a word? The English teacher should know.

Ernst and I are talking about grad school. Will I go to grad school? Maybe. Duncan has been accepted. I miss school and thinking and analyzing. Maybe Law School though. Who knows?

Oh, Rhonni and her sister are here! What a coincidence, sharing a PC-bang. Tomorrow Barb and I are going to Haeinsa temple with Rhonni's sister.

Mountie suffers minor injuries in bizarre accident. No word yet on whether my parents had their house hit by a cop car.

So Rob was supposed to arrive on Firday, rendering Barb and I homeless. He hasn't shown up yet, and no one knows where he is, including his boss (ah the well oiled Korean machine). So Barb and I have moved all our stuff back into his room, awaiting his arival and our eviction. Maybe we've built up enough karma that he won't come this week and we'll be able to keep freeloading off of Ryan and Pascal.

Speaking of Pascal (who's Irish), his mom called tonight while he was out. I love Irish accents. "Not there? Tell 'em 'is mam rayng"

I should be in bed, but I'm not. It's been a strange day. Ollie's blog is up if you're interested. I feel drunk, although I have had no alcohol. Maybe I should try going to bed. Later...

Just watched The Big Lebowski. John Goodman is a god among men.

Bad Kitty's

Hmm, a bad kitty, yet no porn...

Juneteenth

Did you know yesterday was Juneteenth? I had no idea it took over two years for word of the emancipation to reach Texas slaves. You learn something new every day.

Updated

Well, I finished the post about why exactly we had to go to Japan. Scroll down and have a look-see.

So we are currently staying at Ryan's house, because Rob is away until June 20th. Both our new director and our recruiter knew that we had to be out of Ryan's apartment because Rob was coming back. The director told us he would try and have an apartment ready for us.

So I call the recruiter today. He says that the old teachers will not be able to move out of their apartment until June 27th. Now let's ignore for a moment the fact that the director told us that he was looking for a new apartment for us, because the old one was too far from the school. This still doesn't change the fact that they knew we would be homeless come Friday. Now I've been here long enough that I didn't have any grand illusions of the director and recruiter actually having something ready for us in time - there was a glimmer of hope though. You see Koreans don't seem to think more than one step at a time. We had to 1) get contracts and degrees to the school; 2) go to Japan to cancel our old visas; 3) get visa issuance papers; 4) go to Japan to get our new work visas 5) move in and start work. Now until step one is completed - to a Korean - there will be no thinking or working on steps 2-5, etc. That's why they have to spend like 12 hours a day at work. Every step in the process is like a surprise.

So the recruiter acts as if it's news to him when he tells me we can't move in until June 27th and I tell him we have to be out by June 20th. He says he'll call the director. I'm sure when he called the director, the director also acted like the whole thing was news to him, even though he's been told emphatically multiple times. Despite being leery of the whole process, we don't really have much of a backup plan if we don't have somewhere to go on Friday. Many of our friends would let us stay on their floors I'm sure, but we also have all our crap, including two giant bike boxes. So, the recruiter calls us and says we can stay in a hotel in Seoul for eight days until our apartment's ready. The director will even pay half the cost. This might be fine and dandy, but we don't have enough money for even half the cost. Were done-near broke. We ask the recruiter if we can stay at a yeogwan (yug-wahn; cheapo hotel) instead and would the director pay for it (as a yeogwan would be about half the cost of a normal hotel). He consults the director and says this is ok.

So we may be living in a roach motel in Seoul, with all of our things, for a week. We'll probably also have to leave our things in the roach motel to go to Japan for a few days. You think it would be a lot easier if the director just let us store our things somewhere - at the school or his house - and then he wouldn't have to pay for accommodation in Seoul while we're in Japan. That might make too much sense though. Oh well, we came to Korea for adventure, and adventure we're getting.

This will make for some interesting reading...

Deplaned

Incheon Airport, South Korea
So we are back from Japan, an uneventful return. We have good through immigration without any hassles and will soon be on a bus back from Gumi

Japan

Osaka, Japan

We had a great day in Japan today. We got up (relatively) early and headed out through Osaka. It was a warm humid day, but still great for strolling. We had brunch at Subway near Namba station. It's not exactly Japanese food, but it's been a while since we've had it. Mmmm, Subway tuna sub. Our original plan had been to spend the day in Kyoto, one of the most famous ancient cities in Japan. On the advice of Gavin (the husband of Barb's cousin Deb) we instead decided to go to Nara, which was actually the capital of ancient Japan before Kyoto. It has as many historic sites as Kyoto, but is better for a walking trip. So we climbed on the subway (more expensive than Korea) and headed to Nara.

We first went to Nara Park. There are hundreds of domesticated deer wandering around Nara Park, and throughout Nara. The deer is considered sacred to the Japanese. The deer will walk up to you and eat out of your hand. After being in industrialized areas for quite some time, it was great to walk around a park and enjoy nature, even if it's domesticated nature. It was a little ironic for an Albertan to be walking around Japan taking photos of deer. The park is next to Kofukuji Temple, which is a beautiful Buddhist temple. Japanese temples are very classic and subdued. There is none of the glitz that you find in places like Thailand. Even in Korea the wooden temple buildings are decorated with colourful, yet simple, painting. Japanese temple buildings simply use the natural muted colours of the wood. Kokufuji temple contains two beautiful pagodas. One of the pagodas is five stories and 50m high. It is the second highest tower in Japan. Most Korean pagodas are stone and much smaller, but the five-story pagoda is absolutely magnificent. There are a couple museums near Kofukuji, but being poor, we didn't enter any of them. The average entering price was 300-500 Yen ($5) compared to Korea where you can enter most sites for under 1000 Won ($1). It started to rain on us (we apparently arrived in Japan the week the rainy season begins) so we purchased umbrellas and continued on.

Next we went to Nandaimon Gate. Nandaimon is a huge gate leading to Todaiji Temple. The gate contains the Kongo Rikishi guardian deities, which are huge wooden sculptures of Buddhist temple guardians. They were nearly 10m tall, probably the largest wooden sculptures I've ever seen. Nandaimon is a very large gate, and probably rivals the old city gates in Seoul for its size. There were hundreds of school children there when we arrived - consequences of going on a Saturday I guess. They were all posing on the steps of the gate for class pictures (and escaping the rain).

The Todaiji temple complex was beautiful. It's a very large temple, and the grounds are encircled between Nandaimon and the main hall by buildings. The grounds are perfectly flat and the grass is gorgeously green. A large cobblestone walkway leads from the gate to the main hall. Todaiji temple was the central Buddhist temple during the time in which Nara was the capital. The main hall, Daibutsuden, is stunning, and is the largest wooden building in the world. It was originally built in 1752 CE but was rebuilt in 1692 due to a fire. Incredibly the original was actually a third larger than the current structure. Just outside the entrance of the hall is a spooky looking wooden deity that, apparently, can cure you of ailments. You simply rub the statue and then your corresponding body part. Perhaps it will cure Barb's stomach ache. The inside of the hall, known as the "Great Buddha Hall" is equally stunning. The enormity of the wooden structure hits you, and enshrined inside is a 15m tall bronze statue of the (Vairocana) Buddha. The huge Buddha is breathtaking. Unfortunately I wasn't able to get a good picture of it, but I suggest you go see it if ever in Japan. There are many beautiful wooden sculptures inside the temple as well. There is a small hole cut in the bottom of one of the temple support beams. Legend has it that anyone who can fir through the hole is guaranteed enlightenment. I didn't venture it, despite my wiriness. It was funny to watch schoolgirls and skinny women squeeze through.



We left Todaiji and continued on in the rain. As we walked we were greeted with more deer. We visited a couple smaller halls, like Nigatsu-do Hall. We climbed one of the hills (I forget which one) to get a better view of Nara. There wasn't much of a view, however, as the sky was misty from the rain. There was a beautiful Shinto shrine at the top, though. After the hill we continued on to the Kasuga Shrines. The walk up to the mountain of the Kasuga Shrines is beautiful. Entering Kusuga Taisha you see beautiful vermilion coloured pillars and walkways with hundreds of bronze stone lanterns. The buildings and the forest surrounding these Shinto shrines is one of many world heritage sites in Nara. Walking through the forest at the top of the mountain is beautiful and there are hundreds of stone lanterns (unfortunately not lit) lining the way. We were beginning to get a little wet, so we headed back to the town to conclude our sight seeing.

I had a mission in Japan. I had to go look for some video game accessories for my brother. Now as a boy, I would have wanted to go electronics shopping anyway, but this gave me an excuse. We met up with Barb's cousin Deb at Yodobashi Camera in Osaka. After about ten minutes we had to leave to go for sushi. Yes, you heard me right, I was taken from a gigantic Japanese electronics store after ten minutes. Now for you women reading, that's like yanking a newborn puppy from its mother's teat. It just isn't done. I cry when I think about it. Panasonic Q's, millions of digital cameras, MP3 players, all taken from me.

So we went for sushi. Despite the tragedy of Yodobashi, I did very much want to go for sushi. Korean sushi, even the kind that purports to be Japanese - for lack of a better term - sucks. The good stuff (like tuna) is served frozen. Mmm, sushisicle. So I was delighted to go to conveyor-belt style sushi. After I grabbed what turned out to be the only tuna-rolls for the evening we all feasted on huge pieces of salmon (a rarity in Korea), tuna, scallops, etc. It was a belly-filling wasabi-riffic sushifest. Too bad it wasn't all-you-can-eat.

After sushi we spent about 40 minutes trying to find a bank machine for Barb. We wanted to go out for drinks. I wanted to go to a Japanese disco or nightclub, or something where I could experience Japanese nightlife. Barb's cousin instead took us to the cafe where the white people hang out. I didn't really go to Japan to hang out with foreigners, I can do that in Gumi. I'm not a big fan of drinking at cafes anyway. But we're staying at their place free of charge, so I couldn't really protest. We stayed there for a couple drinks then headed home.

My impression of Japan has been pretty good so far. It's expensive, especially compared to Korea. But it's not as expensive as many people will have you believe. Transportation is expensive. I can get from Gumi to Seoul - almost the entire length of the country - for around $15. It costs less for Deb and Gavin to fly to Korea than it does to go to Tokyo. So if you teach in Osaka, you're stuck in Osaka. Japan is cleaner than Korea, and that's one of the things I appreciate. I hate the film of grime that seems to cover everything in Korea. People here seem to know more English than Korea, but that's neither positive or negative. It's hard to compare, because you can't contrast Gumi with Nara. Of course it's beautiful in the ancient cities. Gyeongju is beautiful too. My students often describe Tokyo as "Seoul with Japanese writing on the neon signs."

Our experience in Japan has been tonnes of fun, and hey, we get to come back again soon!

[Photos]

Osaka-bound

So, in a little over seven hours I will be in Japan. Why you ask? Well, let's see...

We've obviously been in the process of looking for new jobs. One of our first opportunities was with a hagweon here in Gumi. We've been talking to the wonderful people at Dalstate Consulting, a recruiting company based in Toronto. Dalstate was one of the recruiting agencies we were dealing with before we came to Korea. We were being screwed around by one recruiting company, Access 1 Korea (Mr. Joseph Pack). Joseph is the guy who got us the jobs with Jane. We didn't want to go with him (long story) and Lori, from Dal State, was trying to hook us up with jobs in Daegu. Despite her valiant efforts we were forced (literally) to go with Joseph and the job at Jane's school. The rest is obviously history. So we turned to a recruiter we actually trusted and asked Lori to help us find new jobs, preferably in Gumi. Sunny, Dalstate's Korean contact, found a position for Barb at Boston Campus. On June 4 Barb went for an interview at Boston (I went with her as well). We found out that Boston, coincidentally, was the place my friend Joe works at, and he had previously recommended the place to us. The school looked great. They teach mostly younger children (including kindergarten) but it was incredibly professional. Jane's school was independent and looked like a run-down hole-in-the-wall. This school was a franchise, and actually looked like both a business and a school.

The interview went really well. The supervisor (the Director doesn't really speak English) seemed great, and seemed like she was interested in Barb. We went to see the apartment. It was a small little studio apartment - smaller than ours in Doryang - but was very new and cozy, unlike our slum. The school was even willing to hire Barb for a 6-month contract, meaning that she'd get to go home at the same time we had originally intended. Following the interview Sunny contacted Barb to let her know that Boston did indeed want to hire her. The offer was great. It would mean we'd have income right away, a place to stay, and we'd get to help Dalstate. The only catch - still no job for me. We had to think about it.

On June 5 we started moving things out of our apartment. Jane had told us she wanted us out by June 6. We told her to screw off, and it's my guess that the police told her it was a labour issue (like they said about our degrees, useless idiots). I had no intention of giving up the apartment if she wasn't going to give us our money or our degrees. I don't know the law exactly, but I'm sure you get a month or at least 15 days after being terminated to stay in your accommodation. But, on the off chance that the police did show up and evict us, or Jane came and changed the locks, we wanted to be safe. Ryan and Pascal, our friends, said we could stay at their place. They have an extra room because Rob isn't coming until June 15. So we began moving all our stuff into Ryan's place.

On June 5 we also had an interview for a job at Global Academy in Gumi. We found this job through ESL Busan. This job was very interesting. It's teaching adults, both in the school, and on-site at companies. Interestingly they do a lot of their work at the LG Learning Center and other LG branches! So we'd not only still be working in Gumi, teaching adults, but we'd essentially we working at LG again, and in better positions (the Learning Center does intensive English courses). What better way to be a thorn in Jane and Jo's sides? The interview went well, and they wanted us to come back for another interview on Monday with the (Canadian) head teacher and the Director. Our recruiter did tell us that the previous teachers left because of some complaints they had, one of those being a crappy apartment. We didn't want to get stuck with a crappy apartment. It seemed like an interesting job though, and there were two positions.

We had moved all our belongings out of the apartment by the June 6 "deadline" but it passed without incident. June 6 was also Barb's birthday. What a wonderful way to celebrate your birthday - unemployed and embroiled in a labour dispute in a foreign country. We celebrated by staying home (i.e. Ryan's home) and watching movies.

On June 7 we went to Seoul. There were several reasons for going to Seoul. We were having Barb's official birthday celebrations there. We also had an interview with Kang's Language School (pronounced kahng's), an interesting job that we hooked up with through Smiling Korea recruiting agency. It would involve teaching both adults and children at a hagweon. Now the salary for this job was only 1.7 million Won per month. Our previous jobs were 1.9M, while most new jobs are advertised at 2.0M. There is possible overtime for 250 000 Won per lass per month. Here's the interesting part, though - only one class on Fridays. Which means we'd essentially have a four-day work week. Not too bad. That leaves loads of free time for leisure activities, or, if we want, we could try to pick up private classes for extra money. There was another interesting part of the job - it was in central Seoul. Not a "suburb" of Seoul (which is recruiter language for a town 50km outside the city), but actually in central Seoul. This can be seen as a positive or a negative. We'd be moving from quaint little Gumi, population 300 000, to the downtown area of one of the world's largest cities. Talk about a change.

Getting to the interview at Kang's was a bit of an adventure. We were told we had to go to Incheon (een-chun), where the Director of another branch (Kang's is a franchise) would meet us. We would then be taken to the central Seoul branch. Incheon is a city grafted onto Seoul, where the airport is (sort of like Missisauga). It's accessible by subway, but it is a separate city from Seoul. We thought that perhaps we were being bamboozled. We were drawn in by the lure of Seoul but instead were interviewing for a job out in Incheon (to be fair Incheon is a nice city, and I've heard good things about it from teachers). It turns out there was no bamboozlement however. The Director of the central Seoul branch had to be in Incheon that day for business. He also has very poor English, but the young couple that runs the Incheon branch has excellent English, so he wanted them to help with the interview. The Incheon school was very nice and very professional looking. It was also pretty large, similar to Boston or Global. It sounded very professional, they have many Korean teachers and they develop their own teaching material and textbooks (as opposed to Jane who does not use material or textbooks). It seemed like a friendly family-type atmosphere. They explained to us that classes are Monday-Thursday and there is a one-hour activity on Fridays, usually with the kids or teenagers. Now here's the great part: The school is semestered and the semesters are two months. Between every semester we get a one-week paid holiday! You have to beg for time off at most hagweons and this one has week-long breaks and one class on Fridays. Also the Christmas break is longer, meaning we could go home for Christmas still! They did say that they like teachers to stay for more than a year, so a six month contract was out of the question (we didn't bring it up).

After our interview the Director drove us to the central Seoul location, where we would be working, to see the school. It was almost identical to the Incheon school (the director apparently used to be a contractor so he helped design and build the schools). We met the Director's father, who founded Kang's, also. Now there is an important thing to note about Kang's. Barb had a suspicion that they were a Christian school, run by the Seventh Day Adventists. She had interviewed for an Adventist school before we came to Korea and thought she recognized the name. The people we interviewed with did have that slightly-creepy, but friendly aura that many religious people have (no offense). Some scanning through literature at the school confirmed that yes, they were at least associated with the Adventists (many of the schools in the US and Australia they do exchanges with are Adventists). This set off some warning bells, but there was nothing overtly Christian at the school. No crosses, Jesus textbooks, etc. There was some sort of prayer on one wall in a classroom, but that's it. They also didn't ask us our religion in the interview, and they made no mention of my Buddhist prayer beads. I'm assuming if they wanted someone who was Christian they would have asked. After we finished at the school we told them we'd get back to them. We told them we had to be out of Ryan's by June 20th. The Director said he would find a new apartment by then, because the current one was too far from the school.


Barb's birthday in Seoul. The Crown Royal Pub.

Following our interview we met up with a bunch of friends in Seoul. Ryan and his girlfriend Stella (from Daejeon, originally of Winsor) met up with us and we went for dinner at TGI Friday's. Yes, that's right, in the center of Seoul we went for cheesy Western franchise food. Now Barb despises franchise restaurants, but when you've been away from home for a while, you even miss things like that. So we scarfed down our "Western" food. We were later met by Brad, our (Australian) friend who used to live in Gumi but is now in Daejeon. Brad's (Korean) girlfriend Jenny, who lives in Seoul, joined us also.

We looked around for a while and then saw a beautiful sight - the Crown Royal Pub. Now this was no officially sponsored pub, copyright laws mean nothing in Korea. Why was the sight so beautiful? Crown Royal is very hard to come by in Korea. You can find it at the black markets, and Barb and I bought Ryan some at E-Mart for his birthday, but it's fairly rare and pricey. Though we drink mainly cheap beer in Korea (it's like being in university) Ryan and I are both rye drinkers, and Crown Royal is our whiskey of choice. We had to visit the Crown Royal pub. So we went in and I ordered a CR and coke. You can see us in the photo above; from left to right are Jenny, Brad, Barb, Me, Stella, and Ryan.

After the Crown Royal we went to Tinpan, another pub. At Tinpan we met up with our old Gumi friends, Taryn and Mike. Mike is from the U of C and Taryn used to be Ryan's roommate. They now live in Ilsan (outside Seoul) and a bunch of their Ilsan friends were there too. We hung out at Tinpan for a while and then we went to The Pink n' Gene, a drum & bass club in Hongdae. Hongdae is the trendy, artsy university-kids area of Seoul. It's where most of the clubs are. We danced there until our ears couldn't take the noise anymore. Ryan left early, but he's not a club kind of guy. We went back to Tinpan for the rest of the night until we retired at our yeogwan.

On Sunday Ryan and Stella went back to Gumi. Barb and I went to Insa-dong. It was our first time there; Insa-dong is a very cool neighbourhood in Seoul. On Sundays the cobblestone street is closed to traffic. Insa-dong is one of the more ancient areas in Seoul. It has many Buddhist shops and galleries, tea houses, calligraphy supply stores, etc. It's a very calm, peaceful atmosphere. There was an annual rice wine festival going on, so there were many drunk old men wandering around (too much "sampling"). Insa-dong is right next to Jogyesa temple. The Jogye Order is the main Buddhist order in Korea, and they practice seon Buddhism (pronounced sun; zen in Japanese and chan in Chinese). Jogye temple is the main temple and is in the heart of Seoul. It wasn't all that peaceful, as there is some construction going on, but there was a friendly English guide.

After visiting the temple we went to Itaewon (ee-tay-wun). Itaewon is the "foreigner area" in Seoul. It has many ethnic restaurants, a Muslim mosque, and many Americans. It is near a US base, and therefore there are many GI's. It's also the more seedy area of Seoul (seedy by Korean standards). Barb wanted to have Indian food for her birthday, and Itaewon is the place to find it. We found a surprisingly cheap yeogwan in the heart of Itaewon for only 25000 Won. We then headed out to an Indian restaurant (we unfortunately couldn't find the one we had intended on going to). The buffet was good, but not as good as the Indian/Pakistani restaurant we had been to our last time in Itaewon. We accidentally bumped into our friends Tracy, Sadia, and Belinda from Gumi there. Belinda works at Boston and Barb would replace her if she took the job there. Belinda spoke highly of it. After dinner we hit various clubs and pubs until bedtime.

On Monday (June 9) we went to the Canadian Embassy. We had two reasons for going to the embassy. First of all we wanted to register as Canadians in Korea - in case there were any further problems with the Korean Gestapo. We also wanted to see if the embassy could provide us with any help in our labour dispute (although we had no high hopes of this). We registered at the embassy and after a while met with "Mrs. Kim". Mrs. Kim gave us the usual spiel about going to the labour board, but she also said she would call Jane herself. She thought maybe a call from the Canadian Embassy would show that we meant business. We were hoping she could at least help us get our degrees back. Barb told Mrs. Kim that we had evacuated the apartment and that we would give the key up when we got our stuff. After our meeting at the embassy we headed for the train station. We passed a guy selling bootleg DVDs of The Matrix Reloaded on the street and I bought one (I know, I shouldn't do that).

Once we got back to Gumi we had to go to Global for our second interview. Let me tell you, that was an interesting affair. We talked with Brandon, the Canadian Head Teacher for a while and then the head (Director, President, i don't know) of Global arrived. He sad he had "heard of" us and our troubles with Jane. "Oh boy, we're fucked," I thought. He asked for our side of the story and we gave it. The whole thing, complete and honest. Surprisingly, he didn't think it was a big deal. He said he thought it was a small issue, and he was willing to go to bat for us at immigration. That was a relief. Maybe he knows Jane and knows what a freak she is. Who knows?

Sunny had told us that Boston wanted to know Barb's answer by Monday. So Monday was decision day. We had 2.5 jobs to chose from: 1) A job for Barb at Boston. This would be immediate and we could move in right away. It was only a job for one of us though; 2) Global. This would be a very easy job to transition to, as it's in Gumi and the same kind of work we're used to. We know we would like the work. There was the possibility that Jane could mess with the process though, because she's that much of a bitch; 3) Kang's school. This would involve a nice setup with all the time off, but we'd need some OT to make more money. It would mean uprooting from Gumi. Despite our complaints about Gumi, we have a great support network here. Seoul could be good or bad.

After a lot of soul searching (didn't we have to do that to get here in the first place?) we made our decision. We decided we couldn't take the risk of how long it would take me to get a job if Barb went to Boston. So we ruled out Boston, despite the fact that it was with Dalstate and was a great school. We weighed the remaining two and decided to venture into the unknown. We chose Kang's School. There were many factors involved in our decision, the amount of time-off obviously being a big one. In the end there was one big determiner, though. We came to Korea for new experiences. To get out of Canada and experience the world. We asked ourselves, "will we experience anything new in Gumi?" I mean, we have tonnes of friends, and we will make many more, but we didn't come to Korea to make Western friends. We'll still have our Gumi friends. We have a great routine here, but we didn't come for a routine. If we go to Seoul we'll have new experiences. I mean, we'll be living in the heart of one of the world's hugest cities. There are like 20 million people in Seoul. The city might eat away at us, but it's an experience I think we need to have. How can we pass it up? So far, I think we made the right decision.

On June 10 Barb told Sunny about our decision. She was a little upset, but she obviously understood. We informed Kang's School as well. So anyway, you're probably wondering what any of this has to do with Japan. Well, you can't get work visas, or change work visas, from within Korea. When we originally came we got our visas from Toronto. So, in order to get new work visas we have to leave the country - i.e., go to Japan. Now here's another catch. Because Jane would not give us release letters, there was a bit of a situation. You need a release letter from your previous employer to transfer your visa to another employer. There is a solution however. You leave the country and whilst doing so cancel your work visa (this is why we are off to Japan). You then re-enter Korea as a tourist (Canadians can stay in Korea for up to six months as a tourist). We then get our papers together, leave again and apply for a new work visa at a Korean embassy in Japan. So this is what we must do. It sucks because Jane is effectively costing Kang's School a flight to Japan because she's being a troll. It's nice in that we get to go to Japan twice, though. So, here we are. Off to Osaka. We're going to stay with Barb's cousin Deb who's an English teacher there. What will we do in Japan? Who knows, maybe go to Kyoto.

I also went to LG on June 10 to talk to the Purchasing guys about our class. I didn't say anything to them about making a decision yet - I didn't want to count my chickens before they hatched. They said they still wanted to schedule a class with me, but that they wanted to wait until the Japan stuff was out of the way.

On June 11 Barb received a call from Jully, one of the Korean teachers at Jane's school. She said that a new teacher was coming that night and Jane wanted the apartment for the next day. Barb told her, obviously, that we weren't giving the key up until we at least had our degrees back. Jully asked us to come to the Hagweon, to which we bluntly refused. We had the police called on us last time we went, we're not going there. If Jane wanted us there she should have thought of it last time. Jane called us later in the day to repeat the story. We told her we were not coming to the hagweon and we were not giving her anything until we got our stuff. Jane said something like "we're not Canadians" and hung up - what a cow. We went to the apartment to clean up and await Jane if she did actually bring our things. At 8:30 a secretary from the school (a new one whom we had not met before) showed up. Way to get your secretary to do your dirty work. The secretary brought our degrees and we exchanged the key for them. We got our degrees back! I didn't want to give up the key for just that. I think we should have refused to give it to her until she paid us, but Barb disagreed. It was a small victory, though, and we got back the things that count.

Yesterday we had a private lesson with one of Jjuni's students. It was fun and we were able to make a little bit of money. Well, that's the looong update until now.

So New Brunswick is still governed by Lord and the Tories. I wish I knew enough about New Brunswick politics to analyze that. Maybe I should go back to school. Anyway, was this actually an election run on car insurance? Is that the most pressing issue in a have-not province with a decimated fishery?

Devils win the cup

So the New Jersey Devils have won the Stanley Cup again. That makes 3 times since 1990. Quite impressive. This also marks the first time since 1990 that I haven't watched the Stanley Cup final. Boo to Korea. But I guess if you're going to miss a final, this is the one. I respect New Jersey and all, but this series was boring hockey vs Disney hockey. But the boring team is, unfortuntately, still a great team. Hopefully in the future hockey can be fun and good at the same time (and maybe even Canadian!). But this is just the bitter writing of an expat Canadian.

Nightmare

Well, yesterday things went from hell to worse-than-hell. Responding to Jane's call on Tuesday where she asked us "Why haven't you come to the Hagweon?" we went to the Hagweon. We didn't go to ask for the money she owes us (thousands of dollars each), but instead to just ask for our letters of release (from our work visas) and the return of our personal documents (university degrees, etc.). Jane handed this piece of paper with our May salaries written on it, with all these ridiculous deductions - such as the salaries of substitute teachers, etc. We told her it was a load of bullshit. When we asked for our letters of release she said we would not get them until we left the apartment. We told her we could not leave the apartment until we got new jobs, which requires letters of release. This went back-and-forth for quite some time. Finally we gave up and asked for our degrees back, which are our personal property. She refused. At this point I became quite angry. For those of you who know me, you know it takes a lot for me to get angry. I don't know if I've lost my temper 5 times in my life, but I lost it yesterday. I don't know if I shouted or not, but I definitely got angry. Barb also got upset. We told Jane that we were not leaving until we got our degrees back. Jane told us to "wait."

So we did just that, waited. Jane left the room and went into a classroom at one point, and then returned. After about 15 minutes three men arrived. One was in normal clothing, the other two were Korean police officers. I kid you not, the police showed up. Jane had left our conversation at one point to speak on the phone, and it must have been then that she called them. The police talked to Jane for what seemed like 10 minutes. Jane then called over another teacher (one whom we had not met yet). the teacher was Asian, but I don't think she was Korean. She spoke English fluently, and her Korean seemed pretty good. Jane asked her to translate for us. The teacher said "even in Canada, when someone asks you to leave their private business, you have to do it." Please note that at no time were we asked to leave. The only order we were given was "wait." We told the police we would leave, but that we needed their help also. We told them she was holding our personal property. They said there was nothing they could do, and told us to go to the Labour Board. So apparently Korean police can protect Jane's private property, but not ours.

Stupid corrupt bigoted county.

So yesterday I got a call from one of my students in the Purchasing Department, Bob. He asked me about what had happened with our class. I tried to explain it to him. He asked if I would come to meet with him this morning. So this morning I scooted over to LG, which I didn't think I'd see again. When I arrived Luz was teaching Mr. Lee (Han-sang), the head of the Department, and there was a new girl at my desk already. I was ushered into a meeting room with two of my students, Arcadia Seo and Bob Yun. Bob and Mr. Seo (pronounced suh as in son). They told me that Mr. Lee was upset about what had happened to me. He wanted to arrange for me to teach a class at the Purchasing department, at least until I found new work. It was nice to actually feel appreciated for once. I agreed to do the class. It won't exactly be a money maker, as I'll have to get myself to the industrial complex and back every day (~a 30 minute drive). It will be worth it, though, to know that I can still go to LG and see Luz (and maybe Jane) and have them know I am still wanted there. Nothing like being motivated by spite...

I also, lo and behold, recieved a call from Jane today. She asked "why have you not come to the Hagweon?" Can you believe the nerve? After telling us a million times that she didn't want to talk to us, and telling us to go to the labour board, she asks why we haven't been to the Hagweon. So I told her we hadn't been because she told us not to. She then told me she wanted us to leave the apartment by Friday because she has new teachers. I told her that she owed us 30 days notice, and that we'd leave the apartment 30 days after she gave it to us. I told her we weren't leaving until she held up her end of our contract. I told her we needed to start new jobs in order to get a new apartment and in order to do that we needed our money, release letters, and documents from her. Can you believe her nerve? God, I'm starting to hate that woman.

Shot down

Today we went to the Labour office. We met our friend Rhonni at 9:45am. Two of Rhonni's adult students helped us with our preparation for the Labour office. Desite the fact that the only the best-of-the-best university graduates are able to get public service jobs in Korea, the don't seem to be able to speak English, while these middle aged Korean women can. The ladies were very nice and very helpful. One even called her friend at the Catholic Worker's Centre to get a contact person at the Labour office. We were feeling very positive about our chances at the Labour office.

What a letdown. We weren't even given the form to fill out. The woman at the labour office told us (and by told us I mean told the ladies - she didn't even say "hello" to us) that because we had not yet worked for 6 months (we have been working for 5.5 months) we were not entitled to any notice. The told us our Director had 14 days from the date of firing us to pay us. They didnt do anything about Barb's April pay, which is now almost one month late. Aparentl in Korea your contract isnt worth the paper it's printed on and you arent roteced by the law unil our contract is half over. I wonder if employees also aren't required to follow the law for the first 6 months?

If it weren't for the generosity of Rhonni's friends in helping us, I would have lost all faith in this godforsaken country (I'm still close). I can't believe that our contract means nothing, and there is no law to protect us. The concept of "honour" as it exists in other Asian countires like Japan does not seem to exist here. Justice and the rule of law also seem to be foreign concepts. Incredibly disappointing.