My pendulum of hope for Korea is back on the upswing – God, that was a terrible phrase. I need to stop blogging at 2.00 am.
Anyway, applying to a bunch of different recruiters has paid off, because I now have two companies talking to me, which is more than can be said for my original recruiter. One is Touch 4 Teaching, which yields precisely 4 Google results, and has been ringing me every single day with information they could easily email – which would also remove the problem of trying to decipher the Korean accent over an atrocious international phone connection. The other is EA & Partners, run by a Korean guy called Mike Jang, who’s been very friendly and helpful – but then, so were the folks at ASK Now, before they hung me out to dry. I’ve also received an email from a teacher at a school in a place called Dongtan, a “new city” (read: sandy construction-site wasteland, like a miniature Dubai minus the glitz). That out-of-the-blue approach puzzled me at first before I remembered that one of the recruiters I went through simply posted my image and resume on their website, for any Korean school to come along and take a squiz at.
My ideal job would be in central Seoul (because I like big cities) teaching younger children like kindergartners and primary school kids (because they’re less likely to catch on that I have no idea what I’m doing). I’d also prefer to teach in a hagwon (private school) over a public school, because public schools generally have much larger classes and provide you with a Korean co-teacher, and as I just said, I’d like my teaching audience to be as small and oblivious as possible to my complete ineptitude and, most likely, paralysing fear. Besides which, Touch 4 Teaching sent me an example of a standard public school contract which was very… restrictive. Government services and complicated bureaucracy go hand in hand, after all.
All of the schools I’ve been offered so far have been in the satellite cities that dot the circumference of Seoul like, well, satellites. I’m keen to hold out for something more central. But at the same time, I don’t want to price myself right out of a job. It is a delicate balancing act, one which my years of being handed whatever job I wanted during Western Australia’s economic boom have left me hilariously unqualified for. But not as unqualified as I am for teaching, SNAP!
Ideally Mike Jang, who is still processing my details, will come through for me like a glittering paladin on a white horse and secure me my dream contract so that I can then be placed under quarantine or lost in the sea of civilian casualties in a vast war. Failing that, I’ll just keep working in the deli at Coles, which I think is the most horrific of the three options.
14 comments
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May 28, 2009 at 8:35 am
chris
dude you have to chose one.. you cant lead them both on like this its unfair… just choose one or end it with both
May 28, 2009 at 11:27 pm
ellisha
haha chris’s comment sounds so much more like he’s talking about a girl than recruiting companies lol.
but i think just go for one of the schools that arent directly central, but more towards the edge of central/the outer areas of the city. dont forget ull have trains and u’ll be there for a long time so its not like u wont get to explore…
May 28, 2009 at 11:44 pm
grubstreethack
yes elisha that was the joke
the two jobs i’ve been offered so far are 40 minutes out of seoul (the one in dongtan) and 2 hours out of seoul. i’ve been talking to the guy in dongtan more and it actually sounds quite appealing but i wouldn’t be able to start until late august and i’m keen to go NOW RIGHT NOW
May 29, 2009 at 1:34 am
sunrise089
What’s the time limit on accepting the current offers?
May 29, 2009 at 1:38 am
grubstreethack
that’s what i’m about to find out. i’m not sure what the ettiquette in these situations is, but i’m fairly confident that most schools entertain more than one applicant, just as i’m entertaining more than one offer. so if i leave it too long i may miss out, and while there’s plenty of other jobs, i can’t keep deferring and deferring or i’ll still be here by xmas.
hopefully the dongtan one will still be open in a few weeks, because if i can’t find something better by then, i’ll be more open to the idea of leaving later.
May 29, 2009 at 9:46 am
chris
THAT IS THE JOKE
umm anyway if you leave later man that means im gonna have a whole fucking year to wait for you…. that aint coolio man. at this rate it doesnt look like we are gonna travel together…
May 29, 2009 at 10:53 am
grubstreethack
and if i don’t go, you’re still gonna have a whole year to wait while i scrape together the money
we’ll see how it goes but if i do end up going around august you could bum around the top end for a while? and maybe do another stint at mornington? i dunno. we’ll see.
unless of course you want to pay for my expenses when we go travelling :D
May 29, 2009 at 11:02 am
grubstreethack
besides which i didn’t think you were planning to wait around for me at all? you finish in late september, and if i go to korea it will be sometime in june, july or august. you would be waiting somewhere between 9 to 11 months regardless.
and of course we are going to travel together you dolt. did you have any other plans at this stage? we don’t live in a dystopic sci-fi world where the government has us put down at age 21.
May 29, 2009 at 1:13 pm
chris
im going to travel… when i get home dude. or maybe work in perth for a bit? i dont know. but im gonna only do this one mornington “stint”
so ill be home in late september…
dont be upset if i find someone else to travel with while your in the land of the dead… DEAD COOL THAT IS
May 29, 2009 at 2:30 pm
grubstreethack
well like i said even if i don’t go to korea i still won’t be able to go in september because i won’t have the money.
and you can’t blame me for seeking long-term work because you told me that after mornington you might go around the top end or into SE asia or whatever…
June 5, 2009 at 7:27 pm
ellisha
omg what is this mitch?
8 days without writing anything new?!?
and u call urself a blogger!! haha
June 5, 2009 at 7:48 pm
grubstreethack
i’ll be damned if i’m going to stand here and be lectured by someone posting twilight fan fiction on her blog!
i just don’t really have anything to write about at the moment… korea posts are overkill and i haven’t finished reading a book in ages
June 6, 2009 at 12:01 pm
chris
update about my phone call to you :D
thats interesting coz its got me in it
June 7, 2009 at 2:08 am
ellisha
hahaha ok i did not post any of that to my blog except one SMALL thing and when i put it there it wasnt even talking about twilight. i was relating it to a completely different point. then again im suprised u even noticed it. i thought u would have been bored to death by the same ongoing drama in my blogs haha. i was in the frame of mind u didnt read them anymore… woops.