Korean Parents: Crazy or Smart? Or both?

Korean parents are strange. 

Fact # 1: The parents of our kids send them first to school, then to one academy (maybe piano), then to another academy (maybe ours), then to another academy (maybe Chinese characters), then to another academy (maybe violin), and they come home between 8 and 10pm, eat dinner, do mountains of homework, and go to bed around 11pm or later. 

Fact # 2: These parents expect their kids to do well in these academies. After all, they are paying lots (LOTS) of money for their kids to attend all these schools. If their kids don’t do a page or two in their books, the parents call the school to find out why. If the kids don’t do well on a test, the parents consider their money wasted and pull the kids out and send them to a different school. 

Fact # 3: Many of these parents expect us to go easy on their kids. Don’t push them too hard. Don’t stress them out. Don’t make them write if they don’t want to. Don’t punish them. Little Bobby doesn’t want to come to Wonderland, please don’t make it too hard for him.

I’m still trying to figure out whether there are two distinct types of parents (those who push their kids and want them to learn, and those who just send their kids to academies because everyone else does), but I don’t think there are. Sure, there are some consistent parents who expect us to push their kids all the time, who get angry with their kids when they get bad scores instead of us, and who keep their kids in Wonderland and just make sure they do the work. But there are still those inconsistent parents who get upset if we spend a day watching a movie instead of doing the textbook, who pull their kids out if they are getting bad grades, but who tell us not to make their kids stressed. 

So that’s the observation. Is there a conclusion? I’m honestly trying to figure that out as I write. Korean culture is very hard on the kids sometimes. Some things are easy for these kids. We teach the wealthiest kids in Jecheon, so these kids have fancy phones, brand name clothes, and new toys all the time. But when I tell them about the hours that American kids go to school, that they often get to choose their extra curricular activities (which include sports, theater, and fun stuff like that), and the amount of time they spend studying, I see their jaws drop with envy. BUT there’s a flip side to that, too. Many American kids don’t get into good colleges, they don’t travel because they can’t speak any other language well (how many of kids right out of high school can say more than a few broken sentences in another language?), they can’t converse with foreign visitors/immigrants to their country, and they never learned a musical instrument. They had a childhood, sure, but a childhood only lasts so long, and then you’re left with the rest of your life. And what you can do with the rest of your life depends largely on what you learned as a child. I think Korean parents struggle a little with this dilemma. It’s Korean culture to push their kids almost to the breaking point to make sure that their kid has a multitude of great opportunities as an adult. But I think some Korean parents still feel guilt, and they try to make it up by telling us not to be too hard on their kids, and by plying them with snacks and toys and fancy phones. As an outsider, I could be totally wrong. But that’s my best guess. As to my own conclusion, I think this is another matter where neither culture is better, but a blend of the two would be better than both. A few more extra curricular activities than American kids have, and fewer than Korean kids have. A little more choice for the Korean kids, a little more push for American kids. Too bad Korea and America are on opposite sides of the world. 

Eight months, eight years, or eight weeks?

I have been in Korea for eight months. EIGHT MONTHS! And Will has been here for seven. In some ways, it doesn’t seem possible we’ve been here for that long. But on the other hand, we’ve grown into our routines and living in Korea has become pretty ordinary... at least sometimes. For the first month I was here, at every moment of every day, there was something strange in the air... A combination of smells, sounds, sights, tastes, and physical feelings that I couldn’t separate and identify, but that was so very different from home. That feeling is gone now. The “strange” smells have become everyday. I still notice them sometimes, but not as something alien. And we have our routines. Get up, make coffee, get ready for work, go to work, teach, come home, cook or go out for dinner, spend the evening reading, watching TV, and playing video games (for Will, at least). We go to Seoul about once a month, but we mostly go to the same places, and even those are becoming familiar. In the middle of this everyday life, I sometimes have to remind myself that less than a year ago, I knew nothing about Korea. Right before I came, I pictured Korea as a totally different place than it actually is, but when I arrived it was still strange. Even frightening. And sometimes it comes as a sudden realization that what I’m doing here is still exotic and interesting, even though to me it’s just living, working, eating, sleeping, sometimes doing something fun. So now I think it’s time (or way PAST time... sorry...) to write down some general observations I’ve made, some things I’ve learned while I’m here, and a general report on the goodness of life. So bear with me... this one’s going to take several posts over the next couple of weeks, since I haven’t written in months. If I save any of it for later, I’m afraid you won’t get it until January! (At which point, I’ll be home, I promise.)