Well, it turns out that for me, getting complete orthodontic treatment will take up to three entire years. I am not willing to stay in Korea that long. Actually, although I'm disappointed that I will have to put off getting orthodontic treatment yet again, I am kind of happy that I won't be here for two years, after all.
I'm not passionate about teaching ESL. The job is not very difficult or stressful. Sometimes it's a lot of fun, but it's not rewarding. Most of the kids really don't give a shit about learning English, and that's a big part of why.
I've been watching a lot of videos on Youtube from supposedly spiritually enlightened gurus such as Mooji, Eckhart Tolle, and Adyashanti. I don't know why they have to adopt silly names after becoming enlightened. I've been reading a book about Ramana Maharishi, too. Truth is, I know that at least some of them are genuine, because I've had the experience of being in the state that they are talking about. It's a bit of an obsession, getting back to it.
The point is, that there is a strong pull within me to eschew the worldly life, and become a monk or a hermit, or a wandering hobo. At odds with this pull is the one that wants to go back to Canada and get started in a career before I'm fifty, for Christ's sake.
A good number of teachers here are my age or older...but most of them are younger. The age thing is starting to feel like an issue. Like I'm running out of time. For most people, teaching English abroad is sort of a fun thing to do when you're young, before you figure out what you REALLY want to do. I don't want to get stuck doing this for the rest of my life because I don't know what the hell else to do with myself. I'm 30 years old, and I've got no career, I'm still single and I've got nothing but $24k in debt and a mouth full of crooked teeth.
I think about that, and I wonder what the hell I am doing here.
But then there is the spiritual side of me that says, "none of that really matters, so just fucking relax already."
Honestly, I would like nothing more than to run off an join a Buddhist monastery but for three things: I don't want to follow dogmatic monastery rules (like going to bed at 9PM and getting up at 3AM, shaving my eyebrows, and bowing to a Buddha statue 108 times every morning), I would really like to fix my teeth, and I feel an obligation to pay off my student debt.
So here is my 5 year plan:
-Finish my contract here, and take distance psychology courses.
-Go back home, get a full time job, start ortho treatment, and go to school part time (more psychology courses) for a year, apply for master's of counseling psychology, and have my current loan paid off.
Then
A) Work part time, go to school full-time for 2 years, become a counselor etc.
or
B)??
Okay, so it's more of a "4 year plan", and it's not bulletproof. But who knows, maybe I'll just say to hell with it all, and run off to Tiruvannamalai, never to be seen again.
Saturday, January 21, 2012
Saturday, January 14, 2012
The Orthodontic Conclusion, Etc.
A fair bit has happened since my last entry. I brought in the new year in Busan, I taught my first winter camp, I enjoyed the first, and longest leg of my vacation time, I visited Tongyeong, and I have come to a resolution about orthodontic treatment.
I went to Busan with Matt to bring in the new year. We met up with a couple other foreigners and played beer pong. From that point on, I was really, really drunk. We went to a casino, where I didn't gamble, but watched ridiculous Korean girl dance routines, inconveniently placed in front of the only exit. I'm really surprised they let us in in the first place. One guy kept pointing to a sign that said "no drunks". Also, here's a fun fact about Korean casinos: they don't let Koreans in. Supposedly Koreans are known to have gambling problems, and thus are prohibited by the government from gambling.
I got way too drunk, and wondered what the hell I was doing with my life.
The first winter camp, at Jeong-Dong elementary school went swimmingly. I had a lot of fun, and I think the kids did too. I look forward to working at the school in the future. Next winter camp begins for me next Monday, this time at the middle school. I'm looking forward to that as well.
I've spend most of this week sleeping off a bad cold, which I probably contracted partly from acclimatizing, and partly from smoking a half a pack of cigarettes on new year's eve. However, I did find time to make it down to Busan to investigate a dentist who does invisalign. Turns out that the treatment was possible for me, but it would not fix my overbite. I the dentist recommended instead, a a kind of braces that go on the inside of the teeth (liminal braces) called "incognito". Unfortunately, those kind of braces are made in Germany and are made out of gold. So the treatment would have cost about ten million won ($9,000). Although I have 4k stashed away for this purpose, my parents might be willing to contribute, and the dentist offered to knock off 10%, that's still several thousand dollars I would have to come up with. Plus, I would have to go out to Busan every other weekend.
So I decided to opt in for traditional braces and get them in Jinju. I'm not too excited about this. Lately, I haven't been too hot on the idea of staying here for two years, either, especially since I will be 32 coming out of it. I've been thinking critically about Korean culture lately. It's the collectivism--the cultural tendency of Koreans to unthinkingly conform. My first year in Korea was kind of like living in a bubble. I didn't have a TV, I didn't speak the language, and I was too impressed with the newness of everything to be judgmental. Now I have to watch myself.
I've been continuing with my Korean lessons, but I'm beginning to wonder more and more if I really want to learn the language, anyway. Some foreigners teach in Korea for years without picking up much more than "nae" or "anniyo". I would really like to come out of this with a skill, but right now my passion for learning Hangeul is beginning to wane.
But it's looking like I'll be here for 2 years. So as of now, I hope to walk out of here with 3 things: Straight teeth, no student debt, and fluency in Hangeul.
That's it for now. Talk to you again soon.
I went to Busan with Matt to bring in the new year. We met up with a couple other foreigners and played beer pong. From that point on, I was really, really drunk. We went to a casino, where I didn't gamble, but watched ridiculous Korean girl dance routines, inconveniently placed in front of the only exit. I'm really surprised they let us in in the first place. One guy kept pointing to a sign that said "no drunks". Also, here's a fun fact about Korean casinos: they don't let Koreans in. Supposedly Koreans are known to have gambling problems, and thus are prohibited by the government from gambling.
I got way too drunk, and wondered what the hell I was doing with my life.
The first winter camp, at Jeong-Dong elementary school went swimmingly. I had a lot of fun, and I think the kids did too. I look forward to working at the school in the future. Next winter camp begins for me next Monday, this time at the middle school. I'm looking forward to that as well.
I've spend most of this week sleeping off a bad cold, which I probably contracted partly from acclimatizing, and partly from smoking a half a pack of cigarettes on new year's eve. However, I did find time to make it down to Busan to investigate a dentist who does invisalign. Turns out that the treatment was possible for me, but it would not fix my overbite. I the dentist recommended instead, a a kind of braces that go on the inside of the teeth (liminal braces) called "incognito". Unfortunately, those kind of braces are made in Germany and are made out of gold. So the treatment would have cost about ten million won ($9,000). Although I have 4k stashed away for this purpose, my parents might be willing to contribute, and the dentist offered to knock off 10%, that's still several thousand dollars I would have to come up with. Plus, I would have to go out to Busan every other weekend.
So I decided to opt in for traditional braces and get them in Jinju. I'm not too excited about this. Lately, I haven't been too hot on the idea of staying here for two years, either, especially since I will be 32 coming out of it. I've been thinking critically about Korean culture lately. It's the collectivism--the cultural tendency of Koreans to unthinkingly conform. My first year in Korea was kind of like living in a bubble. I didn't have a TV, I didn't speak the language, and I was too impressed with the newness of everything to be judgmental. Now I have to watch myself.
I've been continuing with my Korean lessons, but I'm beginning to wonder more and more if I really want to learn the language, anyway. Some foreigners teach in Korea for years without picking up much more than "nae" or "anniyo". I would really like to come out of this with a skill, but right now my passion for learning Hangeul is beginning to wane.
But it's looking like I'll be here for 2 years. So as of now, I hope to walk out of here with 3 things: Straight teeth, no student debt, and fluency in Hangeul.
That's it for now. Talk to you again soon.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)