An Interesting Change of Focus

Out of all the places I've lived, I have to say that living and working in Korea is the strangest experience I've had for a number of reasons. I won't go into all of them here because there are a LOT of them but the biggest reason that always strikes me as odd is this: In every other place I've lived and worked, my job was always my biggest priority, my biggest focus. Not here. Living here in Busan, my biggest priority is strengthening my marriage followed by developing my photography skills followed by helping out at our church. My school is just that place I go Monday to Friday from 830 to 430.

In Germany I planned all my lessons from start to finish, designed the curriculum myself and had to find all the materials myself but here my creativity is limited by the educational traditions set by my school. Here I have to teach from the students' book which means that I have to cover the topics mentioned and make sure that the students learn certain phrases, whether I find them useful or not, because those are the things that are on their tests. Now before you come down on me as being a slacker, you gotta know that this tends to be the situation for most of the foreigners living here. That's why a lot of people come here. All in all, it's an interesting change and one that definitely takes time getting used to.