9.07.2010

Networking.

I've got a lot of meeting-and-greeting to do over the course of the next couple of weeks. Hanging out with your coworkers so much (and having the same ones for so long) inevitably leads to you meeting their friends, a large percentage of whom are other public school teachers. Result? You become known as kind of the executive foreign teacher in the area. IE, new weoneomin comes in, looks a bit befuddled and overwhelmed. The Korean teacher network swings into action: Can we give him your phone number? Would you mind spending some time? Maybe you could make him feel more at home...

A whole boatload of this just went down, because the new semester (with all of its new arrivals) just started. And of course, I don't mind. What I do mind is that all of the new teachers in question are supposed to be both male and younger than me. A. We need more females around these here parts and B. Younger than me? Younger than me? No. I was the youngest around when I got here. No one is allowed to be younger than me. What is happening?

Anyway, if your Korean co-teacher tries to palm off some random foreign girl's phone number on you in the next week or so, you probably seem a bit lost and it's probably mine. Call me if you wanna grab coffee. I'm nice -- I promise.

8 comments:

CeilingofStars said...

LOL! Well, it's a good chance to make friends, hopefully. Good on you for being so accommodating. Wish I'd known an 'expert' in Busan my first few weeks.

word verification: correans O_O

Burndog said...

Same deal here...except that because I do some of the Orientation training, and they get my email address on their first day...it's somewhat magnified!! Here in Yongtong the newbies are always ladies...not sure why.

We still need to get you, me and WTF together in the one place.

I'm no Picasso said...

Yeah it seems all the girls go to Seoul and the closer satelites like Suwon and Bundang and whatnot. Incheon is nothing but boys. I've given up on the whole situation.

What it's going to take, basically, is probably me sucking it up and dealing with either an all-nighter or paying the cab fare back, since you've got bird stuff on Saturdays and WTF works late on Fridays. And I live in the right armpit of Korea.

Burndog said...

Or maybe a coffee on a Sunday. Oh...and I can tell the Bird I'm busy one Saturday...she's quite decent about that sort of thing...because she gets busy too.

Are you going away for Chuseok? I'm not...it's always a good window for Birdless socialising.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot said...

She lies. She is a harsh cruel mistress. Beware.

I'm no Picasso said...

Burn -- Looks like China's out for me, unless I can pull off something amazing in the next week, so I'll probably be here. Whiskey's brother's in town, so we should all get together and celebrate the fact that I'm fucking stuck here. Or something.

Whiskey -- Stop crashing my maniacal schemes to lure in innocent newbs.

Chris in South Korea said...

Um, sorry about China. In the odd chance you might bring your party to Seoul, I have a bottle of Jack to share :) BYOM (bring your own mixers).

Burndog said...

Well...I am the proud owner of a bottle of Vodka, and a bottle of Bacardi...so we could make some wonderful hangovers.

I'm staying put for Chuseok...I just went home and to the Philippines in August...I don't need the kind of life of adventure that might involve leaving Korea twice in a year, much less twice in a month.

Oh...and I think that you're sunk re China...unless you can pick up a new ARC.