All countries and cultures have their quirks and Korea is no different. These are things that while usually are taken for granted by a native might cause a visitor or ex-pat stop and say "huh, that's odd." Often these oddities can provide additional insight into the culture. Quirky Korea is a weekly posting in which I share a picture of something that struck me as odd during my time here. Sometimes the picture will be self-explanatory, other times it will need a bit of context.

One thing that's simultaneously funny and frustrating at the same time is the objectification of foreigners in the country. Coming from a multi-cultural country like the U.S. it's considered ill-mannered to point out someone's "foreign-ness" since just because they might look or dress differently doesn't mean they weren't born and raised in the USA. Korea on the other hand is extremely homogenous and therefore it's likely that when you encounter someone ethnically non-Korean they're a foreigner.

This outsider status foreigners inhabit in Korea has, at times, resulted with intense attention. For the most part I think foreigners are good-natured about it all - we understand we're a bit of an oddity and people are curious about us. When I was in Jinhae for a cherry blossom festival a man asked if he could take my photo by the blooms - I was the only foreigner around and my physical appearance which is different from the people around us made an interesting photo. I obliged, he said thank you and we both went on our way.

However, sometimes the attention is too much and can be a bit invasive. Over the weekend my friends and I went to the local omija festival which was held in a small town outside of Jeomchon. Since it's a relatively small festival in rural Korea it doesn't attract many people outside of Gyeongsangbuk-do and we were the only foreigners there. After walking around a bit we entered a large plaza which had booths set up and a stage with presentations. We wandered around a bit when a man with a video camera came up to us and asked if he could film us trying omija juice. We hesitantly agreed and were handed cups and drank the juice with the camera filming us just a couple of feet from our faces. The cameraman seemed to be selective about who he wanted to film focusing on myself and another girl who are both fair skinned with blue eyes and one guy who's a very tall and light skinned Indian. The two other girls, one ethnically Korean and the other who has an Asian parent were somewhat ignored. I guess since they had black hair and dark eyes they weren't "foreign" enough. After we walked away though we realized we were followed by another guy with a video camera who wanted us to try omija makgeolli and speak on camera and when we kindly refused he kept following us filming us trying omija bread, purchasing omija beer and walking around. One booth had a tall bike and the people there insisted we climb onto it. Only one of us was willing to do it and eventually we had to walk away because they kept insisting. Though we all had a good laugh about the experience I think we were all a bit annoyed because we had really just wanted to relax and enjoy the afternoon at the festival.

However, though we received the usual surprised looks most people weren't overly concerned about our attendance at the festival and when we left the main area we were able to enjoy a more low-key experience of looking around at the booths, trying some food and chatting.

All countries and cultures have their quirks and Korea is no different. These are things that while usually are taken for granted by a native might cause a visitor or ex-pat stop and say "huh, that's odd." Often these oddities can provide additional insight into the culture. Quirky Korea is a weekly posting in which I share a picture of something that struck me as odd during my time here. Sometimes the picture will be self-explanatory, other times it will need a bit of context.

Since Hollywood, pop music and other aspects of Western culture reach the far edges of the globe it's natural that they influence other cultures - their movies, music, fashion, etc. Verbal communication is no different and Konglish is common especially with the youth. Konglish is a Koreanization of English words and it's found its way into the English curriculum here in Korea. Let's go ~ is a great example of Konglish. While I might use the phrase "let's go" on occasion but I rarely use it to the extent that it is taught in class here and I don't think I've ever muttered the phrase "let's go together" something even my Korean friends in college would use regularly. However, after being here for a year it sounds completely natural to me and I'm not even sure what I would say in its place!

Last week we studied the phrase "let's go ..." and one of my 5th graders drew this great picture of space.

All countries and cultures have their quirks and Korea is no different. These are things that while usually are taken for granted by a native might cause a visitor or ex-pat stop and say "huh, that's odd." Often these oddities can provide additional insight into the culture. Quirky Korea is a weekly posting in which I share a picture of something that struck me as odd during my time here. Sometimes the picture will be self-explanatory, other times it will need a bit of context.

How ingredients are incorporated into food varies between cultures and the types of food we eat as a child develop our own understanding and acceptance of different flavor and texture combinations. When you live in a different country suddenly everything you knew to expect when it came to food is challenged. Visiting a bakery in Korea can be an interesting experience because there are a lot of flavor combinations which a Westerner just wouldn't expect. Pastries at the local Tous les Jours are filled with sweet potato, red beans and green peas (pictured below). These are three foods which most Americans would never associate with a sweet fluffy pastry. However, they're quite tasty. One thing I will never grow accustomed to is the garlic bread - which instead of a savory delight of salted butter and garlic is typically sweet in Korea with a sweet butter smeared atop the baguette. It was an unpleasant surprise when I first tried the garlic bread I bought to accompany the pasta dish I had spent the evening preparing.

All countries and cultures have their quirks and Korea is no different. These are things that while usually are taken for granted by a native might cause a visitor or ex-pat stop and say "huh, that's odd." Often these oddities can provide additional insight into the culture. Quirky Korea is a weekly posting in which I share a picture of something that struck me as odd during my time here. Sometimes the picture will be self-explanatory, other times it will need a bit of context.

The below picture might look like a innocuous fan but in reality it is actually of a potential killing machine - or so it is believed by some Koreans. It is accepted as fact by many people in this country that a fan (and sometimes air-conditioning) running in an enclosed room can result in a decrease of oxygen in the room and/or hypothermia. This is why the majority of fans here are run on a timer and I suspect why my co-workers leave a window ajar when they run the air conditioning in our small shared office space. There is even a wikipedia page for "fan death" which offers pseudo-scientific information why Koreans only suffer from this affliction - since foreigners like myself disprove the dangers of "fan death" on a daily basis.

This belief that Koreans are inherently different from others is highlighted by a recent report on the Olympics. An English language Korean newspaper stated that the Korean women's archery team excelled at the sport in part because of "...heightened sensitivity and dexterity in their hands and fingers. This sensitivity supposedly developed generations ago through the traditional method of making the national dish kimchi." The article also attributes their success to Koreans usage of thin metal chopsticks as opposed to the thicker wooden ones used by its neighbors. The Korean article quotes Reuters without acknowledging that it was a somewhat tongue-in-cheek comment with a more serious explanation provided further into the report. The Reuters' article, which you can read here, credits the team's success to the fact that Korean archery athletes train almost exclusively for the Olympics. Their intense training and focus is the more likely reason why Korea has consistently dominated the modern archery competition since it was first introduced at the Olympics in 1972.

All countries and cultures have their quirks and Korea is no different. These are things that while usually are taken for granted by a native might cause a visitor or ex-pat stop and say "huh, that's odd."Often these oddities can provide additional insight into the culture. Quirky Korea is a weekly posting in which I share a picture of something that struck me as odd during my time here. Sometimes the picture will be self-explanatory, other times it will need a bit of context.

This sign recently popped up at a local grocery store. There are approximately 30-35 Western foreigners in town in addition to a few South East Asians - enough I guess they want to entice foreigners to the store by offering us a discount if we purchase multiple items of coconuts, avocados and/or mangoes. My guess that these appeal more to the foreign population and it's a way to draw in business. However, I'm a bit uncomfortable with the offer since Korean nationals aren't able to take advantage of it - I would object to something that would exclude me solely because of my nationality so therefore I feel it's wrong to support an offer that excludes others. I wonder what they would do if a Korean American tried to get the sale price (or any foreigner who is ethnically Asian and therefore occasionally mistaken for Korean) - would they be required to show their passport in order to prove their "foreign-ess"?

All countries and cultures have their quirks and Korea is no different. These are things that while usually are taken for granted by a native might cause a visitor or ex-pat stop and say "huh, that's odd."Often these oddities can provide additional insight into the culture. Quirky Korea is a weekly posting in which I share a picture of something that struck me as odd during my time here. Sometimes the picture will be self-explanatory, other times it will need a bit of context.

There's a lot about Korean schools that I just don't understand but one thing that I find completely illogical is that end of term tests are typically held 2 weeks before the final day of school. This means that students will study intensely, take their tests and then attend classes for an additional two weeks, of which material from this time period is unlikely to show up on the following term's tests. At my technical school the result is near chaos - students literally expect not to do anything in class. They watch movies or, worse yet, have free periods with little supervision which results in rough-housing in their classrooms (based on the noises I hear outside of my classroom). I was strongly advised to show a movie in my classes the final two weeks because the students have learned from example that those final classes are unimportant for any upcoming exams (grades seem to be based almost entirely on a few exams - classroom performance and homework (if even given) appear to be meaningless). And so that's what I did - for all 6 classes I showed a movie and for the most part order was maintained however as a teacher I felt it was a complete waste of 2 class periods and a sad reflection of the school and it's priorities (keep the students happy even if its detrimental to their overall education and future). To be fair this was only at my technical high school, classes were as usual at my elementary and academic high school though I tried to make our last English class together a bit more fun with games or short videos.

I once asked a co-teacher why there were these two extra weeks and he said that Korean teachers have a lot of paperwork. I'm not quite sure exactly what paperwork they have to fill out that their American counterparts don't but I think it's incongruous to organize the school schedule in such a way that nearly a month of classes every year is wasted on movies, games and free time.

All countries and cultures have their quirks and Korea is no different. These are things that while usually are taken for granted by a native might cause a visitor or ex-pat stop and say "huh, that's odd."Often these oddities can provide additional insight into the culture. Quirky Korea is a weekly posting in which I share a picture of something that struck me as odd during my time here. Sometimes the picture will be self-explanatory, other times it will need a bit of context.

When you walk down a residential street in any town throughout the country you will without a doubt come across these gray bins with orange lids. Upon first encounter you might assume they are run-of-the-mill garbage containers and the rotten stench emiting from them in the summer would easily confirm that suspicion. However if you live in Korea you learn quickly that these containers are not generic garbage cans but instead food disposal bins. In Korea garbage is typically separated into 3 (or more) types - garbage, recycalbles and food waste. The food waste is collected in a special container in the kitchen and eventually disposed of in these grey bins outdoors. Once a week a truck snacks through the streets of town and collects the waste and then it is taken to farms where it is fed to pigs. It was a bit of an adjustment remembering to keep the food scraps separate from the rest of the garbage but I quite like the idea the waste is re-used rather than rotting in the local dump.

All countries and cultures have their quirks - I am still mystified by why anyone would want a jumbo 32oz cup of pop or could regularly eat the huge super-sized portions that are the norm in the United States. Quirky Korea is a segment I hope to start which will illustrate some of the oddities I encounter while here. These aren't necessarily criticisms of Korea - just things that make me stop and go "huh, that's odd." Sometimes the quirkiness will be obvious in the photograph - other times a brief explanation will be necessary - like for the photo below -

This humungous flat screen TV that was recently installed in the teachers' office at one of my schools. I realize I only visit the school once a week but in all my time there I have never noted a need for a TV, let alone one so large they had to shift around some of the items in the office like the fridge and copiers. However, what makes this truly odd is that the classrooms are in desperate need for new computer equipment or at the very least a technician needs to come in and work on the current computers - they're not only slow but the computer/TV connection in one classroom is so bad that it takes 5 minutes at the beginning of class to get it to work. Or perhaps they could have used the several thousand dollars on something else within this slightly rundown rural school.