My Culture in Korea

Before I went to Korea, many people warned me that besides a lot of Kimchi, I would definitely be stumbling upon a culture shock. Now that I am here for around four months, I have seen a lot of Kimchi, but have been spared a culture shock (so far). But there are certainly a lot of things that are different from my home country.

It starts with the language, that I still struggle to learn and that puts an invisible boarder between me and most Koreans. There are a lot of students that speak English decently, but once you leave the campus it looks very different and things like shopping for a specific item or finding out what exactly it is you are ordering in a restaurant become amazingly difficult. Even if I manage to get my point across in Korean, I am often unable to understand the answer. In the end, with the help of Konglish and awkward movements of my hands and feet, I usually get what I want, but it’s never easy and direct.

Korea also has a lot of strict, culturally deeply ingrained customs, like for example being especially polite to elders and all the seemingly mundane gestures and details that come with it. There are a lot of important questions that come up in everyday Korean life, like when to receive or hand over things with both hands, how and when to eat with chopsticks and the question where to place them after and during meals. Even preparing food in a restaurant after it arrived is a needed skill. Sometimes things have to be mixed together, cut with scissors or you have to put the ingredients of one bowl into another and stir everything around.

Each of these things don’t exactly sound earth-shaking, but the combination of it and the fact that you encounter little things that you have to adjust to in many different everyday situations, make the whole Korean experience interesting and challenging. And the more you learn, the more you also learn about how much you still don’t know.

Apart from being regularly reminded of my foreignness, I’m often also especially confronted with being German here. There are less than 10 German students I know of, 2 of them happen to be my classmates. So even among the International students I belong to a small minority here in Korea. In a way it is refreshing and it often leads to interesting, though sometimes similar or stereotypical questions, reactions and conversations. My last name is frequently commented with car racing noises and I frequently make the same corny joke that, yes, Michael Schumacher is indeed my uncle. People are always surprised to hear that I don’t like beer, they usually know some German football players’ names and of course they like BMW, Mercedes, Porsche and Audi.

But that’s not all. Me and my two German classmates were genuinely surprised when we found out that our Korean teacher did her PhD in Berlin and lived there for 6 years. Luckily we had nothing bad to say about her, when we talked ‘safely’ in German with each other.

Some days ago, I attended a ‘German meeting’ for the first time and got to know some of the Koreans who study German here at Yonsei. Many Koreans learn the language in high school, but are unable to speak it. English is much more important and difficult enough.

Some of us went to a German Christmas market at a German school some days later. Hearing my mother tongue from all sides and eating ‘Mamorkuchen” and drinking ‘Kinderpunsch’ was seemed absurd, but I also couldn’t help but feel at home to some extend. The temperature was freezing, which helped to make the experience fairly realistic.

One of the things I was very curious about before coming to Korea, was about being part of an ethical minority for once. In most countries I traveled to, I was never obviously a foreigner (before I opened my mouth that is), but in Korea it is obvious. When I first walked into the classroom of my Postmodernism class, my professor greeted me with the words: “So you must be Mr. Schomaker.” The strange thing is that even so I don’t feel like a stranger. People sometimes stare at me in the subway, I run into all kinds of confusions and difficulties, but I only really notice these things if others point it out to me.

One reason is probably that I’m living in the International student dormitory and I’m on many days not exposed to ‘real Korea’. But that still doesn’t account for why the country presents itself ‘foreign’ to me rationally, but emotionally I don’t feel like a foreigner or different in any sense. One might think it’s because of how warm and welcoming the Korean people are, and though I can’t say they’re not, that’s not the reason. I think and hope it’s mainly because of the simple fact that humans are humans and that makes me happy. It’s a sweet insight that I’ll take with me from my time here.

Finding a Place to Live

26^th of August – It was Micha’s birthday and I had finally failed in my attempt to find a guest family. It wasn’t that I had not tried. Ar around 4:30 pm this day, I talked to a woman who participates in the Homestay program of Yonsei University. Actually rather than talking to me, she held a monologue in Korean with my “translator” (a university employee), without looking at me very much.

After around 45 minutes of me listening to a conversation I could not understand, my “translator” told me, that her teenage son was going through a problematic phase. During the conversation I had gathered that she has a son, but I had thought that he was around 9 years old. During one of the seldom interruptions, the translator had asked me if I would consider sharing a room with the “boy”. The outlook was quite different, once I realised the real age (16) of this “boy”. I think she basically needed someone to look after her out-of-control son and talk English to him and her daughter.

Well, I decided against that and went to the I-house (International Student Dormitory) instead, to ask if they had any rooms available. The day before I had already, by coincidence, participated in the I-house welcome party and met Ellina from my university, Ross from the Philippines and others. Plus I had free drinks and pizza, and was of course very happy about that. The saving fox is still very much alive.

The answer to my room request was negative first, but after some minutes they found out, that I had actually had a booking all along. Thank you FU-Berlin! I had a home in Korea!

27^th of August – Moving-in day. I had spent my last night in the Golden Pond Hostel in a 6-Bed dorm, and I had left half of a bag of apples with a long-and-fiery-red-haired Welsh guy, who had spent the entire last 3 days in his room. At least he was always there when I entered. He seemed happy in front of his miniature laptop, caught up in the ever-moving, never-ending alternative reality we call internet. I left with as much as I could carry, including the other half of the apples, left over cornflakes, my two backpacks and one umbrella that people had left in the hostel before. It was heavy, it dragged me down and made my joints hurt. It made my muscles burn and my pores release water quicker than I could refill from the giant water bottle that I had also taken with me. I finally reached the subway station that usually seemed to be so much closer. Once on the subway train, my skin colour went slowly back from shiny red to a delicious tan and I can say with certainty (almost), that the aircon saved me from a cruel and awful death from dehydration. The 30 minutes walk from Shinchon station to the dormitory (I-house) made me suffer and I was drenched in my own perspiration goodness when I finally made it, half-unconscious, to my room on the 5^th (Germany = 4^th) floor. There is no elevator of course.

Till the 10^th of September – The first two weeks I had the small room all for myself. They had lost the 2nd key and therefore I had no room-mate like everybody else. I was happy about the privacy, being able to video chat with Micha, going to bed whenever I wanted, getting up at night chasing blood-thirsty mosquitos…. by the way, the mosquitos here are different than the once I’m used to. They’re slightly bigger, a lot faster, somehow very clever and sly and of course evil and annoying.

Annoying was and still is the construction work that is going on right next to our building. Yonsei is preparing for the future and building a second international dormitory. They start at 6 in the morning, destroying rocks with big metal hammers, blowing rocks with dynamite and who knows what else. In any event, there is always a mind-numbing noise level when you need it least and the workers seem very creative in using different tools and materials to conjure up a vast variety of different sounds and wannabe-melodies. By now I know around 73 different and loud noises that can be elicited from a rock.

To be fair I have to say that the I-house is a very clean place with nice facilities and it is very conveniently located on campus, just 2 minutes away from the KLI (Korean Language Institute or 한국어학당), where I study Korean. Plus the washing machines and dryers are free to use AND there is free drinking water, hot or cold – so how could the saving fox really complain? The accommodation costs are covered by my scholarship as well, so I can only sum up by saying that life is good to me.

10.9.2008 and after – On the 10^th of September my time alone had finally come to an end. My new room-mate 은상 (Eun Sang) moved in. He’s Korean, not an international student, but his English is “unfortunately” very good and he is luckily a very nice guy that doesn’t snore. During the day he’s often in the library, so I still have my private time. If I wanna socialize I just go downstairs to the common room and often meet Ross, some classmates or somebody else. There is usually somebody I know, which is usually a good thing. But sometimes, especially in the evenings when my roommate is back, I miss a quiet place, where I can be alone.

We live in a small international bubble here, that has an invisible wall separating us from the rest of Korea. For now that’s not so bad, I haven’t had a culture shock yet and really enjoy being here; that’s what counts for me – having a pleasant time and exploring and learning a lot on the way.

Fun and the Philippines

The first day of 연고전 (Yeongojeon), the big and long-established sports feud between “my” Yonsei University and the Korea University. A competition in five different sports (Baseball, Basketball, Ice hockey, Football (Soccer), Rugby). Blue against red, eagle against tiger.

We, the foreign students, met at 9am in front of the Global Lounge on our splendid campus and marched to the subwaystation together. After a ride of more than 30 minutes we arrived at 종합운동장(Jeongham Sportscomplex), at the arenas from the Olympic Games of 1988.

It added another pinch of grandeur to the already impressive event. There were people in blue and red shirts everywhere and when we entered the baseball stadium, the noise from the music and the cheers literally hit me in the face. One half of the stadium was a moving blue mass and the other half a moving red mass. There were animators dancing on podests and they and the crowd were performing all kinds of different dances and ‘group movements’. I hung out with Ross, a guy from the Philippines and he explained me the rules… tried to explain to me the rules of Baseball. I now know that there’s a pitcher who throws the ball, a butter who tries to hit it, a catcher behind him, basemen, runners, fieldmen and another person for special purposes that I forgot about. It is actually quite interesting once you know the basic rules and how points can be won.

After seeing Yonsei leading 7-0 after 6 out of 9 innings, we all left for the basketball court. Here the cheering and the whole atmosphere reached new, if not to say insane levels. The stadium was packed, the music was deafening, the air was too warm. In short, it was something I had never seen before.

The music was already playing at an eardrum-crushing-volume before the game started, during the game, during the breaks and after the game had finished. And the people kept dancing and shouting non-stop, like in a wicked, never ending circus of cheering insanity. There were two games going on. The cheering of the two crowds and the basketball game. It was a spectacle that I’ll never forget. Yonsei lost a close 72 to 74 by the way, but that didn’t really matter anyways. I felt intoxicated, my ears still ringing when we finally left the stadium; defeated by the other team, the heat, the constant moving, but happy having been a part of it.

Later I heard that part of the rivalry originates in the fact, that Yonsei is located right next to Ewha Women’s University (and others), which makes the men of Korea University jealous and very angry.

On the way to the subway station Ross and I started talking to Corina, who is from the Philippines as well. We kept talking on the subway and finally went to a restaurant in 신촌 (Sinchon), the area next to our university. They told me many interesting things about the country and reinforced many things that Micha had told me before. Filipinos know everything about there family. 7^th cousin of the grandfather’s sister’s husband’s oldest aunt’s side? No problem! So it wasn’t a surprise that Corina claimed that somebody she knew might have known Micha’s father. More than 90 million people and there’s always a connection somewhere. Crazy.

What I also realized again was, that it really is a very poor country. Ross told me that the allowance of his scholarship is probably more than both his parents’ wage combined. They also told me about Michelle, another Filipina at Yonsei, who we met in later in the second student home on campus. She sends half of her allowance home, which allows her sister to go to college. Janitors and cleaners from the Philippines who work in Korea and other richer countries build splendorous houses with the money they send home.

They also told me about how strict thir parents can be. Ross imitated his father, waiting at the door with a stick in his hand. I had to laugh. Corina imitated her mother: “6pm [not am!]??? Is that a decent time for a young woman to come home?” All this not only made me laugh out loud, but also let me feel closer to Micha in many ways. It is always nice to talk to people from other cultures and connect to them despite the different upbringings.

When Ross and I walked back home, I told him about snowball fights, glaze and how your nose can hurt when you breath in really cold air. He told me about his first two flights. To Manila and then to Seoul.

Koreans at the Beach

After arriving at the beach town of 상주 (Sangju), unable to find the others, I left my luggage at the reception of the pension and walked down to the beach. It was almost dark, but still very warm and there were a few people here and there. It felt a dense atmosphere of being far away in an old land with a long and mystic history. I could see the mountains to both sides of the bay and two little islands in the sea. It seemed like the darkness was embracing all this tenderly and I felt at peace, when suddenly I smelt something very familiar. I knew the smell and couldn’t place it at first… but then I realised it was new year’s eve; and then I realised it wasn’t. It was the smell of fireworks that suddenly lighted the sky in front of me. It seems to be a nightly Korean pastime to shoot up fireworks at the beach and I have to say that it had something to it.

The daytime was different, except for one thing. At the beach (and everywhere else), whether night or day, whether in the sand or in the water, the people here wear clothes! It’s convenient not having to put on swimming wear and sunscreen I guess. We were basically the only people at the beach wearing European style swimming gear.

What finally must have made us a rare sight in 상주, was our ability to stay above water without the help of the yellow floating tires, that were used abundantly by Korean beach tourists who went for a swimm …er… float.

Another thing I’ve never seen in any other country before, was that oftentimes up to 20 or 30 people gathered to play a game at the beach. And I’m not talking about Beach Volleyball, athough that was fairly popular as well. I distinguised at least 3 different games with different variants:

• Towerwondo: Two groups of people (at least 10 persons each) carry one person each on their shoulders and attack the the other team. When one of the elevated persons falls, his or her group loses.

• Beach Rugby: Take at least 30 people and split them evenly into two teams. Also take two chairs and put a small person on each chair. These persons have to catch a ball in order for their team to score and they are about 50 meters apart. The rest of the players basically play rugby; with a football (=soccerball); in the sand.

• Elephant Race: As a little child I often imagined to be some kind of animal. If I wanted to be an elephant, I crossed my arms and held my nose with the hand of the lower arm. Already I had a fake trunk. This technique is known here as well and it’s part of another game. Morph into an elephant, turn around at least twenty times on the spot, run in the direction of a wall or a floeating tire in the shallow area of the sea and try to reach it before the others do. Or at least try to run and fall gracefully. Watching this is a lot of fun!

• There are also a lot of people playing football (soccer) on the beach and once a guy spontaneously involved me in a Frisbee game and, after some minor misses from my side, left me again spontaneously. Digging, the German national sport number two after football, and building sandcastles is not so popular here.

Beach life is mostly the same at any touristic place, but here in Korea it has a very unique flavour and a lot of inimitable oddities to it, so that I kept watching and experiencing what happened around me, rather than just lying in the sun lazily. Thanks to the fiercely burning sun I managed to get a sunburn anyways… I also got bitten by jellyfish and mosquitoes… but that’s another story. This is about the refreshingly different beach atmosphere in the south of South Korea.

Lessons in Korean Culture

18th to 22nd of August

I’m standing in front of some rice fields in 상주 (Sangju), a small tourist beach town on one of the southernmost peninsulas of South Korea. It’s warm, almost hot actually, and quite humid. But there’s a soothing breeze from the nearby sea. Or the close mountains, that are so typical for Korea. Gentle, sinuous and yet majestic, savage and pristine. Around me ample rice fields. The plants have a bright and lush green and are moving with the wind. Time to breath in and relax. Time to get an impression of the other Korea, outside of ubiquitous Seoul.

I arrived on Monday (18^th), after I had followed an invitation from 지미 (Simmy) and her mother, happy to flee the big city a few days before my semester in Korea begins. Outside of the bus window, I saw many more rice fields, mountains and tiny villages, and it felt like a sneak peak into ‘real Korea’, it’s less modern and less gigantic side. When I finally found the Pension with Simmy, her mother and her cousin 혜원, I was really surprised. They gave me my own little room in a nice apartment close to the beach. I felt very lucky and happy that I had escaped smog-ridden Seoul for some more days.

It were to be some days that taught me a lot about Korea and allowed me to have my first cautious insights into the country’s culture.

I learned a lot about Korea’s people. My first lesson was about hospitality. I was given my own room and was welcomed unconditionally by the family of one of my classmates. And it didn’t even feel awkward for one second. I also got to know all kinds of Korean food. Simmy’s mother cooked for us and I had Mandu, Tofu, different vegetables, rice, Kimchi and… quail eggs! These little black speckled eggs actually feel like miniature toy chicken eggs and actually taste like… well, eggs.

Walking around the beach area, 지미 and especially I were often being waved and smiled at, for no particular reason, except that we were obviously not Korean. One time, a guy approached us and asked for a picture. We thought that he wanted a picture of him and his friends, but he actually wanted us in it and seemed overjoyed when we fulfilled his wish.

Oftentimes people would come over to our parasol and asked something irrelevant just to talk English it seemed. One guy asked for the toilets and we told him where they are, pointing in the direction of the clearly visible toilet building. He said thank you and took the opposite direction back to his friends. I was dumbfounded and laughed.

Fortunately all these approaches remained calm, reserved and friendly and I never felt uncomfortable.

There are  a lot of Korean particularities that I noticed and experienced in Sangju:

• The remarkable behaviour of Koreans at the beach, was worth an article on it’s own for me (click here).

• Some of you might know this, but Korean beds are actually just mats or mattresses that lie on the floor. I had one of them in my room and even though it was pretty thin, I slept like I was bedded on a cloud, probably thanks to my recent Swedish camping experience.

• It is interesting that many different cultures invented there own card game. And so did the Koreans. It seems like playing cards is somehow ingrained in the sapient’s genetic code. The cards we played with were quite tiny, mostly red and had no numbers on it. Most of the motives on the cards were taken from nature and it’s necessary to learn how the different cards group together.

• Part of the Korean experience is definitely food. The country has a large number of unique dishes and I will write about them in depth one day. For now I can say that eating with chopsticks and trying new things (for me that leaves out meat and seafood) is essential in this country if you don’t wanna starve, or – even worse – retreat to eating Pizza or going to McDonald’s.

• The landscape makes up part of Korea’s identity as well. Mountains determine much of the inland and the country is surrounded by water on three sides. In Sangju I had both – the clean and warm Korean sea and the mountainside that I experienced firsthand, when we climbed up the 700 meters high 금간 (Keumsan) mountain, which has a Buddhist temple and a shrine on the top.

• On the last evening, we all went to a 노래방 (Noraebang), which means “Songroom” and is better known as Karaoke. There are all kinds of 방 (rooms) in Korea, like PC방, DVD방 and many more, but Noraebang is the most popular and orginal of all of them. Singing for the first time, I was a bit shy, but after a while it was so much fun, that I forgot about my horrible singing voice and my obvious ignorance of the lyrics and started shouting in the microphone. Good thing that the people here are always polite enough to applaud even the most horrible performance.

Sleepless… er… Sleeping in Seoul

15th and 16th of August

After having contacted my mom and talked to Micha till 1am, I finally gave in to the overwhelming fatigue, resulting from little sleep, a serious jet lag and a plethora of new impressions. I fell into a coma and awoke 15 hours later. I showered at 4pm and had my breakfast, delicious chocolate cornflakes from Lucky Mart, around 6pm. Afterwards I called my classmate Stefan Rose, and we met up at Hoehyeon (회현).

The air was clearer than before- it had rained during the day – and the temperature was pleasant. However, I was in constant danger of slipping and falling on the wet streets. I imagined “surfing the curbs of Seoul”. Fortunately I made it through the evening, without diving into a puddle.

We walked through a narrow street market, where all kinds of goods were sold; from (fake) soccer shirts, through all kinds of street food to useless plastic toys. Even though it was quite late and it had just rained, there were still a lot of people haggling, advertising there goods or just walking around. We left the street in search of food and finally found the place of our choice. A shabby little restaurant at the corner of a side street. It was surrounded by tall skyscrapers, that were a contrast to the leaden sky, glowing in an even grey.

It’s almost a secret rule, that the dirtiest places serve the most delicious food. And so it was. I ordered naengmyon (cold  noodle soop) and Stefan ordered bibimgugsu (soup with mixed vegetables and noodles). With it came of course free water and, not the biggest surprise either, Kimchi! My food was quite spicy, but delicious and I’m looking forward to trying more of the elaborate Korean cuisine.

After getting back, I talked to Micha until late at night and afterwards I woke up several times until my sleep was finally ended, when somebody opened the door noisily. I got up reluctantly and couldn’t believe what the clock was telling me: 5:45pm! I have to work on my sleeping rhythm.

The day wasn’t completely over yet and I met up with Simmy, her mother and Jen at a Jazz festival near the Han river. They had set up a really impressive stage right by the river, with the skyline of Seoul in the background. The show itself was less spectacular, but I enjoyed the atmosphere. It was already dark, but still very warm and a lot of people of all age groups walked around, danced and enjoyed the show. We later went to a restaurant, were Simmy’s mother invited us and I had to try Soju, Korea’s national drink. It’s not possible here, to order alcoholic drinks without ordering at least a snack at the same time. The intention is probably to keep people from getting too drunk. Looking around the second floor of the cozy restaurant, I wasn’t sure if it is working.

Back home I made my daily call from Seoul to Berlin and that is how I concluded another day in Korea.

Colours, heat, smells, people, Seoul, soul

13th and 14th of August

My journey to Korea started in a little Finnair plane, headed for Helsinki, sitting next to an old business man from Finnland, who spoke German very well. He was well traveled and we talked about his passion for China and the way flying has changed since the 70’s, where it was more exclusive, difficult and expensive. During our conversation, he kept ordering one Cognac after another, but it didn’t seem affect him very much, although he was equivocally talkative. He embraced the idea of a world without boarders and he made me realise how much the world has changed in a really short amount of time. After all, some countries like Korea had been insulated for centuries and it is only now in our lifetimes that this is changing.

My classmate 지미 and her mother had been on the same plane, and in Helsinki we met 2 more people (Jen, Stefan) from our Korean class. Here I began to feel like I was watching my self from outside, like another version of me in a movie. It felt unreal to meet them outside of the classroom, in Scandinavia. The second flight passed by quickly. I watched an Austrian movie (Die Fälscher [The Counterfeiters]) about jewish concentration camp inmates, who are forced to forge the English Pound and the American Dollar for the Nazi regime. Highly recommendable! I also beat the chesscomputer (in the plane’s entertainment system) twice… on the easiest level and after a hard struggle, though, but I was still immensely satisfied with my triumph.

After finally arriving in Seoul, we all went our different ways and I took a bus (the wrong one) to the city center. It was hot, hectic and humid in the city, but the bus ride there was pleasant and led us along green, forestry mountains on little islands surrounded by water and connected by giant bridges; accumulations of skyscrapers skyscrapers sticking out behind densely grown trees on hilltops. These were the outskirts. Inside of the city there masses of people, car exhaust fumes and I was sweating a lot and felt stranded without any clue about anything.

I didn’t even understand how to cross the street and nobody seemed to know the address of the hostel I had booked before leaving home. Everyone was really nice and tried to help me, but the communication problems were undeniable. It was getting hotter every minute and backpacks were pulling on my shoulders. My clothes were soaked with sweat, I had asked a myriad of people and my legs were shaky when I finally got to the hostel. Glad and proud that I had not taken a taxi, I finally took a (cold) shower, wrote Micha and had to lie down. I basically collapsed on the bed and slept for around 2 1/2 hours.

I awoke really hungry and dived into the crowded side streets near the Hostel, which are packed with people and lurid neon signs. Music is coming from everywhere. It’s colourful, it’s a different world, very different from anything I’ve seen before, but more stimulating than I had hoped for. The city is less extreme than I had feared (in terms of pollution, crowdedness) and more intense (colours, noises, smells) than I had imagined. I went to a Vietnamese restaurant and was able to tell the waitress that I don’t eat meat – in Korean! I find myself reading every second blinking sign, happy about every word I understand… not too many so far.

I’m full of impressions and miss home, Berlin and the people there. I almost feel schizophrenic. Sad on one hand and excited on the other. A strange emotional cocktail, further influenced by the unknown. This is not Germany and this is not Australia. No, Korea feels new, different, unique.