Seven Things I Will Really, Really Miss About South Korea

This article began as a list of "Ways That South Korea is Better Than America”, and in many ways, that is still the heart of the message. As an American English teacher living Daegu, South Korea for the past two years, I have become all too comfortable with the lifestyle. As my return date approaches, I am dreading a great many aspects of the transition. The fact is, there are indisputably many things about everyday life in Korea that are much better than in the United States. That being said, after I started writing this, my rebellious brain almost immediately led me to a list of all the ways that the USA is actually better than South Korea (it's surely a list that could be made). But I'm writing about the country I live in, not the one I'm from. So forget about who's better- I'm heading home to the US tomorrow and I'm super bummed about some things that I'm leaving behind. Here are all those things.

1. Not Having to Really Worry About Finding a Job

I have no choice but to open with this whopper. Most teaching gigs in Korea operate around one-year contracts. Many (most?) of these teaching jobs offer such standard benefits as free round-trip airfare from your home country, free housing, and contract completion bonuses. That's on top of all the other things most modern countries consider “standard” like health benefits (see below for more on healthcare). With the absence of rent and low cost of living, it's virtually impossible not to save money month-to-month while working here. This is why 95% of the people I know go traveling, often for several months, at the end of their contracts. As if the benefits weren't amazing enough, the job requirements make the whole thing seem just plain too good to be true. You basically need three things to teach English in Korea: A passport from an English-speaking country, a bachelor's degree (any subject), and a pulse. How many jobs at home have even half the perks with less than twice the requirements?

On top of all this, English language education is a booming, multi-billion dollar industry in Korea, which means that if you want steady employment here, it's not really a matter of IF you get a job, but WHEN.

All this isn't to say that working in Korea doesn't have its share of pitfalls, dangers, difficulties, and issues. But those problems are magnified by those of us that live here because we often forget just how awesome we have it in comparison to the average American nine-to-fiver.

2. Not Paying an Arm and a Leg for Healthcare

Over the past three years, I have had a few sever bouts of acute gastritis, and on two occasions I've been forced into a trip to the Emergency Room for severe stomach pain- once in Korea, and once in the U.S.A. This made me the subject of a pretty pure experiment in how each of the systems work. In both cases, I was admitted with almost no waiting. I consulted with a doctor, was administered painkillers, got blood work, and was given a few prescriptions. I was released after an hour or two.

The level of service was excellent in both cases. The doctors were equally busy, equally thorough, and equally helpful. The ONLY noticeable difference in these two experiences was the out-of-pocket price tag: the experience in Korea cost the equivalent of about $200. The one in America was well over $2,200.

Why oh why? Well, for starters, South Korea has a single-payer healthcare system. Like most other “modern” countries, they believe that affordable healthcare is a basic human right. Many of my American friends in Korea already have gotten, or plan to get, all of their non-emergency medical work done here, before returning to the States. It'll save them thousands of dollars.

3. Easy, Affordable, Fast Public Transit

If living abroad teaches you anything, it's that the little things are what make the difference in your everyday life; you learn to rise above the bad and appreciate the good. When it comes to getting around in Korea, it's (almost) all good.

Owning a car is a necessity for no Korean in a good-sized city. Buses and subway lines run everywhere, and run frequently. They are almost never crowded. Bus fare in Daegu is about $1 for a ride, with a free transfer. Compare that to nearly $3 for a ride on a smelly city bus in Sacramento, California, for which I'll receive no transfer. Which means I'll have to pay another $3 to the next bus (which I'll have waited 30 minutes for).

But what if you're in a hurry? What if it's late? What if the bus just won't cut it? Taxis are all over the place. The fair begins at about $2.60, and inches slowly up from there. A forty minute ride all the way across town would cost $20 or so. As for the cabs in the US...I really couldn't tell you. I've only been in them a couple of times, and it was always a reminder of why I never take cabs at home. They will clear out your wallet like a vacuum cleaner.

4. Ridiculously Fast Internet...like, really

Is the internet a necessity in modern society? It certainly seems to be heading that way. The USA is on its way up in this regard- most coffee shops, bars, and even Subway sandwich restaurants are wired up with wifi nowadays. The thing that makes Korea so much better is speed. Wifi is everywhere here, and it's all fast; around 14Mbps on average, which is twice the USA's average speed. I have traveled to both urban and rural Korea, and pretty much the only place I couldn't find a wifi network was in the woods. One time, when I REALLY wanted to download an episode of Game of Thrones, I literally just walked down the street with my laptop until an unsecured network showed up. It took me about ten minutes. To find the network AND download the episode.

Korea has a few giant telecom companies that handle cell phone, data, and internet service, much like the US. The difference is that these companies actually compete for your business, fiercely. Rather than the AT&T approach of “we're the only option, so take our terrible, slow and spotty service”, Korea's telecom companies are constantly introducing new advances and perks to attract new customers. You know, that whole capitalism thing?

Now admittedly, American cell phone companies have become super competitive, which is great for consumers. But has Verizion Wireless equipped public trains, city buses, a whole smattering of private businesses, and even entire urban city centers with their wifi service in order to attract customers? I think not. Olleh Telecom in Korea has done this. If your cell phone comes from Olleh, there are payphones all around the country that double as wifi hotspots for you. Beat that, 'Murica.

5. Banks that are actually worthy of the 21^st Century

Before living in Korea, I lived in Thailand for two years as well. Thailand and Korea are VERY different countries, but they do have one thing in common- their banking systems are both better than the U.S.

Korean ATMs are set up to do 95% of the financial transactions you'll need to perform in a given month, and there is one of them every hundred feet in the city. Money transfers between bank accounts, even from different banks, are as simple as a few clicks on a touchscreen, and everyone is wired into this system. This means you can pay your rent, pay your utilities, pay for some concert tickets you want, pay for a book you bought online, and send ten bucks back to your friend that you borrowed it from, all in less than five minutes, on your way to work, at the ATM. Your boss needs nothing other than your account number to send your paycheck to you instantly, 24/7. And you can keep track of everything on a handy little bank book that acts like an automatic check balance book. “But my app does that!” Of course, all Korean banks have apps that do all this stuff too. This ain't amateur hour.

When I lose my debit card in the USA, I have to make a phone call and wait a few days for a card to come in the mail. Hmm, not too bad. In Korea, I walk into a branch and they make me one in five minutes. Hmm, better.

When I don't have enough money to pay for something in America, the bank allows the transaction and charges me $35 for the privilege of buying that stick of gum from 7-11 without being embarrassed. In Korea, when you can't pay for something, you can't buy it. You also can't be gouged by your bank for making a tiny mistake.

Oh, maybe you noticed back there where I mentioned you can pay your rent at the ATM. Back home, they're still asking for checks for the rent. Are you kidding me? CHECKS? What is this, 1991? Needless to say, I will sorely miss not having to head down to the nearest museum bank for some checks just to pay for my apartment.

6. A Practical Response to Alcohol

Some people in Korea (and well, everywhere) have a drinking problem, and that's nothing to take lightly. Drunk drivers are not OK, drunken aggressors can be annoying if not dangerous, and the health risks of heavy drinking should be considered by everyone. Korea is one of the heaviest drinking countries in the world, with bottles of soju (rice wine) going for $1 at every supermarket. But it's not the drinking culture itself that I will miss, but rather the public/law enforcement response to drinking.

Open alcohol containers on the street are not illegal in Korea. When my American friends came to visit me here, I told them that drinking in the streets was totally OK, giving them the impression that lots of people do it. That's really not the case. It's not that everyone does it; it's just that nobody cares if YOU do. Why should they? Something as arbitrary as WHERE you get drunk has nothing to do with how you behave afterward. In this context, American public intoxication and open container laws feel to me like relics of the puritan era. “But I don't want all those drunkies stumbling around me and my kids!” Then don't take them downtown at 11pm on a Saturday, because with or without open container laws, there will be drunks walking the streets in any country. The difference is, Korea doesn't see being drunk as such a terrible social misstep, and while that might not jive with you, being tolerant of the idea that non-criminals can do what they feel like doing certainly jives with me.

DUI laws are fully enforced here, complete with roadside checkpoints and sobriety tests. However, in Korea you can call a service that will send someone over to your location, who will drive you home in your own car. This is a practical solution to a common problem- if you drove to the bar and are now drunk, what do you do? Abandon your car? Sleep it off in the back seat? Take the risk? This service completely neutralizes the problem, while putting some profit in some entrepreneurial pockets.

If you DO wind up drunk on the street in Korea and needing to sleep it off, do the cops throw you in a “drunk tank” with six crackheads and a car thief? Nope. The police station has beds in it. Beds! Just for drunkies to sober up. A safe, secure place where they're not wreaking havoc or beating their wives or being thrown in the dungeon just for having too much to drink.

Why can't WE do that? Instead of finding ways to punish drunk drivers that also fund the City Budget, why can't we come up with some solutions to drunk driving that actually PREVENT bad things from happening? If nothing else, I sure will miss bars that are located a $4 taxi ride away from home- I haven't needed a designated driver in two years.

7. Being a Foreigner

In Thailand, we were called “farang” and here we're “waygookin”. We're the natural outsiders of this city, but you'd be surprised how well that draws us together. Being part of a community of foreigners in a city overseas is at once intimate, fleeting, and invigorating. You instantly have something to talk about with every new person you meet. “Where are you from?” and “How long have you been here?” are questions that some expats find boring to ask, but let me tell you, they are far more boring back home, where 99% of the respective answers you get are “Here,” and “Forever.”

As a white person, I think there's something terribly important about feeling like the other one or two times in your life- about being stared at, sized up, and turned into a generalization enough times that it starts to bother you. It tells you who you really are, helps you understand the world, and heightens your sense of empathy. It's empowering and special, and travel is the only way we feel it.

When I wake up each morning in Korea, I may not be sure if I'll be able to get the lady making my kimbap to understand that no, I don't want radish in it. But I am positive that every day I will learn something new, I will experience the world that I am a part of, and I will feel indisputably unique, thanks to all the people around me who are so different. It's a feeling I've become addicted to, and I can feel preemptive withdrawal setting in as I pack my bags for home. Who knows, maybe I'll be heading back to live here someday? Eh, I kinda doubt it.

There's other words for “foreigner” I wanna try on.

Christmas for Everyone

(I wrote this on a whim last Christmas and posted it to Facebook, but I think it has enough merit to be posted here)

I'm an agnostic. This means that I believe that the big questions like "How did we get here?" and "Is there a God?" are unanswerable by man. It's not that I don't care, it's that I don't know, I think no one else truly knows, and I don't think anyone is capable of knowing. It's highly unlikely that this is going to change for me, ever. That being said, I respect all forms of spirituality, and admire many of the beautiful practices therein. I meditate. I admire Muslim devotion and Jewish traditions. I love Christian-inspired art. I watched the Passion of the Christ and cried. And I celebrate Christmas. I have a wild passion for the holiday.

I consider that last point to be something of a digression, though. Because Christmas in America is....Christmas. That's it. It's a holiday that has lots of things connected to it, from the religious to the secular. But it's not, by definition, religious or secular, it's Christmas. It's whatever you want it to be, and many of us (while not having any interest in religion) want to be a part of it, because it's awesome. We exchange gifts. We decorate trees. We sing Christmas songs. Some of those Christmas songs talk about the baby Jesus. So what? I don't have to believe in a certain religion to enjoy a nice song. Why should I?

I grew up on Christmas, and I did not grow up on Christ. I sang. I put the star at the top of the tree. I marveled at the special quality of the season to bring people together. I reveled in the celebration of life, kindness, selflessness, and pure celebration. None of this was lost on me because I did not believe in Christ, least of all the cool story of the nativity. Because, whether or not you believe the story is true, it's a cool story anyway. It evokes wonder and excitement and positive energy. And we can do whatever we want with that energy- funnel it into religious stuff, or just take it and use it and pass it on, and everyone benefits either way. America has developed its own kind of Christmas, and every family likewise. That's not religion, it's culture. The two aren't mutually exclusive, but neither are they identical.

So let's quit griping about whether to call it "Christmas" or "the holidays". Everyone knows it IS Christmas. And that doesn't make it offensive unless we MAKE it offensive. Christmas is part of our culture, so let's embrace what we've built and enjoy it. Participate in it, or don't. But try to recognize that we're not all enjoying it because we're Christian- I'd say more of us aren't than are. And certainly don't refuse to enjoy it if you aren't Christian. Take the good, leave the bad, spread the love, drink the eggnog, cut out the gingerbread cookie, annoy your relatives, wear ugly sweaters. Watch "A Charlie Brown Christmas" and understand. It's all love, man. Merry Christmas!

Five Reasons TV is Now Better Than Movies

It's definitely happened. Over the past five to ten years or so, since sometime around the early 2000's, a major shift has taken place. TV today is vastly superior entertainment to films. The good stories, the good actors, the good production value (although Hollywood admittedly still has the good budgets), all of it has moved from the big screen to the small one. If you need proof, just flip on any one of half a dozen stellar shows presently on HBO. After that, poke your head briefly into a movie theater and catch a glimpse of some of the crap being pumped out of those places nowadays. When did this shift begin? It's a fascinating question, because the change happened so completely and so quickly. I don't know the exact reason, but I have a few ideas to toss into the ring anyway.

1. The Execs at AMC

I did next to no research before making this list, beyond tapping into the wealth of trivial information already inside my noggin, but I like to imagine a board meeting at AMC that went something like this. A young associate is giving a presentation to the executives of AMC. It's 2006. Profits are down, he says. Only old people watch this network. We need something to revitalize things. And I have an idea: let's make TV that's actually good. Because strangely enough, nobody's doing that.

In the few short years since AMC began producing original series like “Mad Men”, “Breaking Bad”, and “The Walking Dead”, the network has skyrocketed to the top of the cable TV food chain, past that, and into the stratosphere. They almost managed to surpass HBO, the original network of quality TV, who, with shows like “Six Feet Under” and “The Sopranos”, has swept the Emmys pretty much every year since 2000. AMC getting into the game was the first sign of an overall shift to the magnificent.

This board meeting could have been the moment that the change was set into motion, but how did it happen in the first place? Well, for starters, there was the fact that...

2. TV Now Exists In Two Worlds: Scripted And Reality

“Survivor” more-or-less began the reality TV era (there was The Real World before that, but who cares). After its success, TV seems to have hit a major fork, with every new show eventually drifting into one of two zones: either towards well-casted, well-written, high grade scripted TV, or down into the Bog of Eternal Reality. As much as I hate reality TV, I am grateful for its existence. The production of that drivel has made everything else better. It's satisfied the demographic of idiots that enjoy watching The Situation flex his over-tanned muscles. Reality TV satiated the heathens, leaving the path wide open to scripted gold.

The Wire was approximately 10 years ahead of its time. Shows like 24 and Lost in the early 2000's hinted at the shift. But then Breaking Bad came along and broke the mold. No, that's not right. Breaking Bad shattered the mold, completely rethought the idea of the mold, and brought Mold 2.0 out in all its shining glory for everyone in the world of TV to behold. (yes, I'm one of those people. Breaking Bad is awesome. Deal with it.)

3. TV Is Now Infinite Access Entertainment

There's a terrific scene in one of the later seasons of “Breaking Bad” that I quite enjoy (spoilers light if any). Jesse and Walt are having a disagreement about an endeavor Jesse plans to make. It turns physical. They roll around on the floor and fight. When the rumble is over, Jesse asks Walt, “Can you walk?” Walter indicates that he can. “Then get the fuck out of here and never come back.” Jesse replies.

This is not the first F-bomb in Breaking Bad; Walter tells off his boss in the pilot of the show using the word. So why the F word? The show airs on AMC. The producers know that it'll have to be censored.

It's because the environment of TV has changed. Sure, when Breaking Bad airs on TV initially, the F-words will be silenced. But we live in an age when TV is on demand (both literally and on Comcast). People can have their TV now, later, next week or next month, on DVR, on Tivo, on BluRay or DVD, whenever and wherever they want. They can pirate it illegally, they can stream it on Amazon or Netflix, and they certainly can get it in a situation where it doesn't have to be censored. The FCC has lost all its leverage anymore, and even though F Bombs are still censored in one tiny context, producers of shows understand that the practicalities of the 2010's make their TV timeless. If an F Bomb is called for, it ought to show up- it will be heard soon enough.

In the old era of TV, there was a finite feeling to each episode. The airing of that episode, that night, for that one moment, was the climax of the experience. We've left that idea in the dust, and TV shows are now a lasting experience that people are much more likely to enjoy reliving again and again. We're rewatching our favorite shows as often now as we rewatch our favorite movies. That makes TV more valuable than ever.

Also, it's easier to marathon an entire season in one afternoon, ever since...

4. Season Length Now Favors Quality Over Quantity

TV used to be season-based. As in, lasting through multiple seasons of the year. A show's run could last the better part of 12 months. It was a weekly ritual- you could count on your show to be there for you for a long time. Sure, it was mediocre, but it was reliable.

TV is more cinematic now. The number of episodes per season has shrank dramatically from the mid twenties to the low teens. The first season of The Newsroom had only ten episodes. The first season of Breaking Bad had only seven (partially due to the writer's strike, but still). This changes how we think of TV, and as a result, how producers create it.

Go watch a few episodes of Aaron Sorkin-created “The West Wing” (if you don't know who Aaron Sorkin is, Google him. You've definitely watched multiple things he's responsible for). “West Wing” sometimes feels very similar to Sorkin's more recent series, “The Newsroom”. The dialogue is quick and snappy. The characters are self-conscious and overly human. The drama gets REALLY drama-ey at times. And yet....The whole Newsroom season is about something. There's a predetermined arc to the story that we can see, hear, and feel as we watch it. In many ways, it is like a very long film in several parts. “The West Wing” has a much different pace. It's built on the old model, where writers sat down to pump out episode 16 after episode 5 already aired. “What new predicament will the gang get into this week?” That style of television is, for all intents and purposes, over. There's a new sheriff in town, and his name is Quality. We don't want TV episodes coming off an assembly line. We want the good stuff, and if we only get it over the space of a couple of months per year, apparently we're fine with that. Game of Thrones is so popular, people have actually started naming their new babies “Khaleesi”, and with only ten episodes a year. Which brings me to...

#5 Game of Thrones. Nuff said.

My favorite films as an adolescent were the Lord of the Rings movies. I watched them obsessively, purchasing the “extended cut” DVDs, which increased the total run time of the films from 9.5 hours to 13 or so. Those movies were so long, even die hard fans could get bored. How ironic, then, that despite the oppressive length, so much of the original story STILL had to be cut out! The cinematic format just couldn't handle a fantasy epic.

Enter Game of Thrones.

Now, please don't get me wrong: Game of Thrones could NOT have existed without Lord of the Rings. Period. Before LotR was greenlighted, people simply didn't make high-budget fantasy on TV or in movies, at all. In the 20 years before LotR came out, we had nothing much beyond The Dark Crystal and a terrible Tom Cruise movie called “Legend” that nobody watched. New Line Cinema agreed to let Peter Jackson, a chunky, massively under-qualified doofus from New Zealand, direct Lord of the Rings. They greenlighted all three films at once, embarking on a financial endeavor that could easily have bankrupted the studio. But the idea worked, and the rest is history.

Game of Thrones had the ridiculous luck of being ready to become a show right as the age of awesome TV was opening up, AND after LotR proved to everyone that fantasy can make money. The result is probably one of the most well-made fantasy anything since ever. That's the kind of accomplishment that only used to exist in cinema. But not anymore.

I'm certainly not saying that Hollywood is over. It's still a multi-billion dollar industry, with huge budgets and lots of interesting things to say (and they've still got comic book movies when they need to make a buck). But TV has stolen the true cinematic pizzazz from Hollywood, and I don't see them giving it back anytime soon.

And that, as an Aaron Sorkin character might cheekily announce, is all she wrote.