A Chance Run-In at a Baseball Game

Nexen Heroes (Seoul) vs. NC Dinos (Changwon) at the Mokdong Baseball Stadium, Nexen's home base.

Last weekend, one of my classmates invited me to a baseball game in Seoul. She's a fan of Seoul's team, the Nexen Heroes, and she knew that I was a fan of Changwon's team, the NC Dinos¹. We went with other exchange students as well as my friend's homestay family, which included a teenage son, SW, who is crazy about baseball! All of us got seats in a section of the stadium heavy with Nexen fans, and SW was very enthusiastically using his pink thunder sticks to cheer on his team, so much that his parents kept telling him to sit down and be quieter.

Unfortunately for SW, the Nexen Heroes suffered a devastating (and, to be honest, embarrassing) loss against the NC Dinos, who are one of the best teams in the league this year despite being only two years old. The NC Dinos were leading by a few runs in every inning, which I pointed out gleefully to my rather disgruntled classmate. I took a quick selfie and posted it to Facebook, with the caption, "서울에서 넥센과 NC 다이노스 야구 경기를 보는데 다이노스를 혼자 응원해서 좀 쓸쓸하다 ㅋㅋ" (I'm watching a Nexen/NC baseball game in Seoul, but because I'm the only Dinos fan [in this section], it's kind of lonely, lol).

Then, in the sixth inning, something happened that made the Heroes commit error after error after error... maybe it was the fact that it had begun to drizzle? In any case, the Dinos were able to score ten runs at the top of the sixth, bringing the score to 16-5. Ten runs. What baseball team can score ten runs in a single inning?! The scoreboard couldn't even show double digits for runs, so after the tenth run, the numeral "9" was changed to an "A".

I stopped goading my classmate after that because I felt bad about how my team was trampling hers underfoot. Poor SW resorted to praying for a miracle beside me. On the other side of the stadium, however, the devout NC fans were singing and having a whopping good time. I have always been impressed with NC's fans -- I was once told that the Changwon team's fans all had to jump ship from the Busan team (Lotte Giants) when the Dinos were formed in 2012, and then they worked extra hard to build up their fan base in opposition to their neighboring city. As a result, the NC Dinos fans are among the most ardent in the country. I mean, this was a game held in Seoul (5 hours from Changwon), yet enough fans showed up in their section to hold their own against a stadium full of Nexen supporters and their sound systems, mascots, and cheerleaders.

One of my former students (from Changwon Science High School) is one of these die-hard Dinos fans. How did I find this out? Well, it was quite an unexpected and serendipitous meeting. Shortly after I posted the aforementioned photo to Facebook, she saw it pop up on her Facebook newsfeed. (We weren't friends on Facebook, but another one of my former students Liked the photo, and she saw that.) Realizing that we were both at the same game, she walked over to the other side of the stadium, judging by the background she could see in the photo, and then found me!

I was extremely taken aback when I saw her. This is a student who graduated in fall of 2012. I had only taught her for one semester and hadn't seen her (online or anywhere) for two and a half years! The first thing she said to me was (in Korean): "Teacher! Do you remember me?" It took me a moment because her hairstyle was different, and she definitely looked like a third-year college student, not a high schooler. But I remembered her name. In fact, I remember the exact conversation we had, nearly three years ago, when she explained why her name was rather unique among Koreans because it came from a native Korean word that had no hanja (Chinese character) counterpart -- her name means "sunset"².

When I told her that I remembered her, she was so happy she didn't even know what to say next. Also, as it turned out, she hadn't kept up with her English studies, so she was very much speechless. She told me that she loved the Dinos and was even wearing a jersey that had been signed by the team. I was just amazed at this coincidental reunion. I wished my student best of luck in school, told her that we ought to meet up again sometime, and took another selfie before she went back to join her fellow fans. Later, during that improbable sixth inning, I texted her, saying, "WE'RE WINNING!" and she replied, in English, "Perfect!" plus a lot of emojis.

You know, I can't remember all of my former student's names. I can't even remember all of my current Korean friends' names -- it's just harder for me to mentally store and retrieve Korean names, compared to English ones. But I will never forget a student's face. And I'm glad my student didn't forget mine.

That night, I was thrilled that my team won, but what really made my day had nothing to do with the game at all. It had something to do, I believe, with the sunset.

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¹In Korea, professional sports teams are literally named after their corporate sponsors. Nexen Tire Corporation is a Korean tire manufacturing company. Its name is a portmanteau of "next century". The NC Dinos are owned by NCSOFT, a video game development company. Thus, I know many names of Korean sports teams, but I rarely know what city they are meant to represent.

²Okay, her name doesn't actually mean sunset. It actually refers to the glow of the sun at sunset or sunrise, which is... what, Rayleigh scattering? Or just... red sky (in the morning, sailors take warning...)

The Eastern Hemisphere

As I sat at the boarding gate at SFO, Katelyn texted me: "WAHH ARE YOU EXCITED," and I, deciding to be honest, replied, "나 피곤해 ㅠㅠ," which means "I'm tired :(."

Prior to leaving for Korea, I'd spent a week in Colorado with my parents, which, while fun and worthwhile, was a specimen of rather poor timing on my part. You see, I had been busy with my final exams and papers right up until I moved out of Berkeley. Then, I found myself in the Rocky Mountains, far, far away from the banks I needed for foreign currency, the post office where my newly-purchased recording equipment had been sent, and friends who might be able to help me in my seemingly-futile search for an apartment in Seoul.

In between beautiful hikes during the day and delicious meals at night, I was actually spending most of my vacation hours in slight panic mode as my date of departure approached and nothing was falling into place. So at the airport, as I boarded my flight, I was indeed tired, and I found it hard not to worry about how many things still had the possibility of going wrong! Still, I put on my happy facade, updated a quick photo and traveling status to Facebook, and proceeded to watch four and a half movies in a row on the plane. Escapism.

This light display at SFO is one of several dozen that represents the sister cities of San Francisco. I didn't know Seoul was a sister city! The seal also depicts Seoul's city flower, Forsythia viridissima, which is called 금선개나리 (Kumson kaenari) in Korean.

Twelve hours later, I had crossed the International Date Line and was on the other side of the world! It felt very strange to be at the Incheon Airport once again. Everything was so familiar, yet I felt different. I don't know if the nine months since I last was here count as a long time or a short time.

Three hours after that, I had my own apartment, began unpacking, and went to a cafe for WiFi and a 9pm dinner of Honey Bread and a sweet potato latte. And that's when I thought, "Okay, I'm really back in Korea now."

God is good, is He not? I had prayed for a lot of things that week, number one among them being patience and serenity (to accept the things I couldn't change, which were mostly my own fault anyway). I had asked for a way to bring enough cash to pay up front for an apartment I didn't even have yet, and although all the banks had been closed on Memorial Day, the ATMs came through! I had asked for the realtor I'd been talking with (via Kakaotalk, of all things) to be an honest and not-scammy person, and he turned out to be very nice, even waiting for me at his office past its closing time to ensure that I found a place. My studio for the summer is tiny -- basically a glorified dormitory room -- but it's a cheap place to sleep in a quiet neighborhood, and it's not far from SNU's campus, so I'm satisfied.

I had prayed that I would not crash and burn on the placement test for my summer class, because I had neglected to study for it -- not a single hour. My examiner was very nice, and she seemed impressed that I had managed to find an apartment on my own using only Korean. I was placed in level 4 (out of 6). Not great, but not bad at all. I have some catching up to do.

And I had prayed that this summer, I would use my time wisely and understand my purpose for being here. It's ostensibly for study and research. But I'd like to think there's more to it than that. I don't know yet. God doesn't answer every prayer instantaneously. In ten weeks, I'll look back at this and re-evaluate.

When I last checked that goodbye-America-hello-Korea status update on Facebook, I noticed something interesting. There is a small "globe" icon on the menu bar that indicates whether you have any new notifications (and I had about a dozen comments and nearly one hundred "likes" -- were people excited to see me back in Korea or eager to see me leave America?) and it looked different. I realized that while the globe normally shows North and South America for me, suddenly it showed Asia and Africa. Facebook was welcoming me to the Eastern hemisphere.

So here I am. A new adventure awaits. So do old cliches. And who knows what else?

갑시다!

Paris Baguette (파리바게뜨) in Berkeley!

Can we take a minute to chuckle at how excited 1) all my Korean friends and 2) all my friends in Korea are over the discovery of the Korean bakery chain Paris Baguette in California? They're actually popping every in the Bay Area (and Los Angeles/Orange County), due in no small part to the ever-increasing number of Asian immigrants and Asian-American communities. I found one in Berkeley, right next to the Downtown Berkeley BART Station! It's like a taste of Korea (but definitely not like a taste of France, let's be real).

페북친추?

Last week, on Sports Day, one of the students who graduated last year came back to visit school. He was one of two alumni, actually, who returned, and I was delighted to see them both. While we chatted, this former student said something that has stayed with me for some reason.

I was discussing how Facebook etiquette was quite different between students and teachers when I was in high school. Here in Korea, it appears to be very common for students to add their teachers as friends on Facebook, especially their homeroom teachers. Teachers, of course, reciprocrate, and the result is that the already very close teacher-student relationship enters a new dimension of sharing and openness in the social networking multiverse.

Way back in the 2000s, Facebook was just starting out, and it was, in fact, still restricted to college campuses when I was a freshman. I didn't think to add any of my high school teachers as friends on Facebook (except for my awesome Yearbook class adviser, Mrs. Dotson) until after I'd graduated. Even then, not a whole lot of people over 30 even used Facebook.

Now, less than a decade later, everyone and their mom has been sucked into the relentlessly blue global social media network. Here in Korea, my host mother has added me on Facebook. My former students have added me on Facebook. Even current students have added me on Facebook, as well as current teachers at my school. That is, my co-workers, with whom I can barely communicate, want to be my friend. I don't know exactly where to draw the line. I'm not really used to this, so I've stopped adding current students as friends for the time being.

Anyway, back to my former student. I told him about how Facebook had changed so much in the past few years, and how I thought it would make the teacher-student relationship awkward if they were "friends" online. But then he told me, "Well, we never really saw you as a teacher. I mean, you weren't like the other teachers, like Teacher Lee or Teacher Roh."

That got me thinking... I could interpret his words in several ways. On the surface, of course I'm not like the other teachers. My English conversation class is almost like an elective for my students; it's nowhere near as important as their other subjects, like physics or math. So, I'm not as important as the other teachers. I do give my students tests for a grade, but my class is much easier overall than their other classes, to the extent that many of them don't really care. And generally, native English teachers at public Korean schools are not treated the same as regular faculty. We rotate in and out frequently, so we don't have to help with administrative work or even contribute to faculty get-togethers. Frankly, I just kind of do my own thing at my school, and nobody has ever objected. And to be completely honest, it makes me feel isolated and useless from time to time.

But I like to think that my student really meant that I should have considered our teacher-student relationship a little bit differently. Putting on a teaching persona doesn't have to put distance between us, necessarily. Of course, I talk to my students as if they're my friends every single moment of the day. I work out with some of them. I chat in the bathroom with some of them (Man Code? What Man Code?). I tease them and ask for fist bumps and share my food and chase them down the hallway until they reply to my "What's up?" with a feeble "Nothing much." But does that make us friends? Or does that just make me the weirdo, talkative, personal bubble-invading foreign English teacher?

I'm not like the other teachers, and my students never really saw me as one of them. I wonder if the way I have constructed my relationships with my students and with the other faculty at my school has truly been for the best?

What do you think? Do you add your students and/or teachers on Facebook? How about your co-workers? Why or why not?

- - -

P.S. I am friends with that former student on Facebook. His current profile photo is one that he took with his friends, current 3rd-years, on Sports Day. It's too cute!

P.P.S. The title of this post is Korean abbreviation slang: "페이스북 친구 추가," while not a question, roughly means, "Can I add you as a friend on Facebook?"

Twinsters, the reunion of Korean sisters separated at birth

Following up on yesterday's post about SNL Korea's offensive adoptee skit, I'd like to share this "Facebook story" that I really like: "Twinsters".

via facebookstories

About a year ago, I was linked by a friend to a Kickstarter page for a documentary that a Korean adoptee wanted to make... about her newly-discovered twin sister. Thanks to YouTube, Facebook, and the crazy power of social media, she found out that she was one of a pair of girls given up for adoption from Busan in 1987. Her sister was raised in France, while she became American. They reunited, visited each other's adoptive families, toured South Korea, and inspired thousands of people along the way as the story of their reunion unfolded together.

Again: they visited South Korea together (for a Korean adoptee conference). They returned to the land of their birth. As far as I'm aware, they did not reunite with their birth mother or family. Goodness knows if they had, it would not have happened remotely similarly to the crude parody that SNL Korea embarrassed itself with last week.

On that note, SNL Korea has apologized for their skit on Twitter, according to allkpop.com. "We bow our heads and sincerely apologize to the Korean adoptees overseas and their families who've been hurt by the skit... Due to the carelessness of the production team, which failed to handle a sensitive matter with the utmost care, we apologize and will get rid of the relevant corner (코너, Konglish for 'feature')." They admitted that they tried satire and failed miserably. Their sad attempt at in-group humor only alienated an already stigmatized and misunderstood section of Korean society. Hence, the apology. Fair enough. I just hope they don't do it again, but honestly, chances are they'll just make the same mistake with a different marginalized group...

Here is a link to the tweet and the full apology in Korean.

Adoption is no joke. I mean, I'm all for finding humor in various family situations, but we must realize that a line has to be drawn somewhere. And really, isn't it ultimately more rewarding to follow a 'feature' like "Twinsters" that explores adoption not through probing, farcical humor but through mystery, surprise, and genuine storytelling?

Anyway, Facebook did some great work with the infinitely more interesting story, and I encourage you to follow the visually-stunning timeline of their intertwined lives. I'm looking forward to watching the documentary when it is released next year.