Looks Like Kimchee Is Back On The Menu

Well, I heard from my recruiter the other day and it looks like I'm off the waiting list for EPIK. Furthermore, contracts are on their way so hopefully by next week I'll be able to go to the Korean consulate in San Francisco and get my visa processed. Orientation starts on August 18 so there's not a day to spare.

However. I can't feel completely sure about the position just yet. I'm afraid that after another week of waiting I'm going to hear from my recruiter again that EPIK has decided to withdraw my position, or something. There's no specific reason to fear this; I haven't heard of it ever happening. I just won't be able to relax until I have the contract in my hand.

To tide myself over, I've been listening to a mix of field recordings I made on my visit to Korea in 2008. Here it is:

Korea In Sound

Racial Marketing

A while back I wrote about Japan's soft cultural power in Asia. Japan is the cultural leader in things like fashion and music in Asia, and has even taken to "discovering" singers in other countries and presenting them as Japanese like, such as with May, the Thai singer in Sweet Vacation. In my original article I also mentioned a Tibetan singer who had been similarly discovered.

Meet alan (known to her family as Alan Dawa Dolma). She was discovered in China and moved to Japan in 2007 to be groomed for their pop machine, learning the language and getting a makeover.

Here are two of her album covers.

If you saw those out of context, you'd think she was Japanese, right? It's only when you hear her haunting voice that you catch on that something is different.

Here she is on Japanese TV. Towards the end she sings and you can definitely hear the "ethnic" in her voice.



Here's another video, also from Japanese TV, in which she sings a traditional Tibetan song.



But how is alan marketed in her native China?

This is interesting. There's a distinct difference from the Japanese covers. I don't think she's marketed as more "Chinese" here but with the blue contacts there's a definite exoticness happening. Also interesting is that the songs have a world music flavor. Her Japanese music is—aside from her voice—largely indistinguishable from other J-pop but this album mixes traditional instrumentation with modern rhythms.

So does this mean that Japan prefers its outside elements to be made more Japanese, while China doesn't mind a little exotica? I don't want to pass any sweeping judgments, but it sure looks that way based on this one isolated case.

As for me, I prefer the Japanese covers and the Chinese music.

10 Things I Miss About Japan (And 10 Things I Don’t)

There's a lot to miss about living in Japan, but there are some things I absolutely do not miss at all. Here are 10 of each.

Miss

1. Onigiri
This is always on the top of the list of things I miss in Japan. There's just something so perfect about a ball (or triangle) or rice, some dried seaweed and a little salty fish filling. It's been called "Japanese soul food" and I have to agree. And yes, you can buy it here in the States at Japanese grocery stores but it's somehow not the same. Maybe because the plastic wrapping never comes off as elegantly as it does in Japan.

2. Sushi Meijin
This was a low-cost kaiten zushi (conveyer belt sushi) chain in Oita. A dollar a plate. Stuff yourself sick for less than 10 bucks. Brilliant for a student. It was also a family place, with little kids running around and even a kids' play area. I miss this place but I also miss quality and affordable sushi.

3. Japanese Draft Beer
On a hot day, there's nothing better than a frosty mug of cold Japanese draft beer. It's light, refreshing, and served so cold ice crystals form on the head. And there's definitely a head. There has to be.

4. Japanese Sincerity
Here in the West we value irony. Feelings are rarely expressed to friends directly; they're done through jokes and put-downs. You know you've achieved a level of closeness with someone when they start making fun of you a lot. An actual, sincere statement is looked on with bemusement at best and distrust at worst. Not so in Japan. A statement like, "Please do your best" is commonplace, and beautiful in its heartfelt simplicity. I miss that.

5. The Trains
They run on time. They're everywhere and thus extremely convenient. Unless you're way out in the countryside, you just don't need a car. I love riding on trains in Japan.

6. Regional Specialties
Japanese cuisine is rather restricted. It's opened up to accept foreign influences but still, most dishes will contain similar ingredients. Which is why I love the idea of Japanese "regional specialties." It's all the same stuff, just slightly different. Oita, where I lived for a year, has as a specialty tempura-fried chicken. It's different from kara age, regular Japanese fried chicken, in that it's fried in tempura batter. Another place specialized in baked curry rice. The same, yet different.

7. Shinto Shrines
I would live at a Shinto shrine if I could. They give me such a sense of awe, as well as peace. I like Buddhist temples as well but they don't touch me in the same way that Shinto shrines do. Seeing a big torii (shrine gate) just does it for me.

8. Deep Sense of History
I love history and Japan has it in spades. Plus, Japan loves its own history. Castles are constantly being rebuilt, samurai movies and TV shows being produced, and books written. Just take a stroll around your typical small city and you'll find some interesting historical site or other.

9. Being Surrounded By The Language
I really do enjoy learning Japanese, and hearing it spoken on a daily basis is a joy to me. Seeing kanji "in the wild," as it were, is the best way to learn it. I remember making linguistic connections everyday when I lived there.

10. Matsuri
There's nothing like a Japanese festival, or matsuri. And I mean beyond just the food and drinking, which is great. No, a matsuri exists outside of normal society. There's an element of chaos and danger, a feeling hearkening back to pre-civilized man that's all but disappeared in modern society. It's a wonderful feeling that I've only ever experienced otherwise at Burning Man in the mid-90s.

Don't Miss

1. Being Stared At
If you're not Japanese in Japan you're different, and that means you'll get started at. It's not done with animosity (usually), just curiosity and you do get used to it, but you forget how nice anonymity can be once it's gone.

2. Lack of Good Coffee
There are plenty of places to buy a cup of coffee in Japan but few are what I'd call "good." And forget trying to buy any kind of decent coffee at the grocery store for home brewing. Japan still thinks freeze-dried crystals are state of the art.

3. Summer
Oh God, summer is hot and humid in Japan. I'm from the temperate Bay Area, where it's dry and comfortable all summer long. But Japan is like Miami hot. Jamaica hot. After walking around a bit, I would have a V of salt on my back from where I had sweat. I'm not kidding—the salt was visible on my shirt. That's nuts.

4. Drafty Apartments
Japanese apartments are not built for living in, obviously. They're built to hold up the roof and that's all. Hot in the summer and cold in the winter. Useless.

5. Being Excluded
This is part of the whole being different thing. If you're not Japanese then you can never truly fit in. It's one of the prices you have to pay for living there.

6. Mosquitoes
Japanese mosquitoes are sneaky. They attack low, bypassing your head and going straight for your legs. Before you know it, you've been bitten 10 times. And the bites scab over, leaving gross little marks. At least there's no malaria.

7. Expense
Although I've written to the contrary Japan is still an expensive place to live, mainly because there are no budget-priced items. Everything is made in-country and the price strictly controlled by the government. No cheap Chinese imports here. Good for Japanese business, bad for the consumer who has to pay $150 for a rice cooker.

8. Being Illiterate
As much as I love the challenge of learning kanji, it's frustrating and embarrassing to not be able to read at a functional level. Ordering in restaurants often exposed this, with me reduced to pointing at things in the menu I couldn't read.

9. Salty Food
Japanese food is delicious but it's also salty as hell. Here in the US it's recommended we top out at around 2000 mg of sodium a day. A bowl of ramen has like 3 times that amount. Not surprisingly, my blood pressure goes up significantly when I'm in country.

10. Concrete
Japan is a beautiful country, with lush green forests, ample coastlines and rolling hills, but you'd never know it for all the goddamn concrete that covers every inch of natural ground. Tetrapods piled on the coasts, rivers paved over even in the backwoods, and hills encased in concrete. Does Japan even know how beautiful it could be?

Tentacles In My Mouth

Back in 2008, I spent a little time in Korea. One of the things I wanted to do that trip was eat live octopus, known as sannakji in Korean. It's not a particularly exotic dish there. In fact, just wait until the sun goes down and sannakji food carts will magically appear next to subway stations. One night, Mr. Bong, the owner of the hostel where I was staying, took me and another guest to his favorite.



Here's the owner of the stall preparing the octopus. First, it's taken out of the tank, its legs stretched out on a cutting board, and its body cut off. Then the legs are sliced into bite-size pieces.



The octopus has arrived. The tentacle pieces are still moving, much like a chicken with its head cut off. Grab a piece, dip it in sesame oil and then chili sauce. Pop it in your mouth but stat chewing right away. As you can see in the video, the tentacles are still working and the piece of octopus will try to stick to the inside of your mouth.

I recommend drinking soju while you do it.

Size Matters

I can't count how many times I've been told that Japan is a small country. I heard it often enough while living there. But is it really? Japan is roughly the same size as California, and California isn't so small. I thought I'd do a little research look on Wikipedia and see just how Japan sizes up to other countries.

In terms of area, Japan is the 61st largest country on the planet. With a total country count of almost 240, that means that 3/4ths of the countries on the globe are smaller than Japan. Germany? Smaller. England? Smaller. Malaysia, Norway, Italy, and New Zealand—all smaller. Even a unified North and South Korea is significantly smaller. I remember I once told a Japanese person—who had been insisting how small their country was—that it was larger than the UK and she just about freaked out. Japan is also compared to America. "Look how small it is next to mighty America." That's an unfair comparison. Every country except for Russia, Canada and China is small compared to the US and A.

Land mass isn't everything. How about in terms of population? In that respect, Japan comes out even higher, with the 10th largest population in the world. In this respect it's larger than Mexico, the Philippines, Canada, and Australia. You win again, Japan.

Why this insistence on being so small? Japan has a larger landmass than 3/4ths of the countries on the planet, a greater population than just about everyone accept the biggest of the big, and even a population density to be proud of (number 36). And then there's that big ol' economy, number 2 in the world.

So why the low self-esteem, Japan? If size really does matter (and it seems like it does to you) then why not realize how big and strong you really are? I'll bet before you lost the war you didn't go around telling other countries how tiny you were. Have you since made yourself psychologically small?

I'm curious what others think.

First Come First Serve

EPIK is operated on a first come, first serve basis. Unlike JET, which operates by periodically eliminating huge chunks of applicants, EPIK keeps on accepting applications until it overflows with superfluous job seekers, like a clogged storm drain during a flood. And it appears to be storm season.

Here's what showed up on the EPIK website yesterday:

Important Note: Position availability is very limited at this time. Chances of being placed onto a wait list for a province/city are very high. Applicants on the wait list are not guaranteed a position with EPIK.

Although my recruiter has told me I have a very good chance of landing a position, and as long as my papers and such are in order there shouldn't be a problem, this still makes me nervous. I've been languishing on the JET alternate wait list since the beginning of April. I don't think I could stand a repeat of that.

Actually, I tried to anticipate this on my EPIK application. When asked to choose where I would like to be placed, I was given a selection of major metropolitan areas as well as general provinces. I chose the provinces because I knew most people would pick cities first. I came in to this process in the middle of the hiring cycle and knew I wouldn't have as good a chance of getting placed as those in the first wave of applicants. Also, provincial positions pay a little more, which is always a good thing.

Here are my five choices, in order:

1. Gyeongbuk (also known as Gyeongsangbuk), located in the south east part of the peninsula.
2. Gangwon, in the north east on the border with North Korea. Actually, the province is split in two by the border.
3. Gyeongnam (also known as Gyeongsangnam). The southern version of Gyeongbuk.
4. Chungbuk, right in the center.
5. Gyeonggi, the province surrounding Seoul.

As it was explained to me during my interview, after my papers are received by EPIK they are then sent out to my first choice for placement. Assuming there are still positions available and the province board of education likes me, I will be accepted and they will send out contracts. If there are no positions left or they don't like me, my papers will move on to number two on the list, and so on. At this point, the likelihood of my getting a job depends on two things: how popular (or unpopular) the provinces are that I have selected, and how many positions they have left to fill.

Let's take a look at the number of positions available, as posted on the Korea discussion forums on Dave's ESL Cafe by a recruiter from Footprints last Friday.

1. Gyeongbuk: 40 positions (6 already filled)
2. Gangwon: 59 positions (10 already filled)
3. Gyeongnam: 7 positions (1 already filled)
4. Chungbuk: 24 positions (1 already filled)
5. Gyeonggi: 12 positions (7 already filled)

This is good news. My top two have the most positions available in the provinces and are not full (at least, as of last week). Should Gyeongbuk be full, my application will move on to Gangwon, which has a lot of available positions. I like the look of this.

Speed is of the essence right now to make sure my papers arrive at the Gyeongbuk Board of Education before all positions have been filled. There's a lot that could happen to slow down the process though. My papers are on their way to EPIK right now, where they will be triple checked. If anything is found to be wrong, they will be kicked back to me for fixing. They could be languishing at the bottom of a "to be checked" pile while other applications are duly sent on to boards of education. Also, should I be rejected by my first choice, my application re-enters the central bureaucracy and bogs down again before being sent back out.

However. Everyone here is in the same boat. Everyone's papers are being checked and checked again, sent back for reprocessing, rechecked. I have faith in my ability to follow directions and do it right the first time, and to be accepted by my first choice. Let's also not forget that everyone is not trying for these five provinces. There are eight provinces and seven major metropolitan cities with positions.

Hopefully soon I will get an email from my recruiter saying, "You passed at the Gyeongbuk provincial board of education. Contracts are on their way." If not, well, I don't even want to think about it.

*** Update ***

I wrote to my recruiter to try and clarify the EPIK hiring process. I'm glad I did. Essentially, EPIK looks at how many available positions there are in an area and then recommends that number of people. if I'm understanding this right, the "first come first served" part is over and now the positions are being filled by recommendation. Makes sense, right? This is, of course, dependent upon getting your papers in, making sure all of your papers are in order, etc.

Yakihito Is Going Korean

That's right, folks. I'm going to Korea. After what seemed like a long job hiring process, checking the job boards daily, updating my resume, interviewing via Skype and cellphone, I finally decided to take a job teaching English in public schools in Korea starting mid-August.

"Wait, what?" I hear you say, incredulously. "But Adam, you're all about Japan. You don't even speak Korean, for crying out loud."

You're right. I am all about Japan. But I'm also all about paying off my student loans and Japan is not the best place in the world to save money. It's also really difficult to get a job there right now. Well, a good job. I was offered a position with G.education Nova but given the company's recent history I decided not to take it. Japan will always be there. But right now, Korea beckons.

I'm going to be working for EPIK, a Korean government-run program that's similar to JET. I'll be working as an assistant English teacher in a variety of public schools. I don't know if that will be high school, middle school, elementary school (or a mix of all) or even where I'll be yet, but I have a tentative conformation for Gyeongsanbuk province. It's located in the south east of the country and was the center of the Silla kingdom more than 1000 years ago. I visited there on my trip to Korea in 2008 and really liked it.

None of this, however, is 100% certain. I have passed the interview stage, which means EPIK likes me. My required documents have been sent and will be passed on to the Gyeongsanbuk board of education, who will then give me the final OK. I have been working with a recruiter during this whole process and she assures me it's a done deal, that from here on out any delays are just due to matters of formality. I'm a little nervous that all of this will actually pan out—I've had to turn down that job offer and cancel pending interviews—but with about a month to wait for the contracts, I guess I had better just assume a stance of success and put it out of my mind.

T-minus two months and counting. Or not, as the case may be.