Well, I finally did it. I handed in my notice, packed up all of my belongings and said so long to my life in Korea. The decision was really based on two things; wanting to work in my field and realizing that the buck was up for teachers in Korea.
First, was the fact that I was accepted into the 'Museum and Gallery Studies' program at Georgian College in Barrie, Ontario. This was my out. I could use my pension to pay for my tuition and live rent free with my parents (who also live in Barrie) for the duration of the program. The hope in doing the certification being to make contacts and hopefully find a related job in Canada.
When faced with the prospect of leaving full-time employment and moving back in with your parents after more than 10 years of having been away, it's always preferable to have a plan. My plan was to go back to school, live a relatively comfortable life and find work as an art educator, or curator, or education director or conservationist etc... in Canada.
I've put this plan into motion by accepting my offer of admission, quitting my job in Korea and moving back in with my parents in a house just up the street from the one I grew up in. The fact that I will be out of the house, working part-time and hopefully have an extensive social network at school is the only way that I could have faced such a prospect. While it's not ideal and will probably be a whole lot of hard work, I thought that it was preferable to staying in a job and country that I didn't love in a job that has been earmarked to be cut anyway.
Which brings me to the second reason that I chose to leave Korean now after 5 years; the buck is up. The move towards reducing the number of foreign teachers coming to Korea has been happening for several years. In fact, the teaching bubble burst the very year that I first came to Korea. They unceremoniously cut 1/4 of the teachers who had already been hired during the last week of summer only days before we were due to fly out in 2009 and thankfully I wasn't one of them (having already given up my lease, my job and sold all my belongings).
The trend has continued every year, cutting funding, benefits and reducing the numbers of teachers in high schools and middle schools to nearly zilch. Only rich areas and school who can afford to privately fund English teachers have remained while the unregulated private sector and Hagwons have used this to their advantage.
I was the last major hire made by my university and each semester since, I've seen our wages frozen, our benefits and sick days retracted and the services that they give us also decreased. All this was done while increasing our work hours (less class hours but more mandatory unpaid committees and office hours) and the percentage on student evaluations was raised by more than 10% to give us a rather steep incentive for keeping our jobs. This environment of fear and pitting us directly against our colleagues has done nothing to raise staff morale. Everyone is focused on keeping their job and getting ahead of that bottom 20% cut off.
It was largely for these reasons that I was so willing to not re-sign my contract. I haven't had a pay raise in 5 years basically. I got really great vacations, but is a job really worth staying in because you can then go and live your life the way you want to on your vacations? I'd rather be doing something that inspires me every day and not feel the need to escape for 1/3 of the year.
So with those thoughts in mind, I said goodbye to my best friends, ate a last meal of spicy pork and drank to a fresh start. While leaving my friends behind was probably the hardest part of leaving, it was the right choice, because I know that eventually we'll meet again. I will get on a plane to Chicago or Ireland as well as other places and visit those who have been my family while I've lived so far away from my own. I won't regret one moment of my time in Korea (although I wish parts of it had been easier and happier). My experience has made me a stronger and more independent person. It has given me more respect for immigrants and a deeper understanding of just how vast and different this planet is. I will miss the hustle and bustle, the public transportations and the cheap fast service, but I'm in all honesty, ready to go home.
I have looked out of my windows and seen mountains and tall buildings for so long, that now, after returning to the flat, large, quiet landscape of Canada, it seems more like a dream than a reality. I'll have my memories of life in the land of kimchi and k-pop forever, and although a lot of them reflect difficult life experiences, they were all worth having.
It's pretty good to be home eh?
