John arrived in Seoul from Owensboro, Kentucky in August 1995. He worked at Bo-Sung Hagwan until November, 1996, teaching children from 6 to 16 years old.

John now lives in Van Nuys, California, and has recently been named LA Correspondent for American Songwriter Magazine. He originally wrote these essays for broadcast on public radio station WNIN in Evansville, Indiana.

Their names did not come readily off my tongue. In fact, nothing came readily as I stood in front of fifteen Korean teen-agers who could speak very little English. Since I could speak hardly any Korean, teaching them really posed a challenge.

They tittered nervously at my attempts to say, "Choi Hae Min, Kim Ji Yong," but as the lesson unfolded, I enjoyed instant celebrity. I discovered how all I had to do was walk in the classroom, and they'd see me as a short Brad Pitt or Kevin Kline. Knowing about America and Americans mainly through cultural exports, they saw a Hollywood halo about me. To them, everything I said seemed to have a Jimmy Stewart ring or a Cary Grant twinkle.

To break them out of this trance, and to get their noses out of books so they might speak the English grammar that had left ink stains on the palms of their hands and sentence fragments hazy in their minds, I went to the window, stared outside. From there, I invited them over one by one to come take a look with me. I asked the simple question: "What do you see?"

Some said, "A car. A man. A light."

In some other context, this would make for dull conversation at best, poor communication at worst. However, by appreciating the unique situation, I realized that I was rediscovering language. By seeing my students grapple with the utterance of elementary words we take for granted, the necessity and mystery of communication became sublime.

Between classes, I'd often steal back into the drafty, old tiny room they called the teachers' lounge and drink a cup of coffee while staring out the window at the Korean skyline. Just as in the U.S., there was some graffiti spray-painted on a brick wall, in Korean letters, of course. The universal symbol of a heart in the middle connected the foreign letters in an expression of love.

I would sip my coffee, remembering a student's awkward phrasing: "Like me, do you?" The unabashed smile of a bright-eyed, apple-cheeked pupil beamed at me in a need for acceptance and understanding. Recalling the serious nature of my position, I would clear my throat in an effort to be older-sounding, then move on soberly to the next question for the one-on-one interview.

But I think they could see behind my school teacher's facade, see the glimmer of a boy who connected with them and needed their understanding just as much as they needed mine. With this in mind, in the following weeks I memorized their names as though I were the student taking a test from them. I then did as best as I could to say: "Choi Hae Min, Kim Ji Yong," and that was enough for them. I knew this without language. I knew by their smiles.

©1997 John Howard

To become fully initiated and welcomed in Korea, one must endure the "one shot" ritual. This testimonial exercise involves a Korean elder gentleman and you downing a single shot of soju (a potent Korean liquor) at the same time, in one resolute gulp.

That might be okay if not for another Korean maxim: "Never leave your friend's drinking glass empty." When they say, "One shot," they don't mean, "Let's toast each other with just one drink." They mean, "This is one shot in a series of one shots."

I see that custom as a qualifying metaphor, describing a way of life if you're an expatriate living in Seoul.

For instance, my encounter with a burly, drunken ex-soldier of the Korean army itself involved a steadying of my nerves and my resolve to remain properly functional in the face of an unstable agent. (The ex-soldier himself was one hard-to-swallow shot of soju).

He sat right next to me, downing one glass after another, speaking Korean with a soju-induced slur, making my understanding of him doubly difficult (since I didn't know the language all that well, anyway). His speech was a manly rumble. He frequently grunted, "Ne Chin-gu" ("My friend") while patting me on the back and leaning towards me. Periodically, the lit end of his cigarette dangled perilously close to my bare arm. Luckily, I got burned only once.

There were many such "one shot episodes."

Once, I dined with my boss. He ordered for both of us. I'm still not exactly sure what I ate. I just know it was bloody and left me craving a shot of soju.

And I'll never forget going to Christmas Mass with my boss's wife and son. In the middle of church, through her son's interpretation, she scolded me, preached about how I should reform myself, and later would not allow me to partake of Holy Communion. Afterwards, she instructed me to go to Confession. I had been to church since living in Korea, and to her surprise, the priest greeted me by name.

Another unforgettable experience happened in another sacred place: the health club in Olympic Park (where they held the '88 Olympic games). You haven't lifted weights until you've had a huge, charmless rock of a Korean guy hovering over you in the weight room, barking out training instructions.

Or try taking a taxi from one end of the city to the other when you don't really know how to get where you're going. I did that with only 18,000 won (22 dollars) in my wallet. We drove around in circles until I thought I wouldn't have enough money to pay the fare. Try explaining that to someone who doesn't speak your language and is old and wrinkled from dealing with Americans like you.

Living in Seoul involved a series of one shots -- challenges to take it like a man and remain standing. Now safe here in the Midwest of these United States, I raise a glass of milk to all Koreans and cry, "One shot!"

©1997 John Howard

Out of the night they appear on street corners, these tiny restaurants on wheels. O-daeng (long, wooden sticks of fish), soju (Korean-style whiskey), a cupful of o-daeng broth -- what's your pleasure? It's a carnival atmosphere.

Sit on small, plastic seats that remind you of buckets. The table is the restaurant; lean too hard, perhaps it will all roll downhill. Did you want fine dining? Then you've come to the wrong place. Is it open-air, easy-going companionship that you desire while having just a bite and a shot? Then, pull up a bucket.

Many times while in Korea, I came to these shik-pums (food stands). Mainly, I went to the same one. The owners became two of my first friends. I called them Hyung (older brother) and Nuna (older sister), and that they were to me.

In the absence of language, bits of communication, gestures, faces, a few words known by both sides satisfied the need for friendly outreach.

While visiting there, I oftentimes met other Koreans; we became acquainted after pouring soju for each other. I respectfully imitated them, pouring with the right hand always, my left hand's fingers resting on my right arm's elbow.

Some knew a little English. Carefully, I listened to their well-intended attempts at speaking my language, trying to remain patient, to appear as though they spoke fluently. I soon learned to admire others for learning as much as "thank you" in a second language.

"Green onions, John?" Nuna would say, offering a cup of o-daeng broth into which she would put green onions. She knew I couldn't refuse. She always said it, though, in the manner of "What's up?" followed by "Not much," among friends.

After teaching English Conversation at a different academy in a different part of the city, I didn't frequent that food stand as much. In the meantime, I began studying the Korean language formally at So-Gang University.

Having improved upon my Korean, I went back to visit Hyung and Nuna.

Since communication had become easier, it felt somehow strange there. Those times we used to have together long ago (really just a year before) took on an ethereal tint, the way their faces appeared behind the rising steam of the o-daeng broth.

There's a picture I took of Hyung in which he offers me a stick of o-daeng, his face benevolent, that rising steam giving eternity to his memory, safely enshrouded in a dream. That's how I'll remember them both.

©1997 John Howard

After living a short while in Seoul, I learned to run, to dodge, to jump, to push. Whatever it took to get to the next appointment with so-called American promptness, I'd do it (except, of course, I would never elbow an elderly cleaning lady).

This city prized traffic flow over pedestrian putterings. There, a red light meant "kap-shida!" ("Let's go!") for the motor vehicle owner, and "ma-um dae-ro ha-se-yo!" ("Do as you please or dare") for the brave man who owned only his feet. I wondered, who would win if the two collided?

"Cho-shim ha-se-yo" ("please be careful") is a relevant expression here. "Sil-ye-hamnida" ("excuse me") would be too much to ask from people who shi-ge op-so-yo (have no time).

Space had its price there in that city where motorcycles and even cars used sidewalks as thoroughfares. Where could a man walk?

Or, maybe I should say, where could a man stand?

In a subway station one day, I stood at my mark, awaiting the next subway. I think I'd bathed that day, and maybe I'd even brushed my teeth. Anyway, I didn't feel particularly dirty. The cleaning ajomma (older woman) with her determined, wide dust mop, however, thought differently.

While just staring out into the space where the subway would soon be appearing, I felt a pressure against my shoe. Subway rats? Midget North Korean spies?

No, it was she: the cleaning ajomma from Kang-dong subway station. And she had a broom with a mission: to clean the entire world. I glared at her, wondering if this would come to a fist-fight. She looked serious as though she were a riot police officer and I was the protester. I guess I was protesting the removal of dirt.

Not wanting to get tear-gassed (or, at least, take a deadly face-full of mop-head dust), I stepped back to let her pass. While wondering what Korean customs might be in this type of situation, I noticed, just as the subway train approached, that the next victim in her path, a young Korean woman, refused to move.

Was this a telling picture of modern Korea, old vs. new, or was it just an over-worked, under-paid ajomma trying to overcome the powers of soju, Korean style whiskey?

I didn't have time to find out. I had to be at the coffee shop five stops away in ten minutes.

©1997 John Howard

I dreamt of hula girls, I suppose. I guess I even half-way expected to hear Tiny Bubbles.

What I got was a muddy beach. What I discovered was boredom, surrounded on all sides by a foreboding sea. Kang-Hwa Island is not Hawaii or Cheju; there is more to do in just one block of Seoul than on all the island. In even a small area in Seoul, you will find at least a couple of norae-bangs (singing rooms, or Karaoke parlors), as anyone who has ever been to The Big Kim'chi knows.

There's only one norae-bang on all of Kang-Hwa Island, which has a Buddhist temple as its featured attraction.

Since I didn't have my Buddhist monk friend there with me to give a guided tour and explanation of his religious practice, that too merely afforded non-realized expectations. After a tedious climb, standing high on a precipice looking out at the scenery just didn't offer enough inspiration.

What about swimming? I asked. Swimming is only advised for experienced mud wrestlers. Lying on the beach is out of the question unless you share a pig's delight in the dirty splendor of mud.

Of course, you can always drink beer or soju (Korean whiskey), as they say. Wow!

But just when I had resigned myself to a night of drinking Fitzgerald and reading a Green Soju bottle's label, the Ajomma (older woman), proprietor of the restaurant I ate at suggested (firmly, as only an Ajomma can) that I go camping on Kang-Hwa Island with a group of teenage boys.

At the time, I didn't understand what it was we'd be doing together. I only knew that I was going with these youngsters who were actually the age of my middle school students. Also worth noting: Like my middle school students who never studied, they knew very little English. An adventure in the Korean language lay before me.

Riding in the back of the truck that sped us into the heavily wooded center of the island, I quickly learned I had to put aside my role as teacher to go back in time to when I was their age. Having done some acting on the stage (in college), I tried adapting to this new situation and felt the inner stirrings that my background in theatre gave to me.

I soon realized I was a potential burden to them.

These boys were a gang, a group, a clique that I, as a twenty-five year old American man, could scarcely fit into. My Korean was more utilitarian than conversational. Such phrases as "Give me some kim'chi, please" are just plain chae-mi-opda (uninteresting). I felt uncomfortable and half-way wanted to be back in my room reading Tender is the Night.

I thought to myself, no wonder writers are so lonely -- and resolved to have a night out with the guys.

First, it seemed, I needed to be initiated into the group. We went wading in the creek. This, perhaps, had a transforming effect on me (I needed it to take ten years off my age). Our conversation was mainly their conversation with a few asides to me such as, "Be careful, here," and get-to-know-you questions such as, "What is your name?"

In our interaction, both sides were cautious just as we all were in footing the stones, the cold water splashing about, our feet wet with nature. We were frogs, that's all. Who couldn't be a frog? Just hop rock to rock.

When we got to the camping area and I saw the tents, I began to have second thoughts. I would be crammed in these tiny plastic-like houses with four boys I didn't know -- and furthermore, would have a difficult time getting to know because of the Great Wall of Language. Fishing or singing with them was one thing, but spending the night with them? I hadn't slept over at a friend's house since high school, maybe.

Once inside our tent, we listened to music. Some Cranberries, then a Korean artist, alternating in that way between Western and Korean music. Their questions came like the cola we drank: in a steady pour, being careful not to spill. Mainly, we spoke in Korean with a little English now and then.

"Yes, I'm an American. From Kentucky. I teach English at a Hagwon. In Seoul, Kil-dong."

"You speak good Korean."

"Thanks," I said, knowing I still had a long way to go in learning the language. "I studied Korean at So-Gang University. The spring term."

These answers I'd given so many times; I must have sounded like a bad actor who had over-rehearsed his scene.

When I reached the point where I could lie back and, in the absence of talking, relax while enjoying the music, I knew they were becoming more comfortable with their intruder.

Next came dinner. I had already eaten, but didn't want to destroy the work I'd already done to become accepted. Water was drawn from the creek into a pan of ramian noodles. Heating them on a small gas range, we sat on rocks there in the stream, waiting for the food to get done. Here my sense of peace deepened. I simply enjoyed nature's view from the inside, the water properly babbling, the trees enshrining this place with a certain sacredness.

We sat amazingly comfortable on the hard rocks, eating our food. They invited me, as Koreans anywhere do, to eat a lot ("man-hi du-se-yo").

I ate sociably, not wanting to over-stuff myself while at the same time not wanting to displease them or be antisocial.

I learned a few words from them which I've since forgotten (such as the one for creek). I recognized the words for stars and moon and sky, at which I looked up. Clearly I could see the stars shining, as though sending signals to Earth. I fancied them friendly and began to grow roots, attaching myself to the rock on which I sat. No such view could be had in the polluted metropolis of Seoul.

In my imagination, I had re-discovered Kentucky much like Columbus had re-discovered India. I was on the other side of the planet, but I could almost hear Stephen Foster's immortal song, "My Old Kentucky Home," which must have come directly from a babbling creek identical to the one on Kang-Hwa-Do.

As firmly rooted as I was, soon it was time to get up and pursue some other childhood pleasures. I began to find myself doing silly things like skipping rocks on the water, making strange sounds to impress my new friends, and hanging on to a tree branch (aiding my hike up a hill) just a little too long, as though I were a monkey or Tarzan of the jungle.

Back in the tent, we listened to music again and ate cookies. This seemed more important than preparing a lesson plan. I certainly wasn't about to teach them English pronouns or modifiers or conjunctions. I could have been exiled from their tent for that. Had I been wearing a tie, I don't think we could have communicated as well.

Though I didn't understand everything they said, I got into their rhythms, or at least believed I did (which was enough). There was talk about going to the only norae-bang on the island. However, being the "old man" that I was, I fell asleep. Later that night, I was awakened by their singing.

The next morning, I arose with a stiff back and clouds in my eyes. It was early -- earlier than I had been used to getting up. Their words escaped me the way print in a book must evade someone with bad eyesight not wearing his glasses. Whereas the night before I had been able to catch enough of their meaning, that morning it was as if I had become senile. "Gramps, you need a hearing aid," they seemed to say with the looks on their faces.

After some coffee, I told them I should be getting back to Seoul. They walked with me to the house in which I had stored some things but had never slept.

Again I became a part of their group. It was a long march but a pleasant enough one as peace settled on us like the sun which makes the trees, the grass, and the plants emerge as from pictures, in angles pleasing to the eye.

When we finally reached the island's docking port, there was an awkward moment in which the inexpressible needed to be expressed. I was tired, so I just said, "Kom-mop-sumnida" ("Thank you") and we parted.

I left on the barge which took me to South Korea's mainland. I looked out at the island on which I had camped, knowing I had experienced it. I knew I would come back some day. At any time, in my mind, I can sail back out to its refuge of memories (and I can always embellish: add a hula girl or two).

©1997 John Howard

Jingle Bells is Jingle Bells no matter where you are when you hear it. But when you're living in Korea, ambling down the street on a cold day in December and you hear it, the spirit transports while the body sinks down into the ground, making steps difficult.

You can't believe your eyes. They see Korean letters on a traditional Christmas card. They see a home trimmed in tinsel and lights, steeped in snow, stars twinkling in the background with a cheerful, romantic glow and beneath it: not English, but some other language.

Half of you is here, half of you there.

The body knows cold, the same in Korea as in Kentucky. But a Korean Christmas just isn't an American Christmas. While Koreans have some of the decorations up, it's just like anything else Western you see there. Yes, they have some American-style clothes and American-style bars and restaurants, but it always seems like you're at Epcot Center in Disney World.

My Korean friends say "Merry Christmas," knowing how much the holiday means to me. They also want to be American, at least for a moment. Yet, inside I want to either just be here and experience Korea, or just be in America, where I can fully enjoy the holiday season.

Snow sticks to the sidewalk as I make my way over to the display rack of Christmas cards, the ones with typical, American holiday scenes. But over there on another rack, I see some Korean-style cards, depicting Korean-style homes. I notice that Koreans buy the cards you can buy in the States, the only difference being the letters in Han-Gul (the Korean alphabet).

What cards do I buy? The ones picturing Korean houses and Korean landscapes.

Presently, I hear just the music to Jingle Bells. A fat Korean man hums it. Now I hum it too as I dash along, thinking maybe there's snow at my home in the States.

©1997 John Howard

After tapping on my shoulder, a Korean girl in a Mickey Mouse t-shirt says, "Chuck-a-man-yo" ("Just a moment"), holds her hand up to her mouth, and giggles. She stands beside me, at a respectful distance, yet close enough to include us both in a picture. An older Korean woman, presumably the girl's mother, gives a half-smile, awaiting my approval. Once I grin, accepting my role, the mother readies her camera.

Celebrity is given in a flash.

To be American like me, as I was in Seoul, involves playing many different roles in many different situations. Walking around a park in Korea, if you're American like me, you are viewed as a movie star. Just mention "America" or "U.S." and Koreans' eyes light up like you've miraculously stepped out of a glowing billboard, emerging as a real person.

Riding in a bus, taking a subway, if you're American like me, there is no way to escape the press of Korea against you. In a pub, they buy you drinks. In a Catholic church, they send you to the confessional: if you're Catholic and American, you're sinful like me.

They say: "You fought for us, you keep the peace. You don't belong here! Why are your soldiers here? Who are you protecting us from? Our brothers?"

They say: "Where is your family? Why did you leave them behind?"

The questions come like flashing bulbs, from all directions -- when you're an American like me, living in Seoul.

They shake your hand. Pour you a drink. Take you to karaoke. Dance with you, hold you tight.

They say, "An-yong-hi-ka-se-yo" ("go in peace"). They're sad, for a moment, when you've lived in Seoul and you're leaving and you're American like me. They go on with life, in a Korean fashion, and you become a memory, a picture. An essay.

You were an American in Korea. Now you live in America with part of Korea inside you. American? Korean? Like me.

©1997 John Howard