Tutoring in Korea

On Monday I was sitting outside Coffee Bean at HomePlus in Yongtong, a large urban area of Suwon, South Korea. Good shopping, restaurants line the streets. Cafes and their ilk line the darkened alleys on the slippery side of Suwon. Sipping my $4.00 iced coffee and reading “Groove” magazine under a large outdoor umbrella, a strange Korean man, in his late thirties, started talking to me.

“Hello,” he asked. He disturbed my thinking; I came to like leaving a dream.

“Yes?” I said. He was carrying a plastic shopping bag.

“I would like to speak English with you,” he said.

“Hi, sure… sit down,” I replied. He was dressed in dark grey slacks, white shirt, tucked in with a new or unused black belt. It was hot but he was not sweating, the way Koreans don’t sweat or even smell after sweating. They smell like garlic and kim chi, sometimes. It’s not strange to have Koreans want to practice their Korean with westerners. I took this as part of my adventure in Korea.

We talked small talk. It was a bit uncomfortable for him. He would shift in his sit trying to find a position. I positioned myself at a 45 degree angle to him and maintained eye contact and asked questions about what he wanted to accomplish in his English study with me not knowing if I wanted to teach him at all.

“My English is okay but I want to improve,” he said. His English accent was good, his pronunciation good--in the way that Koreans enunciate. I could tell he was educated but not sure of his background. “I want to work on idioms. And improve my English.”

“What do you do?” I asked always a good introduction to someone.

He mumbled.

“Are you in business?” I asked again. “Education?”

He replied: “I am interested in making a place to help old people…”

I asked what he meant. I quickly figured out that he was not working. “A Korean man not working?” I thought to myself. Something is odd about that. In fact, Korea still has a dichotomy of men working, and women raising the family. A one-tier system which is great for raising kids—no strangers from Mexico or Latin America as illegal nannies, entrusted with the delicate care of your son or daughter-- but Korean men work insufferable hours and are expected to socialize and drink, a lot. The upsides are better, I think, for now.

“I want to make a campus,” he continued. “It will help them learn…”

“Like a school?” I asked. “You want to create a school?”

“I want to make a campus. Teaching the bible.”

“Ah, I see. You want to start a church?.”

“This will be a campus to educate people on living…good.”

“Well, this guys a freakin fruit cake,” I thought. “He’s crazy. For Jesus’ sake, why me? Do I have a sign that says: "Will tutor Krazy Koreans?" Go bother someone else.” Well, I had nothing to do at that moment, and wanting to be the friendly foreigner, I was interested in learning more about his church idea and give him a chance to redeem himself.

“Let’s see how you write,” I asked. “I think it will give me a better idea of your language skills. Please write a short paragraph on what you did this past weekend.”

He wrote for five minutes. Jesus!

His paragraph was over half a page. He described going to some Korean mountain where he could “breathe” and had a “vision” of starting his bible campus. “This guy is really waco!” I said to myself. I’m sure there are hundreds of people in Suwon who want to be tutored in business English or to improve their skills but this guy wants me to help improve his English for recruiting neophytes for his cult!

I corrected his grammar and sentence structure. He thought his written English was good but he was wrong. I was nice and showed him how to make his English more strong by rephrasing and making his sentences more succinct; unlike this piece I am writing.

We talked more. I told him I may have time to tutor him. He gave me his number; I gave him my co-workers cell phone number, hope he doesn’t mind helping starting a cult! Hehe.