From: jnlee@uucp (John Lee)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.korean
Subject: Re: Working in Korea- is it worth it?
Date: 29 Sep 92 01:11:47 GMT
Article-I.D.: oracle.1992Sep29.011147.7427
Organization: Oracle Corporation
X-Disclaimer: This message was written by an unauthenticated user
              at Oracle Corporation.  The opinions expressed are those
              of the user and not necessarily those of Oracle.

In article <1992Sep24.031338.14781@u.washington.edu> pmfisher@milton.u.washington.edu (Patrick Fisher) writes:
>
>	I've been thinking about working in Korea for a few years
>and then returning to the U.S. permanently.  But I have reservations
>about doing so.  Moving, expenses, returning back, starting over (?)
>again....
>	I love Korea.  Let me rephrase: I love and hate Korea, but
>I also love and hate the U.S. (where I grew up.)  Both countries
>have thing that I like and hate.
>	I have lived in Korea between 1985-1989.  I hated it (not getting
>allowed into some clubs, being an outsider, being treated as such), but
>really loved it (po-chang-ma-cha and so-u, the people (for the most
>part), my in-laws, the friendly people...the culture in general, I 
>just love it!
>	My in-laws, previous to marriage, were not too turned on my
>my marrying in, but they really love me and REALLY like me because
>I fit in so well.  They like me so much they are begging my wife
>and I (and baby and Jindo Korean dog) to come  back to Korea for 
>at least a few years.
> 	My question is: foreigners are only wanted for two things, basically,
>1) engineering skills and 2) English-teaching skills and English teaching
>seems the way to go since I speak Korean "pretty fluently" and am not an
>engineer.  My in-laws have a few connections with some major companies,
>Koryo University and a couple of other universities.
>	I've heard that teaching English pays well.  Is this true now?
>Is it considered prestigeous?  (I don't want my family to lose face.)
>Is English teaching considered high-class, at all?  Can I save money
>in Korea (I've heard the that things have gotten expensive while we
>were gone)?
>	Thanks,
>	pat-
>.

Although i did not work directly for any Korean company, i did see what 
it would be like as an on loan engineer from an American company.  I was
born in Korea and lived there until end of grade school, when I first went
back in 87 i could hardly believe how different things were from my idealized
memory of Korea and her people.  I was very suprised and somewhat dispointed.

Here are my impression of Korean working environment from my most recent
visits. The first thing that struck me was how smokey the working environment
was, every male employee seems to smoke, and often.  As a non smoker this was
very hard for me to take. Another thing that also stuck me as odd is people
do no have any initiative to take things on and get the job done.  You might
expect this type of work attitude in an assembly line but these were very 
high level engineers in world class company. Their mode of operation consists
of an order from group manager that triggers machine like efficiency that 
gets order accomplished, but that all. No personal initiative to define
required tasks and take them on.  Of cause this is social structure that
make up Korea, but it very fustrating to me where I would expect them 
to bring up ideas and other issues that could help in the future. This 
situation very much reminds me of how military is like in US - I do not
know how is is Korea, but i venture a guess that it is very much like the
work environments that I've seen.

As for expense of living in Korea, I would say it is more expensive then
in US (California SF Bay area used as comparison).  Everything in Korea 
seems much more expensive; such as food  

Overall, I enjoyed very much working in a Korea. 
Your mileage may very depending on your Korean language skills, ethnic orgin,
and understanding of Korean people.  
   
Cheers,

John R. Lee (Jong-Rim Lee)

... I speak for my self, not my company...
Newsgroups: soc.culture.korean