The future

My wife and I got accepted to go teach English in Spain, which is far different from teaching Englishee in Korea. For one thing, far, far less money. Together we will be making a little more than one of our paychecks here. There is also no free apartment, so not only are we making half the cash, we have to pay rent too. But those are the only negatives, besides the impending meltdown of the Spanish Government turning the country into a apocalyptic hellscape straight out of mad max. Or at least according to Mr.Wonderful.



I agree, that Spain, is just steps away from being like Greece, but we wont be going for a while, so we are taking the wait and see approach. We are waiting to see if it is destroyed by an economic meltdown or covered in volcanic ash first.

Two down, three to go.

I just finished the second camp session. I have 3 more groups to go over the next two weeks. Then I go on vacation. Unfortunately, my wife has already had her vacation, so I will just be home with the kids while she is at work.

We originally wanted to go to Thailand on our winter break, like so many other teachers have done. These freezing cold temps, snow and ice are not things my wife particularly enjoys or remotely tolerates.

When we first got to Korea it was sunny and warm, and she loved it. She said every day "This is so much better than back home, maybe we should stay for two years, instead of one!" I smiled and nodded, knowing what was around the corner. She also knew, but my wife lives in the present, her thoughts and opinions changing day to day, moment to moment. To my wife, right now she sees the cold, snow and ice as how Korea will be for the rest of our contracts. In her mind she says "I am miserable now, therefore I will be miserable for the rest of the year."

I tend to take the long view. I don't judge things on how they are at the present moment, I judge by how they have been in the past, and may be in the future. I know that spring is around the corner. In two short months the temperatures will rise, the trees will grow leaves and my wife will not be as miserable.

The cold does not bother me as much as my wife. I was born and raised in the north, since I have lived in the lower 48 for the last 14 years and become "Sissyfied" by the mild winters, I enjoy snow, and like having it again. I do not enjoy freezing my balls off, but I realize it is only temporary.

I do not know however, how i will react to the suffocating humidity that summer will bring. I have never lived in such conditions, where I am from I have experienced over 40 days straight of pure rain in the summer, but with temps rarely rising above 60-70 degrees the humidity did not matter. On the north west coast, if it rained more than 3 to 5 times in the summer, it was considered "wet" with the temps hovering around 80-90 degrees. We would experience a few days of high humidity, but generally it was cooler after a rain.

So right now, with my wife absolutely hating Korea, and my nervously awaiting the upcoming summer, we are hedging our bets. We have applied to teach Englishee in Spain next year. Lovely Spain, where last year in Andalusia it snowed for the first time in 50 years, where it rarely rains and maybe two or 3 months out of the year temps drop below 70 degrees. I don't speak a lick of Spanish, but my wife is pretty good, and my kids ( who have been in Spanish immersion schools in the US, and lived in Spain) speak it well enough to attend public school.

Money

First of all I would like to say what a fucking cunt Dave and all the MODs are at the ESL cafe. I hope you all die from an incredibly bad herpes infection.

Second of all I think I will post a funny translation of products from Icoop by babble fish every day from now on. Today's is 토종가시오가피 and this product translates as "The toe head family city comes and goes, the blood" sounds good, I think I will order some.

The main reason I packed up the family and moved to Korea was to make money. Back in the states I was one of the few employed. In fact I had two jobs. I worked full time as a Carpenter and part time as a Building Coordinator.

Even though I worked around 60 hours a week, we were not able to save any money. I actually made between 3,500-4,200 dollars per month, had health insurance but still could not save a fucking dime.

The government took about 1/3 of my check each month, I had to pay rent, car insurance, for gas, food, etc. Anything that was left from my check went to our credit card bills, which at that time had grown to over 10K from periods of time when I was unemployed (as a union carpenter after a job was finished, so was I). My back was constantly in pain, I began suffering from carpel tunnel syndrome, my job was fucking dangerous, and I was stressed out of my mind.

As a carpenter I got a half hour lunch, that did not count towards my work hour, so I had to work from 6am to 3:30pm. My boss expected me to be at the job site about 15-30 minutes early each day. I would wake up at about 4:50am just to have enough time to take a shit, grab some breakfast and head out while eating.

Living in the ROK, I don't have to pay rent, insurance, gas, etc. My main bills are food and for heat. My wife, who could not get/keep a job to save her life in the US is working too. I only have to actual "work" at the most 4 hours a day. About 100,000 won(about $100) is taken from my check each month for pension and insurance. I have a 1 hour lunch break, which counts towards my 8 hour day. I dont have to be at work until 8:30 and since I dont have class until after 9am, its OK if I am a little late. I am not suffering from back pain all the time, I am less stressed, I have more free time, I actually make less money ( about $2,000 per month), but it goes much further.

Each month, even though we spend my entire paycheck we are able to save my wife's entire paycheck (also about $2,000) each month. At the end of the year, with our pension, deposit (900,000 won each), bonuses (entire months salary each) all other things remaining the same, we will walk away with around $30,000(US) in savings. There was no way I could save that much back in the US.

We go to Seoul almost every other weekend, even though we have 5 mouths to feed (we brought my sister in law to watch/home school our kids) we have money to spend, and frankly our quality of life is better than that in the US. In the US we might have gone out to eat once maybe every other month, but here almost every week.

There are a lot of shitty things about living in Korea, but it is a great place for us right now. We don't want to spend the rest of our lives here of course, but we might spend another year here.
If we can do the same for second year, and leave with about $60,000 that should be enough to achive out goal of opening a restaurant somewhere like Argentina or Spain. We want to live where it doesn't get so fucking cold in the winter!