The Expats of ULI

I'll stick with first names only.

First, the dreaded roommates. Marc and Laurie. At first (meaning the first six hours), I thought they weren't such bad people. However, I soon realized that they were not very nice. There was only one TV in the apartment, and it was kept in their bedroom at all times. As was the phone. And, even though I replaced food that I ate, they later accused me of stealing food. The really nice thing they did was leaving me stuck with a 150 000 won phone bill when they fled the country. Jerks.

Then there was the odd couple, Jeff and Debbie. They claimed not to be dating even though they were living together. He was the ultimate, narcissistic, L.A. pretty boy who thought everything revolved around him. Every guy I knew at ULI wanted to beat the shit out of him. Early on in my time at ULI, he called me an "unqualified waif" (which I was, but to say it to my face? Outrageous!) He managed to skip work whenever he felt like it, mostly to get his mug on EBS. Debbie, meanwhile, was guilty by association because she was friends with this asshole. Jerk and friend of jerk.

There were also good people, however. For instance, Rick. One of the funniest and craziest guys I ever met, he could make you laugh one minute and terrify you the next with his temper. Luckily, his temper was never an issue with me. We became friends and often went into each other's classrooms just to break up the drudgery of our classes. Unlike his afforementioned American compatriot, this dude from San Francisco was cool to hang out with. He had funny-ass stories to tell, not the least of which concerned his sexual exploits (sometimes within close vicinity of ULI!). Plus, he was one of the guys who wanted to beat the shit out of Jeff. He's one guy who I have lost touch with but would love to hear from once more. Cool dude.

**Update (November 15, 2006): A couple days ago, the next guy on this list (Brian) told me how to get in touch with Rick. Not at all surprisingly, he has himself a gig, part-time I hope, portraying one Dr. Knowledge on the Web. Check out his personal channel on ManiaTV to see what kind of guy I'm talking about.

The other really good guy I met at ULI was Brian. He was the guy who had been living with Marc and Laurie (unofficially) until my arrival. He was close friends with Rick (score one point), disliked Jeff immensely (score another point), was a good representative of Canada, unlike my roommates (score another point), and liked cars a whole lot (umm, okay, I'm neutral on that). Plus, later when I got married, he was the only non-family member from my side to attend both our Korean and Canadian weddings. It was a true privilege to work with Brian, and I learned a lot about teaching just by watching him prepare his lessons. Out of all the "teachers" I worked with at ULI, he was the only one who was a real teacher in the sense of being professional about it. Cool dude.

Those were the main expats I knew, but many more passed through ULI while I was there. Here is a concise overview.

Will: my next official roommate after Marc and Laurie left. A little older than I was, he was okay at first, but quickly succumbed to the pressure of working extra hours doing privates. We eventually had a falling out and never really spoke again.

Roger: the dirty Brit, literally and figuratively. He came to my apartment one day begging to use my shower since he didn't have access to one where he lived (a box somewhere, apparently); he also liked to comment on the pussy potential of our female students. All this coming from a 40-something guy.

Derek: a jolly guy from P.E.I. (take that for all the imagery it conjures up).

Lauren and Craig: A couple when they arrived in Korea, I'm not sure they remained that way when they left (which was after I left). Memorably, Craig tried to teach the meaning of the word 'hump' by humping the classroom wall. Talk about TPR!

Brooklyn Allan: What a funny guy! This stereotypical New Yorker never hesitated to curse in front of his students. It's interesting to contemplate how often a teacher can work the word "fuck" into a lesson.

There were many others, too, but I can't remember their names. By the way, ULI is gone now. So sad.

Returning from hiatus

I see it has been more than two months since my last post to this blog. To be honest, I haven't felt like writing about this of late, but since I am now down to the final nine months of my ESL career, I'd better get back at it.

Last time, I was talking about my first job at ULI. I had been there for all of three weeks when the school had it's summer vacation -- five whole days! One of the Korean-American teachers, Jake, asked me to join him and some friends on Korea's east coast for the holiday. Since I knew nobody and looked forward to getting away from my roommates, I said yes.

This was where I learned about Korea's legendary traffic problems during any kind of holiday period. A trip that would normally take three hours ended up lasting the better part of nine hours. We weren't driving along the highway so much as we were crawling. Walking was literally faster. It was absolutely no problem to get out of the car, walk to the side of the highway, take a leak, smell some flowers, and catch 40 winks on the soft earth before having to return to the car, as it would have only travelled some 20 feet in that time. Okay, so I'm joking about the 40 winks, but I've made my point.

Another pleasant discovery of vacationing in Korea was what a beach turns into during summer vacation: namely, a tent city (or refugee camp, if that provides a better visualization). There were so many people that I couldn't see the sand in some places. And the garbage!

Well, enough of the bad stuff. This trip resulted in the chance meeting that would change the course of my life. One of the friends Jake brought along was this shy girl, whose English name was Heather. She was a student of Jake's at ULI, and I think he was keen for her. But she only had eyes for me - HA! Over the course of our stay at Naksan Beach in early August 1995, Heather and I got to know each other just a little bit, but enough so to kindle a spark that would rise into full flame in the fall of that year. Wow, wasn't that poetic.

I had a good time on that trip. Even though I didn't realize how significant it was at the time, it obviously turned out to be the cause of my staying in Korea for far more than one year. Here I am, in 2006, blogging away from east Asia. With a wife. And two kids.