I would ike to tell about Racism and stereotypes in Southern Korea

with SHEETAL MAKHAN

My trek around the world

Pic: Creative Commons, Flickr, Hyku

In 2007, I packed up my life in South Africa and moved across the globe to a country I never visited before to call it home for a year august. I had simply graudated after four years at university and made a decision to relocate to Southern Korea to instruct English at a elementary college.

In those days, young graduates groing through to your east in order to become English teachers was just just becoming popular. Individuals (also even today) think it is really intriguing and uncommon that I (an Indian girl) have gone my moms and dads house snapcougars nedir setting up shack in a nation therefore dissimilar to such a thing i really could imagine. In the end, if we were to follow along with the stereotype, I’d have finished by having a degree that is notable hitched a “nice Indian boy”. Needless to say, we’d have babies and I’d become a stay-at-home-mom or work with the family members business (which includes zero link with my level!)

Having attended an all-girls college and at university, I’ve prided myself on being open-minded about people and countries. I’ve always been thinking about people and once you understand about social structures in society.

While racism remains a common topic in Southern Africa, the social groups We have related to through the years have been diverse. Growing up, I never ever belonged to a clique. I experienced buddies of different events, countries and religions. This is why, I’ve learnt to embrace folks from all parts of society and now have discovered to empathize with buddies and strangers alike.

Settling into my new ‘home’

I had to get used to many different things – food, language, respect for authority and general cultural aspects that is typical of Asian nations when I arrived in Korea. Something different I experienced to obtain used to had been being stared at, whether close to my neighbourhood, regarding the bus or subway or once I was at a restaurant with my colleagues.

I are now living in town one hour far from the center of Seoul – Korea’s money town. Foreigners in Seoul are not unusual to see, especially within the weekends. Many English teachers and American soldiers flock to an area called Itaewon, which caters mostly into the population that is foreign. It really is found nearby the United States Military Base and foreigners will enjoy typical food that is western haven’t any problem with communication, because so many of the Koreans doing work in Itaewon can talk English fairly well.

My town is extremely various and seeing foreigners around here also makes me “sit up and look”. In the region I know that there are a few Bangladeshi’s and Sri Lankans who run Halaal shops that I live in. I don’t see them frequently and alson’t really communicated with them. I really do, nonetheless, have the stare that is occasional whenever I’m call at Seoul, We often even get whistled at. I’m told that we now have more Indian men here than you can find ladies, so seeing A indian girl like me personally is pretty uncommon.

I will be the very first and currently just international instructor at my college. For many of the employees and pupils, i will be additionally the very first foreigner they have ever had contact with and “seen” in real world. For many of this youngsters that haven’t been exposed to TV that is foreign films, I happened to be very different in their mind. Some pupils would appear if you ask me in pairs or groups, inquisitively peer at me and stroke my arm!

Myself to my classes, I showed them photographs of my family and friends in South Africa (including the various races that make up our “Rainbow Nation”) The general reaction from my students were “Oohs and Aahs” when I introduced.

Something different I additionally needed to become accustomed to had been told through my peers that I’m gorgeous. They often times talked about how exactly big my eyes are and that i’ve a “high nose”. We certainly wasn’t accustomed this as We never ever got attention even near to this in Southern Africa. We suppose I became that is just‘ordinary home, the good news is I’m surviving in a homogenous country and also to the locals right here, I’m exotic!