Korean Classroom Heater- only the middle one (for our teacher's room) is on at the time.
The words cold and Korean are synonymous… it’s winter here and the buildings in Korea don’t have central heating. Instead, buildings get “selective heating” and only rooms with consistent occupancy get their heat turned on. Alternately, this means every hallway, restroom, lobby and staircase is almost a guaranteed icebox. It’s Korea’s effort to conserve energy and not “waste” electricity on things such as passing human bodies. For the new EFL teachers coming in– Westerners like myself, Europeans, Australians, South Africans, etc…– none of us know how to deal with the winter freeze in places we’re not normally accustomed to being cold… indoors, for instance.
Just so that the Korean freezing policy doesn’t feel unfair to foreigners and newcomers however, it may brave you to know that Koreans are not a polar bear race either. Perhaps, just their young fashionistas are the coping “die-hard”s to this system, with short skirts, heels and stockings. In my school, Anil Elementary in Daegu, the teachers and students wear thick jackets and coats to school and seldom take them off, even in the classroom or office (and this is provided the heat is on consistently to how it should be). In my classes today- nobody, including myself and co-teacher, took off their winter coats and parkas even though the classroom was being mildly heated. While Koreans don’t openly show it, they do enjoy being warm and buses and car windows will get severely fogged before someone cracks an opening to let the cold air in.
We all look forward to reading about your venture in Korea. Please keep it coming. Love from us here in Hawaii
I should have remembered that Korea gets very cold in the winter from watching MASH all those years ago, but I didn’t. Were you warned about this before you went, so you could bring appropriately warm attire? Is your apartment warm enough?
Hard for me to understand! For me, heat should be turned on in cold weather and schoolwork is hard to do in gloves… but to each his own, I guess.
Still, I can’t imagine how much they save on the heating bills!
@Gray: Yes, my apt is heated -its a fairly good system. Turning on and off the hot water tho is a bit hard for me to remember as is, turning the shower spout off when I use the bathroom sink. I”ve sprayed myself a couple of times. Brought sufficient clothes like a decent New Yorker but some of these indoor places we naturally expect to be warm. Now when I watch Korean films and see actors breathing out puffs of smoke when they’re indoors, I’ll understand.
@Laura: The classrooms have heaters but we only turn them on when the kids are in class. If the room is not occupied, heaters are off. The rest of the building is a freezer. If nothing else, at least the kids (& myself) will be awake.
@Papa: mailing love back, tho I wish I could send the cold.
I used to work at a rotation of 7 schools, all a 20min-1hr drive from my apartment, so I got a motorcycle (not a scooter) while I was there, to get around. Believe me, you don’t know cold until you’ve ridden a motorcycle at 80km/h when it’s -5˚F out!
And yes, when I arrived at school, the heat was almost never on, so all the clothes I piled on to survive the ride would stay on all day, often including the hat and gloves. Do you know how hard it is to write with chalk when you’re wearing gloves?
@Kelsey: ha ha… yeah. You were more rural than me. You must have had one of those robber face masks on when riding yr motorcycle. At least I’m still suburb/city-ish where they have “sorta” heat. I’ve got armwarmers on in addition & wearing a little knit hat?… now I know why Koreans made that part of their style. It’s not only for the hip-hop effect.
Nah, but I did wrap my scarf around my face, and had those big wool felt handlebar covers.
I was definitely in a rural area – the village I lived in for most of the year had about 12,000 people, and for 4 months I lived in a village with less than 100 people. None of my schools had more than 100 students.