Dearest Friends and Family,

(Skipping ahead to what’s actually been on my mind…)

You may be wondering: why did I return to Korea? Actually, the answer to this question was very easy to loose sight of; returning to Daegu in September was an exercise in strength of will.

The story of my difficulty in returning to Korea began on one August night in Daegu, days after leaving Singapore, days before departing for Seattle, when tears began to flow from my eyes that didn’t come from my heart. The tears were followed by a Monday morning in which my right eye turned bright pink. Accustomed as I am to good health, when questioned, I assured everyone that I must have something in my eye – which didn’t truly reassure anyone - least of all my guiding teacher who took one look at my eye and announced that I would go to a doctor. I protested. A lot. Although I eventually subsided when he told me that “the eye is not be messed with,” a statement which I could not refute. Not that that stopped me from again protesting on the way to the doctor – which made my guiding teacher’s lack of gloating when the word “conjunctivitis” was uttered practically angelic. The doctor prescribed me 2 bottles of eye drops to take 20 million times a day plus 5 pills for 3 times a day that were dispensed in neat rows of wax-paper envelopes sans label. I never did find out what those “mystery pills” were – and my post-diagnosis feelings see-sawed between guilt of exposing my students to a nasty virus, pleasure that I missed the usual anti-biotic injection administered to one’s rear end, and finished in disgruntlement after my guiding teacher banned me from wine drinking.

My eye had improved a few days later when I found myself looking out the window at an achingly familiar tarmac. The flight attendant announced, “Welcome to Seattle-Tacoma Airport” while the strangest thing began to happen: my perception of the world turned inside out. It was strange being at Sea-Tac, the airport that used to mean home, with English phrases such as “traffic on I-5,” “Washington Mutual Bank,” or “good chowder at a place called Ivars” coming at me from all directions. And when my father was a bit late in picking me up, I was disconcerted to realize that, savvy traveler I may be, I had arrived in a very familiar world without the tools necessary to deal with it: no working cell phone, no car, no affordable taxis… without even my father’s cell phone number or two quarters in which to make a pay phone call.

As my father returned me to Woodinville, I found everything familiar… I didn’t need to read road signs because I knew what the next curve of the freeway would look like, I knew exactly where we were at any given moment and how long it would take to get “home.” Everything was familiar. But everything felt different. We had just exited the 520 freeway when I was able to put my disorientation into words. I realized first that I had just spent fourteen months comparing every sight I had seen, every city I had been to what I knew: Seattle. And now that I had returned to Seattle after fourteen months, my point of reference had flipped and I had begun comparing Seattle to what I now knew best, Daegu. Everything felt so different! That was when I realized that Seattle hadn’t changed much. But that I had changed a lot.

Returning to the States was sweet. I wanted to eat it all up: the joy and tears of hugging my parents, my sisters, my beloved friends, and my kitties... not to mention the food, of course, as well as a cushy feather bed, a deep bath tub, the ability to drive a car, my beloved Pacific Northwest landscape, the regained knowledge of how to find everything I wanted and the convenience + variety that I no longer take for granted. All so, so sweet.

But a week into my visit, one night tears began to flow from my eyes that were not originating from my heart and by the following morning, my eye was pink and swollen alarmingly. The mystery pills were viewed with amused alarm by my American eye doctor who examined my eyes and prescribed new treatment. But every day, my eye became more and more swollen. And worse, as my eye swelled shut, I began to physically weaken. This necessitated returns – plural - to the doctor. The next days brought lab tests, the infection spreading to the other eye, blurred vision from the original swollen eye… and a daily struggle between wanting enjoy my visit to the fullest while physically miserable.

I piled jetlag onto physical exhaustion when I made the long journey from Woodinville to Daegu with ophthalmologist warnings of permanent corneal scarring still ringing in my ears. In fact, as I prepared to return to Daegu, my ophthalmologist asked, “what would it take for you to get fired and not have to return to Korea?”

My heart and jaw dropped several inches before I replied with unwavering conviction that “My job and my life are currently in Korea.”

These words came back to me as I locked the door of my small apartment and dropped onto my hard bed. Depleted, alone, with blurred vision and itchy eyes, I was sad. I didn’t want to be back in Korea.

So, why return to Korea?

My ophthalmologist’s skepticism about my return to Korea returned to me... vivid and real… the tone of his voice telling me that he pictured Korea unappealing, primitive. And I felt my apartment walls begin to close around me as I recalled a moment from last spring that would confirm his assumptions:

Slinging a cloth market bag onto my shoulder, I exited my apartment, placed a call to my friend on my Samsung hand phone, rounded one garbage strewn corner, bowed to a teaching peer speeding away from work for the day, and continued past the florescent convenience mart. I then the rounded the next dusty corner, passed the little neighborhood dog who was peeing on the curtain of a restaurant fish tank. I went past a stooped grandmother with a baby tied with a sling to her back, past a group of chatty, uniformed middle school students waiting for their afternoon bus, past a few old men squatting on the sidewalk roasting oysters on a grill over a small fire. As I chatted and walked, a careening motorcycle on the sidewalk, driven by a man wearing a chicken costume almost knocked me over. And while I waited to cross the street, I could feel the eyes of a little girl and her mother staring directly at the strange foreigner – me - while another slightly older kid caught my attention and shouted, “hi!”

This is the Korea that I imagine that my ophthalmologist imagines that I live in. This is the Korea that I imagine you all suspect that that I live in. Strange. Comparatively primitive. A country beneath your notice, inhabited by people that look and behave incomprehensibly different. And, as this all actually happened on my way to the nearby fresh food market where I proceeded to buy rice cakes boiled in chili sauce, noodle sausage, kimchi, and rice + ham + egg + rice wrapped in seaweed, I cannot deny that where I live is very different than where I come from.

And well, of course, I find Korea strange. I never forget that I am a stranger here and that that will never change. I could speak the language fluently, I could master Confucian logic, I could learn to make pajon and pork cakes, I could marry a Korean and have children, I could live a 100 years here – and I would still find Korea strange and I would still be a stranger to Koreans.

But here’s the thing. Korea is also familiar. Koreans are passionate about their loved ones, passionate about their culture, passionate about their mountains, passionate about wanting to have comfortable lives, passionate about health – they are passionate about education, passionate about success, and passionate about food. And these passions are very familiar.

But are these reasons to return for another year in Korea? Really, why return to Korea?

That night, just after my return to Daegu from Seattle, I reminded myself of the logical reasons to return to Korea: two years teaching experience would be good for the resume, my summer travels had depleted my savings, and I didn’t know where I wanted to go next.

But that night logical reasoning didn’t help. Nor did lounging in bed with Jon Stewart for company while recovering from jetlag help. I was sad.

Yet on Monday morning, I slipped into my usual routine: I slung my bag across my chest, picked up my cuppa of coffee, and strode down the neighborhood block to work. I opened the door to the teachers’ room – and immediately there exclamations of welcome. I smiled and bowed and hugged and showed off my swollen eye. There was genuine happiness to see me back in Daegu and on my way to health. And I was really happy to see my beloved peers.

But why return to Korea?

Doubtlessly, I returned to Korea for the logical reasons that I named before – but why had I really returned to Korea? The day I returned to Taegu Foreign Language High School, I discovered that if the teachers were happy to see me, the students were thrilled. And my heart leapt at the very sight of each class. In the days that followed many students stopped me in person to ask about my health, inspected my eye, and told me that they were happy to see me. I returned because I love my students. And I believe that they love me.

I don’t know how I could’ve lost sight of this. Really, I don’t. I love my job. I love my school. I love my students. And even with an eye still slightly swollen by pink eye, Korea is where I’m meant to be. For now.

Love,
Laura

Admittedly, it wasn't ALL about the students. It was also very nice to return to new adventures with my friends... this pic makes me laugh! My Kiwi friend Lyndon and I are... uh, imitating an animated statue at the Andong Mask Festival.