Reverse Culture Shock Two.

I meant to keep up my blog when I got back, and I would make up some fabulous excuses but to be honest I don’t have any. Coming home has been more of a shock to my system than I realised and I think that once I had recovered from the jet lag I still needed to recover from the reverse culture shock and the unnerving reality that I am now 24 and I am still very unsure about the next stage in my life. It’s not that I lack direction, it’s that I am not sure if it’s the right way.

I think that when you are away from your home country for a long period of time you tend to idealise it and compare it favourably with what you see around you, particularly in light of scattered nationalistic claims about how Korea is “number one” at something. (This mainly comes from the students, children or adults. However since I am usually the target for the crazies on public transport I did hear my fair share of stories). But when you arrive home you step through Customs at the airport and the reality of it all shatters the rose tinted glasses that made going home so exciting. Ok maybe it wasn’t that bad, but when I arrived back in Oxfordshire me and my Mum spent three hours in a hospital waiting room only to be rudely dismissed by some arrogant nurse who had never heard of a “high ankle sprain” (try using google then) and wasn’t interested in my x-rays because “we use computers now, this isn’t like E.R.” (Surprisingly I figured that out due to the lack of American accents, the fact my pain was real, oh and the fact I am not a total idiot). My ankle still isn’t 100 percent but the pain is nearly gone and I am no longer on a crutch, but I was hoping for some answers, and I was saddened by the lack of care that was shown.

Although life in Korea quickly became routine it doesn’t change the fact that it was different enough to maintain an element of excitement that I don’t get being back at home. Familiarity is not a bad thing, not by any stretch, and I don’t feel out of place at home, I just worry that all the changes that have happened to me will fall away at the wayside because of old habits and because the simple things (like having a conversation, ordering food) are no longer such a challenge. To be sure I have already been to London, Edinburgh,Glasgow, Barcelona and Brighton and made some more amazing memories (and you faithful blog reader are probably shaking your head at the computer screen and thinking that I need help, I probably do) since I have been back, and I am off to Dublin and South East Asia in the next couple of months, but that doesn’t explain the funk I have found myself trying to climb out of. By all accounts I should be bursting with excitement and anticipation of what has been and what’s to come, especially with a trip to see my favourite South African 친구 happening at some point in 2009, but the truth of it all is that being back home has made my own uncertainty about my future more noticeable. I can no longer use the “I will figure it out when I get home” excuse that allowed me to procrastinate while I was in South Korea, and I have reached a point where I want some solid direction in my life.

Maybe it’s because my money is slipping away faster than you can say “Do you want cashback?” Perhaps the fact it’s impossible to get signal on my mobile despite the fact I practically live next to a mobile phone mast/poorly disguised tree is driving me bonkers. Certainly the fact that the BNP and UKIP had successes at the European elections is leaving me disillusioned. Having my fringe butchered by a hairdresser for three times the price I paid for a hair cut in Korea didn’t leave me feeling warm and fuzzy about being home. But I think that my uncertainty and confusion is the key reason I have been in such a funk. Those age old questions that badger you during a period of change have been badgering me during this period of change. What am I doing with my life? What should I do next? When will I figure out what I want? Why is Big Brother still on? Why does the British public revel so much in destroying people through the media? Why do people insist on wearing flip-flops the minute the sun comes out?Being given simple patronising instructions from everyday machines such as ATMs (hide your PIN number…damn, that’s where I have been going wrong…) is definitely not inspiring me to greatness. Watching an entire generation communicate through facebook isn’t exactly soul cheering either, if I wanted to know the mundane details of your life I would simply ask, or I would stalk you.

I have not been taken over entirely by some self-loathing hatred for everything, honest. There are some things I love about being back, spending time my family and friends for starters. Buying books in charity shops (it’s the simple pleasures!). The weird and wonderful city that is Brighton. The sheer range of delicious foods and treats. Cider that isn’t 7UP. Having more than one room to live in. Baths. Sofas. Pub gardens. Watching the sunset over a field as a passenger in a car.

It’s likely I will do my PGCE this year, a couple of hundred miles from home. But all the hoops that I have to jump through is making my application disheartening and it’s not been made easy by the fact I applied so late in the academic year. As a career I am still not convinced that teaching is for me, some of that is because I doubt my abilities. However, a rational side of me just wants to be sure I am making the right decision before spending another year in what might ultimately be the wrong direction. You can never be entirely sure where your choices will take you. Admittedly I am getting really good at settling into new and distant places. Hopefully in a couple of months I will look back at this and wonder what I was going on about,

Reverse Culture Shock

Well, I am back in the United Kingdom, and adjusting is harder than I was expecting. The year in South Korea has changed me in ways I have yet to fully understand or realise, and I am returning to a town where the biggest change has been the colour of the Iron Bridge. Being surrounded by spoken English is giving me a headache and on my first day back the NHS actually made me long for the Korean hospital where I am considered fat and where the therapy involves being scarred for life and being subjected to naked old ladies. While it’s refreshing to see a range of clothes sizes instead of just “free size” (as in no hips, no fat free size) I am saddened by the increasingly amount of what can only be described as morbid obesity on the streets of Britain. I am all for eating good food and I will never be a size 8, but the key word is moderation, and once you have reached size 20 you have overstepped the mark by a long shot. To be sure, this was the right time for me to come home, and I can’t wait to make a start on my PGCE. At the same time, I can understand why people get addicted to the TEFL way of life, and end up re-signing or moving on to the next country.

I have come away from Korea with much more conservative taste in clothing. It’s considered unseemly in Korea to show your shoulders and chest area, though admittedly there are seemingly no qualms about showing the tops of your thighs. Prior to coming to Korea I spent most of my time in strappy tops, even in winter, but now I feel exposed if I am not covered up. It was refreshing to be able to put half my wardrobe in the charity bins, thanks to healthier eating (yes, I do miss Kimchi) and (from when I had two good ankles) lots of walking, but I am surprised at how my taste in clothing has changed. Newsflash, South Korea has turned me into an old lady prone to saying “cover yourself before you catch swine flu” and “you’ll have someone’s eyes out with those.”

The colours seem to be more vivid here, particularly all the greens, even the grey sky seems more vivid. But then again architecturally, much of modern South Korea is as dull as an evening with Ken Barlow-who is still the stud of Coronation Street apparently. I think the colours may seem more bright because England is a lot flatter than Korea, and everywhere I look there are bright gardens, something that apartment building laden Korea severely lacks. Being away has really made me appreciate just how beautiful the United Kingdom can be from the wide open green spaces, to the old intricate architecture. I definitely prefer houses to towering apartment blocks which to me can feel constricting and imposing. But I didn’t realise how much I liked being able to see mountains where ever I was in South Korea. As I have said before on this blog, I am a writing contradiction, I like flat green spaces, but I also like mountains. Perhaps this is the reason why the transition seems so difficult, I don’t know what I want from life at the moment and coming back my feelings weren’t as clear cut as I was expecting them to be.

One thing that is clear cut is the expense. The vast majority of things are more expensive here, a fact that I already knew but that doesn’t make parting with the money any easier. Shelling out £40 for a return train journey knowing that £10 would have got me a similar amount of time on a train in Korea, and on a train with more leg room and more comfortable seats as well, is not making me feel all warm and gooey inside about the UK. Admittedly I didn’t save as much as I was hoping to, but I don’t regret any of the travelling that I did while I was over there. I think a second year in the same country would enable you to save more. Nevertheless I am still of the frame of mind that there is so much more to see on this planet, and if I had spent longer in Korea the novelty would have worn off, and I would have developed itchy feet. Besides there is only so long a girl can go without roast potatoes.