Pengalaman Seorang Swedia di Korea

Ini pengalaman salah seorang teman dari swedia yang mengalami cultural shock di Korea.Namanya Leo. Tapi gw paham, karena gw liat sendiri waktu pertama kali datang Leo dibriefing sama petugas intl office, yang dibilangnya cuman 'you cant do this..., you cant do that, a foreigner went to jail because of this, so you cant do this....'. Gak ada omongan 'you can enjoy this, you can visit that place...Koreans are friendly.... ' yang diomongin cuma kewajiban semua. gak ada haknya. plus, dia juga tinggal di asrama where freedom is restricted by some rules. Dan... aduh... ni orang bener2 gak beruntung sampe2 dia mutusin untuk gak memperpanjang studinya di Korea. CUKUP!!! (katanya)

Jadi ceritanya, Leo ngambil introduction to Korean Society class. Nah, gurunya, of course korean... Dan karena banyak hal hal, kebiasaan orang korea yg mneurut dia tidak logis (bukan tidak logis sih, maksudnya perlu dipertanyakan), di kelas dia ini lumayan aktif menyuarakan pendapat, terutama ketidaksetujuanya. Dan si dosenya ini malah membalas dengan e mail seperti ini. Intinya 'Kau gak boleh bicara tentang hal bagus di Korea. bicara saja tentang hal hal yang bagus di Korea!'. Aduh... gw gak setuju juga dengan si Dosen ni... memang walau beberapa orang korea sudah sangat open minded banget, beberapa orang korea lain ada yang pemikiranya masih tertutup (padahal mereka sering jalan2 keluar negri lo. logikanya mereka juga terekspos dengan kebudayaan lain. tapi... dont know lah). Guru korea gw salah satu yg pemikiranya udah terbuka nih. jadi dia udah jalan2, ngajar bahasa korea ke bbrp tempat, amerika, n myanmar
'di myanmar, ceboknya gak pake tisu, tapi pake air'. Sekelas langsung 'hiiii' kecuali gw tentunya. '아니... pake air setelah saya pikir justru lebih bersih' lanjutnya

Nah... ini nih...jadi sebenernya gak perlu marah kalo budayanya di kritik. Tinggal bilang aja, OK... itu budaya sana, budaya sini begini, alasanya begini dll

To understand is good, but if not you just need to admit it...dan yang jelas, setiap budaya itu pasti mengakui dan menghargai adanya budaya lain...

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After a heated discussion last week about korean society, and how some of us students experienced negative sides of korean society, our teacher (won't call him "professor") sent out this email with "instructions" on how we should conduct our presentation... I think it's quite interesting. Please leave comments and thoughts bellow if you have any;)

I have left out his name bellow.

Start of his email---

Class Instructions - Introduction to Korean Society

Hi, Class!

This is a letter from the professor of introduction to Korean Society. We have only two weeks to go, and you are required to take a chance to make a presentation with the title "the most interesting thing I found in Korea" before the semester ends. When I take the last class into consideration, I think it would be better to give you some guidelines in reference to the presentation.

1. (!!!) Expressions that might bring up the impressions of racial discrimination or ethnic prejudice should be avoided.
[in an online version of the instructions he added: "Any attendee who violates this clause would be demaned to go out from the class."]

2. Political correctness is highly welcomed.

3. A hasty judgment or generalization should be avoided.

4. Paying respect to other cultures is highly evaluated.

5. Trying to view mattes objectively is strongly recommended.

6. Try to put yourself in someone else's shoes. Do not focus on only one side of things. There exist both sides. And the title I suggested is "the most interesting thing I found in Korea."

The reason why the school opens this class is to let foreign students have chances to know more about Korean society and culture and to compare it with their own and others'.

You have spent only a few months in Korea. You may think that you have already learned much about Korea, but knowing about some country is not so easy. Besides, knowing is one thing and understanding is another.

So, what I want you to do is ... Please be more humble and trying to look at something more carefully.
And please, be more open minded, and look at the bright side of things. Don't judge or estimate something only with what you know. There can be different side and aspects. For those who are on the way to learning, it is needless to say that being biased or having prejudice is not good.

Sometimes it needs much patience to live in a foreign country, especially when it comes to living in a totally unfamiliar country. But I bet that the opportunity you are taking now can bring a lot to you. Make this precious opportunity good chance for you to learn and understand more about other cultures. The best way is to meet many people and get chances to travel around the country as much as you can. I hope that you can have chances.

Look forward to seeing you at next class.

Have a nice weekend.

---- End of his email

Until last weeks class and the discussion/argument the instructions were like this:

"Topic for the second half (9th - 15th week) of the semester : The most interesting thing I found in Korea
Length of the presentation : within 20 minutes

You are encouraged to use various audiovisual equipment.
Presentation must be done through MS power point.
You have to submit the manuscript or film or pictures after your presentation. (requirement: MS power point .ppt file)

Deadline for the submission of 2nd manuscript - Dec. 11. 2009."

Where does it say that we only can talk about positive interesting things?

I decided to publish his email here because it is part of my experience here in Korea. And I feel that one thing that is really hard to do here is to come with critique about things in korean society, based on your experience. Even more so in this particular class, with a teacher who clearly takes any such critique as a direct insult to himself as a korean... All of the points he has written down are interesting... especially the first, that I feel implies that we (students with serious critique) almost are racists...