I felt like I would be able to fairly easily adjust to Korea. For one thing...I'm accustomed to change...when I was in h.s I spent a summer away at Governors school (bout 4 hours from home) and then after graduation, I immediately went away to uni. in Raleigh and then Atlanta. Both cities in the south were really challenging, as the south is soooooo different from the north--it was complete culture shock, but I rolled with it!
So when I was preparing for Korea, I assumed that I'd be one of MAYBE 2 brown people. I expected to be stared at and to to be challenged by the language and food. What I found was about what I expected with some lovely surprises!
At the university that I worked, there were 2 other sistas!! One American and the other, Canadian!! I found the food to be "suspicious" ( u know they're stereotyped to put cat, dog n etc..in their food) and....the language, son!! Yowsa!! The shit sounded like straight gibberish!! Nonetheless, I adjusted and had great help doing so!!
The American sis reached out to me through email as one of the other foreign new professors mentioned that I was new staff. We'll call her Miss Jackson. Iwas extremely appreciative. When I first met her she was quite kind and open. She remarked quite a few times how similar we seemed as her name was similar to mine, she just started going natural and she was around the same height and age as me. Additionally, we were now working at the same uni in Korea of all places--and we both had Masters in a related field! I, too found the similarities to be quite pecuilar! I could tell that she was quite excited to meet me, as was I her. Miss Jackson had a lot of useful information to share, as she had been in Korea for about 2 years.
That weekend she invited me to lunch w/ her and 2 of her friends. The one friend was a caucasian Canadian and the other was a sis Canadian (via Jamaica). The sis, (we'll call her TT) seemed really nice and quite eager to meet me. In retrospect, aside from being drawn to my aura, I think these sistas had been color deprived, as there weren't that many brown ppl in Daejeon, especially. At lunch TT also remarked about my hair expressing how much she loved it and really wanted to go natural. She asked for help in maintaining it, of which I gladly offered.
As the days and weeks went on, I spent quite a deal of time w/ Miss Jackson--having lunch and chatting online. She invited me to everything and I gladly accepted. I liked Miss Jackson quite a bit, but realized that I would have to limit how much time I spent with her just because my spirit is a calm, excited, easy-going one and I found her to be a lil loud and rather attention-seeking, as well as bossy. I also realized that my perception was not off as I noticed that every time that we were in public and amongst others, people would attempt to avoid her or have an uncomfortable forced laugh. Despite all of that, I was still grateful for her! I chalked it up to her having some insecurities and that's how she masked it--nothing different from most other ppl. (did i mention that i was a therapist back home? haha)
During that same time period, TT and I started spending a bit of time together as well. I soon was introduced to a few other sistas, too. 2 were South African and one was another Canadian (via Jamaica)! They seemed soooo cool!!
So far,...things are going well!!! Sure, I'm still missing my love, but I'm extremely distracted w/ this new adventure ahead of me and extremely thankful that I have some sistas in my life!
So when I was preparing for Korea, I assumed that I'd be one of MAYBE 2 brown people. I expected to be stared at and to to be challenged by the language and food. What I found was about what I expected with some lovely surprises!
At the university that I worked, there were 2 other sistas!! One American and the other, Canadian!! I found the food to be "suspicious" ( u know they're stereotyped to put cat, dog n etc..in their food) and....the language, son!! Yowsa!! The shit sounded like straight gibberish!! Nonetheless, I adjusted and had great help doing so!!
The American sis reached out to me through email as one of the other foreign new professors mentioned that I was new staff. We'll call her Miss Jackson. Iwas extremely appreciative. When I first met her she was quite kind and open. She remarked quite a few times how similar we seemed as her name was similar to mine, she just started going natural and she was around the same height and age as me. Additionally, we were now working at the same uni in Korea of all places--and we both had Masters in a related field! I, too found the similarities to be quite pecuilar! I could tell that she was quite excited to meet me, as was I her. Miss Jackson had a lot of useful information to share, as she had been in Korea for about 2 years.
That weekend she invited me to lunch w/ her and 2 of her friends. The one friend was a caucasian Canadian and the other was a sis Canadian (via Jamaica). The sis, (we'll call her TT) seemed really nice and quite eager to meet me. In retrospect, aside from being drawn to my aura, I think these sistas had been color deprived, as there weren't that many brown ppl in Daejeon, especially. At lunch TT also remarked about my hair expressing how much she loved it and really wanted to go natural. She asked for help in maintaining it, of which I gladly offered.
As the days and weeks went on, I spent quite a deal of time w/ Miss Jackson--having lunch and chatting online. She invited me to everything and I gladly accepted. I liked Miss Jackson quite a bit, but realized that I would have to limit how much time I spent with her just because my spirit is a calm, excited, easy-going one and I found her to be a lil loud and rather attention-seeking, as well as bossy. I also realized that my perception was not off as I noticed that every time that we were in public and amongst others, people would attempt to avoid her or have an uncomfortable forced laugh. Despite all of that, I was still grateful for her! I chalked it up to her having some insecurities and that's how she masked it--nothing different from most other ppl. (did i mention that i was a therapist back home? haha)
During that same time period, TT and I started spending a bit of time together as well. I soon was introduced to a few other sistas, too. 2 were South African and one was another Canadian (via Jamaica)! They seemed soooo cool!!
So far,...things are going well!!! Sure, I'm still missing my love, but I'm extremely distracted w/ this new adventure ahead of me and extremely thankful that I have some sistas in my life!
No comments:
Post a Comment