OK, so my Korean isn't the best but in the heat of the moment at a downtown hair shop where I was getting royally punked off by a Little Miss Attitude, I scrambled together some sentences in my defence... after which, mind you, I laughed my butt off thinking of how big of a scene me, a foreigner, raising my voice in Korean ended up becoming... oh gosh.
As the story has it, one day I headed to the opposite side of the globe – the Flipside. I arrived in Korea February 16th, 2005 and thought I’d do a year, then leave. I was wrong. I stayed, launched my first company, Flipside Fitness, and then opened Korea's largest boxing club, Hulk's Boxing (now called Hulk's Club).
After 11.5yrs in Korea, I then picked up one day and returned to Toronto, Canada. But then I left again.
Now I live in the Philippines where I am the CEO and head coach of Empowered Clubhouse, the Philippines' first and only boxing clubhouse exclusively just for women. I also am the founder of the Lil' Sistas Project, CEO and designer of Slay Gear and Baa Baa Black Sheep .Ph.
7 comments:
Holy crap girl you've got some balls and so MAD MAD MAD props to you for that. That's awesome!
No props whatsoever. How good is your listening? Did you actually understand everything she was saying or just assume that you did?
Telling off an older person in banmal is beyond rude. You could simply have cut her off while she was speaking with a simple "한국말 할 줄 알라요." If you wanted to make it stronger (and directly confronting) you could even add something like "외국인대해서 말할 때, 조심하세요."
That said, your spoken Korean is improving--so well done on that. But you seriously need some work on your listening skills, anger management, cultural niceties. You come off sounding like the rude one in this exchange. Big time.
I wrote a post about a similar incident I witnessed where the foreigner I was with said something very rude to an older Korean man because she misunderstood him. You should read it: http://storysinger81.blogspot.com/2009/01/reminder.html
Hi Anonymous,
Hahaha... thanks but I was really hoping it wouldn't have to get to that point though.
Hello Diana,
Props to you for putting your name, unlike so many here that don't.
My listening is pretty good, thanks, and yes, I did understand a lot of it. I'd have to say that when I'm not at school teaching English, about 80% of the rest of my day is done all in Korean. Moreover, my middle school students back in the day taught me enough bad words and Korean slang for me to catch her points.
And no, she wasn't older than me. I got my hair done at Leechard Hair which is always infested with young, straight-out-of-hair school stylist. I know better than to not push the limit that far and tell off an elder.
So considering what she said, the fact that she was younger, and the fact that I tried to hold off, I didn't think what I said was so uncalled for. I should note here too though that I did think about telling her I understood but considering what I had already heard her say in the first couple of sentences, I knew she'd be embarrassed and quite honestly, I thought maybe she'd purposely screw up my hair cut. I don't know about you but I don't really care to have some random person kill my hair.
If you read the rest of my post, you would have read that even the manager came out to say sorry. Maybe I should have stopped to talk to her but by that point I was so embarrassed about what had happened and I just wanted to leave.
I don't take back any words I said and I'd like to think that if you were in my situation, ok maybe you wouldn't have said the exact things, I would hope that you'd stick up for yourself too. Her and my conversation started off in Korean, so I wasn't sure as to why she'd totally disregard that and go off like she did. Regardless, she was definitely in the wrong and letting my jacket fall at the end was just the icing on the cake. Up until that point, I really hadn't said anything to her except giving her answers to her questions at the start of our hair meeting.
I'm all for standing up for yourself, and I have. But you really don't have to get nasty about it. I know you were worried about your hair and the coat-dropping thing is annoying, but you were still way over the top. A comment to her after all was done, followed by a private conversation with the manager would have been better.
And yes, I read about the manager apologizing to you, but that happens a lot here, even when there is no actual fault on the part of the Korean person. I have witnessed far too many abusive, nasty foreigners doing and saying horrible things to Koreans they think have wronged them. And then the Koreans fall all over themselves apologizing to those jerks. Maybe this is not the case here, but even if she was a bitch, you don't come out looking like a saint insulting people like that. Unfortunately, you've only reinforced whatever ridiculous stereotypes she might have had about foreigners.
Thanks for the thoughtful response.
To be honest, when I heard your comment to her, I was embarrassed and cringed a little for you. However, I totally realize that I wasn't there and didn't see the exchange. It could have been as bad as you say and it could have been a misunderstanding.
If it were me, I would not have done that. It doesn't mean I don't stand up for myself but before I insult/hurt another human being I would want to make sure there was no chance that I was misunderstanding something. Yes, my Korean is pretty good but I still could not say with 100% confidence that I get all nuances of the language.
My favorite quote to live by is "don't mistake my giving you a second chance as weakness"
For what it's worth, and to give a Korean's perspective on this, I played the video for my husband and he said it wasn't all that rude. He thought you were justified. That's coming from someone who lives outside of his home country and has had to deal with racism on a personal level.
My own opinion is that sometimes living in Korea (or probably any foreign country) is a big stress and we react to situations in ways that we might not otherwise. I remember once losing it with a taxi driver who actually picked up my suitcase and started trying to put it in his cab just to get me to take his taxi. My sister (who was visiting Korea) was with me, and she was shocked by my reaction since I am normally very laid back.
At any rate, I'm glad you didn't tolerate racism from that hairdresser. I do think you should have paid for your haircut, though. A service was rendered and it's not the shop owner's fault that he has rude employees. Why punish him?
Hi Tracey,
I hear you... totally. Had it been the old me that had been in the same situation, I wouldn't had hesitated and would have just punched her. Thank God I've grown since then. I'd like to still think I'm growing and so ya, maybe in a couple of years or so I too won't be reacting like that. But in all honesty, she did go too far. I caught some pretty rude slang and so there's no way she could have justified saying it for whatever reason beyond her being flat out rude.
But anyways, thanks for your opinion and I love that quote. Do you mind if I use it for my quote of the day? Any word on who said it though?
Oh my Beloved!!!
I thought you had disappeared and forgot about all us here in Korea... glad to see that this isn't the case!!!!!!
Thanks for your hubby's perspective, much appreciated. Tell him I said thank you, too.
Ya... I know, I should have paid for the cut. I didn't even realize though that I hadn't until I got home and then I was in a delimma, fact the embarrassment all over again or stay home... so I stayed home. I didn't want it all to surface again. She did do a wicked job of my hair though and so I'm seriously thinking about going back there to simply talk to her about the whole situation and maybe get her to do my hair again next time I need it trim. My students are loving the Japanese-influenced cut I'm sporting, as do I.
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