A few days ago, my boss Christine (that’s her Korean name) told me that she is so sad I’m leaving. She said, “Usually there is a wall between t he foreign and Korean teachers, but there is no wall with you and the Seok Hwa girls. You are the best.”
I can only come close to describing how happy I was to hear those words. Despite how pointless I felt, how I felt I had not made an impact in my students’ lives–or anyone’s for that matter–despite how I felt selfish, impatient, lazy, and angry with my students, despite the amount of failed relationships, misunderstandings, and mistakes dipped in failure, sprinkled in mistakes, and deep fried in failure, I had managed to connect with one person. This for me, was redemption for this entire year.
Christine told me that I had succeeded in the one thing that I really came to a foreign country to do, which was to reach another person through the often superficial muck of culture and tradition which can easily separate two human beings. Anything is possible if you try.
My time here is done. I will miss you, Korea.