Bon Voyage USA
Ten years ago I made one of the toughest decisions of my life. I'd give up my family, friends, familiarities and other cool things that start with the letter "F."
I moved from North and South Dakota to New York City. If you can imagine, the change for me was fairly monumental. Here I was, a medium-small town kid who grew up in Bismarck, North Dakota moving to Manhattan—the City That Never Sleeps—the center of the country and the world in terms of finance, fashion and comic books (which is why I decided to relocate). I don't regret the decision to move to NYC to chase my hopes and dreams (that were later crushed and pulverized…over and over again).
And now, a decade later, I've made another monumental choice. As I left just about everything I knew when I left Bismarck for NYC, I'm leaving the United States for Seoul in South Korea—it's a whole ‘nother country. I'm going to be teaching English over there. I decided I was sick and tired of working in the bars. I need to do something with my life, besides get people drunk or kick people's asses. I learned from some of the most wonderful teachers in the world, so it's time to pass some of that knowledge down to some other kiddies.
But I'm not moving to the other side of the planet just for some humanitarian cause. There are plenty of other reasons…
Duh, Asian women.
Barbecue is awesome.
Batman, Wolverine and Rambo all moved to Asian countries (China, Japan and Thailand respectively)—and became even more badass afterwards. Same same, Luke Skywalker trained with Yoda in Dagoba—which is kind of like South Korea (hot and humid and lots of short people).
Even though South Korea is a country that has been continually conquered by Japan or China, and then continually crapped on by the US and USSR, not to mention their leaders have been proven to be corrupt, their government is still less shitty than ours.
I'll finally be considered tall.
Have you guys ever dated an Asian lady? It's amazing.
Allegedly, there are no open container alcohol laws in Seoul, which is pretty awesome.
I'll be able to complain about "La Migra" like my Mexican buddies.
Maybe being a white guy in Korea is like being a black guy in America. Chicks will instantly think my weiner is bigger than it actually is.
My Brazilian Jiu Jitsu skills are far superior to Tae Kwon Do.
I can finally live my dream of being the stereotypical white American villain in foreign movies.
If North Korea starts dropping nukes, maybe I can finally get radioactive superpowers like the Hulk or Spider-Man.
I will finally start buying designer clothes for my girlfriend. (Don't tell her they're all knock-offs.)
Hopefully, I'll never go to another bar that plays hip hop mash ups.
Karaoke (or noraebang) is like a national sport over there.
I could possibly relive the hammer scene from Oldboy. (If you've seen this Korean masterpiece of a movie, you know what I'm talking about.)
Not a single one of my ex-girlfriends lives over there.
Did I mention Asian chicks?
In all seriousness, I'm nervous as hell. I think it will be a great experience and I truly believe in what I'm doing. It's weird to think of leaving my entire home, friends and country. But it's something I've got to do. I feel a lot like I did ten years ago, when I moved to NYC, which ended up being one of the most important things I've ever done.
In case you were worried, I will be keeping my post at PIC for the time being, but I will be busy so my writing may or may not be here all the time.
So ten years ago I moved from the country to the city. Now I'm moving from my country to a new one. And who knows, maybe a decade from now I'll be moving off the planet…