Winter vacation for English teachers in Korea means two weeks of getting the hell out. We teachers get our free time during the window of our school's break which is the entire month of January, plus a week on either side, usually. Last year, I went to the Philippines. Friends of mine went to Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, China, and Japan, among other places. This year, some of my friend are going to Nepal and Spain, among other places. Needless to say, this is a period of time that is much looked-forward to.
My plans are to spend three weeks in Australia with my brother who has never been out of the country before (Canada doesn't count). Three weeks in an English-speaking country in the middle of summer in January - very nice. However, as things often go here in Korea, my plans have been fucked up real good by some dumbass ticket insurance policy and the great Korean bureaucracy.
I must admit I made the initial mistake in buying my plane ticket early, before my winter camp schedule was finalized. English camps are what occupies us English teachers during the school breaks when we are not on our vacations. I figured that since my school finishes on December 18th, I would have the rest of December and the first part of January to work my allotment of camps before I leave the country on January 7th. I also contacted my coodinator at the Daegu Metropolitan Office of Education pretty early to let him know I want to buy my tickets and request camps as early as possible so that I could get them over with. He said it was still far too early to say when camps would be, but I figured I would be okay requesting early camps based on previous winter and summer camps. This leads to Point of Bullshit the First:
Point of Bullshit the First is that the DMOE takes FOREVER to get even the most basic of scheduling done for these winter camps. Teachers are understandably looking to get the hell out of the country to somewhere exotic, and want to make plans as early as possible to save money and hassle. It wasn't until November 24th that we were officially informed of the window of time in which our camps would fall (the first and second weeks of January - precisely when my $1100 ticket says I'm going to be in Australia). And it's not going to be until December 15th that we will know our exact dates and locations - three weeks away from when our camps will likely start. Fortunately I anticipated this terrible delay of vital information and bought cancellation insurance on my ticket in case I had to change my ticket or just scrap it and buy a new one. This leads to Point of Bullshit the Second.
Point of Bullshit the Second is that when I called up Orbitz to figure out exactly how to go about the cancellation refund process, I was informed of the troublesome news that I am only protected from cancellation fees and penalties if there is a serious medical emergency inflicted upon myself, and that simply wanting to cancel because of scheduling difficulties doesn't get me any money back. In fact, the Orbitz representative actually told me if I cancelled my ticket, I would not only lose the money I paid for it, I would actually have to pay an ADDITIONAL $857 worth of penalties to Japan Air. I nearly punched my fucking laptop. I asked what would happen if I just didn't show up. I would lose my money for the ticket and that's it. I don't get how pulling a no-show puts you in a better situation than kindly informing the airline that you won't be able to make the flight so they can sell the seat to someone else, but apparently that's how things work. I think the guy mentioned something about how canceling gives me credit toward other fights in the amount of the difference in penalties or some bullshit like that, but I don't really know because I was busy not punching my computer. At this point, I don't know if I am going to be able to spend my three weeks in the sun. And those three weeks bring me to Point of Bullshit the Third.
Point of Bullshit the Third has to do with just how much time I get for vacation. Officially, we are allowed only ten working days. My ticket includes 17 working days. Before I bought the ticket, I checked, double-checked, and triple-checked with my school that it was okay that I spend extra time out of the country. I wanted to be sure that they were sure that they weren't going to decide to put me to work somehow during my non-camp, non-official vacation days, as schools often do. This would have been no problem, since it's provided for in our contract even though lots of whiney-ass foreign teachers like to complain about how they should be able to do whatever they want just because they don't have classes. Anyway, they said it was fine, I could take the extra time. But all of a sudden, two days ago - at least a month after I bought my ticket - my co-teacher tells me that the principal wants me to teach conversation classes and that I am only supposed to have 10 days of vacation. I pointed out that I asked repeatedly about this very situation a long time ago, and was pretty annoyed about the whole thing, but I was too pissed about possibly losing all the money I spent on my ticket in the first place, and the possibility of me not being able to get to Australia at all to worry about this unwelcome point of bullshit. And here in Korea, what the principal SAID doesn't matter so much as what she now SAYS. The conversation bout this little point of conflict went something like this:
"The principal says you are only supposed to have 10 days vacation."
"But I asked you several times if taking all the time off was okay."
"Yes, but the principal says you are only supposed to have 10 days."
"I made sure to be very clear about this before I bought my ticket. This was a month ago."
"But the principal found out about the vacation yesterday."
"I asked last month."
That's pretty much how it went. I didn't pursue the argument because, as I said, I was trying to ignore the terrible news of possibly losing a lot of money and a trip to somewhere warm.
This has been a summary of the main Points of Bullshit concerning my (possible) upcoming vacation. Please understand that there are many smaller Points of Bullshit that would have been very irritating to explain. However, there is hope for each Point of Bullshit mentioned. Please check back soon for what I hope will be a happy ending to this story of shattered dreams.
No comments:
Post a Comment