This might be tougher than I thought...

Almost every interaction I've had with EPIK so far has been great, and I've been impressed with the efforts and planning that goes into the program.  The pre-orientation course was fantastic, giving me extremely useful information (in a fun and interesting format) while also beginning to get me accustomed to Korean culture simply through its appearance and structure ("You must finish your learning!").  The information packet for arrival and the week of orientation is superbly detailed yet concise.  There is also a Canadian-born coordinator for native English teachers in my city who sent a wonderful welcome email.  Things like this make me even more excited about the upcoming year.  Then I read things like this little gem.  This is great information for me to have.  I'm very glad to have it, and I'm sure it will help me immensely.  But it also makes me realize that I'm up for more severe culture shock than I'd realized.

I am a fairly assertive person, independent, [insert other problematic qualities here].  You know, your basic city-dwelling American woman who can get shit done.  I would tend to view many of the expected and accepted behaviors described in the posting linked above as immature and/or unprofessional, and likely keep the person exhibiting those behaviors at arms length.  Obviously this will not be a productive way to deal with Korean working culture.  To make matters more difficult, I have been very fortunate in my supervisors so far, so I am not accustomed to dealing with personality conflicts in the workplace. I am used to working around/pushing though bureaucracy rather than just letting it happen once I've started the process.  I pride myself in solving problems with another person by sitting down and having a respectful dialogue rather than just rolling over.  I can respect the position that a person holds, but I don't put much stock in rank for the sake of rank.  Hierarchy, in my opinion, has its place, but I'll be damned if I will allow someone to walk on me just because (s)he is farther up the chain of command.

A helpful tidbit that a former coworker found useful when working with people from Asia: There are three genders: men, women, and American women.  We really are an entirely different breed in the eyes of a huge portion of the world.

So I guess I will be relying heavily on my ability to adapt (I think I have that ability).  I'll play the game to some extent and find a way to look at this that doesn't make me feel degraded, helpless, etc.  My current strategy: See this as a lesson in backroom politics.

Also, Korean language/writing is incredibly difficult but also kind of awesome.  All of the consonants in Hangul are designed to reflect the shape of the mouth when the sounds are made.  This is probably the coolest thing I have heard in a very long time.  And all of the little letter symbols fit together like a puzzle to form syllables.  I am so lost and frustrated, but I am so fascinated.  I guess in the end it's all ok, since my guide over at Kimchi Icecream says things will go better for me at work if I don't speak Korean (or don't let on that I've learned any if I can figure this stuff out).