Never Mind the Beasts

I am moving to Korea in two weeks for a one year teaching contract. It is a very good deal. Free lodging, HEALTH BENEFITS, good pay. Plus a culture I am not at all familiar with. I posted my cv on an ESL job board and the next day I got six requests for phone interviews. Amazing. So less than two weeks later I have signed a contract and they are paying for my flight. I will teach elementary kids English in Incheon (right outside Seoul). 25 hours a week. No composition essays to grade. I will save about $14,000 for the year after my living expenses and potential travels to China, Japan etc. All around good deal.

I almost accepted a teaching job in Poland, but with a few outside bills it would be really tight. I am considering going to Poland and teaching later. I’ll see how the year goes, but I may just travel around eastern Europe after Korea and teach ESL. I need to see and experience a little more of the world now that I’ve lived in the U.S. for 18 years. The sad thing is I am going to drop off a shitload of poetry books at the Bookshop in chapel Hill because I am moving out permenantly and I can’t lug around all my books.

I also just purchased a 12 inch Powerbook so I will post to the blog about once a week while I am in Korea.

I am going to choose about five books of poetry for my trip (I am going to store about two boxes of poetry books while I am gone).

I have two questions:

1) If you could pick five books of poetry to take with you for a one year stint in another country, which five?

2) Anyone know any Korean poets of the experimental kind?