25ish.

While I’m busy opining about how old I look, I realize this insecurity may be highlighted by the fact that I’m in a country surrounded by people who look perpetually younger than their age. And tonight I found out why.

One of the things I’ve liked about being a teacher in a foreign country is that anytime I have a cultural question, I have forty to fifty different kids who are eager to explain away my confusion – probably because I’m offering extra credit for anyone who can do so in proper, complete sentences. It is in this way that I’ve managed to piece together certain nuances that aren’t readily available in Lonely Planet.

My school, like many things in Korea, is very technologically advanced. Most of my “paperwork” revolves around the computer in my classroom. If I mark a child absent in the system, his parents receive a text message within the first half-hour of class, letting them know their kid is not in his seat. I download every lesson plan, test, and handout from our server that’s updated by our research and development department located in Seoul; conversely, the kids are able to log in to the system from home, see their grades and complete their online homework. Very efficient. Very 2007. And very Korean.

From my screen, I can summon up all kinds of information about my students; test score averages, attendance records, which regular school they attend, what grade they’re in, etc. Most of this is useless to me, however I did skim over their grades and ages shortly before I began the term; being a new teacher, I thought I could gauge what level they’d be at by their age. But when I compared my first on-screen roster of thirteen year-olds to the class full of young faces staring back at me, I was a bit confused. Shrugging, I figured puberty must hit late on this side of the globe and was just happy they were so talkative. It wasn't until Sherry's birthday today that I began to question everything.

Sherry, the young woman who works at the school’s front desk, reminds me of a Korean Air stewardess: she constantly has a smile on her face, understands only rudimentary English, and is happy to get you a cup of tea but looks like she might stab you with a chopstick if you don’t say please. The first face I see when I get off the elevator and the last person I say goodnight to as I leave work, she’s always waving and smiling, which until my Korean vocabulary progresses to include verbs, is as far as our communication usually gets us. She, like the rest of our Korean staff, works tirelessly and I honestly don’t understand how she stays so chipper. They deal with parents all day and then kids all night – easily pulling ten to twelve hour shifts, while the Western teachers stroll in for our six-hour teaching stints and stroll right back out making double their salaries simply because our parents taught us “hello” instead of “an-young-kah-say-oh.”

So when I found out it was her birthday when I arrived to work tonight, I wished someone had told me sooner so I could have gotten her something. But the more I thought about it I realized this was my first Korean birthday and I wasn’t sure if my Western customs applied. Should I have gotten her a card? Flowers? A giant bottle of Soju to ease the pain? Feeling (familiarly) incompetent, I wished her a happy birthday and was shocked to hear that she was turning 27. The thing is, she doesn’t look a day over 14.

Happy 27th? Or 25th? Or New Year?

Back in class, my kids, eager to get off subject and always amused when they get to tell their teacher something he didn’t already know, informed me that in Korea people have two ages – their Korean age and their Western age. Their Korean age begins roughly around the time of conception (a tradition which I’m sure FOX News will no doubt be subscribing to shortly) and so babies reach age one when they come kicking out of their mother. Also, as I came to understand it, Koreans who are counting back in this manner also really celebrate their birthday on the lunar New Year – which to me just sounds like even more of an excuse for the whole country to get really drunk together. But I’m definitely not arguing.

According to this math, it’s possible for a baby to be two years old and only off the umbilical cord for two days. No wonder there’s so much pressure on the kids to succeed – they’re already slacking from day one. What? Are you just going to sit there? You’re almost three years old. Shouldn’t you be walking, talking and beginning calculus?

When I asked them their Western ages, my kids happily revealed that instead of being the teenagers I thought, the class was full of eleven and twelve year-olds – which, from what I remember about being that age, is a big difference. I think this explains their willingness to shout out answers in class and (gasp) speak in front of the opposite sex. As for Sherry, I found out that we’re the same age. A fact I had to prove to her with my passport. “But Travis. You so bald.” Annnnd there it is.