Lost in O’Hare – Millenial Influx

It was the toilet. After the 15 hour-long plane ride all across the North Pacific Ocean, my sweatshirt was stained with the grey smell of Korean Air 037. My eyes were loose and my stomach felt empty, but at the same time I was filled with an endless air of grogginess. As I locked the stall door and turned to face the toilet – there, my first culture shock awakened my jet lag. The toilet was way bigger and taller than the ones I was used to. I just stood there and stared at it for a brief second. It was huge. I was reminded of how short I am, or should I say, how shorter I have become within the last 15 hours span. I knew that the culture shock was going to happen sooner or later, but not this soon – not in the bathroom of O’Hare, ten minutes after the landing.

I held onto the duty-free shopping bag with my right hand and my backpack with my left hand on the line to customs. My hands didn’t know how to control anxiousness. The shopping bag was made with a smooth and thick kind of plastic. I tried stretching it with my thumb pressing it down against my index finger. I thought about how this is where everything will begin. Once I passed through customs and got that stamp on my passport, there was no turning back.

Soon enough it was my turn to walk up.

“Hello,” I said to the worker with a weak and nervous smile. I handed him over my blue American passport. I had a green Korean one too somewhere in my backpack. Green and blue. Somewhere in between those two colors was where I stood.

“Good morning!”

The worker looked down at me with a jolly smile. He was in his mid-40s, quite big and had thin glasses on. He flipped through to the first page of my passport. There I saw an eagle and me. The eagle looked like it was staring at me, and me in the photo looked like it was looking away from the worker.

“So, where are you coming from?”

“South Korea.”

“Oh! Ahn-nyeong-ha-sae-yo!”

I was unexpectedly amused to be welcomed in Korean language by a Caucasian man at O’Hare. He was excited to greet me in Korean.

“Yeah! Ahn-nyeong-ha-sae-yo.”

I slightly bowed my head as I greeted him back, just the way it should be done in Korea. He told me something along the lines that he knows a Korean neighbor or someone who taught him how to say hello in Korean. At that time I was attentive and thrilled to find out about how he learned the phrase “Ahn-nyeong-ha-sae-yo”. Now I no longer remember the exact details of that conversation. Ever since that first man I got to converse with in Chicago, I have encountered countless of people who tried explaining themselves to me about how they knew how to speak certain Korean phrases or where they got to try eating Kimchi.

“Were you in Korea for the summer vacation?”

I wasn’t quite sure how to answer his question. Yes, I was in Korea for the summer vacation, but I was there for the past 20 years of my entire life as well. Standing in front of his cubicle-looking-like station with numerous other tired travelers lined behind me, I knew that I had to answer him quickly and with honesty. What if I pulled out my green Korean passport then? What if I tried explaining to him that I have been living as both a Korean and a Korean American in Korea? Would he have listened? It was a long story. I was used to try keeping things appear simple.

“Umm… Well, my parents live in Korea, so…”

He nodded as he swiped my passport against the machine. Then he said in an affirming voice, “summer vacation.” He grabbed his purple stamp and hit it down on the page of my passport. I saw it and I heard it. He then folded the blue passport and handed it back to me.

“Welcome back home!”

“Thank you.”

Home? Wasn’t he just greeting me in Korean?

photo courtesy: http://www.factmonster.com/us/history/ohare-international-airport.html

Homeschooler in the Real World

Emma Folts, a sophomore at Wheaton College, shares her experience about her transition into college and how homeschool has both helped and hindered her.
How has your homeschool experience benefitted you, especially in your transition into college?
I think the one thing that homeschooling did that was really helpful as I entered college was that it taught me time management. As a homeschooler I had the same freedom as a college student has to put things off during the day and go see a friend instead. Since I had that experience, I knew the cost of that.
Also, personal responsibility and accountability with assignments. I feel like a lot of the other students had more expectations for gentler grading and that the professor would give them retakes or extensions, but that wasn’t something that ever happened to me in school. That learning curve wasn’t added because I never had it the other way. I think another thing was that because I was homeschooled, I was familiar with the format of teaching and then studying on my own.
Did you see any issues with your transition socially?
I think that homeschooling had two ramifications for me socially. One was helpful, one was hurtful.
It was really helpful because as a homeschooler, I had spent a lot of time realizing and developing who I was as a person and learning to recognize people who were being themselves, and those were the people I sought out as friends. Friendship as a homeschooler takes a lot more investment. I knew I was choosier with my friends which made me a lot less anxious and a lot more content.
The only real negative impact of the social bit was that I was really used to getting to choose the time I got to spend with people. As a homeschooler I spent a lot of time with people, but that time was controlled by me. As a college student, I found that you can’t really control the time you spend with people and alone time is not really available. Learning to deal with that was a lot harder than anticipated.
Any last comments on homeschool and how it has affected your college experience?
I think homeschooling is really helpful, however it does take a slightly increased amount of advocacy with your peers when you’re entering into college. I think a lot of people come in with certain assumptions about homeschool, especially students. You’re going to get a lot of, ‘oh my gosh, you don’t seem like a homeschooled person!’ [You can’t] take that too personally and explain your experience so that friends can understand it’s an important piece of you, though it might not look like the homeschooling that they’ve seen.
My encouragement to anyone who is a homeschooler transitioning into college is to realize the benefit that you have having been homeschooled, and to realize that the bit of advocacy and explaining that you need to do with your peers is totally normal and that it’s not a big deal. Once they understand your experience, it’s not something I’ve experienced being looked down on for.