Welcome to our home. It’s not much, but we’re all you have. So be grateful. Regardless, it’s going to get a lot better from here.

Let me introduce myself. I’m Stu, the younger, wiser member of this two-room schoolhouse. I’m the guy responsible for making this website as ugly or beautiful as you find it on a daily basis. Blame me for everything that doesn’t work, and so on.

Now, I realize this place looks like a crappy wordpress blog. And it is. But we don’t want it to be! I can’t promise you when, but eventually this will look a lot different than it does now.

What we can promise you are continuous entries, at least three a week from here on. Head on over to our About Page for a complete idea of what we want to (will) be.

First, a few words

A word about the website name before we get started: Speaking Korean is a term that every English teacher will hear everyday as his or her students tattletale on each other for speaking their native language in class. As intermittently hilarious/annoying as it can be (depending on which student says it and how it is said), it is ubiquitous. We thought it would be a good jumping point for a name. But since we won’t be speaking Korean, but speaking about Korea we went with the current name.

Now, a few thoughts come to my mind on my maiden voyage into the blogosphere:

1. Blogosphere is a word I will never reference on this page again because I think it’s retarded.
2. While my co-writer Andrew works at the same school as I in Korea, we are both completely different people (of course) and therefore if one of us says something that you don’t agree with, take it up with the writer of the post directly. Comments will be enabled. Go for it.
3. We will refrain as much as possible from brutal Korean stereotypes. I promise we will keep the kimchi references to a minimum. Shit-needle references are limitless however.
4. Every once in awhile I might exclaim some unknown Korean phrase that’s meaning isn’t necessary for the reader to understand. I do it on impulse, leave me be.
5. We are not Korean, and therefore see things differently than a Korean might. That being said, I intend to generally throw cultural sensitivity aside daily.

Korea is a unique country, and it’s safe to say that nearly everyone who comes here doesn’t find what they originally expected. Perhaps over time we can help narrow that obvious divide between what people think Korea will be like and what it actually is (from the perspective of two outsiders living on the inside). Kaja!