Miscommunication

Sometimes communication can be difficult in a foreign nation, especially when you don't learn to speak the native language. My Korean is so bad that I can't say much more than "How much is this?" Since I can only say about three sentences and understand maybe five sentences in Korean, the conversation has to continue in English if we ever want to get beyond "I am a teacher." This does not work well if the other person speaks as much English as I do Korean. Often I just talk to people in English while they respond in Korean, neither of us knowing what the other said. This situation is acceptable if you are talking to the taxi driver or waitress, but other situations can turn disastrous. When I try to explain a problem with my schedule to a Korean staff at my school, the schedule inevitably comes back wrong about five times before I stop trying to explain the problem and decide to ignore it. I suppose it is my fault for being in Korea and not learning the language, but I do work at an English academy. One would think that they would hire English speaking staff. While most of the miscommunication I experience here is due to the language barrier, I experienced a different kind of miscommunication on Friday. It was the kind of miscommunication where you think back to what someone said, and you think to yourself She totally lied to me!

I went to a dermatologist for rosacea. Rosacea is what makes my face red. Basically, the blood vessels are too close to the skin. I've tried lotions and prescriptions before, but I decided to look into laser surgery, thinking it would be cheaper in Korea. The doctor spoke English, and we talked about it for a while. She made it seem like it wouldn't be a big deal so I decided to try it. She told me I could start right then and there. I told her that I needed to be at work in a couple of hours, and she reassured me that it was ok. The only warning that she gave me was, "You will be a little red." Remember that quote because this is what I feel lied to about. So I went ahead and had the laser treatment done. It felt like a lot of little bee stings. When I stood up to leave, I looked in the mirror and noticed that my face wasn't "a little red." It was covered in purple bruises. I had spots like a leopard, and I had to go teach children. Deciding that bandages on my face looked better than the spots, I tried to look inconspicuous. I told my students that my cat attacked me in the middle of the night. The doctor lied to me, so I lied to the kids. Maybe it's not lying, maybe I just miscommunicated the information.