The Infomercial

I have now appeared three times on Korean network television. Shopping network television of course. The product I am shamelessly promoting is known as 'Crazy English'. This product comes via a Chinese man called Li Yang who has accurately observed that many of the 3 billion people living in Asia are very interested in learning the English language.

Enter the Korean market. And enter it he does, sandwiched between monotonous pitches for exercise machines and kitchen accessories at 3am on weeknights. Apparently it's doing reasonably brisk sales so far. With the idea of getting those sales even brisker they've requested that I enter the picture. An authentic, English speaking white man from a land far away.

I sat waiting in no better a place than the waiting room, surrounded by Koreans not really acknowledging my presence. After a short time one of the men who looked like he may be in charge approached me cautiously and began to speak in broken English.
"Grant we are hoping that you can say that as a young boy in Canada you learned English specifically by waving your hands everywhere."
As soon as the question was out of his mouth he waited expectantly for me to confirm his request. I looked over at Young who gave me a thumbs up, and then back at the man. My face betraying the obvious confusion his question had caused, I tried to clarify.
"You uhh....want me to say that in Canada we wave our hands everywhere in order to learn English?" I asked rather hesitantly.
"Yes, yes please that would be great," he replied excitedly. "Please just try now to see how it goes."
I looked at Young again who seemed to be nothing but thumbs up today. The other Koreans looked at me curiously waiting for me to do something. Definitely having nothing to lose I shrugged my shoulders and flailed my hands wildly in all directions like a madman.
"Like this?" I queried in the middle of my waving.
"Oh, Oh...yes please that is excellent. Please just like that Mr. Grant," our man blurted out excitedly. The rest of the Koreans seemed fairly impressed at my lack of coordination and began giggling in unison.

One of the ideas behind Crazy English is that Koreans are by nature very shy. When in the presence of foreigners - white foreigners to be exact - they become very nervous. Crazy English combats this problem by encouraging the listener to act silly while studying English. Screaming loudly in time with the tapes while making wild motions in front of a mirror is being sold to Koreans as the most effective route to speaking English confidently.

The mental image of Koreans actually standing in their homes and doing this aside, I really did think this product was ridiculous. Combine one of the world's most homogenous populations with centuries of collective mistrust of anything non-Korean and you have the perfect recipe for Koreans to be terrified of any interactions with anyone but other Koreans. The vast majority of Koreans just simply don't know what to do when confronted with a non-Korean. They can yell at themselves in the mirror until the cows come home and when they do they can yell with them too. This issue goes a bit deeper than a few tapes in the mail is going to fix.

This was driven home about half an hour later as I stood behind the camera waiting for my cameo appearance. The two hosts were bantering back and forth about 'Crazy English' in glowing terms. At this point one of them stood up and began priming the small studio audience for some genuine participation. With a 'Crazy English' tape rolling they began a very disjointed version of a song entitled "How is Your Business?".

In a way it was like all of their pronunciation and intonation errors somehow combined to produce an almost intelligible version of the song on the tape. It was at this point that I snapped my fingers and let out a short cry of recognition. The cameraman looked around rather startled as the rusty gears turned in my head putting together two and two.

A couple weeks back I received a puzzling text message out of the blue from one of the adults who's children I tutor. As far as I know she can't really speak English. We always talk in Korean (Imagine what she's writing on her blog about me). In English she had said hello and proceeded to ask me and I now quote "How is your business?"

At the time I of course responded that my business has been better and chalked it up to the fact she was Korean. As I stood there in the studio watching the Koreans sing their lungs out about other people's businesses it all came together. I sometimes wonder if the world is really as ridiculous as I think it is, or whether I construct it that way in order to avoid taking anything seriously. At this particular moment in time I was fairly convinced that at least in this case, it really was ridiculous.

My short stint that first time on Korean TV went pretty much the same as the two that followed. I was asked a few questions in Korean and replied to them all in English. Fairly nonsensical things of course. That we really do wave our hands everywhere to learn English in Canada, that I think 'Crazy English is wonderful and recommended to all the Koreans so they can speak English.

I did have slight issues with the fact I was prostituting my credibility so easily. Credibility hard-earned by existing as a white person in Korea I might add. But who was I kidding? This was not the time for a full review of my ethical standards. I just wanted to get my 90,000 Won and get out on the street putting it back into the hands of pub owners who deserve it.

In any case I rationalized it by imagining that the typical purchasing process would involve a Korean housewife watching perplexed by the gangly white man garbling away in a language she'll never dream of understanding but will step over her own mother so her kids will. "Hmm...I have no idea what he's talking about but it seems positive. Not to mention the fact he's waving his arms everywhere," and out comes the credit card.

I mean really, there is a need for some personal responsibility here is there not? That's what I told myself as I went to bed that night, ninety thousand Won richer and my business going pretty good.