Koreans work hard, Indians work smart!
After reading my post – Why Indians speak better English than Koreans – I got this interesting feedback from Brian (of Brian in Jeollanam-do fame).
He says
Just stopping by to say I enjoyed this post and look forward to more of your perspective as an Indian in Korea. I saw “Just Another Indian in Korea” and, pardon my ignorance, didn’t realize there were others blogging about it in English.
I’m curious if you have any experience in the English education business in Korea. I ask because I wonder if you could compare the intensity with which Koreans study—for purely domestic purposes—the language compared to what you experienced in India.
Well, to reply to your comment Brian frankly speaking I do not have any experience in the English education business in Korea. But I do interact with a lot of Koreans on a day to day basis. Also, the native speakers I bump into are mostly English Teachers and I do have a few exchange language friends here in Korea who teach me Korean in exchange for English. So my views are completely based on my day to day interactions with these people and my observations. Coming from a non native speaking country the demarcation is more evident when it comes to learning / speaking / applying English in your daily life in Korea as compared to India.
Over worked Korean Students
Agreed that the intensity of Indians to learn English as compared to Koreans is much much lower, because we Indians don’t have to. English is very much a part of our education system from the time a kid starts attending school. Local languages are taught as language subjects much later when the kid is around 8-9 yrs old whereas other subjects are taught in English. An Indian would study English with greater intensity for higher studies and immigration abroad, as he would be expected to clear his IELTS, TOEFL exams. On the contrary if he has to work / study in India he would not be expected to give any English exams, which is not the case in Korea. Koreans if they have to apply for a job in Samsung, LGE or any other Chaebol then he would be expected to clear his TOEIC. And I know this for a fact from the experience of my Korean colleagues who are finding it difficult to switch jobs in Korea. And when I say that an Indian would have to apply for a job in India it translates to jobs in various Fortune 500 Multinational companies in India like Accenture, AT&T, Vodafone, ABN Amro Bank, Fidelity, Pfizer, Siemens, Unilever, Glaxo, Novartis, Sanofi Aventis, Mckinsey, Ernest & Young, Delloit, LG, Samsung, Hyundai to name a few.
Other facts about India which I’d love to highlight is that India has a large number of call centers which is thriving purely on English Speaking Indians. Apart from Call Centers there are various BPOs and KPOs in India which offers Business and Knowledge Process Solutions to their Clients across the world. In my past, I have the experience of working for more than 5 yrs in the eLearning industry in India. I was employed with TATA Interactive Sytems which is the world’s leading developer of learning solutions. One of our job was to provide Content Solutions, Content Strategy and Instructional Design for Simulations, Enterprise Application Training, K-12 Education, Soft skill training, Sales training to various clients across Corporate, Education and Government segments. Apart from Singapore and some Middle East countries I don’t think so any other Asian country offers such diverse solutions like India, not even Philippines.
So my point is that if we can teach the world (subjects beyond English in English) then why not Koreans. The entire purpose of writing this and the previous blog was to plead the Republic of Korea to look at India for solutions beyond trade. Yes, we know that Korea has signed a MOU with India to help small and medium enterprises (SMEs) of both the nations. But we’d also like to request ROK to look at India for education solutions and to hire teachers from India to teach English too. As per the current scenario when Korea needs English Teachers they look at Native Speakers where as if they need Engineers they look at India. So with this blog I would like to bring it to your notice that India has much more to offer if (you = any country) care to dig a bit deeper. We have an extremely talented pool of technical writers, instructional designers, content writers, copy writers, educational writers, usability and accessibility experts, creative writers, accent trainers and above all TEACHERS to be hand picked by ROK and other countries.
In the past few years India has seen an exponential rise of readers giving rise to new stream of writers in both fiction and non-fiction segment – Karan Bajaj, Chetan Bhagat, Siddharth Shangvhi, Rajashree, Kunal Basu adding to our gamut of talented, Man Booker, Pulitzer and other award winning writers like Aravind Adiga, Kiran Desai, Jhumpa Lahiri, Arundhati Roy, Salman Rushdie, V. S. Naipaul, Shobha De, R. K. Narayan, Manju Kapoor, Vikram Seth and many more. Also, the movies these days in India are more or less bilingual which is a strong indicator that given a few years Indians “on an average” would be at par with native speakers.
baresytapas
I came to this blog by accident, but I found very interesting. Greetings to all who visit here.
John Grant
Everyone work. That`s is important
Nolen
I’ve always wondered about this. I found it rather curious that Afrikaner South Africans (who, from what I’ve heard, don’t start English until 8 or 9) were given precedence over Indians…
vijay
do you think, Indians are not given more importance for english teaching ? May be it is because of our own accent system than “American” as koreans do prefer (or completely depend on
)
Jonak
@ Vijay, I do not think they can even understand American accent as well. If I speak faster they always say “slow down/little slower’ please. It’s just the skin tone and nationality that mater for them which choosing English teachers. And it’s also a fact that not all Indians leaving abroad can speak good English.
Jon
Indians speak with strange accents – Not really the ideal English teacher. I’m in the USA, and I hate speaking to oversea operators.
jstele
You brag about Indians working smarter, not harder. But that is not really the case. The reason that Indians speak English was due to FORCED English education by the Brits. As a result, Indians had to learn English. And enough Indians under British rule learned English well enough to pass it on to the next generation. That is the same achievement as an American teaching English to other Americans. It’s not a big deal as you make it out to be. Koreans don’t really want to learn English from Indians as they don’t think the Indian accent is good to emulate. They prefer the American accent the most followed by British and other accents. Maybe if you offered your “advice” with a sense of humility, it would be taken more seriously. But you are just interested in showing off the “superiority” of India. If Koreans are going to have an accent in speaking English, why should they have an Indian accent? It’s not even considered a glamorous accent. Koreans don’t have to learn English. They can choose if they want to, but it really is not your business to tell them what to learn. Most Koreans don’t have to learn English at all.
Kumar
Know matter what accent of English u speak but make sure others understand u
Ryan Wong
Hi, I am from Singpore. Our education system dictates English as our business language and is taught as a 1st language since 1st day of school. Singapore, although once a British colony, is not forced by the Brits to learn English. It’s only after independence that current government slowly phased in the English stream where all the subjects are taught in English, except our mother tongue. This is for strategic purpose to given Singaporeans an edge to compete in the global market.
If you do not know, Singapore got no natural resources. Look at Singapore now, its a thriving city and world class financial hub. You cannot even see Singapore on the world map. Its that small. Try finding another nation without natural resources doing as well as Singapore. We are a multi-racial country comprising majority Chinese, then Malays and Indians.
Most Singaporeans can speak and write English, on top of our mother tongue and native dialects. The lower educated folks can speak some English or broken English. The English we spoke within the community in our regular conversation is not the standard English, its known as Singlish, which is a mixture of English, Chinese, Malay and Indian language or dialects. Of course when we write for business, we write in standard English. Higher educated folks can switch between Singlish and standard English. Singaporean do speak English with a strange accent, so in case you want to learn English, please do not come to Singapore. Just my 2 cents worth.
newyera
I have been to Korea, one thing I don’t understand is why Koreans are so obsessed with English.
You koreans speak one language throughout the the country (AFAIK), and you have solid economy and your own gigantic MNCs. You don’t have to learn English.
But we Indians have more than 16 different languages, in big cities like Bangalore, one guy doesn’t understand what the next guy is talking if they speak in their mother tongue, Since there is a huge immigrant population. So India has to have some common language to communicate, that is the main reason English is also an official language in India.
And most of the highly educated population works for Eastern companies, So we have to know English to survive. I wish India was like Korea.
haan but one thing… I never understood why Koreans work so hard and yet have so low productivity. The same work we Indians can do much faster and probably a white guy can do it in couple of hours…
Sumit Arora
Please do not compare korean indian indian with english language, and remove this Tag that Indian work smart and Korean Work Hard.
If Indians are Smart – in terms of what ? (Please do not talk here just because of specific people, Talk in General, Few people are good everywhere)
Koreans are Intelligent and smart.
Source :
I have worked with koreans, learnt their culture,language ,had korean food..and I was involved with work related activities.
Shanon King
Are you from India?
TheKoreaGuide
Yes, from Mumbai. I was in Korea in 2010 working as a software engineer.
The views and opinions expressed in the post above is based out of my personal experience and interactions while working in Korea.