A Visit to Wellington College

Result of writing bits and bits from time to time after the Vision Trip...

A Visit to Wellington College

          Beautiful green plain stretching to meet the end of the clear blue sky, sheep and cows here and there, merrily enjoying themselves, and a group of birds flying as if to boast their freedom was what England showed me on the way to Wellington College, on the second day of the vision trip. We went to Wellington College after a pleasant tour around Oxford, and we were expecting the tour of Wellington to be as much joyful. However, the tour to Wellington gave me more of a lingering feeling of anxiety, instead of a cheerful surprise.

Although I knew that Wellington College was one of the most prestigious high schools in England, I, and probably most of my friends, were sincerely awed by the size and quality of Wellington. However, there was one more thing that awed me, that left me in sheer admiration; the students there were all handsome and pretty in so much mature way. Boys, tall boys, almost 190cm tall, with beards and an adult-like look in their faces, with thick eyebrows, big eyes, tall nose. Girls, also tall girls, with a womanly shaped body, and the same thing like the boys for their face shapes. – Well, every one of them were very close to our, Koreans’, standard of ideal beauty. When I looked at me, and my friends, and our teachers after seeing these ‘attractive’ ‘western’ students, I felt - ‘ashamed’. I was ashamed of myself and my friends because, well, we looked so childish compared to the mature-looking western students. All the time during the tour, I could not help myself staring at those western kids, and it got to the extent where it felt like those kids were condescending when talking to us, and I felt inferior towards them. And all the while, I was envious of their attractive appearances, hating Korea’s extreme lookism at the same time. It got worse when I realized that I had to compete with them in foreign universities; I felt miserable.

But suddenly, I stopped. Then I wondered, ‘Why am I -?’ Why was I comparing these things with them? What am I doing? I realized how stupid I was – feeling miserable because somebody else looked handsome? Then, I could think straight. Those white, big-nosed hairy big boys are what western people look like. Us, the proud Asians look like the way I look. It’s just a difference of how fast your body grows up. No need to care. Done. Well, this time, I felt ashamed for a totally different reason.

Having come back from the vision trip, I talked to my friends about what I felt at Wellington College, and to my surprise, he told things that I believe are notable, and very fit for what I am trying to say.

“So when we went to Wellington, these students came to talk to us, and everybody was like wow they look so handsome and pretty. But what I think is that these reactions show how much we are tainted by this way of thinking of western people as superior. If you think of it, we say someone is handsome when that person resembles people from western countries. In the same nature, even though KMLA has its own unique merits and strong points, and the same for Wellington, everybody’s like KMLA sucks and Wellington rocks. Personally, I think if Wellington students came to KMLA, they will also be impressed by our traditional buildings and stuff. And it’s real sad cause most people don’t have this pride for our traditional stuff but instead they go looking for these western culture things. Of course, it’s understandable cause the medias all show us cool things from western culture like Hollywood movies and stuff, but ……….”     - (recorded, then translated)