An Open Letter to South Korean President Moon Jae-In on the 2017 E2 Visa Crisis

I commiserate with these people that are getting deportation orders and bans from Korea.  It makes sense for someone to have followed the directions they were given by their employer to get their visa.  Sending them out to get it done properly would seem to be more of an appropriate response in my opinion.

However, if that letter is real it's good it got posted here to be critiqued.  Ever hear of being succinct and sticking to key issues? That letter sounds like a young person complaining to their family and friends and really trying to garner sympathy points.  I think you're hoping with those deep ties to the community you mentioned (such as with the people at your GS 25) the powers that be are going to pause and think "this guy isn't just some foreigner getting lit in Itaewon, he's really tried to fit in.  And trying the old. "Well, what about all those scammers from other countries that get to stay?" is just whiny.  Unless, you can provide details I'm going to call BS on that point anyway. 

How your time in Korea was going is irrelevant to the fact the visas were wrong.  What country is it where an illegal immigrant would get to stay because they said they're really enjoying themselves? 

Wow, does anyone remember back when trolling used be an art-form?  This is poor trolling.  Please don't send it, if you're actually serious.  The document reads like a 7th graders essay.  All the while you boast about how educated you are and 'brain drain'.  What a joke.

With his anti-gay comments about the military and citizens, who knows if he'll be accepting of interracial relationships

Mixed puppies are ok, but I don't think mixed relationships are ok with our new president.

I think most of the populous, including South Korea, prefer rare and "pretty" breeds over mutts.

At the same time, wasn't there some statistic out there about how Korea had crazy plastic surgery for their dogs too?  Clipping ears, altering tails, etc, just so their dogs look "prettier".

http://kotaku.com/in-south-korea-dogs-are-getting-plastic-surgery-1721711793

Camron would have already been married to a Korean girl so he could have been on an F-7 visa and he would have had 3 kids by now.   

Camden....Camron whatever LOL

Please don't send it, if you're actually serious.  The document reads like a 7th graders essay.

If anyone wrote higher than the middle school level, who in Korea would ever attempt to translate it?  It makes sense that writing should be "dumbed down" for the sake of clear understanding here.

Inversely, do you think most Americans would be watching the news on T.V. if the anchors were speaking at post-graduate university level English?  People would change the channel within seconds.  That's why all the media and news stations speak at the middle school English level because it gets the most coverage of understanding.

How do you think Trump won?  He spoke at a dumb enough level that he became the only candidate that "most" of America could coherently understand and connect with.  Hillary just bombarded people with big numbers, statistics and facts, and confused half of America.  Highly educated people look at Trump and just get sick of hearing him talk like the way he does.

If foreigners wanted to "connect" with Koreans for a typical conversation and discuss problems, we HAVE to dumb things down to an "understandable" level of English.  That's just the reality.  Unless someone spent like 20 years in America or something and graduated university overseas, its unlikely that any "college level" English conversation would be clearly understood.  Sure, its not impossible, but still HIGHLY unlikely.

It's not that the writing in the letter is dumb in terms of ability.  It's that it has an immature theme and attitude.  The unfortunate fact is he got put on the wrong visa.  Instead of understanding that that certainly needs to be addressed, even if he's not to blame, he triesto  invoke sentiment based on him liking it here and having a girlfriend.  That's the childish part. I think he shouldn't be barred from a future return, but trying to get people to pity his situation is where the lack of maturity is revealed. 

The Op brings up a good point regardless of if he is trolling or not.  Most of us expats here contribute to society more than we cause detriment.  Most of us are college educated, we are for the most part gainfully employed and contribute to the economy, we may innovate after living here for some time if we go to grad school/work outside of the education system here, etc.

Yeah.  A few of us drink our faces off every weekend but that is about all we do that is bad.

It doesn't matter if you are a Korean or a foreigner but it seems like both groups sometimes think of the expat community negatively.  The South Koreans are for the most part bringing in foreigners in the right manner.  Live in Thailand for 2 months.  I love the Thai nationals and they are awesome but they have an expat problem.  I had never seen such a vile group of villainy until I kicked it in Thailand.  And this comes from a person unopposed to someone participating in the vices of the night.

I think most of you homies are decent blokes.  I am sometimes annoyed by you HBC hipsters with your hipster swag but I even like you all too.

How do I delete someone else's post?

Seriously this sounds like a troll post and OP has yet to give a rebuttal to all those who are calling OP.  Probably just a public school noob bored at work.

Hey could you ask to untether the visas to employers while your at it?    How about an American town.  We have korea town so it's only fair. 

Forget it, Jake. It's Americatown.

I commiserate with these people that are getting deportation orders and bans from Korea. 

yeah. My sympathies too.


the deciding factors always seem to be so random and unfair.


Has anyone ever been ejected for actually relevant reasons? Being a good teacher or not never seems to have much to do with it.

If Park Geun Hye were president you lefties would be blaming her for the deportations, but under a lefty president you assume "oh, he doesn't know, if he knew he'd help."

I like how he included himself among the most educated foreigners with his liberal arts degree from a Canadian university.

Instead of writing an OPEN letter to the prez he or she should be marching right into immigration and applying for the correct visa.  IF the OP has the 2 degrees they claim to, they should easily qualify for the E7 needed to teach beyond conversational English permitted on the E2. 

Why wait and see if Immigration gets around to picking on his/her school next or soon. Fill out the application for changing status and get that little piece of paper that says you have applied and you are good to go while your application is pending.. Letters to the government aren't going to help.  Everyone on an E2 that could get an E7 and has not, should be doing it right now.. WTH. why wait and see if they can F you over next.  Proactive be proactive. If you wait to be reactive, its too late. They will just hand you something you cant really understand and say sign it and get out..

Instead of writing an OPEN letter to the prez he or she should be marching right into immigration and applying for the correct visa.  IF the OP has the 2 degrees they claim to, they should easily qualify for the E7 needed to teach beyond conversational English permitted on the E2. 

Why wait and see if Immigration gets around to picking on his/her school next or soon. Fill out the application for changing status and get that little piece of paper that says you have applied and you are good to go while your application is pending.. Letters to the government aren't going to help.  Everyone on an E2 that could get an E7 and has not, should be doing it right now.. WTH. why wait and see if they can F you over next.  Proactive be proactive. If you wait to be reactive, its too late. They will just hand you something you cant really understand and say sign it and get out..

In this case....if it's about that CBC school, they weren't allowed to just "switch" to the correct visa.  Immigration this time wanted to make examples of them I guess and just gave them an immediate deportation notice.  Immigration was not kind to these foreigners at all in this case.  Which is funny because if know of people who have gotten arrested for fighting and they have been given second chances to avoid deportation.  So it all depends on the Immigration department in your area.  Not all immigration departments sing the same song.  The Suwon district might be more strict on trying to deport foreigners that misunderstand the visa system while the North Seoul region might be a little more understanding to a foreigners mistake. 

So....OP are you ever going to response to this thread!?!?!?  (*cough troll *cough *cough)

OP should talk to their local government representative.

Unfortunately OP can't speak Korean. So it might be hard to communicate his feelings to his local representative. He can however read hangul. So maybe they can write messages to each other.

This letter is so cringe-y it hurts. It sounds like it was written by a 16 year old after taking a persuasive essay writing class for the first time. After the first few lines, I thought it had to be someone who is very new to Korea. He's been here a few years much to my chagrin.  I don't know what he thinks this will accomplish but, please don't. My favorite is the part where he calls the government incompetent.  Yes, call them names, that'll get them to react favorably!