It Takes a Village

I figured it would be a good idea to dedicate a blog entry to showcasing the grounds of the Gyeonggi English Village (hereinafter referred to as EV). EV is located in Paju, which is a suburb of Seoul, about 40 minutes away via the 2200 bus. There are other ways to get to Seoul, but they’ll take a lot longer.

These pictures are in no way meant to give you an idea of what it looks like in South Korea. EV was built to resemble buildings that you might see somewhere in England. Due to this fact, and considering that there probably around 80+ English-speaking foreigners working here, most days I don’t feel like I even live in a foreign country. It is a gated community sitting atop some of the highest of Paju’s rolling hills, surrounded by lush greenery and small pockets of art galleries and restaurants.

The campus includes several classroom buildings with computer labs, a sports complex, a cafeteria, an English Pub, Italian restaurant, fried chicken joint, bakery, coffee and ice cream shop, City Hall, Concert Hall, Exhibition Hall, dorm-style hotels for visiting students, and apartment-style housing for the teachers. There is also a bank, post office, and convenience store, which serve double-duty as both fully-functional operations and learning experiences for the students and other visitors.

Interestingly enough, EV is also used quite frequently to film commercials, movies, and music videos. There have already been quite a few film crews on site over the past four weeks that I’ve been here. In several pictures in the slideshow below, you’ll see some fake snow/bubbles on the set…they were supposedly shooting a laundry detergent commercial. I was able to take quite a few pictures before one of the people on set yelled, “No photo, no photo!” But, I just went to a different side of the set, or took pictures through a window to get shots of the set. In some other photos, it looked like they were shooting a wedding send-off for a car commercial. The “bride” is supposed to be some famous Korean model, but of course, none of us knew who she was. (I almost never know who any of the famous American people are, let alone the Korean ones! LOL)

Apparently, a lot of companies shoot here because this is one of the few places in Korea that you can shoot something with English or European style backdrops and architecture, without having to build a set from scratch. The funny thing is, there’s almost nowhere in either of these places where you’ll find only Koreans…so, I have made myself available for cameo appearances…you know, for diversity’s sake. No one has approached me to be an extra on their set just yet, but if they do, you’ll be the first to know!

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