Saturday, August 14, 2010

What the ... health superiority complex?

Talking about being sick in South Korea reminded me of something. have you ever have a friend who would act as if they were superior than you for one reason or another? I had one, a fellow Canuck

If you got sick a couple of times it would be lorded over you. "You get sick easily. I don't." If you and others had been sick, even once, in a period of time you would hear "I guess I am healthier than you guys." or "I am tougher than you guys." You might be sick once in 6-7 months and she would bring up every time you had been sick in the last 5+ years. All the while going on about how she rarely if ever got sick.

One thing to keep in mind is that when you are working with kids it is a lot easier to catch something than working with adults. Their hygiene is dodgey at best. Hell, you can say the same about a lot of Korean adults.

Parents send the kids to school and hagwons even if they are feverish and hacking up a lung. Koreans never seem to cover their mouths when they cough or sneeze. They don't usually wash their hands after using the bathroom. As I mentioned before, one of the nice things to come out of swine flu is that Koreans were TAUGHT how to wash the hands and told to wash after eating and using the bathroom. unfortunately once the hype over the illness died down so did the attention to hygiene. I taught kids and my "friend" taught University students.

Of course she was also ignoring reality. She was conveniently forgetting the times she was sick. The times you listened to her whine about being sick. How she was dieing. Not once throwing her bullshit back in her face. For some reason I put up with it. Mind you, we aren't friends anymore.

Not having someone go off like that anymore is nice. It is something I have noticed in the last couple of days. No one seemed to take pleasure in my being sick and going on and on about how healthy they are.

13 comments:

  1. Yeah, she had issues all right. I remember once she slipped on a curb getting into a cab, and when you moved to help her up she snapped "Leave me alone!" It's like she could not accept help at all, as that would be admitting a terrible weakness of some kind.

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  2. for future reference the present continuous form of "lie" and "die" is "lying" and "dying". Not to be a grammar nazi or anything-- just saying-- since you are supposed to employed as an English teacher...

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  3. Thanks for the correction ... and by the way I am not employed as an English teacher. At least not right now.

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  4. When I was back in Korea last September I was in a shop and I heard that "hawwwwkkkkk" sound behind me , I spun around and gave the shop boy the death glare and he spat into a tissue. Ok, that's a little better. I noticed on the public announcement posters on the bus there was ZERO mention of spitting, not just for the sake of swine flu but for TB which Korea still has a high rate of. By November spitting was back in full force. I think Korea lost a golden opportunity right there.

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  5. That is a strange thing to have a superiority complex over. Kind of funny too. Next time I meet a sick person, I'm going to call them a pussy.

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  6. Yep, some people forget what to censor what exits from their mouth...sounds like a case of "help I'm talking and I can't shut up".

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  7. Mr P.

    Yeah, they definitely missed an opportunity to get people to be more hygienic. The spitting ... just on a hygiene level is disgusting.

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  8. 3gyupsal

    I always thought it was strange but I ignored it for as long as I could. She was a tie to home.

    Health, memory (and hers was NOT as great as she thought it was), pretty much anything that would make her look better than everyone else.

    Stig was there for the memory BS at Costco.

    There are reasons why her and I aren't friends anymore and that is part of it.

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  9. IG

    She is one of those type of people that will try to pawn off being bitchy as being blunt.

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  10. Stig correct me if I am wrong but after saying leave me alone did she not say "Don't fucking touch me?" or was that another time she fell?

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  11. Mook of the week submission:
    that older guy (as in there are lots of them) on the bike with the bell that is constantly ringing riding down busy sidewalks.

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  12. Now THAT is a great addition. I have no pics of one though. :(

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