I sat and watched Brandon being disciplined by Pi Seon-u (our principal). I felt dirty, watching it. I always do. It's not really that bad, I tell myself. It's the way things are done here. Mr Pi makes Brandon hold a ream of photocopy paper on his hands, outstretched.
What I'm seeing is identical to the sorts of hazing exercises that were so common in basic training, in the US Army. You hold out your arms, palms downward, straight in front of you. Your M16 sits on top. It's not really that heavy, you tell yourself. And it's not. But holding it there for more than half a minute or so is incredibly difficult. Try it sometime. It takes discipline, and it hurts the outstretched muscles in the arms and in the back of your hands.
Brandon holds it. Drops it. Picks it up and holds it again. Mr Pi lectures him in soft tones. I don't understand what's being said, but it's easy to imagine. Behave. Self-discipline. Don't disappoint. Work hard. What would your parents think? Do you want to end up a failure?
Brandon is such an intelligent and bright-spirited boy. A fifth-grader, I think… he was at LinguaForum, before coming to Hellbridge. But he's the kind of boy that gives the term "bouncing off the walls" literal resonance. In the US, he would be labeled ADHD and would be strung out on ritalin. Anyway… it's easy for me to imagine what he might have done to antagonize his teacher – I sent him out of my classroom more than once, myself, back when I had him at LF.
And I wonder. Is it possible to learn discipline, for me, at this late age in life? I had a singularly undisciplined childhood, and despite that, I still play the same sorts of lecture scripts in my head. Not that they're successful. Not that they impart any kind of self-discipline. But they're there.
Can I, now, learn discipline? I feel guilty that I don't have it, when I watch someone like Brandon being disciplined. Disciplined.
Discipline.
Can I look at it from a Foucauldian perspective, theoretically, and still continue to believe that it has value for the individual? Can I see the cruelty of it, with children, and still believe that it could have value, for me? It seems so.
I think it might be the case that I'm sticking it out at Hellbridge because of this burning quest for discipline. Those piles of papers to correct… they impart discipline. I've enrolled myself in a new sort of psychic boot camp.
Discipline.
Korean culture approaches almost all collective cultural pursuits (schooling, work, even social gatherings) in a way that Americans reserve for boot camp: social spaces provide a means to impart the collective discipline on the individual. And the individual is there to soak it up.
Falling down is common. And the response is supposed to be: pick yourself up, brush yourself off, and soldier on. Push hard, fail hard, push some more.
Not everyone picks up and soldiers on. And the shame of failing… of not picking up… is excruciating for the individual. The suicide rate is very high in Korea, especially among students. A 10-year-old boy was in the news, recently; he committed suicide over academic pressures. A 10-year-old! Kids like Brandon.
Koreans shake their heads, feeling sadness and sympathy. Even empathy, I'm sure. But they never question the basic premise: the failure belongs to the individual, the success, to the collective. Not one Korean whom I overheard discussing it thought to question if the boy's parents might not have been doing a perfectly adequate job, in placing such pressures on him, or thought to wonder if the academic system here bears some responsibility.
If Brandon turns up dead tomorrow, what will people say? What will they believe? What will I feel?Would I be complicit, because I've watched Mr Pi disciplining him from the corner of my eye, with a disturbing mixture of distaste and envy? Yes, envy: that I had such strength of spirit. To fall down, pick up, and soldier on.
Discipline.