Classes break down barriers
OLYMPIA, Wash. — Native Korean and English speakers at an Olympia retirement community used to have a difficult time communicating, a problem highlighted by formerly frayed feelings about placement of the nations' flags in the recreation room.
But now that they are learning each other's languages, the residents at Providence St. Francis House are respecting one another more, they say.
Marian Cunningham, who speaks English, lives on the third floor, where she said many Koreans live.
"I've been seeing them for three years, and I couldn't say a word to them," she said. "It gets so you're feeling lonely."
About 28 of the retirement community's 68 tenants are natives of Korea. Many don't speak much English, and few Americans knew Korean.
Apartment manager Randy Kinnamon said there is no open hostility among neighbors who speak different languages, but there also was little interaction among them.
"When I first got here, they kept to themselves," said Kinnamon, who arrived at the center about three years ago.
That began to change a few months ago, when one of the Korean tenants requested an English class at the retirement community, and an English-speaking resident requested a Korean class. Now, word by word, invisible barriers are breaking down at the St. Francis House Community Room.
"When they weren't taking the class, all they could do is just smile at each other," said Sun Young Pak, supervisor of Armstrong Home Care, which provides assistance for some seniors at the retirement home.
The two-hour classes are held in rooms that are next to each other. During 15-minute breaks, the seniors share coffee, cake and conversation.
"Now they can say 'Hi' and say something to each other," Pak said.
Pak, whose clients include seniors who are native speakers of many languages, said she thinks the biggest needs for foreign-born seniors are English and driving skills.
"And because they don't speak English, they're afraid to take the driving test," she said.
Pak's employer, Armstrong Home Care, paid for the classes after tenant Dong Son Lee asked if an English teacher could be brought into the building.
"He wanted it here because most people here don't drive," said home-care worker Sun Cha Facer, who was translating for Lee.
The apartments, part of a housing program affiliated with the Providence Health System, aren't marketed toward people of any particular nationality, but many of the Korean seniors know one another from church or by word-of-mouth, Kinnamon said.
Kinnamon helps with the cultural exchange. Calendars posted throughout the halls feature words in Korean and English. He asked the Korean seniors to host their neighbors for an open house.
"Once a quarter, I bring in a translator for Korean residents, and they bring up things like, 'Hey, Randy, we'd like an English class,"' he said.
Kinnamon said the language and cultural barriers have caused some frostiness among neighbors.The closest the cultures came to clashing was about a year and a half ago, when some residents hung a U.S. flag in the recreation room, and the Korean seniors brought in a Korean flag."I said, 'No, you're proud of where you came from, and they're just proud of where they came from, too,'" Kinnamon said. "Then they felt better about it."Today, both flagpoles sit in the recreation room where English as a Second Language teacher Young Kim animatedly ran the Korean seniors through the paces of English phrases."Do you love your wife?" she asked the men over and over, not relenting until they responded: "Yes, I love my wife," although one man jokingly shook his head no.The Korean seniors requested the class so they could better navigate the post office, pharmacy and doctor's office, Kim said."Answering the phone can be a scary thing," Kim said during a class break."We teach them everything. They want to learn everything, going to a post office or the bank. 'How are you?' 'What's your job?' 'How are your children?"'In the next room, Korean conversation teacher Liz Fairfield played the children's song "Ten Little Indians" and translated to Korean so her English-speaking students could learn to count in Korean."I can't even explain what a difference it has been," said Cunningham, one of Fairfield's students. "Now I can say, 'How are you?"'Pak said having English-speakers take the class has helped ease the tensions that sometimes crop up with neighbors."Sometimes Koreans cook foods that are smelly to Americans. They don't complain now because they can understand the different cultures," Pak said.Cunningham said she was one of the first residents to try a different language in the halls."The first time I did it, they laughed and laughed and said, 'She can do it!"' Cunningham said. "They corrected me, but now I say, 'An nyong haseyo?"' An nyong haseyo is a greeting in Korean.
With each nationality working on the other's language, the apartments are a nicer place to live, residents said."It's friendlier in here," said Patricia Ryan, another resident who is learning Korean. "The Asians and Korean people are mingling with the rest of the building, the rest of the neighbors. It was a godsend."Kinnamon hopes it's the start of building a community."People are saying, 'Hey, I know these people now,'" Kinnamon said. "In my universe, it's huge."
