Honest review of my recruiter

Hello one and all. I thought I'd take the time to give my honest review of my recruiter: Alistair Wery of Korean Horizons.

Let me give you a bit of a background of myself:

I left Korea in March 2013 feeling very negative about Korea. I was honestly thinking of not coming back. Things at my institute were getting worse--and so was my health. I desperately needed a break.

While I was home, after resting/recovering for about a month and traveling with dad for 3 weeks (and then recovering from that), I decided that I wanted to go overseas again, I just didn't know where. Out of all of my chosen options, Korea was the best choice. I still wasn't thinking very seriously of returning though. Then I decided to read a few websites from different recruiters. They all promised the same thing. I ended up at www.gooverseas.com to check out the different reviews people have left.

Then I saw it.

A recruiter with a 95% approval rate. And this from over 90 reviews. I skimmed them. The only negative comment I saw was along the lines of: "he was just doing his job." Sounds pretty neutral to me. I know people (myself included) who didn't exactly have the best experiences in Korea. Even those who loved it have something negative to say. How can it be that no one had anything actually negative to say?

I decided to find out for myself.

I went to his website (www.koreanhorizons.com). I was impressed with the straight-forward honesty I met. I know Korea isn't perfect (what country in the world is?), but I also know that sugar-coating is lying. Please spare me the b.s. and we will have a better chance of getting along. That website made me want to try returning to Korea. I filled out the application form, sent in everything they wanted, and lo and behold: I'm currently living my 1st day of teaching in the Korean public school system.

Alistair was very helpful and straightforward through the entire process. He told me things as they were and gave me very practical tips. There were times when he was very quiet and didn't contact me, but that was because he had nothing to update. When he did have something new to inform, he did so immediately. Alistair seemed very distant and a little too professional during the process (i.e. I thought he didn't like me), but he proved himself to be a likable guy who can smile and laugh--just before I arrived to Korea. I probably owe passing the EPIK interview to him, considering his mock-interview turned out to be much more stressful than how my actual EPIK interview was. I'm very grateful for that.

He was an excellent host. He picked us up at the airport and brought us under his wing. He put us up in a guesthouse for the night, took us out for dinner and breakfast, brought us back to the airport the next morning to meet the EPIK crew and they took it from there. As we were waiting to leave for orientation, Alistair gave each of us a large welcome packet including the following:

a Korean-English dictionary

a Lonely Planet guidebook to Korea

a Lonely Planet Korean phrasebook and dictionary

an ESL textbook

a Korea tourist map + 2 maps on your respective area (mine is Gangwon Province)

a guesthouse info book.

A book about Korean cuisine

 a book about Korea's temple-stay program (spending the night in a Buddhist temple and participating in their different activities)

Did I mention that we didn't have to pay 1 penny for any of this? EVERYTHING (books, 1-night stay in guesthouse, dinner, breakfast, picking us up, taking us to the airport, advice, tips, etc.) came from Alistair. All this and he still wants to keep in contact with each one of us. This is a man who genuinely cares about his job AND his recruits.

So here it is, my honest, no-bull review of my recruiter. I honestly recommend any and all who want to teach in Korea--and are serious about it--to talk to Alistair. I can assure you, you will be in the best of (recruiter) hands.

Need I say more?