A memoir of finding balance and renewal in an alien culture—South Korea.

Mourning the end of her 15-year marriage to betrayal and infidelity, Cheryl Pallant seized on an opportunity to get away from the pain that had taken over her life in Virginia—7,000 miles away. She accepted the offer of a job teaching English and American culture from a university she had never heard of in an unfamiliar city in a country she associated with Hyundai, Samsung, and a war featured on M*A*S*H. With no images of its landscape or architecture, and no knowledge of its language, history, food, or culture, she landed in South Korea.

In GINSENG TANGO, Cheryl Pallant recounts her transformative year as a Professor at Keimyung University and a meegok navigating everyday life in Daegu, South Korea. With immediacy and humor, Pallant shares the challenges of figuring out how to operate a washing machine, shop for groceries, and communicate with gestures without offending anyone—and what to order in a restaurant (besides kimchi—a breakfast, lunch, and dinner staple) without aggravating her stomach. She shares her adventures in public bathing and rock climbing; her involvement in a tango community, shamanism, and acupuncture; and her introductions to Korean protocols and customs, from bowing in respect to superiors (including teachers) to the national celebration of Children’s Day. Through her experiences, both thrilling and frightening, she came to grasp South Korea’s contradictions and struggles, and grow in admiration and affection for its people.

Opening a window into a country caught between traditions and ideologies, GINSENG TANGO reveals:

• The patriarchies and hierarchies that dominate South Korea—socially and professionally.
• South Korea’s impoverished past and ongoing industrial revolution—and why the ability to speak and write English is an extremely valuable business asset.
• The tense relationship between the two Koreas—and why many South Koreans fear and loath North Korea.

As U.S. relations with North Korea remain headline news, Cheryl Pallant offers a timely, personal guide to understanding Korea’s challenges, complexities, and resilience.

Praise

“Her narrative weaves, like dancers, in and out of the modern, the ancient, the mystical and boilerplate reality of life in today’s Korea…In Ginseng Tango, Pallant takes the reader into a place most of us haven’t seen and would be challenged to describe if we did.” —Richmond Magazine

Read the Prologue here

About the Author

Cheryl Pallant is a prolific writer, poet, dancer, energy healer, and professor. She has traveled in wide-ranging countries, including Indonesia, Japan, Singapore, Morocco, Hungary, and Slovakia, and has taught English in Malaysia and Hong Kong, as well as South Korea. She currently teaches creative writing and dance at the University of Richmond near her home in Virginia and leads workshops throughout the U.S. and abroad.

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