A basketball player, golfer and state champion debater while in high school at Poland Regional High, Devin Conway, resident of Poland Spring and the world in general, is getting the itch again. He’s traveled extensively over the last four years, while going to college, including an eye-opening one-year stint in the beautiful country of South Korea as an English teacher, complete with swearing 7-year-olds and chicken feet appetizers. But he’s been back home for a few months and the road is again calling. 

Age: 23

Hometown: Poland

Any nickname you’d be embarrassed to tell us about? When I taught in Korea, my students called me Devil Teacher, but I like to think that’s only because Devin and Devil are spelled so similarly. At least that’s what I told myself. I’ve got a few more from high school basketball and college, but I’m not sure any are fit to print.

What do you consider your areas of expertise? I’m not sure I would consider myself an expert on any one thing in particular. I’ve done a lot of traveling, so I’ve become quite adept at learning how to get around foreign cities and haggle in languages I only know 10-20 words of. In Thailand, I bought souvenirs for myself, my family and my girlfriend for about 5 dollars total. I only knew how to say yes, no and thank you, count to 100 and say “Please make it cheaper.” My philosophy degree has also endowed upon me a fair bit of somewhat obscure knowledge. I could talk your ear off about German idealism or existentialism, but I’m not sure that you would want me to.

You spent a year teaching in South Korea. Are the kids there like American kids? Before I went, I was told to be prepared for a bunch of silent kids who would just stare at me and barely even ask questions. But oh, how misguided that was. There was about a 2-3 week grace period where it held true, but my problems quickly changed from convincing the students to speak to getting a word in myself. In the end, kids are kids regardless of where in the world you are, for better and for worse. I had one interesting day with a class of 7-year-olds who somehow learned a few choice words. As it turns out, teaching a small child who doesn’t speak English how inappropriate it is to shout the f word in school is not an easy task.

The recent military action against South Korea by North Korea is troubling. Are the South Koreans used to this kind of tension and what do you predict? I was there when the North Koreans sunk the Cheonan, a South Korean destroyer. At the time, the international media made quite a big deal out of it, but the Koreans I spoke to never seemed even remotely concerned. People seemed to be accustomed to this sort of thing, and just saw it as North Korean posturing. I think South Koreans give the North more credit than Americans do because they are neighbors and have a great deal in common with them. When I asked my students about North Korea, they generally expressed the sentiment that it was part of the same country, just with a different government. Being so far away and really not knowing much about that part of the world, Americans are more ready to accept that the North Korean government is actually crazy and would thus be willing to start a war. South Koreans I spoke with there, on the other hand, think that Kim Jong-Il and his sons aren’t really irrational enough to believe that starting a war would actually serve their interests.

South Korea wouldn’t be on every tourists’ Top 5. Is it friendly? Beautiful? Would you recommend it when tensions die down? Korea is definitely a wonderful and underrated country. The people are all friendly and always helpful. There are a lot of foreigners who live and work there as teachers or in the military, so Koreans are very understanding of your confusion about customs and your language deficiencies. Strangers will go out of their way to help you get around, teach you how to say hello, as well as how to eat and, of course, drink like a Korean. They take neither of those last two lightly. The scenery is often breathtaking too. Buddhist temples are nestled into the mountains all across the countryside, always in beautiful places with incredible views. When I first got there, I spent a lot of time hiking in the mountains that surrounded Daegu and would often stumble across them just by accident. So yes, I would definitely recommend taking some time to see Korea if you’re planning a trip to East Asia. It’s a beautiful country populated by kind, helpful people.

Craziest food you tried? Best food? I was tricked into eating chicken feet once, which was not a pleasant experience. It had the most bizarre texture, all skin and bone and cartilage, but it’s popular there for some reason. Another, which sounds horrible but was actually delicious, was called Soondae. Basically, they take a pig intestine and fill it with noodles and pigs’ blood and steam it up. It took some serious soul-searching before I managed to work up the nerve to try it, but when I did it turned out to be one of my favorite foods. I once brought some into a class to celebrate the end of the semester and my students went crazy for it. Korean and American kids have a lot in common, but I’m not sure that pig blood sausage would have the same effect at an elementary school here.

The best food has to be the street food though. There are stands along the sides of the roads and in the markets that sell all sorts of different foods. Rice cake, or tteok (pronounced like “duck”), is very common in a lot of these dishes. Tteok boki, which you can get almost anywhere at any time of day, quickly became one of my favorites. It’s basically a bunch of cylindrical rice cakes in a sweet, very spicy sauce. As with almost all Korean food, it took a little while to get used to the heat, but once I did, it quickly became a staple of my diet.

And of course, any discussion of Korean food has to include kimchi: spicy fermented cabbage. It’s served with every Korean meal, breakfast, lunch and dinner, and has an astonishing number of variants. Nearly every Korean family makes their own kimchi by fermenting it over the winter in giant clay pots, and basically every Korean person thinks their mom’s kimchi is the best in the world. I really just liked all of it.

You’ve traveled extensively. Where do you want to go next? That’s a tough one because there are just so many places I would love to go and so little time and money available to see them. South America is definitely near the top of the list because it’s so diverse in every way, people, traditions, food, geography. I would love to just spend a month or two backpacking around, hitting the beaches in Brazil, hiking in Peru, scuba diving in the Galapagos. It would be amazing. I’d also love to do another trip to Europe, and Eastern Europe in particular. When I studied abroad, I mostly stuck to Western Europe and I feel like I missed out on a whole different side of the continent (both literally and figuratively). China, Japan and India are also places I’d love to go since I didn’t have the time to get there while I was teaching in Korea. I want to do a lot more traveling over the course of my life, so I’m hoping to make it to all these places and more.

Where do you see yourself in 10 years? I’m applying to law school at the moment, where I intend to concentrate in International Law. I would love to be working at the International Court of Justice or the International Criminal Court, both of which are in the Hague, in 10 years time. I believe very strongly in the overriding importance of human rights and in the necessity of a strong, robust system of international law to assure that countries uphold their obligations to each other and to their own citizens. Such a system could, if it can attain a status of significant authority, lend more legitimacy to treaties like the Geneva Conventions and drastically decrease the number of human rights abuses across the world. So that’s something that I would love to be involved in, and would certainly give me ample opportunity to see the world and make a difference in it.

Won’t you miss Poland, Maine? I always miss Poland and the people here any time I’m gone, but for me right now, the world’s too big to stay in any one place for too long. I’ve been back home for a couple months now, but I am certainly getting the itch to go find my way somewhere new. My hometown will always have a special place in my heart though.