Blueshoe in Daegu

Annoyed

2007-05-11T21:49:00.000+09:00

I should really try to write something positive someday. I guess people don't carry their good days around like they do their bad ones. I've just been really frustrated and annoyed the past few days. Not a whole lot has happened to make me feel this way. I do know what some of it relates to but I should be less annoyed or not feel as bad as I do.

I was in the hospital last week for some minor procedure. Even though, I'd read the procedure was supposed to be relatively minor and quick healing, it hasn't been what I'd thought it would be. It was nothing life-threatening so no one needs to be worried not that anyone reads this thing on a regular basis anymore (or ever did). There's just been this consistent uncomfort from it for the past few week and it's been worse since Tuesday. I mean it's not like I'm in constant pain and even a day of it would be fine but it's just always there and doesn't feel right and I'm worried it's not going to feel right again. I don't know if this is the main cause of it all but it's definitely aggravating everything else.

Then there are issues with my job (not that there haven't always been issues). I quit my job 6 weeks ago today. I owed them 8 weeks notice and will be giving them about 9 to just end the month. The problem is that my replacement who was scheduled to come on June 1st, has suddenly decided she won't be coming until June 17th or something. So my school is pressuring me to stay until at least the 15th. I've considered it and the idea just sickens me. I don't think I should've had to give 11+ weeks notice for some crappy hagwon job. I thought 8 weeks was absurd enough. The only nice thing is that I had my departure date all lined up in advance. May 12th, I think it was. It was somehow pushed back (since I was procrastinating about it, plus I wanted them to fulfill their obligations to me before I told them I would be leaving in 8 weeks).

It's just all such fucking crap. The school is trying to convince me that it's my obligation to stay on until a replacement comes. My plans are still all up in the air so I don't actually know what I will do. It may come as a great surprise to some but I'm considering staying in Korea and signing yet another contract. There are a few reasons for it but I'll get to them later. Anyways, if I take one job they'd need me to start training on May 28th (they've actually delayed it by one week just for me) so I definitely couldn't stay until June 15th with that job. Another job, I'd told them I would start in July but I wanted to have a whole month off before I were to go there. So this would fuck that plan up. I'm just worried about what my boss will do if I continue to say no.

In order to get another job, I'd need a letter of release which I guess he isn't actually obligated to give me. So he could threaten to withhold that. His representative (he has a tenuous grasp of English at best) told me that since I won't be paid until the 10th anyways, I should just stay until the 15th to make sure I get it. I don't know if she was just unclear on things or whether that's what my boss actually told her. Anyways, there's probably a high likelihood that my replacement is going to flake out entirely. I don't know what it would be exactly but I wouldn't be at all surprised if she just delayed and delayed and then finally decided against it all. So should I agree to stay on until the replacement or a replacement finally got there, I may be waiting a long long time.

Probably most upsetting of all though is my impending birthday. It's not that I mind getting older. I've already begun thinking of myself as being 25 and have to remind myself that I am 24. It's more the fact that it's looking to be another crap birthday. I haven't really celebrated my birthday since 1992. I mean I've gone out for dinner with my parents or whatever but it was never an event and I never wanted it to be. I've also always kind of been in a transitory state. My birthday is 3 weeks away I guess and this time I don't know where I'll be the next day or what I will do the next month or week. If I leave Swaton when I want to leave, I'm probably not going to have a place to live (which is always fun). Most the other times, I've usually just arrived somewhere and am on that side of the transition.

It seems certain that I will spend a 3rd birthday in Daegu, a city where I was certain I'd only spend one. The first one, with less than 2 months here, with a visit from my parents and that was pretty much it. I don't remember if they even knew it was birthday at work. I would say probably not since I don't remember anything being done for me but had they known they probably wouldn't have done anything anyways.

The second one I spent with some friends who I thought knew me well enough to know when my birthday was. Luckily it came up somehow the night before so I knew better than to expect much from the next day. I'd also just returned to Korea maybe 5 days before. I wasn't really upset by it, I mean I was, but it was mostly just disappointment.

This year, all the people that I know, I've basically known for 5 months at the most. One guy I met over a year ago now but was basically just an IM buddy for most of that time. The person who's probably been there for me the most since I've come back to Korea will not be there. She's leaving the country for a year and she's leaving right on my birthday. So in all likelihood, I'm probably going to be sad on my birthday and if I have to go into work that day on top on that I just don't know what I'm going to do.

Then of course, the hot sticky summer is looming and the only heat relief my apartment has is to open the windows. They promised me an air conditioner but of course never delivered on it. Opening the windows however seems to just be an invitation for hundreds of gnats to come flying in. I could continue to ramble but don't have the energy for it. I don't really know how to end this so I guess I just will.

Latest Thoughts

2007-03-12T01:40:00.000+09:00

I'd been working illegally for the past 2 months. I wasn't keen on the school but they said I could work there illegally since no one was able to give me a visa. It's a little complicated but anyways, I had a visa application approved and was pretty upset about the whole thing. Anyhow, I went to Japan for a last minute visa run. I was upset about most of that, too. They told us around 5pm the night before we left. I worked until 1030 and was expected to be ready to go by 5am. I went with my co-worker and the receptionist from the school because she knew some Japanese. It felt like we were being babysat for the most part. Like we wouldn't be able to handle going to Japan by ourselves. I was exhausted the whole time and didn't see anything. At least I got 2 days off work.

Work has been getting worse daily. I'm excited about quitting. I still don't know what I'm going to do afterwards. I was thinking about going to Africa but it doesn't really appeal to me anymore. I'm not in the mood to make new friends at all. I'm not in the mood for anything really. The prospect of vagabonding doesn't seem so bad to me anymore and I'm reconsidering moving to Sweden or France for awhile. I don't know why the prospect of staying in one place for an indefinite amount of time scares me so much. Seems really strange. I thought it was what I wanted but I'm reluctant to commit to the idea. I've also been avoiding thinking about it for the most part which is really strange considering how much I'm looking forward to leaving the ESL world behind. I guess it's in tune with my indecision and inconsistency at least.

My schedule is a bit strange now. I don't start work until 6pm twice a week. Maybe I'll have to go somewhere some afternoon and think about things.

Vagabonding

2007-01-16T01:01:00.001+09:00

I've been thinking a lot about what to do with my life recently. Things in Daegu have changed a lot for me recently with my new job, new apartment, and living in a completely different part of the city. It's really not an ideal situation and were it not for the opportunity to earn some money and the need to hold Win School accountable I could almost certainly say that I would not be here. The answer to the question of where I would be is also a reason that I am still here because I really don't know.

I've probably said it a few times before but I really don't have much going on for me anywhere. I lived in Edmonton, well close to Edmonton, for 17 years and only have a couple of people that I am still friends with there and one of them lives in Florida. I lived in Newfoundland for a year and there's no one that I'm in contact with from there. I lived in Texas for about 3 years over a 4.5 year period and I'm not really in contact with anyone there either. I really don't know why all of my friends (with very few exceptions) seem to come from 10 months I spent in Denmark.

I suppose it has something to do with everyone going there and being in a foreign environment. No one really knowing anyone else. I don't know, I guess I'm just not very good at making new friends especially when people already have routines, which is why I may have decided to abandon my vagabond lifestyle. I mean I still want to be in different places and do different things but not with different people since evidently I'm quite bad at meeting people.

Ideally I would meet a group of people of 3-4 people maybe and we'd go around the world together but the chances of that happening are slim and the longterm prospects wouldn't be that great either. I mean I'm only 24 (though I'm beginning to think more along the lines of 25) but I'm really starting to think about the future a lot more. I think continuing the kind of life I'm leading is just going to result in a series of gains and losses. If I were more outgoing or better at meeting people it might not be such a problem. I could make a huge group of friends and people could come in and out of it easily. That's really not me though. I tend to have a small group of good friends, maybe even as few as 1 or 2. So then once it's time to move on the loss is felt more heavily. I'm tired of having just a series of losses when I'm not good at making gains. Even if I see these people again I know if won't be the same and they will never be in my daily life again.

One of my favourite songs is called 'Again' by Lenny Kravitz. I don't know whether I like the song for how it actually sounds. I remember when I first heard it there were parts of it that I really didn't like but now I don't remember which parts of it. I think it's mostly because I can relate to it. There's a line in the song "I wonder if I'll ever see you again." Except my family, I guess, I could wonder that about far too many people, which I just think of as depressing.

I'm weighing 3 options right now. It's basically a given that I will leave Korea in about 3 months. That could change but I'm sick and tired of the ESL game. My father would be in India at that point, he'll probably be there sometime next week, so depending what month it is I may spend a few weeks there. After that though, I'm thinking of either going to Africa, Australia, or Vancouver. The A options would be a continuation of vagabonding and the last one would be me deciding to actually stay put for a while.

I was excited about Australia for awhile but that's been waning lately. I'm scared it'll just turn into another time where I'll start out lonely for a few months, then meet a couple of people if I'm lucky, and then be depressed for a few months afterwards. It just seems inevitable.

Africa would be a nice option I think. I would just travel around Africa for a few months. I've been psychoanalyzing myself much too much so I don't think I need to do that here. Anyways, it would be a nice way to end vagabonding, one last really good trip before I settle down. Maybe I could get some kind of internship there with a development agency or something for a few months. I don't know.

I'm thinking most seriously about Vancouver. I don't really know anyone there but I'd have to meet new people practically anywhere I went either and I really think I'd be able to live in Vancouver for awhile. Get a masters in some branch of economics maybe at UBC. Everyone says Vancouver is one of the best places to live. I could also easily move there, not have to worry about getting visas or anything. So maybe I'll do Africa for a few months and then move to Vancouver at the end of summer. Might be a good plan?

Bored at the Tokyo Airport

2007-01-05T15:13:00.000+09:00

I have 4 hours at the airport left. I've already been here for an hour or so. I would walk around but I already toured the airport a week ago when I had a 7 hour layover. I took a shower then but I don't need one now.

I'm on my way back from Hawaii where I had a mediocre week. I felt like being depressed while I was there for whatever reason. Well actually, that wasn't how I went into it but my sister was there with her friend and it was annoying being around her again. It reminded me of high school and how depressed I was back then which made me think of how depressed I am now about everything now, which wasn't really a good thing.

I was going to write about how depressed I was while I was there but decided not to do that since that seems to be the only thing I write about these days. For some reason though, I don't feel quite as depressed right now and decided I would write something. Let's see. I don't really know where to start. I guess I will start with my dad's visit. He came and I met him in Seoul and we spent a few days there. Then we came back to Daegu and he saw all the things he saw last year. There's really not enough in town to keep a tourist busy for a week so it was pretty relaxed and we didn't do much. We went out with Young Mi and a friend of hers one night. We had makjang and went drinking until 3am. I think my dad was impressed with himself that he stayed up that late or at least that I kept him out that late. Then he left, and Young Mi left and I moved in with Young Mi's boss and had a small xmas dinner and had my chest x-rayed for a visa application. My Australian working holiday visa has been approved by the way. I have no idea when I'll use it but I have until January 2nd, 2008 to get in the country.

I won't really talk about Hawaii that much since I didn't find it that interesting. I spent a lot of time with my Korean book and went through 200 pages or something. I'd learn it all (more or less) before so it was easy to speed through. I think that might be part of the reason I'm not as depressed as I was before I left. Thinking about how "awesome" I am at Korean made me excited to learn more. I'm really not excited about my new job but it'll be a means to an end and give me enough money and free time. I can't say I have that many goals right now and it's a bit disappointing to say that money is a motivating factor for me. I guess it was before but I didn't think of teaching English as being a sacrifice before.

So anyways, there's the money potential since I don't imagine myself spending much at all while I'm there this time. There's also the prospect of learning more Korean. It's easy to delude myself right now since I've just sped right through an introductory textbook with ease and feel semi-fluent because of it even though I know I should really doubt my abilities to have a real conversation. If I can keep up my current enthusiasm (which is certain to not last), I would be in good shape. Speaking of which, that is my other goal. There are a ton of gyms around my new job so it shouldn't be hard to find a decent one.

I'll have to say goodbye to my last one since it'll suddenly be very far away. So anyways, I guess I've resigned myself for the next few months and accepting it is a big step. Well maybe I haven't quite accepted it but I'm on the path towards acceptance. I think a week with my parents has made my realize that I'm willing to pay a higher price for independence that I previously thought.

Ramblings

2006-12-08T16:23:00.000+09:00

I'm not sure what I will end up writing about so the title I've chosen could be inappropriate. I have something specific in mind but who knows where it will go.

I'm still in Korea putting up a fight. I have everything arranged basically. I've been running around to all kinds of government offices lately. The labour office, legal aid, and immigration mostly. Usually all on the same day. I know all the busses and how to get to all the offices. The tax office and pension office I've been to but not recently. Anyways, I have 3 friends at all 3 places. I call them my friends just because it makes it more humourous, less bureaucratic, and really they have been helpful.

One day, Young Mi and I got a call from a lawyer who wanted to discuss our case. Okay, I guess I started talking about this last time. Anyways, we had thought the lawyer was there to help us but he was actually representing Win School, kind of misrepresented himself or at least we were being too optimistic. Anyways, he gave me a most generous offer from Mr. Lee. 200,000 won when he owed me 3,000,000 won. It was pretty easy to turn that down. The lawyer seemed nice and Young Mi and I were a bit rude to him just because of who had been paying him. He explained that Mr. Lee would appeal every decision a court made and I wouldn't get any money for 2 or 3 years so I should just take $200 and be happy. This is money that he doesn't even dispute is mine. The money he owes minus all his baseless deductions. The offer was pretty easy to turn down and the lawyer seemed sympathetic and understood why I would be suing Mr. Lee.

So after that I went to the legal aid office. Met my new friend Mr. Noh. He calls himself Mr. Roh as most Noh's do since it doesn't have the best connotations inn English to be known as Mr. No. That's my theory, anyways. So Mr. Noh told me that it would probably take 5-6 months to get to court. Which was a relief after the years the other lawyer had tried to intimidate me with. It turns out that I had made a mistake before at the labour board not seeking punishment. That's why I'd heard nothing from my friend, Ms. Shim. So I had to go to the labour board and get a document to state that I had unpaid wages and would then have to go to immigration to change my visa status.

The next day, I went to immigration. Met my friend, Mr. Song. He said I wasn't the illegally yet but only had until the next Wednesday to sort everything out. He needed me to fill out 2 forms and come back. I went back to see Mr. Roh. He agreed to be my sponsor (my new visa required a Korean citizen to be held accountable for any criminal acts). Mr. Noh found got me a Korean stamp. Koreans don't use signatures for official forms, they use a little stamp (I'd had to use my thumbprint before this). I thought that was exciting. I then went back to see Mr. Song. Everything seemed okay but then it turned out I only had a preliminary certificate of unpaid wages. I then went to see Ms. Shim who told me she couldn't issue the final certificate until Friday. By that point in the day it was 5 so I gave up for the day. Actually this was all on a Friday so I saved it for the next week.

On Tuesday, I continued again. Monday I went and applied at a few schools and then felt thoroughly depressed by the time I got to Sangin to ask for jobs. I found one place that was hiring but they wanted me to work Saturdays and the hours and pay weren't that great. That's the point where I realized that I'd only be able to find work at desperate hagwons and didn't want to do that again.

Back to Tuesday. I got up and went to immigration to see Mr. Song and explain that I couldn't get the certificate until Friday. I saw a different guy, Mr. Kang. He was nice enough and gave me a 30 day grace period to get the certificate and change my visa. He told me to go see Mr. Noh or Ms. Shin. He called me Mr. Noh. Mr. Noh and Ms. Shin have also called each other so it's like a circle of my bureaucratic friends. Mr. Kang was kind of discouraging and told me foreigners never get the money so I should basically give up. After, Mr. Kang (Mr. Song was out for lunch by the time my number came up), I went to see Ms. Shim. Actually, I was going to see Mr. Noh but I went past the bus stop where I got off before since it seemed like I got off early (I had to change busses). The bus then went much closer to Ms. Shim's so I went there instead. Low and behold, she was having her meeting with Mr. Lee so I had the unexpected pleasure of running into him there. I guess they just had one problem to sort out. My Saturday work. Mr. Lee had promised to pay me and I didn't get anything in writing. So I understood that given my lack of evidence that she couldn't force him to pay since he'd now changed his mind. I explained that it was my mistake to have taken Mr. Lee at his word. Ms. Shim's English is probably the poorest of all my friends so Mr. Lee explained to her what I had said, probably saying that I was mistaken about the whole issue. I talked to Mr. Seok on the phone there. He knew what Mr. Lee had said since he was the one who'd relayed it to me. Seok took Mr. Lee's side saying that there never was such an agreement and that I worked less than the overtime hours so I shouldn't be paid. I can understand why Seok said what he said but I've lost the last shreds of respect I had for him.

Mr. Lee agreed to pay the pension (since it was his legal responsibility to all along) but I owed the same amount so that was deducted from my last month's wages. Luckily though, Mr. Lee has to match it and I get it all back so I get an extra 500,000 won out of that deal. The labour inspector, Ms. Shim, ultimately decided that he owed me 2.2M won. Mr. Lee says he does but that I owe him 2.0M won for airfare, recruiting fees, and housing for 4 days that I stayed there after my last working day. So basically that's the issue. Ms. Shim was unimpressed by his argument for the deductions but he wants a judge to decide. So hopefully, I can revisit the overtime issue there too.

After this I went to see Mr. Noh with the certificate that Ms. Shim had now issued. Then I went back to see Mr. Song. So I'm now on a G-1 visa which is a miscellaneous visa, or a special case visa. So that's all taken care of and I just need to wait for Mr. Noh to tell me when I will be going to court.

So lately, I've just been involved with finding a new job and place to live. There hasn't been much promising. My two failed contracts make schools very leery of me. It's something that English teachers would understand if I explained but potential employers are sympathetic and then decide I'm too risky or not worth changing the contract for. The Saturday place was interested but I was interested. Another place interviewed me and things looked like they would go ahead. I was a bit apprehensive because of all this extra work I would have to do. Of course, during the interview I had just said that wouldn't be a problem. Then I get the contract and it says I'd be required to teach 180 - 40 minute classes before getting overtime. I don't want to work overtime but I'm not going to be in the classroom for 30 hours a week.

The other place I've been looking at (I had a real interview there yesterday as opposed to the phone interview) teaching adults. There are a few downsides to that job. Mostly the hours and the fact that housing isn't covered. Apparently, rent is only about 300,000 a month for a studio, even right downtown. I figure teaching adults would be much easier than trying to control children who don't want to be there and might be worth that bit of money. Plus, I'm getting a bit desperate and teaching adults would be a nice change of pace for me. The other thing is that I'd be able to choose my own apartment and the school is right downtown where both subway lines meet. They will let me know on Monday. The guy who interviewed me was British and had heard all the stories of bad kiddie hagwons so understood where I was coming from. As opposed to other kiddie hagwons that just think I must be a whiner and a quitter and would rather hire someone fresh off a plane with no idea what other hagwons are like. I'd always figured at Wonderland that all the other esl teachers were going through the same thing.

My dad has accepted the job in Mumbai and will be moving there for 2-3 years starting the middle of next month. He'll be stopping in Seoul on his way back to Canada. He's going to get a return ticket from Mumbai so when he flies from Seoul to Edmonton he'll get to go from Seoul to Mumbai to Frankfurt to Toronto to Edmonton. Anyways, seems a bit silly to me unless you really love airports and being on planes.

I guess, I'm about where I was before except that my visa situation is taken care of. I don't know when I'll get to see Ms. Shim or Mr. Song again since their jobs are pretty much done. Mr. Noh is really nice though and has been very helpful. I think he's my favourite of my bureaucrat buddies. He's even invited me to his house at some unspecified point in the future.

If the adult place with the bad hours doesn't give me the job on Monday I may have to consider relocating to a different city. I hope it doesn't come to that though. That seems to be enough for now.

An Update

2006-11-29T20:17:00.001+09:00

Well, my life is going pretty poorly at the moment. I have no job, I have no house, and apparently I'm in Korea illegally right now. I have to take my boss to court to get my last month's paycheque. It's really frustrating.

I don't like sharing an apartment, much less a bed. I want the money my boss owes me and in order to get it I need to sue him which I found out yesterday could take as long as 2-3 months. I really don't want to take another job in Korea but I may be forced to since it's the only way for me to get my own apartment. I'm living off my savings right now which isn't fun either.

In addition to this, I may be an illegal alien. Because my school didn't cancel my visa, I figured I was fine as far as immigration went. I guess I may have been wrong about that and that I should've gone to immigration to cancel the visa myself. Apparently, I could be fined some huge amount for staying here on a working visa while not working. I guess I'd been too busy feeling frustrated, depressed, angry, and lonely to bother going to a government office where no one can understand what I can say to ask about my immigration status.

I don't know where these problems keep coming from. I've also recently realized just how homeless I am. I have no place of my own right now and really I don't have a room to call my own anywhere in the world. I suppose I have one at my parent's house. I've never been to my parent's house though since they moved after I left. So there's a bedroom there but one of my sisters is living there now so it really doesn't make that much sense. My room in name only. Plus, they will be moving in May so it's really not much of a room anyway. I don't usually feel this way but right now I'm really envious of people whose parents have lived in the same house forever and whose bedrooms are basically the same as they left them when they moved out.

My parents by the way will likely be moving to Mumbai, India (formerly Bombay). It's pretty exciting really but just comes at a strange time for me. I guess their house isn't really my home and I'd much rather visit them in a strange city as opposed to one where I've become a stranger. Edmonton is such a distant thing for me. I mean I know it and there are many familiar things but it was never really my home. I'd always lived in Beaumont which has become hugely popular and has so many new developments and renovations that it's really not familiar to me. I guess I really just feel lost. I don't know where I should be or what I should be doing.

There's just nothing familiar about anything in my life right now. I'm staying in the apartment of some guy I barely know. My good friend is gone and I had very few of those here. I've seen his girlfriend, who has assumed the position of best friend in Korea, a few times. She and a few businesses are really the only things that are familiar to me. A little sad that I count my kimbap lady as a good friend of mine considering we've never really had a conversation given she doesn't speak English.

I really just want a place that's familiar to me and I can go there to be alone. That's all I want. I can't do that where I am now given that it's not my apartment and am completely reliant on others for everything at the moment. I've stayed at a few jjimjilbangs which was better than staying here actually since even though they've been full of Koreans they've pretty much left me alone aside from the odd, well not that uncommon, "waygook/miguk saram" (foreigner/American) that I hear there. Hotels are expensive and motels are dirty and not that cheap either.It's not really even the point. I can't feel sorry for myself in a new place. I really just need something.

For those of you who don't know, jjimjilbangs are pretty much 24 hour saunas. You go there and put on an orange shirt and orange shorts and go sit in dry saunas and can sleep on a hard floor for the night. It's kind of surreal since you are wearing the exact same thing as everyone else. It feels like a huge sleepover for you and hundreds of Korean strangers. I don't think many people go alone, usually family and couples. Anyways, they are cheap ($6-8).

I'm going to meet some lawyer with Young Mi, my friend's Korean girlfriend, tomorrow afternoon. Hopefully, he'll be able to tell me what I should do or give me a better time frame. We don't even know who he is. He just called Young Mi and told her he wanted to meet to go over my case. He's either been assigned by the courts or else is Young Mi's boss' friend. Or in a glimpse at where my mind has gone, some kind of Win School operative sent to take my evidence and burn it. Mind you, last year on my way to the immigration office (when my boss cancelled my visa the proper way), I had images of him driving me to some remote area and butchering me.

I really almost feel like giving up. I've fighting with my boss since the beginning of September really and now that I basically have nothing going on here it feels strange to stay. I really just can't let my boss keep that money after everything. I can't let him win but my victory seems so distant.

Uncertainty Abounds

2006-11-16T14:17:00.000+09:00

I'm not sure the last time I wrote. I could look it up I guess but I'm a bit lazy. Anyways, since then a lot has happened. Nothing really exciting, well not in a good way at least, but definitely life-altering.

On October 30th, at the end of the day, I see a note on my desk. The vice-director is not happy with me. I didn't teach the class she told me to teach at 3:25. I had told her the Wednesday before that I wouldn't teach them since my contract says I start work at 4. The note tells me she wants to see me before I leave. It's 10:05. The vice-director is busy talking to the assistant teachers, giving them directions. I wait until 10:25 and then I make towards the door. The vice-director stops me and tells me she needs to see me. I blurt out that I wasn't going to wait forever. I decide to give her 5 more minutes. Finally, at 10:28, she is ready to speak to me. She leads me into the little conference room, hands me a letter, and says "There are no words."

I know what the letter says already. I run into the assistant teachers on the way out. They confirm what I thought, that the vice-director was just telling them the same things again and again. I really can't believe that the vice-director was so immature as to make me wait for no reason except to inflate her ego and make herself feel powerful.

Within the envelope is a formal notice. I've been fired. I'd been expecting it. I'd gone to the labour board to sort out a few things in my contract like the tax rate, not being paid overtime, and a few other pieces of nonsense. After going the first time, the labour board said they would call the school and try to resolve things that way. Following this I get a letter. The letter says that they don't owe me anything and also that I'm a terrible teacher and should only ask for things once I'm doing "perfect teaching." So, a thinly veiled threat not to take things further or I'll be canned. I could've really cared less about my job. I was planning on quitting the end of November anyway. I took things further. I went back to the labour board to file a formal complaint. It was a Thursday. I'm sure they drafted my notice over the weekend since there wasn't even mention of me not teaching the first class on Monday. There was, however, mention of me not going to work on a Saturday when I had already told them I wouldn't work any more Saturdays.

That's really not the worst part though. They gave me only 7 days notice since the scheduled labour board mediation was in 8. They really didn't want to go to that meeting. I stayed in my apartment until the day of the meeting and refused to leave since even by the worthless contract they owed me 15 days. The meeting comes and Young Mi decides to come with me (the labour inspection speaks no English). My boss shows up 45 minutes late telling everyone what an important, rich, respectable person he was. He decides that he's not going to give me my last month's pay since I betrayed him by taking him to the labour board and also that I should repay him for the airfare and recruiting fees (even though the contract says I only need to pay him for that if I break the contract). Also, he says he's going to charge me rent for the apartment 40,000 won a day. There's no way my apartment is worth 1.2 million won a month.

So now, I'm unemployed and homeless in Korea and am owed something like 3 million won. Luckily, my boss hasn't cancelled my visa so I don't have to leave the country or anything. He has until the 24th of this month to pay me. If he doesn't, then I need to take him to court. So until I get my money, I am stuck in Korea just waiting it out.

Then there are a few other things to make me feel all the more uncertain about life and everything. Aside from having no job, no home, and being involved in a labour dispute, my parents may be moving to India if my dad accepts a job there, my best friend in Korea is leaving this weekend, I don't know where I'm going after Korea, and the younger brother of a good friend of mine (who I'd met)died accidentally. Uncertainty indeed.

Limbo - How low can you go?

2006-10-28T18:11:00.000+09:00

I should probably mention that I'm kind of at war with my boss at the moment. I've made 2 trips to the labour board already. The first earned me a letter from my employers refusing my demands for money they've withheld from me and lovely threatening language about how I'm a terrible teacher and am in serious danger of losing my job because my teaching ability is insufficient. This was never mentionned before my trip to the labour board, of course. If only I had the letter with me now I could make fun of it. There's a part about me not being 'a RESP teacher.' I'm not exactly sure what that means. I can only imagine they weren't able to listen to the Aretha Franklin all the way through. Not that they know what the word means anyway.

I'm worried that I might be fired sometime next week and that they'll deduct the recruiting fee and airfare from my last paycheque. I guess I just get to sit in suspense until that happens. I'm almost looking forward to that since I'd be able to go back to the labour board and claim unfair termination. Basically the problem is that I wasn't fully paid for morning classes I taught back in August, they haven't paid me overtime for some Saturdays that I worked and they withholding too much tax from my paycheque. All in all, it's quite a bit of money. The only problem is that I might not get any of it because of some strange tax law that lets employers pay income tax only once at the end of the year. Therefor, the tax office has no records as to how much tax I'd actually owe and so it's unsolvable from the governments perspective until my boss actually pays my taxes at the end of the year. The other things were just verbal agreements and so I can't prove anything.

It's just really frustrating and I don't know what to do quite frankly.

Change

2006-10-23T14:03:00.000+09:00

Despite initial hopes and expectations, I don't think my second stint at English teaching will last much longer than my first. I've been having trouble with my bosses lately. And even if I get everything I want, I'm not sure I'd be that satisfied. I just don't there's much more for me to be got by being here aside from a little more money in my pocket. Sometimes, I enjoy my job and while I'm in the classroom it never seems that bad. The idea of work though is something that I'm beginning to despise. Just having to go into work and feeling that my work doesn't matter is starting to bother me.

Perhaps, it's because I either don't notice any progress being made by any of the students or they aren't making much at all. Some of my initial plans have also gone awry. I was going to take Korean lessons and then my bosses proved themselves to be unreasonable and I decided to cut my stay short by a few months. At which point, the 4 hours spent learning how to ask what something was and to say what something is or isn't seemed especially useless. (Is this a shoe? No, it's not a shoe. It's a chair.) I also skipped to the end of the book and could still follow it and so 4 hours a day 5 days a week to practice speaking seemed hardly worth the time or expense.

I had also planned to be better friends with my co-workers by this point. Of course, I favoured others over them so am a bit alienated from them. I'm not sure I have all that much in common with them anyways and going out can be fun every once in awhile but I don't really relish the idea of getting drunk at every opportunity.

So instead of talking badly about the past which I feel is all I really ever do on this thing. I should try to be positive about the future. I suppose the possibilities can be both exciting and unnerving.

Post 100

2006-09-24T01:38:00.000+09:00

I felt like it was about to blog something. I've been feeling a bit funny lately. I guess I should say strange. Anyways, I happen to have posted 99 times before so that means that this is post 100. Blogspot counts it. I certainly wouldn't count them otherwise.

So anyways, I haven't done all that much recently. Well I suppose I've done quite a bit but it boils down to almost nothing. I went to a river and had an I don't quite know how to describe it time. We went for a barbeque by this little river below a damn. We had samgyeopsal. Then, we went to a buddhist temple. I got a bit drunk, well more than a bit, quite by accident. Well, I went to the bathroom and when I left these ajeossis invited me to have some soju which I accepted. Then, after a while they had given me a whole bottle. It was quite a long time ago though but I did some cartwheels and tried to climb trees and a bunch of other stupid things. I kind of felt like an idiot afterwards but kind of had fun at the time. Mostly. The next weekend was really bad.

The weekend after that or possibly the one after that I went rafting with Alex and Young Mi. I'd never gone rafting before. I was fun. I don't have any pictures and I guess the people who took pictures for the company have yet to release them to the public so you'll just have to believe that I did it.

Well, I don't think I did anything all that interesting aside from those things. My one day off a week has become quite bothersome. I really can't do anything with it and when I do it doesn't make for an energetic next week. So I've been having some issues at work. Just me basically telling them that I'm not supposed to work according to my contract and them telling me that all they can do for me is give me 2-3 extra vacation days a year which really means nothing since they decide when I can take those days. I make a request rather and they can't choose to grant it or not so really they could give me 100 vacation days and it would amount to the same thing I'm sure. Finally, I told them I would not work another Saturday until I got something else for it. Yesterday, I was told that I would be paid for Saturdays and was supposed to get the details today but didn't since the vice-director comes to work after I do and once I start I only get 5 minute breaks. Then once I'm finished she continues to teach and not wanting to stick around the school indefinitely I left. I guess we'll see what kind of deal they give me. I really didn't mean to start talking about that..... Or did I?

I'm beginning to wonder what I'm doing here. Being here right now is fine but a change is in the works. A good friend of mine, possibly my only true one here, is leaving in 2 months and some other friends may or may not be coming to Daegu. It will be interesting to see what happens come mid-November.

For some reason, I thought this year would be a lot of different and it's been better but not quite what I expected. One of the reasons, I chose the school I did was because there would be a handful of foreign teachers all living in the same building. When I came here, there were 3 other teachers. One was kind of a loner and I didn't know him at all since he taught at a different school, well different location. The other had his own group of friends which was fine and the other was leaving in 2 weeks anyway. I had Alex from the year before. Then 2 new teachers came. Both knew each other coming over and I did a few things with them. Not all that much though since Korea was still so new to them and the whole idea of being a guide doesn't appeal to me. It was kind of like in Denmark. I was there for the whole year and once the fall semester people had gone, I only hung out with other full-years. It had nothing to do with them (though they did seem annoying) but they were at a different place. For me Denmark was home, and for them it was this wild, crazy, new place. Talking about what makes Korea different doesn't interest me as a topic of conversation whereas that's the topic du jour for them. So I hung out with Alex and they hung out with each other. Since then 2 new teachers have arrived and now Scott and Adam get to play guide. Anyways, the 4 of them do quite a bit together I believe. So, I feel a bit excluded without necessarily wanting to be included. Anyways, that's a bit strange.

I just know that once Alex leaves, my life will be completely different. Same job and whatever but I will have to adjust and I'm not sure it's something I want to do. When I was having trouble at work, I began contemplating, wondering what I was doing here. I mean my job isn't too bad. I make decent money but the idea of another 8 months didn't appeal to me very much. Part of it is for silly reasons. I've spent 2 birthdays in Daegu and will be dangerously close to a third once my contract ends. I think 3-4 days or something. I'd really rather be far gone by the time my birthday comes. Age is really just arbitrary, I mean it doesn't actually mean anything but I don't want to be in Korea when I become a year older.

I'll just have to see how I feel around December. Whether I want to finish my contract and all. There have been Korean classes though that I'm thinking of taking, and have already paid for. After 200 hours of Korean instruction I should at least be proficient in Korean but I don't know if it's worth it if I don't stay much past the end of the classes. I've also been sick and have had little energy the past week so I can't even imagine taking the classes when just going to work seems tiring.

The nice thing has been that I've been having really nice dreams. I went to Copenhagen last night and I think I seem to go there quite a lot in my dreams. I think at least half of the dreams I remember since I left Denmark have had something to do with Denmark. I guess I haven't been many places since then, well lived in many places since then. Corpus Christi, which I hated, and Daegu. Edmonton hardly counts. I wonder why I never have dreams about Edmonton. I'm always in some locationless dream or in Denmark. My dreams haven't even really centred around Korea. I just realized that. Anyways, I seem to be lost in thought now so I'll have to continue this later in post 101.

Korea finally

2006-07-28T23:47:00.000+09:00

I've been in Korea now for a little over 2 months. Really only 2 days more than 2 months. Maybe 2 months, 2 days, and 2 hours who knows. Something like that. Depends if you count arriving in Busan or Daegu. Let's see where I should start.

I guess the airport since all epic journeys begin at some kind of station. I guess returns can't really be epic unless I'd been away for more than 20 years maybe. There might be a different rule if it's your hometown or something. So LAX. I can't really think of anything worth mentioning about the flight over except that what I thought would be a nice seat when I picked it on the seat map wasn't all that great. I liked that I was on Northwest flight 1 from LA to Tokyo. I think that was probably the most interesting thing.

I got to Busan and met my recruiter who drove me to Daegu. The old awkward conversation with the Korean thing. I always hate awkward conversations with strangers that happen only because both people feel obligated to talk to the other. It was alright for one of those though. Got to Daegu took a 2 minute tour of the school and went to my new apartment to sleep. My apartment was pretty disappointing. Full of useless chairs and tables. It's much better now and I'm actually quite happy with it. If I cleaned up a bit maybe I'd take a picture of it.

Work has been going fine. They stuck me with a few classes on Saturdays but I decided I was fine with it since Alex and Young Mi would be working anyway and I knew I'd do absolutely nothing with it. Plus half the week I barely have class. I teach for less than 3 hours so I was never dying for the weekend to come which is a big change. They gave me 4 extra classes the last couple weeks but I'm getting rid of a few next week. Actually next week I only have 29-40 minute classes but I'm waiting for them to give me a couple more.

Let's see what else. There was the World Cup. Korea unfortunately didn't make it to round 2 but we saw the Togo-Korea game in the middle of a big intersection. So it was fun to see Korea win with a giant field of red horns. The Koreans are known as the red devils. That was actually the night that 2 new teachers came in and I got out of class early.

I also took a day trip up to Seoul to see an old Austrian friend of Alex's. An Austrian, an American, a Canadian, and a Korean hanging out in the streets of Seoul. It always sounds like the opening to some bad joke when everyone is a different nationality. Of course, to the Koreans were all just Miguks or Waygooks (American/Foreigners) hanging out with a native daughter. Young Mi had her nationality questioned by some Korean kid. "Mom, where's that girl from?" "I'm Korean." "Mom, where is she from?" Funny only because usually kids only ask that question about people who don't look like them. Foreigner by association. We went to the Gyeongbukkung Palace and Insa-dong. Both places I'd been before. It was quite a silly day probably since we woke up about 4 hours before usual and we exhausted by 4pm. The Austrian was all jet-lagged and only knew she was staying with a guy named Kim which can't really get anymore vague in Korea.

I also went to Gyeongju with my boss and my newly arrived Canadian co-workers. That was quite a long day. I should really start updating this thing more often.

Basically things are going pretty well with everything. I've been having a bit too much fun and am already 200,000 won below my savings goal for the month with another week to go. Luckily, this next paycheque should have some extra money. We've been teaching morning classes for the past week which isn't too bad since it's really only an extra 2 classes with a 4 hour break between them and the regular working day. The nice thing is that I get an extra 150,000 a week. Not that much but enough to pretend that I saved 1,000,000 total this month. I bought some new clothes though, went to Seoul, had 2 really fun nights out, and got a personal trainer for the month.

I've been going to the gym during my 4 hour breaks and they have a really nice sauna so by the time I get back to work the morning feels like it was a different day. The trainer is actually a pretty good deal, too. 200,000 won for 16 sessions. It's a lot of money though so this will probably be my first and only month of doing that. Maybe I can work something out with them because 280,000 a month (membership fee) for fitness seems crazy especially when it's only 10% of my salary. I don't need 4 private sessions a week. Of course, I could come out of Korea with a totally awesome body. I'll have to put myself on a strict budget though. Anyways, I guess that's about all I feel like writing at the moment. Well I could write more but you're probably getting sick of reading this. Until the next.

Los Angeles Times

2006-06-26T21:35:00.000+09:00

I go so long between entries these days. I'm not quite sure why that is. It was once because I didn't think I was really doing anything all that exciting, not that what I was doing wasn't fun but it just didn't seem like anything worth writing about. Drunken nights, while quite fun, tend to not make very interesting stories so I didn't bother writing about them. However, I have been in Korea for exactly a month today so maybe I should now make an effort to update this thing more regularly.

I had a good time while I was in Whittier. I can't say that I did all that much. My friend, Joey, would go to work at 8:30 when he should've left much earlier and I would sleep in until the mid-afternoon. I guess somedays I woke up a little after 12 but you get the picture. Then it was time for a bean and cheese burrito down the street and to watch back-to-back episodes of Law&Order on TNT. I was pretty much at the whim of my friend's schedule. I was practically a wife or pet dog. Sometimes I would clean up the house out of boredom. There were 5-6 people living in the house and none of them liked to clean so the one time I vacuumed there must have been months worth of dust. I swear I've never actually witnessed the carpet change colours after being vacuumed. Pretty much of all them were gone during the day and I came to the conclusion that if I actually were a housewife and had no car and no company during the day that I would probably want to have a baby. Caillie, the illegal resident, was a sometimes companion during the day but she had classes and work. I thoroughly enjoyed her company though. I was prepared for all that though and had I been in Edmonton I would've been sitting around the house and have it be colder outside and sit around at night also. It's too bad I had to pay for rent and utilities in LA but I guess most people pay rent. In case you didn't know, English teachers in Korea have free accommodation. Anyways, once Joey came home and my tail stopped wagging we'd have a good time. We'd go for sushi with Matt or watch TV at home and drink lots of beer. Sometimes we'd even leave Whittier.

A few days, I had little adventures. I drove down to CBS Television city for a taping of the Late Late Show but I thought was too late to get in so just drove by. It was one of the days of the big immigration protests. I also had to take the bus and subway to downtown LA to go to the Korean Consulate. I had a big fat book so the the 1.5 hour journey (one-way) (3h total) didn't seem that long. I managed to make it to a taping of Real Time with Bill Maher. That was pretty cool but also really surreal. This will sound really stupid but Bill Maher looked exactly the same as he does on television. I expected him to look different in person. Mind you I never saw him out of the stage lights so that may be part of it. The set also seemed really small. Anyways, it was pretty much just like watching the show but from inside the TV but further away and with an unchanging view. Well actually our seats weren't great because cameras blocked my view of the host and all the guests so I actually did watch the monitor most of the time. After we went for Ethiopan food. Interesting as well considering neither of us knew anything about Ethiopian food.

I also went to a Bob Dylan concert in Bakersfield. I got to sit with his mom way at the back of the Robabank Center (something like that) where she fell asleep. Joey meanwhile was 3 rows from the front. Then there was Joey's birthday party at a Latin jazz club, a cinco de mayo/Joey and Matt's combined birthday party, a trip to the Getty Museum and 3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica. Then on one of the last days we took a trip downtown and saw historic Los Angeles, Union Station, Koreatown, the tar pits, and maybe something. Also, Jelena, which was nice. I met her one of the other times I was in Whittier. Alex, my friend in Korea, went to Whittier and knows her better than I do so I thought I'd take pictures to weird him out.

I guess that pretty much sums up LA for me. That and a few catchphrases and singing out Wikipedia won't make sense to any but a select few. I guess I didn't mention Korea at all so I should probably change the title of this entry. Anyways, here are some drunken photos.

Joey and Laura, lovely wife of his friend

Laura's lovely husband

A photo of them together too bad not to show.

View from the Getty Centre. Smogarific.

Jelena and Me.

Can you spot the pseudo-penis?

My daytime companion and her boyfriend who account for the 0/1 roommate since he was away for training.

So long, buddy.

Ko REE Ah

2006-05-04T05:58:00.000+09:00

I'm still in Los Angeles and haven't broken any laws. I was going to try to get a job working illegally but decided to not bother anymore. I'm only in LA for another 2-3 weeks and I was just too intimidated to go in to places and ask them to break the law for me. Actually, I may have broken the law, I don't know.

When I was going through customs they didn't like the look of me and took me to the special interogation room. Well actually, they didn't like that I didn't have a return ticket and no job. I told them I wanted to stay for 2 months because someone I knew was getting married at the end of May. The guy told me he didn't want me to stay in the country that long and would have to break it into 2 trips. Ultimately, I ended up buying a one-way ticket back to Edmonton that was for April 29th so obviously I didn't end up using it. I don't know if that counts as breaking the law since I'm still entitled to be in the country. I had planned on going abroad again from LA. I wasn't sure where: Australia, Japan, or back to Korea, possibly France. I ended up going with Korea and here's why:

I was thinking about going to Australia but decided I should have a bit more in the bank before I went. I also figured it would be fall/winter in Australia so I would go back to Korea and work for 6 months to save some money and wrap up my Korean experience in a better way. I ended up coming across a really decent position in Daegu, the same city I worked in before. It sounded really good. I'll have a better schedule working from 4-10pm Monday to Friday. I'll be teaching 22 hours a week or thereabouts. I'll be living a lot closer to downtown than last year but will still be on a subway line so that's a double plus. There will also be 4 other foreign teachers there divided between 2 schools, which should be a lot better than working with 1 couple from Sudbury that rarely spoke to anyone outside their relationship. Not only will I be teaching better hours, less often, with better people and living in a better part of town but I'll be making $300 more a month. As long as the job turns out as well as it looks on paper I'll probably end up finishing the contract. So I'll have to put off Australia until at least then but I'll get there eventually.

Places been, decisions made, photos posted

2006-04-13T16:56:00.000+09:00

I should probably write a few entries but you know how it is. The longer you wait the more daunting the task of updating. I don't think I really feel the need to come back with a bang but I have 3 months of my life that remain unchronicled. I guess I'll just jump right in.

So I got back from Hawaii and barely had anytime to relax before heading off to Mexico. Well I guess I had a couple weeks but I like to pretend to be a jetsetter, which I guess I kind of could be just looking at the last 6 months or so but between jet trips my life is quite dull. I sat in front of the TV listening to music and playing sudoku. So grand. I don't even know if I like sudoku but I play them compulsively now. So that sums up about about 2-3 weeks.

Then I flew down to Las Vegas. I won about $200 and then I lost about $200 plus an extra twenty. I met my Korean friend, who is white and from Oregon but I know him from Daegu. He did about the same as I did minus the winning $200. From there we took a quick detour to the Grand Canyon in a rental car and drove over the Hoover Dam. If you want to get out of your car head over to the Arizona side. Those Nevadans are always after you money.

From this point I will only make bullet points to save time. Some of the highlights (and lowlights):

But first, here's a map of the route we took:

Sleeping in a rental car in a Tuscan parking lot

Crossing the border to Mexico (still upset about no passport stamp)

Being on busses or in bus stations for 30 hours straight including a 14-hour overnight bus where I thought I slept horribly but according to Alex, who was afraid of being stabbed in the neck the whole night, slept quite well

Taking a train through 'amazing' vistas in the Copper Canyon where the views were unimpressive for 4 hours and then unviewable for 7 because of the overwhelming blackness of night

Eating ramen noodles on said train since there was no Mexican food on the Mexican train

Spending a night in the drug capital of Mexico, Los Mochis

Trying to read while Platoon dubbed in Spanish blared through the speakers on yet another bus

Finally, starting our Mexican vacation in Mazatlan about 2.5 days after being in Mexico

Eating marlin quesadillas, which are delicious

Having my mother be called a whore by some old Mexican lady

Meeting a friend of Alex's who we had been planning to meet but were unable to since our plans didn't mesh, at the airport in Mexico City by sheer coincidence. Crazy how that happens

Dancing to blues music at some bar with a 40 something health statician from Seattle

Finally meeting Alex's aunt and uncle and young cousins who we arranged to meet so many different times that meeting them seemed highly unlikely

Soaking up some sun in Mazunte

Taking a 6 hour ride in an suv through dense forested hills where going straight for more than 10 seconds was nearly impossible and nearly orgasmic the 2 times that it happened

Seeing Zapotec ruins at Monte Alban outside of Oaxaca

Literally falling out the doors of a bar after a few too many tequillas and twisting my ankle (only slightly)

Somewhat impressing some Norweigan girls with my unintelligible Danish

Consuming lots of chocolate in the chocolate capital of Mexico, still Oaxaca....mmmmm chocomilk

Watching a Zapotista demonstration

Meeting my grandmother, great-aunt and uncle at a bus station in Mexico City

Being serenaded to by a Juan Gabriel impersonator, a very popular Mexican singer, a Mexican Elton John you might say

Going to see the hometown of my great-grandmother and seeing the house where she was born and hearing how it became abandoned and was used as a place to get high

Losing badly to my cousin at a gladiator-style competition on an inflatable platform (Alex and my cousin, Fernando, well my mom's cousin technically)

Watching him dislocate his shoulder playing the same game by putting too much force into his swings

Going to a soccer game only to find out that we couldn't get tickets and just drinking for pretty much 8 hours instead

Having beers with my cousin while he drove on the freeway

Going to see giant pyramids outside of Mexico City only to return as a lobster and clown (my nose always burns)

Watching Alex go ga-ga at all the Don Quixote iconography in Guanajuato though this picture has very little to do with that piece of literature but apparently I took no photos of the Don

Stealing a bottle of water in the dead of night from a locked fridge at the hostel in Guadalajara out of unbearable thirst (I left 10 pesos with some other money on the counter)

Getting very nervous the next morning when I saw the surveillance camera

Staying with my grandma at her time share in Puerto Vallarta

Saying goodbye to Alex from a bus in Puerto Vallarta

Staying another 2 weeks in Puerto Vallarta reading trashy detective novels and Dostoyevsky

Flying back to Mexico City, and then to Oaxaca with my aunt and grandma only to see everything there for a second time (photo appears for a second time for comedic effect)

Going to a family reunion in the hometown of my great-grandmother, Real Del Monte(ditto)

Finding out that I'm probably descended from the man who started the first labour strike in the Americas by paying such poor wages

Seeing the sights of downtown Mexico City

Flying to Los Angeles with a screaming 12 month old girl, I do mean screaming after 7 weeks in Mexico (was supposed to be 4 but then I decided to stay for the reunion)

Seeing my original friend from Whittier though he worked each day I was there but it's ok (I'll come to that)

Binge drinking in Pasadena on St. Patrick's day

Going on to Denver to see another one of my Danish friends who is actually Asian and from Los Angeles but who I know from Denmark

Going for happy hour at a local bar and confessing all my secrets to said friend

Finally, returning to Edmonton (we live on the very edge of the city but my parents moved last week so I'll never see this 'sweet' view again. If you look closely you can see the reflection of my camera and without looking closely you can see powerlines)

Playing Sudoku at home for a week in Edmonton

Flying to Washington, DC via Minneapolis and Detroit to spend some time with my Danish friend who is actually from Hungary but who I know from Denmark

Eating lots of cookies from Potbelly's

Getting a bit lost after a quick electoral trip to the Hungarian embassy when the zoo turned out to be a bit further from the embassy than appeared on the map (I suppose groundhogs aren't the most exotic animals at the zoo)

Seeing another Danish friend who by now it will come as no surprise is actually from Memphis and listening to his classification of all people into 3 categories: Ninjas, Pirates, and Robot Dinosaurs

Flying back to LA to see the same friend

Going to Bakersfield to go see a Bob Dylan concert, he sat in the 3rd row and I sat in the very back row of the Rabobank stadium with his mom, though she is quite cool for a mom

I guess it's time to break back into a narrative. I'm actually staying with my friend in LA right now. Well, I'm being charged rent so I don't know if that's staying, probably not. I had nothing going on and for some reason I thought it would be smart to move down for a month or 2 while I decided what to do with the months after that. One of his 6 roommates was moving out so it seemed predestined that I come occupy the room for awhile so I did. I still need to go about finding an illegal job here. I'll have to think of something. It really is too bad that there's this big immigration debate going on in the US right now. I think it's probably easier to work under the table when what you're doing isn't thee hot topic of the day.

Also, I've signed a contract to go back to Korea. It's a cliffhanger.

Blueshoewhotwo in Hono-lulu

2006-02-06T08:39:00.000+09:00

Ok, I have to admit my traveling has become a bit obsessive. This one however had been planned a long time ago by someone else. It was back when I had a contract with one of those Korean hagwons. I was supposed to still be in Korea around xmas, well actually had I not broken my contract I would still be kicking about in that place. My parents decided it would be nice to me over the xmas break of which I had at least 4 days off (from the 28th to the 31st and who knows how few days after that) so my parents thought they´d fly me to Hawaii since it was about half-way for both of us. There really is nothing else in the mid-Pacific.

I´d been home for a little over 2 weeks and then decided I´d go visit a friend in my connecting city since nothing is ever direct from out-of-the-way-from-everything Edmonton. I spent a few nice days there meeting my friends family and some of his college friends from Taipei and Kathmandu. Strange that I´ve technically been to both those cities. I guess Taipei airport doesn´t quite make the cut for having been there but anyway. I went snowboarding even for a day and kicked some ass at Scabble. How the word ´fax´ could earn me so many points I´ll never know.

My parents flew out from Edmonton and I met them at the airport. We went to board the plane and they announced they were looking for volunteers to take a different route to Honolulu. So instead of going direct, I volunteered and spent some time at the airport in Seattle and earned myself a free flight voucher. I arrived 2 hours after the rest of my family but what is there to do in Hawaii after dark anyway.

I didn´t really do all that much in Hawaii. I sat on the beach. I sat by the pool. My albino self gradually became flesh-toned. I read a half-decent book and another now that I think about it. My parents, 2 sisters, and grandmother were there for about 2 weeks. Actually, one of my sisters left on December 30th since the thought of spending New Year´s without her boyfriend was too traumatic. I was as pleased with xmas as I could´ve been.

I guess I can mention something about Pearl Harbour. Even though it´s technically Harbor I still feel like throwing in the all important ´U.´ So anyways, we had to take a limo there. They are the same fare as regular cabs in Honolulu. I was a bit embarrassed to be the first one out of the limo to Pearl Harbour. Then we waited in line for a few hours and another few hours waiting for our group to be called. Finally, we saw a short film and got on a little boat to go see the USS Arizona. I was as moved by this as I usually am by such things. There were a bunch of patriotic Americans of course but being Canadian I can´t say it was all that important to me or stirred up many feelings. There were quite a few Japanese tourists there since the Japanese love Hawaii. At one point, a couple of Japanese guys were talking away in Japanese and began to laugh about something. Some guy decides to get over offended and yells at them telling them that Pearl Harbour is not funny. This coming from a guy who had to be told repeatedly that video photography was not allowed at the site. It was just strange to see what racist feelings Pearl Harbour provoked. There were quite a few white folk chatting happily while there but according to this guy the Japanese needed to be extra solemn while there. I wonder what he would think about being in Hiroshima or Nagasaki.

So there was that and more beach and a hokey luau ceremony. I´d been to Hawaii before and I think that time was better. There was a point in the show where there´s this barebacked woman facing the rear of the stage shaking her hips and all. The moment she turned around the reveal all these leis covering her chest was the moment I heard the most disappointed communal groan.

Let´s see. There was New Year´s. I never really enjoy new years all that much. It just kind of reminds me of all the things I didn´t accomplish the previous year. My parents were pretty lame about it and went to bed around 10´30. My grandma decided to go back to the hotel room as well. My one sister was back in Edmonton and the other with her little Hawaiian fling who was from West Virginia and sold timeshares. I watched some fireworks on the beach. Pretty impressive ones I´ll admit but I think there´s a time limit to how much you can enjoy them.

Then I spent another few days about the sun and sand doing very little. It´s nice to relax but I´d already had, oh I don´t know, 3 months of no work, all play. Then we took a limo to the airport and flew overnight to Minneapolis and spent a good five hours waiting for our next flight and that was how I spent the days from December 20 to January 5th.

At Home

2006-01-21T17:54:00.000+09:00

Well, I've been back home now since December 3rd and I've pretty much done nothing. I managed to surprise my mom on her birthday which was on December 3rd, the longest day of my life. I got off the plane before I left. My sister came to pick me up with her roommate's dog. Then we drove to the restaurant where they would all be eating. "All" meaning my parents, my sisters, and my grandma. We got there and were walking to the door when we see the other sister driving past in her car, then my parents. Luckily, in Edmonton, it gets dark at like 3pm in December so they didn't see me.

When we walk into the restaurant my mom is right there talking to the hostess. She turns around and looks right into my eyes and then starts talking to the hostess again. One of those mindless looks where you aren't really seeing. Anyways, she doesn't remember and was surprised to see me home 2 days before I had said I was coming home.

From that time on I did absolutely nothing until maybe the 20th of December. I just remember having trouble adjusting to the time difference for pretty much that whole time. Getting tired around 8pm and having to force myself to stay awake until a respectable time to go to bed. I saw a movie called Just Friends, I think. It was definitely not worth the money. I also saw Syriana which was quite a bit better.

Aside from those terribly interesting things. I was at home doing even less interesting things. Watching TV, eating food that was easily identifiable, doing x-word puzzles and what not. I really don't know what I was doing those few weeks actually.

I always hate coming back home. I magically revert to my teenage self and feel like I've never left at all. It's an awful feeling really. I just look at the calendar and think, hmmm another x amount of months have passed, where have I been? what have I been doing? I mean, I know what it was that I was doing but as soon as I get back to Edmonton it feels like it never happened. Like I had been in a coma for months or stepped into some time wormhole. So all of the sudden, all these things have happened to other people and I've just had a dream. It was a really nice dream, well Wonderland not so much, but it didn't really happen. I'm just all of the sudden older without anything to show for it: some photos, passport stamps, and memories of things that no longer seem real.

I think I'd make a really good spy. I mean I'd be able to pull off any nationality and I'm only able to concentrate on the present. Nothing else feels real to me. So I could be reborn as some diamond merchant in Amsterdam, some scientist in Chicago, or an industrial engineer in Buenos Aires. Well maybe I can't pull off those professions but you know what I mean. I could go there and only know those lives and places. I'd have vague impressions of having been other people in the past but where I am at that moment, the person I am at that moment, would be what defines me.

No Seoul Pun

2006-01-15T10:04:00.000+09:00

Seoul was quite a long time ago but I will do my best to finally wrap up my time in Korea.

I got out of the station without incident and got into a cab. I didn't have the address of the place I wanted to go but I knew the station I would have to get to. I didn't want to take the hassle of bringing all my luggage onto the subway. I ended up taking a luxury cab but it still wasn't all that much. I tried to bring the image of the map I had seen to get to the hostel into my mind but couldn't quite manage to conjure it. There are PC bangs all over Korea but I can never find them when I need to. I walked around some developed area with fancy restaurants and Koreans in fancy clothes. After pulling my suitcases and backpack all over the place some guy offered to help me. I was having to take a break every 15m. I found a PC bang and the address and realized I was on the wrong side of the street. I left my big suitcase on the street while I headed upstairs. I'm always disappointed to see that it hasn't been stolen. I eventually got to the hostel and I chatted with the girl who was working there. She bought me some ramen and we talked.... about her boyfriend and my time in Daegu. Her boyfriend was doing his military service.

I met a bunch of Japanese people who were staying there at the time. I went to bed and woke up late. I'm ashamed to admit I didn't have much interest in seeing Seoul. Maybe if I had a bit more energy or hadn't seen more interesting sights elsewhere. I went to the national palace and did the audio tour since it was so cheap 2000W I think. There were hardly any people there or anything that hadn't been rebuild sometime in the last 20 years. I suppose it was important to see though. I was still a bit torn about leaving Korea and didn't know how to feel about leaving. I still don't know how I feel about Korea, actually.

I think I went to Namdaemun that day. Maybe it was dongdaemun, I don't know. The more commercialized one. I really didn't see anything very interesting and tried to walk back to the hostel but I got lost. I always get lost, well take streets that I think will lead places but only lead to dead end or progressively smaller darker alleyways.

The next day I tried to go to Seoul tower. I was well on my way and fond the gondola up to the top but opted to walk. I was following a path that seemed to be headed in the right direction but as I kept walking I became convinced that it was leading me away from the tower. It started off heading upwards but later started going downwards. I ended up hoping over this little barrier and climbed the hill on my own. There were quite a few leaves and didn't look like many people decided to stray from the path. I was gripping trees and roots to climb up this hill at some points. I always feel stupid when I stray from the main routes and that I might end up stranded for days or become some unindentiable body when I'm finally found. I wonder if there's an equivalent to John Doe in Korea. Either that or I become convinced that I'm going to stumble upon a dead body. I always end up finding trash or broken picnic tables so I realize that I'm not actually in that remote a place. I finally make it to the top and casually climb over a barrier there. I didn't just walk up the mountain like some kind of caveman. I followed the road just like everyone else. The worst part was that Seoul Tower wasn't even open. I got there at the perfect time too. Right around sunset so you could see it lit up by the sky and then a nightscape of the city. I didn't realize it was supposed to be closed and then came across a sign that said it was supposed to be re-opened on December 1st. That was the day I was there. Maybe it was the second. At any rate it should've been open. The view from the top of the hill would've been more impressive had I been able to see through all the trees.

I went to the other market that night but wasn't really in the mood to be there. It was pretty cold too. This was the night that some guy asked me if I was Japanese. I still don't understand that. I also ran into some drunk guy who stole my waffle and started eating it. Then he offered to give me parts of it back. Then he jabbered away at me in friendly Korean and seemed genuinely surprised that I couldn't understand anything he was saying. This was actually the night I was lost but it doesn't matter. This isn't a very accurate account of what I did in Seoul but more of the impression that's been left on me.

I met a Dane that night though. He was born in Korea and looking for a job teaching English. A Danish Kyopo. I don't think they're very common. He told me I spoke Danish well even though I really only said a few sentences. It was still nice. I ended up leaving my towel with him. I felt a bit bad about it since it was long overdue for a wash.

I took a crappy tour of the DMZ. The Japanese people took the USO tour which I guess is much better and you actually go right to the border and can take a few steps into North Korea. I only got to go to some lookout point. It was still pretty interesting though. The worst part was that I had to wake up around 5am and the tour didn't start until 9 or so. It was all so I could be picked up my hostel even though the guy was 40 minutes late or something. The cave was pretty interesting but of course, photos were forbidden. At the lookout point you could only take photos if you stood behind some big white line. I still don't understand that. There was also a nice trip to a jewelery factory. Fascinating. I left after 2 minutes. I hate tours that sneak in trips tofactories.

I forgot to mention this little station. They've already built the station heading to Pyeongyang. They even have a little place where you can stamp your passport. I thought it was official thing. It turns out you just stamp it yourself. I was a bit hesistant about mutilating my passport so I debated it once I got the front. Then some guy from behind just took it and stamped it for me. It's pretty lame I think and it's upside down. I'm still worried some customs official will be disappointed that it's been mutilated but there you have it. There were other people debating about the implications of doing it. It's now a little spot of shame inside my passport but at least I wasn't the one to deface it.

I was pretty worried by this point though. By the time I got back to the hostel I only had 2.5 hours before my flight. I really thought I'd be back before then. It was a stressful ride to the airport as I watched the minutes go by. I got to the airport with only 55 minutes until my flight. The driver also wasn't very happy with my excess luggage. I could probably go into my luggage programs a bit more but don't really feel like it. I had a suitcase that weighed in at 35kg. My backpack was 27kg. I had to take out 5kg from the big one making my smaller backpack and labtop case extremely heavy. I was really surprised I made it onto the plane.

There's a really nice thing about line. In order to wait for the least amount of time, one has to either arrive right at the beginning or right at the end. It's all about timing really. I could've arrived an hour earlier and still had to wait just as long. It really depends on when the person before you gets there. When I was waiting at the Indian embassy in Kathmandu, I was in an ideal position. I was there an hour after the guy in front of me but it didn't matter because anyone who had come between figured they wouldn't get in or didn't bother coming to try. So anyways, it was lucky that I made my flight and didn't have to wait in line. Well I guess I had to wait for maybe 5 minutes.

Then I ran around the airport trying to sneak in my last meal and get rid of my excess won. I somehow dropped my boarding pass along the way. I was surprised when someone was handing it back to me. Eventually, they were ready to board my row and I left Korea feeling as confused as when I got there.

Final Days in Daegu

2006-01-05T08:24:00.000+09:00

Back in Korea I really didn’t do all that much. I had returned for a grand cocktail party in Alex’s apartment where everyone got quite toasted. It was nothing compared to my last trip to Itaewon Pub Crew so I almost felt sober. I even wore my suit to the party, I got to know Young Mi and her friends. A good time was had by all.

I think I stayed in Daegu for about 5 days. I really can’t think of anything that I did. I went back to my old area. My pizza guy was so happy to see me. I saw one of my old workmates, well I don’t know if I can call her that. She doesn’t speak English and never spoke to me. Grace Teacher. I thought about going to see my replacement at my old apartment but decided against it since it would be kind of weird. Weird even to think of that really. I walked around downtown a bit but mostly just lazed around Alex’s apartment.

Of course, I waited until my last day in Daegu to do important things like close bank accounts. I didn’t want stacks of Korean money, although I could’ve felt like some kind of smooth criminal with so many bills. I’d love to get stacks of bills from the bank but since my bags were overloaded as they were I opted for a cheque. I assumed she’d give me an international bank draft but she gave me a cheque that couldn’t be used outside of Korea. I had to FedEx it back to Korea to have it wired to my bank in Canada. Idiocy really. I should’ve known it wasn’t wise when I didn’t see a single Roman letter on this little slip of paper but I thought I’d impress a bank teller with my foreign cheque. She didn’t seem impressed with it at all. They could’ve accepted it had it been Chinese or Japanese but Korean cheques were taboo for Canadian banks.

Alex treated me to a last meal in Daegu and then I got in a cab with a giant suitcase(35kg), a laptop case, a giant backpack (28kg), and a smaller backpack. All of them overloaded. The laptop case and smaller backpack were both really heavy but since Air Canada didn’t weigh them when I checked in I don’t know how much they weighed.

I got to Daegu station and managed to buy a ticket and get on a train to Seoul. It was my only real time on the KTX. It was technically my 3rd time but since you can’t see the countryside passing you by quickly there’s no point saying you were on a train going 300km/h. I was in Seoul an hour and a half later.

Back to Korea via Bangkok and Taipei

2005-12-31T04:19:00.000+09:00

I’m the most behind I’ve ever been. I’m writing about things now that happened over a month ago. It’s time to get caught up, I guess.

So I spent a night in Georgetown, Malaysia at some little hostel that hosts people competing in Koran reading competitions. I again spent time only in Little India. I was the only one using utensils, also the only non-Indian so I guess that’s what made me stand out a bit more. I returned to my room only to find that I was locked out. I remember getting into the room and not only was some guy awake he said something to me that made me think ill of him. I can’t remember what. It was also very hot.

I had a cold shower and worried I wouldn’t make my bus to Hat Yai. I waited where some guys told me to wait. An hour after my bus should’ve left I went to the counter where I bought my ticket. I guess I was supposed to go there to begin with. Shame on me for listening to people who worked at the bus station. Anyways, I had to repay the fare, I got a slight discount on account of me being a retard and I was off….. about 4 hours later. I sat and read the last of my Harry Potter books.

I read all the way to Thailand and then across the border as well. I decided I would just go to the airport when I got to Hat Yai. I was in some kind of weird mood near the end of my trip where based on poor logic I decided that since my trip was so close to almost being over that it might as well be over. Also I plan to journey through Thailand some other time so I wasn’t very keen on seeing all that much. I got to the airport and tried to buy a ticket from Bangkok to Incheon so I wouldn’t have to do it later. It turns out that they had no flights to Korea. All the flights had been cancelled, probably because not enough people were flying. I decided I would sort it out in Bangkok and just fly there that night. So that’s what I did. Harry thwarted his nemesis en route. I got to Bangkok and didn’t plan on leaving the airport but went airline to airline asking for fares. They were all grossly overprices. Like $600 one-way whereas my cheapo fare would’ve been $240 one-way had there been flights. I really didn’t know what to do. I thought I’d even fly to Macao and then go through China and take the ferry again. I ended up on Kao Sanh road. A Thai friend of mine found me a cheap place to stay despite her being in Chicago. I think my room was less than $1. Yeah, like 20 baht or something. I also found a cheap fare back to Korea on China Airlines.

The next day I toured Bangkok. I got up late. Had something to eat and went with some Tuk Tuk driver who told me that I was there on the only day that all these temples and things were open. Buddha Day. I doubted him really until his cohort inside the Lucky Buddha temple affirmed his story. It was also supposedly a time when all suits were on sale. It was the last day of this massive sale. I don’t know how but I got kind of swept up in this so now I have a Thai suit. I really don’t know what possessed me to buy it. It wasn’t that expensive but something about the custom-tailored part persuaded me. I even got 2 custom made shirts. I don’t deny that I was scammed but it wasn’t that bad a deal, well for Thailand it was but what’s done is done. I saw a few temples and sat around some places but didn’t do many noteworthy things.

I went to bed early which is pointless on Kao Sanh road since I couldn’t get to sleep until the bars closed. I caught the 5am shuttle to the airport and then boarded the biggest plane I’d ever been on. I still don’t understand why they need a huge double decker plane to fly from Bangkok to Taipei. Well only first class was on the upper deck, you know what kind of plane I mean. I sat next to a woman from Malawi and a Chinese man. She was one of the few who actually wanted to go to Taipei. Hardly anyone wanted the customs declaration for the Republic of China. I don’t think I saw Taiwan anywhere in the Taipei airport. I checked my email there though and some middle aged American kept saying ‘Fuck’ about something.

So after my next flight I was back in Korea and immigration went much smoother than I thought it would. I imagined myself being detained for not having an ongoing ticket, which seems a bit silly now. He asked me a few questions though which is actually nicer than just being stamped and ignored as a living being. I took the bus to Seoul station and within 2 minutes of entering the station was offered a job. I kind of wish I’d asked for some details but knew I wouldn’t be returning to the job market for a few more months. I called Alex and then boarded the KTX bound for Daegu, well it was bound for Busan but that would be misleading. I was almost able to take the newly opened second line but I was lucky to get on line 1. I took a taxi and was back at my old sleeping ground. I even had a little greeting party awaiting me. Alex, his newly acquired girlfriend Young Mi, and his co-worker, Nathan. It was nice to get back to somewhere kind of familiar.

Pulau Pangkor

2005-12-10T23:24:00.000+09:00

Well I can't sleep so this is the most productive thing I can think of doing without leaving my bed. Laptops are great aren't they.

Anyways, I left Kuala Lumpur headed for beach and relaxation. The monsoon limited me to the west coast of Malaysia. I picked Pangkor since it was described as being more lowkey than any of the other places on the west coast. I don't know how you heavily promote something as being lowkey but that's what the government is trying to do. It was pretty lowkey actually.

I took the bus to Lumut to catch the ferry. We stop in Lumut and these Scandinavian girls ask the driver about the ferry terminal. He says 5 minutes. I assume, as the girls do, that this means in 5 minutes we will go to the ferry terminal. I could tell there were others left on the bus besides these Scandinavian girls. The driver gets back on the bus and tells us to get off. Turns out the other people on the bus were European tourists as well. Stupid tourists. I thought there were natives left on the bus.

I end up spending the next few days with the Scandinavian girls. We got along but had only lowkey fun. They were waitresses from Sweden but waitressed in Oslo. One was Vivian and the other Tess I think. We shared a triple and went to the beach and ate at restaurants together. I ended up getting burnt the one day I spent at the beach. It was hardly even sunny. Not a bad burn though. It was pretty cloudy the second day and the girls decided to leave. I ended up deciding to leave as well. It was a nice beach though. It just wasn't beach weather. I decided to just cross over into Thailand as soon as possible. I really don't know why. I was getting a little tired of traveling. I'd been traveling for about 5 weeks at this point and it was just a random trip with no particular destinations or things to see. Plus I didn't want to see very much since I'd imagined I'd be back in South-East Asia at some point.

I ended up in Georgetown that night on Pulau Penang. Nice town and I could've spent more time there. I was only in Little India though. That was the only place I saw Indians eating with their hands. My 6 hours in India outside of trains didn't expose me to much. The next morning I went to catch the bus to Hat Yai, Thailand. I ended up missing it because I was supposed to go to the ticket booth where I got the ticket and not to the place where the people who run the station told me to go. So I had to buy another ticket and wait for 3 hours at the bus terminal with my book. If only I hadn't had to lug around a heavy backpack with me everywhere I could've seen a bit more of Georgetown.

Kuala Lumpur

2005-12-09T17:49:00.000+09:00

Let me think back to my time in KL. I wasn't there very long and didn't really do all that much. I woke up early enough and left Singapore. I slept for most of the bus ride. Malaysia and Singapore both kind of have little slogans that they hang up at immigration. 'Death for drug traffikers.' I was there before the Australian was executed in Singapore so 'death to' signs were more comical to me then. Oh, Israelis aren't allowed to go to Malaysia. I've been a few places where people have said that Israelis are the worst tourists. I know that's not why they aren't allowed into Malaysia. Malaysia's largely Islamic.

I really can't think of anything that interesting that happened to me while in KL. I met some guy from Korea. Why are Koreans that aren't in Korea so untypically Korean. This guy had a big bushy head of hair. An Asian 'fro if you will. He didn't do anything but hang out at the hostel from what I could gather. I tried to go out sightseeing one afternoon but those monsoon rains got in the way. I ducked into the National Museum of History. My shoes were all wet and squeaky since I'd been wandering around in the rain in a little plastic poncho and had submerged my whole feet in water. My pants were soaked right through too. I really only felt bad because I had followed a woman who had just cleaned the floors. I relearnt about Malaysia's rotating monarchy. They've actually have 13 kings or something since independence in 1960 (I think) and only 4-5 prime ministers. The country has 9 sultans but only one can be king so they take turns.

I went to the Petronas Towers. I didn't go inside though. I meant to go the next day but they say you need to get there early since they limit the number of people who can go in. I woke up too late and knew it was my last day so I went to the Kuala Lumpur Tower which is uglier but has a higher observation deck. I also discovered I had seen 3 of the 10 highest towers on my trip. One in Seoul that I only saw in passing and the strange tower in Shanghai. KL's tower was 2 or 3rd.

I really like being in Islamic countries. I think it's something about the mosques and architecture. I've really only been to Turkey and Malaysia but it just makes them feel so much more foreign. Sarajevo was actually my first Islamic city. Downtown Sarajevo is actually really nice. Malaysia though was the only one where the women covered their heads. I'm not sure what it was but for some reason I found myself staring at them so much more. Something about it being mysterious or just different. The men were dressed pretty securlarly though. Funny to see some guy in t-shirt and jeans walking around with a woman in full muslim get-up. Malaysia has a fair number of Indians and Chinese, obviously. I took a photo of some women waiting for the bus outside of 7/11. Turned out blurry though. It really is a diverse Asian country.

My pics of the Petronas towers look incredibly unnatural. I swear I didn't do anything to them.

I really liked the base of them. Some strange reflective material makes it look there's motion. After I took it I looked at it my little screen and thought what the hell? After I took this some guy started talking to me in Portugese. I just look at him like what are you saying? He was from Brazil and thought I was too. We had a little chat but I think he was disappointed. He really wanted to be a fellow countryman. I really should be a masterspy or something. People have thought I was so many different nationalities. The strangest one happened while I was in Seoul. I was in Dongdaemun market and some guy says to me "Japanese?" I did have a hat on though but still. Then other people are sure my ancestors are nothing but northern European. People have thought I was Turkish, Chilean, French, Russian. I know I've mentionned this before but it seems to be a recurring theme in my life. Do I really have this ambiguous nationality look?

For the record, I'm quite a mutt. in decreasing order, I'm part English, Irish, Spanish, Scottish, Austrian, German, French, Welsh, and a teensy bit Dutch. Not Danish at all, or Turkish or Japanese for that matter.

Singapura

2005-12-07T13:12:00.000+09:00

I'm calling it Singapura since I'm pretentious and it's more fun to say it that way. I arrived in Singapore around 4am. It was a pretty nice airport. I never get to spend much time in nice airports. They are always crummy airports. So I was tired and dirty but really that was nothing new. I remember stepping outside and it being really humid.

Bad pic but I like it.

I walked over to the Terminal 1. I never understand why people take the escalator or trams in airports. You've either just been on a long flight or are about to be. What do you have against movement? The moon looked nice. It was actually too early for the busses to run so I had to sit and wait for them to start. I had some burgerking and exchanged the rest of my Chinese yuan. The subway started at 6am (not sure why I didn't to talk about the busses instead). I found my hostel alright. Luckily I used the 15 free internet in the terminal to research a place to stay. Lonely Planet didn't really have their act together on accommodation for Singapore. Of course, I wasn't able to check-in at 7am. I walked around for a bit. Found the Raffles Hotel and tried to buy some things that fell out of bag on the flight.

Tried to take a nap but just rested really. Then I went out in search of something to do. I decided I would go to Little India since my trip to India wasn't that Indian. It was monsoon season in Singapore so suddenly it starts raining like mad and I duck into an Indian restaurant. I'm a bit hesistant about the food since I'd never eaten Indian buffet style. I ordered rice and chicken. Of course, I get all these sauces to dip stuff in or pour onto things. I like my food plain. I'm a gastronic dullard, what can I say? I try my best to eat it the proper way but I guess I failed because the guy next to me asked if I'd ever had Indian food and told me I didn't look like I was enjoying it.

He seemed nice enough this guy. He was there to have his fortune told by this other Indian guy. Once I'd finished and it was still raining, this guy Joe, told me my fortune. He foresaw good things in terms of relationships and friends or whatever. I forget really. He did tell me that I was unable to stay put very long and like to be on the move. Gemini is an air sign you see (so that's what it is). This first guy left and Joe and I talked about Buddhism.I have a very limited knowledge but he explained the basics to me. He also told me about yoga. I didn't realize it was about waking up centres and bringing it all in line. I'm not the least bit spiritual.

Actually, I had some kind of weird desire to go to Singapore. I'd been there before you see. Most people would say I haven't.I was there in February or something of 1982. I was born in June. So yeah, a prenatal vacation (maybe that's what it is). My parents had a layover in Hawaii too. I had a kind of strange experience when I went to Hawaii a few years ago. I sometimes wonder if I left a part of myself in Singapore back in 1982. Anyways, it's kind of beside the point but I wondered if anything would happen in Singapore. It did strangely feel like I'd been there before but that could've just been it was the most Western place I'd been since coming to Asia and people spoke English everywhere. My uncle had been working in Singapore at the time. My parents were never big travelers. I didn't even leave Alberta until I was 8 or something. A big fishing trip on the border with Saskatchewan. Well and when I was 2 I went to Vancouver but only because my aunt was working there.

Later I was invited to say since they were having some kind of gathering.2 British graphic designers, one a prof. So I had a few beers with them and told one about teacher in Korea. The one prof seemed quite interested despite my warnings. Who knows? Universities are much better places than hagwons. Joe also took me to his Hindu temple and showed me around. So he taught me about 3 religions or disciplines and he was into astrology and all that too. He was in his late 40s. We had some roti and he showed me around the department store for south asian expats where things were really cheap, well for Singapore I guess.

I had gone here at night when it was a lot more lively. I always feel like such an outsider at religious places. I don't take pictures.

Then we went back to the restaurant. A native Chinese Singaporean with a crazy laugh joined us for a bit. Very strange lady. The some native Indian Singaporean who was in 70s came. I guess they didn't get along because the crazy lady gave the odd man the finger to the back of his head. This guy had had a stroke a few months before. They said he was always a bit weird though. He had just gotten up but had been awake for 25 hours. He found out that I had been an English teacher and told me to take lessons from Sidney Poitier in To Sir, With Love. He sang the theme song to me. Then started asking me all kinds of personal questions. "Was I able to make love in my country?" I thought I must have misheard but nope. "Did I enjoy making love? How long have I been making love? With whom had I made love? etc." So strange being asked these questions by some old Indian man in Singapore. I learnt a lot that day.... and had my drinks and food paid for. (I actually had donated $10 Sg to something for the children. Maybe there is such a thing as Karma, or at least in Little India there is).

The next day pales in comparison since I only did typical tourist things. I did get to experience the embarrassing accompaniment (if that's the word) to an ATM. I could've sworn I had my credit card. I also tried to go see the largest fountain in the world. The Fountain of Wealth. Closed, probable an omen. Singapore was nice but really I felt like I'd been there before and that I'd be there again so I wasn't that sad to leave it after 2 days.

Pleasant Singapore. I ate at one of the restaurants across the water.

Kathmandu to Kolkata (or 48 hours of nothing)

2005-12-01T20:14:00.000+09:00

I've got to write this very carefully or it will switch to Korean. I'm not sure how it's happening but I can't use this latin script long because it keeps switching to Hangul for some unknown reason.

I haven't been in Kathmandu for nearly 3 weeks according to my passport. I left Kathmandu on a Tuesday I believe. I had a message at my hotel but I didn't return it for awhile because I like to procrastinate. It was my travel agent where I bought my bus and train tickets to Calcutta. He was calling to tell me to take an earlier bus, the bus that was leaving in 15 minutes. Needless to say I was unable to catch that bus. I took one that left several hours before I was planning on leaving. It was an interesting journey to Calcutta. I asked the guy when I would be arriving in Calcutta and he told me 12:45 on Monday. That's right I left on a Sunday. So we were driving along in this Nepalese bus, we being myself and Nepalese people. I figured out how to switch back to latin characters. Shift + alt. As I was saying, I met some guy sitting near me. I didn't really feel like having a conversation in broken English so I just answered his questions. I'm a pitiful conversationalist to begin with.

I'm not sure why I brought that guy up so soon. I was told the bus ride would last about 3 hours. I've been on this bus for about 5 hours already and it's getting quite dark. Actually, there was no daylight left. We stop a few places along the way for bathroom breaks and some food. There's no toilet on the bus. My diarrhea had subsided by this point (thank god). I thought it was just a 3 hour ride so I never bothered to get much. The guy bought me some kind of fruit. Like an orange but they didn't quite look like oranges. I had 2 of them I think. At 9pm, the bus pulls over one last time. It doesn't go anywhere for the next 8 hours. The bus just pulls over to the side of the road and we all sleep there on the bus. I wasn't told about this. I'm a bit concerned that I'm going to miss my train plus I'm still in Nepal and haven't even crossed the border. I guess it's because of the Maoists that we pull over. The guy tells me the busses used to run all night. So I slept crammed between 2 seats with no real jacket. Lucky me am right at the front of the bus also with the door wide open bringing in cool breezes. It isn't warm at night in Nepal.

Finally at 5am the bus starts up again and we press on towards Sunauli. The scenery is nice at least. Very green and hilly. Nepalese music is a bit uncreative though. The songs last forever and basically just repeats 10 seconds of music again and again. At least you could learn to sing along rather quickly. It could have been Indian music. I didn't really developed much of an ear for it.

Finally we get to the border. I guess the guy must have said 13 hours to reach the border and even that I now realize it a bit of an underestimate. It looks so close on the map. I catch a rickshaw to the agent who has my train ticket. That goes smoothly enough. Then the rickshaw driver takes me to the border. That goes rather well also. I was kind of worried about the Indian border since I had a transit visa but didn't have my onward ticket since I bought it online and had to give my printed copy to the Indian embassy and never bothered to reprint it. I left them but would see them again shortly.

I got to the guy who is supposed to give me the bus tickets. I somehow managed to lose my train tickets despite having had them for only 15 minutes or so. The rickshaw driver goes back to Nepal while I stay at the Indian immigration office. I left it at Nepali immigration. That bit of stupidity aside it was alright. The rickshaw driver charged me a stupidity fee, well extra hassle or something. He made me give him the rest of my Nepali money for the drive (not much though I doubt it's illegal to take Nepali rupees to India, I'd removed some from my wallet beforehand though). I'd already paid him before that so I had to give him Chinese Yuan since it was all I had.

India didn't go very smoothly. I did understand where the 12:45 Monday came in. That's when the train left for Calcutta. I had no idea it would take so long. The bus guy tells me that if I take the bus I will miss the train. I need to take a taxi now. I wonder if that's even true. I'm a favourite target of small scams. I believed it though since I only had about 2 hours to get to the train station which was in another town. I had no money for the taxi so I had to give a deposit in Chinese Yuan and then they would take me to an ATM in Gorakhpur. After driving about 2 hours we finally get there. They tell me I need to give them more money because my ticket is a sleeper with AC. I tell them no, that I needed some kind of proof that I owed them more money. Anyways, I really have no tolerance for these kind of things, hence the reason I didn't want to spend much time in India. I relented, since I always relent.

I still haven't eaten since I left Kathmandu aside from 2 pieces of fruit or possibly just one. I'm rushed into the station and onto a train. I don't know how long I'll be on this train. I know it's overnight and that I'm not getting to Kolkata by 12:45 on Monday since it's about 12:44 on Monday. So I find my sleeper, top bunk, no access to a window. I end up reading the whole time and sleeping. I finish reading Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. I end up being on the train for 25 hours. Not what I was expecting to say the least. I buy some water at some station and a little stuffed bread thing. I was hungry, not having eaten anything substantial in oh, 40 hours or so. I didn't even get to see much of the countryside. Quite boring.

I had planned on spending 2 days in Kolkata/Calcutta but due to a misunderstanding I have 8 hours total. My flight is at 10pm that night. I try to leave my bags at the train station but they refuse to take them since I don't have a train ticket. I end up wasting all my time in Calcutta. I just take a taxi to Sutter street, eat some tandoori chicken, go to an internet cafe for 4 hours, have some more tandoori chicken and then go to the airport.

Of course, I didn't take out many rupees since I knew I wouldn't be in India long. The taxi which was agreed to be 200 rupees, jumps to 300 when we arrive at the airport and I want to go to the international terminal 200m further. It ends up being a moot point since I don't have anything less than a 500 note. He won't give me any change either since he didn't pick up a passenger. I really had no use for a few dollars worth of rupees so all I had was a 'fuck you' left for him. I'm such a relenter.

Luckily my plane ticket was ridiculously cheap. Only $100 US from Kolkata to Singapore. I really expected the international terminal of the airport to be a lot bigger. There were only 2 gates. I had to stand around and wait for immigration to start their shift. I guess no one flies into Calcutta or out of for that matter. I board the plane and am the only non-South Asian on the flight. Actually that's not true, the pilot was Australian and the flight team as they call flight attendants plurally were based in Singapore. Jet Star Asia was a good airline though. That brings me to the 16th of November now... ok later.

Kathmandu omissions

2005-11-21T22:57:00.000+09:00

I never really went much into my mystery illness. So let me begin. I wasn't feeling all that well. Something to do with my stomach. So I deduced from that that it must have been something that I drank or ate. Then I suddenly remembered that I'd taken a vitamin earlier in the day that I started to feel not so good.... with tap water.

So after my one day of sightseeing and me planning to do a half day the next day with my bus leaving at 6pm, someone Sam had been traveling with for a few days back in China showed up at our hostel. Apparently, she had amoeboid dysentary. Not all that fun. So after she mentioned this I immediately became concerned that I had amoebas inside of me. After she left I looked up my travel guide health section and read all the water-borne diseases. All of them involved diarrhea. Good, I don't have dysentery. Of course that meant I could have any number of other things. I went to bed not feeling all that great so I took the garbage can and brought it close to my bed.

I don't know how long I'd been asleep but then I got sick 3 times. That didn't feel very good but I felt a bit better afterwards. Then in the middle of the night it became obvious that shall we say, I might have had amoebas. It was sudden and violent. The next day I still felt funny.

I still had to do a bit of running around also. I forgot to mention what a dolt I've become. Actually, I'm a bit iffy on the definition of dolt but I've become a bit forgetful. I just forgot my shoes on the bus actually, and I forgot my daypack on the beach a couple nights ago, I left my sunglasses behind on another bus, and while in Kathmandu I forgot my ATM card in surprise surprise an ATM. I didn't realize for a few days while when I next went to take out money. Who ever heard of a return card button? Once I get my money and receipt I figure I'm done and I leave. Anyways, I had to call the bank, meet a guy at the ATM, find out since it happened days ago my card is at the head office, go to the head office later but miss the appointment because my rickshaw driver was slow at getting me change, and go on my last day. I got my card back though. I was shocked my student card worked though. It's through a bank but I'd thought it would only be accessible in Texas. Don't ask me why I still have a bank account based in Texas.

The missed appointment is visa related. Don't try to get an Indian visa in Nepal. It's next to impossible. Scott, Sam, and I showed up one day at 1 trying to get visas. We were told there were closed and to get there the next day by 6am. It doesn't open until 9:30. The next day, days before my illness, I'm the only one to get up. I get there by 8:30. The line is long and I'm number 68 on the list. I doubt I will be seen. I spend the day there and read most of my book. Prisoner of Azkaban. Yep, been reading Harry Potter since Beijing. Anyways, I'm barely seen just before 12 when they close. They can't do anything for me. I need an onward ticket for a transit visa, of course I don't want to buy a ticket until I have a visa. Anyways, I buy a ticket online and head there the next day at 6 with Sam and Scott. They are getting tourist visas. This time we are numbers 44-46. A lot of people between 40 and 60 just leave because they lose faith that they will be seen. That's how I managed to scrape in the first day. Anyways, this second time I go in the line for transit visas. I was there the day before but someone moving from the visa line to the transit visa line convinced me I needed to be in the visa line first. Dumb since I got seen right away in this other line and just had to wait for hours while Scott and Sam waited in this miserable line. They were the last 2 to be seen before the window shut. Actually, that's what they like to say but really they were seen at 11:59 so technically the last before when they should've closed. There was still a line of people waiting and we were hoping they would shut the window and for things to get ugly. We got impatient and left. Scott and Sam had to wait a week for the telex clearance form to go through and then standing in that line all over again. My transit visa was ready in the afternoon and that's why I was late getting to the bank to get my card.

Let's see if there's anything else I should mention about my time in Nepal. Umm... I've rarely seen such a marked border. Nepal really is a lot greener and hillier than Tibet. I guess it began to change a bit before that but anyways. The change in scenery was as dramatic and Lonely Planet made it out to be. I would quote it but I've sold my China book. It was also much warmer and I only ever needed to wear 2 layers there. Well aside from when I felt cold during my brief illness.

Entering Nepal

Mountains floating in the sky

Dine and Scott

Look at how drunk I am

Good times, the Tibet 5 (minus 1)

Kathmandu

2005-11-21T15:01:00.000+09:00

What can I say about Kathmandu?

I didn't actually do a whole lot in Kathmandu. Actually I pretty much just spent a week relaxing, not doing a thing. Showers (with hot water even!), real restaurants, bars, electricity. I spent my time just readjusting/overindulging in those kinds of things. I really did just do absolutely nothing. I read, sat around, ate, and drank.

I did spend one day, maybe a half-day sightseeing just looking around Durbar Square. There was a living goddess there but I missed her. She's called the Kudari, maybe just a Kudari. Anyways, she's this little girl goddess. Right, she's the Goddess of Kathmandu I think. She lives in her little temple and dresses in her little Kudari costume. When she hits puberty though it means she is no longer the goddess but a mere mortal so they kick her out and from that point on no man will touch her for fear of death within 14 days. I wouldn't like to be the living goddess. Scott and Sam saw her for a brief moment. They said she looked pouty and a bit resentful. Some other word also but I don't recall. I actually wasn't feeling very good on that last day.

We'd gone out that night. The first night after the girls had flown off to Bangkok we went out with some other people for steak (I had chicken since that's what I do, I go to a sushi restaurant and order teriyaki chicken, I like chicken. Steak I will eat but never order...anyways). Then we went to a casino where I lost 6 out of 7 hands of blackjack. So I lost my money very quickly and then started to feel unwell. I left early and paid way to much for a taxi back to the hotel. I wasn't in the mood to argue and my fuckitness (as I call it) was in fullswing so I just paid and went right to bed. I woke up the next morning feeling pretty shitty. Like I had drank way too much (2 beers, I swear). The one day I had left to sightsee and I felt sluggish and a bit sick. Here are some pics of Durbar square. I saw a monkey. Not great quality but I'm not retouching them on vacation.

Photo Highlight Reel

2005-11-16T16:32:00.000+09:00

I've decided to finally post some pictures but due to the number of photos and that I'm paying to use the internet, I will only post a couple from each place. Maybe even some really bad ones of myself.
Leaving Incheon by ferry/ Slow boat to China

Shanghai

Bright blurry lights

It's like I'm in the future - Shanghai

Me in Tianamen Square

Obligatory photo

Feeling exasperated and like such a tourist in the Forbidden City

Konglish meet Chinglish

People crowd to see the Terra Cotta Warriors (you know what they look like)

Aren't pandas cute? I suppose.

Gotta lead Tibet with Potala Palace, home of the Dalai Lama...uhh..if he weren't in exile that is

Some happy Tibetan people

Me on a yak... ok half yak

People I was stuck in a jeep with for 7 days: Me, Vanessa, Dine, Scott, and Sam...... oh, yeah and Everest

I think that's enough photos for one day. The last 3 photos were stolen from the others. No more photos for you!

Nyalam to the border

2005-11-15T20:57:00.000+09:00

The next day in Nyalam, the gateway to Hell, we did a bit of trekking. We hiked up a stretch of the mountain in search of a lake. We found out the lake was much further than we had thought. We never saw it but it was still nice walking along. I managed to step through some ice and got my foot sopping wet. I was worried I'd have to turn back but it wasn't that cold during the day and I forgot about it awhile later.

We found a big rock with some Tibetan prayer flags atop it, we climbed it. We saw some yaks. An abandoned house. Not really interesting to read about.

Then we drove to Zhangmu on the border with Nepal. It was so surreal. At first we are in the desert where nothing grows and only shepherds, goats, yaks, mountains, and rocks can be seen to really lush hills. Tibet was nice and all but we were pretty ready to leave. It must be much nicer in the summer. We were still all filthy animals. Zhangmu was just surrounded by trees and plants, all these waterfalls, and it really felt like Tibet was so far away. We found a place to stay and bid goodbye to Dawa. The hotel had actual showers, actual electricity, real menu options. It's hard to believe I could be so excited by such a thing as an electrical outlet or flushing toilets.

We spent the night out having a few beers. The girls went to bed and Sam, Scott, and I (lured by promises of bread that I never received) snuck out again. I was already pretty drunk and just wanted to sleep. We went to some club with performers on stage. It was kind of odd. Some Tibetan (city Tibetan I guess) kept trying to proposition women for sex. The last woman he approached was appauled, but only by the price he offered. At 500, it was all settled and the 2 of them hugged and walked off stage. Very odd story line. Then we danced with locals for a bit to Tibetan/Nepali/Chinese traditional music with a dance beat. A lot of them were in traditional clothes dancing the night away. One lady there must have been well over 40. It was jolly good fun.

Then we decided to switch it up. I was pretty tired but still went. I had a drumstick that I bought from a street vendor. Very good drumstick but a bit too spicy for my liking. I still managed to have 3 of them that night though. I didn't enjoy the second place so much. I missed the dancing girls who Scott had said were better than strippers and I didn't do any dancing there. I just longed for sleep or more chicken legs. I don't know why I was so tired.

On the way back we stopped for chicken legs several times passing a few places with red lights and Sam singing Roxanne. At one chicken plac, we saw 2 guys come in who were served chicken right away at no cost. The guy and his wife were so attentive to these leather clad serious men that we were sure they were local mobsters. Then we finally got back to hotel and Sam tried the key and it broke off it the lock so he kicked the door open. Ok, this part came between the girls going to bed and us going out again but I just forgot to mention it.

The next morning, the girls came in to wake us at 8. I guess we'd agreed to the time earlier. We got out of bed at 10. The girls were a bit upset and anxious to cross the border into Nepal. We had to get to Kathmandu before sunset or I'm not sure, something very bad would happen to us. We ate breakfast, exchanged some money, got into a small argument about the key (I'd conveniently gone in search of postcards), and then walked 10 feet and cleared Chinese immigration. Out of Tibet and China and into no man's land between the 2 borders.

So at long last I finish my travelogue of China and Tibet. I'm still one country behind since I'm actually no longer in Nepal either. Where could I be? Unfortunately, you'll have to wait until I'm 2 countries behind since I'm leaving this one in another few hours. 4 entries in one day, it's not that there isn't anything to see or do where I am but due to some unclear explanations by the ticket agent and people's unwillingness to watch my bag for just the afternoon it really isn't worth seeing or doing anything here with my heavy pack across my back.

Tingri & Nyalam

2005-11-15T20:45:00.000+09:00

Tingri wasn't really worth the trouble of getting to. We did have a nice little argument with Dawa through one of the hotel employees. He said we had only booked 8 days. We knew we'd booked 9. I don't know why it escalated so much. We only ended up using 7 days total. We were threatening to kick Dawa's wife out of our jeep and just leave her wherever. Threatening to tell Snowland and anyone else who would listen what a shitty driver he was. I don't think the threats were translated.

We decided to go to the nearby hot springs. It was quite nice to actually be warm for a change. We pretended we were now clean and then headed to Nyalam. Lonely Planet says that Nyalam means "Gateway to Hell" in Tibetan. We were no longer worried about hell though having lived through it the day before.

We got to the hotel in Nyalam and the man at the hotel was quite nice. Later though he turned on us and wouldn't heat the guest room for us even though we were his only guests. There was no heating in this place either. I was really sick of being cold all the time. At least Canada has indoor heating in the dead of winter. It's really the only way to make the cold bearable, being toasty warm inside. Anyways, we are sure that Dawa tainted the innkeeper's image of us. He also wouldn't let us watch TV or do anything really. There wasn't much to do in Nyalam that night and we'd promised ourselves we wouldn't use the internet while in Tibet. We ate Nepalese food and shivered in our beds like so many nights before.

Dawa and his effin' wife

2005-11-15T19:40:00.000+09:00

I forget whether I mentioned that Dawa had brought his wife along for the journey. We picked her up at another place where we'd stopped for momos. The bathrooms in this town we so bad shit extended all the way to the outside entrance. I should've taken a picture. Shit all over the floor. Apparently, Dawa's wife's cousin or sister was having a baby right on the border.

Nobody slept well at Everest and I woke up feeling pretty shitty. Combination of altitude sickness and a hangover and some weird feeling in my stomach. Dawa took us down to Everest Base Camp. We decided we didn't want to walk 2 hours from the monastery on a road very much accesible by car. It was freezing cold don't forget.

We decided we would trek around the base of Mt. Everest for a couple hours. We got there and the wind was howling away. It was blowing so hard in my face that I could hardly breathe. The girls turned back in less than 10 minutes, an iced-over stream was enough to make the tropical island girls (French Mauritian girls). Originally they had planned to do several days of trekking around the base. We all had a good laugh about that in retrospect. I trudged (is that the word?) for another hour or so. I had images of myself collapsing and needing to be carried back. Hangover trekking at altitude in strong winds is hard. So I kept going until I thought I'd get a nice clean view of Everest. Just around one more bend I kept saying. Anyways it became one bend to many and I turned back. As luck would have it, it really was only one more bend and then it became a nice little valley protected from the wind. Damn!

I walked back to jeep and stopped several times. I could've had nice little naps on the jagged stones. I laid down on several actually. There was virtually no vegetation at Everest. All I could see was rock and snow. Completely barren and lots of wind. It really isn't a place that humans are meant to go. By meant, I mean adapted to go.

So now we come to a key moment in the trip. One we have decided to immortalize in a t-shirt. We drove out of Everest base camp. Scott and Sam had been looking for it all over the place in the valley (we'd actually stopped the jeep there, some lady told us it was a 30 minute walk, I guess she had no clue). We'd been driving for maybe an hour and then Dawa stopped the jeep. He went to the back of the jeep and got some water. He came back and we kept driving. Maybe 20 minutes later he stops again. He gets out and goes around to the back. He's out there for maybe 5 minutes and Sam decides to see what's up. He opens the door and the back passenger side tire is completely flat. Rim touching the ground flat.

The girls decide that while he is changing the tire, they'll go for a walk and then we can pick them up along the road when we get moving again. Us 3 guys, decide to just sit and wait. Dawa slowly gets the jack out and then changes the tire. After putting the spare on, he decides there's a problem. The spare is flat, too! He never lowered the vehicle but decided him pushing on the tire was test enough.

He and his wife have some snacks since we're going to wait for a passing vehicle to help. The girls return aware that the odds of them being picked up by us were getting smaller and smaller. Eventually, Dawa decides to go. He and his wife grab some things and walk back down the road from where we came. All he tells us is to stay at with the car. We have no idea when he'll return. The 5 of us hang out in the car for a long freaking time and then I leave to go to the bathroom.

I come back and off in the distance we see 2 people walking along a path. Maybe we're saved. Scott notices what the 2 are wearing and yells "It's Dawa and his fucking wife." They'd been gone for 2 hours and we now walking along some parallel road in the opposite direction. What the hell!

Later, we see 2 more people off in the distance. Who are these people? We wonder who they are for the longest time and then see a giant herd of goats following them. We get worried as these 2 approach the vehicle. We were all in some weird state of paranoia by this stage. They come and peek into the windows. Tibetans aren't the cleanest of people and nor do they have the best of oral hygiene either as we discover. Sam decides they are safe and shows them what's wrong with the jeep. They'd approached from the left side. Then these 2 decide to hang around a bit, peering into the jeep and all. I don't think these 2 had had many opportunities with tourists or white people before. Then before they leave the offer us the chance to buy a goat so we could eat it. We decide not to.

Then we're alone again in the jeep. We decide to go through all the compartments to see if there's anything useful to survival. A few of us were sure we'd be spending the night in this jeep freezing to death right on the Tibetan plateau. Nice views of mountains but between them the land is absolutely flat. We find several items of note. First some unidentified green substance in little baggies. It isn't marijuana but that's really all we know. Next we find the vehicle registration. The vehicle we were told was a 1998 Toyota Landcruiser when we had been sure it was no later than a '93 was actually a '92. Then we find Dawa's ID. He's not 29 as he had claimed but 34. No wait, we find another set of ID and he is 29. Who is this guy? Why does he have 2 IDs with his photo with different birthdates.

We begin to wonder who our driver is. We question why he stopped for water. Did he puncture the tire on purpose? Is he going to let us freeze to death overnight? What was he doing when he headed off for 2 hours only to re-emerge in the distance somewhere else? Why had no cars past in the 3 hours we had been there? Why did Dawa not tell us where he was going? Should we have bought a goat?

We decided the next time a shepherd went by that we would indeed buy a goat. A few more hours past. We were still in the jeep. Then off in the distance, along the parallel road, which was paved (why weren't we on the paved road?) we saw two vehicles approaching from the direction Dawa had gone. We needed to save ourselves. Dine, Sam, and I raced to catch them before they had driven by. This other road was several hundred metres away. We didn't think we'd catch them. Dine used her big red scarf and waved it furiously in the air. They actually stopped and we went to them. They were Chinese tourists and didn't understand what we were saying. From what we could work out with signs, they had seen our driver, understood we had a flat tire, and motioned that they'd be coming around to our vehicle. We went back to our 4x4 which looked so tiny off in the distance along some dirt path that couldn't be seen from the main road. The Chinese never came.

Then maybe an hour later, we see another group of vehicles. This time Vanessa and Scott run to stop them. They reach them and out of one of the vehicles, Dawa emerges with a new tire. The jeeps had several empty seats as far as we could tell and she'd been making due in the back with all our bags piled up around her. We figured his wife must be at the next village. Dawa takes awhile to cross this field with a giant tire over his back. Just as he reaches the vehicle, a mysterious cart being pulled by a donkey arrives on the dirt road. Who do we see sitting in the cart but Dawa's wife? Why did she arrive by donkey and Dawa by jeep? It really made no sense.

With our fears of a driver who'd just left us to die in the middle of nowhere subsided, we were on our way again. Dawa had very strange driving habits. If the road was good, flat, and straight he would drive maybe 40km per hour. In the middle of nowhere, driving on what was barely even a path going over all kinds of bumps and through water, he would drive about 60km. No sense. Eventually the sun set and we were driving through these hills and over passes in the pitch blackness. We still didn't know if we would actually make it to Tingri and we had more images of us sleeping in the 4x4. Then at last Dawa pointed at some lights in the distance and said "Tingri." Then he would turn and the lights wouldn't be in front of us and we would worry. I was getting pretty restless in the end. I needed to get out of the jeep or something terrible might happen.

Finally, after about 10 hours (3 hours for other groups) we got to Tingri. We tried to find a guesthouse which we had read had hot showers. It had been about 4-5 days since our last one. Lonely Planet had lied to us. They only had hot showers in the summer. We spent another night in an unheated room. We had more momos. I had 2 bowls since Dine had just become really unwell and needed to go right to bed. I was starving. We decided we didn't need to stop at the guesthouse for lunch since Tingri wasn't that far away. Despite all our plans to post really bad things about Dawa and the Snowland Hotel where we had hired our car and driver, we never followed through. They really do have you on those one-way journeys.

Everest

2005-11-15T19:11:00.000+09:00

I think the last time I blogged I was in Shegar. Well I wasn't actually in Shegar at the time but at any rate. We got out of Shegar without much todo. Well Dawa, our driver, was anxious to leave. Up for several hours, he was, just waiting.

We got into the 4x4 and got on the road. I don't remember if I this came before Shegar or afterwards but anyways, we were supposed to stay in some town, Tashi Dzom, I believe. There wasn't much there so we kept on going, stopping only for momos. What Tibetans call Chinese dumplings. We ended up at the base of Everest. Well not exactly the base but the Rongphu monastery with Everest right in sight. We really didn't do very much there. We got out of the 4x4 and went to the guesthouse across the road from the monastery. We put our bags in the room and noticed our splendid bathroom. Actually it wasn't a bathroom at all, okay technically it is, but a little stone cube with a narrow slit through the floor. Squat toilets didn't look nearly as bad as they did before. There were 2 slits I believe but one was covered over with... waste, shall we call it. The other one was practically right at the door, from which, you could see people standing about on the sidewalk in front of the guesthouse. So I kind of positioned myself in the best possible fashion pretending there was no way I could be seen. There was another bathroom but both holes had vanished so business was just done in corners. Pleasant way to start my journey to Everest right?

After that, we headed across the street to the monastery. It was a nice little monastery but not all that special aside from Everest being right there. The monks and nuns were a bit cold and tried to buy clothes from some of us. They gave us some bread and we told them we'd come back tomorrow. We didn't though. We just wanted to lie to Buddhists. Okay, the lie wasn't intentional.

We went back to the guesthouse and hung out in the kitchen with every other person who had come to Everest from the Tibetan side. We ran into almost all the people there at some point later in the trip. A Welsh guy traveling with 2 Koreans who didn't know each other previously, an Irish and Aussie girl who were downers for their group, 2 middle aged Frenchmen, and others. A Dutch guy I had met in Chengdu was there. I ended up just playing cards most of the night. Some Hearts and then Presidents and Assholes. I won a game of Hearts and was president for most of the night. I had quite a few beers at high altitude. Beer goes a long way at 5200m. I was toasty warm the whole time too being right behind the stove. Everyone was all bundled up and I was down to a t-shirt. Then they kicked us out of the room and we took the game to our chilly non-heated room. We took extra care to duct tape the holes and gaps in the glass. We had our little lightbulb though..... for about 10 minutes and then very slowly the light dimmed to blackness. I don't know why but we were obsessed with the game and everyone went to get their headlamps. We played for 2 more hours I think. We were noisy. Not that it mattered. Nobody slept at all. I'd been sleeping fine the whole time except for that one night. Even with all the alcohol the decreased oxygen in the air and the cold made it impossible to sleep. I also couldn't quit thinking about cards.

Some more from the Tibetan plateau

2005-11-09T23:23:00.000+09:00

I'm no longer in Tibet but I've been doing a bad job at keeping this up to date. I was doing so well before I met people.

So last place I was was Shigatse? I think I need to prod my memory banks a little. Ok I think I've got it. From Shigatse we drove to Shegar. It was a pretty boring day really. We drove over fairly unfriendly roads around some very nice mountains and lakes. Tibet is very brown and lacks a lot of vegetation. Scott kept saying how it reminded him of Star Wars. I guess it is kind of other worldly, maybe Martian like but only because there's hardly any green to be seen. We'd see some other 4x4's making the reverse trip and some shepherds and their flocks. It really is hard to believe that they still have shepherds in Tibet. We's be driving forever and in the middle of nowhere would be this man and all these sheep/yaks. I guess there really aren't any predators there. Unbelievably boring job though.

There's really not much that else can be said for a day of driving. We got to Shegar which for some reason I'd imagined to be completely different. It sounds like some formerly great city, right? Anyways, we did absolutely nothing in Shegar. We arrived and there were no showers at all, no electricity save for a lightbulb in the middle of our room. "You can turn the light on after 7pm" they told us. Really barebones type stuff. Our pillowcases though were adorned with little birds that may or may not have been ducks. I actually had a dream involving these little cartoon birds. We spent most of our time in the main part of the hotel with everyone else since it was the only source of heat. In the centre of the room was a big oven that was really only used to heat water and unless you were really close to it couldn't feel any warmth. Tibet is freezing... well when there's no heat indoors. Yeah, no heat in any of our hostel rooms in the whole of Tibet. They are also lacking fuel in Tibet so yak poop and goat poop is burned. It didn't smell bad but then again I have a really poor sense of smell.

So the five of us sat around drinking beer (which goes a long way at high altitudes) playing cards and other weird little games until it seemed like a good time to go to bed.

I'll update tomorrow probably since I need to meet some people in 4 minutes. I was really hoping to put some pictures up but I'll need to burn a CD for that from Sam's computer. Seems like the easiest way since I've downloaded my pictures on his computer and deleted them from my memory card (reluctantly). I have 80 free minutes of internet from the laundry/internet place so I'll finish up Tibet then. Good times.

7 days in Tibet (well first 2 days I guess)

2005-11-04T21:42:00.000+09:00

I'm not sure how much I'm going to write today. It's the first time I've been on the internet since I last wrote. I been through most of Tibet now, well from Lhasa. My hotel is only a few hundred meters from the Chinese border, another 8km to Nepal but my time in Tibet is coming to an end.

It was quite an interesting way to spend a week. I think this is day 7 of what was supposed to be a 9 day ride. I think 9 days was a bit too ambitious for us. Let me go back to the beginning now. If only I had my camera on me to jog my memory a bit.

We met our driver, Dawa, at about 8 in front of our hotel. He pulled up and the number 7 was displayed on the back of the Landcruiser. Lucky 7, I thought. We left Lhasa and shortly thereafter we saw a Landcruiser flipped over in the ditch. Nice way to start things (no accident is forthcoming in the narrative, just to let you know). We drove further and eventually came to Yagrem Lake (something with a Y anyway). It was a pretty nice lake but honestly growing up with the Canadian Rockies not far away it's hard to impress me with mountains and lakes. So we were on the top of the pass. It took forever to climb this hill with our slow driver and all these loops. We could see the same village at the base of the mountains for at least an hour or two. We got to the top and got out. I was scammed a little bit up there but not more than $5. I sat on a yak and had my picture taken. I gave her 20 yuan since I didn't have a fiver. She said everyone else in the group would get their picture taken and then no change would be needed. The others all paid seperately so I lost about $2 there. Then I had my picture taken with some dog. Not that special really and the dog and camera were thrust upon me rather quickly. Another $2 gone. I guess I need more pictures of myself on this trip anyway.

We were listening to some CDs in the 4x4. We decided to shell out an extra 500 yuan (umm, $70 per person over the course of 9 days) for a new vehicle, a '98 we were told. It came with a CD player as luck would have it. Shortly after passing the lake our driver stops and gets out of the 4x4 and looks under the hood. He never told us anything he did. Gets back in and we're off. Maybe 20 minutes later we just stop and stay there for 20 minutes or so. Something wrong with the engine or something. Dawa was a poor communicator. Anyways, we keep going and stopping for quite awhile. Eventually we reach some village. He tells us to go eat and everything will be fixed. OK. Actually, we called the agency and told them about the vehicle. At first, they don't know who we are or why we'd called. Finally, after speaking with our driver (Dawa speaks virtually no English btw), they figure it out. They'll fix the vehicle and send us a new one the next day. Whatever.

Somehow, we make it to the next place, Gyantse (no idea where we stopped for lunch to pay for an expensive buffet). We get there and aren't too impressed. So this is the least Chinese influenced city in Tibet? We decide to walk around and then leave in a few hours. We see some fort but it doesn't seem worth paying the entrance fee. We walk in as far as possible before getting caught and leaving. We decide there's not much to see in Gyantse and decide to continue to Shigatse (Tibet's number 2 city after Lhasa). Turns out we missed quite a lot in Gyantse. We didn't explore the Tibetan part of the town (no wonder it didn't seem very Tibetan) and we missed the monastery there. I saw it from the car at least. No going back now, I guess.

Shigatse we did something similar. We missed the big draw there as well in favour of a smaller one. We took a minibus to go see this monastery next to some tiny village. It was really nice actually. I don't know what to say about it really. We saw some little rooms with iconic images which wasn't too impressive actually. I felt a bit like an intruder there. All these buddhist monks and buddhists doing their worship (or whatever you want to call it) and me and my travel companions, mind you I wasn't with them for a lot of the time there. The most impressive part was seeing all these monks doing chants in the main room. I wasn't sure if I should be in there or not. I crept along the out walls (there were other tourists there so I didn't feel too bad) but then some monk who wasn't part of the ceremony smiled at me so I figured it was ok. There were only 3 other tourists there the whole time. A bit disrespectful I must say photographing with the flash on in there. I admit I took a short video with my little camera but there was no flash. Walking around the little halls around the main area with all these chants and drums was quite an experience. Maybe it was more that I felt I was intruding and was like some kind of spirituality spy.

We left the monastery and decided to hike up to the hermitage on the hill. We got to the base of the hill and 2 boys with a cart and donkey decided to offer us a ride. Vanessa was feeling a bit tired so she negotiated a 12c ride to the top. That donkey was slow and she lagged behind quickly. The boys only took her part way before renogociating at which point Vanessa got out and we waited 5-10 minutes for her to catch up. The hermitage wasn't all that impressive. We got to the top and took a break. There was a nice shrine that I would've gone to see had there not been a giant ravine that I had to walk around. I finished my Harry Potter book there at this buddhist hermitage in Tibet. Sam and Scott decided to go while the French Mauritian girls and I took a little nap. They actually got some holy water poured over their heads up there. I regretted that I didn't go a bit but realized I didn't really believe in that so what was the point in going through an empty spiritual ritual. I kind of wish I'd gone but oh well.

We got back to the village. We found some farmer and hopped on his little tractor to get back to the highway. We waited at this other village along the highway for quite awhile. We were passed by by all kinds of vehicles. Hitching was really the only way back. Half empty busses didn't even stop. Eventually some truck stops for us and we ride back to Shigatse atop all these glass bottles, can, and other various assortments of garbage for about 45 minutes. I had this bag of broken glass or something else very sharp under one leg. We made do.

We were going to go to the other big monastery in Tibet (home to the Panchen lama) but were too tired. We decided to just drive by the next day. That was kind of a mistake. Turns out it's this giant complex that is essentially a village inside the town. The Panchen lama is second to the Dalai Lama who is in exile. You can hang pictures of the Panchen lama and he is quite visible around Tibet. He's kind of like Beijing's poster guy for Buddhism. Tells Tibetans what Beijing wants him to. Actually he was a bit more rebelious than Beijing had hoped (he was appointed by the govt) but anyways. We quickly ran up to take a few photos and then left. Another high entrance fee and an impatient driver waiting for us.

Tibetans seem to all know at least 3 words. Hello, sorry, and money. They say hello, then sorry, and then hold out their hands for money. I must say I wasn't that generous. It depends on the place too. The city beggars have their beggary pretty well laid out. I remember one group of Tibetans walking by. The woman has her mouth full with this giant bun she was eating and she holds out her hand as they are walking by and says 'money, money.' Then she kind of shrugs her shoulders and moves on. All without stopping mind you. It was a bit depressing to see at times but you can't help everyone so my solution was to help no one. Cruel, I know.

Anyways, Scott stayed in the car while we went to the gates. Some kid came up to the window 'money, money.' Scott decides to give them a bun or something. One kid runs up the window and just grabs a couple from the bag. Can't reward the thief and punish the innocent so our breakfast disappeared pretty quickly.

I think that's all I'll go into for today. There should be something up here in the next few days. I plan to spend a few days in the next place I go so there'll be plenty of time to update my English teacher turned vagabond traveller blog.

We won't stay in touch

2005-10-29T00:25:00.000+09:00

This is just a quick little post. I've just kind of been chillin' in Tibet for the past few days. It really is just great being here. I've mentioned all that before.

I'm going to be out of touch for the next week most likely. I'm taking a 4x4 through Tibet with 4 other people down to the Nepalese border. I was thinking yesterday. Wow! I'm in Tibet! I'm going to Nepal! I don't know if I can really believe it. I went to Potala Palace today. It was quite amazing. I didn't really feel like I belonged. Kind of like I was intruding upon the Tibetans and their religion. The outside was much more impressive. I might be able to post some pictures soon but hey, no promises.

I'll be sharing a landcruiser with a guy from Amherst, Massachusetts (age 23), a guy from Brandon, Manitoba (29) who had also been teaching in Korea, and two French girls (26,27) who are actually from Mauritius. So we'll have 8-9 days together in a little jeep going around Tibet. So far we have 3 bottles of wine and one of vodka. Should be some good times.

Out of China, well not technically

2005-10-26T15:49:00.000+09:00

I've left Chengdu. I'm so glad I did. Yesterday, I had to wake up really early for the second day in a row. Well, I suppose 7:45 isn't all that early but yesterday I woke up at 5. That's right 5am. I needed to be on the end of the alley by 5:20. I managed to make it by 5:15 but I had to sacrifice one of my t-shirts. I could've gone back for it I suppose but technically it's just an undershirt and I have at least 2 others the same in my bag. I also lost the key to the room and despite there being a key deposit I didn't lose any money. They even gave me the key deposit back. I'm glad that I reported the loss to some young guy working there who either didn't know or didn't care to charge me and just gave me a new key.

Right, I needed to be on the street by 5:20 because I was catching a shuttle bus to the airport. I was catching my flight to Tibet. I hadn't been on a plane in over 6 months which is the longest I've gone for 5 years or so, maybe more. It was a typical flight except the food was really terrible. It was basically some type of rice gruel that barely looked fit for prisoners. I had a bit. I think it was because I knew that I should be eating but I looked around and didn't see anyone else eating it so I folded the aluminum foil back over it.

I arrived at the airport in Tibet and was pretty worried. It was freezing. I don't have a jacket either. I just have all these layers. Then, they warned us all about altitude sickness. I was a bit paranoid about that. I actually went from being about 500m above sea level to 3700m. One woman fainted while we were waiting for the luggage. Then we got on this bus to head to Lhasa (the airport is over an hour outside of town) and someone had puked in the back seat. I didn't look but someone said it looked just like the plane food. Of course, puked up rice wouldn't have looked any different.

Tibet so far though has been amazing. Everything looks so different. I think I was a bit down on China just because it didn't seem all that different from Korea. Tibet feels nothing like Korea. The people look different. The food is different (much better in my opinion). The buildings. The air. The atmosphere.

I took it a bit slow yesterday. I stayed at the hotel and watched a movie, "Kingdom of Heaven," with some guys I met. One had been staying at my hostel and I'd gone out for pizza with him and some people. The other guy had been teaching in Korea for 3 years on and off. I met him on the bus along with an Aussie girl who's been traveling for 8 months now. We had gone out for lunch shortly after getting here. It was such good food. I love meat and potatoes. It was more than that though. I haven't really eaten potatoes in 6 months, I guess almost 7 now.

I walked around town by myself for awhile. I had a bit of a headache actually, because of the altitude I think. It was so nice. I actually felt like I was traveling. All these people in traditional clothes, actual traditional. Everything just feels so authentic. Not like in China or Korea where you might see something traditional but made it new ways so it was only superficially authentic. You know what I'm trying to say. The hostel in Chengdu, Lonely Planet said that it dated back to the Ming dynasty or Qing at least. Turns out the building dates back all the way to 1993. Nothing felt authentic in Korea. Well most things technically weren't since most really old things had been destroyed by wars and fires. "This temple dates back to 1338 but was destroyed many times, the current structure was built in 1974." I bought a bit of bread and was eating it while I walked around. I saw some little Tibetan boy who was also eating bread and he stared at me for a bit and then said hello to me. Some other kids said hello to me also. It didn't annoy me at all and actually made me a bit happy. In Korea or China, I was either indifferent or annoyed. I usually wasn't indifferent by the way.

So even though I really haven't seen anything in Tibet aside from the street life, I'm really enjoying it. They speak English much better than the Chinese also, which is interesting/unusual. I've been disappointed by a few things here but mostly just how much more modern it is than I would've imagined. Of course, this is Lhasa, Tibet's largest city. They have ATMs, electronics, internet obviously. I bought some stuff from an old lady today and afterwards, she got a call on her cell phone. I don't even have a cell phone and I don't imagine many old women around the globe carry cell phones with them. It's nice for the people though, just a little depressing for the traveller. I've realized though that even if I go the ends of the Earth, I'm still going to find someone there blabbing away to someone on a cell phone.

Panda-monium

2005-10-24T20:37:00.000+09:00

Lame title I know. I don't feel like writing anymore and really have been a bum today. I woke up early and went to go see some pandas this morning at the Panda research and breeding centre with the San Fran girls. Pandas are pretty cute but also kind of lazy and uncoordinated. They were fun to watch but after awhile they were kind of boring. I guess Pandas don't realize when they are pregnant and so this baby popping out of them (literally popping in a little burst like out of canon）is a bit alarming. They don't know what to do with them and kind of throw them around a bit. New born pandas (I only saw them on video) are hairless and look like deformed kittens.

After that I went to some buddhist temple and ate a bad vegetarian chinese meal. Afterwards I went back to the hostel. I was a bit tired. I woke up at 7:45 to go see the pandas. Then I just thought about my travel plan. It's still pretty loose but I'm hoping to get back to Korea in about one months time. We'll see what happens.

PS There's a guy next to me smoking. Chinese cigarettes seem a lot more potent and the smoke seems to linger in the air for much longer. I wonder if it's part of the Chinese government's efforts to reduce the population. Air pollution is pretty visible too. The sun yesterday was just some glowing yellow orb barely visible through a hazy white sky.

Chengdu Check-in fiasco

2005-10-24T20:13:00.000+09:00

Fiasco might be a bit of an overstatement.

I left Xian on Saturday around 1pm. I didn't do anything that day really. Those girls had booked the same train as I did. They were in the same compartment. It was nice to have someone to talk to for the 16 hour train ride. Nothing much of interest happened on the train. Saw some countryside and little villages from the train but that's about it. I managed to finish 2 books which really isn't that fair to say since I only read about 250 pages total. I didn't sleep very well on the train.

I've been thinking that maybe I should go back to college since I feel like I didn't learn anything. Really, I think it's more about me feeling like I missed out on the college experience since I intensely disliked most things about my school. It's probably not worth spending a semester in university but I thought about it anyways.

So the fiasco began once we got to Chengdu. I had no reservations but the 2 girls did and the hostel was supposed to pick them up. We waited and looked around and decided to take a taxi there. The driver let us out on a poorly lit street and pointed down a dark alley. We read in Lonely Planet, which is apparently given to you when you get the Chinese visa since every single tourist has one, that the hostel was down an alley so we trusted the guy and off he went. The alley was pretty frightening for 530am with no sunlight. Most of the alley was a giant pit and we had to walk down it for a few hundred metres hoping the hostel would magically appear. I was pretty surprised that it was actually there.

The bad thing about reaching the hostel though was that nobody was there. There were some people that we had met at the train station who told us that the guy from the hostel eventually showed up and that they had all taken a cab back. The guy, however, was in a different cab that took some turn somewhere and never showed up at the hostel. I still don't know what happened to him. So anyways, there was no one at the hostel except all these people who had just arrived from Xian and some old American man with crazy beliefs prone to ranting (different from rambling) and his Australian wife who were waiting to go on a tour. I don't know why they showed up 2 hours early for the tour. So anyways we had to sit there for 3 hours in a chilly courtyard waiting for the check-in to open. It was not fun. Eventually they opened though and I was able to get a room.

The rest of the day I didn't really do anything. Walked around with these 2 girls from San Francisco who had met each other in a bar in Guatemala. No romantic potential though, in case you were wondering. They are paranoid about getting avian bird flu and Japanese encephalitis. One girl was going to get a shot for the latter that morning. We went for a western breakfast at a place called Grandma's kitchen and I had 'fluffy pancakes.' You had to be there really. I didn't find it all that funny. Erica requested hers not to be fluffed. My mind didn't go there.

Then I bought some tickets for Tibet that I should go pick up soon.

I met a guy who is also going to Tibet so we could be traveling together for a bit. Actually, we are kind of going to the same places but I might be going through at a faster pace. I've kind of decided on a basic route to take but I'm going to keep it secret for now. I'm going to have to take a couple flights I think.

That night a group of us went out for pizza. I'm such an adventurous eater don't you think. Tonight I might be actually. The pizza was pretty good. I even had a Carlsberg. I don't know why it's so prevalent in China. Then we ended up at some bar that was some odd combination of western paraphenalia. There was a Victorian waltz mural, a santa claus, a giant windmill outside, with banners of European football teams, and fancy porcelain figurine lamps playing boyz II men music. We went back to the hostel instead and drank beer there. I also ran into a guy who had been in my hostel in Xian the night before last thereby not knowing about the light incident.

Last day in Xian

2005-10-24T19:48:00.000+09:00

I guess it's been 4 days since I last posted anything. So let's go back in time 4 days.

I went to go see the Terra Cotta soldiers on whatever day that was. I think today is Monday so that would make that Friday, October 21st. I went on a tour and had to follow a lady with a green flag around. We went to a few places but aside from the warriors, none of them were all that interesting.

One place was the site of the Xian incident. They were some hot springs and bathhouses used by the emperor and his concubines in the Ming dynasty I think. Fascinating, I know. So the Xian incident happened on December 12th, 1936 and involved Chiang Kaishek of the Kuomintang and some gun shots. The English section on this was very vague so if you want to know more you'll have to look it up. It involves Kaishek's priority of trying to stamp out the communist threat while Japan was invading. So there was that. Nice garden I guess, not that I would want to pay to go to a garden.

The Terra Cotta soldiers were interesting. I heard from this girl that I'm kind of traveling with now (until tomorrow at least) that her neighbour had said the soldiers really evoked the spirit of the heavenly father. Being that no one in China had even heard of Christianity when these soldiers were made, it makes very little sense. I wasn't overwhelmed with emotion about them. I kind of expected to be in awe of them but I had very little emotional response to them. I always feel like I don't appreciate what I am seeing. I can't be blown away by everything but I wish it happened more often. The Great Wall was pretty spectacular though. I was more impressed with the mountains themselves and with myself for walking along it for such a long way than with the actual wall but anyways.

So after the soldiers we went to the mausoleum of the guy to whom the soldiers were built to help protect. He's the same emperor who begin construction of the Great Wall. Xian is China's former capital. Oh yeah, I think this emperor had something like 3000 wives. That's what the guide said at least but anyone who's been in Asia has run into people who confuse numbers so maybe it was only 300. I remember being in a restaurant and a waitress told my father the bill was 50 million won or something. It's really only funny because she said it with such a straight face because she didn't realize she'd made a mistake. It was basically just a giant hill that covered the emperors tomb and had the bones of slaves, animals, and whoever else he decided to have buried alive with him.

The street vendors in Xian were quite funny. They weren't really aggressive or anything but they would just come up to you and say 'Hello....hello' in these high-pitched little voices. They sounded just like parrots. It must have been the only word they knew. They hadn't learnt the phrase 'Buy my crap.' We'd be sitting on the bus waiting for it to leave and all these women would come up to our windows and say hello and show us things. Fake jade, fruit, little warriors, whatever. I really don't think I could handle a job like that. Being rejected so often. I would take it personally and then go home and cry or something because no one bought any of the crap I was hawking. Those little hello's will haunt me for awhile. I suppose you would have had to be there probably. Hello....hello.

I also met the girls I was going to the train station with. I don't know if I mentioned them. Anyways, I ran into them at the warriors and they invited me to go out that night. I got quite tipsy but found my way back to my hostel.

The only troublesome thing about that was that I woke up at like 5am and the lights were on. I don't remember turning them on or off but I've presumed myself guilty. Luckily I didn't talk to any of the people in my room because I never saw any of them outside of their beds. I turned it off though when I realized it was on. I wonder if that absolves me.

Rain in Xi'an

2005-10-20T15:54:00.000+09:00

As you could probably guess, I'm in Xian right now and it's raining. It's a little cold outside too and my fingers are feeling a little stiff. I've finally left Beijing. I did absolutely nothing on my last day. I really should've left the day before I think.

I walked around trying to find cheap internet but couldn't find any internet places. And then I did find one and it was the same as the hostel. Then I saw a giant temple high in the sky so I ventured over there and it was just a phony temple atop a giant shopping centre so I became a bit disillusioned.

It's so much stranger traveling by myself than I has been any other time. I haven't even been traveling very long but for some reason it feels like I've been in China a lot longer than 10 days. Actually only 9 days. My emotions have been all over the place. I've been bored and lonely, I've been happy and find myself laughing at nothing really (maybe I'm becoming insane). I was going to go to a Taoist temple but once I got there I really didn't have any interest. I think it was the ticket booth with all these photos and people just standing around inside the temple in faux little Taoist outfits. Then I went and sat down on a slab of concrete beside some grass and read "The Essence of Buddhism." I'd actually read a few chapters while I had some coffee too. Some parts of Buddhism make a lot of sense to me. Well, this guy's interpretation at least.

It was talking about how everything is connected because nothing arises spontaneously but has to come from somewhere. No man is an island kind of stuff really. I'm thinking that maybe I am a bit disconnected. I don't know if I'm just feeling that way because when I walk down the street I don't see people who look like me or people who can speak the same language. I also can't read anything. I should've made this post after I'd just read the book. I was going to actually but couldn't find the cheap internet place. The book also talked about repetitive emotions. It was similar to what I'd seen in "What the bleep do we know." About how if you always have negative thoughts you'll just always be negative. I really need to work on thinking more positively. That's part of the reason I've been laughing for no reason. Well, just chuckling to myself really. It's not really about nothing either, just things that have happened to me or to other people. I also find my self portraits in front of great monuments to be both hilarious and depressing. Depends on my mood.

The other thing about Buddhism that I learnt was that things have no permanence or what the book called intrinsic existence (I think). I'd already learned that nothing has permanence through my rotten July or was it August. I think late July to mid-August I had my iPod crash, my bike stolen, my external hard drive fall to the floor, and some other things that I don't recall right now. I also lost some interest in this newer passport of mine after my treasured one went up in flames outside of Ithaca. I kind of just expect to lose things now so I don't put that much value in them. I'm sure that seems depressing.

I've also been having different thoughts about my relationships with other people. Actually, I don't really feel like going into that at the moment. Maybe another raining day in some other city.

So after reading, I went back to the hostel and sat in the lounge. I kind of had a conversation with a group of people. I mean I did, but those that know me know that I don't contribute much to group conversations. I'd put myself at 10% of the words in a group of 4-5 which isn't that bad for me.

It's so funny being from Canada. I don't know why me being Canadian automatically makes me interested in someone's cousin living in Halifax. Maybe if Canada were smaller and Halifax weren't a 7 hour flight away. I actually don't know how far it is considering there actually aren't any direct flights. I should start doing that with Americans. Oh you're from California, I've been to Detroit. Never happens. I ended up taking a taxi to the train stations with these 2 girls. I left the hostel at 5:30 and we got to the train station at 7 right as my train was leaving. Beijing traffic is horrible. So I missed my train and was going to go to Xian with these 2 girls. I didn't have much interest in Pingyao so I wasn't too upset aside from the wasted ticket and money. I didn't even pay them back for my share of the taxi. I had to take a later train. I thougt I was getting a hard sleeper but instead I just got a hard seat. The train cleared out a little after 2 hours so I was able to get a row of seats to myself. This Chinese family tried to tell me what was going on. It would be so much better if I were fluent in at least one of the Chinese dialects. But alas, I have become like a dog so only points and gestures have any meaning for me. This guy gave me a bottle pillow. A plastic bottle wrapped in newspaper. I used it for awhile. I managed to sleep a little since I remember having some weird dream. I don't remember much of it now of course.

Xi'an is the city of the Terra Cotta soldiers but they are out of town somewhat and I'm feeling a lack of motivation to get there on my own so I'll probably book a tour for tomorrow and go on to Chengdu tomorrow night. It might not be possible. I guess we'll have to see.

I haven't decided how I'll get back to Korea either. My previous plan is a bit workless being that I've had confirmation of my suspicion that the road from Pakistan to China has been destroyed by the earthquake. There are also no border crossings between India and Myanmar for non-residents. So I'll either be stuck in Nepal or India. Unless I somehow go through Pakistan and then Iran and Afghanistan or something but something tells me that it's not the best idea for non-muslim me. Plus it'd take so long. I could handle a few days in Pakistan but I don't imagine things would go all that smoothly in Afghanistan.

Mao and the Forbidden City

2005-10-18T18:40:00.000+09:00

I woke up a little late today. Well, not that late actually just later than I planned. I left the hostel around 9, I guess, to go to Mao's mausoleum. The line was so long. The mausoleum or memorial hall is huge and the line wrapped around all sides of the building. I was going to take a picture of one side but I forgot. I started at the end of the line and had been in it for maybe 10 minutes when some guy told me I needed to check my bag. I didn't want to waste the 10 minutes I'd been in line but decided to follow him anyways. I checked my bag and then he offered to let me jump to maybe first 5th of the line. I swear I jumped like 1000 people. I had to pay about $8 but the admission was free and I saved over an hour, maybe several hours. I talked him down from 100 yuan to 60.

The mausoleum was much busier than Lenin's. Mao is still revered by quite a few Chinese. I saw some woman praying in front of it. Then there was a point where you could buy some flowers for Mao. So many people bought flowers. I really couldn't believe it. It seemed like such a big waste too. When you entered, there was a giant statue of Mao and a little table to put the flowers on. It was more like a cupboard that could be rolled away. I think the top of it must lower because every once in awhile they would crank it and the flowers would sink and they also rearranged them to allow for more flowers. I'm guessing they must take the flowers out and then resell them. Then of course, I got to see the body. I heard there are replicas but I think I saw the real thing since it had such sunken skin and droopy face. Of course, that's the part of the line that moves the fastest. They zip you right past the body. I must say that it was cheerier than Lenin's tomb. Some sunlight and brighter walls. I didn't get in any trouble either. Oh, when they put the flowers on the counter, they all did this bow and brought the flowers up over their heads and then down again several times. I ran into some Chinese girls later and one said that when she went some old woman was in tears. Funny to think of how Mao is so hated outside of China.

Afterwards, I went to the Forbidden City. It was a little disappointing I must say. The buildings mostly all looked the same to me and there were throngs and throngs of people. People everywhere. Fat people, skinny people, you get the idea I'm sure. I also became skilled at the art of self-photography. No point asking someone to take my picture when half the time they don't end up even taking one. My camera isn't that hard to work, it just takes a few seconds of holding the button down to take the picture. I asked Avena to take 3 pictures of my on the Great Wall. She actually only took one. Self-photography will have to be the way I go I think. I'd hate to have to chase someone down to get my camera back. Plus I look completely ridiculous in the photos and get to feel equally ridiculous taking them. It amuses me. My head is also massive since my arms aren't long enough and I block most of what I'm trying to take a photo of.

So anyways, Forbidden City was so-so. I think it's better for me to have no expectations. I hate the anti-climax. That's probably why I wanted to go to strange locations since I had no idea what I would see.

I've also formulated a new travel plan. I thought it was much better a few hours before I realized something but we'll see I guess. I think that I'm also definitely going to go to Tibet. It's too bad I'm not really that spiritual so some aspects of Tibet will be lost on me. So after a few days in Tibet I'll probably head across the border to Nepal. Then I thought I'd be going east but actually it makes more sense to go west. I thought maybe I'd fly from Nepal to Hong Kong or something but flying doesn't seem very exciting. Seems too easy. So now I might go through India and Pakistan and go back through China, through the part I meant to go through all along. Then I can spend a few days on a train heading back to the coast and the eventual ferry back to Korea.

After the Forbidden City, I met some girls who were from outside Shanghai. We walked together for a bit. I was surprised actually. They didn't try to take me to an art exhibition (I went to a third one today, arghh, oh well). They just wanted to practice their English. They asked if I had any siblings. I don't know why everyone always assumes I'm the youngest. No one has ever guessed that I was the oldest. I wonder why that is. I read some birth order psych book and it seemed pretty accurate really, well for me, the oldest brother of sisters. I always think I would've been so much different if I'd had a brother. I took some stupid online quiz that said I must've been a 4th born. I thought about that as I was walking along to the Temple of Heaven. It wasn't a long walk and I was almost there but then no longer felt like going. I've been Beijinged out I think. I think the key to avoiding loneliness is to keep on trucking. The whole self-photography business, funny as it may be, makes you feel a bit lonely after awhile.

I'm in Beijing for another day as well. I could go back to the Temple of Heaven or the Summer Palace. Hopefully, I'll feel more up to it tomorrow. Maybe I've been walking too much. I'm going to sleep in tomorrow I think. I'm taking a train to Pingyao tomorrow.

I climbed the Great Wall

2005-10-17T23:32:00.000+09:00

I climbed the Great Wall today. I had to wake up at 6:45 this morning, ok it was 6:55 when I decided to get out of bed. Then I had to ride the bus for about 4 hours. There are closer spots to climb the wall but they are much more touristed I think.

I was on the wall for about 4 hours. I trekked over 10km on the wall and some parts were really steep with tall stairs that weren't very deep. It was quite hard at some points but I made it through and by the time we reached the end it was pretty touristy. We could've taken a zipline to get back on the bus.

I met an Australian girl who speaks a useless Chinese dialect. She said most people in Beijing haven't even heard of it. She was quite nice though. I can't imagine going all that way alone, especially for the whole day. She was able to speak some Mandarin, I guess, and had just spent 6 weeks in Mongolia.

I had my own personal guide for a time. She was Mongolian and just kind of followed me for quite a ways. I really don't know how to spell that even though I say it a fair bit. She would tell me stuff in Chinese and I would just nod along. The only thing I really understood was when she pointed to one side and said Mongolia and then pointed to the other and would either say Beijing or China. I don't think I actually saw Mongolia though. Anyways, after quite a bit of time had passed, she pulled out some t-shirts for me to buy. I didn't want a crappy t-shirt. I politely declined to buy them. She started to get a bit upset and pushed them at me saying "Buy! Buy!" I guess in all my nodding, I'd agreed to buy something from her. Avena, the Aussie, explained that I didn't understand anything she had said but I ended up buying some postcards. I paid more than I should've for China. I really need to get better at haggling. She had been by my side for an hour probably and even took my garbage from me. I can't imagine walking along the Great Wall everyday just trying to sell things to tourists. Oh, she would also tell me to be careful and to go slow. I understood that part. I still don't know at what point I agreed to buy something from her since she didn't even show me anything she was going to sell.

I also met some guys who had just been to North Korea. They were more keen on talking to Avena so I didn't say much to them. I should've asked them about North Korean kimchi and soju. It's funny how in North Korea reunification is a much bigger issue than it was in Daegu. I don't remember anyone ever bringing the subject up except me and only once because the subject was changed so quickly.

Anyways, that was all I did today since the hike was exhausting, 4 hours, and the bus rides were long 4 hours each way. I'm doing some laundry now and it's probably done by now. I also don't know how I'll be getting back to Korea now since the trans-siberian appeals to me less and less. Yeah, no idea since the more I think about the more options seem to pop into my head and just make me more undecided. Decision-making is not my forte, as some of you know more than others.

Lazy Day in Beijing

2005-10-16T23:01:00.000+09:00

I had a very leisurely day today. I woke up late. Was on the internet for awhile and then headed downtown around 1:30. I really didn't do much of anything. I went to a bookstore, felt a bit tired and sick so I got something to eat. Then I walked past Tianamen square, the only thing I've really seen in this city, to another bookstore since I didn't find the book I wanted. I guess I should explain.

I've decided to skip out on the 'stans. Actually, it's not definite but that looks the way it's going at the moment. I'll probably miss Urumqi and Kashgar too. It's all up in the air really so maybe I'll go there. China's just so big. It would be a 53 hour train ride there and then back. 106 hours is a big investment plus there's another 24 hour bus ride between the two cities. I guess it's mostly a money thing, maybe time. 106 is a bit excessive, maybe masochistic. Anyways, my plan now is to go to Tibet and spend some time there and then head over to Nepal. From Nepal, I guess it would be India, then Myanmar, and Thailand. I don't know whether I have any desire to go to Bangladesh. I guess I'll see how much a visa is. I don't know how long I'd be in India either. The image I have in my head of India is just chaotic, full of beggars, and merchants looking to get as many rupees as possible, or rip you off to put it more plainly. Of course, I'm really just ignorant so it might not be like that at all. It's got to be somewhat like that. I really don't know I'd get back to Korea either. I'd either have to go back through China and get another visa or just take a flight from Bangkok or something. I'm not too sure. My lack of concern seems like cause for concern.

The reason I was at the bookstore is that in addition to not knowing much about India, I know precious little about Buddhism too. I managed to find a decent book. 'Essential Buddhism: Introduction to Philosophy and Practice' or something like that. It seems interesting at the moment. The word Buddhahood makes me smile for some reason. I also bought a Harry Potter book since Ulysses is a bit too mind consuming for me. I'd rather not have to read each sentence word by word to discern who the speaker is and then have to read through 3-5 pages of notes at the end of each chapter for all these references to Irish history and other things that I just don't get. I felt like I was learning but it felt so draining. Plus the book is huge so it'll lighten my load a little.

I also bought a knee support thing. My stupid right knee, that's right it;s stupid, has been bothering me. In Shanghai I took a taxi back to my hostel because I couldn't bear the thought of walking much more, plus I was completely lost and it would've taken days to find the way back. I'm supposed to hike the Great Wall tomorrow (I have to be ready at 730am) and it involves a lot of energy I would imagine. All parts of the wall are different and I guess this part is near vertical in some places. Hopefully, I'll feel like less of a geezer tomorrow. It's probably a bad idea to go even but I won't let that stop me. I was hobbling down the steps of the subway station just like this old woman in front of me. If only I were more active, it would make joint pain less embarrassing. It must've been all that standing I was doing. A relic of Wonderland.

What else? I didn't end up meeting those Aussies again. I hung out with the guys from my room last night and this American girl. Two of the guys were Swedish and they'd taken the Trans-Manchurian from Moscow to Beijing. One was Peter (Peder probably) and the other was Alex. I just can't escape running into Alex's in Asia. I think that makes 4, mind you one wasn't really Alex but I didn't learn his Korean name, Pak something I think, Kim maybe. Doesn't matter. (Best I could muster, Thompson, nothing that witty pops to mind). The 3rd guy grew up in China but had been living in New York since he was 12 or 13. The girl, I don't know how to describe her really, she was from Kansas originally but has been bumming around China since August.... of 2004. She also speaks virtually no Chinese which seems really weird being that she's been here so long. So the 5 of us went out for eats (feeling slangy I guess). I had a taste of Peking duck, bad Peking duck I was told and some other things. Then we had a drink at some bar and the Swedes and I were too tired to do anything else so we went back to the room and a disappointed James and.... oops forgot her name already came back also. Anika I think. Yes, Anika. The Asians or East Asians at least like to have the whitest shade of skin possible tell Anika that she is 'too black.' Pretty face but too black.

Anyways, it's been a slow day. There were so many people walking around that I was glad I didn't go to any of the tourist meccas. I'll have to go to bed early tonight for the Wall tomorrow. As I was reading my Essential Buddhism book, I thought about writing all this stuff about what I thought and whatever but it hardly seems worth it now.

Oh, I also got my haircut today. For only 5 yuan, all but maybe an inch of my hair got to decorate a whole section of flooring. Ah, my 75c haircut. I don't even miss my hair, I thought I would.

Beijing for a few days

2005-10-15T21:11:00.000+09:00

I've made it to Beijing. I didn't arrive until about 10:30 this morning. Another overnight bus. It went alright. I feel special on the busses because the drivers take good care of me. I know it's because they think I'm stupid and don't understand anything that is going and basically they are right.

For some reason, in the middle of the night, well around 23:30, we just switched busses. That I was strange, I thought it was just going to be another trip to the bathroom. The new bus had better beds but I still don't understand why we switched.

So far, I haven't done much in Beijing. I've been to Tianamen Square (I should learn how to spell that probably) and I met 2 Aussies and an American who are all studying in Shanghai. I'm not sure why exactly. They've been in Shanghai for about 6 weeks. I hung out with them for quite a few hours. They rented bikes and I had to sit on this little metal rack for too long. I'm surprised I'm not more sore from that. Later we switched and Lana from Melbourne hung on to the back and I wasn't the best driver so she rode with her boyfriend, Alex, on a smaller rack. Basically, that's what happened. Lana was sick of Chinese food so we ate at McDonalds and had a run-in with an old woman. I'm not sure why but there's a 10 yuan fee to park your bike outside (meals were like 20 yuan). Anyways, we left and refused to pay. I think it was a bike guarding fee or something. Anyways, she held on the back of one of the bikes (not mine) and wouldn't let go. Eventually, we wrestled the bike from her and sped off. She grabbed hold of Lana I guess and Lana punched her in the bum or something and got away. Someone was snapping pictures to give to the police later. It was all very bizarre. I'm supposed to meet them and some other foreigners(Beijing residents) later tonight. Actually, I should've already called them. My sparkling insights into Beijing will have to wait until tomorrow.

I've been blocked

2005-10-14T15:42:00.000+09:00

I was going to reply to the comments/questions on the comments section but I can't view my blog from China. I could in Yantai so I don't know whether it was my anti-china comment that got my blocked or what. It seems a bit strange that I can't view it from here only a day or so later. Probably just paranoia. I also have to show my passport to use the computers here but to buy a bus ticket no ID was needed. I wonder if it's like Cuba where only foreigners can access the internet. The wrote my name and visa number in a little log book too. Very strange, indeed.

Anyways
Cal: I didn't buy any art and the exhibition was little more than a small room in some building full of those vertical Chinese banners. They were nice enough but weren't anything that special. The drinks were a seperate deal after I'd left the art exhibition.

The Canada - US thing was more about her not listening to what I had told her. I wouldn't have cared about her comment had I not told her I wasn't American. The other part of that was that to some people America means US-Canada or the whole of the Americas. I don't care for that defintion but in Korea, America typically just means the US. Not important really.

Alex: I misread your email. You wrote 'other stalker girls' which I guess doesn't make sense either since there were only the pair. The s threw me. Maybe I no longer have a stalker. I might not have to be afraid of going back to Daegu. Also, I forgot the mention in that entry that the girl's appearance made want to go out and get drunk. I somehow over drank and ended up making quite the spectacle of myself. I made quite a good friend but I remember neither his name or anything we discussed except that we had a lengthy conversation and he helpe carry my limpless body to a cab. It was bad. Never have soju cocktails after 4 other drinks on an empty stomach. Let that be my advice to all of you.

Yes, I wrote wondered. A homonym. My goodness. Maybe you can become my editor or proofreader or something.

Ah, those cultural differences.

I've become a bit disillusioned with Shanghai. It feels too modern to be that interesting. Financial capitals aren't that interesting. I think all that was interesting about Shanghai faded after the founding of the People's Republic. Not that I'd be up for gangs, gambling, and prostitution. Actually, I ran across the latter two wandering around last night. I don't know whether they were actually gambling or just playing but I'm pretty sure about the prostitutes. The gangs I haven't seen nor anybody in traditional Shanghai wear. Only mannequins which isn't exciting/interesting at all. It feels a bit too touristy here. Beijing will be the same I think. I'll be heading there in a couple hours, wasting my last few hours in Shanghai on the internet. I'm tired, feeling a bit sick, my knee hurts, and what's left to be seen doesn't interest much in my current state of mind. Until Beijing then.

Ode to My Korean Stalker

2005-10-13T19:49:00.000+09:00

That's right. I have a Korean stalker. Her name is Hwang-Su. I don't know what she does though she tried to tell me 3 times. She speaks hardly any English and has a cousin whose English is hardly any better.

Luckily I met her a few days before I left. I was eating a restaurant near Alex's apartment. I'm too good-looking for my own good sometimes. That's all she could've been interested in really. Definitely wasn't for conversation. Sometimes, I like to pretend I'm very attractive but honestly I don't think I could live up to any hype as I'm pretty average looking. Anyways, they ask if they can come to our table. We had a warning before-hand from the owner who was doing the asking. We said yes, not knowing what we were getting into. They had a lot more confidence in their English skills than their skills would actually merit. We had such bad small talk. She likes all American movies, that's right ALL every single one. It was pretty bad, I didn't even know what to say to her since she had a vocabulary of maybe 30 words. She was ballsy, I'll give her that.

Somehow, they ended back at Alex's apartment. That was just as awkward. She was kind of nasty and pretended to lick the behind of this stuffed monkey. More bad conversation and they left. The next day, or maybe the day after, she showed up at the apartment. Taking them there was a really bad idea. Anyways, she had a phrasebook this time and a page worth of dialogue she had written from it. She called her friend who spoke English and gave the phone to Alex. He told the friend that we had been trying to watch a movie and the girls were bothering us. So they kind of stormed out leaving the phrasebook behing. She had circled several phrases including "I'm lovesick" and something about falling in love the moment we met. She came back and got her phrasebook the next day. I didn't see her, Alex just shoved the book at her and she left.

Anyways, since I've been gone and I figured she'd have given up, she's returned to Alex's apartment bearing flowers. How bizarre! I told her I was going to China. I guess she just pretended to understand. It's very strange. I don't even know what to make of it. Hopefully, she'll have given up by the time I get back to Korea. We'll have to see how determined she is.

One of her phrases was 'I've always wanted to American friends.' She doesn't even listen to me. I told her I was Canadian. They know that America and Canada are different places. If only I were a bit uglier. The guy today too told me how handsome I was. Model. Italian boy. Maybe I should've been a bit gayer acting with him. He might have paid for my share of the drinks if I had. Yes, no more friends for me in Shanghai.

Actually, I met one friend who cost me nothing. She just wanted me to buy art. Took me to her school's exhibition. Good thing she wasn't pushy. I was even alone for 3 minutes between these 3 encounters. At least the art would've lasted. Expensive drinks go right through you and without good memories are a complete waste of money.

Yantai, Shanghai but not beyond

2005-10-13T19:23:00.000+09:00

I've had one half-interesting day yesterday and today was pretty interesting but expensive, unexpectedly expensive.

Yesterday, I stayed at a place without showers. So I decided to leave Yantai as quickly as possible. It didn't seem like that interesting a place to be. I left the hotel and got to the bus station and met some man. He didn't really speak English but got me on a bus to Shanghai. He tried to get me to stay at a hotel for the 5 hours until the bus. I don't know what that was about. I'm always suspicious of prostitution now. I don't think it had anything to do with that. Anyways, instead of that we went out to eat. He had like 3 beers at 9:30 in the morning. Possibly more, there were 600ml bottles. I had some too but drank very slowly. The bill was reasonable so I didn't mind that much. I saw some prostitutes working from their little homes. Oh, the finger through the hole sign. International, I guess. Then he took me to the bus station and I just waited on the bus for hours. I was told the bus was leaving at 1:30. I didn't end up leaving until 3:30. What a waste of a couple hours. I perused my travel guide. I'm getting a bit sick actually. I think some English teacher gave me some illness he had. I suppose there's time to blame later. Maybe it's retribution for something. I will make another post if my time doesn't run out. I don't like this pay in advance business.

The bus ride was pretty long. It was about 12 hours. I slept for some of it. There weren't any seats. I had to lay down the whole time which would've been nicer if the busses weren't designed for tiny Chinese people. The bus to Yantai from Weihai was the same. It's like they aren't meant for people with femurs. I saw some Chinese movie 3 times in a row. The same one. It wasn't even the whole movie. I don't know what that was about. Then a few hours of Chinese variety hours followed by Terminator 2 so now I can say 've seen it.... in Mandarin. Good thing it's not a dialogue heavy movie and basically full of just guns and explosions.

I got to Shanghai at 3:30 in the morning. I really haven't done very much. I tried to get into the 2 hostels in town but they were both full... sorry. They said it very quickly too and I could tell they weren't sorry at all. I stayed at a different place again paying too much money. My 'fuck it' limit is too low. I should strive to be more frugal. I might have to after today.

I spent a few hours with some people from X'ian. They were here travelling. They spoke decent English. We went to a traditional tea house and sampled all kinds of teas. They were 38 yuan per sample and we had 6 plus some side dishes so my share came out to something like $50. I thought you were supposed to be poor people of China. I guess they figure foreigners are just loaded all the time. They didn't even flinch at the price.

After that I met some Japanese teacher from Okinawa and we went for coffee. I knew I shouldn't have really but it was just coffee. Similar story except we didn't have coffee at all. We had hard alcohol. Again, only I was shocked by the price. I suppose the divide between the rich and the poor is sharper in Shanghai than the rest of China. Mind you, the people I met weren't even from Shanghai.

I had to take a taxi from the 'coffee house' to the ATM to get more money. It was so ridiculously expensive, too expensive to actually tell you. She told me what she thought of Korea. The Korean women are beautiful but lots of times it' only because of plastic surgery and that Korean men are wifebeaters. I'd known that already but really it's only older men who do that. I don't think it's a big problem among younger people but what do I know. I find it hard to believe that a man that carried a purse would beat his girlfriend with it. I never thought that much about it and don't have much of an opinion on the matter but will say that the definition of masculinity in Korea is different for different ages.

So far, I've only walked around for a bit and spent too much money for too little. I did learn how to tell people I wasn't interested in buying watches but haven't been asked since I learnt it of course. I'll have to explore the Bund a little more. It's full of European architecture and the Chinese flags are the only indication that I'm in China. Go back to the square where I met the young people from Xian. I've been told it would be quite easy to get a job teaching English here. I guess there are 10,000+ students at their university and only 12 English teachers. English teaching wasn't so bad now that I look back on it. I would definitely make a smarter decision before I signed. I really do make poor decisions. No more friends in Shanghai for me unless they are poor travellers like me. These local people think I must have money oozing out of every orifice. They each paid their share. What expensive shares! I'll have to eat very cheap tonight. I don't know how many more days I will be here. I guess it depends when I get a train to Beijing and when said train leaves. I think it's a 14 hour ride.

Also my Korean bank card, I believe is useless outside of Korea. No machines I've found will take it. Surprising that my Bank of Montreal card will get me further than the one from a neighbouring country, well not money wise but you know what I mean.

China so far

2005-10-11T19:02:00.000+09:00

Back to the travel aspect.

I got off the ferry and I had absolutely no money. Not a single Chinese Yuan. I found some ATMs and they had the little Cirrus and Maestro logos but no money came out. Some kind of error. I still don't know what the problem was. I could understand my Korean account not working since I've never used it outside of Daegu (Korea at least). My Canadian one worked in Korea though.

Then I remembered that I had about 70,000 Korean won ($70). I found a bank but they wouldn't change it since it wasn't a major currency. Not a dollar, euro, pound, or a yen. They told me to go to the Bank of China to exchange it. I thought I had found one and they refused it. It might have been a different bank. They are all Bank of China. Industrial and Commercial Bank of China. Agricultural Bank of China. Commercial Bank of China. Anyways, the logos for some are similar. I was really discouraged though and imagined either becoming homeless in Weihai (already penniless), resorting to begging and thieving, selling my camera, or using my credit card to stay at a nice hotel and having my parents wire me money. I guess only 1% of China has a credit card so the last plan may have been iffy, that's why it needed to be like a 4 star hotel.

I walked down the street going the wrong way of course since I did't imagine it was down the other way since it was short and people kept pointing up this other street rather than down the one I was on. Eventually, I found it though and all that wandering around for ATMs with my logo that would actually work and for the mythical Bank of China let me see enough of the city so I took a taxi from the bank to the bus station.

I'm such a retard here. I can't speak the language and am totally illetirate. That doesn't look like the right spelling but unlike in Korea I wouldn't even be able to sound things out. I should've learnt more Chinese. I had my bus ticket and I had no idea what it said. The door number, bus number, time, anything. I'll just have to get good at place names. That was all I could manage in Weihai (too bad I'm not a pothead, that name could've meant much more) in order to get to Yantai.

I arrived in Yantai and was looking for this hotel. I was sure I was near it but these girls decided to help me and told me I needed to get on this bus and the driver would tell me when to get out. I don't know who didn't know what they were talking about but I ended up in the middle of nowhere really. Actually it was a nice drive, the coast was on one side and some building being guarded by military police. I got back to where I had been and being on the other side of the street can grant so much perspective sometimes. In big letters on a sign I must have walked by 5 times but invisible when you walk right under it, the name of the hotel.

I bought a bit of food for very little money and then came here. Nearly $0.50 for 2 hours of internet. Anyways, that's what I've done today. I also slept a bit on the bus ride over and depressing thoughts I had been having in Korea have stopped because I've been actually doing things that require way to much mental energy for what I'm actually trying to accomplish. Getting on a bus at home or the subway require virtually no mental effort whatsoever. I've also felt much more confident in my Korean since that is what I want to speak now. There's not even a word for no in Mandarin. You have to take the verb and add a negative modifier. How I'm to decipher the verb when I can't distinguish words even will be impossible. Good old headshake, it'll have to be. I should buy a phrasebook probably. This is the least touristy city I will probably visit though (transit point to Shanghai) so I DON'T KNOW IF IT'S WORTH IT. Time to go, sorry for the caps there.

Ethical concerns (or how China might banish me also)

2005-10-11T18:25:00.000+09:00

I had this great entry that I was writing being all critical of China... but I guess I need to pay in advance to use the internet here so after an hour it cut me off and my entry vanished.

I'm sure you all know about China, the repression of political dissent, the lack of a fair judicial system, the valuing of economic output over the environment, the three river gorge dam, etc. Maybe I'll try to write it again but this time I will watch the time.

I was reading my travel guide last night (I went into a little spiel on Lonely Planet but despite everyone using them and thereby making it practically tour like in some aspects they are useful). It was talking about the Uighurs in the far west of China. They really have very little to do with Chinese culture and are much more similar to Central Asians in virtually every respect but government. So anyways, in 1997, the Uighurs had a large protest that turned violent (by whom?) and 200 people were killed according to the Chinese media (reliable?). Then some rioters(?) who weren't killed were arrested and then executed the same day as their trial. Then after September 11th, China was able to term many of them Islamic Extremist and was able to exert more power and this time with US support. It really made me wonder whether I wanted to be in China.

I thought about going to see the titanic dam that they are building that will flood an unknown amount of land, bury national treasures, dislocate people. It will also probably slow the river allowing for increased accumulation of chemical waste. Then I realized, why would I want to go see something that I am opposed to. It didn't make sense. So I've been thinking about what responsible tourism is. If I come to China, does that mean that I am condoning its actions. Am I a supporter of the government of China? I don't know. If I were in the US it wouldn't mean that I was supporting the invasion of Iraq but it seems different here (in my whole 12 hours of experience) just because no one is able to speak out against the government. I'm even a slight bit paranoid about writing this. What if the government reads this and comes after me?

I just don't know. I was thinking about it in the context of other authoritarian governments as well. Maybe I shouldn't go to Uzbekistan who recently violently suppressed a protest (700-800 killed, I think). Really though, the government has so little to do with the people. It doesn't really represent the interests of the people. Does the average Han Chinese (dominant group) care about what happens to their Muslim countrymen. Probably not? Does it mean they support the actions of the government? Probably not. Maybe, that's what bothers me about China. The fact that everyone is either complacent about what is going on in their own country or doesn't realize. I think in Uzbekistan, it's probably different. More people are probably against the government than in support of it. I'm sure they might be complacent too but I guess they are used to the government not doing much for them. Here it seems, perhaps falsely, that everyone supports the government so long as it improves their lives. I guess the Chinese don't see why the people of Tibet or the Uighurs resent them since they built them all these roads, schools, and hospitals. At the same time though, they create all these government positions and give them to Chinese and encourage migration to areas where Han Chinese are minorities. I guess the Uighurs went from being about 90% of the population of their province to about 40% today. It just seems like the average Chinese is consenting to the action of the government. i realize that not all are but that's just the impression I get when I see people walking merrily down the street.

That's where my little debate is at the moment. Is it the people or the government? Am I supporting the way that China is governed or administered? Or am I here to see the people and discover how things are for myself? Anyways, after reading about and remembering all these things that China has done, I don't know how much time I want to spend in typical China. I thought about going to Tibet but it seems so far and might not be easy to get to. It seems easier to reach from Nepal which I would like to go to one day. I haven't made up my mind about Tibet we'll say.

I have on the other hand decided to visit Shanghai. It's a bit out of the way but I don't know if I'd go any other time. I thought maybe when I went to Hong Kong (whenever that might be) but it was further than I thought and I'm maybe only 1/3 closer to Beijing than Shanghai at the moment. I wish my guide gave better information about travel time. So right now, it looks like Shanghai, Beijing, Xian, and then leaving typical China for Kashgar and Urumqi, possibly Tibet.

My little responsible tourism has led me to question my visit to Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan was always a bit questionable due mostly to visas. Should I go there and 'support' the government through visa fees and taxes? Or by going there would it improve the lives of average citizens (not that I would bring a lot of foreign investment or whatever)? I'll have to work out these little ethical problems within the next few days.

My Slow Boat to China

2005-10-11T17:26:00.000+09:00

I've made it to China almost without incident. I woke up somewhere in Itaewon, well at my hotel but I don't know where it was exactly. I saw quite a few embassies like I had the night before and walked up a big hill and then down again since I really had no clue where I was. It was so weird seeing all those white faces in Itaewon. I could tell virtually all the young people were affiliated with the military. Perhaps a few of the single ones were English teachers. Military seems to travel in groups for some reason. I was walking behing a mass of them and they reminded me of when I was in Texas. It's nice that I'm not there anymore. I found a bookstore and bought Ulysses by James Joyce and a new copy of Lonely Planet China, since their website lied to me. No used copy to be found.

Then I had to ride the subway for an hour or so. I transfered twice. I really thought since I was the second to last stop that the crowds would start to thin out a lot sooner than the 4th to the end when I was finally able to sit down. I was on it for 27 stops or something. So many stops were universities too. So&so Catholic Univ., Theological, Christian, Bible. Why do the schools need to be associated with religions?

I was worried there wouldn't be any tickets to Weihai left but there were so that was a relief. Actually, it was annoying also. I don't know if it was just me and I don't know that they were Chinese for sure but they had no respect for the line or queue if you will. I was standing maybe a metre behind the person at the wicket who was taking forever and then I switched to a second window. I was the only one waiting but somehow all these people ended up going ahead of me. I was about to get pushy but then it was free. I saw maybe 4 non-Asian people on the ship. I wondered if they had escaped lives as English teachers. I didn't talk to any of them. I talked to one man who was Korean or Chinese, I didn't ask. He asked about my book but since I'd only read about 20 pages I couldn't tell him much. Then I saw people grabbing tons of toilet paper off the reels in the rooms. I slept in a mass room with maybe 36 beds. It was divided into 3 little hallways though and everyone had a side that was wall and another that was curtain. Anyways, that doesn't really matter. I had a nice pillow and slept well for the most part. I guess until I thought that I should be getting up but I didn't look at the time for quite awhile. It was only 630 and I was worried it was nearly 8, the time we were supposed to disembark. I don't think I got out of the ship until 9 something. So that was needless worrying. Oh right, the toilet paper, anyways there was a lot of it in the rooms. Toilet paper exists in strange places in Korea and I've forgotten how strange it is. I saw people pulling toilet paper for days. I don't know what they did with it. They could've absorbed quite a large body of water though.

So I got to China. I brought something illegal too. I'm quite the rebel. I snuck in some bananas. Customs in Asia seems to be a funny thing too. At the borders in Canada and the US, they ask you all these questions about what you will be doing, what you have with you, etc. The 3 times I've gone through customs in Asia, into and out of Korea and into China, I've only been told one word. "Sign." I forgot to sign my arrival card to/for (don't know) China. She looked at the photo and me several times. I must not look like the person I was on August 9th, 2004. Don't ask me why I remember the date my passport photo was taken. So after that and feeling uneasy about my bananas (they even went through the x-ray machine, I imagined myself getting into all kinds of trouble but I'd been through immigration already so it was too late to get rid of them. Then I wondered out of the terminal into China.

Journey into the unknown

2005-10-09T22:56:00.000+09:00

I'm in Itaewon right now. I don't really know what I'm doing. I've been in Seoul for about 3 hours now. I managed to not find the hostel where I wanted to stay and got tired so I'm staying at some little motel where I paid more money than I would've liked. I took the KTX to Seoul and it being after dark I managed to not see a bit of countryside and didn't appreciate the speed at which I was going. About 300km/hr. It all looks the same in the darkness of night. I just sat there really for however long.

I managed to navigate the subway system with ease. I decided to go to Itaewon. I'm not sure why. It's the only place name in Seoul that I was familiar with and the used travel guide for China that I want to buy is somewhere around here. Well the bookstore that is. I really need to find a guidebook I think. As free-spirited or whatever traveling without a guide may be, I just can't do it. I'm already in Seoul without a guidebook. There was no point bringing it for the one day I will be here although I probably should've at least looked at it.

I somehow managed to find more information about the ferry than I could manage to find in Daegu which makes no sense being that the internet should be the same. Anyways, I found 2 sites that listed dates and times for ferries. I really hope they are wrong though since neither have anything leaving Incheon on Monday. I hope I can trust the ferry company's website that says the boat to Weihai leaves on Monday. I don't know what I will do if I can't leave the country. You'd think I'd be able to extend the exit order by one day. I'll have to go to the ferry terminal tomorrow, there should be an immigration or customs office at least. Otherwise, I might have to fly somewhere or try to rush to Busan and catch a ferry to Japan. I don't think it will come to that though. The Weidong ferry website looks more accurate than the other 2 I saw. If only my life didn't feel dreamlike and I actually made more concrete plans because of some sense of urgency or something. I have no idea what is even in Weihai.... or if I can go there tomorrow. I'm probably too happy-go-lucky for my own good. Not that either is that applicable to me at the moment.

I took the subway from Banwoldang to Dongdaegu station and out of habit I went to the side going back to Wolbae so I had to pay the fare twice. I mean, it wasn't expensive but just reminds me of how my intellect has dulled since I've been in Korea. I've been running on auto-pilot for way to long now. I don't know where my mind has gone. I'm really looking forward to leaving this country for awhile. I guess I don't really have much else to say other than Alex Thompson is a good man. I guess if I don't post anything in the next 24 hours that means I got on the ferry or managed to leave Seoul somehow. Hopefully the next post will be from somewhere in China.

Loose plans

2005-10-06T16:58:00.000+09:00

I decided I would change the layout of my blog. The old one had been annoying me for awhile but I never had the energy, patience, or time to do anything. We'll see how long it takes before I change it again. Owing largely to laziness I think this one might be around for quite awhile. I will still be unemployed when I go back home (whenever that might be) so who knows?

I haven't done very much with myself the past few days. Sleeping has been so nice. I can't say it's all that comfortable being that I sleep on 3 couch cushions on the floor that constantly slip away from each other and me. I have no idea what a real bed is like anymore. I technically haven't slept on a real bed since my vacation in July and really I've only slept in a proper bed for maybe 10 nights (generous guess) of the past 180. I wonder how Candace is enjoying the hard mattress on the floor.

I actually went back to my old apartment yesterday to swipe my magazine from the mailbox. Gotta love the keyless, very unsecure Korean mailboxes. It was in my name though and no one was the wiser. I also tried the door but she had locked it. That one might have been a little iffier where the law is concerned had the door been unlocked.

I finally called my bank in the US and had them send me a new cheque card. Why do I have a bank account in the US, you ask? Well, I just never closed it after I left Texas. I tried to have my new Canadian bank try to transfer the money and the last I heard Wells Fargo needed a notarized letter so my money sits in an American savings account. Plus I figured I would travel in the US so I could keep some money in a chequing account. That's quite boring isn't it? Anyways, I lost my card in January and finally took care of that. I also changed my address with the Economist. That'll take 2 weeks to kick in so Candace will be able to enjoy 2 free issues. My parents on the other hand will receive maybe 6 issues before I get back home...whenever that might be. It's only my possibly very inaccurate projection.

I only have 4 days left in Korea before I'm here illegally. I've decided to take a boat to Weihai, China in Shandong province. I don't know what's there but I'd much rather leave on Monday than have to rush to Seoul a few days before I would've liked. Plus, I found out that the ferry to Tiajin doesn't even dock in Tianjin but some other port so I wouldn't be right in the heart of Beijing to begin with. Aside from that, my plans are about as flexible as a Romanian gymnast (whatever that means). Only visa concerns really. I guess there really aren't any countries bordering China that I don't need visas for. I suppose Hong Kong and Macau but those 2 only border China and the sea and I'd need a visa to get back to China. Hmm...

I'm a bit worried that I won't meet anyone going on my particular proposed route. So I might either be very lonely for however long I am lost in Asia or end up travelling with random strangers to wherever they were going. I really don't know. I should really make more concrete plans but instead I change the layout of this page and waste time in all kinds of other ways.

Down by the river

2005-10-03T21:36:00.000+09:00

I went running tonight.... down by the river. It was quite nice running... down by the river. I'm still in Daegu staying with my friend. Luckily it can't be for longer than a week so hopefully I won't drive him too insane.

My last day at work was pretty surreal, much like all my other days there. The funny thing was that even though it was my last day it went by just like any other day. Right down to the end of the day. Actually that part was a bit different. When it was time for my to leave Wonderland for good I said goodbye to everyone, well more a mass goodbye as I headed towards the door. They all smiled and waved goodbye like I would be seeing them on Monday. I mean, I didn't care about any of them either, maybe it was better that emotions weren't feigned. Matt came out of the office after I'd walked out and shook my hand, wished me luck with everything. Not even Renee gave me a proper goodbye. It was all a bit strange. Usually no one is there when I leave on Fridays.

I went home, finished packing up my stuff. Jupiter came and collected the key. He actually drove me to my friends place. I told him I was going to take a taxi but me standing in front of my building with my large suitcase, travel backpack, smaller backpack, laptop case, and 2 pillows 2 blocks from any place a taxi could be hailed, must have looked a touch pathetic. We actually had a better conversation than we had ever had before (which isn't saying much). Turned out the whole office went out for dinner after I had left. I was so beloved there. To be fair, I skipped out on the last office meal because I knew I wouldn't really be wanted there. Ah, so funny and a bit depressing. I ordered pizza for the last time and my pizza couple seemed much sadder to see me go. They made all these sad faces and were confused since I'd only been there for 6 months. Everyone must know how the hagwons work. Speaks wonders that my pizza man was infinitely more affected by my departure. The kids too acted like it was just another day.

I saw Karen's mother at the garage sale day. It seems like such a scam, this garage sale day. All the kids bring in some unwanted items, donations I guess. Then the school affixes price tags to everything and then a few days later the kids come and exchange real dollars (well, won)for phoney Wonderland dollars and their goods are resold to them and Wonderland keeps all this money. Anyways, Karen's mother told me how much Karen liked me and that she will miss me. I suppose I already said goodbye to Karen on the field trip. She didn't want to do the relay race and I picked her up and she kind of just clung to me. If I ever have a daughter, I hope she would be just like Karen.

Anyways, my Wonderland life and my days of going by Shawn Teacher are gone for good. I'm never going to let anyone give me a different name again. That must sound really strange.

My friend had to go into work tonight. I decided to do something active so I went running down by the river. I decided the only reason I like having longer hair is that it moves with the wind. Makes me feel like I'm part of nature, gives me fluidity. Anyhow, I ran a bit too quickly at first and shortly lost my breath. Walked right by the river along these stones that are really just decorative since they were much worse than the worst cobblestoned streets in Europe. I crossed to the other side of the river and jogged at a reasonable pace for quite a ways. I got back to the main street of where I'll be living for the next 4 days or so and sprinted to the corner. Then I sprinted some more. I like running fast even though I can't do it for long. I even chased a car for a bit. Then I was going to return to the apartment but and I almost did but then I went running again along the streets sprinting past pedestrians and dashing between cars between alleyways. Luckily the stoplights gave me time to catch my breath again. Maybe I should go running everyday. I probably won't but maybe I could. Rambling time is over, it's ramyeon time now.

Paragraph 1, Article 68

2005-09-30T15:02:00.000+09:00

Pursuant to Paragraph 1, Article 68 of the Immigration Law, Blue S. Who-Two is ordered to leave the Republic of Korea.
Deadline of Departure: 2005.10.10

So not only am I leaving but I've been banished. It's an official exit order. That was what I accomplished today. Expulsion from a country. I had to drive with my boss to the immigration office which took about 40 minutes. Maybe 20 words were exchanged. I've had my last class with the Melon students. Only 6 more classes and then freedom for 10 days followed by mandatory expulsion.

Hate & Hilarity

2005-09-27T20:31:00.000+09:00

It's a really good thing that I am leaving my job soon otherwise I might start to take all this unexpressed hostility towards me personally. I don't even think anyone has even raised their voice to me actually. I find it all quite funny actually.

So Julie has hated me since move-in day when I didn't volunteer to give up a day of my vacation to help the school move maybe I should say when I wasn't taken advantage of by the school, since that's the way I see it. I don't remember if I've mentioned this. Probably. Her way of telling me things is to get the kinder students to tell me. Quite immature and I decided I would just do things the way I did them and Julie needs to tell me herself. Not that it matters with 3 days left which is what makes the whole thing ridiculous. I guess, I was writing the kids' name too big on the board. I'd leave it there if I had another class with them (Wednesday and Thursday only). The kids tell me this makes Julie teacher very angry because she wants to use the whole board. I need to write the kids names smaller which of course contradicts with something Amy said once (if you write their names, make them big). Anyways, so that's the way Julie expresses herself to me. She had to give me some kids' numbers once. I found it on a post-it on my desk. No verbal mention. Only the most urgent things are not written to me.

I told Amy on Monday that I wasn't going to make tests for next month. Monday was the only day this week that I have a decent break. Today I worked the whole day, every single class period. I don't think anyone has done this for a very long time at the school. Certainly, none of the current teachers. Not even when someone's out sick. Wednesday, I have one class off in the morning. Thursday one class right at the end. Friday when I usually get to sleep in I will have to go with my boss to immigration. I hadn't thought about how awkward the drive there and back will be until now. He's probably been the nicest to me since maybe the 2nd or 3rd day after I quit. He wasn't so nice the day I actually quit but what do you expect? Right, so I told Amy how I had no time to make them. Her solution was that I should use my Monday break to make these tests which would've probably taken 2 hours. 2 unpaid hours that would eat away my only time off that day. So I sat there for way too long thinking about how I would tell her I wasn't going to do them. I imagined all kinds of potential statements and arguments. I always do that. Anyways, I prepared way too much. I told her and her eyes just changed completely as if I had just told her something shocking. She was quite speechless actually. All she asked was if I would show the new teacher how to make them. I don't know whether she was trying to get me to feel sorry for the new teacher or if she was serious but I said that was okay and left before Amy could think of anything else to say. I doubt that they'd make Candace make them but I'm not going to let them take me advantage of me like that. I don't owe the school any favours. They should be thanking me that I actually gave 40 days notice and didn't run off in the middle of the night.

Amy's way of getting back at me was to print out the field trip schedule and put it on everyone's desk but mine. Also to misspell my name. Shwan. She's done it since I've been there though. I don't understand why she thinks Shawn and Shwan are interchangeable. I swear it's half the time. Yet, Renee's little accent always gets special treatment. It isn't my name so I never bothered to say anything. Shawn or Shwan isn't my name. She also started the post-it method of communication. Quite a hit with the angry K teacher crowd. I just realized that I don't like the name Shawn. I never realized it until reading something and having the students point it out. The sun shone brightly in the sun. 'Ah, Shawn teacher.' What kind of name is the past tense of a verb. I wouldn't mind being Shine, well I would, but Shawn/Shone implies that my shining time has come and gone. I really hope that isn't a metaphor for my life. Ah, yes, your scholastic years were your finest years, but those days are gone. You have already shone your brightest. In life, you will be a failure. I know I'm reading too much into this. Someone wrote something to me a few days ago. Someone I've kept in reasonable touch with over IM. Anyways, he not only misspelt my name but gave me an entirely different one. Taylor. I really wonder if this was a slip or if he actually thinks my name is Taylor. Probably offends me more as of the 50 or so people I come into contact weekly so few of them know my actual name.

More about how hated I am. I showed up to work about 20 minutes late today, 10 minutes before we left on the field trip. I hate the 30 minute rule but so far no one has ever said a thing. No one tells me when I do anything wrong. I can tell they disapprove but for some reason they never tell me what it is they disapprove of. No one said a single word to me the whole morning except for my students. None of the Korean teachers at least. Wait, Grace teacher who speaks no English may have said my non-name and pointed to where in the bus she wanted me to sit. That was the extent of it. I really says a lot that I was shocked when Julie teacher was going around with a trash bag and actually held it long enough for me to put stuff in it. She held it for my and the students who were seating around me. Enough about how much I am hated and how funny I find it all.

I went on a field trip to the Daegu Arboretum today. Basically we just walked around looking at plants. The kids sketched for about 30 minutes. We sat on the grass (well mats on the grass) and ate. I guess they played a little bit. A relay race and some singing. I swung them around for a bit which I knew was a bad idea since once you do one kid you have to do them all at least 50 times. So it was fun. Kate gave me a sad pouty face when she said I would be gone next week. That made me feel good but then she got all excited about the new teacher. Kate is such a popular girl. Twice on field trips she's run into people she knew. Hasn't happened to anyone else. She made 1000 won from the encounter. Karen and Justin will also be sad I think. Most of the kinders will miss me I think. The older students not so much. I was going to try to make an effort to be more concise but I guess I just can't be concise. So here are some pictures of the field trip.

This is Andrew and some pastels. He loves me. He tells me so. He has a bit (way) too much energy and is uncontrollable at times. I like him though.

This is Elly. She hasn't been there very long. I guess 2-3 months. She had to go to the hospital the other day for stitches because she hit her chin on the table somehow. I'm so grateful it wasn't in one of my classes. Julie never mentioned the incident.

Here's Karen. I've written about her before. She didn't want to let me take her picture today so I stuck the camera close to her downturned face and just snapped. Her hair isn't short, that's one of her pigtails. Hands down my favourite. She'll miss me for sure.

Here's Erica. I've written about her before, too. She doesn't trust me and hates being touched in any way. She didn't mind being spun today though. They either confuse 'just one more time' and 'again' but it's likely a trick. Kind of an artsy picture I think. She didn't want me to take her picture either.

This is Paul. He's quite unusual. Maybe I will give him his own post tomorrow. He listens much better than he used to. I think he just takes a lot time to adjust to people. Months. The other day he was so scared of Amy teacher that it took him almost a minute to tell her the classroom was hot(aka turn on the a/c for that room). I felt bad for him. I really like Paul now.

Here's Justin. He'll miss me too I think. We have fun at times but he is always pushing the boundaries. He doesn't mean to. He just thinks he do what he wants because "we're best friends." I like him though. I just wish he and Andrew weren't always playing together instead of listening. He's the big man on campus. Andrew's his number 2. Mostly good though. Extremely good with Julie teacher I think.

This is Kate with Justin in behind. Kate's the popular girl I mentioned earlier. She's probably pretty spoiled I imagine and needs everything of hers to be perfect in every way or she will get upset. Definitely a princess. I remember having one big fight with her and one teacher said she was afraid of me for awhile. I've got her though and we had fun on the bus today as she taught me Korean words.

Here's Amy. She's pretty cute. She's either really quiet or just wants to tell me all kinds of things. Her English is probably the worst though. She hasn't been with me very long. Maybe a month or two. Yesterday she got sick and I had to clean up her vomit with toilet paper. At least, I didn't miss out on that teaching milestone. Quite cute if a bit dazed most times. With me at least. My boss is in the background if you care to look. The bottom picture has all the students in it but no one's face really. Let's see the order: Kate, Elly, Amy, Erica, Karen, Catherine (who I somehow neglected to photograph today), Andrew, Paul, and Justin. Maybe on Garage Sale day I'll have some more pictures.

23 Photographs

2005-09-20T18:25:00.000+09:00

Strange title, I know. I don't know what else to call it.

I got out of bed today having fallen asleep later and woken earlier than I would've liked. I contemplated washing my bedding but have decided to wash it tomorrow. I don't know how I feel about everything really. I have to admit my upbeatness didn't make it very far into the weekend. I've swung right back. I did absolutely nothing with my long weekend. Yesterday the most exciting event was one I would've rather missed.

I was cleaning my bathroom and just decided to spray the windows with the shower hose. The seal isn't airtight I guess and though the windows were closed water got out and fell onto boxed produce belonging to the convenience store. I make horrible decisions really especially when it comes to cleaning. Anyways, I have to confess that I did this twice yesterday. The first time I got away with it, I guess. The second time I could hear someone outside saying 'mul, mul' (water, water). A few minutes later the ajumma was at my door looking upset. She took me down to her store and showed me the track of water leading out of my window and then the slightly wet boxes. I felt bad but given my low level Korean I couldn't even apologize so I just looked sheepish while she lectured me in Korean. I don't know how she feels about me, whether she knows it was accidently/unintentional or whether she just thinks I'm the selfish foreigner that everyone seems to peg me as. I heard her when I went back up to my apartment just repeating the word waygook to someone (foreigner). Luckily, I only have about 9-10 days worth of avoiding her. Sometimes she seems happy to see me and other times just either indifferent or a little upset. Maybe I've wronged her before. Maybe I play my music too loudly or she's offended I don't buy much from her. I don't know. I contemplated buying her flowers or something to apologize but I'm a selfish foreigner and I don't feel like spending money. I watched Curb Your Enthusiasm on DVD yesterday. I can relate so much more to being a victim of a combination of circumstance and poor decisions.

Now on to the title story. I went to a travel agent today. I was going to go to the one where Julie's brother worked, not knowing other ones. I don't know how close they are and it's probably better the place was closed lest there be some kind of familial hatred of me. I was going to lie about where I worked and deny any connection to Julie teacher. She wouldn't know my real name anyways. Maybe that's what this whole problem is related to. Perhaps I make a horrible Shawn. It's funny how I'll be remembered by that name there. Anyways, I went by my old Korean hagwon (where I learnt [hardly any(due to lack of effort)] Korean). I'm not sure why. I saw one of the people from my class outside on their break. I talked to her for a bit. I reconfirmed that my decision to leave Korea was for the best. She gave me the name of a travel agent. I went over there and entered the agency one second before some other Westerner. The agent assumed we were together naturally. I would've also probably. I bought a Chinese visa that should be ready by next Tuesday. It was an extra $25 I think but worth it to not have to overnight in Busan or Seoul and stand in long lines. I also had to get one passport sized photo. Of course you can't just buy one so I had to buy 23. I ended up getting a little keychain with a locket size photo of me. Kind of funny. I went back to give him the photos after about 20 minutes. The other guy was still there. I'm glad I beat him there, we rode up in the same elevator (I beat him to the elevator bank, the 15th floor button, and the agent's door so there was no question really). I think I took less than 10 minutes. Hopefully, I won't need my passport for the next week.

I've begun formulating the first leg of my trip. I'm probably going to literally take a slow boat to China, spend a few days in Beijing arranging for more visas and sightseeing. I'll have a week in Korea so maybe I'll be able to get a Kazakh visa here. I don't think there's a Kyrgyz embassy in Korea anyways. I might have to wait to Beijing to get several visas. Almaty supposedly is the best place to get visas in central Asia. It's probably a good thing I still have 22 passport photos.

After Beijing, I'll probably spend a few days in Xian with the terra cotta soldiers and other things before going on to Urumqi (56 hours by train or bus) and then Almaty (20 hours I think, 7 of which are spent at the border). I'll probably overload my luggage with huge novels. I might have to breakdown and buy another guidebook for China(41,000 won). I'm hoping to buy a used one in Seoul. Otherwise I'll be lost until I get to Kazakhstan, which seems very bizarre. I think I'm more worried about the China segment. I'm not sure why but I think petty theft is worse in China. Aaron, the former former teacher whose workload I have, had his iPod and camera I think stolen his first week in China. I definitely plan on traveling light. I don't know about my digital camera. That's probably the only thing of significant value I'll take aside from currency and my passport. I've always fallen into the con rather than outright theft. I've only ever had my bike stolen I think. It's happened twice now.

Almaty onward is still very much up in the air. Kyrgyztan on to Tajikistan and then Uzbekistan. Turkmenistan might be too big a visa pain to go to. Accompanied guide and visa approval of a month or more even for just a transit visa. I guess I'll have to plot the cities now and read up on the other visas. Hopefully my Chinese visa will be processed uneventfully.

Nausea explained

2005-09-16T20:29:00.000+09:00

A few weeks ago I kept feeling nauseous right in the middle of the afternoon. I had no idea why.

I tried to remain in my current state and was successful for most of the afternoon. My last class though came pretty close to ruining the whole thing. What a bunch of yahoos those 3 boys are! One is basically functionally retarded, I just give him the answers and don't make him work at all. Honesty can sound so cruel sometimes. Anyways, about halfway through class I started feeling a bit nauseated. Then I realized what it was. It's from yelling. I swear it is. I felt my stomach as I was yelling and my abdominals were contracting doing strange things with my stomach contents I imagine. My yelling has improved my loud voice I think. I used to not be able to speak that loudly without my throat starting to hurt at some point. Now I feel like I could just yell, all day long, because surprise, surprise, that's what I've been doing for longer than I would have liked.

I also might be starting to speak more loudly in general. I can't really tell since I usually don't speak very loud at all so maybe I'm not only speaking at an average volume but I can't help like feeling like some loud obnoxious jerk when I enter an elevator or am in a quiet space. I don't have any hypothesis for that one I'm afraid. Might all be in my head.

I think I've managed to regain some of my enthusiasm for life from this afternoon. Maybe this will be a nice weekend after all. Would still like to get away if only to head to some consulates. Namely the Chinese one. I wouldn't mind spending a few days in Beijing to obtain a Kazakh visa. I only have the first leg of my potential Stan trip covered. While there are a few things in China that I would like to see that wasn't really the aim of this trip, well potential trip. So my plan would be to dash through China, stop in Urumqi and then take a train or bus to Almaty in Kazakhstan. It's the most cosmopolitan city in central asia so they say. After that I'd arrange for the next visa to Kyrgyztan and Tajikistan possibly. It's going to be such a headache to get visas espescially for Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Tajikistan. They all require a letter of invitation which can be bought for about $25 each. Damn visas! They will make fine additions to my passport though. I would love to eyed suspiciously going through customs. 'What was this fellow doing in Uzbekistan?' I've secretly always wanted to come under suspicion. Nothing serious though, just mystery novel type suspicion. I'd never be guilty of anything so maybe that's as far as I'm willing to flirt with serious crime. Anyways, I just felt like writing again to say that I've managed to barely hold on to feeling and that yelling too much will make me nauseated if I don't eat properly for it. I wonder what the ideal diet is for a yelling machine. Only required Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Only 8 more days.

Also there's a replacement for me all lined up. Candace. Poor naive Candace.

Korea's made me bi-polar

2005-09-16T14:20:00.000+09:00

This kid isn't even one my students but I don't have any of mine looking quite this happy. This is Ian but I'm posting it to show my current mood. This other one is a girl my friend and I played with under a monument in Buenos Aires. We thought she might have been a homeless girl but it turns out she just likes to play in a lot of dirt. Her parents were eyeing us suspiciously from afar. She wouldn't talk to us, she just kept running around us and we'd purposely bungle attempts to catch her. Kids are fun.

I'm feeling quite well at the moment. Happy, actually. That may have been too strong a word maybe, well I just don't want to jinx it really. I'm sure this feeling will be gone by the time my afternoon classes roll around.

I had so much fun today with my Melon class. I was kind of an irresponsible teacher maybe. Well, I didn't try to teach them all that much. I don't even remember what we did for most of the phonics class. I would say at least 15 minutes was devoted to the textbook. Another 10 to the little letter quiz I give them. Ok, Paul show me a W. Then they write the letter and make a little drawing if they want. Fills up so much time and they seem to enjoy it.

I'm really going to miss Karen I think. I had so much fun with her today. We had a birthday party today for the kindergarten students. 2 of mine had birthdays. Sometimes I feel kind of like their father and am proud of them. Those are my kids up there and they're so much smarter, more fun, and better looking than those other kids. I was just kind of happy for them. So many ups and downs but really right now I'm higher than I have been for quite awhile. The birthday party is usually a complete mess afterwards. I have to serve them food, find cups and forks, and then clean it all up afterwards. The bell rang and I didn't even care that I'd have to clean it up all by myself. I was just playing with them all and was actually interested in what they had to say. I was picking them up, making them jump really high. Completely shunnning my obligations as a teacher. They get so much more out of real interaction though than focusing on the textbook. Yes, van starts with a V and foot with an F and all that but that's not useful. Julie came in while I was playing with them after the bell had rung and told them to put stuff away. I wonder why I used to like Julie as a person. Hmmm.. Anyways, I even stayed a little later than usual today. Usually I clean up and head out the door. Karen helped me clean up a little bit, well watched maybe, and then I flew her to the kids room. I don't know where all this good emotion is coming from though. I woke up feeling disappointed that my alarm wasn't the one to wake me. Then I got ready for work. Sleep really is a wonderful thing. I've just got to accept everything as it is. I don't even mind that the school is ripping hours away from my break time so long as I get to spend the time with my Melons not teaching them anything. Maybe I should just rush through the work and play with them. It would get exhausting I suppose. I could seriously put up with a lot of crap if every morning were like the one today. Too bad this afternoon will completely kill that. I can feel it already. If only they didn't fight with each other or behave so badly sometimes. I wonder if this is related to my feelings of freedom. I still don't have any definitive plans for October but for some reason I just don't care at this point. I will be free.

That Karen. If only she'd been there for August. I missed her. Amy and Andrew and Paul are growing on me too. I need to devote some posts to them I think. I still have a bit of time left. I'll be able to take photos of them on the field trip next week. I'll just need to have some energy. Some days they make me miserable, I must admit, but I'm going to miss my Melons. I don't think they know I'll be leaving yet.

Yesterday too actually went pretty well. I was having a miserable morning. I taught them speech class and afterwards I just felt really low and didn't want to do the class. Julie made mistakes on the schedule and has me teaching unit 8 before 6 and 7 and then teaching 8 again so I knew it wasn't a big deal. It's too bad there are nine of them. That's too many for games I think, well the nice ones that come in boxes. I just kind of let them go a bit crazy but controlled crazy if that's possible. The afternoon too I gave up on trying to control them. I just went with whatever came along instead of telling them to sit down and be quiet. You want to speak Korean, go ahead. Not caring about teaching them anything just relieved this huge burden. It just freed me. I still taught the pages but with very minimal effort. Teaching English isn't really something to be taken seriously. It's too taxing to actually force them to learn. I suppose it's because the school has just taken so much from me that I really don't care if I don't fulfill all my duties. It would be really nice to carry this feeling, this elevated spirit of mine right through the weekend, a four day weekend, in which it might prove impossible to actually do anything. It would be nice, maybe it could happen. I'll do my best.

Depressing Danish Post

2005-09-12T20:12:00.000+09:00

Jeg skal skrive på dansk i dag. Det har været en rigtig læng tid at jeg har skrivet noget på dansk men jeg har ting at sige og jeg vil ikke være forstået. Jeg synes der er ikke nogen at kan forstå mig nu fordi min dansk er så dårlig. Jeg har ikke skrivet noget glad for mange måneder men jeg har ikke skrivet på dansk før og derfer det er forskeligt.

Det ved jeg ikke om noget. Det ved jeg ikke hvorfor jeg er her en Korea eller hvad jeg skal lave med mit liv. Jeg ved kun jeg vil gerne rejse. Det er helt. Jeg vil ikke arbejde men jeg bliver nødt til en dag. Jeg vil ikke skulle hjem. Jeg har ikke venner der. Jeg har ikke venner en et sted i verden. Alle mine venner som i forskelligt stede og lande. Jeg synes jeg kan godt lide at rejse fordi jeg prøver at finde et sted i verden hvor jeg hører til. Måske det ikke er et sted.

Mit job er meget dårligt. Jeg tror det ødelægger mig. Jeg kan ikke sove. Jeg har ikke lyst til at spise. Jeg har ikke lyst til noget. Jeg læser Gandhis selvbiografi og jeg hader det. Han skriver om hvordan befri selv fra ønske. Jeg ønsker at jeg har ønsker. Det er hvordan man kender at man er levende. Jeg er ikke åndelig derfor jeg ikke kan forstå hvordan han tænker. Det er ikke et liv hvis man har ikke ønske.

Det er bedre at jeg skriver på dansk, synes jeg. Det er sværter at skrive og jeg kan ikke være kedelig om alt fordi jeg er nødt til at tænke for meget. Jeg kan ikke skrive mange ting heller ikke fordi jeg har glemt min dansk. Jeg kunne ikke tale rigtig godt dansk da jeg var i Danmark.

Det er sværter at gå til mit job hver dag. Jeg taler ikke med nogen. Koreanerne snakker ikke med mig fordi de hader mig og den anden canadier fordi de snakker altid sammen. Det er meget svært at have kun børn for at snakke til. De kan ikke tale engelsk. Jeg har ikke anden ting at sige på dansk i dag.

Hvis du har udnyttet en oversætter på nettet du har beraget men jeg har beraget også fordi jeg har glemt mange orden. Det har været mere end 2 år og jeg kan stadig skrive en lidt. Alle mine venner har glemt alt. Jeg gad vide hvad min laerer skulle syne.

My Name is Jay Walker

2005-09-09T14:20:00.000+09:00

I've been meaning to write about this for awhile. I'm usually a very law-abiding person and all and usually do what the little man tells me to do. A few weeks, maybe more than a few I began jaywalking. It was never anything dangerous, well maybe once. It just makes me feel better for some reason that I don't have to wait and can just go whenever I want (provided no cars are coming). I think it was directly related to how powerful I felt in other areas of my life. I felt utterly helpless and so to prove how much power I had I decided to rebel and walk even though red lights told me not to. After I quit though or when I'm feeling more content, I'm fine waiting for the light to change. It feels so nice to just leave people waiting on the curb while you brush past them right onto the street.

There was only one dangerous time. I was feeling quite pissed off that day and there were cars coming. I waited until a giant bus was rounding the corner and walked behind it. There was a Korean man whose mouth was just agape. He couldn't believe what I had done. I don't know why that made me feel good. Sidenote: I actually met a guy named Jay Walker once but never put it together until later. He was in my speech class and had done some missionary work or something in Kenya. It was kind of depressing to hear about how the Masai (sp) were into Shaq and the NBA. It's very hard to escape western pop culture I think. I heard that Kate Winslet was hiking through the Himalayas or doing something in a very remote place and she happened across this elderly man and he looked at her, pointed, and said 'Titanic.' I wonder if there's such a thing as exploring when Paramount or Universal can be anywhere much faster than you.

In other news, I've kind of decided not to teach again. I have good days and bad days but really I don't know if I care to have any more of the bad days. It's kind of sad that I didn't finish my year here. I've discussed my job with a few people and I don't think any of them would have stayed. I applied at this one school and she said even she would've quit and I didn't even tell her anything in detail. I wouldn't mind teaching here for another 6 months just to complete my year here but I doubt I will find anything like that with decent hours in the area I want. Really, I would only want to teach for 3 and leave when a friend of mine is. Either way though, one of us would have 90 days of feeling alone and abandoned. I also had been thinking about having freedom again and after that any job just doesn't sound appealing.

As of now, my plans are very much in the air. I have a basic plan but I don't know whether I have time to prepare it. I've been in Korea for 5.5 months now and I feel as though I've seen nothing of Asia, even Korea. I'll probably go to Seoul for my first time next weekend. I have an open return date, well one I will have to change regardless, so I figure that I should stay and do a bit of travelling. I feel like I've got to do something epic. I'll probably go to South East Asia sometime in my life but I don't know when if ever I would journey to central Asia. My rough plan involves the trans-siberian railroad. I will either ride from Vladivostok to Moscow or the reverse and take some other form of land travel and maybe go through Kazakstan and Turkmenistan or something. I really need to do some research on this though and might skim through some travel guides tomorrow. My plan is for the journey to last about 30-40 days maybe. I'd like to be back in North America before the end of November so I can use my free flight which will expire at the end of that month. That's another part of it. I think I might just go home for a couple months and find some crappy job that doesn't require trying to control the behaviour of others. Then in February possibly take a road trip down to Latin America. I should take advantage of my Chilean entry fee which is good until the expiration of my passport. None of this has been well thought out of course so who knows what will happen to me.

Perspectives

2005-09-03T14:10:00.000+09:00

It's been about 2 weeks since I've resigned. Maybe it is a good thing I needed to give 40 days notice. I have no idea what to do with myself come October. I haven't been able to find a new job in Korea. I really don't know if I'll be able to manage it either. At least not one where I'd get everything I wanted and only work for 3-6 months. I'm counting down the days at work. 18. That can't mean I like my job and I don't regret leaving it. I feel like staying just for the security of it, which is a stupid reason but one that I imagine a lot of adhere to.

My latest impractical plan involves train travel to Africa. I guess I could go teach in Ghana for like 6 months which wouldn't be bad really. It wouldn't really solve anything though. I don't know what I want. If only I had a city that felt like home. I haven't lived in Edmonton really since 2000. I didn't even live there for the 1998-99 schoolyear. I didn't go to school in Beaumont for the 97/98 year either. It's been a long time and will never really feel like home again. I wonder if it ever did. Maybe that's my whole problem. I'd rather not have this be another introspective 'what's wrong with me?' posts.

The above picture I took in Chile on February 2 my camera says. I wish I could just go to some great landscape and think about the future. Then, I always realize though when I find these places that I'm not some fictional character where things work out like this and instead just end up getting bit by insects or have loud trucks go by. If only I were fictional and my life were heading toward some kind of climax.

Actually, I don't know how I feel about that. The whole happily ever after bit. You'd think something interesting would've happened between the time Snow White, Cinderalla, etc. and Prince Charming got married and the time they died. That's one wickedly long denouement. I mean the rest is kind of dull in comparison but really, effectively their lives just kind of end at that point. Maybe it's better to not have one huge climax. Hopefully, I haven't had mine, just in my theoretical everyone's lives must have some kind of climax at some point. It reminds me of some Onion thing. I have a little day calendar from the Onion. "Best years of Area Man's Life Apparently Never Going to Happen." That's pretty depressing though. I suppose you have to actively seek out the best years. I think that's why I'm avoiding going back to school or entering a true labour force. I don't think you can have the best years while at the same time saving for retirement or thinking about getting a new dishwasher. Maybe that's a fallacy on my part. I guess once you have a stable job and a spouse your life might just become a happily ever after. After children I guess. I mean, so many people are just defined by their age, occupation, marital status, and place of residence.

Joe Baker
Age: 45
Occupation: Accountant
Married with 2 children. Lives in Portsmith, Kansas.

Joe Baker died last Tuesday. Aged 84. He is survived by his wife Lorraine and their 2 children and 3 grandchildren. He had been accountant for 40 years. So long, Joe.

This can't be my life. I don't know what the alternative is though. Once he married Lorraine and settled on accounting his life was over really as far as anything worthy of narration goes. I suppose one day I might crave that kind of stability but I think I want to be at least 35 before my story ends. Ghana, anyone?

Options and possibilities

2005-08-29T21:18:00.000+09:00

This is the 3rd time, I've tried to make this post. Well, not this exact post but you should know what I mean. Once I tried to post it and instead deleted it and the other time the computer froze so I just had to shut it down. So annoying especially since I always write so much. I swear I'd almost finished rambling.

Anyways, my boss became more reasonable last Wednesday I guess. He decided to let me leave (after checking the figures, I'm sure) as long as I repaid the airfare. I really don't like how deceptive it sounds in the contract. Resign before completing 6 months should just have to do with working there for 6 months. I really wish I'd followed through the last time. He also said he would sign the letter of release if my new school (wherever that may be) agreed to pay half the recruiting fee. I guess that would be fair if I didn't get my job through a recruiter but unfair to make me agree to something that a future employer would do. I don't know what will happen with that. I wish I knew how much the recruiter fee was. Oh, I forget to mention that my plane ticket was more than I thought. 1.6 million yen. Yeah, I don't know why my boss would say yen either. But that's about double what I was hoping it was. I haven't seen an actual figure. I really wish I hadn't been rushed over here like I was. Those airlines and there policies. Good thing I didn't have to fly first class I guess. I'll end up getting a return flight out of it at least. Jupiter was going to see if he could refund it though. I might never use it.

Or I might use it right away. Actually, I don't know. I talked to my parents last night. They both expressed how much they'd like me to come home. They even mentioned how all the gas stations and grocery stores were looking for people. Geez, Mom and Dad, I don't know what you think my future plans are but I don't remember gas jockey ever coming up before. It's one of my parents indicators as to the general job market but really the sound of it just depresses me. I have no reason to go back to Edmonton. I mean my parents are there but how much fun are they to hang out with? I don't know anyone in Edmonton anymore so I'd basically be starting fresh wherever I went. I really wish I still kept in contact with people from high school, or that I had made more and better friends in college(same for high school really), and that everyone I know weren't scattered over North America. I can't really live in the US without (lots of maybe) paperwork but I don't really want to live there anyway. I think that's one of the reasons I'm hanging on to the idea of staying here. I have one good friend here which is more than I can say about a lot of other places. I'm becoming quite a downer lately so who knows maybe that won't last. Then again he'll be leaving in 4 months. If I have to rebuild a life somewhere though it might as well be here. Actually, I don't know.

I've been having all these crazy thoughts. I could leave Korea which wouldn't upset me really except that I don't think I've really experienced much of Korea and I didn't make as much money as I thought I would. If only I had been placed at a decent school to begin with. I think my 2 problems are that I'm too trusting and make my decisions too impulsively. This college is going to give me a scholarship. Well, ok. I think I only have 2 regrets and going to that school is one of them. Sorry TAMUCC people. Well, maybe it's more that I stayed there for so long. I really wonder how much money I spent my last year on plane tickets. Let's see from September 2003 to December 2004, I flew to Seattle, Indianapolis, Los Angeles (I guess fall 2003 wasn't bad), Rochester back from DC, Chicago, Los Angeles to Tampa back to Corpus (still not that bad), Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Charleston, SC, Los Angeles (again, I know), Mexico City and those are the ones I remember at the moment. I guess that's only 11 and I didn't pay for 2 of them since they were parent related (met them in Las Vegas and Tampa). That's 9 and I would have to say they were all about 300 each so that's probably about $2500. Hmmm... I don't know how I feel about that. Then there was a road trip I took to El Paso once and another one to Memphis with my mother(strange). I went so many places in the US that year. I'm going to list for curiosity's sake and this post probably won't make it either.
Starting from my return to Corpus in July 2003:
Edmonton
Seattle (Halloween)
Indianapolis (also Bluffton and Fort Wayne, IN for Thanksgiving)
Edmonton for xmas
LA for New Years
Road trip to Memphis through Texas, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana (mom's visit)
Rochester to DC via Ithaca, Williamstown, Providence, Boston, New York (spring break)
Chicago (no particular reason)
Los Angeles to Tampa back to Corpus Christi (post spring semester pre summer session)
Austin several times, ditto San Antonio
Dallas
El Paso and Las Cruces, NM (strange weekend had to get out of Corpus urge)
Edmonton
Los Angeles on to Vegas for Labour Day (I think)
Las Vegas (to see parents)
Charleston, SC (Halloween)
LA (concert)
Mexico City (Thanksgiving break)

It's funny I went to so different places while being in school and working the whole time. I can't believe I went to LA four times in one year. It was split between 2 friends but still. I hadn't been to California in over 10 years and then just bang I was there all the time. I managed to earn a free flight though that will expire in November unless I take another trip on Continental. Hmmm..

Anyways, that was rather pointless. My other thoughts if I'm unable to find anything in Daegu is to go somewhere else in Korea, which I'm not sure how I feel about. Or (and these are my most recent flights of fancy) take a ferry to Vladivostock and catch a train to Moscow and head on to Stockholm. I should be able to do a working holiday program there. I just need to apply for the visa 6 weeks before my arrival there. I could've gone to Australia which was my plan but I need a minimum of $7000 to my name and don't know if I'd be able to manage that. Sweden only required $2000. I don't know about the Netherlands or France. The strange thing about Sweden though is I'd only be going to reacquaint myself with Scandinavia. I could live in Malmo and go to Kbh all the time for sweet Matilde and Cafe Istanbul. It would be so nice but I don't think Copenhagen would be the same without the same people. I could scam a visits from old friends though. If only I'd made more money. Then, I could go back to Alberta and pump gas. I don't know what I'd do in Sweden. I imagine something just as menial but menial outside your city is always better than menial at home with the folks which is where I would live since I'm such a poor loser. That would be like failure really if that happened.

I even thought as I was on my way downtown today that maybe I could sign a full year contract again. I don't know if I want to be here until next October since I need to be on a different continent for my 24th birthday or I will die. Gypsy curse, can't go into it. I'm going to try to find a 6 month contract in central Daegu. I hate telling people where I live and have them give me shocked faces and tell me how far it is. Plus taxi fares are being felt more each day especially now that I owe my boss 1.6 million yen. I hope he just gave me that number to worry me or that he was rounding up at least. I hope it's not 1.68 million won not that it matters much once a certain figure is breached. I guess I'll see how this week goes. I emailed some recruiters and a school or two. I'll be out knocking on hagwon doors tomorrow provided I work my normal hours and have the energy. My early Tuesdays are coming to an end tomorrow. They will be missed. Ok, that's enough contentless drivel for now.

I quit and now it's kind of awkward

2005-08-23T12:10:00.000+09:00

This will be a short post. I have to go to Korean lessons in a few minutes.

Last night, I decided to announce my resignation to my boss. He didn't seem that surprised really since I'd tried to quit before and was talked out of it. Plus, that's the only reason I would talk to him when leaving.

Basically, it didn't go very well. I told him my problems with a lot of things. Not everything. I just can't stand teaching 6 classes back to back. I can't even sit down. There are tons of other things though. He told me that there was a chance my schedule could change........ in December. He said he would refuse to release me from my contract until December. It all hedges on the other foreign teachers. He's afraid of what the parents will think if 2 teachers quit in the same year but I could leave at the same time as the other 2 because my disappearance would be masked or something. The other guy was in Daegu but his girlfriend was placed in Seoul so that was why he was released. Anyways, he told me that I was an 'irresponsible teacher' and if I had thought of any 'inferences'(sic:references) that he might give. I really can't believe that I countered with the fact that I could make the same kinds of threats. He would have such a hard time finding someone to replace if I did a few things. I had enough hesistation signing the contract to begin with. I feel like I should go out and print all these "I hate Wonderland" shirts. Find the logo and just go from there. I could wear it everywhere I went. All the time except when I was at work for these last 40 days. Actually, I could still manage to find work without his letter of release. Immigration just has to do a few more things. I am leaving at the end of September though. I'll find out what my options are in Korea but if they turn out to be very limited then I'll just board a plane to Sydney, Paris, Cape Town, Stockholm, wherever.

Today was a bit strange at work too. My boss gave a little hello to me. Then he and the VP had a little chat with the door closed. I imagine it was about me. Then just as I was leaving his wife was exiting the elevator and gave me this big smile. Either they are oblivious to what I told Jupiter or they are trying their best to make me feel welcome. After everything though, even if they were to give me the best schedule, give me a raise, give me a better apartment with AC, I would still leave. So that's the latest. My future is very much undetermined.

I've had it

2005-08-22T13:19:00.000+09:00

My internet is down at the moment so I’m writing this as a Word document. I decided that I would quit today. I just can’t handle it anymore. Technically, I could probably handle it but it would mean being unhappy for the next several months. It’s really not worth it. I need to work another 40 days as it is. It’s evaluation week, too, my least favourite week. I have to correct tests and then fill out evaluation forms for 27 students. I don’t think anyone else has to do that many. I really can’t imagine a worse schedule than what I have. My legs are starting to hurt all the time because I have to stand for 4.5 hours straight. I know that’s not really that bad but I just can’t stand it. I go to work angry, leave work angry, and feign not being angry during class. It’s exhausting.

I emailed several recruiters yesterday. I’d be interested to see what they had to say. I’m sure I must have emails in my inbox. That’s just the way my life works at the moment. The internet is down because I have 2 great emails with tons of job offers for me. Probably not but I’m stuck in this ‘woe is me’ rut,

I bought an external hard drive a few weeks ago. I forget which day it was but I was sweeping the floor and put it up on the dresser. I have no real table and there’s nowhere to put one if I did so I have this cords and everything leading from the wall to what amounts to my coffee table. Anyways, I need to get these cords out of the way so I have to put stuff on these counters. Well, I ended up knocking it over and it fell onto the floor. I had downloaded several movies that I hadn’t watched as well as putting my entire music collection on it. Now it just refuses to work. Everything looks fine and it will turn on but as of now it’s just a little box of nothing that haunts me. Just like the keys to my bicycle lock. I wonder why I’ve been hanging on to those. Maybe I’m just in denial about it. I don’t know how Korea made me so unlucky. My reasoning has led to believe that my sleep deprivation leads me to make poor decisions.

I’ve done some serious irrational things, namely staying at Wonderland when I hate it so much. I’d worked out that I could quit today since it was 40 days until the 6 month mark. I re-read my contract and I guess it’s resignation before the 6 month mark that I need to repay the airfare. So if I don’t want to repay it then I need to work until the end of September and then give notice and end up working until the end of October. The thought of 40 days at Wonderland is bad enough. I’ll be damned before that becomes 70 days. Actually 80 probably. Then my contract talks about full teaching sessions and my first one was technically incomplete so if my boss wanted to be a complete asshole about it I could end up working until the end of November. I really wonder how quitting will go today. I didn’t even see my boss there this morning. I don’t think he spoke to me at all last week. Not a single word.

I ended up talking to one of the Korean teachers after work on Friday. She asked me why I wasn’t there on moving day. I explained that that was a day of my vacation and if I wanted to give it up and be taken advantage of that should’ve been my choice. Truth be told, I may have actually helped the school move had I been asked nicely rather than demanded. Anyways, she told me that I just reconfirmed their view that foreigners are all selfish bastards. She might not have added the bastard but it was definitely implied. I swear they even avoid making eye contact with me. I remember on Thursday we had gone on a field trip and our bus was back before the other one. Jupiter asked Renee why we were back earlier than the other bus and what she thought of the human body exposition that we’d gone to. I didn’t want him to ask me anything and he didn’t. Didn’t even look at me. I’m so loved at work.

Actually, my boss may have spoken to me last week. He asked if I had been receiving or paying any bills from the cable company. I told him no since I had never received a cable bill. Maybe that’s why the internet is down. Maybe I’ve been cut off. The cable company provides my internet service also. It was working 2 hours ago though. The little lights on the internet box are still flashing not that I know anything about what they may mean. I can only assume it means it’s getting or sending some kind of information. Maybe it’s just trying to.

It’s official. Not only is my internet down but my cable is out, too. Now, I’m especially cut off from everything. I have a few CDs and books, a telephone, and a few Korean radio and television stations.

I'm at a PC bang now. I can't believe I've had to come to one of these. My boss said he would look into everything about the cable bill but apparently he didn't. Any reservations I may have had about quitting have completely vanished. It turns out I didn't have any emails. Figures really. I really feel like I should've had some kind of meltdown by this point.

Anyways, let's try to add some cheerful things in here to distract me. I asked Kevin if he had been at EMart. I guess that was him and then he tried to tell me something about my face that day. I was a desperate and exhausted man at EMart like if I couldn't find sleeping pills I was going to die. I've actually only taken 3 of them total. I think the first and second days I had them and then on Saturday.

Ah Saturday, I went bowling on Saturday. It was kind of fun I guess but the only thing I kept thinking was that it could be a lot more fun with alcohol. I feel like I can only have a good time now if I'm drinking or at least high on caffeine. That bothers me. Either I will become a raging alcoholic in September or I will go stone-cold sober. I just don't know. I didn't end up doing anything on Saturday night. I sat at home and did nothing really. I listened to one CD again and again and then just one song again and again. I also read about 50 pages of Gandhi's autobiography. That was quite interesting and made me realize how little I know about India. I suppose he didn't write it for me but for his Indian or possible just Hindu brethren. Then I decided it was late enough to go to bed but could only think about my work situation and after a few hours of this I decided to reach for a little blue pills. I slept very well actually. Until like 2pm. It's even been getting a little cool in my apartment. Only 30 degrees at the moment. I actually got cold in the morning and decided I could now start sleeping with something to cover me so I went and got a blanket. Maybe it's just the blanket that I've been missing. It felt nice. I even felt positive yesterday. I'm not sure why. Drug influence probably. Had I gotten a bad sleep yet again I would've had a much worse day. I tried to call someone on Saturday to potentially enjoy myself. There was no answer. Just as well I suppose. Maybe I just needed to wallow in self-pity for an evening.

Let's talk about Thursday night for a moment. Thursday was kind of enjoyable. Went out to eat with Alex, went to a few bars, and met a group of interesting people. Alex left a bit after we met these people for reasons I will not explain. I was already pretty drunk I guess but ended up drinking a bit with a guy from Shanghai, someone from near Chechnya, and a girl from Oklahoma named Lydia. An odd trio to say the least. We stayed at this one bar until it closed and then went to a noraebang or karaoke. It was kind of fun I guess but only because I'd had the right amount to drink. I thought that maybe I should go home but I was enjoying myself and the others needed to work the next day too even earlier than I did. I don't think it was that wise a decision. I didn't get home until 6:20 and I slept until about 10. I felt awful at work the night day but I always feel awful there so nothing was new really except the feeling that if I threw up I would've felt a lot better. I deserved it really but when a job drives you to drink what can you do? I know. Quit it.

Where is my mind?

2005-08-17T00:10:00.000+09:00

I am seriously going bonkers. I was on the train today coming back home. I got off the subway and thought that I should just run home as quickly as I could. I knew that no one was following me or anything but it felt like someone could have been. I don't know.

There have been a few other things that have happened that make me suspicious, too. Maybe I really am Tyler Durden or something. They are just little things but I really don't remember doing them. One night I came home and there were books on my table. I don't remember putting them there. Today, I went into the bathroom and the windows were closed. I didn't close the windows. Did I? Why would I have closed the windows?

I really can't sleep either. I bought some sleeping pills on Sunday night at the height of my loopiness. I could've had a nervous breakdown right in the middle of E-Mart. First, I was sure that they would be closed and I would be doomed to have another sleepless night. It was open though. So I thought for sure the only reason they were open was because they weren't selling what I wanted. I'd gone to 7/11 earlier in the day, well night. I looked along the shelves and saw nothing. Then I managed to communicate to the cashier that I couldn't sleep. Of course, she had no idea why I was telling her this random bit of information. Anyways, I wandered desperately around E-Mart for much too long and then decided to go upstairs. There was a pharmacy. I bought some sleeping pills. They were only 1000 won or $1 US. Kind of disturbing how cheap they were. I also saw one of my students there. His mom tried to help me once there was nothing left for me to understand really but nice all the same. The kid made no kind of signs that he recognized me. Maybe he didn't want to converse with me in English or he wasn't one of my students or maybe a complete hallucination.

I've taken sleeping pills the past 2 nights. The first time I managed to sleep for like 9 hours. Unbelievable really. That's like a week's worth of sleep in one evening. Ok, maybe only 2-3 nights but still, and that part really isn't an exageration. I still felt groggy for a bit after I woke up. I thought maybe last night would've been better. It wasn't really. I woke up and felt awful and had to teach. Awful. Then I went off the Korean class. I hadn't been there in a week since my job and screwed me over on my breaks. Oh Tuesday's presentation was moved to Wednesday. Thanks for letting me know 20 minutes after it was supposed to have started. Why do I have to ask explicitly if the presentation is at the time indicated on the calendar? Then Thursday I had to stay to make tests. I only managed to stay for one hour today. I was so out of it. I couldn't concentrate. I didn't know what they were saying. I might've stayed but the prospect of teaching for 3 hours (thank god Columbia isn't around this month) without any kind of rest scared me so I left. I didn't get much of a break though. I didn't want to be in my sweltering apartment and I certainly didn't want to hang around the school. Came home and wasted time. I've hardly said anything to my co-workers. My perma-scowl and auditory barrier (earphones) keep them from initiating conversations with me, not that they would. I wonder what I look like to them. I swear I must look like I'm on the verge of strangling someone. I'm so anti-social. I don't even walk slowly to the paper recycle. I do my speedy airport style walks. I love walking through airports alone.

I wasn't even at work for very long today before I felt drained. It probably had to do with my sleeping pills. I feel like I am either completely inert or totally wired. I can't be in between anymore. I need to get some sleep. Real sleep. Not drug-induced or drug-facilitated at least. Maybe it's all from the massive amounts of drugs I've been doing. You know, caffeine, alcohol, and recently sleeping pills. They aren't even very big only 25mg. I kind of felt happy yesterday. I was even listening to Barenaked Ladies. Old school though. Well, I don't know early 90s. Enid. "I can get a job, I can pay the phone bill, I can cut the lawn, cut my hair, cut down my cholesterol, I can work in a mine, I can work overtime, I can do it all for you...... But I don't want to." I love that part. I even ran down the escalator so I could go up the stairs instead. I hate escalators. They aren't rides people. They aren't even wide enough to walk around people. I had energy yesterday where did it go. I took a sleeping pill the night before so it can't be the pill that killed it.

I'm really dreading tomorrow. I could barely manage 4 classes this afternoon. Tomorrow I get to have 6 in the afternoon and an extra kindy class. I really hate Wednesdays.

I feel so out of it. Where am I? Can it really be August? Have I been here this long? Can people see me? Am I a real person? What is real? I just don't know anymore. People come and read this but no one ever leaves any comments. Maybe I'm the only one who's real. That can't be right. Some Korean woman yelled Ajosshi at me today and seem surprised that I didn't understand her question or maybe just upset that she couldn't get an answer to whatever it was she said. I wonder if she really thought I'd be able to speak Korean. I guess some people can see me and assume I am a fluent Korean speaker.

I'd really like to spend more time learning Korean. It's just so hard....to find time and energy that is. I could be wowing people if it weren't for my soul-sucking job. I'm really going to quit on Monday. 40 days before my 6 month mark meaning I don't need to repay airfare. Doing a midnight run would be kind of exhilirating but I could and would never do that. Well, I suppose everyone has his or her limits. If only I could sleep or remember where I put that brain that of mine.

I don't know my feelings or my odd digression to childhood

2005-08-13T13:21:00.000+09:00

I don't know if I've used this title before or not. It's something one of kids says all the time. I don't know why. I assume it's just because he doesn't want to say anything. They all try to get their turn over with as quickly as possible. Some want to tell me all kinds of things.

I'm sitting at home right now and don't feel like doing anything. I managed to get about 7 hours of sleep last night. Well, I'll pretend it was that much. I went to bed around 4-5 hoping that extreme exhaustion would force me to sleep for a decent amount of time. I don't know if it was successful. I woke up around 11 of course. I forced myself to stay in bed. I returned to sleep and actually had a dream. It was a nice dream I guess. I was somewhere in Korea and my office, well faculty room, was in like a bar or restaurant or something. There were 2 good things about my dream. I had some Matilde. How I love Matilde. It's this Danish chocolate milk that I became obsessed with while I was in Copenhagen. I was hopelessly addicted. I swear I would have a least 2 litres a day. That's a lot of chocolate milk to have everyday. That's one thing that is different about Korea. I haven't found any food staples, aside from Ramyon that is. That's not a staple really. I have it because it's easy to make, cheap, and is okay. I'm not an adventurous food person. I tend to eat the same things at restaurants and week to week I usually eat the same things. In Denmark, I would have my rødbrød med chocolade and 500ml of Matilde. Then at lunch, I would go to Cafe Istanbul and have the number 38 and have another 500ml of Matilde. My supper had much more variety but nevertheless there would be a whole litre of Matilde for me. There were 2 kinds of Matilde. One was with a blue background and the other was red. Now usually, the 500ml was only available in blue. The red was only in 1litre. It was a little bit more money but incredibly good. In my dream I only had 1 litre of blue. I thought that I spied a red and rushed over to it but it was something else in similar packaging. Why can't I find a Korean Matilde? Their biggest chocolate milk available for sale is like 240ml. This isn't hotdog day people. I can drink more chocolate milk than that.

Let me digress to talk about hotdog day some weird part of my childhood I guess. About once a month in school (I don't know when they started or when they ended), we would have hotdog day. We had to pay $2.50 at least the day before. I want to say hotdog days were always on Wednesday and were possibly linked to early dismissal (the first Wednesday of every month, we'd get to go home at 2 instead of three so the teachers could have a staff meeting. I think that's what it was about). All these childhood school things that I don't know if are unique to me or not. So anyways, on hotdog day no one would bring lunch. They'd give us hotdogs wrapped in tin foil and another papery wrapper. If someone didn't have a hotdog, it was very sad since they were excluded and all. A few people would try to collect all the tinfoil and make a ball with it. There were always too many people going for a giant ball so they were never very big. I never tried. I don't know why. Something to do with me not having an interest in shiny ball made of aluminum foil (since I'm not sure) and never feeling popular enough to get enough foil. Everyone would try to convince you to let them have your foil. What odd creatures children are sometimes. Hotdog days we'd always get little things of chocolate milk in those little cartons.

Maybe I always had hotdog day. I have some memory though it involves orange juice. It was grade 2 with Mme Goudreau. I didn't want my orange juice so I threw it in the garbage. I must have had some though since it was open. Maybe they were in cups. I don't remember that much. So I threw it in the garbage and then later the garbage can started leaking. Mme Goudreau (Mme stands for Madame, I was in French immersion until grade nine so it was always Mme. or Monsieur (M.), I only had one Mlle (Mademoiselle) but she is now a Mme) was pretty mad about it I remember. She asked who had thrown orange juice in the garbage. I didn't say anything. I wonder why I have that memory. Maybe I feel ashamed about it or something. Maybe I need to confess my crime. What's the point in confessing something that no one else remembers? Funny. Odd funny. I don't have many other memories from grade 2. Well maybe I do. We had this carpet with all these toys that we were allowed to play with when we were done working. I was always the first one there. I was such a genius back then. I don't know what happened to me. I don't feel particularly smart now although I do feel like a lot of people are stupid. Then I remember some book about a kid with a pet skunk and it was in grade 2 I think that we had to write out whole math problems. No more just filling in answers in the little booklet. We had a big math book and would have to write 3+6 in our little cahiers. Cahier is such a good word, much better than notebook. Kie-yay say it with me now. There was a compliment rainbow too. Everyone got one. One person was picked for the week and we all had to write down a compliment for this person and then they'd all be written on a rainbow. I still have mine somewhere. My compliment to myself was that I liked my Mexican shoes. I was kind of a strange kid.

This short digression has suddenly become about my primary school. Anyways, maybe it's still relevant to my personality now. In kindergarten, I would've been a perfect Korean student. They would give us playstations. I remember being at the little sand pit, a little 3x1 foot box of sand on the table. There was a little bucket and a shovel and some other things. I didn't know what to do. I didn't want to play with sand or any of it. Maybe I was too serious back then. I preferred the structured play time. Either I was really serious and didn't know how to play or just had my favourite games and didn't do other things. I remember just wanting her to say it was time to switch stations. I probably knew what it was back then but given my lack of other kindergarten thoughts, I'll just have to wonder now. That was with Mme Speers. She was my grade 3 teacher too. That's a weird little story. She was our kindergarten teacher and after the year was over she had a nervous breakdown and took a year off and came back as the grade 3 teacher. She taught the class above us and then she had us again. Then after her year with us was over she had another nervous breakdown. We were practically all the same kids. It was stuff to do with her personal life so they say but it is a strange coincidence. So either we were just the worst class or we were like her all-time favourite class. There was a schoolyard rumour that Mme Speers had cried near the end of the year. I had just always thought until like just now that the tears must've been related to us and how she was going to miss us. Maybe they were unrelated to us or possible just a rumour.

Then let's see what else. I also remember we had to think our favourite colour. I swear to god I couldn't think of one. We had to make a whole collage full of pictures with our favourite colour and I didn't have one. So I looked over and Jonathan Loper's favourite colour was orange. I thought, ok, orange is a nice colour but I can't copy it so I picked a similar colour, red. Maybe I'm a complete sociopath. Sociopathic people would completely do that wouldn't they. That was grade 1 with Mme Roberge. Then there was this other time that I had an accident in class. I had to go to the bathroom and was about to raise my hand when Gerrett Gard asked to go to the bathroom. He was her little classroom devil and she told him no and that nobody else had better ask to go to the bathroom. Damn it! So because I was such a passive kid, I didn't even bother asking. I wonder how long I was able to hold it. Anyways, I couldn't. Mme Roberge was a little too scary to be a grade 1 teacher. She could be terrifying but really nice too. Anyways, let's see if there are any other telling stories from my childhood. Once, there was this teacher who asked us all to smile. She went around the class and asked everyone to smile. At my turn, she told me that mine was not a smile. I didn't know how to force a smile and I guess it didn't look very good. What would make a teacher criticise a smile, honestly? I don't know what year that was. Grade 2 I think. I think it was because it was P.D. class or personal development. Grade 1 I think I had religion instead. Anyways, she wasn't even the teacher she was a sub or something but she taught at the school. That's unsociopathic though, I think. Sociopaths are excellent at fake smiles and I didn't know how to make one. There's this picture of me from grade 1 and I just made a connection to it with my fake smiles. I'm sure the guy taking the picture told me to smile but I didn't. I just look a little confused and bewildered in the picture. The next year or 2 afterwards there was my fake smile. It's so obvious. There are pictures of me smiling in photos from my childhood but they are always genuine smiles, otherwise I've got this neutral expression. I just needed some reason to smile or laugh or whatever. Someone commanding me to smile wasn't enough. That's just like movies and TV really. Well everything. I rarely laugh at jokes. Maybe it's like a command to laugh in my mind. Why else to people tell jokes if not to say this is going to be funny, I want you to laugh. I always find situations to be much funnier or stories. I wonder what a trained professional would have to say about this. Does it mean that I have some kind of mental illness? Maybe it means that I'm saner than everyone.

Let's wrap this up with the end of my dream this morning. I don't know whether it's related to the first part of not. I was at some bar and I was with all these people that I had just met. For some reason, in most of my dreams I am friends with people that I have never seen before but this time I think I had just met them, there was one that was a good friend (never seen his face before in waking life, that I'm aware of, I'm sure these faces come from somewhere in reality, some guy I saw on a bench 3 years ago maybe, whatever). So, I'm at this bar and Simon and Garfunkel starts playing. The Sound of Silence. I pretend like I know the words and lip synch to it, well I think I was singing but then realized I didn't know them at all so had to lip synch. Anyways, it was quite pathetic, the lack of lyrics I knew. They laughed and I laughed a little and then I couldn't help myself from laughing and started laughing hysterically. A very nice way to end a dream. Who would've thought that Sound of Silence could make anyone laugh so much?

Sleepless, dreamless nights

2005-08-09T11:57:00.000+09:00

It feels like a very long time since I wrote anything. I'm on a two hour break from school. Well it should be like 3.5 hours but I have to go back to work for a useless presentation at 2. Let's see I had some bad wine on Friday night and didn't do all that much. Saturday, I kind of slept, I think. I laid in bed most of the day at least. The past 2 nights that seems like all sleep is. Saturday night, I ended up having a pretty good time. I went out with friend's of a girl that Alex had met a few weeks ago. It turns out that actually work close to where my old school was. These things always happen to me. They are still the closest people I know. Hopefully, I'll end up doing a few things with them. We'll see. It was basically another Saturday spent boozing. We went dancing, too which I seem to enjoy a whole lot more than I used to. I don't know why that would be. I didn't get home until after 6. I also repeated my wine+fish equation that night. The exact same meal and the same cream pea soup that I did not touch.

It was nice to meet some other teachers who didn't have great jobs either. They don't have AC either and they live far from the centre of town. At least I don't need to take a taxi to the subway stop. That is the only thing that I like about my apartment. I seriously can't imagine what it is like to have an actual table or chair. I also don't have a balcony so I need to dry my clothes in my bedroom which basically halves the amount of floor space. Speaking of which.....I'll hang those up later. So we complained about work for awhile and I basically trumped them on every level. So wait a minute, you don't have a split shift and you don't have to do phone teaching, you have a bed, a balcony, a table with chairs. I'm getting so sick of work. I was dying to leave this morning and I only had an hour and a half worth of classes. I don't think I smiled at all. Well maybe my small phony one that makes the kids think I care about what they have to say. That's not that fair really. I usually care but today I couldn't have cared less what their favourite animals were. PE class and then science is an exhausting combo. The kids are so hyped up and I had no energy at all. I let them do whatever for PE class. They take the balls and pretend they are dinosaurs eggs. Ok, go with it kids. I'm most definitely not looking forward to the rest of today. At least I only have 4 classes this afternoon instead of 6. Of course, I have this presentation and an equally mind numbing staff meeting.

I thought I would be doing a lot of yelling yesterday. I went to bed at 12:55 and just alternated between sides of the bed for about 6 hours or so. Then at the point of sheer exhaustion I manage to fall asleep and then have my alarm ring almost immediately. I managed to make it through the day ok. Well, much better than I thought I would do. It wasn't great. At least, I don't have to exert much energy in terms of classroom control by the end of the day. Well, one class is good and the other I let get away with anything because frankly, they don't understand most of what I say and I'm less than useless by that point in the day. I don't know how I made phrases like: Is this your suitcase? No, it's not. It's hers. Last for like 20 minute but somehow I did. Then I had them make pictures and a few sentences about what they did yesterday. Of course, they draw stuff like warthogs and scenes from Starcraft. I don't care. I've told the director about that class.

I know that all I seem to do is complain about work but honestly most of the week, my life consists of nothing but work. Yesterday, there was a new girl in my kindergarten class. Did I find out the typical 2 seconds before class? Nope, not yesterday. She just came into the class. Kate says this is Amy. Uh, ok. I did get a warning from Kate that Amy was coming to class on Monday last week. Of course, when they try to tell me complex things I don't usually have a clue what they are trying to say. I'd worked it out but thought that someone besides a student would tell me when someone was starting class. I mean if Kate knew last week, who knows how long the school had the opportunity to share this piece of information with me. Luckily, it's August and Erica and Karen are taking the month off. Come next month though, I will have 9 kids in that class. They were the biggest class I had with 8. I don't know how I will be able to control 9 kids. At least, it's 6 girls I guess. I couldn't even imagine the trouble I'd have with another boy.

Then I saw on the calendar that there is another speech contest in a couple weeks. I thought those things were done with a long time ago. I guess not. Then of course, it has to be on a Sunday. I wish it were at 4pm or later but of course it will be 11 or something and I need to be there 3 hours early. I really don't understand why they give us one long weekend and then take another day away from us. I was thinking about pretending I had plans that weekend. It was only put on the calendar yesterday and it was never even mentioned to me before. I mean really, if you want me to sacrifice a weekend you have to give me at least a month to mentally prepare for it. Then unlike the last speech contest I can't even enjoy the night because I have to work the next day. We'll see how the rest of the day goes as to whether I just take over the staff meeting about how we are never told anything. Depends if my day leans more towards angry frustration or slow withdrawal of my last remaining bit of energy. Anger seems to be one of the few things that motivate me these days, that and trying to screw over my boss.

I would be much more obliging if I had any kind of sleep. I was thinking of some word but I've forgotten it. Something to do with satisfying my daily needs like sleep and food and making me more complacent at work. Maybe I'll remember what word it was. I thought I would get some sleep last night since I didn't get any the night before. It didn't really feel that way of course. Oh, another thing about yesterday. I thought that it hadn't gone that badly and then realized it was only Monday. I haven't been this tired in a number of weeks and this is my first full week at work for about 3. Given my 2 half weeks of work to accomodate the fucked up vacation schedule. I can't believe it's only halfway through Tuesday, and not even that. Anyways, I didn't sleep well last night and woke up feeling more tired than when I went to sleep. I don't know how that's possible. I can understand it when you first wake up but once your mind adjusts to being awake you should feel at least kind of rested. It was even colder in my apartment than it has been in awhile. 32. I even exercised yesterday. I can't even sleep on the weekends. I came home at 6am pretty skunky drunk. At least the alcohol made my sleep continuous but I still woke up around 11. Then I pretended to sleep for several hours. Maybe I've just to reconcile the fact that my brain will never sleep again. I can lay there and do a pretty good impression of someone sleeping in terms of breathing and what not but I'm still aware of all the noise, heat, and light. I can't believe that they'd move me into an apartment with no barriers to light (bought some curtains) or heat(I even had to buy my own garbage can), and expect me to be satisfied. Plus this week is test week and evaluations and phone teaching. Something is bound to happen. If you hear of a triple homicide or anything in Daegu next week, yes, that was probably me.

Maybe I will make some protest art and slogans to hand at my workstation. Heaven knows, I won't be able to sleep. Which reminds of some lyrics that seem to really be applicable to my life at the moment.

Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now
-The Smiths

I was happy in the haze of a drunken hour
But heaven knows I’m miserable now

I was looking for a job, and then I found a job
And heaven knows I’m miserable now

In my life
Why do I give valuable time
To people who don’t care if I live or die ?

Two lovers entwined pass me by
And heaven knows I’m miserable now

I was looking for a job, and then I found a job
And heaven knows I’m miserable now

In my life
Oh, why do I give valuable time
To people who don’t care if I live or die ?

What she asked of me at the end of the day
Caligula would have blushed[not so much this part]

Oh, you’ve been in the house too long she said
And I (naturally) fled

In my life
Why do I smile
At people who I’d much rather kick in the eye ?

I was happy in the haze of a drunken hour
But heaven knows I’m miserable now

Oh, you’ve been in the house too long she said
And I (naturally) fled

In my life
Oh, why do I give valuable time
----------

Not really anything insightful or interesting. What can I say? My brain has turned to mush. I'm in a walking coma.

Fish+Wine=Yummy

2005-08-05T00:41:00.000+09:00

Let's do a backward post today.

It's almost 1am. I am home.
I bought a bottle of water for 1000 won. It is normally only 800 but the lady looked so peaceful asleep so I just put 1000won on the register. Maybe that was the wrong thing to do and she will be confused but ethically I think it's okay.
Alex and I tried to find Pub Morrison but couldn't. I don't either of us wanted to go really. I don't think it was a wine serving place. This is too backwards really.
Let's just do days. Today I actually had a hard time waking up. It was so nice to dream. I had a dream I was running through trees. Not for long though. I was in a drunken race with Renee and Gareth. It's strange I should dream about the foreign teachers at my school. Not that Gareth was even there very long. It seems strange to have dreams about someone I only knew for 2-3 days over 4 months ago. I wonder why Matt wasn't there. For some reason my idea of a perfect group is 2 guys and 1 girl. I'm not sure why but if I were on a desert island I would want 1 guy there and 1 girl. It's wouldn't even be sexual with the girl. Maybe Matt wasn't there to remove the hint of sexuality or the couplehood. You can't be friends with a couple I've decided. I'm looking forward to them leaving actually. I hope they are replaced with single people who don't abstain from alcohol. I bet they hire another couple. It's smart for the school really. Unless they get the singles to share accommodation. That's a boring digression. I'm not going to take it. Right, Thursday. I had a banana before work. I really shouldn't skip breakfast. It's not intentional. I would eat if I had time or steady source of bananas. They are the only fruit I eat but I tend not to buy them just because they seem expensive and they sell too many and I can't eat them fast enough. I actually have rotting bananas in my freezer. I should do something about them. I bought like a dozen bananas one night. The next morning I had one and it was very mushy. Then the next time I had one, I dropped one and it broke open on the floor and looked mashed. It was a little gross really to have this liquid banana on the floor. I think it was the heat or the bananas I bought were too ripe, overripe, I don't know. I probably shouldn't buy bananas in the dark. Anyways, I thought I'd stick them in the freezer to keep them fresh or the same level of decay at least. Next time I take out the trash I will add them. I really can't throw food in the garbage. I don't make enough garbage so it really only leads to me becoming a breeder of quality maggots and flies. I forgot what it was that they like more than rotting bananas but there was something they just love. I really can get sidetracked easily. Work actually went fine today. My classes haven't been that bad the last 2 days aside from maybe one class. I even got out of work early today. 6:30. Earliest release ever. So I'm on parole for the next 10 hours and I've already enjoyed 6.5 hours of it. It really wasn't bad today at all and I think I know why. I just need to eat and sleep properly. It's amazing what an adequate amount of sleep and food can do. It really was stupid to not eat for most of the day. I used to eat waffles from the waffle family outside of the school but they became unreliable. They opened too late in the afternoon and from 3:30-8 I can't leave the building. I'm really amazed I haven't collapsed at work. The sleep problem can't be helped much unless I get demanding but I've pushed the bounds too much recently. Food wise though I could be doing a lot better. Back to the today. After work I came home and then went downtown to get some food.

We went to eat at a French restaurant called Dijon. Alex was supposed to meet me at Starbucks but due to some lack of coordination he was only able to handle one invitee at a time. The other one being one of his workmates. I've been alternating between workmate and co-worker. I don't know. I don't even work with any Non-North American speakers of English. Nor do I hang out with any. Odd. Anyways, usually Alex is always waiting outside of Starbucks because of my lengthy trip to the centre. It's an 18 minute subway ride plus however long I have to wait for the train. Compared to his 5 minute cabride or less maybe, it takes me ages. Anyways, I was a little perplexed by it but was proud to have beaten him. I had an iced cafe mocha while I waited. It was nice really. I met a university prof of management. Dr, Kim. Dr. Jin-Han Kim. He seemed quite nice really. First he asked me if I was American or Canadian and I thought 'God, not one of these conversations.' It wasn't bad though. He actually gave me a business card and told me if I was interested in working at the university to give him a call. I'm sure a university would be a much better listing on a resume. Member of the faculty of Taegu University sounds much better than Monkey Teacher at Wonderland hagwon. Anyways, maybe I should send him my resume see what happens. Of course, I don't know how long I want to spend in Korea and being only 5 years older than my youngest students would be a little strange. Not that it isn't strange that I teach people born in 1999 probably. Those people shouldn't be able to talk yet. Even then people from 1994 bother me. I have memories from 1994, shouldn't you just be learning how to walk, maybe learning to read at most. I feel old sometimes. Then in Korean class I felt young. In ten years, I will still only be 33 which doesn't seem that old. Plus some guy I thought was like 24 turned out to be 28. Anyways, I felt like a spring chicken kind of. Anyways, that was my run in with Dr. Kim at Starbucks. He first had Starbucks at the airport in Vancouver. A little fact he felt like he needed to share so I will pass that on. Little facts like that I find interesting. I don't know when I first had anything from Starbucks. It must have been hot chocolate though since that used to be all I ever ordered at coffee shops except when I went in Korea it was hot so I needed something cool and the iced cafe mocha seemed the most chocolatey.

I really am a rambler. I wonder why that is. Nate, you can link to him, said he thought he would ramble on like this but his ADD got in the way. He doesn't actually have ADD though. Maybe I just like reliving little pieces of my life. I bet my first Starbucks was in Florida. Those Blakeley's like Starbucks or possibly it was in Seattle when we went to visit my uncle because Starbucks is a Seattle thing. Otherwise my parents wouldn't have gone. They aren't big into coffee and we wouldn't go there on vacation because my sisters and I don't drink coffee. Maybe my sisters drink coffee now. I haven't been around them in them much in the past 5 years or so and I don't talk to them on the phone when I'm away. Maybe once in 6 months or something. I like being prodigal really. I think I'm much more interesting as a mystery. "Oh you have a brother, what's he like?" is better than "Oh nice to meet you, I find you a bit dull." I'm quite aloof with strangers. So eventually, Alex did come and we went to the restaurant. I was actually involved in the conversation as opposed to my active listening and occasional comment that is usually more like a unrespondable remark. I'm a horrible conversationalist really. I had salmon and wine. My salmon was supposedly Norwegian. I still really like Scandinavia. Even though I was only in Norway for 6 hours or something I still feel tied to the region. Mostly because I was in Denmark for 10 months. My mind is actively trying to go off into random tangents. Is that a sign that my brain is processing things better or worse? I guess a lack of focus probably shows a lack of a problem. Anyways, after my yummy fish and wine I came home feeling satisfied. I even got to take the subway back since it wasn't that late. I also feel like I don't pay enough for my meal. Maybe I did but when 2 people refuse to talk the extra money I will gladly take it. I have spent so much money in the past month and I don't even know where it all went. I suppose I don't mind. It hasn't really kept me in my saving $1000 a month but I could've spent a lot more on my vacation. But I haven't made that much really. I think my first month was 1.2 and then 1.5 and 1.5. I get paid again in less than a week. A full amount this time so I can spend $700 a month. I make 1.9 but in my head I always think 1.7. As long as I don't spend more than what I make I should be fine. I really think I've spend like over $1000 this month. No idea how. Well some ideas. I guess that's enough for today. Unless I want to mention Jessy who was my only problem at work today. It really only takes one or 2 bad students to ruin your day. Let's not talk about Jessy. I will only say that I've never imagine anyone being a disappointment to their parents but if he were my kid, I just don't know.

Yesterday was my first day back at work since my little forewarned disappearing act. It was a bit awkward but no kind of harsh accusations. It wasn't even until my break that it was brought up. The first question my boss asked was how my vacation was. It's a bit awkward between us. I'm just going to pretend nothing happened. Amy had a calm talk with me. I guess I created a bit of a divide somehow. I still don't know how. I guess some of the teachers talked about me, asking where I was. Is Shawn teacher not a Wonderland teacher in his heart? Is he not part of the Wonderland family? I really wish they'd avoid using phrases like this. Amy even mentioned something about understanding how teachers wanted to have personal lives but on special days I need to be part of the Wonderland family. I could've argued about it but she brought it up nicely and I was happy to just put it to rest. The next special day I will be there but not if it's one of my vacation days or has no educational element. I don't need to be part of the Wonderland family. Some of the Korean teachers I think might be a bit hostile towards me but in true Korean fashion they would never reveal this to me directly. I'm fine with that. I'm the office rebel now that nobody cares for all that much. I do feel more competent as a teacher all of the sudden. I'm not sure why that is. Maybe it's all the sleep and food. Anyways, I wasn't reprimanded in any way for skipping out on what they told me were my job responsibilities. I think Amy was more upset that I didn't get permission from her and skipped her in the totem pole. She wouldn't have given me permission plus I knew she didn't want to be there either. She had to cancel a family trip to move. I can't think of anything else worth mentioning right now. Maybe at some later point. There was something that happened a couple weekends ago that I could write about but I won't. You'll have to check out:

http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=alexsoccerboy

and read the July 24th entry. It's much more lucid than anything I could write. What a wild and crazy night. If there's a request I could write about it but it isn't all that exciting. Didn't go much past than what was mentioned. You will learn my actual name though. It's strange how they alternate between my real name and my 'stage' name. Usually it's the stage name but every so often they remind me that I have this other name I went by for 22 years. Let's see if 2 nights of decent sleep will make work any better. I will definitely have a banana tomorrow morning.

The rest of my weekend

2005-08-02T02:21:00.000+09:00

I woke up in Pohang on Sunday, I guess it was. I didn't stick around very long. I went to the beach to take a picture or two and then hopped on a bus back to the bus terminal. Good old 105. It seemed so much longer the night before. Of course, I rode it too long because I didn't know when to get off. It also went to all these suburbs the night before. I think it might have gone back to the bus station. How many little statues of liberty could there be on buildings. Anyways, I caught a bus to Yeongdok. I guess it's only known for crabs. I didn't stay there very long either. Maybe an hour or two. I planned to spend the night. I went to a motel. 50,000 won. For a Sunday night in this town. Then I walked to try to find the motel that this Moon Handbook travelguide mentioned was cheaper. I always want to put 2 n's in mentioned. I'm sure it's to do with French. I'm going to work on not doing it. Anyways, I walked. I bought a Pepsi in complete silence. I picked it out of the fridge, the woman looked like she didn't know what to do. I pulled out a 1000 bill. She smiled and took it and I waved goodbye. I followed some 20 something or teenage Koreans for a few blocks. I didn't feel like walking past them. Then I saw this little path. I followed it. I wound up at some Buddhist temple. I sat there on the steps for about an hour. I thought about a few things. There was dead bee there and some ants. I saw two ants fight over a piece of something. They dropped it and then wrestled and threw each other off the step and fell a few feet. Something to be learned from that...maybe. Then I looked at a tree. It had a lot of leaves and it made me think of all the life that must be in that tree. All the birds that have sat in it, the ants that crawled on it now, and then I thought about how boring it must be to be a tree. I tried to think about what to do but couldn't really. I did for a little bit but drew no conclusions as I usually never do. Then some woman came to the temple well not the temple but the little building beside it. I thought maybe I should become a Buddhist or something. I'm not a very spiritual person though and so it would all be pretend really. I thought maybe I could go inside and meditate/think about my problems. Anyways, later the woman came out with another woman and they said goodbye to each other. Then I heard a TV and thought about how meaningless everything was. I've thought it lots of times before so it was nothing new. I just always think about how I didn't exist for billions of years and how one day I wouldn't exist anymore. I really wish I believed in some kind of afterlife but it's just impossible for me.

I think it's because I believe in evolution so I always think, at what point did humans become so special. Was it at cro-magnan man, homo habilis? So really, what I'm saying is that if there is a heaven for humans then there must be a heaven for other apes, and crabs, and butterflies, and amoebae maybe. So that doesn't seem very realistic to me. Aside from all the physical laws. How do people in heaven get energy to live? You wouldn't think they'd have to eat but they must. So if there aren't an infinite amount of heavens then there must only be one and if there's just one and it's full of amoebae and squid and what not and they all still need to eat than how is it different from Earth. So anyways, maybe it would be better if I weren't so logical and could just believe certain things. I just never could. I always found it must easier to believe in the Easter Bunny or Santa Claus than Jesus, Angels, or God. At least the Tooth Fairy did something for a reason. I guess my childhood was more full of that kind of propaganda rather than religious stuff. My parents would read us the story of Jesus and what not at Christmas. It just seemed like another story to me. I remember hearing something about Bethlehem on the news and told my mom how there was actually a city called Bethlehem. She told me that it was the same one as in the story. Then I asked if the people there had heard it. I must have never believed in Jesus really. I don't even think it was until I was like 10 that I realized it was supposed to based from a true story. I would put true in quotations but who am I to tell you what is true. Anyways, where did this come from? Right, my lack of faith in anything. Well, I would have had to pretend to be faithful and the TV just made me realise that this temple was just another place. I went back to the station and ended up going to Pyeonghae. Ijust randomly decided as I do many other things. Actually, I looked at the map in the Moon Handbook and saw Hupo. It wasn't in the index so I thought maybe I should go there. Then I found something else that mentioned a pavilion outside of Pyeonghae with spectacular views of the sea and sunset over the mountains. That sounded like a good place for self reflection. That was the only time I had to wait for a bus. They've always just been there after I bought my ticket. The ride to Pyeonghae really wasn't very far but it took the longest time. Traffic was slow and it took 2 hours or so to get there. I think it was only 50km away. It was a nice drive though. I got to watch the sea pretty much the whole time alternating between rocks and sand. The water looked nice.

I arrived in Pyeonghae. Walked around a bit trying to find a motel. Found one but no one was there except a family who probably wondered why I was loitering outside the front waiting for someone. I walked to the next one. The same thing happened. The desk was on the 2nd floor. I went up but no one was there. I went back down and someone was there though. I ended up paying 50,000 won for this little motel. It didn't even have air conditioning. Luckily it wasn't as hot as in Daegu so I managed to sleep alright. After dropping off my bag I went to a bakery and bought some bread and cookies. She told me the price and I actually understood. Cheon o baek un. Maybe she was waygooking it for me. Anyways, then I walked to this old looking temple that I saw before looking for the motel thinking that possibly it was the pavilion. It was locked and I decided to follow the path that looked like it led behind it. Some man's house was there and he asked me 'Odi-e kayo?' Wow, more Korean I actually understand. Of course, I didn't know the answer and just kind of shrugged. He said something and made some kind of motion like there was nothing to see. I'm sure I was trespassing. Anyways, I felt pretty good about my virtually non-existent Korean skills. Then I decided to walk along the highway since the pavilion was supposedly a few Km outside of the 'farming community.' I really didn't think that was the pavilion. Well, I walked along the highway. I don't know how far I went. I didn't even know the name of the pavilion. I saw it on some sign as we were driving. My shorts also kept falling down. Well not down but sat very low on my hips due to my excess of change in one pocket and my camera in the other. I kept trying to fashion some kind of primitive belt out of the blades of grass. Really, I was trying to tie it around two of the belt loops. None of them worked though and I just held them up. I found some sign, well two actually. One said something, I still don't know what was 2.5km away. Then I went to the other one. Don't know why. It sounded like what I remembered reading. I walked to this little community of houses and saw some temple or pharmacy sign. It said it was 700m away. I don't think I walked 700m before the trail ended and there was a little house. There were big dogs barking at me too. I didn't know what I was doing plus it was getting dark. I turned around and walked backed to Pyeonghae. I got back and didn't want to go to a Korean restaurant that didn't have pictures. I bought some ramyon and ate it dry in a bag while watching CNN. Then bed and I woke up the next day and it was raining. I didn't feel the need to go to this pavilion in the rain so I hopped on the bus back to Daegu. Bought my ticket as the bus was leaving. I never have to wait for the bus. There must have been some crazy mixup in Yeongdok. Don't they know the bus runs based on my movements.

I tried to think on the way back on the bus. It was okay at first while they were showing a Korean movie. That was much easier to tune out than Martin Lawrence. Why do Koreans want to watch Black Knight in the first place? So that made it difficult. I didn't think much and will probably delay that until next time to talk about. I was really just announcing that I was changing my profile pic. The old one is from around last Halloween. Taken in Charleston, South Carolina of all places on one of my many many escapes from Texas trips. It was a decent picture. I don't think it looks much like me though. Not now at least. This new one though just captures my attitude so much more. Humourless, a little annoyed maybe. It's from my trip to Woobang Towerland. A friend of a friend who has never met me said I looked kind of hot in a serial killer kind of way. I don't know what that is supposed to mean really, but I'll take it.

Well, I've uploaded some photos but they are out of order and I'm too lazy to fix it.

Big green hill while walking the highway in Pyeonghae

I really like the colour green sometimes. Much more brilliant in real life. I always think it's funny how pictures can be so deceptive. Some just really can't capture anything and other times it captures everything and more. Seriously, I had some pictures of Bucharest that made it look amazing but it really wasn't all that nice.

Field we passed on the bus back to Daegu.

Bukbu Beach in Pohang complete with steel mill and ferry terminal

Big spider I saw on the way to the pavilion that I never made it to.

Better view of Bukbu beach.

Can't write what I intend to. Rambling interferes.

2005-07-31T00:19:00.000+09:00

This post will probably be very long because I'm trying to sort some things out and the beach full of people despite the midnight hour really wasn't conducive. Nor is this PC bang but at least I should stay more focused. Most of this will involve me trying to decide what I should do about my job and the period up to next March probably. Just be warned that it will probably be depressing or boring.

I'm in Pohang right now. I don't know how I feel about a lot of things. I don't know what to do about anything.

It's my vacation right now. It really doesn't feel like it though. I thought vacations were about relaxing, trying to enjoy yourself, basically escaping work. I'm finding it very hard to not think about work. My self-prescribed method of pretending I had no job didn't really work. I have no idea what I'm going to do. My vacation started on Wednesday. I told my boss I would go help for 2 hours with the move. Then my bike was stolen and I just became very selfish. I had every intention of going until I woke up late with a small headache. It really made me not want to go. I thought about it for several minutes and then decided to say 'screw that' basically. This stolen bike thing really got to me. Plus I didn't feel like having a big discussion as I left after 2 hours or however long I would've stayed. So now, I just get to stress about what is going to happen when work starts again on Wednesday. I'm sure I've completely alienated myself from everyone. I can just imagine going to work with a sea of glares directed at me. Actually, I can't since I don't really know what the school looks like. I know where it is and poked my head in (well tried to) as some people were doing some constuction work on it. I'm sure there will be some discussion maybe about everything. My phone teaching, the fight, lack of control in the classroom, general attitude, the whole gamut. August will be my 5th month. I really wish I didn't have to give 40 days notice. That's way to long to work in an uncomfortable environment. Let's do some math let's say 6 weeks and 5x6 is 30. 30 work days. Yeah, way too long. I really thought I could go until the end of Semptember for a full 6 months. I really don't know though. Maybe the new office will change things. My vacation so far hasn't. I thought I could have a little break and come back feeling refreshed and invigourated. I don't imagine that happening in the next 3 days.

Anyways, on Wednesday, I ended up spending most of the day on my bed. I was waiting for Alex to tell me he was ready to leave and he waited for basically the same thing and we ended up leaving a lot later than either of us had planned. He called me but in my paranoia about work I didn't answer the phone. In any case, I'll take responsibility for the confusion. I really just wanted to get the hell out of Daegu. I hate being in an apartment provided for by my employer. It really just makes it feel like I can never escape my job. Never. I even had thoughts of him coming to my door. I locked my door just in case though he probably has a key. I really don't like feeling like I'm in a slave-master relationship. This little rebellion of mine makes me feel like I'm just in for a bit of punishment. It didn't really empower me like it should've. I'm sure it has to do with the bike. You really can't stay in power long when you become a victim of theft 30 seconds later. Empowered to helpless in half a minute. At any rate finally I did leave my apartment. Got to Alex's place. I took a taxi there. The subway really is faster I think or much better value at least. The taxi seemed no faster. Then we went to the bank. I couldn't get my card to work at one of the machines. I'm used to having only one kind of Daegu Bank screen. Anyways, made me feel more powerless. Got on the train and headed for Busan. We got on the subway and left one station only to find we didn't pay the correct fare. We jumped the turnstyles. Oh, in Busan too, I lost my train ticket and couldn't leave the station. Actually, I could and some guard just let me through. i know I should've had the ticket. I'm the guard just wanted to avoid using English. Sometimes, it's good to be a foreigner. So more feelings of powerlessness. We also got off at the wrong station and walked to the next one. We found the place listed in the Lonely Planet. It was a love motel and there were Vegas style call girl cards outside the door. The 2 of us went in and probably shocked the staff. First of all, we weren't Korean, second we were 2 guys, and third, we wanted the room to sleep. So we got up to the room. There's a double bed and a dresser and table. I shared a bed with another guy but for some reason it didn't feel the least bit weird unlike every other time I've done it. I guess when you deal with odd things happening all day it's hard for anything to really be that weird again. We walked around forever trying to find a decent restaurant in this district that's basically red light but not explicitly so. We found some place. I picked it just because it was Since 1982 and the 2 of us were from that year also. We looked at the menu. I don't know Korean foods really. I just asked for chicken. I got the same thing I had with the middle aged Korean man and his family. It wasn't too bad. I can always eat chicken, well maybe not always. We got quite a few stares in that place. You'd think with Busan being a bigger city than Daegu that they'd be more used to foreigners. I didn't get that impression at all.

Next day we decided to change places. We went over to Gwangalli beach (I think that's the name). We decided to stay at Hotel Hermes. The classiest place on the strip of beach probably. It was quite nice aside from a few things that had little to do with the hotel. Well, I guess room service was problematic and it may or may not have led to Alex's leg scabies. 2 beds in this place. Well first we asked for the price and the 2 at the desk acted like it was the craziest question they'd ever been asked. At first we got 2 rooms but then they figured out that by 2 beds we meant the same room with 2 beds not 2 beds in 2 separate rooms. Anyways, that day seemed rather fine. We went swimming. One guy saw us and ran to pose with us. Again, because we don't look all that Asian. He was in his 20s too. How could you be so fascinated by us? Alex wonders if the photos will lead to some embellished stories. Not hard to embellish, I saw these 2 guys walk down the beach. That photo really would require embellishment, I think. I would find it to be very dull. By night though, it was a little depressing. We tried to find some place to eat. Nowhere looked good. They all looked like the standard Korean restaurants. Some drunk wanted money and had to pushed away so he would finally leave. We ate at some place and continued to get drunk really. Both of us kind of thought that with most of Korea being on vacation these 2 weeks that it would be really easy to meet people. We met no one. We bought some whisky and in my drunken haze bananas were what I wanted. Well more than a haze really. We went back to the room and tried to order a pizza. This was one of the more memorable moments. I asked to order a pizza, well I asked for a pepperoni pizza because I figured it would be easy even if it wasn't on the menu. Nope, only Oriental pizza. What about the pizzas on the room service menu? Well, if we wanted those we had to go to the 19th floor. Though they can be made on the 19th floor they have some kind of tracking device that will not let them go down stairs or elevators. Ok, what's on the Oriental pizza? We never got an answer to this one. All I know is no roadhouse pizza, and no New Orleans pizza. Anyways, time passes as I replay all the ways to make sure I understand that the only pizza we can get from room service is the Oriental pizza with mystery toppings that is not on the menu and none of those on the menu can be ordered. So after this, I talk to a different woman. She says we can have something similar to pepperoni pizza. Great. 5 minutes later there is a telephone call. No, we can't have that pizza. What about the oriental pizza? That somehow disappeared as an option altogether as did the pizzas on the 19th floor. We have a menu so I ask what there is left to order that we can have. Ham sandwich or ham and cheese. I'm really amazed we got something resembling ham and cheese sandwiches. This probably isn't even interesting but due to our rather dull weekend it was very amusing and they were 7000 won. Things that make you go hmmmm...... (funny to one lone soul....possibly).

Next day we got up pretty late. Well not really. I woke up at seven due to my new found ability to sleep only after heavy intoxication. I tried so hard to fall back asleep but 4-5 hours of drunken sleep regardless of bed comfort, temperature, or noise (all of which were ideal) was all I would get. So 4 hours later I went downstairs and got a massage. That was thoroughly bizarre and basically involved me naked on a table in the corner of a big room with people going in and out. Sometimes a towel covered me and sometimes it didn't. At one point a man wearing only tiny shorts was sitting on the back of my legs while I was covered by just the smallest of towels and he was trying to pop my back at every single vertebra. I think only one of them popped and I'm not even sure that it did. I think he must've been frustrated and I don't know if the fact that he couldn't make it pop is good or bad. Anyways, that was weird but I felt relaxed afterward though maybe somewhat violated.

Anyways, then we went to Haeundae Beach. The most famous beach in all of Korea which last weekend hosted 800,000 people. That's not a typo 0.8 million. At least, according to my source who I tend to trust. It was rainy the whole weekend so the beach wasn't really the best place to go. We got some stupid straw cowboy hats and went to the casino. We actually both ended up winning. I doubled my 10,000 on video poker and then won maybe 30 or 40,000 won on blackjack. Alex was ahead by 10,000 only when we left. Pretty good though. Then we went to eat and some Thai place. How the bill ended up being 77,000 between us both I'll never understand. The chicken was too spicy hence my note about usually, almost always really. I ate about half of it. Anyways, then we went back to the casino where Alex proceeded to lose 50,000. I was up and felt pretty good and decided to bet 25,000 on one hand. The minimum was 10,000 and I think I played 20,000 maybe twice. Anyways, so I knew that would be my last hand no matter what. My first card was a jack and I felt pretty good about it. And then the second one came. An ace. Wow! I got a blackjack. Then the dealer had an ace and then I completely confused as all the players at the table turned to me to ask me what I wanted to do. I didn't know what was going on. It was all about insurance and I knew I didn't want any so I shook my head but then they thought that I wanted to stay on 21 or something and that I hadn't answered what they asked me. Anyways, it was all rather confusing but I ended up winning 110,000. A small amount really but exciting none the less. Enough to pay for our second night at the Hermes. On the way back we almost got in an accident and then we walked up and down the beach several times feeling lonely. My joy at winning was very short-lived actually. I think I'm happier about it now than I was then though I was just now more depressed than I was last night, if that makes any sense. Probably not.

So anyways, we were quite down on Korea since aside from the beach and casino, Busan seemed exactly the same as Daegu. The people were the same too really. We decided to go to the 19th floor to see if we could get pizza there. We could and it was awful. Well really not worth the extra long wait or all the confusion from the day before. We also had some Guinness which was quite good but quite expensive. At least Alex got a glass for it. We also had to sit next to some drunk man and his angry wife. It was really quite strange that we got more negative/unwanted attention in Busan and less of the attention we wanted. We got a lot more stares for some reason and some kid on the subway just today made some motion to his friend about how hairy my legs were. I totally called him on and looked him straight in the eye and rubbed my hairy legs while making ooh and aah faces. I don't think it had the desire effect though as he just continued though I had done nothing. Anyways, I wasn't sad to leave Busan today. They have this noise at the station though that sounded like a noise in some tapes I have to play at school. It made me so ill at ease. I really don't know what to do about work.

I got home. It turns out that I had left my lights on the whole time. I don't know why I would've had the lights on when I left at 4 on Wednesday. I was a bit suspicious that someone had been to my apartment. Maybe I did leave them on. Anyways, my room was as hot as ever. I tried to decide what I should do with the rest of my holiday that I now had to spend alone. I thought maybe I would go to Seoul and try to have some fun. Trying to have fun though doesn't seem to work though. It's all about the expectations. Had we assumed we'd have rather dull experiences in Busan it would've been fine. Had we expected it to really be no different from Daegu, it would've been fine. Instead we come back feeling a little defeated at our lack of success. I didn't even get to have a decent night's sleep. The next morning might have been fine except that some Creed song blared from across the beach up to our 9th story window. God was it loud. Why do you need to test speakers at 9am? How loud can we really get these speakers? Anyways, I decided that I wasn't going to stay in Daegu for another few days and I wasn't going to go to Seoul since I doubted I would have much fun. I decided I would go to Donghae and try to go to a remote a town as possible and decide when to quit my job or possibly to just keep it for the sake of convenience. It's all about timing really. Maybe I will just save it for tomorrow night since I probably won't be doing anything. This is what I do when I travel by myself. Spend the day looking around, after nightfall I eat, and then I go to an internet cafe until I think it's late enough to go to bed.

I went to 3 stations and finally got to the one selling tickets to Donghae. They were all sold out so I just picked some other city on the coast. I could go there but I'd need to transfer in Pohang which is why I'm here. I actually met a nice woman on the bus. We had a strange little conversation full of broken English and broken Korean. I wonder if we both took the same things from the conversation. Unlikely. Anyways, she told me to go to Bukbu beach and that's where I am. They were having some kind of music festival and fireworks. Anyways, the music wasn't good and I missed the fireworks mostly while looking for food on the otherside of tall buildings that separated me from the sea. I think Bukbu beach is actually the best beach I've been to in Korea. I'm a fan on the finer sand is what it comes down to really. The bridge at Gwangalli beach really made it feel industrial but I would have to say that it is nothing compared to the steel mill across the little bay. It looks kind of nice at night in that spooky kind of futuristic way. I remember I had a dream once about living in refinery. It's something about those tiny columns covered in lights. It makes me think of some dirty polluted castle. I really just wanted to walk along the beach alone with my thoughts. It really is amazing though how sometimes more people can just make you feel much more alone. The beach is too crowded so I will probably leave tomorrow and go to the city that the woman told me was only known for lobsters. It's not even mentioned in the Lonely Planet(I have issues with this being like the unofficial guide of everyplace but that's another story) aside from being on the map. We'll see how that turns out.

I'm surprised the direction that this entry took. I thought it would be a lot whinier than it ended up being. Maybe I should just stick to descriptive things about the past rather than contemplate about the future or maybe I'm just delaying having to come a decision about what to do. Maybe I will just change the opening or delete it rather. I don't know why I write like this. It's much too stream of consciousness. I don't know whether I like people knowing how I think. It's really rather indecisive isn't it. I don't really weigh pros and cons either. I try too but basically I just think about something for a bit and then choose something impulsively really because I'm tired of thinking about it. I guess I'll leave it up. It's just easier. The title I might change, the current title is :This will likely be long. Vacation/Work stuff again. I'm a bit proud of my titles. They are usually good. More interesting than the content at any rate.

Let's see 2 more things. So the woman on the bus made me realize that it's really not that I dislike Koreans at all. I actually find them nice on an individual level most of the time. It just really doesn't make me feel any less alienated from their society. Of course, right after they got off I couldn't find my ticket and had to pay the fare again (only 6000 but still) and of course within 2 seconds of looking off the bus I find it. That kind of made me doubt my newfound optimism of Korean people. He wasn't very nice to me, as if he knew the whole time that I didn't have a ticket and had snuck aboard or something. I really wanted to show him that I did have a ticket and my desperate searching hadn't all been an act. Anyways, I went to a restaurant tonight and the chef and waitress were really quite nice so maybe these won't be a couple days spent wallowing in self-pity and serious self reflection. I'd think I'd better stick to these lowered expectations though so when I came in here to write I was feeling quite depressed about everything. Maybe I just needed to tell Cal-Mo-Dee how I was feeling or whoever you are if you are reading this. Now I just need to think of a different title and go to bed.

2005-07-27T14:52:00.000+09:00

So here's a picture I took back in mid-February I think. It makes me feel very artisic. I went horseback riding on the island of Chiloe in Chile at dawn along the beach. That sounds so much cooler now. Pictures really spice things up I think. It's to help me realize that my vacation has started.

A Canadian Dokdo

2005-07-27T13:43:00.000+09:00

Territorial disputes are just stupid. Especially when the land in question is barren and inhospitable to life. Korea and Japan are fighting over 2 rocks in the middle of the Sea of Japan or the East Sea as Korea calls it. They are worthless rocks. There's really nothing you could even do with them except do a victory dance on them or something. It's thoroughly ridiculous.

The Canadian land dispute is even more ridiculous. Canada and Denmark are locked in a battle over a tiny rocky barren little island in the Arctic. You would really think that two countries as rational as Canada and Denmark would realize what a silly little battle it was especially since the two countries don't have any bad history (that I'm aware of at least). I guess both Canada and Greenland need yet another barren, frozen piece of rock. Both countries have more than they know what to do with. It's all about potential I guess. Here's an article about it that I read today:

Hans Island

Why can't it just become a dual protectorate or something? I think there's some Caribbean Island that is owned by the Netherlands (St. Maartan's) and France (St. Martin). At least a Caribbean island is something worth fighting over. They should really just do that and let it become some symbol of Canada-Denmark relations or the unity of the Inuit people rather than a symbol of greed and stupidity. At least it's not as heated as Dokdo.

Also, despite being so angry yesterday, I'm feeling okay about everything today. I ordered a pizza and took it downtown and ate it outside of Starbucks with Alex. Then we went out and had several pitchers of beer. At least 3. I told my boss I would actually go help out with the move today but only for a couple hours. Anyways, I didn't feel like going. It's my first day of vacation, I'm not obligated to go. My phone rang around 10:15 today. I wonder who it could've been. I bet Jupiter got Amy to call me. I would've been more pleasant with her. The VP should at least be at the school setting things up. It really isn't fair to the other teachers that I didn't go but ultimately, it was unfair of Jupiter to demand everyone go. That's an injustice committed by Jupiter not me. If they don't mind being taken advantage of that's fine. I really wonder what will happen when I go back to work on Wednesday. I wonder where the new little lecture room will be. I'm sure I'll get something about my attitude, not being a team player, etc. I couldn't care less really. I'm sure I've alienated myself from the other teachers but I doubt it would really make my work environment much less pleasant. I posted something online at Dave's. I feel totally vindicated. I don't feel the least bit bad about what I did. I don't even mind if I'm fired over the whole thing. I can go over to that Prisoner of Wonderland site. Fired for not going to work on a vacation day that is guaranteed to me under my contract. That's just about ridiculous enough to happen actually. I will probably totally get the staredown from the other teachers and everyone. I've never felt more like a rebel. I actually hope they do lecture me and then I can just tell them how ridiculous the whole thing is. It would probably scare them if they realized they couldn't control me. I really can't imagine myself being the loose canon at work but I really think I must be now. That's completely unexpected. Korea will definitely change me more than Denmark or the US ever did.

I am so fucking mad!

2005-07-26T20:28:00.000+09:00

Someone fucking stole my bike today. My shitty $80 bike. Why would some go through the fucking trouble to steal such a shitty bike? I was paranoid that someone might steal it just because that's something that would probably happen to me. No worries, I thought. Who would steal the cheapest fucking bike at Lespo? Aren't there any fucking better bikes you could nab? Mine looked absolutely no different from any of the other bikes except that maybe it was a bit shinier. I used my shitty lock from Lespo because I didn't figure anyone would fucking steal my piece of shit bike. Really, why should the lock be worth like 20% of the value of the bike. I cannot fucking believe someone would take it.

I don't even care about the freaking bike. I feel like someone just chained me somewhere. I loved my piece of shit bike. I haven't even had it a week. Fucking 4 days. The last day at the school too. God, what an asshole. I can't remember the last time I was this fucking angry and that's really saying a lot considering how generally pissed I've been lately. That bike just made me feel so free. I didn't have to walk 15 minutes through dark alleyways, dirty streets, and garbage. I could just hop on my bike and roll down the slight incline and be home in 5 minutes. Who the fuck would do this? 80 fucking dollars. I wonder what he really thought he could sell it for. Fucking retard.

This has to come like 2 minutes after I fucking told my boss that I wouldn't help with the move tomorrow. It's my god damn vacation. I'm not a mover. I'm not a fucking cleaner. I told him I would set up my workstation and whatever and stay 2 hours at the most. I could tell he was upset and whatever. I just wanted to leave so I said Fuck It. 2 hours. I'll be out of there by noon. If they make a big deal of my leaving early tomorrow. I'm just going to fucking resign. So yeah. He said all teachers had to come. There's absolutely no fucking way he could make me stay. There's some clause in there about occasional Saturdays and Sundays. I've had 2 in 4 months. I hate that but I just have to deal with it. This though. I'm fucking entitled to 5 days of vacation. Bad enough it's from a Wednesday to Tuesday but I'm not fucking going to taken advantage of like that. I couldn't really care less whether the other people just want to let him use them like that. Hire people you fucker. Just because I signed a shitty contract doesn't entitle you to tell me to come in on my fucking vacation day. So I felt kind of liberated right and then it was all just gone. Why the fuck!!

I feel like just going to report it to the police to fucking say that crime does happen here. It would be such a hassle though. I really fucking hope someone didn't take it because I wasn't Korean. I really am kind of suspicious that it was something personal though because who the fuck steals the shittiest bike from the shittiest place to buy bikes. I feel so much less free than I ever have before. Nice way to start my fucking vacation. Fucking retard.

Random thoughts / I'm so confused

2005-07-24T16:37:00.000+09:00

I was reading my Economist magazine today. For some reason, I was just struck by the amount of problems in the world. You'd think there would be some kind of limit to the world's problems. Let's list off the themes of the articles (I'm going to skip the business ones I think, interests rates aren't the kinds of problems I meant):

Terrorism
Corruption
Historical arguments
North Korea
Abuse
Drug Trade
Pollution
Israel and Palestine
AIDS
Apartheid
Poverty
Income Inequality
Racial profiling
Global warming
Religion v. Science
Territorial Disputes
War

So that's my quick list of the world's problems this week. I'm in a weird kind of mood. I went out last night and just feel like lying on my bed today. It's funny though how all the problems seem kind of connected. Why do racial and religious differences lead to war and disputes? Why do poor nations seem to be linked to corruption, AIDS, and drugs? So I was thinking whether the world would be better if it were more apathetic or more concerned. I decided both. Apathy is probably better in terms of things like religion, resources, and territorial disputes. Greed and self-righteousness really are horrible traits. I guess anything to do with any kind of dispute. If people didn't care enough to hate, there would be so fewer problems. Then, some things really won't solve themselves. AIDS and poverty in Africa for instance or pollution. Really those are problems that exist because of too much apathy. It's so easy to forget about poverty when you're in your lovely condo deciding which art print to hang on the wall. There was some line in Collateral. Tom Cruise was a hit man and Jamie Foxx was driving him around. Foxx realized that Cruise was killing people and Cruise said "why do you care? thousands of people die everyday in Africa from conflict, starvation, disease, etc. this is one guy and he had it coming." Or something to that effect. I wonder if proximity is the only thing that makes people less indifferent. Is it because that's the only thing that makes it real? There could be a rapist on the only side of the city and the people's reaction is just 'oh, that's terrible' but if it's their side of the city their attitude is completely different. It's unfortunate really that that is the only way to make people care. Have it personally affect them. Then again, if everyone had strong opinions about Israel the world would be divided into Pro-Israel and Pro-Palestine. I don't know. Maybe it's the likelihood of successful action that make people respond. You can eridicate small pox and polio (almost, I think) but AIDS will just continue to spread because of poverty, stigma, and religious dogma. I still don't understand the evils of birth control. The Catholic Church could do such positive things in places where religion still plays a role in people's lives. Instead they adhere to old doctrine that's outdated. I'm being so political today. I wonder why that is. I'm really kind of being a hypocrite anyway. I don't really do anything to solve the world's problems. I do my best to recycle.

I was also wondering about evil today. I've never believed in evil, well evil acts maybe, not evil people. I was watching "Ninjai: The Little Ninja" today. Evil can exist in a fictional setting. Then I was reading about Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. "The Jordanian-born Mr Zarqawi, who swears allegiance to Osama bin Laden, is held responsible for some of the most brutal violence in Iraq. The suicide bombings, the kidnapping and beheading of hostages...." It just made me think of the villain in Ninjai. I could never imagine myself beheading someone or ordering someone to do. What kind of person is this? Is it really possible for a man to commit such evil acts just out of sheer hate and powerlust?

My other naked bed lying thoughts involved my life. I have no idea where it is going. I have a secret plan, well maybe not so secret, to go to Australia once I finish my stint in Korea. I plan on travelling only by land and sea. I'm sure there must be ferries between Papua New Guinea and Darwin or some kind of sea route between the continent and some Indonesian island. Anyways, that's how I plan to see as much of the world as possible. Plus it would be so strange to arrive in a western country without having left the ground. Sometimes, I feel like I'm reborn each time I go on a plane. Especially, when I'm travelling alone and between places that have no connection to any other part of my life. Like when I was living in Corpus Christi and travelling to and from Edmonton. No one in Texas knows anyone in Alberta. Well, I guess they met my parents. It's always weird when my parents enter any of my non-Edmonton lives. I have a hard time with out-of-sight out-of-mind problems. I'm very good at compartmentalizing and it's just odd when I realize that these compartments neighbour other ones. I wonder if my life is just a small series of smaller lives. Mind you most of my lives are now dead. My Newfoundland life, my Denmark life, my London life, my Texas life are all dead really. There are ghosts of them but for all intensive purposes they will never exist again. Unfortunate, I really liked my Denmark life. I think it died May 29th, 2003 when I hopped on a plane and was reborn in London. Then my London life died on July 12th and I lived my Edmonton life for about 10 hours mostly spent sleeping and resumed my Texas life the next day. I was on so many planes those 2 days. I guess airports are pretty much like limbo. Appropriate really since it really is a lot like limbo. Well, when transferring planes especially. It's a place you never plan to go and just walk around waiting for another flight and everyone there is exactly the same. It's really funny how airports are always full of people but they will never be the same people aside from the staff. Sometimes, I wonder how it is that all our lives have led us to this point in time, to all be in the same place at one time but then never again. Even on the subway, I think that. Maybe this girl had just missed the last train or what made this guy come at this precise moment. Coincidence and whatever has led us all to be here and now we'll just sit and ignore everyone and never be together again. It really is all meaningless but sometimes I pretend it's not. I can only do that with transportation. It's so random and no one is going to the same place. Even cars on the street I do that. I was sitting in the back seat at a stoplight and there was a car next to us. Could you have ever just picked me and the people in the other car and predicted that our paths would cross this way? I think there was some movie like that or maybe I just thought of what a weird movie it would be. Two people living seperate lives and the whole story they don't know each other but you feel like they are somehow destined to be together and at the end of the movie they walk down the sidewalk in opposite directions and just pass each other without speaking. Maybe it's a book or something. Quite anticlimactic but probably very realistic aside from the destiny thing.

That kind of got off topic. Anyways, so Australia by land and sea. I have no goals in life maybe that's my problem aside from wanderlust. Anyways, my Edmonton life is in a coma. I don't know whether it will ever wake up. Probably not. I don't feel like I have a home anymore. I feels a lot more like visiting when I go 'home.' My parents change of address probably has a lot to do with that. Anyways, my goal after Australia was to head over to the UK or Sweden by land and sea again. I wonder how expensive it is to travel through Kazakstan. Then I was going to go to grad school in York. Now I don't know. Maybe I will just end up as a drifter. Travel around Sydney to Stockholm, Cairo to Cape town. I wonder how long I'd be able to do this. Maybe work illegally in a few countries (would it really matter if I were deported) if I needed some money or felt like staying a few months. The only problem I could think of would be long term things. I have no clue what to do with myself. This guy I know is 20 and about to start law school in the fall. I can't imagine resigning myself to one career for more than 1 year, let alone a lifetime. Would my life be better if I could? Maybe I'll be a vagabond until 30 and then make some decisions. 30 year olds can be broke and still survive after 65 right?

I slept

2005-07-23T12:20:00.000+09:00

I'm awake now. I should probably still be trying to sleep but it's an exercise in futility really. 35 degrees in my apartment. That's right, slightly hotter than freezing for all you Fahrenheit thinkers. I just read what I wrote last night. It was pretty impressed with my drunken typing skills. A few mistakes but it was so clear and understandable. I thought it would be completely garbled and beyond comprenhension even for those who correct journals for kids who barely speak English. They are tricky to read. I have one kid who always throws in random A's. I went a to a grandmother a home. I wonder if it's uh's that he's trying to use. I wonder how many times I say Uh during the day. Probably a lot more than I think I do. It's better than the Russian version. They bring their chin down so that they have no neck and made an mmmm sound from the back of the throat. Maybe that was just the tour guide who did that. That was a strange trip to Moscow. Our tour guide pointed out every McDonald's to us. Do non-Westerners think that we are just uber-in love with McDonald's and can't get enough? The golden arches are embarrassing but I imagine some people think that must be the only place we eat. What was I writing about again. Let's see how many digressions I made. My typing to diary entries to the Uh sound to the Russian mmm sound to McDonald's. Sounds about right.

So I edited out something I wrote last night. I warned you I would do it. Now, you'll just have to wonder what it was about. It was nothing any more or less interesting than you'd read here. It only mattered to one person really. I admitted something that she probably already knows but it would be better if I never say anything. Does that make it as obvious as I think it does? I thought about leaving it up since it entertained me slightly and she probably never reads this. It's gone now and you'll just have to wonder.

Oh one of my comments about something wouldn't make sense. My one little stumble in my drunken typing spree. I did a search for myself. I googled my blog name. It turned up on some website about the marketability of a website. toothpaste for dinner. I guess some of you have clicked that link. I have potential to bring B$611 to the website if it were profit based. I think B$ are blog dollars. Anyways, I was number 96 on the list or something. Now, I'm not even in the top 100 not that I had far to fall. I looked at a cached version. I felt a bit proud about it. Well, not after realizing that I'm no longer in the top 100. I always imagine that no one reads this. No one does really but all of the sudden a few people click a link and my blog name appears on a list. Strange. Number 1 had B$23,000.

Let's see, there's nothing more of interest to write. I really wonder if I'll be able to sleep under covers with clothes on again though. Why don't I have AC? Should I try and see if I can go back to sleep? Ok.

2005-07-23T04:55:00.000+09:00

So right now I am completely wasted, yet I am checking my grammar and spelling much more than I usually do.Why is it that one eye is more effective than 2 in such circumstances?

So tonight I ate half a pizza and then went downtown.I had 2-3 Last Man Standing. I guess it was 3.Then Gypsy rock or maybe some other place. I think it was some other place. I had a Singapore Sling. Ayways, I like Singapore. My aunt is from Singapore. I was there when I was a wee fetus. Seriously, I went to Singapore and Hawaii when my mom was 6 months pregnant. Anyways, I went to Hawaii once in the year 2000. Let's pretend you watch Conan O'Brien and can remember that voice.. I had a good time. I could only imagine that I'd have eqaually as good a time as I did in Hawaii. Sometimes, I feel like I am dead inside and that maybe Tony Bennett left his heart in San Francisco and that I mine was left in Singapore. At six months, your heart beats on its own........I think. That;s probably all just some superstitious fetus thing. I should go back there though. My aunt's sister still lives there I think and I always think of doughnuts covered in icing sugar when I think of her. It's been like over 10 years, 15 maybe but still the memory lingers. So anyways, I'm like 1/4 asian through marriage. How special am I? My cousins Keshia Jade and Tatalia Ying and the last name we share. My father had only brothers. So anyways, my last name name mean Swamp dweller basically in a much more poetic way. King of the swamp dwelling people perhaps. Or something sexual if you want. It's not the best last name in the world. I don't mind it anymore. Anyways, it's a compound word. 8 letters. Swamp king. It's of Scottish or Northern Irish origin let's see if you can guess it.Remember the sexual reference and you may get it right.Comment if you want.

I was thinking of maybe including a link to people who comment to me. I was listed as number 96 or something on my link to "toothpaste for dinner."How strange. Yet, I am no longer in the top 100. I feel like I should crack the top 100 again. Why am I writing. I should be sleeping.

Two full days off this weekend. What a lucky bastard I am?

Someone gave me a bracelet and it says BRITISH AMERICAN TOBACCO. Who gave me this?Anyways, I' drunk. Maybe you enjoyed this and maybe you didn't.

Bedtime methinks. Adios a todos. Voy a dormir.

Swimming, bikes, and some phone teaching

2005-07-21T22:57:00.000+09:00

My day was a bit of a valley today. It started out okay I guess. I went swimming with all the kindergarten kids. It was really kind of strange. We have new busses at school I guess. We watched a video on the way to the pool. Or rather, I watched a video. It was Shrek 2 but it was in English and they forgot to put on the subtitles until halfway through. I usually object to dubbing but kids movies and cartoons I think, it's acceptable to dub. Especially the ones for kids. I don't know how well they can read Korean but probably not fast enough to keep up. They laughed at the physical comedy. They also all brought little inner tubes with them. We got to the pool and it turns out they weren't allowed or something. They don't tell us anything but the fact that they found some sticks and propped them upright and stacked tubes with them gave me some clues. Of course, it could be some bizarre Korean custom. Bring a tube and keep it outside the pool and it will keep you from drowning. You'd think they'd have called the pool or something before they bring 40 kids with tubes. The swimming part was alright. I realized that Erica doesn't trust me. I nominated her for student of the month today. The pool was only 3 feet deep or so, too. I could sit on the floor and still have my shoulders above the water, well about water level.

Then after swimming, we had to get changed. This isn't something I'd normally write about but I don't really know you people. I don't think people I know read this. Then again, maybe some of them do and just don't tell me they do. Anyways, Korea is very pro-same sex nudity. There's like nowhere to hide even if you wanted to. They also use towels that are about the size of a tea towel. I'm not sure if that's a Canadian thing or not, the dish drying towel. Maybe I just haven't heard people refer to it outside of Canada. Perhaps, it's only my parents that call it that. Nevermind, so I saw like 20 naked kindergarten kids. A few of them saw me, which is kind of....I'm not sure how I feel about it exactly. Anyways, one of my students grabbed 'it.' Can't get more obvious than 'it' right? So yeah, I was groped or molested even by a 5-7 year old. I don't know how to tell in Korea. Subtract one or 2 years. In January, you can pretty much subtract 2 but December only 1. Anyways, after that I tried to conceal myself as much as possible. I had my big towel and fashioned into what they called a skirt. Then they tried to rip it away from me. I was also pretty much useless. I really did nothing to help any of them get dressed. I helped the same kid who grabbed at me get his leg through the hole in his Winnie the Pooh underpants. What an odd experience. Matt undertook the majority of them. I had maybe 4(are these Freudian typos? I wrote hate. I'm back to edit that). My 3 and another one who feels like he knows me since I teach his 2 older brothers. His foreign teacher is Renee who needless to say is not a boy. I don't know whether he was manhandled at all. I don't think I'll ask. Our boss was there too. Fully-dressed helping kids and some guy from the pool. I was pretty useless though. I helped the one kid with what I told you about and asked one if these were his shoes. The answer was yes. I was fine helping them with shoes. Actually, I'm pretty useless in any situation with self-delegated tasks. I'm also much better at living in Dutch society. It's not that I want someone else to pay for anything but by the time I usually think to pull out my wallet the bill has already been settled.

Then, I got back to the school to enjoy my hour and 30 minutes. I did some evaluations and was pretty slow about it. I like having my desk against the wall. I write with my head leaning on it. I enjoy my location in the office. I don't have to worry about people walking past my desk, except to leave but there's enough room for the door. I just have to deal with kids poking me from the door. I remember growing up that the teacher's lounge was like the one forbidden place in the school. Not in Korea. They run in and out of there all the time. I listened to music and felt retarded. I was reading some science manual written in English by a Korean. You can always tell. Anyways, I couldn't make sense of the directions. It was a combination of strange wording and my lack of mental energy. I had to read it like 10 times. Then I did science with 2 classes back to back. The first got bored with it after 10 minutes. The second class really loved it. It was just a piece of foil wrapped around a cylinder. It was about reflections in a curved mirror. Andrew (different from kindie Andrew) just loved it. They kept saying Bravo and trying to tell me things. They love the phrase "this and this and this" as they either draw or mime. It was kind of fun just being around energy of people who get so excited about shiny things wrapped around tubes. Usually, I just stand up there and yell. Science class though I let them do pretty much anything as long as they fill in the lab report that takes 20 seconds to do. Plus after a field trip I don't have energy to yell. My Nobel class went fine today I guess. They were still loud but this time it was all good humoured. Usually, there's some kind of fight. Kipper gets upset when I write his name on the board but not others. I've really got to become less subjective about it. I don't like doing it but it's got to be done I suppose. It's hard though when the next strike puts them in the corner and they said one Korean word. Anyways, today instead of being a pain about it, he decided to go crazy. Making weird faces and all. The others thought it was funny. So no fights and I yelled less. It's really hard to get them back to work once everyone's been laughing. Then I need to bring out my angry voice and strike others, well on the board. You know what I mean. I've never had the temptation to actually do that. Then I had Columbia and got to go home. There were only 2 of them. They would hate when I would ask about their weekends. I found better ways to get them speaking. Their answers would be so deliberately dull. "3 things." "I ate, I slept, and (struggle with the 3rd)....I stayed at home or something else completely useless." Maybe it was because Wendy, the ringleader was absent. I enjoyed that class today and got to come home early. 7:20. Sha-zaah. We played Guess Who for the last 15 minutes. I don't know why they can't use the word blonde. I was a little peeved that I still had to explain that blonde meant 'yellow hair' for the 5th time. Facial hair was equally funny. They called it special face. 'Does he have special face?' as they stroked their chins and cheeks.

Moving on. On my home I impulsively decided to buy a bike. Actually, I'd been thinking about buying a bike for awhile but suddenly today was the day I would act. I went into the place that I walk by slowly to check out prices. Lespo. There all over the place. I can think of 3 that are less than ten minutes away on foot and I don't really live in a commercial area not that any part of the city is that uncommercial. Anyways, the first bikes were like 165,000 or 210,000 won. Then I found the crappy ones they kept at the back. I bought a new bike for 80,000 which included a free lock and a free little vitamin drink that I got to enjoy as they got the bike ready for me. Then I went riding for about 30 minutes. I actually don't know how long it was. I rode past Daegok station even (the last subway stop), not that far though considering I'm 3 from the end. It felt nice. I was so speedy and the breeze felt nice. I rode to the new school location. It only took me about 3 minutes. 1 of the minutes spent at the crosswalk. I hate the crosswalks here. They take forever to change and seem to have some time-out on the green. It stops after 15 seconds or something even if the traffic continues for another minute. I don't get it. I rode back a different way avoiding to light. I was a bit worried I'd be hit by someone. Some many little alleys and I slowed down at all of them. Anyways, I felt so free that what used to be like a 10 minute walk takes no time at all now. If I want something, I can just go to E-Mart without contemplating it. Soon of course, a 4 minute ride will seem like a long time. It was nice to see a different part of town. I only go to the same places now. To and from school and the weekend trip downtown. It was liberating. I wonder how long it will take me to get to school now. For all 3-4 days that I have left there. Well, I probably shouldn't take my bike on moving day. I can walk one last time. I might never see that area again. Matt and Renee live over there but I've been to there place like 3 times maybe over the last 3 months. I don't know why they don't want to move. They've convinced themselves that 4 months is no time at all.

So phone teaching week was last week but I called a few of the kids I didn't call last week. I had nice little conversations with all five of them. With some of them I just call to hear myself speak and answer the questions for them when they aren't quick enough. Well multiple choice style. "What do you want to be when you grow up?" "....pause....uhhh....uhhh....." "Do you want to be a doctor, a musician, a teacher? What do you want to be?" Teacher. Ok. I did find out that in that one class that 3 out of 4 wouldn't be coming to school tomorrow. One was a maybe. Of course, I think I used school instead of Wonderland once. They have summer vacation (1 whole month) from their elementary schools. Some of them are going to skip out on their hagwons that much too. My boss complained about on the drive to my apartment yesterday, A ride home without a hidden agenda (except to make me feel more comfortable at work or maybe he lost his courage to bring up whatever it was he wanted to take about), imagine that? Then I called Bin, whose English name is Robert, he's such a Bin though. I talked to him for like 2 minutes then asked something about his sister who is in my Columbia class. Anyways, suddenly Sandy was on the phone. I talked to her for about 10 minutes or something. It turns out that David, the kid I don't like, thinks I'm just so goodlooking. Like a moviestar. It's a common compliment here. He says I look like Tom Cruise. Similar hair colours and we're twins. Actually, it's not that similar at all. Sometimes, I wonder if they can tell us about at all. Not that I'm that adept at distinguishing between Asians I see on the street. If I only meet them once, I might not be able to recognize them if I saw them again. I don't think they all like Lucy Liu or Jackie Chan though or one of the other 5 Asian celebrities. Let's see who I can name off the top of my head: Jet Li, Chow Yun Phat (however you spell that, I'm not looking it up), Connie Chung, Judge Ito, David Suzuki(Cdn Environmentalist, I may or may not have seen him in Banff once), Xiang Xi (also don't know spelling), Michelle Yeoh, that one Korean who pops up in a lot of sitcoms, Karate Kid guy, Tia Carrere (though she's not really typical Chinese looking), the guy who played her dad in Wayne's World (you don't know his name either), Bruce Lee, Sandra O or Oh. I'm sure there are several other obvious ones that I can't think of. Anyways, phone teaching didn't go too badly. I really hope none of them show up tomorrow. It would feel so nice to leave work before 7:20 one day. Even 7:20 is great. 8 isn't that late but 6 classes back to back is too much to take at times. 5 is such a relief. I'm sure there'll be one kid who shows up and it will be in the class I teach during the second block. I wonder what it would be like if no one in either class signed up for August. I would be paid exactly the same too. I shouldn't get my hopes though.

I was also feeling more active than usual I guess after my bike ride. Usually, I feel like I should already be at the 3rd floor when I get to the 2nd but today I kept right on walking. This doesn't look like the 3rd floor. I guess there's a penthouse or something on the floor above mine. Then I climbed another flight just because the stairs were there and I was in a Magellan mood. Anyways, I ended up on the roof. Another liberating moment in a way. Just some plants and lines for hanging laundry. I walked under them as if they were electrified. I don't know why. I should go up there during the daytime. Sometimes I feel boxed in by the buildings and I never get a good view of anything. My buildings maybe one floor above the ones in front of it. I didn't realize how unparallel my street was to the main road before. So that's why there's no shortcut to the subway station when I'm coming from work. So that was my thrilling discovery of the day.