El Diablo

Utter the words "fresh cut noodles" and "fresh flatbread" and my mouth will water uncontrollably. Spicy, savory, hot, and addictive. And SO cheap when you're eating the real thing in rural China. This particular meal ran us a total of about $2, I seem to recall.


My cousin's devlish appearance can only be attributed to his anger at being forced to wait 2 more seconds to eat. Actually I'm getting a little angry myself that I can't walk outside indulge in a little authentic Chinese cuisine. Curse this mortal body and it's inability to time travel!

Casa de Chunchon

After many requests (well, OK, ONE request - you know who you are), here is a picture of my cozy abode in South Korea. It's a three story apartment building. I live on the ground level and my lone window faces the building next door, barely 10 feet away.


A pleasant picture to gaze upon as the green leaves on the trees are long gone and the ground is now covered in snow and ice. Brrrr!

Would you like your face filleted today sir?

After two days in the filthy, street-torn city of Datong, China, I wanted a shave. Somehow I thought it would make a memorable end to my stay to get a shave in a salon with a straight edge razor. How I rue THAT decision. 've never had a shave this way so my mind was set (the many warnings from my cousin be damned!).


The razor was sharp and the poor woman assigned to tried very hard to baby my tender face but it all failed to ease the sense that she was slowly peeling the skin from my neck! As the pain intensified and all the muscles in my body tensed in anticipation of the next slice (notice my clenched arms and hands), the departure time of our train drew near and we had to rush out before she finished. What a relief.

Potty humor

Many parts of China, I'm told, lack what we consider modern plumbing and what little I witnessed this summer supports this claim. Most of the public outhouses I saw were vile, some unspeakably so.


With that as background, my cousin and I spent an hour wandering the picturesque backstreets of a neighborhood in Zhangjiakou, some 4 hours northeast of Beijing. As normally happened, we attracted a following of young children, curious to know about the obvious foreigners. (I'm sure my cousin's excellent Chinese and the colorful stickers I handed out did nothing to encourage this.)


After I suggested we take a picture of this unusualy colorful community outhouse, I was initially annoyed that our entourage wouldn't take the hint to step out of view. Of couse now I'm glad they stayed as we caught them nearly doubled over with laughter.


Why are they laughing? I can't say for certain but wouldn't YOU laugh if some rich foreigner waltzed into YOUR town and decided to take a picture of such a humble, meaningless structure?

Chinese canine

Missing my own mutt in Utah, I couldn't resist a close-up of this one we encountered in a remote and poor village some two hours outside of Datong in China. Like the children in the community who all seemed to share ownership with him, he was energetic, carefree, and seemingly oblivious to the outside world as it raced by.

tuesday | 11.19.02 | korea | day 259

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the pain, the agony

So sick, so weak, so anxious to die. OK, slight exaggeration. Grand designs to write many delightful posts over the weekend faded along with my strength and energy. What I at first thought was a severe cold has, I believe, morphed into a severe case of the flu instead. Oh, for a cold. Or for a mild case of leprosy.

Samgyopsal in Yangyang

On our way to Seoraksan, we paused in the town of Yangyang to dip our toes in the East Sea and eat lunch. We feasted on my favorite Korean dish, samgyopsal, fried slices of pork, cooked at the table and eaten wrapped in a lettuce leaf with fresh, sliced garlic and red pepper paste.


Please excuse me while I indulge in a guided culinary meditation.

Seoraksan smiler

Little Richard, a fellow teacher, and I took an impromptu day trip to Seoraksan Mountain National Park in early October, hoping to witness the Autumn changing of the guard. Unfortunately we were a week or two too early so we had to settle for a refreshing day of vigorous hiking, beautiful greenery, and brisk mountain air. What a let-down.


At the end of the day, as we were leaving the park, I shared a private moment with this darling Korean girl and she was gracious enough to hold the pose while I scrambled for my camera.

day | ..02 | korea | day

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jin-soo and phonics

day | ..02 | korea | day

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never met a republican

Happy happy Chunchon mascot

The flood-control canal behind the hagwon is lined for a few hundred yards with various murals that depict different seasonal events in Chunchon. This is a shot of one of the paintings of the official town mascot. Happy, isn't he? (Or maybe he is a she. Who knows?)


The "happy, happy" is a reference to the "Happy, Happy Girl" song a Korean teacher has been repeatedly singing with her students lately as a means of teaching English. Has anyone else heard this song? It's a teeny bopper type of song and kinda catchy.

Halloween monster

I recycled today's picture from shylock in korea where I neglected to add an explanation.


We celebrated Halloween at the hagwon and to our horror this ghoulish-looking zombie-mutant crashed our party. And then he had to ruin this lovely picture of me by flashing his awful mug in the background. Scary!


Truthfully, the hagwon Director couldn't resist sharing the limelight with this photo of me modeling my great Dracula costume. Who was I to pull rank on the boss?

Two vagabonds

Taken back in August as my globe-trotting cousin and China tour guide and I parted ways in Incheon: I to sultry though picturesque Chunchon, he to Taiwan, San Francisco, and finally New York. If not for him, my 12-day vacation in China would not have happened but it did, thanks to his previous experience in China and his impressive Chinese and Korean language skills.


What made our travels even more memorable were our lengthy, impassioned discussions about how to advance the cause of conservatism in America. Right cousin?


Doesn't this shot look more like some third world South American village plaza rather than a subway station in a modern Asian country?


(Note about yesterday's post: It has been re-brought to my attention that I'm not as farm animal-deficient as a certain "friend" previously implied. The burden of beast in the picture IS a donkey, not a mule. Ha!)

wednesday | 10.13.02 | korea | day 253

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Language/culture clash

While studying my beginning Korean textbook at the school this afternoon during a break between classes, the Director walked into the room. When he noticed what I was doing, he was impressed ("Oooh!" "Aaah!"). In what then must have been a desire to test my abilities, he wrote a simple question in Korean for me on the white board. I was semi-confident I knew the answer so I blurted it out.

I was wrong. Obviously I jumbled the vocabulary because he immediately laughed, heartily, at my mistake and proceeded to share my blunder with several Korean teachers standing nearby.

Let me say as I proceed that I like this Director. He is kind, thoughtful (though perpetually late in paying his employees), relaxed, and he has a great sense of humor. I can only guess he was tapping into this "sense of humor" by laughing at me because I can find no other plausible explanation.

Normally I wouldn't be put out by such a response; learning a new language is challenging at best and everyone knows the best way to accelerate the process is by practicing in real world situations. But when I consider the plethora of mistakes I hear when every Korean speaks English, especially those made by this Director and the other Koreans working at the hagwon, I'm primarily angry that they would laugh at my mistakes when I am instead kind, supportive, and more inclined to focus on their language strengths rather than their missteps.

What aggravated this event was the Director's reaction to my reaction. He launched into a speech about how we foreign teachers are too sensitive, that laughing as he did is not offensive in the Korean culture, and that by being offended I was showing my failure to adapt to the culture of the land in which I was living. (My response to THIS preposterous accusations is fodder for another blog entry.)

This is not a colossal problem (though it did degenerate into an "us vs. them" debate for 15 minutes between the Korean and foreign teachers). I am a bit discouraged though that I must now selectively choose where and with whom to practice my budding language skills.

"Oooh, a donkey! I want a picture with a donkey!"

Another quote from my farm animal-deprived Korean friend.


Our day at the Korean Folk Village was drawing to a close. We were tired and cold but satisfied at a day well-spent. Two donkeys (see next paragraph) were tethered in a half-vacant cabbage field, looking lonely and in need of a loving carress from a fellow Korean. Little Richard delivered and this picture also shows I captured the setting sun as the day drew to a close.


It has since been brought to my own farm animal-deficient attention that this is more accurately a mule, not a donkey. Boy, am I embarrassed!

Life as a sardine

Simply the best b/w picture I've taken on the Seoul subways. It was rush hour and SO crowded which, in fairness, is the exception rather than the rule.

Put your shoulder to the wheel

Following church and a baptism, the ladies of the Chunchon Ward served a delicious lunch of bulgogi. (:o'''' <---me, drooling.) Elders Ellis and Clarkson, noble missionaries both, rose to the task of dish duty.

It also happened to be Elder Ellis' last Sunday in Chunchon where he has served ever since I arrived 8+ months ago. Sad times indeed.

sunday | 11.10.02 | korea | day 250

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book report

Though it's still a jumbled, incomplete mess, I've now linked to my already existent book report blog.

Got milk?

OK, so the caption and subject don't quite match. Got a better idea? Then get your own blog smart guy!


Seriously though, I welcome comments, suggestions for better captions, and even ideas for changing the mind-numbing drudgery that is my life. I haven't added a 'comment' link to this page yet but you can use the guestbook for now.

saturday | 10.09.02 | korea | day 249

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Korean Folk Village

I finally made it to the folk village!

"Breaking the law is exciting!"

A direct quote from my "law-abiding" Korean friend.

Me and my pal Kyanna

This picture is sort of fuzzy but it's also overly-bright which I think is a nice effect as it was taken in a church on a Sunday. The day was unusually sunny and cold and we posed in the Chunchon LDS Ward building with it's bright white walls and ultra-glossy floors.


And Kyanna manages to be quite the doll, taking the edge off the vacancy I feel, missing my nieces/nephews back home.

friday | 10.08.02 | korea | day 248

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daily.picture.post

Try as I do, I have lately failed to submit daily posts. Between teaching at the hagwon, teaching private lessons, attending my Beginning Korean class at Kangwon University, language exchanging with Little Richard, educating my political self at Rush Limbaugh.com, and indulging my guilty pleasure of listening to The Phil Hendrie Show, the time passes too quickly. Writing, I'm ashamed to say, gets displaced by other, often lesser priorities.

So to boost my output by 1,000 words a day, I've created a daily picture post page. Visit it often and you'll have another (or at least one) reason to get out of bed each morning.

tuesday | 10.05.02 | korea | day 245

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15 hours a week is work?

The new school schedule is hot off the presses! I've dropped precipitously from teaching 28 hours a week to a mere 15 hours a week. It's likely to skyrocket to 17 hours when the long anticipated writing class begins in a week or two, but come on!

As of this day I no longer work in Korea; I live and play in Korea with a few brief moments per week of something that other people call work. Sheesh!

English/Korean Electronic Dictionaries

Zeromarket

1. AP-25 W75,000
   
   
2. SHARP PA-3100H W50,000
   
   
3. SHARP PA-4720H W69,500
   
   
4. SHARP PA-5200H W80,000
   
   
5. SHARP PA-9100H W95,500
   
   
6. SHARP RD-400 W115,500
   
   
7. SHARP RD-400+ W135,000
   
   

Interpark

1. SHARP PA-3100H W46,000
   
   
2. SHARP PA-3900H W73,000
   
   
3. SHARP PA-3900H W73,000
   
   
4. SHARP PA-4720H W67,000
   
   
5. SHARP PA-4920H W76,000
   
   
6. SHARP PA-5200H W81,000
   
   
7. SHARP PA-5200H W81,000
   
   
8. SHARP PA-9100H W98,000
   
   
9. SHARP PW-4100S W134,000
   
   
10. SHARP PW-6000 W146,000
    
    
11. SHARP PW-7000 W171,200
    
    
12. SHARP PW-K300 W198,000
    
    
13. SHARP RD-400 W117,000
    
    
14. SHARP RD-1100 W167,000
    
    
15. SHARP RD-2000 W187,000
    
    
16. SHARP RD-2000 W561,000
    
    
17. SHARP RD-3000 W240,000
    
    
18. SHARP RD-3000 W720,000
    
    
19. SHARP RD-3000 W1,200,000
    
    

monday | 10.04.02 | korea | day 244

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sunday | 10.03.02 | korea | day 243

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saturday | 10.02.02 | korea | day 242

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friday | 11.01.02 | korea | day 241

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The end of an ice age?

To what do I owe this shocking about face? The coworker who was the target of my "b" word rant appears to have grown up a couple decades and joined the world of the mature. I think it's thanks to our raving Halloween party and the arrival of the new teachers yesterday in that it's forced her to act normal or get left out of the loop. Two of my other coworkers who had recently commented about her odd behavior also noticed the change and wondered aloud to me what could have produced this miracle.

I know enough to not expect this improvement to be permanent or long-lasting. And oh that I could make her see and feel the effects of her wildly inconsistent behavior.