Because my Brother Pointed it Out

and it rocks,....
Feist:

Grill Up

In the mood for some BBQ? How about some pork? Mmmm'kay? Well, how about some,....


RECTUM!!!!
(Rectum? I damn near killed 'im!)
Rectum is yum yum!

This isn't really rectum - this stuff. It's the intestines of the pig, and it's also the specialty of my friends' restaurant. There's a lot of work that goes into preparing the intestines so they're ready to get grilled up. One must be fastidious with the cleaning of this stuff or you're going to get pretty ill. Maybe die. Something like that. So my friends clean it up very carefully inside and out and then they're all put inside an actual washing machine that only washes intestines! Then it's left to marinate in some special concoction that has a KIWI base! Pretty cool!

The intestines actually look just like intestines when they're placed on the grill. They start to get all tubey as they cook - the restaurant fills with this smell that's not bad at all. It's like bacon without the smokiness. Drooly.


After they've plumped up you snatch them up with tongs and cut them open with scissors. Then brown them up. I like smushing them into the grill so they sizzle and get good and crispy on the outside.


Then they're dipped into this spicy sauce filled with thinly sliced gochu (spicy green peppers) and peanuts. It's very delicious as well.


You can pop the "mackchang" (intestines - also called "holmone" in Japan) into your mouth just so, or cradle them up in a lettuce or sesame leaf with some sliced onions that are soaked in soy, vinegar, and wasabi and a nice sweet roasted clove of garlic. The intestines are chewy. Like fatty pork gum. I love the smell of mackchang, but can only eat a bit before I think "uhhhhh, that's enough chewy pig rectum for me."

T-Minus 2 days

Time goes by so fast. I'm heading off to Canada for a nice little vacation in a couple days. I'm hoping to spend a lot of time having fun at talking in WARP speed English. If joy and laughter don't envelop me during every moment I'm back in the motherland I'm going to kick everybody's ass.

No pressure, though.

I'm also hoping that this break in my regularly scheduled programming is going to knock me in to gear creativity wise. Sheesh. I'd intended to write a bunch of posts (about what, I dunno) over the past week, but,...

But,...
I don't know.
I caught a bad cold and I think everyone is stupid?

Those aren't really related to one another, yet they've both made me pretty crabby.

Here.
Look at a puppy.

Whyfore he bark at me every time I pass by?
He kind of looks like he wants to bite my jugular out, eh?

Bad Bad Me

See? This is why it's good I don't have children. I'm neglectful. Forgive me, y'all,...it's been three weeks since my last post. I just haven't felt moved by the blogging spirit lately. If I had a baby it'd be all "Wah, wah, FEED ME!" and I'd think, "Yaaaahhhh - I'm just not that motivated."

That's not true. I'd totally feed the baby. I feed my cat every day - so there you go. As a matter of fact, though, I ran out of cat food after feeding him his breakfast this morning and so rushed after work to the local pet store in my town (one of one of a kind here) to fetch him some chow. Usually I head downtown once a week at least to grab his food, but I haven't had the time lately. I caught the local store just as they were closing up, but they unlocked the door for me. (Aside: poor un-airconditioned dogs and puppies on the inside of that shop! The place reeks something horrible and is overrun with fruit flies. There must be at least fifteen dogs and twenty puppies all caged in that stink. Poor things.) So I was happy to have made it to the pet store before they closed (forty five minutes early than their sign says they do) but was dismayed to discover they had no cat food! So Kamikaze just ate up a dish of fine Korean "chicken and jelly" dog food. I expect him to start barking anytime now.

So if I had a baby wah-wahing for some food chances are I'd pop a beer in it's mouth and give it a tattoo.

In my absence from this here blog I had a fling. So, the camel aspect of my being has been satiated. The fling has flung now and I'm flunged out. Posting will resume.

For about a week, that is.
I'm flinging myself to Canada next week where I will spend a few days in the big city and no less than eighteen days in max-chillax mode at my family's cottage. Details and pictures will surely follow whence I return in mid-August,...but starting mid-next-week this here space is probably going to get pretty dark.

Don't cry for me, though. I intend on eating half a delicious Canadian (and therefore not subject to hysterical Korean protest) cow done up right on the barbeque. And the beer,....ohhhhhh Molson je'taime beaucoup.

*TAP*TAP*TAP*

Is this thing on?

Escape

I forgot to mention that the wee praying mantis escaped their little home. This was taken a couple weeks ago on a Monday, and all the little babies were long gone.

I had hoped that once the little guys broke free they would wait around for me to show up and then climb aboard my finger and, like, sing me a song or something. They probably made scarce though because of me. They knew some big thing stopped by a couple times a day to stroke their nest and say "ooooootheca." I think they were inside imagining me salivating and licking my lips anticipating what a tasty snack they'd be once they'd made their way outside. I removed the ootheca and snapped it open to investigate the inside. There were little pods to house each of the little mantis. One cool thing about little praying mantis babies is that they hatch as perfect little replicas of their parents. Trés cute.

I miss having the ootheca to pass by every day, though. I need a new touchstone.

Meanwhile I escaped through the countryside to the beach. The rice paddies are growing up prettily.




Spot the crane?


And the sea was lovely. I could have swam in it, but was in my jeans and a T-shirt. Still, I had a nice wade to almost knee deep.
Spot the fishermen?


There was an animal skull on the beach. Probably a dog, and I spared you all the photographic evidence. It was unclear whether it was consumed by man or beast. That was gross, but otherwise it was a nice day.

Rocky

We got a new teacher finally. Yeeee hah! I don't know too much about her, except her English is crap. I know I shouldn't be surprised, but still I am. She's worked as an English teacher for at least five years, so I expected her to have a decent grasp of the language. No dice. She also talks to herself. A lot! And as I speak to her she repeats words I say multiple times. It's kind of like speaking to a parrot.

We went out for dinner in the middle of the week to celebrate her arrival and my FOUR YEAR anniversary. I was pleased to find that New Teacher drinks. Often at our meals out I was the only one having a few glasses of whatever, and it's always nicer to have someone to "cheers." Thing is, New Teacher started rocking herself back and forth about halfway through the meal and didn't stop for another hour and a half. I just found it to be weird.

Another weird thing happened on Friday when I showed up to work to find one of my student's mothers waiting for me. She owns a bar near the school and we've become very friendly. She had a favour to ask me and came inside so my boss could translate. Pancha (my student's mom) has a friend who is going through some marriage troubles and has left her husband and come here from another city. Apparently she's already gotten herself a job, but doesn't have anywhere to stay. Pancha was hoping I'd let her stay with me.

I only had to think about it for .0025 seconds before saying "uhhhhh no way!"
I looked at my boss and said, "Please tell her I'm sorry, but that's impossible."

I live in a studio apartment. There's no way in hell I could handle a middle aged woman sleeping on my floor. Who I don't know. Who doesn't speak English. Pancha just hoped that I'd be cool and sleep alongside this stranger on the floor Korean style.

I think that's the nuttiest thing anyone has asked me to do since I've been here.

Jindo Dog

Here's the big jindo dog that gets really excited when he sees me coming by on my way to work. I always stop and give him some pets and tell him he's a handsome fellow. Sometimes I'll sneak him a treat. It's such a drag he's chained to his doghouse all the time. He's very much NOT trained, so if he's happened to escape off his chain (which has happened a couple times) he jumps all over me. He's very strong.


Here's Jindo Dog yesterday looking stupid with eyebrows that some dumbass drew on him.

Granny Gets Down!

There was a bakery across the road from my school that I almost never went to. I guess me not buying anything there affected them, because they packed up their stuff and closed up shop a couple weeks ago. The construction guys swooped in a couple days later and started renovating the place. I didn't know what the store was going to end up being, but I was hoping for a giant multiplex cinema.

No such luck, though. Another bakery opened up in the the old bakery's place.
Ah well.
But, with the opening of the shop came the usual circus complete with a clown and dancing girls. Damn, it was loud! It's usually a challenge to get my voice over top ten screaming little students, but when you have a nightclub outside your window,...fuggedaboutit. (They also hired a truck with two dancing girls on it that drove around the neighbourhood blaring dance music. When the truck would swing by this way we got double the noise pollution. Cuckoo!)

Check out the granny who broke rank from the vegetable selling halmonies!


Nice bums on the girls, huh?

WCB - (#IDON'TKNOW) Arms Inside the Ride

Big Kamikaze has a Big Giant Mouth, which is good for chomping up all the fishies. Still, his Big Giant Mouth cannot contain his Massive Giant Fangs.
See?


They're ferocious and fierce and liable to bite your fingers clear off, so I try to keep my hands inside the roller coaster at all times.

But sometimes I forget and my hands and fingers are just wandering around doing stuff and then *BAM* I've got a cat with fierce and massively uncontainable fangs attached to my digits.
See?


I couldn't take a picture of the aftermath because that there was mah pitcher takin' fingah. Now I've got a nub.

He's Japanese, so Kamikaze Kamakiri Kitty is a good name for him, but if I'd gotten him when I travelled around in Scotland I would've totally named him Fangs MacNubmaker.

So now you should all Highland Fling over to Sher's and see the kitty with a shoe on her head. I think Laura's high. Thanks Sher for hosting this weekend's round-up and I hope you're feeling better.

Star Flower

Purge

When I was younger my family lived in a house with a furnished basement. I used to spend time down there because that's where the television lived, but you would only find me there if my father wasn't home. The downstairs was his domain, and I made sure to make it seem like I had never been there at all once I'd turned the TV off. We never ever watched TV together. In fact, we never really did anything together after we'd moved to that house. I stopped showing up for the most hostile passive-aggressive experience on Earth dinner once I started high school, and my father bought himself a car with only two seats in it, and my ass was never invited to grace the passenger side.

My extended family didn't gather together too often, but would occasionally have some reason to come by to the most hostile passive-aggressive place on Earth our house. On those occasions, my father would dress up in a tie and his festive red vest and head down to his basement domain and stand behind his bar like he was waiting for his first customers to stop by. Everyone else would stay upstairs on the first floor. The three velour stools on the other side of the bar downstairs always stayed empty.

If I'd have had more courage I might have sat down in one of them and asked, "What the hell is WRONG with you?" but I was too twisted full of rage and pain. I hated the guy, but I couldn't stop my heart from reeling, thinking that downstairs was the angriest loneliest man in the world.

I've spent my life trying to figure out what was going on with him, and I've never been brave enough to ask. I've also never really had the courage to talk about any of that mess with anyone, and I don't think it's done me any favours.

"Time heals all wounds."
Does it?
Time distances. It ticks. It carries you away and allows for experience that might help you to view the past from a different perspective, but I don't think it heals. It may help to make circumstances that were once so jagged and angry seem less so. But, maybe not.

I was at a bar a few weeks ago and a couple of drunk guys approached me to have a chat. One of them was very nice, but he gestured toward his friend and said, "He is drunk asshole." I took him at his word and avoided talking to his buddy who sat on the stool next to him. At some point, the asshole said something to me (I honestly can't recall what it was, but it was ignorant) and I told him to fuck off. He reached around and grabbed me by the hair and yanked my head back. Hard. I grabbed the bar with one hand, trying not to be dragged off my stool, and grabbed his wrist with the other one.

"Let go," I said. "Seriously, let go of me."
His grip tightened as his friend urged him to stop.
I tried another tact, "I'm a girl! Let GO!"
And he did.
And without even thinking about it, I leaned over and punched the guy in the head. Which felt good, so I punched him again. And now his friend was telling me to "hajima," and so I stopped. Punching him. But I stepped off my stool and kicked him hard in the shin. His friend pulled him away, out the door and up the stairs.

I was alone again, and my mind transported me to the other side of the bar and quickly suited me in a tie and a festive red vest. And so I asked me what the hell is WRONG, and I've spent the last few weeks examining all this wreckage that time has helped to bury and form into a hard hot ball in the basement of my soul. I don't think it's just a coincidence that I've had a bad stomach ever since, and I've felt so guilty when I think about my actions, even if the guy was an asshole. There's no going back in time to make things any different about my past, but I think it's just about time to yank all this shit out into the sunlight because it's affecting my present.

"We consume our tomorrows fretting about our yesterdays." -Persius

Now it's time to figure out how to make myself let go.

"History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again." -Maya Angelou

Ugly Bike

I think the kid who owns this probably painted it himself. Nice work!

Zzzzzzzz

I don't know, maybe it's just me - but this doesn't seem like the best place for a soju-induced mid-afternoon nap.

This guy was insistent about sleeping in the MIDDLE of the road, too! He'd already been dragged to the curb twice by the concerned vegetable-selling grandmas who line the opposite side of the road (and hassle me as I walk by every single time!) Sleepy Soju Man would protest by screaming and trying to slap them away and then roll himself back into the centre of the street.

There are the grandmothers on one side and always a bunch of grandpas sitting on benches on the other side of the street. Most days they're all drinking, so things can get pretty interesting. Earlier in the week two grandmas got into a fight and ended up slapping each other silly.

Then there's this guy.

He's a regular outside my school. Sometimes he dances and sings and sometimes he fights. Someone usually ends up fetching his wife who comes around to shout at him and smack him around. Quite the daily show going on here!

Speaking of Z's, I was dozing off after I came home from work, so decided to turn off the TV and commit to a little nap, figuring I'd be out for an hour or so. I woke up SIX HOURS later! Holy Jelly Van Winkle! TGIF,...it's been a long tiring week.

The Latest

I finally got my computer back at home and she's all fixed up. That's good news! Now I can resume not commenting on my favourite blogs and not replying to e-mails from my favourite people. I'm awesome.

My co-worker Sunny had given her notice, intending to quit at the end of May. She was recently changing her mind, though - and had agreed to stay on until my boss found a teacher to replace her. It turns out that she wasn't planning on taking a course after all (I felt she was lying when she told me she was going back to school) and was instead going to look for a job that paid her more money. She told me last Friday that she was reconsidering, and was thinking about staying on at my school. I guess she changed her mind over the weekend, because she sent the boss a text message on Monday ten minutes before her first class was starting saying she was taking a week off to go travelling. If Karen still wanted her to work after she got back, she would.

Ballsy I tells ya!

Karen is finally fed up and Sunny is so fired.
Good!

I'm pretty ticked off at her as well. It's obvious she doesn't care about her students or Karen and I. She's such a chicken, and that's not a trait I enjoy in anyone. Actually I called her on Monday night and was surprised she answered the phone. She wasn't travelling anywhere either. I don't know what her deal is, but it's like every couple months she figures it's time for her to have a mini-vacation. I'm tired of covering her classes and I'm tired of her crap English anyhow. So buh-bye Sunny-pie.

I've been gathering all sorts of documents so my boss can visit immigration in a couple days and extend my visa. My contract expires on the 11th of June, but my visa always expires at the end of May. Karen's looking to submit another year-long contract, which I haven't totally committed to. We've been negotiating for the last few days and can't seem to agree on the details. We're stuck on money,...go figure, and I'm being quite rigid. I want to go home this summer and I want her to pay for the airfare and she's having trouble agreeing to that idea. It's not an insane expectation by any means. Schools almost always pay for the airfare of their foreign teachers from and to their home countries. I've been here four years, and Karen's never paid for a trip home. Granted, I've only gone home once but that was on my dime. I paid over two thousand clams at the time for my airfare, and with the way airlines have raised their fares, I'm expecting it'll cost even more. Karen's offered to let me go for two weeks of paid vacation, but that's not making me happy. She seems very stressed out by the whole airfare idea, so finally I said to her today, "Listen, this is non-negotiable. You're paying for my trip home one way or another. Either you buy me a return ticket or a one-way ticket and find a new teacher." Then I turned her upside down and shook all the loose change out of her pockets and said, "I'm taking this TOO!"

We're haggling over a thousand dollars or so worth of raise as well. When I speak to her about why I deserve it and how there's better employment deals to be had out there and how I often feel lonely and isolated in this silly little town I can hear a little voice in the back of my head yelling, "Why are you even bartering to stay here, you idiot?" I think I've got some weird version of Stockholm Syndrome.

Today I went to the hospital to get tested for the government regulations for foreigners here to make sure I don't have AIDS and I'm not high on drugs. I had to get my brother to go fetch me a Criminal Record Check from the Toronto police as well. Once I've got those in my silly hands I'm free and clear to change jobs, so we'll see what happens.

Here's a new puppy. It's Buddy's replacement apparently.

Cute.
Now I'm waiting to see what the replacement for Sunny's going to be like. When we find one, that is.

Good-Bye Good-Boy

I'm pretty sure Buddy: The Good Boy didn't pull through. I didn't see his corpse (thankfully) but I stopped to talk to the man who owns the land where Buddy, Circle-Gay and Big Jindo Puppy all hang out. I mentioned Buddy was so sick, and he said he knew. I asked what was wrong, and he said he didn't know. I said it was a shame, because he is such a good boy, and when I asked where he was the man bent to look in the dog house Buddy and Circle-Gay share. He wasn't there, and the man then told me "Maybe he's there," and pointed up to the sky. I sadly nodded in agreement. He probably was up in Doggy Heaven. The last time I'd seen him he seemed not to want to lie down even though he could barely stand. I wondered if he was hesitating, thinking he wouldn't ever get up again. I gave the note to his "owner" the following day, and he nodded and told me it was okay to take Buddy to the vet, but Buddy wasn't around. I never saw him again.


On Wednesday this past week, Buddy and Circle-Gay's dog house was gone.

In fact, I hadn't seen Circle for a long time, and when I asked that sky-pointing man where he was, he said maybe Circle was in the sky as well. That turned out not to be true, as Circle-Gay re-appeared on Wednesday night and followed me all the way home. He's skinnier than before, but has a great appetite and wolfed down a bowl of dog food in about a minute once we reached my apartment. I was worried that he'd caught what Buddy had, if it was a virus after all. It seems like Circle made scarce while Buddy was dying.

I don't blame him.

Computer Says No

I say, "Work, goddamn you! Liiiiiivvvveee."

But my computer,....well - see the title?

Buddy

I don't think Buddy's going to pull through.


He just keeps getting worse. I wonder what happened to him. Was he hit by a car? Does he have some illness? His whole character has changed. He doesn't seem to remember who I am anymore. Today he was limping around in a slow circle, like he didn't know what he was supposed to be doing. He'd go up to the water bowl, but not bend to drink. I called to him and spoke in a low calm tone, but he didn't acknowledge me. He's barely opening his eyes. I told him what a Good Boy he is.

I was a tear stained mess by the time I got to work. I got my boss to write a note: "Can I take your dog to the vet?" that I'll show his owner tomorrow. But really, I need more help than that. It should read, "If the vet wants to put him down is that ok?"

It should read "If you took care of your dog I could walk to work and not have my heart break every day. TAKE HIM TO THE DOCTOR, ASSHOLE!"

Poor Buddy.

Happy Teacher's Day!

It's Teacher's Day here in K-Land. I'm going to go to work and maybe get me some presents. I'm not expecting much. I think last year I got a lollipop. I know I'm not going to get the present I really want, because that would be to stay at home in bed.

Bah, humbug.

TMI

I spent Monday, which was a holiday for me (Happy Birthday Buddha!) in bed. When I wasn't in bed, I was in the bathroom. On the toilet. Swearing and writhing. I started to not feel very well on Sunday and by Monday afternoon it was apparent I had picked up some kind of stomach bug. It wasn't pleasant.

When I wasn't gripping my mid-section and moaning, I spent a lot of time sleeping and I wondered if I was going to be able to make it to work the next day.

When I woke up on Tuesday, there was about five minutes where I thought I might actually be alright, but then suddenly it was like a fist grabbed ahold of my stomach and squeezed and twisted. Youch! I ran to sit atop my porcelain throne. I few minutes later I stood, feeling weak and shaky and turned to look into the bowl.

"Jesus Christ!" I thought, "I am soooooo sick. Look at that. It's purple."

This wasn't such a surprise, as all I'd consumed since Sunday afternoon was water and about a litre and a half of grape juice.

"But, that's messed up. It looks crystallized,....almost fuzzy!" I started to think about maybe going to the hospital. "I mean,...look at the edge there - it's black! Is that dried up blood? It's so fuzzy! What the hell is that? Oh, man. I think I might be dying!"

Was it my liver?
How'd my liver get out? There was nothing "solid" about what I'd just created in the toilet. How had my liver come out all liquid and reformed itself into this fuzzy mess?

"Ohmygod, I'm so siiiiiccckkkk,...it looks like a soooooccck," my brain shrieked.

...

"Wait a minute. That IS a sock! WHAT THE......???"

I was suddenly relieved that it wasn't my fuzzy purple liver, and it wasn't that I had eaten one of my socks while I was sleeping. When I pulled on my pyjama bottoms a few minutes earlier, a sock must have been balled up inside them and had fallen in the bowl when I'd yanked them down.

Lovely.

My stomach still hurts, but at least my liver seems to still be in place.