Today's Beast

I bet you were wondering what kind of beast I'd run into today, weren't you?

Well, I was on my way to the doctor's,...I can't seem to shake the remnants of whatever bug I picked up a couple weeks ago. I spent the night almost completely failing to sleep - with a wet barking cough that erupted every couple minutes. It's so humid here. Like being in a bowl of soup. I feel silly walking around snuffling and sneezing and coughing.

So I'd just taken a few steps out of the building and had to turn around to go fetch my camera. Speaking of barking,...

Fierce!

This little guy was tethered to a couple of tightly permed and colourful grandmas who sat on the street curb smoking thin cigarettes. Honestly, who does this to a little puppy? (No, I didn't colour the guy on the computer, that's actually how he looked!)

"Oh, this puppy is cute, but wouldn't he so much MORE so if he were pink?"
Sheesh!

Then I noticed the old woman holding the leash had a tattoo running up the inside of her arm from her wrist almost to her elbow. There's another thing you don't see everyday! I wanted to, but wasn't brave enough to ask if I could take her picture. And dye her hair. Pink.

Puppy was excited about the attention he was getting from me, and let me scratch his head and comment on his waggy tail, before he remembered how bloody hot it is and resumed an appropriate stance.

Yum!

You know it's definitely summertime in Korea once the green apples have shown up!

Funky Beetle Deux

I was headed down the stairs on my way to work today, when I felt my hand, which was sliding along the railing, come into contact with something. I shrieked when I saw it was a big bug. I've posted about this beast before. Bad beetle! But what surprised me the most was that this beast suddenly took flight - and headed right toward my nose! AGGHHHHH! I didn't know it could do that!

It settled down so I could take it's photo. You can still see his wings not quite tucked in properly.


Then it turned and glared at me, and threatened to try and fly up my nose again.

Uhhh, no thanks, buddy.

I showed a few of my students the picture today, and they recognized the beast immediately. Do you know what it's called here. (Remember, it's known as the Asian Longhorned Beetle in English.) In Korean it's called a SKY-COW! That's awesome!

I have to ask again tomorrow how to say it. I can't remember the word for "sky." This rivals my other favourite Korean word - "mool-jip" - which means blister, and translates as "water-house." Too precious!

Here's what was waiting on the railing when I came home.

It's a "samagee," also known as "kamakiri," which is Kamikaze's namesake in Japanese. I didn't touch this little guy, but he was ready to fight. He'd raise his little scary arms up when I put my finger near him.


I wonder what sort of beast I'll run into tomorrow.

Leave the Gun, Take the Cannolis

Back home in Canadanadingdong, today is the baptism of my beautiful new neice Farah.


Some of my family will gather together at some Catholic Church for the baptising of the baby and then head out somewhere for the eating of the food. This blog's title has something to do with the high probability of the presence of cannolis at the baptism post-feed. My sister-in-law and her family are all spirited Italians. I love hanging out with them. I love cannolis.

But moreso than that, the title is in reference to what I coulda been. I woulda been. Had I been in Canada for the baptism, I woulda been da Godfather. My sister-in-law's sister, Antonella is going to be da Godmother, and my brother told me a few weeks ago he wanted me to be da Godfather. (Really, Godmother part deux, but I like the idea of being a raspy-voiced marshmallow-filled-mouth Godfather better.) (Though - if I had gone the way of Godmother pt. 2, I'd slap a "Fairy" in front of the title.)

Regardless, I'm neither G-Father or G-Mother, as I'm half way round the world, and they just won't do these things by video phone. And they can't yet teletransport leftover cannolis to me either, so the whole thing is a wash as far as I'm concerned.

But, to all my family back home who never bother to read this blog, I hope you have a peaceful gathering and bask in the fellowship, love, and joy of family togetherne....

HA!

I couldn't keep a straight face.

I hope you reign in your passive aggressive grudgeholding and try to have a good time despite the tension that's going to feel like you're all wearing 10 neckties done up wayyyy too tight. At least enjoy the cannolis, eh?

WCB - 111 BookCat

I always make sure to have a couple of new books to read. Kamikaze likes to pre-read them and highlight parts that he thinks I'll really enjoy. When I brought my latest purchases home, he pounced right on one of the books. He's been looking forward to reading it!

Mine!

He lies on his back on the bed and holds the book up in the air while reading. We're often in the exact same pose. We both have a good laugh when we lick our fingers at the same time to turn the page.


Kamikaze has to really focus on what he's reading. His English has gotten a lot better since he first came to live with me, but still, Japanese is his mother-tongue. Look how hard he's concentrating.


This was, apparently, an especially riveting part of the book.


What's that Kami? You finished the book? Already?!? It was good? Right on! High five!

My turn now!

So while I start on The Kite Runner, Kamikaze's going to pre-read Barrel Fever. I know he's going to enjoy it. We love David Sedaris.

So, why don't you pick up a good book and have yourself a read? I've heard something about some new book about some wizard-kid has just come out. I should look into that.

But before you bury your nose in a book, what say you head on over to this weekend's round-up of fantastic felines over at Paulchen's Food Blog! Thanks to them for hosting this time around!

Hovel

This place creeps me out. I don't know why, really.

It's some kind of little storage shed with nothing in it. A couple weeks ago I noticed it was "open," and I screwed up my courage to step up and peer inside. I was fairly sure there was going to be an angry troll in there just waiting for a face to appear in his window so he could spring forward and bite said face off.
There was not a troll, though, and my face thankfully remains intact. It was a close call.
This is Jelly, reporting on mundane events that happen while walking around. Stay tuned next time, when Jelly finds a leaf that kind of looks like Kim Jong Il's head.

The Last to Know

Communication has always been sort of an issue at work. Usually I end up finding out about the things I need to to know because I ASK someone about it. "Hey! Where's Billy? He's been absent my last two classes."
Then I find out he and his family packed up and moved to China.
I tend to find out I have a new student in class (whose family probably just moved here from China) when I walk in and see a face I don't recognize. Then I get to scramble to rearrange plans a bit, or make a couple more of the handouts I've prepared.
But it's not just student issues.

All the students now know when our luxurious three-day-long summer vacation is. They know, because notices were handed out yesterday. I now know, on the other hand, because I asked one of the kids what it said on the paper. So, I've been given about eleven days advance notice to make plans. (Or not.) But, none of the other staff have bothered to fill me in, still!

And today a man showed up.

I've seen him a couple times before. He stopped in last week and went to talk with the boss in a closed classroom, and he popped in again this past Monday. I assumed he was one of the kid's fathers. However, he showed up again today and didn't leave! And then, there he was suddenly teaching! HUH?

So. From what I could make out from Sunny, the boss doesn't want to come in anymore at all. (She's only in two days a week now as it is.) And the manager doesn't want to teach. So maybe this guy is going to be our new teacher. I'm not sure if they hired him. I spoke to him very briefly today (He asked me the standard, "Where are you from, how old are you, are you married, do you live alone?" questions.) I replied too quickly, and he interrupted, "Slow. I only leetle Englishee." Awesome!

He's a big tall guy with some gold teeth and heavy framed glasses. He doesn't smile when I look at him, but stares at me when I'm not looking at him. We had the first of what will surely be many more awkward moments when we both tried going through the Teacher's Room door at the same time, and I accidentally smushed my head into his chest. And I smelled, for the first time in over three years, a very strange scent in the Staffroom. Man-scent. Man-breath.

The students yanked on my sleeves all day and cornered me. "Who's he?" they asked with big curious eyes. "I'm not sure." I answered honestly.

To add to what had already been a trying day, just before my last class, I had the 675th meeting in our ongoing series of meetings trying to resolve tax and pension. I truly thought we had settled it a month ago, until the figure my boss showed me last week, which she was about to start paying out in installments, didn't come close to matching what we had agreed upon.

So we finally got the chance to sit down and argue about it, and now I'm going to say it flat out, but she's a liar. She's twisted everything we had negotiated and is once again doing "but the tax and pension offices told me this!" And I got angrier and angrier. "No. No. No. NO!"

We're back to square one. She told me to make calls to confirm (AGAIN!) my information. I told her I'd make the calls, and I was going to go after EVERYTHING. I turned all Tyra Banks, "Understand. Me. I mean. Ev. Ree. Thing." And then I told her I had to go to class. (So kiss my ass!)

My sole middle school student asked me if I was alright when I came into the classroom. I wasn't, so much. I looked at myself in my little hand mirror and I was absolutely scarlet! The most crimson part of my face was the left side of my forehead that had smashed into the windshield over a month ago. It seems like I may have developed a Telletubbie-style mood window in my noggin. Fantastic! Now if only I could hone my laser-eye skills. Maybe my cat can give me some lessons.

Better

I'm just about done being sick. I'm feeling much better, and I'm helped along by the fact that today's a holiday. YAH!!! I hate how I've been (not) sleeping these past few weeks. I go to bed WAY too late, and wake up an hour or two before my alarm and just lay there with my mind rolling all over the place. My eyes are perma bloodshot. The next time I'm able to sleep through eight hours, I'm having a party. You're all invited!

Alien

Oh Baby!

Here's a cute little baby stuck to his mom's back.

I've reverted to being a baby. Mostly, when I haven't been working, I've been curled in a fetal position. I caught some bug last Wednesday that started with a cough but evolved into some beast with brutal stomach pains, a flood of "nose water," fire-lungs, fever, and,....well,...everything. Ebola. Black Plague. Something like that. I'm sleeping in shifts. I get a couple fitful hours in before Angry Black Death-Virus wakes me and starts batting me around.

Maybe you know what I'm talking about, but it's rough, being at work and realizing that you're just one spasmed cough or forceful sneeze away from crapping your pants.

Pleasant.

Typhoons come through here like scrub brushes. I lay in bed yesterday watching the clouds whip by as sheets of misty rain coated the forest outside my window. The day afterwards is almost always gorgeous. Typhoons seem to be a giant sponge, sucking out the humidity. Bloody heaps of praise to Allah and little baby Jesus.

From my balcony this morn':


If I feel up to it, I'll post something later on.

Dear Google Searcher

"Mammy Two Shoes Ass?" Really?

Boomtown

I don't like Mondays.
Rats!

Bruschetta

I woke up hungry. At 3 o'clock. Because I didn't go to sleep until after 9 a.m. Damned West Wing! But oh, it's such a good show. Rather, it was. And its kind of curious that I love it so much, because I actually don't care that much about politics. But I love the characters, and I love the actors that make the characters so awesome. Most of all, I love the writers that make the actors make their characters so quick, and sharp, and SMART! Outstanding! The writers from West Wing should have a reunion BBQ and roast the writers from the last couple seasons of Friends on great big spits. "Mmmmmmm," (Homer drool) "writers!"

Anyhow. I was hungry. What to eat? I spied a 3-day old baguette sitting on my counter and wondered if it was still viable. Hm. How about some bruschetta?

Okay!

Switch on the broiler. (My little table-top contraption with three gas burners has a little broiler in the bottom. It's okay for a couple pieces of fish, which I do occasionally, but mostly I use it for bread that won't fit in the toaster.)

Chop some cherry tomatoes, lovely purple onions I was happy to come across the other day, and rip apart some green olives, separating them from their pits. I threw in some dried basil (I've never seen fresh here) and a tiny bit of diced garlic. I tossed that up with some chili and garlic olive oil, and a little salt and pepper.

I toasted the bread on both sides and rubbed it with a couple cloves of garlic sliced in half. Then I spooned on the tomato concoction, added a wee sprinkling of shredded mozzarella and another tiny drizzle of olive oil, and back under the broiler just to melt the cheese a bit.


Deeeeeelicious!
I found a recipe for white gazpacho online the other week, and I wished I had a batch of that to enjoy with the bread. I've got a container full of homemade chicken broth in the freezer. BUT I don't have a blender, and I'm not sure if plain unsweetened yogurt is available here. I'd have to sour the cream myself, but that's do-able. Maybe next time. I love cold soups in the summer, don't you?

WCB -109 Cat With a Hat

Kamikaze's fancy legwarmers also double as a pretty pretty hat. He loves wearing it, and is even urging me to attach a veil to the back of it so he can march slowly around pretending to be a pretty pretty bride.


I'm not lying, you know.
Look how happy is is wearing his frilly little hat!

You can see the joy bursting out of him!

Then a strange thing happened.
He ripped his frilly hat off and started to change.
He turned into a demon cat.


Sheesh! Scary!
"Calm down, big boy! Here. Here's your frilly hat! Stop acting all crazy!"

So you best be moving along now or he's liable to gobble your legs up.
Go over to my friend Sher's site and check out all the WCB kitties Upsie's staying cool in the Cali heat. I hear ya, sister. It's pretty muggy here as well these days!

Maybe that's why Kamikaze's so very moody. Yes. That must be it. It's definitely not the frilly hat. He loves that hat, I tell ya.

Boo. Friggin'. Hoo.

Have you ever noticed. The way Tyra Banks. Talks. In. Short. Staccato. Sentences.?
Especially when she's. Trying to. Make. A. Point.
I can't watch her talk show, because it's laaaaaame. And the way she speaks. Really. Bugs. Me.

But occasionally I watch America's Next Top Model. Perhaps because she's not in any given episode all that much. And, you know, it's, like, "OhmyGod! Who's going to BE America's. Next. Top. Model?"

So anyhow, this week they're airing Season 7 here and the five remaining girls are in Barcelona. Tyra sits them down to have. A. Talk. She's been in the bidness fo' years, so you know she's full of sage advice for these young hopefulls. She tells them that the modelling industry is hard, so hard! It's probably one of "the toughest industries."

"If you're not a great actor, you can go to an acting coach and improve. If someone tells you you're sometimes singing off key, you can get voice lessons. But if a client says 'I just don't like her look,' what are you going to do? You're still YOU!"

Oh Tyra! How true! How very very very true! It is tough to be a model.

Orrrrr,...wait a minute! You could go to a gym. And for a massage. And then a plastic surgeon's office. Lipo, Botox, Lift, Fat-lips, Boob-job. Heal up at a spa. And then head to a beauty salon and have your colours done and a gorgeous haircut. And hire someone to do your makeup. And get a fan to blow your hair around luxuriously while a professional photographer snaps your pictures. Then they'll touch it up and airbrush the shit out of it.

But, yah. At the end of the day, you're still just you.
Poor little model!

You* and Me

*YOU are the BEAR.

Funky Beetle

Here's a little guy I snapped on my way to work. Such interesting colours.


But he's a bad mammajamma. From this site on the Asian Longhorned Beetle:

"A new and potentially serious threat to some of North America’s most beautiful and popular trees is the Asian Longhorned Beetle (Anoplophora glabripennis). Native to parts of Asia, the beetle is believed to have arrived in North America in the wooden packing material used in cargo shipments from China. Isolated Asian Longhorned Beetle infestations have been discovered in Brooklyn and Amityville, New York, and in Chicago, Illinois. In all instances where Asian Longhorned Beetles have been found, authorities have reacted quickly to stop the infestation from spreading.

Trees favored by the Asian Longhorned Beetle are predominantly maples, but infestations have also been discovered in horsechestnuts, poplars, willows, elms, mulberries and black locusts. Currently, there is no known chemical or biological defense against the Asian Longhorned Beetle and, in North America, they have few natural predators. In all cases of infestation, the affected trees are cut down and the wood destroyed."

Bad beetle. BAD!

Frost

I entered the staffroom today and it was positively frosty. It wasn't because the air conditioner had been turned on the moment the first person arrived either. (Nooooo! "Zine air cohn vill be toorned on at sree o'clock!" proclaimed the gestapo last week. "Vee onlee haf two schtudents at too o'clock!" was the rationale. Nevermind I'm sweating like a chicken at KFC. Nevermind it takes over a good hour for the conditioning of the air to occur after the systems been turned on. What? Are you guys saving a whole ten bucks in that jungle hour? Nice work, air-con nazi.)

No it was frosty because I didn't "Yassum ma'am" and "Thank yah, ma'am" my manager for sticking me with another class. I guess. I don't know what the deal was, I can only assume, since I was not spoken to by said manager all day. Or looked at. And because I put the SUCK in "SUCKer" I ended up teacher the class anyways. One grade eight student.

It's not always super fun to be working with a bunch of women. I tend to have a lot of guy friends. I don't have a lot of patience for pissy women. Frankly, I don't have a lot of patience for me when I'm being pissy. But if I am being a pain in the ass, I'll tell you why. It turns out Sunny's having a mole removed. But, my boss explained, her mother is so strong, she insists Sunny have a week off back at the homestead to recuperate. Seriously?

My mother and I have an ongoing joke lately. If anyone's causing her some grief, I say "Let me talk to them. No seriously. Give me their number. I'll call them and tell them what the hell's what." My mother puts on her "mom" voice, "Now Jennifer, you nevermind. Don't go causing trouble."

Recently I've threatened to call her (ex?)boyfriend, my uncle, an abandoned restaurant/pub we used to enjoy visiting, her cat for not coming home when called, and some vegetables that were going bad in her fridge. ("SERIOUSLY! Give me the broccoli's number!")

But that's in jest. And I'm trying to remain calm and reasonable. (See: stuff my feelings deep deep inside so I can hash them out eventually with an Air Marshall in a spectacular burst of rage when I don't get my extra glass of ice quick enough in-flight.)

It's too bad my worried mom didn't make a call after my car crash or my surgery to get me a week off! Anyhow, I blocked my manager's icy assault today with my own wall of bricks. Like I said, I suck!

I spoke with my boss about the possibility of vacation time in August, and was kind of surprised how smoothly it was agreed to. BUT, no more than 2 and a half weeks, and the flight's on my dime. Which isn't enough time, really, and isn't really fair about the cost of the flight either. (Just so you know, teachers here have their return airfare covered by their employers. Last year, I paid my own two thousand plus dollar airfare home for a similar vacation. I was about desperate to get the hell out of here for awhile, and was just happy to have been allowed the time off.) That's like spending about a hundred and fifty bucks per day to be home. Worth it? Mmmmmmaybe. But then there's all the money I spend there, plus the salary I'm NOT paid while I'm away. I wonder if I can broker a deal where I'm paid in full for the time I'm gone? Might be worth proposing. It's not like any of the other staff is paid extra for covering my classes. (Nor am I when I cover theirs.)

So I don't know. But that's not unusual, me not knowing. The alternative is just packing it in. I could collect some thousand, pass go, go home for four weeks or so, which is what I want, and roll the dice on a new gig in the fall. But it's not that simple either. There's cat concerns and stuff concerns. You wouldn't believe what I've managed to accumulate in over five years in Asia.

Pack up? Pack it in? Pakistan? Pachyderms? Pac-Man?
Pack me!

Issues

I arrived to work today to find us missing a teacher. Sunny's having some kind of surgery removing some sort of growth from inside or on her breast. I was told a few times "it's NOT cancer!" which is damned good news. "How do they know? Did they do a biopsy? Is it serious?" I asked. But, no one was able to let me know any details except to say that she's going to be absent for the whole week. I hope she's alright.

So my manager asked me to "do her a favour" and teach the last class tomorrow whereas I would normally catch a break and get out an hour earlier. I just looked at her plain-faced for awhile until she turned away and thanked me for agreeing to work. Only I hadn't agreed. "I have plans," I said.

A couple months ago I asked for a scheduling favour. I asked for my last-class break, which occurs on Tuesdays, to be switched with my 4 o'clock break that occurs on Thursdays. I'd been invited to attend an event in another city that Thursday night, and had told my friend I would probably be able to swing getting off early. If I taught the last class, I wasn't going to be able to go. Seeing as I very very rarely ask for any kind of amendment to my schedule I didn't think it was going to be a problem, but ohhhhhh, it was.

In the end it was "too bad, so sad" for me, and no one was even willing to articulate why I couldn't be granted this one change. My manager said we'd talk about it "later" (see: never) and that her visit to the doctor for a headache earlier in the day had messed up her mind so that she wasn't able to use her brain. Mmmm'kay.

So, while I'm not a great fan of "tit for tat," I was reminded of that happening a couple months ago when I was asked to lend a hand tonight. I've covered for absent teachers before. Many times, actually. And I've also been happy to be a team player in the past. I wavered as I headed to class tonight, letting guilt slip in and make me think I'd relent and agree to cover before I left for home. But then I noticed my manager sitting around eating ramen with a group of kids who were straggling from the previous class. Lady, if you're busy with managerial tasks and unable to teach, I understand. But, sheesh! Oh - and I noticed she'd parked students from her last class of the day (which she was covering) in front of a scrabble board, told two teams to pick about 15 tiles each and, there! Work it out! That's your English lesson today, kids!

I've got to talk to my boss tomorrow about the possibility of vacation time. In August. When I should be teaching "special classes" on top of my regular schedule. We've also for to talk about tax and pension monies, which it seems like I might be getting. Perhaps. (Cross your fingers.) And I've got to decide that if I'm not able to get back home for some time this summer, if it's time to just call it a day here. I'm hoping things are going to turn out well, but I'm not very sure at all.

Fern Flower

And a bug.

Toast-uh

A "toast-uh" is a Korean sandwich, often cooked up on the street in a little truck or from a cart. It's usually made of egg, a slice of ham or thin sausage patty kind of thing, maybe some cheese, and a pile of shredded cabbage doused with maybe Thousand Island dressing or ketchup and mayo on white bread that's been griddled grilled cheese-style. You can check out a picture on this Flickr page, or about 3/4 of the way down here on the fabulous Mary Eats site. It's not an entirely healthy snack, but it goes well during or after a night out of carousing. Or anytime.

Well recently a little shop called "Tomahto" opened up near my school, and I'd seen students walking around with a unique version of toast-uh. It was puffy and circular and reminded me of a Hot-Pocket, though I'm fairly sure I've never actually eaten a Hot-Pocket.

So as I was passing by the other day, I decided to stop in and treat my co-workers and myself to a sandwich. "Toast-uh, seyge juseyo," I requested. The lady rattled off a list of possible ingredients (?) and I chose "chamchi" - tuna. So as she went about assembling the first sandwich, my eyes widened. She piled a slice of white bread high with a myriad of stuff, and then plunked it onto a heated cast iron press that pinched off the corners and sealed the edges.

I've never seen anything like it.
This is Sunny's toast-uh.

It's made of tuna salad loaded with corn, peas, macaroni, and mayo. There's also a slice of ham, a few sweet pickles, a pile of shredded cabbage, a glob of mashed potatoes, and a slathering of strawberry jam.
??????

This is mine.

It was the third one made, and I ixnayed the tuna, since I'm not a fan of the peas and corn. So mine's mostly potatoes, ham, cabbage, pickles and strawberry jam.


It tasted,...well,....what do you think? It tasted gross. Like something a crazy pregnant woman with irrational cravings dreamed up. Ewwwwww. And I couldn't properly explain to my co-workers or students (who I fed most of my sandwich to) why it was so mental. To them it was seriously deelish. Ick!

Hulk, Smash!

I went out the other night with a friend of mine. I needed to get a new pair of sandals. I had been wearing the ones I bought last summer, but realized after they'd gotten drenched last week and I pulled my leg up to let the doctor change my bandages, that they reeked and that my toes were disgustingly dirty. It was worse when they were re-soaked on the way to dinner and a movie on Saturday and I caught whiff of what smelled like a wet dog wafting up to my nose from under the table. How embarrassing!

Anyhow, I snagged a cheapie pair of men's sport sandals and left my dirty dog ones on top of a pile of trash on the side of the road. I got two shoes. I got new shoes.

With that taken care of, Ben and I looked around for a spot to have some dinner. "There's a nice gogi-jip up over there," I said, pointing over yonder. "Or, there's a slummier but good one that way," gesturing in the opposite direction.
"Let's slum it!" said Ben.
As we approached the restaurant, Ben nodded toward a place a couple doors down. "How about there?"
"Makkoli?" (Danger, danger!) "Really?"
"Yah!! Makkoli!"
"Mmmmmmmmm,...ok!"

So we went inside and ordered up a crooked kettle of milky tangy rice wine and some doobu kimchi, and sat talking. As is always the case, we drew attention and ended up chatting with a couple of nice fellows. On the other side of us, a table of four girls arrived and sat down. I sensed them staring at us, and noticed how they gestured toward my new sandal. I knew it wasn't the beauty of my functional man-sandal, but the bit of my tattoo poking out from between the straps that drew their attention. I pretended I wasn't aware they were talking about me. Ben soon had them nicknamed. There was "Pink Girl" (for her T-shirt,) "Japanese Girl," because Ben thought she looked Japanese, "Spitty Girl," because she seemed to enjoy dropping large gobs of bubbly hork into the ashtray, and "60's Girl" because she was dressed a little retro in a long paisley baby-doll top and white capris with a pouffy bouffantish doo and giant hoop earrings. These were tough girls. All but Pink Girl were smoking at the table (very unusual) and their speech was peppered with eighteens and dog babies.

A conversation was struck up because 60's Girl told us to "shut up" as Ben and I hummed the theme from Jeopardy. I think we were deliberating on another crooked kettle. "What?" I asked. "Shut up?"
"No, no, no!" smiles and hand waving abounded. "Where are you prom-uh?" Subject changed.

A few moments later I returned from the washroom to find that Ben had joined their table. So I sat down on a stool Japanese Girl was patting beside her. Two guys had arrived as well, so now we were a group of eight. It was alright, "cheers" all around for a little while. Their group settled up first and left, but they beckoned to us from across the street as we exited, where they were parked in plastic chairs outside a convenience store. They invited us to join them in the park across the street. Inside the Family Mart, I bought a round of beers for everyone. When 60's Girl realized it was 'on me', she scurried her two Hite tall-boys back to the cooler and opted for a couple Heinekens. Double the price. Whatever. I was already very aware that she was a Princess. She demonstrated an inflated sense of entitlement, spoke in Whine, and ladled out cruel comments toward everyone in her vicinity.

We settled down in a wooden gazebo, cracked our cans of beer and cheers-ed each other. The night was warm, but there was a nice breeze. Everyone was in a fine mood, but it was getting a bit late. So Pink girl and her boyfriend headed out, followed by Ben, who had to work at six in the morning, and then Spitty Girl. I'd finished my beer and was thinking about heading across the road for one more before I called it a night, when the guy 60's Girl was snuggling up to offered me his Heineken, which was 3/4 full.

60's Girl protested, whining at length while smacking her new fella on the arm. She kept this up for a couple minutes, and also started gesturing at me with a classic Korean angry-face. Koreans can do angry-face like nobody I've ever seen. It's a wide eyed, knitted-eyebrow snarl. They'll cuss you quickly between bared clenched teeth, while they jut their chins out repeatedly to punctuate their curses. I usually find it pretty funny, actually. But coming from this twenty one year old,...too much.

I started out with a growled, "Look, I didn't ask for his beer but even if I'd wanted to, see this? See all these beers? I paid for them,....they're all mine!"
She continued to curse at me.
And I raised my voice.
And she flashed her teeth and gestured threateningly toward me.

And I LOST it.
Seriously, I cannot remember the last time I so completely blew my lid. I stood up and scuh-REAMED at her. I suggested she think about removing her snarl from her face, or I was going to remove her face from her face. She remained belligerent for awhile, until she realized that I might kill her. I think maybe it was my foaming at the mouth and tearing my hair out to throw at her.
I'm kidding.
But I was just livid.
And truly, it wasn't all about her by any means. I've felt so frustrated and strange and messed up over the past couple weeks - I know I was a volcano that was only barely still dormant. She was the straw for my camel-back, but oh, what a straw!
Soon enough she ended up in a ball in the middle of the gazebo, squished in tight to her man who was urging her to apologize, which she did, in a sing-song-la-dee-dah-not-sorry-at-all manner. "Sorry? My ASS, you're sorry!"

So I bellowed some more and whipped the can of Heineken at her head. (Truly, I wasn't aiming at her head. It whizzed by about a foot away from her right ear.) But it got her to start apologizing in earnest.
And suddenly my storm passed. "Go home." I pointed at them. "You. All of you. Go home, now."
I backed away so they could get themselves together and scramble off.

I watched as my skin faded from the deep olive green it had turned and the Hulk rage subsided. I was David Banner again. Easy going scientist teacher. Mild mannered me. Sort of.

I found an episode of The West Wing I watched last night to be interesting. One of the characters, Donna, had been in a horrible accident. When she was saying she wasn't ready to "talk to someone" about what had happened, she noted that she was experiencing classic symptoms, "quick to anger, and apt to cry over nothing." Check, check.

The body is quite the machine. Mine's healing well. But, it's my psyche that's messed up. As I sat solitary in the aftermath of my tornado, I realized every time I'm faced with trauma to my spirit, it's like I'm picking at the barely healed scabs that cover my heart. They're old wounds, and they're terribly slow to heal. When they're re-opened I can almost feel the poison leaking through myself.

I mentioned "faking it 'til you make it" before, but maybe even as I'm "making it" with my usually optimistic sunshiney attitude, I'm actually just faking it. Deep in my heart lies a Hulk.

Fruity

What


Is


This?

I've Got to Admit

I'm getting better. A little better all the time.

I went to the hospital today and had my stitches taken out. I've got a bit of an infection. I guess it's okay for now because the doctor didn't amputate it or anything. Actually, I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that there's glass inside my leg. When I was changing the bandage on my head the other day, I pulled out four little pieces of glass, and that area had been cleaned and re-dressed numerous times by three different doctors since the accident! I've also had to have more dug out from the bottom of my foot over the last couple weeks. My knee is still swollen and purple, but numb. I could jab a pencil in it and wouldn't feel it. Doc says it may be another month or so before feeling comes back, but maybe not. I'm still numb on the other half of my forehead where I fell about a year ago. Who knows? I still have a headache everyday, and my neck and shoulders are all screwed up. But really, I am getting better.

A few days after the accident I bought myself the fifth season of The Sopranos, and I was bummed that I finished it this past Saturday night. I don't know if the sixth season pt.1 has been released here. I haven't come across it. I lucked out tonight though, and found seasons six and seven of The West Wing! Yuh-huh, I've got 44 episodes on deck.

I wish I was sleeping better, but since I'm not I'm finding that I want to keep myself distracted at all times. If I give myself too much time to be alone with my thoughts, I tend to head down deep and dark tubes. My heart flips around in my chest and I feel panicked. I haven't felt like talking much. Everything bugs me lately. This post bugs me.

I have realized that I should become an actress. I'm doling out daily Oscar worthy performances in the classroom. I'm channeling Robin Williams in Dead Poets. So, there's that.

You know, fake it 'til you make it sort of thing.
How you guys doing?

Flower Power

WCB 107 - Prison Heat

Kamikaze found himself imprisoned in his carrot when I rescued my clothes horse full of laundry from the rain that was starting to pour outside. I plunked the drying rack right overtop of him, his carrot, and his fancy leg warmers.


Why for you jail me?


Downstairs there was a racket. Holy YOWLINESS! What's up with all the noise? Can you spot the culprits?


I've heard other parts of Korea have had their share of hot muggy weather, but down here I can't complain too much. We've has a couple short spells of hot, but generally it's been very nice - sunny days and nice breezes. The night temperatures have been cooperating and dropped down to provide pleasant sleeping weather. This past week was the first real taste of summer we got, and the air conditioner was finally turned on at work. Now we get to have the battle of the temperature setting, though. My co-workers seem to like a setting of 25 which makes the machine constantly cycle off. It only takes a couple minutes in the classroom to realize there's no air, and within ten minutes I'm breaking a sweat. So I sneak out and set the air conditioner to 22. Ah, that's better. Constant coolness. Then one of my co-workers notices the revised setting and bumps it back up. We'll continue this battle for the next three months or so.

But, speaking of a taste of summer, what's better than ice cream?

Nothing. Nothing's better than ice cream, I tell ya!

Kamikaze agrees. When he spies something that resembles an ice bream bar or cone he manoeuvres himself to be right beside me and then looks expectantly from me to the ice cream to me to the ice cream.
Gimme!

Mmmmmm! Pistaschioliciousness!!

Ice cream bars and cones are anywhere from fifty to eighty cents here. T'ain't nothing wrong with that, eh?

Now I order you to go see other kitties at this weekend's hosting spot Scamperdude.com. Check out Scamperdude, the rock star super-hero!

Swear Jar

My brother pointed this Budweiser commercial out to me.

Not Much to Report

Headache. Taxi. Neurologist. Orthopedic Doc. X-Rays. Physiotherapy. Injection Room. Pharmacy. Pills. Taxi.
The weather is gorgeous.

Riddle Me This

How does one walk with crutches while holding an umbrella? It's raining. I'm thinking maybe I can fasten an umbrella to my head with duct tape. I can't sleep these days, so I have time to come up with a plan.

A Little Mercy

The doctor isn't liking the way my leg's looking. He definitely wasn't too happy to see I'd taken the splint off. I think if his English was better he would have really scolded me. He'd like me to not walk on it at all. He wrote down his telephone number and asked me to have my Wonjangnim (boss) call him when I got to work. So Jane spoke with him and then she scolded me - kind of sort of. My not walking is contrary to being at work, which isn't in the school's best interest.

But I guess the doctor was pretty serious, and I'll bet he used the Korean word for "bed-rest," because he told me twice in English that's what I should be doing. He mentioned ligaments to Jane, and that we'll probably need more X-rays and such on Saturday. He wouldn't take the crutches back, so I've been making an effort to use them. It takes a long time to get anywhere on them, and I feel kind of silly knowing I can just tuck them under my arm and walk much faster. I know I have a tendency to do things because I can, regardless of if I should. I find it really difficult to try and stay seated in the classroom.

So when I had a break at 4 o'clock, Jane spent about 20 minutes rubbing ice on my giant purple leg before deciding that I could go home. I actually misted up with gratefulness. She told me they should have given me some time to rest, but that she really appreciates me coming in. Tomorrow I'm going to visit my usual doctor to have the dressing on my forehead changed before work. The hospital visits are costing about fifty bucks a day, compared to the four dollars I pay at Dr. Demento Dolphin-Head's office.

In other news, I just got my very first dirty phone call in Korea. (Isn't there a term for a wanking heavy breather on the phone? It seems to me there used to be a word for it, before the invention of called ID.) After I said, "Hello?" the guy whispered "Wait-uh," and then there was some heavy breathing before he said "Pone-uh sex-uh hagushipseyo." I listened to him breathe and groan a bit before he said "Hello? Huuhhhh huuuuhhh" and then I laughed and said "Bye-bye!" I heard him protesting as I hung up, but he didn't call back.

A Muslim fellow I know called tonight and invited me out on the weekend. His Korean friend just got a new car and wants to go for a long drive. I declined. I think I'll not leave my apartment this weekend besides the hospital visit on Saturday. There's a good chance I'll feel lonely and blue. If anyone wants to chat, let me know, eh?

Crutch

I went and got my splint and crutches today. Have you ever seen these splint thingies? I was thinking I'd maybe have yardsticks affixed to either side of my leg with masking tape or something. Turns out they lay you down on a gurney and then prop your leg up at the knee on what looks like one of those table-top ironing boards. Then they apply what feels like something made out of that evil morphy guy in the Terminator movie to the back of your leg. It's hot and wet and moulds to the shape of your bent leg. Your leg is then wrapped mummy style in tensor bandages and once everything had cooled and hardened you get to put your jeans back on and they get soaked. I was bound from mid-thigh to ankle.

"Here, have some crutches, SUCKER!" the nurse said to me in Korean. I think.

Then I was led to the fourth floor, otherwise known as the FIFTH floor for some physical therapy on my neck and shoulders. Like thirteen back home, four is the bad luck number here and it's eliminated in hospitals because of superstitions. I was instructed to lie down on a gurney beside a window. Again, a wonderful breeze made me feel content, and my head and shoulders were cushioned by this heated plushy pillow. I could have stayed there all day. Then I was flipped over and had twenty minutes worth of electrical pulse therapy. It felt weird at first, but then got to be quite nice. I think I'll get me some more of that tomorrow.

When I was in high school, my brother broke his leg playing hockey. For days after he got his cast on, I'd come home after school and find him in his room with things stuck down inside - pencils, rulers, a long barbecue fork - trying to reach the itchy parts. It was driving him nuts. On about the fifth day, I came home to find him with a hack saw stuck down in his cast. He couldn't reach the itch at the bottom of his foot, and he was angrily cutting himself free.

Well, turns out he lasted a hell of a lot longer than I did. Getting into a taxi made me realize how cumbersome having an unbending leg for a week was going to be. The splint dug painfully into my heel when I sat down, and gaped stupidly at the back of my thigh when I stood up. It was hot and itchy and unpleasant. Right after my first class finished, I went into an empty classroom, took my jeans off and de-splinted. I could not get the hang of walking on the crutches, anyhow. My mind would instruct my body, "two crutches and left leg together, okay - right leg, two crutches and left leg, right leg,..." but my body was spastically scuttling around like I suddenly had four legs that all needed to move at different times. I ended up walking stiff legged and carrying the crutches in my hand.

So I might as well have just gone to the hospital and handed them a hundred bucks to not do anything and jumped back in a cab to go to work. It kind of seemed they were insisting on demobilizing my leg just to BUG me anyhow. It kind of seems like everyone is existing these days just to bug me. I think they wake up in the morning and think, "Hmmmm. How can I bug Jenn if I happen to cross her path today?"

Maybe tomorrow they'll find someone else to annoy (and I'll be in a brighter mood). Bear with me, folks.

Crashed

Hey. How you doing?

Me? Not so great.

I haven't been sleeping well at all, and I feel pretty exhausted. I'm also having a hard time reigning in my emotions. I took a cab to the hospital today, and he drove quickly - as cabbies tend to do here - down the hill from my apartment. We came to a screechy sudden stop at the bottom where there's a blind turn, and narrowly missed hitting a car that was coming through the intersection. I screamed, "FUCK!!!" and then started to cry. Granted, I wasn't wailing like a baby who needs a diaper change - my pants were still dry, in fact. But yet, there was a steady flow of tears that I just couldn't staunch. I arrived at the hospital to find that all the doctors were having lunch, and it was going to be a fifty minute wait. So I parked myself on a bench in an empty waiting area outside of the neurosurgery and (I don't know the name of the doctor who handles giant swollen bruised legs) offices. A fantastic breeze was blowing through the corridor and I just sat there and cried. I wasn't even terribly self conscious about it. A hospital's a great place to go and have a good cry. People are crying in there all the time I'm sure. Thing is, I can't be at the hospital all day long. But all day long is the duration that I feel like crying.

I feel panicked most of the time.

On Monday I went to the hospital for more X-rays and bandage changing, and I met up with my friend the car-crasher. We had to go downtown together to fill out a police report. We had Jane meet us to make sure I knew what was going on. It was pretty uneventful. My report read, "I was a passenger in my friend's car early Saturday morning. Suddenly, we crashed. I was surprised."

I don't remember what I was doing before the accident. I remember being surprised. I didn't know what was happening as I was smashing into the windshield. It wasn't until the car had settled on its side and felt water seeping in and blood dripping down my face that I figured out we weren't on the road anymore. I don't even know how long I was trapped in there. It was dark when we crashed, and it was daylight when I was in the ambulance.

It was a cat, my friend explained to the police. He'd swerved to avoid a cat. I hadn't even asked him what happened. I assumed it was the curvy wet roads and that he'd maybe taken a turn too fast. Back in the car after the police station, I turned to him and asked, "Was there really a cat?" He answered in a way that I totally believe him. Isn't it weird I pandified my face last June to avoid killing a cat as well?

Five minutes away from the station, there was a police officer in the middle of the road who waved us over. "What's wrong?" I asked. My friend pointed to the front of him where there was no seat belt. I had learned my lesson and was buckled in. Buddy got a ticket.

Tomorrow the doctor who deals with mangled legs wants to put me in a splint and on crutches. He would have done so today, but my jeans weren't loose enough to facilitate the splint. The doctor told me they'd give me hospital pants, but there's no bloody way I was going to work in those. The swelling and bruising is working its way down from my knee to my whole leg, and the doctor says if I keep doing things like walking and bending it's only going to get worse and more painful. I thought I was going to avoid a panda eye when I was still okay on Monday afternoon. I noticed some blackening in the corner after my last class, though, and woke up Tuesday morning after three hours of non-restful sleep with this:


Down at the store before work today I noticed the strap of my bag that was crossing over my chest was stained with blood. I immediately wanted to go back to the bench in the hallway at the hospital and cry some more.

At school, we had four bodies to cover classes. Only two of the six periods that make up the day had each of the three classrooms full. At any given time, one of my co-workers wasn't teaching, and more often two of them were sitting in the staffroom chatting and snacking. Sunny only taught one and a half classes today. I worked all of them. Everytime I'd hobble in there I'd seethe. When Jane criticized me for leaving the class alone to go make copies for two new students, I just about grabbed my blood soaked bag to go hobble home. Heartless. Honestly, when I'm not feeling like I'm going to cry, I'm feeling like I want to punch someone in the head. I DO NOT want to have my leg splinted tomorrow. I DON'T want crutches, but the doctor's insisting. At least I'll have something to hit people with, I guess.

Happy Anniversary

Today marks the start of my 4th year in my silly little town. Wheeee!

I didn't realize yesterday that I was going to feel worse today, but Holy Helga with a Hula Hoop,...everything hurts. Actually, maybe I have a couple toes on each foot that are alright. But even with painkillers, my muscles are screwwwwwed. All of them. Whatever's happening under the bandage on my forehead isn't good. There's seepage. My name is Jenny Limps-A-Lot.

I want someone to wash my hair. I'm not supposed to get my forehead wet, though. And there's still glass in my hair. I wonder if when I finally shampoo if I'm going to end up grinding the shards into my skull. I want someone to chew some food and regurgitate it Mama-Bird style into my mouth. It hurts to move my jaw.

I've only been able to sleep an hour or so at a time. I've hardly slept at all. I'm really tired.

Thank you, to folks who've commented. I am very thankful that it wasn't worse than it was. But still, as far as things go, it was pretty messed up. It's my anniversary. Where's the cake and the party hats?

Wreck

I've had quite a number of "firsts" whilst I've been in Korea. There always seems to be something new around the corner. Some "firsts" are good. Some bad. A few hours ago was awful. I was involved in my first car crash.

I was a passenger in my friend's car as we drove back to my town from the just rained on and un-fun beach. He navigated the small windy unlit roads through the countryside and we drove along happy and chatty until suddenly my head was smashing into the windshield. I ended up twisted with my friend in the driver's side as the car careened and flipped down an embankment and landed on its side. He managed to slide out through a small space in the half rolled down window, and then climbed on top of the car and opened the passenger door, yelling at me to get up and climb out. But I couldn't. My leg felt mangled and I felt - well I guess I was in shock, hyperventilating and trying not to pass out. Everything kept going grey. He kept talking to me, and I stayed conscious. Reaching into the cold muddy water through the window beside me, I found things: pens that had fallen out of my bag, my new nerdy glasses, mangled. My sandal.

I stayed there bleeding, half in the drivers seat and half on the door, crying and quietly saying stupid things. "Oh! My glasses! I really liked these! Is there a frog here?"

Finally, people showed up. They covered me with some white blanket and a man reached down through the passenger door and held my shaking hand as a fireman took an axe to the sunroof beside me. It was sturdy glass and seemed to take a long time to break. Arms came in and hauled me out. More hands held me up as I limped toward a stone wall, and other hands pulled me up onto the road and led me to an ambulance. It was my first ambulance ride, too!

We drove to the hospital. Sadly, I don't recall sirens. (What's a ride in an ambulance or firetruck without sirens?!?) I bet there were swirly lights though, so that's something. The EMT held scissors up, saying she was going to cut my jeans open. I shrugged, but came to my senses just as she was going to shear me. These are my favourite (now blood-soaked) jeans. I sat up and hiked them up to my thigh.

This was actually a few minutes after the nurses cleaned me up.

Pretty.

I guess I'm unveiling my regular summer look. Seriously. Why does June hate me so much?

Then I had some bandages.

And fifteen stitches up the side of my right leg. And a left knee that is hot and swollen and so purple and blue. Cuts and scratches everywhere. And X-rays on everything. And an MRI.

And no broken bones. And (apparently) no brain damage. And a $220 bill.

My friend had already vamoosed, headed toward the police station to fill out a report, and then to the airport to catch a flight to Seoul. When I called my manager to tell her what happened she shrieked that he should have paid my bill. Maybe. I don't know. It was, afterall, an accident. Right now I don't care. I feel shaken and stirred. I called my mother (who I wish was here) and my brother to tell them about the accident and that I love them. At least I'm alive.

I'm picking bits of glass and dried chunks of blood out of my hair, and kissing the individual packs of painkillers the hospital gave me. I'm still discovering new injuries. I just this moment noticed about six lines of scratches on my left ass cheek when I went to take a pee. It looks like a tiger swiped me.

But, I'm still here.

Movies

I watched Adaptation again tonight. I think I've seen it four or five times, and it's one of those movies that I like better every time I see it. I saw Dreamgirls. Meh. I might have enjoyed it more if I didn't have to snatch up the remote to lower the volume every time they started to sing (which was often) and volume back up during dialogue because it sounded like everyone was whispering.

I watched a movie called something like "Yobi: The Nine Tailed Fox," which was certainly an animated children's version of Gumiho, a 1994 Korean film. It made me cry. I'm such a big baby.

Last night I tried to watch Smokin' Aces, but realized about a third of the way in I had no idea what was going on. I was too busy yapping with my friend. So we switched to the movie he'd brought, Chung Hing sam lam, and the movie played in its entirety. When it finished I only barely knew what had happened. Chattiness does not make for a good movie experience.

I watched Lady in the Water which was weird. I really like Paul Giamatti, and he did a good job acting, despite the story being too strange. My manager watched the DVD on Wednesday and today at school she was all flustered because it was all a LIE. The story was most definitely NOT a Korean fable.
"But, it's not real, Jane."
"Yes, exactly! I NEVER heard that story as a child."
"I mean, it's not real."
"No! It's not real! I asked my mother if she ever heard that story...."
"No, I mean it's NOT real! The fable isn't a real fable. The writer/director/producer/actor actually made the story up for his children."
"Oh!" she said, letting it sink in. "Oh,....it's not real!"
"No, it's just a story about a made up fable."
"Oh."

I watched Blood Diamond. 'Twas good. It ticked Jane off as well, though. "How are we supposed to know which is a blood diamond and which isn't?!?!"

The Korean movie Maundy Thursday was pretty good. A bit Dead Man Walking-ish. I watched another Korean movie last week that was so dreadful I fast forwarded through the last half of it, hoping all the characters would die. They didn't. I was trying to evoke the power I felt when I wished so hard that Meg Ryan, riding her bike- happy and in love- in City of Angels would get hit by a truck. And then SPLAT! Hello, truck! (Just after that happened I remember feeling a bit guilty. Ha!)

So there you have it. I'm no Ebert, huh? If you want my recommendation, for an enjoyable movie night, pick a Charlie Kaufman film.

Phonics

One of my six o'clock classes is a mix of 4th to 6th graders. They're really beginners, and while some of them are doing quite well, others are really struggling. I'm teaching them how to read. Right now we're attempting to master vowel sounds.

An aside. One thing that drives me crazy is the Korean teachers' insistence on correlating English phonics with hangul. It works out okay vowel wise, except when it comes to SHORT i. The symbol they use is,...well I can't type it on my English keyboard - but it equates to a LONG e. There simply is no Korean sound to equate to a SHORT i, (or p, or f, or th, or,....you get the idea.) After the K-teachers teach the LONG e for SHORT i thing, I get to try to re-teach them to say "ih." It's FISH instead of FEESH. (Or worse "peeshu.") I can't even teach them to swear properly. When I want them to say the bad-speak for "excrement," they end up talking about their bed linens.

But anyhow, with my class we were working on SHORT u today. The text had some good examples, -u- -ut- but, cut, hut. I'd go through with the whole class, "Everyone! Uh, Uht,..." and then call on an individual to try to make out the next three words. I always head to the brighter stars of the class so they can (hopefully) demonstrate how it's done.

But I ran out of text examples, so was winging it on the board. It doesn't really matter if the words make sense,...I'm not defining them for the students. It's all about the reading. But for my mind it's easier to put real words up if I can.

So I was all -u- -uck- luck, duck, muck. Yes, stay far away from the "F" sensei! And then it was -u- -unt- hunt,....uhhhh? Not being able to think of another word, I wrote a "c" and then uttered, "For God's sake, Jenn." and erased the whole thing. English is a mine zone.

"Let's move on class! Repeat after me! -u- -uh- duh, duuuuuh, duuuuuuuuuh."

Crackdown

Just tonight, the Nomad mentions that a month long crackdown has commenced in Seoul . Police are targeting motorists who don't stop behind the lines at intersections. Go, coppers!

Actually, just tonight I was getting all riled up on a public bus headed into the city. Out in the countryside here, nevermind the lines at intersections, red stoplights are considered mere suggestions. Like, "Maybe, if you feel like it, and if you're not too involved in your cellphone conversation, you might want to perhaps think about possibly stopping for this red light. At least slow down? No? Okay, then. Just whiz on through - you asshole." What's the worst is when bus drivers decide they don't have to stop for red lights. In that case, they're making the decision to risk my life. Yet, I've never ever heard another passenger say anything as we sail through what is hopefully a clear intersection. My bus driver tonight wasn't too bad, and only ran one red. At one red light where he actually came to a complete stop, a scooter trying to make a lefthand turn on his green light inched out into the intersection to (wisely) make sure the cars coming through on the other side of our bus were coming to a stop. Two of them sped through before the scooter was able to make his turn. If that scooter guy hadn't been cautious, he would have gotten creamed.

I sat and seethed and cursed the back windows of the cars that had ignored the traffic signal. I'm not a traffic nazi. I can understand coming to an intersection in the countryside, crawling to a slow and performing a courtesy momentary stop before carrying on, but only after you've established there's nothing coming in either direction. But these folks don't even slow down. I've been behind them many times, and brake lights don't come on at all. It's likely that they've driven these roads many many times and know the chances of a vehicle coming through in the opposite direction is very slim. But then there will be the one time they're wrong. And that, as they say, will be that.

So for the rest of the journey I designed machines in my mind that would do the cop's jobs for them.

First, a spike strip that launches as the light turns red. It doesn't have to launch every time. These guys seem to like Russian roulette. Maybe four out of five times they'll get through. But on the fifth, oi! You need four new tires, tough guy!

Then I designed a ramp that would lift up and careen the speeding car Dukes of Hazzard style into a waist deep swamp off the side of the road. Oi! Tow truck time!

My third booby trap was kind of similar, but instead of the swamp, the car would get ushered into a cage full of lions. Roll your windows up, Speedy McSpeedster! (Don't worry, the lions are full - they're not going to eat the carfull of people. I'm not heartless.) But the Speedster will have to wait for a trained animal technician to arrive to get them out of the cage. And to think Buddy was running red lights because he was in a hurry,...those animal technicians are like refrigerator deliverymen!

Then my inventions just got silly. Lasers zapped from outerspace. And webs jettisoned by Spider Men. And policemen hiding behind billboards doing their job. Crazy-talk.

Punk

I've had one middle school student for about seven months or so. In all that time, I never noticed that she has what looks like a little baby's finger growing out of her head beside her ear. I might never have noticed, except she came to class last Thursday with this:


Four new earrings now, where the day before there were none. As soon as she walked through the door, I saw her new punky ear. I was quite surprised, actually. Korea is a pretty conservative place, and this girl has only just started grade eight!


I called my boss into my class as she passed by and told her to have a look. She said, "If she were my daughter, I'd want to kill her." My student says her mother thinks it's pretty, and that her teachers don't care. I find these details surprising as well. I also found it interesting that she decided to decorate the ear with the baby-finger growing out of it, leaving the other finger-free one bare.

I can't figure this kid out, actually. She really marches to her own drummer. She's got huge owlish black rimmed round glasses, and her teeth are all serrated. It kind of looks like she went to a specialist to have them filed into three jagged little points each. She wears her pleated school uniform skirt almost down to her ankles, and likes to skip class a couple times a week. She's by far the lowest levelled student in the class, and likes to sneak in text messages on her phone when it seems like I'm not paying attention. She doesn't have a really bad attitude, but she also seems to really not care about studying, preferring to shrug her shoulders and whine she doesn't understand the task, despite it being explained in both English and Korean.

Today, one of her friends switched from the higher levelled 5 o'clock class and now it looks like my formerly enjoyable class is going to head down the tubes. With Punk's aversion to studying, and her friend's general pissy attitude, they're adopting a too-cool-for-school stance, and scaring the other two fantastic younger girls into silence. During a speaking exercise today, where I encouraged them to work with one another they wriggled around and sighed and finally just leaned over and copied each other's surveys. I was already exhasperated, and tossed my pencil down and sat there staring at them for the last five minutes.

It didn't help that we've got no new textbooks to start our new "semester." I knew this was going to happen. It always does. Even though we've been working toward finishing up the textbooks for the last three months and the supervisors know we're going to need new texts, they don't order them in time. Just about nothing is done in a timely manner here. Last week we were running around to get all the paperwork done for my new visa the day before it needed to be handed in, even though that deadline has been approaching for the last twelve months!

It's not a huge deal, though. Truly, I've gotten used to it and learned it's easier to just smile and shake my head a bit instead of throwing a tantrum. It's not like all the students won't benefit from a week's worth of review anyhow. One more day 'til a holiday!

Guess

I like one out of these three things. Can you guess which one?

Here we have "moo-kimchi" - which is white radish that's strong smelling, crunchy, and spicy sweet. Beside that is ubiquitous "bondeggi" - silkworm larvae (see:bugs). And finally, there's makkoli, a fermented rice wine which is always served in crooked kettles at restaurants and drank out of bowls. It's a favourite drink on rainy days, and goes well with "pajeon," which is sometimes called as "Korean pizza" - though I think "Korean pancake" is a better description.

I enjoyed one of these three things the other Friday night when Joy - my former co-worker came back into town. I was surprised to see her face in the window of the 1st class I was teaching that day! We made arrangements to meet after work, so three of us (Sunny, my current co-worker came as well) met up for some makkoli. I really miss Joy!

I like Sunny well enough, but communicating with her is really challenging. She keeps asking me to do things with her, shopping or going out for dinner, but I'm wary and don't think I'd have the patience for it. But it's always fine when we go out with another person who can speak English well. Joy and I talked and talked, and I knew Sunny wasn't able to keep up with it, but Joy would translate the gist of the conversation.

Sunny has a gaspy laugh (he-he huuuuuu he-he huuuuuu) which gets more pronnounced when she drinks, and she can't drink very much at all. After a bowl of makkoli, she's bright red! Maybe she's allergic. As we walked to meet Joy that night, we chatted a little bit. She was trying to ask me what I thought was special about Korean culture, but it took a few minutes for her to put the words together so I could understand what she was getting at. I said, "I think your English is special!" Everytime we'd have to cross a street she'd link her arm through mine and clutch me to her, and I'd try to shake her off. "Oh, Jenny! Be careful!" I told her I'd managed to not get sucked under a passing car thus far in life, and I was pretty sure I could cross the street unassisted. She laughed breathily at me, not knowing what the hell I was talking about.

After Joy and I finished the lion's share of three kettles of makkoli, we headed off to the noraebang for some singing. Time flies so fast in those dark singing rooms, and it was a lot of fun. It was almost two in the morning when we finally emerged. Joy and I headed across the street to the park where she could sober up a bit before going home, and Sunny walked off in the direction of her brother's apartment where she's staying with his family.

I found out Monday that her brother had been waiting up for her when she got home. He shouted at her awhile and she ended up crying and apologizing for coming home after two a.m., sober and twenty nine years old, on a Friday night. I just can't relate to it.

It was so good to have a little Joy for some time. I wish she was still working with us. This past week, Sunny actually called in sick on Thursday. No one was feeling particularily fantastic this week. Jane's back is still acting up, Sunny has an awful cold, and I've been worrying about things back home. Next week, though, is a short week - broken up by a holiday on Wednesday. Good. My visa got renewed for another year, which isn't to say I'll be staying here another year,...but I wasn't going to be leaving last Thursday when my current visa expired. So there you have it.

Bugs.

WCB 104 - Ballet

First off, let's have a look at this week's Laser Cats out and about in the neighbourhood. This cat waits for chicken to fall out from the chicken restaurant.

Do you have chicken?


No? Then get lost!


I don't know if these two are lovers or fighters, but they were making a HUGE racket. The lower one was chasing the higher one all over town last Tuesday. I actually left my dinner at a restaurant and walked outside to see what all the fuss was about.


Back at home, Kamikaze is a tiny dancer.
I got a red rose the other night, and it was all fancy, wrapped in ribbons. Some of the ribbons I thought would be perfect accessories for Kamikaze as he practices his dance routine. He didn't really agree, turns out.


I don't think he appreciated me laughing my head off at him either.


This move is called "What the Hell?" Apparently, one cannot turn upright with these frilly legwarmers on. One can only wave ones paws wildly and curse the big laughing meanie who put them on.


For more Weekend Catblogginess, head on over to CatSynth.com and check out Luna and all the other kitties! Thanks for hosting, guys!