Seoul Circa 1970

Talking with the school's vice principal is nearly impossible for me. He is an awkwardly shy man, who's soft voice runs through the Korean language fully expecting my ears can keep up. It's a constant struggle but over this half year we've developed a good relationship (mostly by not talking). My favorite catch phrase of his, "Let's go eat together" signals my lunch hour and it never comes soon enough. The other day while walking to the cafeteria he was trying to ask me about the heating in my classroom. I made a small complaint because I didn't know how to turn down the heat. This made him shake his head and giggle.

Luckily we ran into Mr. Bae at this time to translate because he then started off on a long story of teaching hardships and woes. In 1970 Seoul he would of loved to of had any classroom heat let alone too much heat. Before overdoing it completetly with his tales of walking to work uphill both ways in blizzards all year round. He told us about his largest class ever of 86 students in it. That's five short of all the kids in our whole school now. He made sure I understood this number repeating it five times in Korean before echoing my shocked and very high pitched 86 back at me in English. Seeing as we were talking about my heating issues I just thought, with that many bodies in a room do you even need a heater? Man what a whiner.

American Thanksgiving

Joel's American Thanksgiving Luncheon was an amazing time. The turkey was perfectly stuffed and cooked by Jes who had Seajin believing that it's a tradition to pee on the turkey for extra flavour. There was no shortage of food and my mistake was loading up on the snacks that Joel had made with love.

My sole contribution to the lunch was a spicy dip that Heidi had sent over from Texas.

Teddy rocking out in his leather pants.

Tony and Joel taking a break from entertaining.

Shelly and I enjoying a gorgeous crisp autumn day.

The two Koreans, Kiwi and Brit were all new to Amercing Thanksgiving and so didn't make it into this photo. Joel and Jes were fully qualified for this day but Shelly and I with half American families felt alright using this day to kick off the holiday season celebrations.

The gang lubed before heading off to meet up at Teddy's bar Bliss.

I didn't last as long as the others at Bliss but did have fun dancing, wearing Teddy's riding Helmet, taking ridiculous pictures and making a million appointments for the future. Unfortunately, I made these plans while dancing in a helmet amid a flurry of camera flashes. I have no idea when I'm having a mid week dinner, touring a Russian Whore Bar, getting together with others for our annual Christmas Dinner or heading off to Shanghai to visit James.

Singin' in the Rain

I got caught in the rain on the way home and instead of buying an umbrella right outside the subway exit, I decided to plow on home without. This fall is the first time I can remember thunder showers dominating the season and I love it. When the sky fills with light and thunder echoes off the buildings there is no better reminder that nature rules. At first it was a nice cleansing walk but once I felt my money soaking up the rain I clearly had made a silly decision. My shoes squeaked meekly as I climbed the stairs to our place confirming my drenched state.

When I peeled my now extra heavy clothes off I started to feel stupid but I quickly thought about Seajin and Saturday night to cheer me up. After the wedding we went out dancing where Saejin (and his self tittle "up tight ass") did his infamous bum dip move and he busted straight out of his third pair of pants in two years. Luckily we had our clothes from Friday night so he quickly ran off to the washroom to change. On Monday he returned his pants to the store where he placed the guilt of his pants riping on the weak threading. He claimed he sat down at the start of the wedding and his pants ripped apart. He then went on about his total embarrassment and continued to build up his fake story and subsequent shame. The store manager apologised more than twenty times before Seajin let him set him up with another pair.

Autumn's Return

I'm happy to report that fall has decided to return for one final stay and just in time for American Thanksgiving. This weekend Joel is playing Dad and will carve a nice big turkey up for his American friends and the rest of us hanger-ons. The only trouble is that the food is being served at lunch time and with that comes drinks. It could turn out ugly early and may end up being a real dysfunctional family gathering. I'm excited.

I took these pictures off my camera before it decided to run away. They are from a small hill near my old place. As for the camera situation, it looks like it's been resolved. Yun Jung has graciously given me her camera. For her wedding, her brother who is studying in Japan, is bringing her a new camera making this one her old one. I love Koreans who upgrade every six months. I tried my best to refuse the gift but she honestly wanted me to have it and named her price as a nice Sushi dinner.

Watching Others

Tomorrow I have another chance to be bored out of my mind as I watch another teacher "teach" their kids. The last school I was at had just had their classroom remodelled and I caught sight of the city skyline on one of the walls. If you can't see there are two airplanes heading right for a couple of towers that closely mirror the World Trade Center in NY. I gamboled between feelings of outrage and amusement at the audacity of the artist. Not too sure if any of the Koreans even noticed.

Butts

God, in all his infinite wisdom should of made some sort of bird that lived off cigarette butts.

Brrr!

The last few days have been bordering on winter and it sucks. Yesterday night was kind of fun when a snow/thunder storm took stage outside my window. I've never had those two events coincide (I'll blame global warming). To warm things up, here is the only public kiss of the wedding. It happened after Sung Ho drank more than enough beer and soju bomb shots. Luckily for them, they are now in Fiji enjoying their honeymoon and not stuck wearing multiple layers of clothing.

Start of the Wedding Season

Sung Ho and Ji Hyun's wedding is the first of four that I've been invited to over the next three months. Saejin and I took the eleven pm bus to Sung Ho's hometown on Friday where Sung Ho's father (as is Korean custom and because of Seajin's constant reminders of this) had rented us a hotel room for the night. The wedding started at two but we went early to catch the lunch buffet before the good food was taken. Above is Sung Ho and his family. The bride was locked away in a small room where she sat for more than an hour with people flowing in to have their picture taken with her.


Sung Ho and the women he is giving up. Along with his sister are two of his best girlfriends. Ji Young had to leave before the wedding stared because Koreans believe that because she has set her wedding date (next month) if she were to attend the ceremony all her wedding luck would go to Sung Ho. Ji Young refuses to believe this but all afternoon ladies came running up to her wide eyed wondering what she was thinking.


My only picture from inside the church. It was a formal Catholic wedding with lots of standing, sitting, and offerings of god. Disappointingly there was no kiss to seal the deal.



The wedding finished at 3:30 and we were supposed to come back by bus but Sung Ho made one of his friends drive us back. This was a huge mistake as Ji Young stuck to the bus plan leaving an hour later than us but making it back to Seoul a whole hour before us. (There is a math question in there somewhere.) Once in Seoul the drinking couldn't have started soon enough. Mr. and Mrs. Sung Ho treated us to a night a booze that I'll post tomorrow.

You tubin'

Last night Saejin came home around eleven tipsy from drinking and singing with his coworker. He then twisted my arm and forced me to drink beer with him well past my bed time on a school night. We soon found ourselves in front of the computer seeing what music we could find on Youtube. Here are some of the "better" ones we rocked out to.

Starship, Nothing's Going to Stop us Now:

This song was Deanna Humble and my "song" in grade six. Kudos to Saejin for spotting Kim Cattrall as the mannequin, I had no idea she was in this movie.

Cindy Lauper, Good Enough:

Goonies is one of my all time favorite movies. I love all the WWF wrestlers in her videos.

Twisted Sister, We're Not Going to Take:

I'm waiting for the Twisted Sister look to make its comeback.

Madonna, Papa Don't Preach:

Madonna before getting proper dance lessons.

Peter Cetera and Amy Grant, The Next Time I Fall:

Another one of Deanna and my "songs". Each time we broke up (and it happened at least once a week) we had to find a new song.

It's Gone

I've searched every corner of my apartment and have toured my desk at work more times than I want to admit. Nowhere in my journeys have I been close to finding my camera. It has disappeared.

I know I had it Monday when our school cancelled afternoon classes so that the teachers could either hike or go to the movies. The fall colours were captured all the way up and down the hill and I looked at the pictures in a coworkers car but since tucking it away in my bag there, I haven't seen it. I thought it may of come out of my bag at my private but after talking to Dong Ook it's been confirmed it's not around.

It's a strange feeling when you lose something and there isn't a trance of memory loss due to alcohol to blame it on. My camera is always within arms reach of me and the only way I lost it had to be that it tumbled out of my bag when I grabbed my book on the subway. I just can't think of where else it would be.

Because I can, I'm going to blame my bad hair cut and pray the camera comes back when the hair grows back. Since that will never happen, I'll have to use my older camera and start thinking about if I want to buy an new version of the one I had or to buy a different model to get over the loss.

Beyonce in Seoul

The concert was amazing! Beyonce played for almost two hours and I was surprised by the number of songs I actually knew. She looked as gorgeous as ever and danced for almost the whole show. When we had bought our tickets there was a final row of "seats" in the front standing area that could have been ours but we thought we'd take the first row of the standing area behind them giving us more room to dance. (The tickets cost the same price.) When we walked into the Olympic stadium our mistake was obvious. Standing meant standing and the collapsible chairs I was expecting were completely missing. Our front row meant nothing and by the time we filed in we were much further back.

As we all gathered Michelle and I tried to be as big as we could be but our Korean friends wandered about. It didn't take long before we were all cut off from one another. Luckily as Michelle and I held our ground our friends were working on a plan. Ji Young's friend happened to be working at the concert and she was able to secure two Staff passes for us that let us go into the front section of the concert.

We used the passes to get past security and once in we'd send out one person to bring back another person. Once here we had a lot more room to get our groove on. One nosey lady did complain to the security about our little scam but when the security guard confronted Ji Young's husband, he played the race card. He said he worked for Hyundai Card (the main sponsor of the event) and was just trying to show his foreign friends a good time. This worked. Being a foreigner does have its perks sometimes.

I'll post pictures (bad hair and all) from before and after the concert (I was one of the few who honored the no pictures rule) when I track down my camera. I used it on Monday when I went hiking with a couple of teachers but it's not in my bag today. I hoping it's at home.

Oops...I'll give you a discount

Some people blog about cats, some conquer food and others write to bitch about the government. My blog seems to constantly be about haircut updates. This time round it truely isn't a pretty sight. I went to a shop around Sillim station just to try and prove Saejin's grand statement that "there are no good hair shops around Sillim Station" wrong. This being strike three I'm willing to concede he's right.

Saturday I went into the exotic sounding Franck Provost Hair Shop and the feel of the place made me think I could actually win this bet. I sat down in the chair and explained what I wanted and the hairdresser seemed to of understood me. He then went to work avoiding any use of the clippers and had my sides and back of the head looking just as I wanted it. He then came to do my bangs and I closed my eyes to keep my now dry fine hair from sprinkling in. When there was a pause and a longer silence than normal I looked up and my hair had all but disappeared from by fringe. There were two tufts of hair sprouting from the corners of my forehead but the area just above my t-zone was barren of any hair.

It was 100 percent shorter than I wanted but I tried my best not to show any disappointment. Somehow I felt bad that he'd done a bad job. When your hair is so short a tantrum wouldn't of solved anything so I just accepted that I was going to have a shaved head look. The hairdresser read my look and quickly offered a five dollar discount.

I paid up and headed home where I opened the fridge and quickly by passed the cans of beer and grabbed the much bigger two litres plastic bottle of beer and started drinking. Half way through the bottle I had the courage try and sculpt a look out of my scissor induced buzz cut. It's definitely not pretty but could be in a few weeks time. Until then I'll be drunk and just accept that Saejin is right no matter how bold a statement he makes.

Beyonce

The only plans for the weekend is the Beyonce concert on Saturday night. I know I've heard a lot of her songs but the only ones I really know are Crazy in Love and the sappy one from Dream Girls. I'm just going in hopes of learning a few dance moves to add to my repertoire to try out when we go out dancing afterwards.

Too Much Work

This week I have had zero free time at work. I was busy preparing for yesterday's International Food Festival that all 21 Elementary schools in our city put on. (I'll post pictures later.) To make up for actually having to earn my pay I left work early today to do some banking. Banking used to be a lot more fun, I hate the strong Canadian dollar right now.

After the Show

After the show the plan was to head back to Silim for dinner but it was soon tossed away when Jin mentioned that there was a great rundown place just behind Seoul Station that sold amazing pork. The place is housed in a small building where none of the floors were even and old and dirty was the decor.

This was the last time we got to meet Sung Ho before he takes the plunge and marries in two weeks. We had a good time together and because Sung Ho is nervous about losing all his friends once married we made up a list of things to do in the near future. Returning for amazing meat is definitely the first.

The Donkey Show

Sunday afternoon Saejin got a cryptic message from Sung Ho asking us to meet him and his fiancee if we wanted to get a present. Thinking it was a free house gift and dinner we greedily went to DaeHang-ro. Once there we were told to find The Donkey Show theatre and it soon became clear what our gift was. DaeHang-ro is the heart of independent plays and comedy shows in Korea and this show definitely met both criteria.
The show takes place in a night club and we the audience stand, dance, participate and watch the story take place all around us. There is a lot of gender bending, singing and prancing around in little clothing that goes on. It's a lot of fun and worth seeing even if you don't know a lick of Korean you will enjoy the eye candy. The show was billed as a Broadway show (probably to bump up the ticket prices, Sung Ho got four for free) but I can't find anything anywhere to prove this right or wrong. It would definitely of been a lot more fun if we had gone on a busier night but it was definitely a surprisingly good way to end what was a quiet weekend.

Today's Questions

If seniors can ride the subways for free in Seoul why do so many of them choose to duck under the turnstiles?

What is the best response to your supervisor when she tells you the head English supervisor for the city is still a virgin? What do you do next when she takes your silence for a lack of vocabulary and painfully explains it to you?

Do car GPS' know if they are being driven backwards?

When will the year's last mosquito die and stop interupting my sleeps?

Why is 2001: A Space Odyssey, considered such a great movie? Was I supposed to take drugs?