I'm not used to owning a camera, hence I'm not used to carrying some square piece of electronica around and snapping random plastic bags on the ground while I analyze the beautiful simplicity of life (don't act like you never did something like this when you were a teenager). I wish I had taken my camera out with me this weekend cuz there were lots of things I should have captured on a photo.

I went out to Seoul, that big capital city thing, over the weekend and saw a bunch of C-mont people. I met up with Alex Su and met a bunch of his fulbright friends, where I had several awkward conversations about topics I never talk about such as douchebag med students (cuz I know so many...), making out with random dudes on the subway and LOL WHAT'S THE DEAL WITH KOREAN FOOD.

Then went to a club with several other C-mont people. Normally I wouldn't really try to get back into the club scene...wait no I was never really into a club scene to begin with. Anyway, this club had Drunken Tiger performing there, a hip hop group I was really into in my azn high school days, so I had to check them out. Tiger JK was definitely much more imposing in person. I didn't meet him but even just standing at the back...dang. Anyway, clubbing until 4 am...I haven't done that for a while. Basically I stayed up and waited for the subways to open then I found a hot spa that a friend recommended. Korean hot spas are nice because they provide areas to sleep on with soft mats and pillows and stuff. Plus it's nice and hot. They also have public baths there and so there are lots of naked men and lots of naked man-things that I can't help but awkwardly glance at. I mean, I'm not used to all that nudity - where the fuck am I SUPPOSED to look? At my own junk?

Lastly, I saw a punk scene/group out in Seoul. They had everything down (patched jackets, tight pants, up-to-no-good attitudes). I wanted to tell them I listen to that one leftover crack song but I chickened out. If that one punk concert taught me anything, it's that I am very scared of teenage punks, no matter what country they belong to.

I've noticed that a lot of the Korean English teachers here use 'in my case' very frequently. It's their 'personally' statement and it always sounds a little strange but they learned English through a very grammatically-focused cirriculum. Not like us at all. I learned all my English grammar when I took high school Spanish.

Did you also know that the Korean word for 'foreigners' is "Wae-gook?" You probably did. It's probably where the derisive gook slur came from - the word can sound like "we gook" sometimes so I imagine that a whole bunch of stupid twats (probably during the Korean War) got called waegook a lot but thought the Koreans were calling themselves gooks. Blech.

There once was a writer
Who was also a K-1 Fighter
But he doesn't have many fans
And he doesn't have many plans
But he also wins against a tiger.



This shit is DEEP, yo

There are some interesting differences between English and Korean that I've discovered so far.

- We use the term 'single' to describe someone who is available and is currently seeing no one. 'Single' in Korean, however, just means that said person is not married. They can have a partner and still be considered single because they are still technically "available." After all, break ups happen all the time no? So if they're not wearing a wedding ring in Korea, apparently it's all fair game.

- Oh shit I forgot the rest of them. I'll update when I think of them again...

In my last entry, I mentioned that it was a little difficult meeting new people. Obviously the GEPIK workshop was not the best place for me to find some new friends...which is strange since it's not exactly hard to meet new people when you have a whole weekend alone with a bunch of a new people. But as I said, it's hard for me.

Skip ahead to two weeks later. One of my mother's old friends came to visit and she took both of us out to dinner. Her daughter also came along. She had studied in America for a few year so she could speak a little English with me and then surprisingly she invited me to her church.

Now I had stopped going to church a long time ago, but at this point in my time here I was desperate to find a comfortable, safe space to meet new people. And so I had hoped to write an entry about my issues with going to church not for the religious experience but....

I stopped going. I went once and that was it. Organized religion and I can't really function together anymore. So it ruined the whole meeting new people sort of thing. Ah but I did meet a lot of new people in the city. Yay! New people.

OBAAAAAAAAAMAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA














So now that I got that out of the way

I think I've completely adjusted to life in Korea now, which means I'm getting lazier everyday. However, I found a gym and am willing to pay money to get my ass out of my apartment and do some exercise. I will also work on updating this blog more often.

I wanted to talk about the week I spent at the GEPIK teacher orientation. Oh my, meeting new people. It's been so long since I interacted with people I didn't know. Introducing myself and breaking the ice isn't as hard as it used to be for me, but I still suck at socializing.

I've been so used to socializing with people who share the same special interests I do. So when I do meet lots of new people with new cultures, backgrounds and ages, I hesitate cuz that switch in my head goes on and it tells me not to say anything offensive that I would normally say amongst my other friends (e.g. lol white people amirite?). Unfortunately, I couldn't think of anything else to say really. There were lots of lol white people there. Not that they were the majority. But lol.

It's been so long since I've had to interact with a lot of people who aren't really on the same page as I am, in terms of beliefs and a general mindest of how the world works. The real world hit me hard that week to remind me that the real world has a lot of socially popular, charismatic, charming, nonchalant moderate-conservative priveleged people in the world. And they are here in this country as well.

And a disproportionate number of them are marrying Korean women. But that's been common for a while. Still, it's hard to sort out my feelings about this. I can't tell if it's just some repressed nationalism/envy that's going on or I'm just disturbed by seeing this sort of gender power dynamic up close and personal. And then I feel all guilty cuz I'm condemning a couple's 'love' and then I try to convince myself that they just like each other for who they are but then I say 'bullshit' cuz I am a bitter old man.

I got kind of pushed around the first night I was there. Three people were assigned to one hotel room but my roommates didn't show up for the orientation. So I had the room to myself. But that first night someone from the staff showed up to my door asking if I could move into another room with two other guys. Apparently random white dude teacher has a girlfriend teacher in the same program. I think they both got into arguments with their roommates, cuz they wanted to fuck each other and they obviously wanted to do it right now in privacy, so they asked me if I could go. Jesus Christ, I thought, that's not cool. They can't spend 4 nights away from each other's genitals? But I was still in social mode so I moved out like a tool.

And thennnnnnn....oooh my roommates. I had one awesome roommate. Veteran teacher, masters in education, taking a break from writing a book, taught in America, WATCHES STAR TREK, PLAYS STARCRAFT, etc. Then the other dude. Hairy (HAIRY HAIRY HAIRY) middle aged white dude, says he's a writer, writes poetry, macked on one of the female Korean staff as he was talking to me in the Internet Cafe. AAAAAAAAAAnd at dinner, he actually used the colorblind routine. I almost laughed out loud. Really. I never thought I'd hear that from someone face to face. But he did. He looks at me so seriously, points at me and says so proudly -

"I DON'T SEE YOU AS A COLOR. I AM *PAUSE*....COLORBLIND."

At this point I actually told him that there was nothing wrong with him acknowleding I'm colored, because there isn't anything wrong with BEING a color or a minority. Honestly I was trying to change this guy's view but he got really defensive and then explained how he has black friends and black relatives. He went with the 'black friend' argument because there were some black south africans (cuz there are lots of white south africans too...) sitting next to us. Great dude, it's not like you offended me with that comment.....

The workshops themselves were very helpful. One speaker, a current GEPIK teacher, really gave me some insight on how to improve my teaching. A lot of teachers here are like me - recent college grads trying to save some money and have a good time. But we forget that we have a job to do and we all suffer when the teachers don't do their jobs - the students, the school and us. I'm going to keep my job in a more positive perspective from now on, because lately I've been focusing too much on the negative things (which are, honestly, few and far in between) and that has been affecting the level of effort I put into my work.

So in general...that week was really informative but the social awkwardness of it frightened me into never meeting new people ever again. At least, not that many and not all at once. I did make some friends, mostly people around my city and they're my type of person so it's all good.

The weekends are getting more dull each week...which is why I made a strange choice recently....but it's late and I need to get up and teach four classes in a row in the morning. Shit.

You, Daniel Dong Hyun Shin, need to be more assertive. I'm not suggesting that you go all westerner on these Koreans and start demanding shit. I don't want you to constantly complain about cultural shit that you should have realized would be a small problem for you when you moved to a different country with a different culture from the one you grew up in. You don't do that because you've adjusted pretty well and I'm proud of you! Of course, this adjustment was made easier by the fact that you are Korean in the sense that you were raised by Korean people, in a Korean household.

No no Daniel, I'm suggesting that when you have a good idea, go with it! The other day, someone asked you to prepare an English festival booth for little elementary school children. With pictures! Lots of pictures! And you said, "animals." Animals! That's simple and everybody fucking LOVES animals! Some people love animals in wrong ways, but that's not the point. Animals are easy to learn about and you can make that booth fun by doing stupid shit like act like a gorilla and suddenly YOU'RE A GREAT TEACHER!

Don't let the other teachers get you down when they say that might be too 'hard' because who the fuck can't learn another word for 'bear' besides newborn infants?!?

And don't let it get to you when they say your other idea, talking about national monuments, is wayyyyyy too hard, because IT IS! YOU DUMB FUCK! How're you going to get kids understand how the Statue of Liberty is a false symbol of hope and freedom, whose only purpose is to give a metaphorical middle finger to incoming immigrants who will be oppressed to no end!?!?! You can't!

And when the same teachers decide to do a new idea for the English booth YOU are in charge in for a whole day, don't get discouraged. Just try to do a good job working on this new idea for the booth, which is..........an ANIMAL PICTURE BOOTH?!?!?

Ok, so I know that's the first idea you pitched, which was rejected, but is now somehow magically a NEW IDEA made up by this teacher who is helping you, but this whole clusterfuck is partly your fault because you weren't assertive enough! Seriously, it was a great idea! So great, that when hearing it, someone most of had an aneurism, which made them forget about that idea consciously but it was still IN THEIR HEAD somewhere. And one day while they were looking through your collection of national monument pictures you collected from google, they must have said "oh fuck, those children are gonna shit themselves like a bunch of chimpanzees trying to figure this out," when suddenly, ANIMALS pops into their head. And they go "WOW, that's a pretty good fuck idea!." And you have to hear someone else pitch your same idea all over again!

Daniel, be more assertive! Show more courage! Push it to the limit! And do your best to finish this project and make it a good show! Also, get some candy for these kids.

It's been a while guys. I hope you people in the States are hanging in there with the American Economy taking a nose dive into the pile of shit we've slowly been accumulating over the years. All you other peeps in different countries (so, basically, George and maybe Tiff), LET'S GO BUY FUR COATS.

Last week was midterm week, so all the boys were busy taking tests for the whole week. This week is a blessing for the rest of the teachers, as it's one of the few weeks of the year that they can relax at school. Or if you're like me, work on more lesson plans. None of the teachers have to teach anything, they only come to school to proctor tests. Except for me, that is. I'm not a real teacher so I didn't get to do anything, but DUR HUR I still had to come. So I came to work and did nothing but lesson planning and facebook stalking.

Last Thursday was a great break from, um, doing nothing, because it was the school picnic! We went all da way to Disneyland Korea (Everland) and I pretended to be a stupid kid again! It was actually very fun because I'm starting to hate thrillparks like Six Flags and starting to love atmosphere-centered parks like Disneyland. It was actually much more impressive than Disneyland, not because of size or rides, but it's just much more aesthetically pleasing. Beautiful flower gardens, massize Vegas-style fountains and hotels within the park and a zoo as well! Plus lots of white people who play a bunch of random white people roles. I didn't know the Phantom of the Opera was a popular guy amongst the kids. Anyway, I can't show you the pictures here but you should go to my facebook album. You've probably already seen it.

Last Saturday my mother and I went to a nearby city to find my grandfather's grave. This is my father's father we're talking about. In general, in this filial-piety-centered Korean society, the father's father gets a lot of respect and it's especially that the grandson, the one who will carry on the family name, pay that respect. Unfortunately, I only met this man once in my American lifetime and I don't remember much. I always wondered what he thought of me and my family, what he thought about how I grew up and what he thought about my complete lack of korean language fluency (I'm sure he didn't like it....). This train of thought always makes me wonder how I would have turned out if I had grown up in my native country; a thought most of us have had sometime in our lives. Then I feel sad that I've let down this man I barely knew but should have known. Paying my respects is the only thing I can do for him now.

Tomorrow I'm off to Yongin for my program's quarter Orientation program which I just found out about today during work. So, no work this week, I get to play ice breakers (PLEASE MAKE US PLAY BOOM CHIKA BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM) and meet even more new people.

NIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIICE.

Bye.

She is teaching English at the all-girl middle school across town.

Also, she's French but lives in South Africa. And her name is Amelie.

I can't wait to find out how she constructs race.

1) In an attempt to spice up my cooking skills, I tried to make this katsu dish that I've seen in Western-style restaurants around here: Pizza Katsu. The "pizza" part was limited to basically "sauce" and "cheese" but think about it guys: what else is on your standard pizza except for sauce, cheese and the dough? Do not attempt to correct me by listing all the toppings; I thought it would be all kinds of redundant to put more meat on top of my meat pizza. I'm making it out of katsu, remember?

Unfortunately, my local supermarket did not have oregano or any basic tomato paste/tomato sauce. I had to settle for pre-prepared spaghetti sauce as the base for my pizza sauce. The taste was, for some strange reason, really sweet.

So these were my basic ingredients - some "fruit" sugar (to counter-act all the garlic I added to the sauce in case I added too much since I don't actually have "teaspoons"), mozarella cheese, olive oil, pepper, the said katsu and the spaghetti sauce.


This katsu was pre made and given to me by my grandmama. It is full of grandmotherly love and some chicken. Maybe some cheese too because this white, gooey stuff leaked out. No, that was probably the love.

SAUCE. I put in enough garlic to make it actually taste like some kind of italian sauce. Added too much pepper (spicy but not in a good way...) so I'll have to remember that. Also, I cooked too much sauce. Will remember that for next time.

The finished katsu....
so, this isn't very aesthetically pleasing. At first I had smeared on a good amount, but found myself looking at some kind of huge red blot. I added the cheese but I did it by chunks (no cheese grater - it's for these moments that you really need those cheese graters, fruit peelers, citrus zester's and ravioli climpers). Then I realized that I made too much sauce, so I poured the rest on. Lemme tell you though, this shit was so cash (re: it was good).

2) I absolutely HATE using public bathrooms. The mess I was unfortunate enough to look on today....dear God, how was that humanly possible....

3) I just got paid. Apparently, according to some Korean tradition, my first paycheck should be used to buy all my relatives some underwear. I have 5 aunts and 1 uncle currently living in my area. They in turn have produced 12 cousins. So, yeah, uh, I'm not done shopping for them yet but....well, anyway, I also bought this expensive jacket. I don't think I'll be using it anytime soon though. The night scene is weak. Also, I really need a drink. It's hard to pretend to be alcohol-abstinent here around my conservative mother. Maybe that point should be number 4.

I remember Elisa saying something along the lines of "after I finished this year of teaching, my patience level will be over 9000." Or something. I always thought I had great patience - putting up with idiots through my own public school experience has honed my "don't kick them in the balls" skills and has successfully stopped any impulses to kick said balls.

The reason I say kick balls is all the freaking jerks I've met in my life have mostly been men. Or in this f-ing case, boys.

You have no idea how CLOSE I am to actually participating in this school's system of corporal punishment.

Thank god for that weekend.

Oh, also, it turns out that I'm teaching - not the English teachers - just the Teacher teachers. The ones who don't speak English. And they are very good listeners. What a nice change of pace.

Maybe it's the job or something I ate, or maybe something I'm wearing but I keep getting little itchy bumps here and there on my arms and legs. Hmmm. This is annoying.

I started my job here at Icheon Middle School about three weeks ago. I started with no real experience teaching in a classroom setting but I've gotten used to it. At least, I think so. My job is to improve these kids' English pronunciation by making them practice English with me every class. The whole thing is a slow process - I'd LIKE to introduce them to a lot of common vocabulary they don't know yet, but at the moment it's midterm season and I'm supposed to prepare them for their upcoming English midterm. Supposedly it will consist of everyday conversations like

Ordering at a fast food restaurant
Calling your friend over the telephone
Checking into Customs at an Airport

But I want to get to the important stuff, the stuff we folk from the West ACTUALLY use such as:

AWESOME pick up lines (e.g. IS THERE A MIRROR IN YOUR PANTS BECAUSE I WANNA HAVE SEX WITH YOU)
How to successfully diss someone over the internet
How to step up your game with some fresh lyricz and beatz

I'm also in charge of an elective English class after school on Tuesdays and Thursdays. This class is something I look forward to, since I have complete control over the subject matter. Today I introduced those kids to some American history - slavery, Harriet Tubman, Abe Lincoln and Martin Luther King Jr. I had a little trouble with translations and such, but I think they got the point of the lesson - DISCRIMINATION = BAD. If you have any suggestions as to what I should teach next, please let me know. I'm going to talk about Tall Tales next week.

Finally, for some reason I am going to teach an English class to the English Teachers at the school. This just seems like an attempt to squeeze the most out of my contract with the school because these teachers are actually very competent at English. Sure, they don't really know any colloquial English. Sure, I can't really discuss the finer points of the '08 campaign, globalization and why there aren't any f*cking Lucky Charms in the country, but most of them could pass off as Americans with their English knowledge and level of pronunciation. But I guess it's a good opportunity for them to level up their English skillz.

Ahhh, and the students. Oh the students. Most of them I haven't gotten to know. There are a few that I have gotten to know and they are PRECIOUS. Almost everyday these two boys come into the Teacher's Office to talk to me, walking in while holding hands and smiling. I think they're getting better at their English (I hope so, God I hope so). Then there are the kids who don't care but it's not my job to discipline students. Luckily whenever I have to teach a class, there's an English Teacher in the classroom ready to SHUT THEM UP.

...Except for this one teacher, who, in comparison to all the other English Teachers, excessively babies her students. As a result, they will not shut up. Even when I yell at them they won't shut up. I don't look forward to teaching those classes.....

That's all for now. Midterm's are coming up in a few weeks so I'll be busy. Apparently after midterms the school sponsors a class "picnic". But instead of a weak-ass year end picnic at the water slide (like the one I got when I was in middle school) this school will be taking us to the Korean equivalent of Disneyland - Everland. Next entry folks!

BTW, I totally made this by myself. It's supposed to be omurice. I overcooked the egg a little and I got sloppy towards the end, but not bad for the first try.

It's been one busy day after another one here. I still manage to fit in facebook and other internet things every other minute or so, but I haven't found the time to make a substantial update. Go read this guy's blog instead, he is OUTSTANDING. And probably tastes like pizza crusts.

http://mehererightnow.blogspot.com/

Hello. For your convenience and in the interest of our mutual desire to resist the MAN and his creepy internet laws, you are now allowed to make anonymous comments on ma blog without having to have a google account.

Anyway, I'll be moving into my apartment soon - it's ok, it's a two bedroom loft, so now I can finally create an imaginary friend who I'll have fights with and when it gets really bad I'll just go sleep in the other room - but will not have any internet for a while. I thought I'd leave you with some pics of my grandma's farm.



These are what my grandmother sells/eats for a living: peppers. mmm-mmm, just looking at these peppers makes my taste buds begin to kill themselves in order to avoid the spicy pain.

This is outside of my late-grandfather's brother's house. He has a nice flower patch. Wait, what do you call your grandfather's brother in english? The english translation for the Korean term is literally "Bigger/Older Grandfather".




Fields of leeks? Or some kind of green, tall plant thingy.

The courtyard outside the house.

Dog #1. His name is Dora. I think they named him after the famous, spanish explorer.

Dog #2. Don't know her name.

Dog #3. Don't know her name either. WON'T SHUT THE FUCK UP WHEN I'M NEAR HER.

The house.

I'll have more to talk about later. I start my first classes next Monday! Miss you all and hope you're all well!

I never believed
I'd be able to have a little slice of heaven
until I met you
Shrimp Pizza

Indeed, one of the most important rules I've forgotten is the "pix or it didn't happen." So I'll show you what I did today; climb an effing mountain. It was pretty bad; I'm very out of shape and I'm still very afraid of heights. Oh well.

some sign for some road up the mountain














My uncle and one of my cousins. Plus the dog. God, they didn't stop once on the wayup








































The view from the top of the mountain.

Hello. For the two or three of you who are reading this, I'm giving you an update on how I'm doing here in Korea so far.

I don't have much to say at this point, even after being in Korea for about 5 days. This particular city that I'm living in (Icheon) is mostly a rural area. There's a main, more industrial city that's about 15 minutes away from my grandmother's farm, but compared to what I've seen in other cities like Seoul (the one time I went that is...) it's pretty weak. It's still a nice area.

So guys, apparently when you go abroad, one of the first things you write about in your abroad blogspot blog is the "culture shock."

Culture shock, eh?

I've been here before so there's been little to no "shock" since I've been here. I'm more used to the subtleties of Korean culture, I guess, so these things don't really get to me.

What 'things' you ask? Things like:
1) no regard for pedestrian safety (you really can die easily if you don't look both ways here)
2) negotiating the price of anything that's for sale. ANYTHING. Whether it be clothes, food or a circumcision, you never have to pay the retail price. If you, yes YOU, ever come here, you'd better fucking WHINE about how expensive that kimchi is. Then you'll get it next to NOTHING.
3) Toll booths are everywhere. Just take public transport, which is like, the best way to get around this country.

There's more to that list. But I have to think real hard about what else is different.

Lastly, today I paid a visit to the school I'd be working at. I had a meeting with the Principal and vice Principal and I thought that it would be...awkward, but they were very nice. My mother tells me they're only nice to me now since they just met me. Sad. The english teachers, who all speak perfect english btw, weren't expecting me but they were all very nice as well. I'd hate to think that they were also being fake about, ya know, that whole being nice to me thing, but we'll see where this relationship goes. The interesting thing is, I am the first foreign teacher's assistant that this school will have. I guess no one wanted to live out here in the boonies.

Well, I would have liked to stimulate your senses with some pictures of big Korean buildings and other shiny things but there's nothing like that out here, really. Unless you guys wanna see pictures of the farm. Do you? Let me know.

Bye for now