Post #25

Goodbye Korea,

That's right, loyal reader, this is the final Foley in Korea Blog. It's been a ride, and all you readers out there, thanks for going on it with me. Trying to sum up the totality of my experiences here in a single blog post would be surely selling this great land short. So, I've decided to do something much more shallow and fun. As this is Blog #25, welcome to Foley in Korea - the Top 25 List.

The following is the best, the worst, and the weird things about my home for the last year:

25. Modeling
It was inevitable.  I am a model. Well, actually more of a movie star. Yeah, I know. Holy crap.

The other day I was called up by my modeling agency saying they had a gig for me. My massive ego could not resist. I accepted, blind to all details about the shoot. The day before, they informed me I would need to wear a suit as I would be posing as businessman. I shrugged. It sounded reasonable. They were paying me. Why should I worry about the details? Smile here, pose there, get my check and bounce. Easy, right?


Not even in the ballpark. I got picked up at Seoul Station by two men who spoke little English but invited me into their van. They explained on the way about how this was a government video, but could not give details beyond that. Then, while driving on the highway, they pulled over to the side of the road and told me to get out. I did so, and a video crew rolled up behind us. There, while cars flew by going 70, I was supposed to look at a highway sign that read "Kimpo," smile and nod like I knew what the hell was going on, and then walk off camera. It only got weirder from there.


After that, they took me to a dock where they made me stare at fishermen taking nets of crabs out of a boat. Then I held up nets of crabs that pinched at my fingers (all the time wearing a business suit). At one point I shake hands with a little girl in a park and give her a paper airplane that they planned to digitally add fireworks to during the editing process. In case you missed that, let me restate it: a paper airplane that shoots fireworks. I know - I didn't think Koreans had LSD either.


Long story short, halfway through production I figured out they were making a movie called "A Foreigner Visits Kimpo" - Kimpo being the name of the city we were in. Evidently in Korea, having movies about a foreigner who visit your city boosts revenue. And yes, to answer your next question, you can all see this movie next month on the Kimpo city website


Which leads me to number 24...

24. Being a Foreigner Here
Because it's great. Not only are Koreans quick to compliment my handsomeness (if you didn't read 25, yes I am a model in this country) but I am constantly invited to free soju drinking sessions with drunken businessmen, giggled at by groups of caffeine infused coffee shop girls, and barraged with hello's from friendly young children. It's like being a celebrity without, you know, having any talent. Though I have been at least trying to speak their language, which isn't always easy. Like in...


23. Church
Koreans get into church. It's fun here. Rock bands and after parties and free drinks - it's definitely my idea of religion. And at the end of every service - sometimes random people get up and talk, sometimes for a 50 year anniversary or to make an announcement. Because the church community was so much a part of my life here, I wanted to get up in front of the church and thank them. Only problem was, I had to do it in Korean.


Public speaking is not my forte (unless I have about half a dozen cocktails in me, and it seems like that would be slightly inappropriate for church) but doing it in Korean proved to be a struggle and a good testament to my talents in the language. I got a few laughs at the beginning and end and then in the middle no one knew what the hell I was talking about. Nervousness is not a common quality in me, but during that speech, my hands were shaking so much I couldn't read my notes (also in Korean). The one thing that kept me going was this one dude with a big head in the audience who kept nodding when I said things that made sense. So, though he'll most likely never read this, thank you, Korean Big Head Man.


22. G.na
My new favorite K-pop sensation.

This is her song "Bananas." It's swell. For the music quality, of course.

21. The Phrase "Good For Your Health."
Koreans use this to describe everything - from plum wine to pig skin. For some reason I don't always believe them.

20. Cow's Brain
A delicacy of the Jeolla Province and so much more delicious than it sounds. It's not like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom where they eat the monkey brains right out of the skull. No, no, my friends, it's cut up and grilled for your enjoyment. It's tender and, according to Koreans, good for your brain. It's always served with cow blood soup (not joking) and cow testicle pizza (okay, that one's a joke).



19. Korean Hospitals
So let's say you electrocute yourself. Happens to the best of us. Luckily, you didn't die. Sounds good right? But now you have to go to an American hospital without an appointment. That means an hour of waiting in one room, another thirty in a smaller room, a conversation with the nurse, waiting, testing, more waiting, and then maybe you see the doctor who tells you you're fine or you need to come back. Either way, two hours of your life you're never getting back.

I broke my foot once in Korea and thought I did a second time. I must have visited the hospital six times this year. My longest stint was maybe half an hour. There's none of the unnecessary questionnaire nonsense, no second waiting room. You show up and get called to see the doctor. And their doctors are solid. Hell, they lead the world in stomach cancer treatment. But the reason why is disturbing, as we will see by analyzing...

18. The Habits of Korean Men
They work hard, and they play hard. You know that time your boss took you and your coworkers out for drinks on a Friday night and got you all way too drunk and your Saturday morning was hell? Imagine that, two or three times a week, exclusively on weeknights. These are what Korean businessmen refer to as "meetings." They start around seven or eight and go until the boss says you can stop drinking. These aren't mandatory, unless you value your job, in which case they are. Turning down an invitation for drinks is a clear sign of weakness in this country.

But between the consumption of soju (rice wine that can take the paint off a car), kimchi (which we all know is spicy as hell), and a chain-smoking cigarret-a-thon, Korean men's stomachs tend to have the consistancy of Swiss Cheese. Hence, their stomach cancer treatment rates are the best in the world. But they're not the only ones in this country that have issues.  

17. The Habits of Korean Women
They smoke too. But it's considered unfit or unladylike to do so, so smoking usually transpires in dark alleys or public bathrooms. Alongside the secret tobacco addiction is the far more prolific addiction to coffee shops, which are so plentiful in Korea, they are often used as landmarks when giving directions. Young Korean women frequent these Starbucks clones, slugging green tea lattes and taking pictures of themselves with their cellphone every five minutes to make sure they still look just as shallow as before.


16. Korean Girls' Legs
I guess I'm pretty shallow myself.


15. Daegu
So I was supposed to take the GRE's a few Saturdays ago in the city of Daegu. This is a city of which I knew nothing. Being responsible, I got into Daegu at ten the Friday night before and started looking for a hotel near the university where the test was. Only problem was, there were three universities by the same name. So, when I called the GRE services for further clarification, I learned that somehow, my registration had not gone through, and I couldn't take the test. Boy was my face red.

But not all was lost. I was faced with a decision. I could

1.) Catch a four hour bus ride back to Gwangju, putting me home at three in the morning.

OR

2.) Party all night long in a city where I knew no one and take the 6:00AM bus back to Gwangju.

Of course we all know what I chose

Daegu was full of surprises. I found some foreigners who took me out to a this bar called Thursdays. Never before had I seen such a happy mesh of foreigners and Koreans, dancing, laughing, drinking. There I met three Korean guys there who boozed it all night with me and then took me out for pork bone soup as the sun began to rise over those Daegu hills. A very cool spot and a place I would consider living for Korea Round 2.

14. Red Beans
They use red bean out here like we use chocolate. Tastes similar but way healthier. Two thumbs up. Plus, good for your health.


13. My Students
I've said this a lot, but I'll tell you, nothing beats a half hour "conversation" class with your eleven-year-old student asking how to earn stars in Mario 64. In English of course. Honestly, I don't know why I get paid to do these things.

12. Konglish
It's Korean-English. Words like "Pa-na-na" (Banana) and "Re-bol-bah" (Revolver) and "A-chill-es Ten-don-i-tis-uh" (I'm sure you can get that one). Either way, it makes learning Korean easier, and it's usually good for a laugh. (Though for some reason, "Canada" is just "Canada.")
 

11. Motel District
In some cities in Korea, especially ones at the crossroads that get a lot of traveling businessmen, the Motel District in inevitable. No matter how you picture it in your mind, I promise you it's one thousand times seedier than than anything your mind can muster. It's two square city blocks with nothing but neon light up hotel signs and "businessmen bars." These "businessmen bars" along with "businessmen karaoke rooms" feature "helpers" that will sing and drink with you. To put it bluntly, finding a girl in this district who's not a hooker would take nothing short of a miracle. After going to said location, I recommend taking a shower. Maybe two.


10. Live Octopus

Oh baby. I've had a lot of strange things in this country (pupa, fermented stingray, fish eyes) but this one takes the cake. It's octopus chopped up into pieces and served raw. You know, like sushi. So it's not cooked. And it's dead. Except that it's not.

The tentacles still move.

I'm not talking a little twitch here and there, I'm saying they will literally crawl off your plate and away from you. I experienced this with my Korean brother and his wife, and while delicious, it's a little unnerving when you're chewing something that crawls out of your mouth and stick to the side of your face. In the past, foolish people have tried eating tentacles whole and have choked to death. The tentacle found a way to choke the eater despite the significant disability of being dead.

I had two videos of myself munching on this - but they were far too large of files for this blog. So here's some random guy doing it. Fast forward to 2:00 in to skip the boring talking.

9. Being Confused For Tom Cruise Everyday
Dig it.


8. Korean Festivals
The other day, I was invited to a Korean Games Festival in which ancient games are celebrated. The foreigner community was invited to take part - and let me tell you, it was worth it. We played a game known as Chajon-nori.We were divided into two teams. Then in the middle of the biggest road in the city, as a metal pot banging band cheered us on, each team lifted a giant wooden beam with wooden hoops on the end - and then charged each other like angry bulls. The winner was the team that smashed the other team better. Why did we do this? Because it's awesome.


After we finished, the Koreans did the same - only on a much larger scale. It looked something like this

7. Convenience
It's Wednesday night. 3:00AM. You can't sleep because you're hungry and a swarm of mosquitoes won't leave you alone. But there's no food in your fridge and you've got nothing to keep away those hell-spawned insects. In America, you're in for a night of misery. But Korea, there are so many restaurants open 24/7, and if not, there's always a Ministop, Family Mart, or 7Eleven right on your street corner. That's right, you don't even have to drive to get your fix of barbecue chips and bug spray. And that's a life saver, truly truly. Speaking of which...



6. Mosquitoes
I don't know if Korean blood is hyper rich in iron or if their buildings are so poorly insulated that a cat could squeeze under a door, but I had at least three mosquitoes every night in my tiny one room apartment until I left at the end of October. It didn't matter how many I killed - there were always more. But because they drew first blood (and because it's impossible to pass out with their evil siren song in your ear) I spent many a sleepless night learning to become a master of slaying those bloodsuckers. Truly, I am a dead eye with a dish towel. But that doesn't compare to my skills at...


5. Kumdo
I have become the American Ninja. Not quite a black belt yet - but my sword fighting skill is strong. I have had epic battles against my own brother, kumdo masters, and even fought in a tournament (where I got my ass kicked by a third degree black belt). But I think nothing compares to fighting a fifteen-year-old rookie my last week of kumdo. While trying a manuever he was not even close to ready for, I ended up taking his bamboo stick to the groin. I distinctly remember the sound it made as a hollow thud. While I was in the fetal position on the floor, crying in agony from the deathblow, I learned something as laughter filled the dojo. Men getting hit in the crotch is funny in all cultures. Except of course, if you're that man.


4. Foreigners
Korea has radically changed my opinion on Canadians and Brits for the better. As fellow teachers, we constantly wage a war against Korean nine-year-olds. This builds comradery, and helps me to overlook past rivalries in Hockey and , you know, war. But truly, the foreign community of Gwangju is a strong one, and most of us are pretty well-behaved. And hell, for the most part, Koreans seem to dig us.

The only real anti-American sentiment comes from the behavior of American military personnel. Note that not all American soldiers cause problems in this fair land, but enough do that many places in Seoul have banned American soldiers because of the destruction they have caused. Seriously, there are a staggering number of fights that start at their hands. It has gotten to the point that, if caught in one of these "banned bars" as an American Soldier, they can be court marshaled. I support our fighting men and women, truly I do, but come on guys - remember who you're representing.  



3. Street Food
A heaping plate of sweet and sour pork for a buck fifty. I don't think life gets any better. Just saying. You think putting it at number 3 is too high? Clearly you've never had it before.   



2. People
The people here almost take the number one spot. Because they're awesome (shown below Korean family).

If I can be serious for a moment, you'll understand why. I entered into a country knowing neither the language nor a single person. In a year, I have made friends who have taken me under their wing and shown me their beautiful country and students who have changed the way I speak, act, and think. There are foreigners who have been a taste of home for me in the good times and a comfort to me in darker times. I have a man here who calls me brother and his family who have taken me in as one of their own. I even managed to fall in love out here with an incredible girl. So given all that - what do people take a back seat too?

1. 정
"정" or for you non-Korean speakers, "Jeong," is a concept introduced to me while eating crab fries and slanging beers with Alex. My understanding of 정 has grown, through experiences dueling my sword fighting brothers, taking moonlit beach walks, fighting back the desire to choke out my students, and saying "gam-bay" (cheers) while I booze it with my friends. 정 is all of these things. It is a concept that appears in Korean medicine but is used more wildly to describe the interactions between people. We have no word for it in English, and while I feel inadequate to describe it justly, I want to try.

정 is a connection, an energy between people, like a life force. Korean people put this energy above love and hate, and good and evil. It is passion, and love, and hatred. It flows in us. And people can have 정 alone, or with one another. Your soul mate, the one you understand the best - you have good 정 with them. But that witch in H.R. that you always get into a shouting match with, or that jackass guy who you almost came to blows with at the bar last night, you have 정 with them too. 정 is so many things. The only thing it really isn't is stagnant. It is not stable, nor is it stationary. It moves, it flows, it lives.

My experience in Korea, the relationships I have and still have, cannot be quantified. While I am lucky enough to say most of Korea has been good to me, there has been tragedy and sadness too. If there was one way to describe my life here, in just a single sentence, it would be this: My life in Korea was saturated with 정. And that makes me happy in a way I don't think I could ever really describe.

My fellow Americans, I will be back home for Thanksgiving - I will be seeing all of you very soon.
But first, dear reader, I must complete my odyssey of Thailand with Mr. Adam Brown. Perhaps you will see one more blog after this - detailing the absurdity of our travels.


I hope you know it humbles me to have readers, so I will close with this.



Thanks for reading - because you, my reader, helped my 정 flow strong.
-Daniel J. Foley

Post #24

Happy Thanksgiving?

Hello everyone and welcome to the long awaited Foley in Korea Blog #24. There's no time to hesitate as we delve into another poignant examination of Korean society, including Korean baseball, socially acceptable physical punishment, and of course, Korean Thanksgiving (among other random factoids).

But...perhaps I am getting a little ahead of myself. I have to bracket all of this with (for those of you who don't know): I am currently unemployed and living in this country under legally ambiguous circumstances. How did this happen? Well, sports fans, it turns out, my bosses are insane. On a warm Monday in early August, I came into work. Now, several times, my bosses had promised to extend my contract to November. So wasn't my face red when they dropped this cataclysmic bomb:

"Daniel, (they love calling me Daniel) you must leave in September. We hired a new teacher. We will fly you back home September 7th. If you don't you will be arrested as an illegal alien."

Now, I pride myself on my ability to not lose my mind when someone sticks a dagger in my back and then twists it. But, seeing as though I had made plans for September and October to take tests, vacations, and you know, live in Korea for another two months, this did not settle well with me. So, I took a deep breath and excused myself for a walk outside. Then I calmly and tactfully returned to raise holy hell on them. I told them I was the best teacher they had and how dare they betray me like this. This was not how human beings behave to one another. My boss looked like she was going to cry. And then things started to look up.

That day my replacement teacher (that usurping bastard) came in. He's a Vietnamese-American from San Francisco area.  As it was his first day, his only job to shadow me, you know, watch a master at work. I was weary all day of this, to make sure I was on top of my teaching game. I didn't want to give them any excuse to fire me. So you'll understand why my stomach started doing jumping jacks when my boss interrupted my class to pull out the replacement teacher. I thought they were gonna screw me good and use something ridiculous the replacement said to justify it. Man, was I mistaken.

After class, my boss took me aside. Her eyes get serious, and she looks embarrassed. "The new teacher," she says, and nothing more. Her eyes keep dodging mine.

"Yeah?" I say.

"What do you think of him?"

"I dunno. I just met him. Seems like an alright guy."

"Daniel," she says, looking over her shoulder to make sure we're alone. "He's a homosexual."

"He's...he's what?"

"We think he's a homosexual. Is he?"

"I uh....what?"

"A homosexual."

"Why do you think that?"

"Well his haircut. And his bag. He is kind of like a girl." (He did have longer hair and did use one of those leather bags. You know the kind - it's not a purse, it's European).

"Well, he's from California. Lots of people out there have hair and bags like that."

My boss contemplated that for a minute and says: "But, he's in love with you."

"He is?"

"Yes, he brought you in coffee this morning."

"No he didn't. He got two coffees for himself."

"Oh," she said, again thinking. "But he brought you pizza!"

"No he didn't. That would have been nice though."

"Oh. But he follows you around everywhere!"

"That's because you told him to watch me teach today."

"Oh."

I can't get over the enormous lawsuit that this conversation would have led to in America. Long story short, they fired him and offered me my job back. When I told them to shove it, they hired him back. But, feeling remorse for all the stress they caused me, offered me a bogus year long contract in order for me to get another year long visa in Korea. What does that mean? It means I can come in go in this country for the for the next year because of this deliciously illegal transaction. Victory? Dan.

So yes, I'm unemployed. But don't you go feeling bad for me. As my father, the Great Jim Foley once told me of his days after being laid off from Wang Computers. "Being unemployed is awesome." Truer words were never spoken. Since the idea of shopping detests me and I learned how to cook tofu this past year, I've saved a fair amount of money, so I'm not worried about falling into debt. My days are spent applying for PhD programs in the States, drinking beer with friends, and sleeping whenever the hell I want. The only thing I miss is the kids (and I really, really do), a few of who are staying in touch with me. One eleven-year-old boy named Austin (the drummer in the band) drew me this the other day and emailed it to me.

But enough about me, let's get into some Korean culture. A lot of these stories involve my Korean brother Alex, so this blog's is dedicated to him. He's been my ace in the hole since getting canned, even hooking me up with tutoring his crazy doctor friend (cha-CHING!). Alright, let's talk some baseball.

While the rules are the same, pro baseball in Korea is truly different than pro baseball in America (at least different than Boston, I can't speak on behalf of all the ballparks in America or...Canada). The only really bad difference is the talent. You're not seeing Manny and Poppy out here (remember, this is the nation who gave us Byung Hyun Kim, Boston's sucky submariner). In all honesty, the skill isn't that bad, though I do think an American college team could give them a run for their money. But you probably could have guessed that.

While the skills are slightly lacking in Korean ball clubs, I think America could take a lesson in sheer fun from Korean pro ball. Visiting the ballpark of Gwangju's team, the Kia Tigers (yes, like the car), I came out with a laundry list of problems with American ballparks. For starters, baseball in America doesn't have cheerleaders. Korea asks the existential question: "Why?"

They're swell.

But aside from smoking hotties pumping up the crowd, Korea improves on the formula of hot dogs and beer but substituting fresh-made delectable fried chicken and...well, still beer. But, unlike Fenway park where a Budweiser costs you six bucks and a fraction of your soul, out here, it's BYOB. Sure, they've got vendors outside who jack up the price a little (two bucks for a beer, if that's jacking it up) but when you have friends like Alex, who show up with a backpack cooler teeming to the brim with mek-ju (Korean beer), there are no worries. I spent maybe thirty bucks that day, for my ticket, a bucket of fried chicken for me and my friends, a six pack of beer, and some squid jerky. That's how baseball should be.

What else is better? Everyone's into the game. Like, everyone. I mean, Kia was walloping SK like 8 to 1 by like the third inning and everyone was still cheering and smashing their inflatable clappers together. None of this talking on cell phones nonsense or falling asleep or leaving in the seventh inning. People are there to watch some serious baseball.

I think a lot of this comes from how uncorporate Korean baseball is. It's cheap and the players are real Gwangju people. Sure the game is a little rough around the edges but it's pure and fun and sometimes you even see some of the ballplayers downtown drinking. You're not fueling some pretentious A-Rod character to make twenty grand for an at-bat where he strikes out. You're paying to be entertained and cheer on your team. You gotta dig it.

To shift gears completely, let's talk beating children. Yeah, that still totally flies out here. Although on a legal level it's been phased out of schools after some kid was brutalized in class, it still exists off the radar. "Discipline" teachers employ bizarre forms of punishment, from the Catholic Nun ideology of smashing student's knuckles with a piece of wood, to the sinister 'Hold both of your arms in the air above your head and keep them there for the next hour (or until I tell you that you can stop)."

It happens at home, too. Now, I'm not quite sure how I stand on the idea of beating in general. I don't think I would ever beat my kids, but I can understand the train of thought that, in extreme cases, a backhand could be deemed necessary to set some brat straight. However, with the sheer amount of competition and pressure that exists in this country, that's not always the case. I have heard horror stories out here of parents giving the following threat:

"On this test, for every point less than100% you earn, I will beat you ten times. But if you get a perfect score, I will buy you a present."

Thanks Mom and Dad. Now granted, there are a lot of parents who don't hit, or just spank a little bit, but it is a disturbing trend in many senses. Part of me hopes this next generation will phase it out. At the same time, Korea is also the safest country in the world. Is it because everyone has a fear of God from getting the crap beaten out of them as a kid? Who knows? For this author, the jury is still out.

On a less violent note, my Korean skills are officially intermediate (at least based of the class I now take). What does that mean? Well the other day, I met my Korean tutor for the first time (who oddly, doesn't speak any English) and spoke with her in Korean for two hours. Now, before you think I'm some sort of language prodigy, cell phone dictionaries and drawings were implemented regularly to buffer the conversation, but still, I think I have some validation to toot my own horn.

This has led me to be able to understand certain situational things around my Korean friends and in Kumdo, tidbits of conversations, and of course, impress pretty girls by being able to speak their language. It also kept me from being too out of the loop during Korean Thanksgiving, known as 추석 (Chuseok). I recently celebrated this holiday Alex's (read: "my") family.

This November I will be home for Thanksgiving, but it will be the first one in three years. I mean, I've had plenty of occasions to stuff my face, but none where it was actually encouraged. Thus brings us to Chuseok. It was a great honor to be invited to this occasion as I don't know any foreigners (barring those with Korean spouses) who have experienced this holiday. And this is the big one. Way bigger than our Thanksgiving. This is their Christmas (or if you don't believe in Santa, insert your biggest holiday), though perhaps bigger than that. The term marathon-holiday gets thrown around all too often these days, but Chuseok really brings it home. I don't know the last time I took part in a three day holiday. That's right, three days with the Kim family. And they don't believe in sobriety.


For this occasion, I wore a 한복 (hanbok) which is the Korean Traditional Dress for both men and women. Although I do not have any actual pictures as of yet (they're coming), I've provided this simulation in order to give you an idea.

That's right, I looked fine.

But this mega-holiday had some interesting features that were similar, although not exactly, like our Thanksgiving. For instance, whereas we give thanks before we eat, they have an elaborate ceremony for their relatives that have gone before them. It was reminiscent of what I had learned about Mexico's el Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead). We served our ancestors (both theirs and mine) a meticulously organized feast. No red food could be present. All fish had to face west. There could not be four of any dish, only three or five, as four is the number associated with death. We prayed in both the Korean traditional way and the Catholic way, as the Kim family is both, and poured a healthy amount of mokali (Korean rice wine) for our ancestors to drink. Later we also prayed in the cemetery.


The cuisine was a mismatch of savory delights (slow cooked top grade beef ribs with potatoes) to "holy-crap-what-is-that?" type food. Eating fish eyes was no where near as bad as I thought it would be (actually kind of squishy and fun) but the truly wild fare was something I'd been looking forward to for a long time. It's called 홍어(hung-oh) and I remember having a conversation with my Uncle Bishy about it. He had seen it on one of those bizarre food shows, and from that moment on, I knew I had to experience it. It was once the food of kings, and to this day, it's still super expensive. The highest quality go for a thousand bucks a pop. But most people really, really don't like it.

Oh, I forgot to tell you what it is. Hung-oh is fermented stingray.

But honestly, kind just looks like sushi right? Nope. They make this the same way they make kimchi. They take a stingray, throw it in a pot, close it off from the world, and then, when it's nice and rotted, they eat it. I can your stomach growling. Now, at the table, I sat around with Alex, his wife, Helena, his father, mother, brother Steve, and his brother's wife. His father took down the stingray like a champion, and offered a piece to me. Alex told me I did not have to (he can't stand it), but my curiousness and inability to turn down food prohibited me from saying "no."

The way in which one eats this composted fish is by stacking it with a slice of pork and sliding a nice piece of kimchi in the middle. They call it the holy trinity of food. I like kimchi sandwich better. When I first bit into this, it was great. A little crunchy, a little salty, but complex and interesting to say the least. Then I understood the natural aversion to this delicacy. It came quickly, suddenly, like a thief in the night. It overtook my sense. Some claim it's the pungent and overwhelming smell of ammonia, but that's selling the experience a little short. It's more like rubbing ammonia in your inner nostrils til they start to burn. It consumes your nasal passages in a way I can only liken to wasabi, but with that sweet ammonia odor all the way through. As I swallowed it, they all waited and watched my reaction. What would I do? Start crying? Sprint to the bathroom? Throw up a little in my mouth? None of the above.

I picked up another piece. Because I dig the stingray.

This was the start of Alex's father's respect for me. And he is a truly great man. He was the superintendent of schools in Suncheon (the area where we were) and also a published poet. His subject? The disputed island of Dokdo - currently occupied by Japan but was originally Korea territory. A sore spot for Koreans everywhere. Though we often needed Alex to translate for us, much of our conversations came from the sharing of food and drink, which is often times the best kind of conversation.


And speaking of drinking, it just didn't stop. Ever. When we got there, the men (Alex, his Dad, Steve, and me) sat down and began gulping down rice wine at a rate that brought back college memories. Meanwhile, the women worked in the kitchen (a phenomenon I refuse to comment on). And then we drank more. Occasionally, we mixed in beer and spirits. And then we drank more until the point I was sufficiently trashed. Not uncomfortably so, but to the point where I knew more drinking would be troublesome. This was seven o'clock, and it was dinner time. I thanked God.

To Alex I said: "Man, we did some good drinking today."

To which he responded: "The drinking is just beginning."

He wasn't kidding. The beer and rice wine didn't stop. We drank all through the evening and into the night. And then, when I thought I could takes no mores, he pulled out a liter of Jim Beam.

"We're drinking that?" I asked.

To which Alex responded. "It is only a liter."

I have fond memories of those nights. We stayed up late discussing world events and slugging bourbon. His parents insisted I called them 아빠 "a-pa" and 엄마 "eom-ma" (Dad and Mom), to which they responded, in English "my son." Alex, Steve, and I stayed up late laughing in the living room til four in the morning when Mom came in to yell at us. We felt like real brothers. The next night we went out to pray to the moon after crushing half a dozen beers, only to find some high school punks playing basketball on our court. We challenged them to a game and took back our turf with a victory. Not bad for a team whose average age was 31.

All and all, it was one of the best times I had in Korea. It truly felt like a family, and, when so far away from my blood family, it gave me something I truly needed. For those three days, I was a Kim.

Also - in a very surreal experience that happened to me this evening - I was at my Korean artist friend (Donkyu's) studio, and he said "I want to show you this documentary." He turned on his computer. We started watching "Young at Heart" about a group of eldery singers in North Hampton, Mass (with Korean subtitles). That's one silly kind of coincidence and makes this world feel very small.
Life is so interesting now, as time winds down. I have but one month left in this great land. Then it is off to Thailand for some truly wacky adventures for another month, and then, finally, I'm coming home. I miss and love you all.


AND, before you - check this out. I was on the Korean News.


http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=269182526437514


And yes, I was hungover as all hell that morning. Keep rockin people. I'll see you all soon.


-News Man

Post #23

Hello...China?

Yes everyone, we all love Korea, but this blog posting will be about my swashbuckling Chinese adventures, featuring Nick Callos and his lovely girlfriend Ting Ting. But I'm getting a little ahead of myself.

The insanity begins in Korea, where I found myself sleeping alongside homeless men in bus station in Seoul at 2:30 in the morning. I was waiting for the 5:30AM shuttle. I'm not quite sure why they were there, but they were quite friendly. Some largely toothless man asked me for money in the bathroom. I threw him a couple bucks and then struck up a conversation with him in Korean about where I was from. Whether he had the a thick accent or his tongue was swollen with soju, we will never know, but the conversation was a struggle for sure. From what I gathered, he wanted to eat dog with me in Boston. I agreed to it and prayed to God he wouldn't take me up on it.

Upon arriving at the airport, I learned that Expedia thought it would be funny to switch my flight numbers and times on me without the slightest notification (those bastards). Twice I found myself rushing around airports, trying desperately to catch my flight. Once in Seoul, once in Shanghai. I did have just enough time to use the bathroom in Shanghai, though. This is where I will begin my discourse of China.

Toilets fascinate me. They just do. Especially given the sharp divide between the quasi-futuristic super-intelligent toilets of Korea and the "kill-me-now" squatters of China. That's right, they look like this:

 

Only much dirtier.

The rules are a bit different for bathroom etiquette than in the western world. For instance, having toilet paper near squatters is more of a suggestion than a requirement for the Chinese bathroom. And trust me, after consuming a glut of hyper-spicy Chengdu's specialty Sichuan food, you don't want to be caught pants-down without TP. I'm sure you can decipher why.

Another great little element of the Chinese making-water room is that they have little pandas with Chinese idioms poorly translated into English above each urinal. In English it says "Please aim carefully" but according to Nick (whose Chinese makes me ashamed at my Korean skills) the true translation is something along the lines of "One step closer leads to happier bathrooms."

Such idioms are everywhere and make-up the legendary Chinese Propaganda. Yet in English, something is always lost in the translation. For instance, we saw this while hiking a mountain:

Awesome.

This mountain was truly an excursion and the focal point of the trip (it's nice to do things other than get wasted and eat spicy food, though we did a lot of that too). Three hours outside of the bustling, eleven million denizen, metropolis of Chengdu, stood the magnificent and serene Emei Mountain. Truly a spectacle. Our mission? Spend the night in the town beneath the mountain sipping on Tsing-tso beer and wake up at four AM to scale that beast.

The mellow night we had in mind proved to have a few surprises. I need to preface this by saying Chinese people aren't ghouls, trolls, or any sort of mythological creatures, but I'm about to make them out to be. Throats, feet, hearts, lungs, and eyeballs comprise the typical spectrum of Chinese cuisine. When you eat an animal, boy, you eat the whole damn thing. Ting Ting was a big fan of pointing out which part of the animal I was eating in an attempt to make me comfortably disturbed. One thing I couldn't bring myself to eat was the head of a duck. She laughed and used it like a puppet before eating its skin. That girl is all kinds of cool.

I respect the Chinese for this honesty with animals. They serve you rabbit? You better believe it's coming, head and all. In America, everyone loves Porky Pig, but we try to distance ourselves from the fact that we eat his back meat for breakfast. But that's the truth. In this respect, I made it my mission to embrace my honesty with food. After all, if I'm okay eating an animal, I need to be okay with killing it. And, as means of a test, that night, on the mountain, we got a chicken. No, we didn't order KFC. We found a cage, I pointed to it, the guy took out the chicken, and we followed him to the kitchen. We watched the last moments of Mr. Chicken as the chef slit its throat and drain its blood. Below are the pictures, from purchase to slaughter to dinner.

WARNING - SOME MIGHT FIND THESE SOMEWHAT DISTURBING. IT MAY BE IN YOUR BEST INTEREST TO SCROLL DOWN AND NOT VIEW THE NEXT FOUR PICTURES.

It was an excellent meal. I made sure to eat every bite of it, because, well, otherwise, it just seemed wrong. I realized that I don't have a problem killing animals for food, but I have a huge problem with needlessly killing animals, torturing them, or wasting the food you got from them. The way I see it, if you're a hungry cannibal and you kill me and eat me, you better damn well eat every last bit of me.

But aside from that, I didn't consume anything too wacky. The chance just never came up for rabbit head, frogs legs, or cow penis soup (super expensive and supposedly really good for virility, although Asians think almost everything is good for virility).

That night, we killed a couple of beers and went to bed early (12:30 AM). Nick and I had to be perky for hiking early the next day (Ting Ting was too sleepy). So, in an effort to stay hydrated AND copying my genius father, I used my 20oz Tsing-Tso Beer Bottle as a water bottle in my hotel room. Tap water in China is lethal for your digestive system, so I had to be prudent about filling it up at purified water stations. It worked great at first, quenching my thirtst, until that night. Fumbling for the light switch in the bathroom, I knocked over the beer bottle, shattering it on the floor. Instantly, my foot felt strange. I proceeded to turn on the lights. Watching blood spurting (yes, spurting) from your foot in a Chinese bathroom at 2:00 AM is definitely one for the record books. I hobbled around, trying to wash out the wound. Finally, I got the frustrated hotel owner to give me a couple band-aids for my wound. The Chinese are great people, but not known for their sympathy..

Emei Mountain is famous as it contains a massive Buddhist Temple at its zenith. On one hand, the climb is easy because it's all stairs. On the other hand, there's no way can 5,000 steps ever be considered easy. To get up past the monkey0filled (no joke) lower mountain, we paid a guy to drive us up.If you'd think that leaving at 4:21 in the morning is early enough to make a two hour climb by sunrise, you'd be wrong. This mountain was so crowded, we didn't even start to climb the mountain til well after sunrise.

The climb itself was gorgeous. Turns out, Nick and I were too, because we got more stares, "hello's," and people requesting photo opts with us than I'd ever experienced in Korea. We had a good sweat going by the top, but man, it was worth it...except that we could have paid two Sherpas to carry us up, like this lovely woman did.

Atop the Golden Sumit is the Giant Buddah. It stands at over 150 feet (48 meters) tall and inside, there's a Buddhist Temple. And all around the Golden Summit, you can look over the jaw dropping mountainous terrain, shrouded in clouds, that truly, pictrues cannot do justice (but I took some anyways).

Then after witnessing heaven, I proceeded to hell. The bus ride down the mountain. In a previous blog post, I mentioned how Koreans are terrible drivers. Since then, I have been enlightened. Chinese people obey traffic laws like the Koreans obey copyright laws. If that was too obscure, Chinese drivers are freakishly bad. Allow me to supplement this blatant racism with some concrete evidence.

On the way home from the airport, I thought it was bad when we were weaving between bicycles and people crossing the street without using signals and cutting off fellow automobiles just for the hell of it. But the bus ride down the mountain would make James Bond lose his bowel control. Our bus driver was gunning it downhill a two lane road (one lane going up the mountain, one going down) with no breakdown lane. About every twenty seconds, there was a hairpin turn that he whipped around like it was Chengdu Drift: Bus Edition. Now, normally, that would be bad. But what added to the choking absurdity of this ride was that motorists constantly passed each other. On the straightaways? Heeeellllllllllllllllllllllll no! On the blind hairpin turns. How could they possibly do this safely? By beeping their horn at every turn as a warning.

Now you might be saying to yourself, "Dan, if they beep, it's totally safe. The other cars will know to slow down" Why are you always wrong? Think about this situation: When people going up are passing and people going down are passing. They both decide to beep for safety. Can the cars hear each other? Of course not. They're too busy beeping. And some people just don't give a shit. I need to make clear to you how much I am not exaggerating this. There was at least one time I was certain we were going to smash a blue sedan off the side of the mountain. The mortality rate on that mountain...well you get the idea..

The important thing is: we survived. Thank. God.

Now here's some fun facts about China.

• In a restaurant, when you have trash (dirty napkins, food bones) it's customary to just throw them on the floor. It's so awesome and lazy at the same time it's worth the trip just to do it. 

•  Poor parents sometimes make their children go out and sell flowers in the middle of the night (i.e. beg). A definitively disturbing practice that puts you in the ambiguous ethical situation of whether or not you should give money to them. On one hand, their parents might beat them if they don't bring home money. On the other hand, giving money sustains this practice. It's tough to know what to do.

• Sichuan area (where Chengdu is) is furiously serious about their spice. Things like hotpot, shown below, are what you get when you combine a buffet of uncooked things, a pot of super hot flavored oil, and of course, Sichuan Peppers (aka Chinese Numbing Peppers). For those of you who don't know, this is the stuff they would use before Novocaine was kicking around. A couple years back, Nick brought a bag of Sichuan Peppers to our place on Foster Street. Of course we all popped in about five or six after consuming a fair amount of booze. A truly interesting experience - when you eat them, you can't feel anything in your mouth (except an unholy empty tingling) and you drool like a madman. Sounds crazy, but in food, man, are they tasty.

 

• The Chinese money (RMB) is on the up and up, so prices are rising all around China. Nick was complaining about how the price of a 20oz beer rose from 2.5 quai to a bank-breaking 3.5 quai. For reference, 6.1 quai is about a dollar, so he was bitching about a 20oz beer costing about 58 cents. Upon hearing this, I beat him with a bamboo stick.

For me, one of the most interesting parts of China was how much it defies the stereotypes. Like, for example, how uncommunist it was. If anything, people there are very concerned with money. And the divide between rich and poor is staggering. Beautiful high rise apartments for Lamborghini-totting families are right across from the guy who works 60 hours a week as a waiter for pennies.

Speaking of defying stereotypes, Ting Ting's parents took us out for dinner one night. Amazing people, Buddhists, very welcoming. And oh man could her dad drink. But what was the dinner time conversation about?

Politics.

Wait a minute...something's not right. I thought people were cut up into little pieces and put in the hot dogs for talking politics in China. Is this a set-up?

It's more complicated than that. The Chinese aren't stupid. They understand that there's a lot of propaganda and that their government lies to them. They likewise make the point that America isn't all that different in those respects. But the way it works in China is, as long as they're not talking about tearing down the government and replacing it with democracy, they're more or less free to talk about what they want, as long as it's the right crowd. China isn't the Big Brother Thought Police from 1984. Hell, they don't even block Wikipedia, even though they probably could.

Nick once told me about a conversation he had about freedom of speech with a smart Chinese friend of his.

Nick asked the man: "Don't you want to be free?"

The guy responded: "Free? How am I not free? I live where I want, work where I want, eat what I want, and marry who I want. You want me to complain?"

Interesting viewpoint. Not sure I see completely eye-to-eye with it, but it does make you think.

Speaking of the Chinese government, they have one of the only economies that is actually doing well. And they are sustaining it. Sure they do some illegal things like price adjusting, but at the end of the day, even with 1.4 billion people, they have less malnutrition then America. Seriously, you don't see homeless people. People don't complain about working all the time and everyone eats. It's not some wacky third world country. Though the driving still blows

So that's what I got out of China this time. Sorry, no one tried to drug me this time, and no bar fights. But I think it was even better this time. It's truly an awesome place, though I think Korea was definitely the right choice for me. Why? I'm not quite sure. But it's all good. The more I travel, the more I see how awesome this world is. And everywhere I go, I meet really cool people, and furthermore, see really good families. Ting Ting's family is the same kind of good family as I see in Korea, or as I see in America, or anywhere. Good families like to eat good food, have good conversation, be good to one another, and every so often (or all the time) drink some good drink.

A special thanks to my awesome hosts, and to Chinese people for making some kick-ass food. Next time, more on Korea, but until then, my friends, I miss and love you all.

-Chinese Democracy

P.S. If a certain Cincinnati expat living in Chengdu tells you it's safe to wash fruit in unpurified Chinese water, (you know, that it won't turn your intestines into an amusement park for the next week) do me a favor. Punch him in the throat.

Post #22

Hello Philosophers,

And welcome to Foley in Korea #22. A long time has passed, and there's much that needs to be discussed. For those of you who don't know, I managed to survive the Korean mudslides and flooding, on account of the fact that I was 200 miles away from them. And not only am I survivor, but I'm currently on vacation, which gives me the opportunity to learn you all a little something about this fair land. And we'll start with a little philosophy lesson.

My boss's son (who I've mentioned a number of times before) is four years old and entering that time in a little boy's where he has discovered the most fascinating and annoying question in the English language:

"Why?"

He asks it about everything. "Why do monkeys like bananas?" "Why is the air conditioner broken?" "Why does Daddy look at naked people on the computer?" Now, I know it's cute, and I dig the inquisitiveness, but it's hard to read a book about swans when he averages thirty questions per page (I don't know why swans have white feathers, damn it!). But I have to say, one instance of his curiosity was truly justified.

Instead of peeing all over the place, he's matured to the point where he asks to use the bathroom now. We're all very happy about this. And, seeing as though I have the bladder of a twelve-year-old girl, I usually have to go when he does. So, the other day, we went to the bathroom. There we were, standing, pants around our ankles, in side by side stalls. I'm focused on taking care of my business, when I realize he's looking up at me. Well, looking up at part of me. Then, in a voice full of wonder, he asks:

"Why is yours bigger?"

It is probably the only time anyone will ever ask me that, but that day, the little guy scored major points in my book.

But now, on to bigger, errr...more culturally relevant things.

So, the Korean summer is hot. Like, waking up in a pool of sweat hot. And if there's one thing Koreans are bad at (other than driving), it's insulating apartments. I can leave my air conditioner on for three hours, turn it off, and within minutes my apartment will be a sweltering 88 degrees of thick humidity. So, instead of throwing my money (and cold air) out the window, I opted for a fan. My boss was nice enough to get me one, but upon giving it to me, she gave me an ominous warning:

"Don't leave the fan on with the windows and doors closed."

I looked at her like she was new. What the hell was she talking about?

"Why not?" I ask.

"Every year, a few people die from having fans on them with the windows and doors closed."

Now, I'm trying to wrap my head around this one. At first, I think my boss has lost her damn mind, but after conferring with many Korean friends, this is a legitimate concern in Korea. Their rationale is that "People use up all the oxygen in the room and suffocate." So Korean people are terrified of this phenomenon.

But here's the thing - it defies common sense. Factoring out that extremely poor insulation that would let in fresh oxygen, how would a fan blowing air on you be any different than if it wasn't? It's the same air in the room, whether it's be blasted through moving propellers or not. It just doesn't make any sense. And yet, most Koreans buy into this paranoia.

And sadly, I do too. Logically, I know it's foolishness, but I'd rather be safe then sorry. This place is starting to rub off on me. That's why I don't trim my toenails at night. Bad luck.

But one thing that hasn't rubbed off on me yet is Paris Baguette. Paris Baguette, along with a slew of other Korean bakeries, is the pinnacle of mismatched food. You might be wondering how you can put a terrible Korean twist on a donut, but I promise, it's not hard. The mission statement of said establishment, I gather, is something along the lines of:

"We take a delicious pastry, bake it to perfection, and then throw some weird shit into it, and serve it to you, with a smile on our face."

For those of you who may have missed it, the equation follows Normal Pastry + Nonsense = Korean Delight.

Now, how bad could they mess up a croissant? How about by sticking a room temperature hot dog in there, with room temperature cheese, and salsa. Now, I like all those things, but try to imagine a sweet bun mixed with a salty hot dog and bitter salsa, and then, cheese. Your stomach growling? No? Me neither. Or the never overrated glazed onion crawler. That's right, it's a delectable glazed donut, twisted around and around, and infused with just onion flavor to make you wonder how fast donuts grow mold. Or my personal favorite - what I thought was a powdered jelly donut. Wrong again. Powdered donut on the outside. Shredded steak and pepper on the inside. That one's actually not even that bad, but loses points for false advertising. It's like a really convincing drag queen. The outside looks great but the inside is...well, you get the idea.
 
And the truly baffling thing about these bakeries is that they don't open til 8 in the morning. Some not til 9. Same with coffee shops. It's like they totally missed the point.

And speaking of missing the point, I sometimes feel this country totally biffs it and I don't understand how it could do the things it does. Other times, I feel like Korea is right on the money, and we could all learn a lesson. Here are two such examples.

I've mentioned plastic surgery before. The statistics speak for themselves. Some studies show that half of Korean girls in their mid-twenties have had some work done. Now. while I'm fervently against it, except in situations of actual physical deformities (burn victims, mangled noses, etc.) I understand that I don't call the shots. If a girl needs a confidence boost and thinks making her eyes (or other parts of her body) bigger will make her happy, can I really stand in the way? No, that would be wrong. (Ironically, as I'm writing this, I'm getting an advertisement in the corner of my screen for liposuction). But there is one thing I have a problem with, and I think I can make a moral claim about.



Parents giving their children plastic surgery. Yep, yep, yeppers. It happens. Is it common? It's starting to be. Some parents reward children for good grades with a trip to the cosmetic surgeon. How young? Some reports say as early as twelve years old. Some say younger (but I cannot confirm those). I don't know the truth, but I do know there is something truly disturbing about this practice. All health issues aside (sculpting faces, eyes, and bones that are not done growing can have devastating results), the social ramifications cannot be ignored.

This advantage of being the prettiest (if you want to call it that) girl in school because of surgery creates a necessity for it. It's like steroids in baseball. If no one's doing steroids, there's no problem. But once some players start doing it, they have an artificial edge that is tough to compensate by normal measures. The result? Steroids become an epidemic. Again, I have serious qualms about plastic surgery in general - but come on, can't we wait til they're eighteen to make their nose look more western?

But, in a twisted way, parents do this out of love. They want their girl to be the most successful, happiest girl they can be. And here, plastic surgery is a plausible means to do just that.

Good CNN video here http://cnn.com/video/?/video/world/2011/05/23/lah.skorea.plastic.surgery.cnn about a twelve year old girl who got plastic surgery. Very interesting stuff.

And while that's a bit deranged, let's talk about something good. Language.

Translating Korean into English is sometimes not a direct translation. Sure 버스 (bu-suh) and bus refer to the same moving vehicle that transports people to cheap to buy a car, but translating directly can sometimes be misleading. For instance, Koreans don't have the present perfect in the way we do (I have eaten 25 hot dogs today). Likewise their verb for "have" or "has" is "있어요" (eess-o-yo) meaning more "there is" or "there are." Furthermore, Koreans often leave out pronouns (like "I" or "you") in a sentence because the meaning is implied. And everyone your age is "친구" or "friend" whereas older and younger people are referred to as "older/younger brother/sister," whereas we're more apt to say "that guy" or "my classmate."

The question you're probably asking is, "Why should I care? They have different words. Whoop-dee-do!"

You've got some attitude.

Think about the significance of this. In English, we are more possessive. The idea of "I have done this" mean we "have" an experience. It's ours. I have a girlfriend, I have a monkey, I have something. Whereas, in Korean, you look at things as merely "there." You say "there is a monkey." You are not claiming ownership over said monkey, you are merely stating that it exists. You don't say "I have been bungie jumping" you merely say "bungie jumping happened."

Think of the ramifications of that. The idea of ownership, especially with land (made super important by John Locke, Englishman), has been the foundation for our basic laws in America. Our laws are about "having" rights. This is mine, not yours.




While keeping that in mind, let's go back to the Korean language. They often leave out the ideas of "me" and "you" and call everyone "friend" or "family." It's not "Do you want to eat food with me?" It's "eat food?" Just the idea, nothing more. Or you address them as brother and say, "Hey bro, food is good."  This is where I wonder if, perhaps, language causes a rift between us. You take the furiously independent mentality of America - is it always a good thing? Could we benefit from thinking about others as more family, and stop worrying so much about what's mine and what's yours and just worry about what is? Or are my hippie ideas to far out and groovy for you?

And this brings me to Bubble Bar. While I've mentioned it before, I must explain the relevence of this Gwang-ju institution. It's arguably the most international place in Korea, where people from Korea and Persia and Nigeria and India and China and America and Britian and all the silly countries in-between get together to interact in a cesspool of sin. No, it's not hell on earth, but it is notably sketchy and brings out some of Korean society's more colorful and provocative individuals. And what does this international community do in Bubble Bar? Dance...and then fight. Bubble Bar has more fights than anywhere else in Gwang-ju. And sadly, the origins of the fights are frequently tied to race or nationality. You wanna see Egyptians battling with Syrians, blacks versus whites, Koreans against Chinese, and everything in the middle? Look no further.

My friend D is a bartender there. This is a man who, in his tenure in the Korean military, had a landmind blow up in his face. If anyone is prepared to work there, it's him. He talks about the frequency of tournament style brawls in Bubble, where two people will get into an argument. It escalates, and then, throughout the duration of the night, all of their friends will take turns fighting, not at the same time, but through various points throughout the night, until everyones bigotry has been justified.

This bothers me so much because I grew up in the 90's, where every TV show featured the "Burger King Kids Club" ideal (shown below)



Where, some of us are Asian or black or white kids with weird blonde hair and glasses, but we can all get along. There were a million examples of this: Power Rangers, Recess, the brochure for Northfield Mount Hermon (shown below)



But, the more intrinsic differences I see between people, and the way the world is, sometimes I wonder if it's possible for there to exist peace between such varying ideologies, languages, and people. I mean, is this world destined for destruction? Are these ideas of world peace and coexistence and all colors high-fiving and watching the Olympics together just a farce?

I say no. What brings me to this conclusion? The Boryeong Mud Festival. What is a Mud Festival you ask? It's a place where people get covered in mud and...well that's about it. There's mud and mud beer and mudslides and mudmusic and mudwrestling and mudobstaclecourses and mud everything. And what kind of people attended this event? Everyone you could possibly think of. Why? Because everyone has fun together playing in the mud.

This made me realize - what the world needs to get along isn't trying to work out our differences - it's about being united under a common goal, like feeding the world, or curing cancer, or killing aliens, or in this case, mud. Because, when you're covered in mud, no one can tell what race you look like. When you're covered in mud, everyone looks the same....

Like a zombie.



Special points were added to my enjoyment of mudfest when I blasted my friend Krista in the eye with my mud filled Thomas the Tank Engine squirt gun. She was wearing contacts and the mud managed to wedge in between her pupil and the contacts. She cried for ten minutes. I tried not to pee myself laughing.    


(Above is moments before I blinded her with my flawless aim).

But aside from that heavy philosophical mumbo jumbo, my friends, I have just two quick announcements, and you can get back to your lives.

1.) I just had to turn down a modeling gig (working all day next Monday) because I have to work. I was going to be in a commercial for a construction company. And if you laugh at that, you're not really my friend.

2.) I'm off to China tomorrow to visit my boy Nick and his girl Tingting. The next Foley in Korea Blog will be focused on Foley in China, which, I know, we're all very excited about.

I miss and love you all. Peace out,

-Mudman

Post #21

Hello My Filthy Feet Readers,

Long time, no see. Much to discuss. My hiatus has been largely due to the fascist GRE’s and their inexorable vocabulary word bank (on the plus side, I now know a bunch of words that I will never, ever use). But all that’s over and we can get down to the best part of life: inflicting severe pain on loved ones on their wedding night.

Some Korean traditions are based in history, others in culture or religion, but this one is sheerly about fun. Or masochism. Whatever floats your boat. According to Korean culture, on the night of his entrance into matrimony, the man’s feet must be cleaned. While this sounds like the set up to a dirty joke your alcoholic uncle would tell you, I assure you, it’s something much, much more awesome.

The official English word for it is “bastinado,” the practice of beating someone’s feet to cause pain, often an effective torture technique (because it leaves little bruising). This is known as “cleaning the feet” in Korea, whereas people pay the groom money in order to get a good whack in on the feet. The more money you pay, the more pain you get to give him. Spend a dollar (cheon won), you can slap his feet with your hand. Throw down twenty bones (e-man won) you can use something that resembles a wooden cane. And while it’s undoubtedly hilarious, it’s slowly being phased out, mainly because in rare cases it causes broken bones and even death. However, those still brave and stupid enough love the practice.

Seen HERE:

Also as a side note, one website I went to claims the traditional tool in which to beat them with is “Dried Yellow Corvina.” For those of you who were as baffled as I was, do a Google search. Yup, that’s right. Tradition states beating feet with dried fish meat. Oh yeah. Bring on the fishy fun.

Speaking of food, it turns out no one knows what the hell Chinese food is. Now I’ve eaten Chinese food in America, Korea, and China (where of course, they just call it food) and no one can agree as to what Chinese food is. In America, as we all know, it’s usually fried. Often it’s saturated delicious in sauce, moderate on spice, and comes with a cookie at the end with either profound advice or something along the lines of “you like Chinese food” (God, I hate that fortune). The Korean’s go-to Chinese dish is call ja-jal-mein, which is a combination of potatoes, meat, and vegetables, in a salty black sauce that has the consistency of sludge, served over noodles. Think Beef Stroganoff, and then make it Koreany. And then, in my trip to China a year ago, I saw food that resembled none of the above. What I found were super oily, super spicy dishes, featuring strange animals and ineffable flavors.

But, my general consensus is that, while no one really can say what Chinese food is, no matter where you go, it’s the bee’s knees.

Now, I’m not one to hate on religion. But if there’s one thing about this country that I just can’t stand , it’s all those damn Buddhists.

Just kidding. How could you not love Buddha?


But there is one group that angers me. Let me paint you an all too common picture to the foreigners of this fair land. You’re somewhere public, a park on a beautiful sunny day, or chilling on the beach, trying to add a shred of color to that pasty white skin, when all of a sudden, a smoking hot Korean girl runs up to you and says, “Hello!” Now, if you’re me, this is not an uncommon situation, because, well, I mean, we’ve all seen me. But this could happen to anyone, even those of us who aren’t potential models (though that modeling agency still hasn’t called me back....). Regardless, it seems like a little slice of heaven - nice location, super hotty girl starts talking to you in perfect English, so you’re apt to pay attention.

But, often times, the conversation goes down like this:

SUPER HOT BABE: “Hello!”

FOREIGN DUDE: “Well hello to you...”(I know that sounded smooth, I know it did!)

SUPER HOT BABE: “What are you up to?”

FOREIGN DUDE: “Just enjoying the weather.”(and trying like hell not to mess this up...)

SUPER HOT BABE: “Do you want to play together for a little while?”

FOREIGN DUDE: “Play? Sure! I LOVE playing!”(easy tiger, relax, don’t scare her off...)

SUPER HOT BABE: “Can we talk?”

FOREIGN DUDE: “Yeah! We can talk about anything!”(especially if it involves marrying you!)

SUPER HOT BABE: “Great! Let’s talk about if you’ve accepted Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior!”

FOREIGN DUDE: “Damn....” (Jehovah’s...)

Yes, ladies and germs, Jehovah’s Witnesses in Korea are a far more evolved state of the religion. No, they don’t need to go to your door. They can attack with their pamphlets in a much more seductive vehicle: hotties. And my God, I don’t know where they went to school, but their English is flawless. I gotta give them credit, their methods are improving.





And speaking of religion, the Korean word for pockets is “ju-mon-ee.” Say it slow. Ah, the anti-Semitism. 

In other news, my kumdo (sword fighting) skills are developing nicely. For any of you familiar with the video game genre RPG (Role-Playing-Game), it kind of resembles that. Each time I go, I gain experience. I learn new attacks, new defense moves. I can string along combination attacks now, fake attacks, and can even do this gnarly thing where I cut at the wrists to get the person to raise their hands up, thus revealing their torso, and then slice them in half across the waist, finishing with only one hand on the sword. Badass. I’m getting faster, stronger, and above all, smarter with my kumdo. And the best part is, when I do well, my master (fellow gamers, get ready) looks at me, gives me the thumbs up, and says “LEVEL UP!”

I’m not joking.

   
If I keep up my skills and my progress, I can become a black belt before I leave in November. Ninja progress.

But I’m not all jokes today. Long overdue is my explanation of 5/18, a day recently celebrated in Korea. In a previous post I mentioned it, but I did not quite understand what it was at that time.

It is neither Independence Day nor Patriots Day, yet there is some of both of those in it. 5/18 commemorates May 18th, 1980, in my fair city of Gwang-ju. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

In the aftermath of the Korean War, the country was struggling. Things with the North were bad (surprise) but the real problems the South faced came from within their own country. Struggling between a democracy and a military dictatorship came to a head when the President Park-Chung-hee was assassinated in a coup, masterminded by General Chun Doo-hwan and Roe Tae-Woo in 1979. The result? Martial law. Lock-downs everywhere. Chun Doo-hwan took over and made sure he was calling the shots.

Meanwhile, the Jeolla region (where Gwangju is located) was enraged. Jelloa citizens, especially those of Gwangju, are known for two things: food and political activism. The extremely fertile region makes the people generous and well fed, and likewise gives them that political “don’t tread on me” attitude. This came into severe conflict over the eighteen years when Park-Chung-hee was in power. During his presidency, he made a point to slight the Jeolla people whenever he got a chance. And now, in the months following his assassination, things didn’t get better, they got worse. So the university students, in the ensuing months, took to the streets, protesting for their God-given rights to freedom.

Chun Doo-hwan was not having any of this. Gwangju was the thorn in his dictatorial paw, especially because it was the home to the well-loved Kim Dae-Jung, who was on the forefront of the Korean liberation movement. Arrests were made, including Kim Dae-Jung (who later managed to escape and flee the country) and universities were shut down. Paratroopers were stationed to ensure order in the grotesquely titled “Operation Fantastic Vacation.” Chun Doo-hwan thought he had licked the Gwangju people. They were just getting started.

On May 18th, a standoff between the protesters, now in the hundreds, and the paratroopers reached a breaking point. The soldiers attacked the protesters with clubs, the students fought back with rocks. The tension rose when a deaf man was killed by paratroopers, resulting in thousands of protestors flooding the streets.

Over the next three days, Gwangju was transformed. As more and more soldiers poured into the streets, the community united. Over ten thousand began protesting, trying to relinquish the army’s stranglehold of Jeolla. When the paratroopers began firing on citizens, they fought back. Many police sided with the protesters, and the stations that didn’t were raided for guns and ammunition. Buses and taxis attempted to form a barricade in the city. A civil war had begun.

In response, Chun Doo-hwan cut of the city’s communication. No phones. No mail. No communication with the outside world. Foreign reporters who tried to cover the story were shot at by military personnel. The government’s “official" reports claimed unsubstantiated riots in Gwangju, where civilians were brutally killing military officials for no reason. And that’s exactly what the world heard. Jeolla province was alone.

Learning about what happened next filled me with a multitude of feelings. I was likewise appaulled and moved, I lamented and rejoiced the events of May, 1980. Visiting the national monument, witnessing the history, the museum, the documentary, I found myself overwrought at four revelations: one about country, one about people, one about battle, and one about truth.

About country: Learning of 5/18 filled me with a profound shame. Why shame? Why should I feel bad? Chun Doo-hwan may have been in charge of Korea, but he answered to a higher authority: the United States. Following the Korean War, America kept Korea on a tight leash. But, fearing another anti-American uprising, the U.S.A. not only sanctioned Chun Doo-hwan’s siege of Gwangju, we told them how to do it. The strategy for eradicating freedom in South Korea came from the minds of the American government. We even gave it the gut-wrenching name Operation Fantastic Vacation. America had the final say in what went down, and we sided with the Chun Doo-hwan’s malevolent force.

About people: While Chun Doo-hwan’s army were documented as having brutalized and tortured the people (including throwing bound naked people into farms of red ants), many of his men didn’t want to be there. Some were even from Gwangju. Despite the constant fighting, many allowed doctors and nurses to take the wounded into hospitals to treat them. They were not some great evil, though perhaps their leader was.

Perhaps even more amazing were the denizens of Gwangju, and what they created: The People’s Liberation Army. Composed mostly of university students and other young people, they ruled Jeolla for the ensuing week. But yet, in the absence of government, there was no chaos. Not a single bank was looted, no stores were broken into. Rather, the whole city came together. People came into the streets in numbers that are estimated in the hundred thousands. Despite the economic noose on Jeolla, restaurants, grocery stores, and old women gave what food they had at no cost to the People’s Liberation Army. Citizens lined up to donate blood. There were speeches and rallies where people spoke of great hope for democracy. And the People’s Liberation Army was hailed as heroes everywhere they went in Jeolla. They demanded no power, only peace and community.

About battle: After the week of skirmishes and the rule of the People’s Liberation Army, the uprising was extirpated. Rebels were imprisoned or killed and the city fell. The full force of the Korean Army proved to be too much. Chun Doo-hwan assumed power, and soon became president. The national monument is home to the graves of over a hundred people who gave their lives that day, but the true monument, nearby, has the real numbers. The Gwangju People’s Monument, as it’s called, contains a graveyard where the casualties number in the thousands.

About truth: How can we celebrate an uprising that was defeated? Because Korea is a hallmark example of the power of truth. Over the years following, the country’s trust in Chun Doo-hwan diminished. Slowly, truth was revealed. The people demanded a freely elected government, and the hero of freedom, Kim Dae-jung, was elected president some decade and a half later. Most Koreans hail him as the greatest president they’ve ever had. In 1996, he put Chun Doo-hwan on trial for war crimes. In 2000, he was given the Nobel Peace Prize.

What I find so amazing about all this is that it happened only thirty-one years ago. People close to me experienced so many of these things. My friend’s mother was shot at on the street. My Korean teacher remembers the old women handing out rice cakes and cheering on the People’s Liberation Army. My priest’s best friend was killed in the uprising and was perhaps the largest factor in his ordination. And yet, from that point, Korea has gone over an economic boom whose speed unrivaled by any other country in the history of the world.

Hope I didn’t make the mood too heavy for you, my reader. I’ll leave you on that. I miss and love you all.

-Heavy Guy