Random Thoughts about America

I see a nation consumed with endless varieties of entertainment, self-distraction, and self-gratification. America is a nation of penem et circircences, breads and circus. We have a sport for each season to keep us perpetually entranced from the sordid realities that confront us. All the while our country slowly atrophies from gross negligence and blithe indifference. Let us not mind the poor or the millions that cannot find work. Forget about the untold billions we waste defending ungrateful populations e.g. Afghanistan, Iraq, among many others. Don't worry about our aging infrastructure, our dilapidated public transportation system, lest of all our astronomical deficit. Instead let us stay transfixed with Obama's empty elocution, with meaningless games, and Hollywood movies that deaden senses.

-There are those hapless individuals that cling to the notion that party politics are still relevant and necessary in rectifying societal ills. They mistakenly put their principles behind corporate subsidized parties and self-interested politicians that only seek re-election. Only when we change our political system can true change be implemented.

-By its very nature democracy or rule by the people will inevitably fail in creating a humane, judicious, and prosperous society. The unwitting masses are without exception always blinded by the elitist demagogues that control them. So as long as democracy exists, nations will habitually focus on the wrong sort of problems. Healthcare is the red herring at hand.

A New Hope

I've overcome the depths of melancholy that I had felt over the past month. Living abroad teaches you so much about yourself and how to deal with internal self-created problems. Up until a couple weeks ago, as noted in recent blogs, I was suffering from a deep depression. I've experienced nothing quite like it in my entire life. Homesickness would be the most apt name for it. Yet it's one thing to experience it and another thing altogether to say you understand how it feels. Let it be written that much to my approval, I have conquered the woes I once faced, at least for now. Solving problems like homesickness here are incredibly more challenging than can be adequately explained. Nonetheless, I'll try and impart to you some of the knowledge I've attained. If you're homesick, you face a couple of problems. For starters, there's the language barrier. At times, you can get completely annoyed and frustrated at the inconvenience of doing simple things like asking 'what times is the last bus leaving'? I'm learning Korean yet there are always new phrases such as that one that are of practical use that I've yet to learn. Next if you have a problem, you can't console yourself with your friends like one might do back home. Back home you have a more intimate relationship with friends. If you have a problem you usually approach or deal with it in a different way. If you're feeling blue back at home you can ask a friend to watch a game, TV show, or movie with you to divert your low spirits. Maybe go to the beach, get some food, etc. Here, the few friends that you connect with are usually of similar backgrounds as you but at the same time they're still not quite your old college friends. You don't gel in the same type of way. Just as importantly there's the cultural/societal element involved. Like with home, you don't have the luxury of doing the same things you might otherwise to do solve your despair. In effect, you're forced to deal with your desolation often by yourself. This I'm glad to say is all past history. I've coped with where I am and am now the boundaries of my limitations. And for that I can honestly say I'm a stronger, more patient person. O the places you'll go and the things you'll learn! :) p.s. I wrote this while at home with H1N1 influenza so it may not the most thoroughly well thought out of my blogs

Musings of Home

These past few weeks, perhaps month have certainly been the most agonizing of times here. A deep melancholy angst has overcome me. The cause of which I do not know. Can it be Fall's onset and the approach of winter? This is the first time in my life where I can actually feel a noticeable difference in the weather. When I arrived the unfamiliar exoticness of the place seemed to cancel out the chilly temperatures or at least periodically distracted me from them. Also, going from winter to spring is not a bad transition while you're getting adjusted to a completely different culture. The retrogression into shorter colder days however is welcome only in the fact that autumn saves you from the irritating humidity of summer.

Aside from the weather I'm having to confront the more troubling uncertainty of my future. This I hate probably more than anything else- hell, it kept me from graduating college for so long! I do not know what I'll be doing come February and that scares and depresses me a great deal. The options currently only the table are as follows: a) I've just applied to graduate school to get an m.a. in international relations here- provided A, I get in of course, and B, the school gives me some sort of financial aid I really would like to do this b) I can teach another year again here- kind of apathetic/mildly interested in doing this another year right now; could be because I've been down lately, and lastly option c) I could come home and face the worst job market in oo I don't know fifty some odd years- always a compelling reason to come home. So in a nutshell that's what in store for me on paper.

And yet another reason I'm feeling like The Dude after getting his rug stolen is for the first time I'm homesick or maybe not homesick but more appropriately, 'friend-sick'- a term I brilliantly coined while writing this very blog (I'm a god damn genius sometimes, I really am). It'd be nice to watch some college football or maybe even just talk about football. The people that live around me either don't like football out of defective personalities or they're from a lousy country like Canada which you might argue are one and the same. I'd like to watch my alma mater try to compete with schools that seemingly recruit better maladjusted athletes yet have not much to offer other than lots of rain- the entire north west, smelly brainless hippies- again north west, fugly women- most of the schools except the Arizona ones or S fuckin C, people who are completely socially inept way past the point of amusement- Standford take a bow, grunge rock- Berkley on up, and or boiler plate schools masquerading as legitimate institutions of higher learning e.g. Oregon State or most of the Pac-10 for that matter. I'd also like to play some beer pong during the day against people who actually treat peer bong as if it actually mattered who wins and then beat them at it. Some real Mexican food cooked by immigrants of questionable legal status would be welcomed. Having a decent steak once in a while would be nice too. Yea... it's safe to say I miss home. Maybe I'll be over this in a month or two I don't know.....

The Fall Classic and other trifling matters

Fall has enveloped the Korean peninsula. The rice fields which blanket the countryside around me have tinged yellowish-green; it's quite a sight to see. The dearth of vegetation and trees still remaining have only partially begun to welcome autumn which is to say they're spattered with bits of yellow and green. The air has noticeably lost its merciless humidity thank G-d or thank goodness; divinity or not, I'm appreciative of the cooler weather. We're a month and a half into my second semester of teaching a language I, myself, am still trying to conquer. The novelty and some of the new found wonderment of teaching has wore off and with it has come the enduring task of facing a perpetually confounding reality. I'm taking a Korean language class at the nearby university and am slowly, agonizingly learning bits and pieces of a world which has long remained so damn elusive. Naturally it makes life a little more bearable when you can ask for more milk in your coffee or are actually able to discern the contents of the menu you're looking at. Yesterday, (Sunday) the history teacher at my school called me at about 10 in the morning to invite me to go to a Korean baseball game. In the reckless depravity of college, calling me at 10 in the morning would be an excellent way of hearing my voicemail. Now, my usual weekend mornings around town consists of getting up around 8:30-9:00. Walking down the street a couple minutes to the nearest 'restaurant' which specializes in making these toast egg-cheese sandwiches. They spread this sugary sauce on the wonder bread (to my constant dismay, you can't readily buy whole wheat bread in most places here) and you can get different things on the sandwich like ham, tuna, or the Korean favorite, bulgogi (beef sauteed with a special and completely overrated Korean sauce). I usually get just the standard egg-cheese (they use bon-fide American cheese btw) and sometimes when I'll feel a bit like a heathen I'll order it with ham. Anyway, I usually get one of these sandwich toast type things and read whatever book I happen to be reading at the time for an hour-two hours. I happened to be reading when I got invited to go to the baseball game. This game was the second I've attended but unlike the last one, this game was a playoff game. The atmosphere at Korean baseball games are pretty intense, at least the ones I've been to and they both been sellouts. If I said 'electric' that'd be the wrong and overused word so I think I'll just stick with intensely different to throw in an adverb for good measure. Nearly everyone has thunder-sticks and when your team is at bat your chanting pretty much the whole time. It's definitely a lot more participatory then American baseball (and not coincidentally, American democracy). Most of the chants are in English- big surprise there, which makes it easier for me to get into the merriment. The have ultra attractive cheerleaders that dance on top of the dug out in between innings- needless to say but this is obvious denigration to women and spectacle of promiscuity is certainly something the imperialist MLB should learn. The downside to all this was my team, the Doosan Bears ended up losing. The series is now tied 2-2 (best of five) and the winner of this game goes on to the Korean World Series (aaaaaaaaa oooooo!!) They play tomorrow night (Tuesday) at 5 should you might want to watch the Doosan Bears take on the SK Wyverns (it's a dragon type animal- I had no idea either just like when Weeks explained what a yeti was to me). Well, it's 10:42 and my bedtimes is nearing. Next time maybe I'll discuss whether I have seasonal depression (seasonal affective disorder), melancholic depression, or the much diagnosed manic depression in a special upcoming blog entitled- why the bleep have I been feeling so shitty lately?

As long as I could remember I've never struggled to make or find new friends. Ascending each class all the way from grade school to university, I've always found myself hanging out with the 'popular crowd', or at least, the self-confident sport playing, half-hazard experimental type. Popularity and self-assurance seem to be a ubiquitous pair in the manner of insecurity and meekness. Despite having more attributes of the latter, I've continually 'fit in' or have been accepted- whatever that means. In Korea however, I have few people that are worthy of calling friends. My dearth of friends stems not from opportunity- ironically I live in a small 'rural' (by Korean standards not ours) community called, Shinchang, that is the epicenter where virtually all of the English teachers in the region live. Collectively, there are probably 50-60 'foreigners' living throughout my apartment complex which consists of nine high rise apartment buildings. A friend and I derisively call the people that live around here the 'Star Trek convention' for all the eccentric oddballs that happened to congregate in this part of the Korean peninsula. Being a newly minted twenty-five year old I'm actually quite young vis-a-vi most of the other foreigners. If I had to place a median age for the people living here it'd probably be around thirty-five. If only you had a chance to meet some of the neurotic characters that live around here. A psychologist would have a field day diagnosing all the sundry neuroses. Most of the people that I've met in our town and Korea come to here to teach English because of some sort of problem or insecurity back at home. They sort of fled or escaped in way. Only the honest ones will actually admit this. Naturally everyone says they're here because they love to travel or they came here to pay off their college loans- you can save at least a grand a month if you don't travel and live penuriously (I don't btw). Truth be told though, that's only the official convenient reason why people come. Many come here because they were the ones that were never included back at home; euphemistically you could say they're the loners or the introverts; I would label them, the dorks, tools, douchebags, etc. Whatever the case may have been these people graduate college totally devoid of meaning or direction and decide to come to Korea. Was I a part of this group you may ask? I don't think so, at least, not in terms of being a social outcast or Holden Caulfield type (Catcher in the Rue main character). Another group which I flippantly confess I'm apart, of came to Korea because they have a thing for Asian women and depressingly, probably came up on the short end of the stick when it came to getting laid. Like a couple others I thought surrounding myself with a race I find quite sexually appealing would be a fine idea. So far, I haven't been disappointed. When someone asks me why I came here, provided its within the realm of propriety to tell them the truth, I tell them the truth rather blatantly. 'Came here for the beautiful women'. When I say this people usually chuckle nervously and gently try to move the conversation elsewhere out of fear that I'm a perverse sexual deviant or are simply disinterested in talking about my erotic escapades. Next you have another type of person who came to Korea for some really dramatic reason e.g. rape, latent homosexuality, acute delusional psychosis and loss of reality itself. The vast majority of women here I'm sorry to say, are here because they nearly have to pay for sex back at home. Yea, they're generally not your cheerleader, sorority dunce types. A friend of mine told me a Korean thought all foreign women are overweight. A completely understandable observation made by this Korean seeing that a plurality of them here indeed are.

The people living in my town are as eclectic as they are bizarre. I'll try and describe some of them if I can. We have this one middle-aged Australian guy who even my good friend whose Australian says, he's Australian as they come. On the wagon, he has a pretty thick accent but when he gets drunk and rest assured, he often does, becomes completely incomprehensible. On top of this he speaks to everyone like he's speaking to his best mate back in the bush which is to say he uses Australian colloquialisms that only crocodile Dundee would understand. If you're lucky he'll tell stories of him sodomizing transvestites in Thailand. One night after the bars I had the unfortunate task of escorting him home and he tried coming on to me; needless to stay that left me stupefied beyond belief for the next week or so. The next day I told my friend about what transpired that night and learned that apparently he has tried successfully or not to come on to nearly every male or female in our town. As one might imagine this only happens when he's inebriated. Next we have a upper-twenties Kiwi (New Zealander for all you yanks that don't know) who came to Korea in order to teach English and pursue her 'rock-star' aspirations. That's right, rock-star like Bonjovi (incidentally a favorite of hers). Literally, within an hour of meeting her she invariably drags her wanting to become a rock-star somewhere into the conversation. I emphasize 'rock-star' because for some reason that's what she wants to become; not a musician or singer song writer but a sex, drugs, and rock n roll crazed rock-star. Now granted I'm not a psychologist, hell, I haven't even taken a psych class in college but she definitely has 'delusional psychosis' tattooed across her forehead. She's in a band made up of other foreigners (teachers). One night I felt like wasting my time so I went to see her band perform. She's the lead singer of course, and as fate would have it she's the definition of sub-par mediocrity. Forgot to mention her looks. When you're eight beers down she's mildly attractive if you're totally desperate. I'm not, thankfully. My friends and I try and avoid long conversations with her just so we don't have to incessantly hear about her wanting to become a rock-star. My friend was spot on when he said, that she's one of those people that have watched the movie, 'The Secret' way too many times. A fitting analogy would be those people that believe anything at all costs- reason or reality be damned; I suppose you could call them fundamentalists. It'd be like if you're jogging on the 405 at 3:30 in the morning and you believe you're not going to get hit by a car because you will yourself not to do so. Last time I spoke to her we were discussing our future plans. After asking what her plans were she replied, 'I'm gong to teach in Korea if I don't get signed by a major record label to do a European tour' (mind you we're in the middle of nowhere in Korea).

Today was a pretty typical Tuesday. I went through my usual routine; the alarm clock on my cell phone woke me up at 7:20 am. Unless I've go to bed at a really late time or drink (which I rarely do anymore, especially on weekdays), getting up at that time is not such a huge pain. In fact, getting up early in the morning here has been more of a welcome delight than a chore. I suppose that means I enjoy what I'm doing here? Trying to get me up at that time during my formative years i.e. college years and I would've most likely turned off my alarm with only the faintest of regrets over not having attended a class for the umpteenth straight day. To this day I still wonder what caused my lack of motivation during my last couple years in college. Was it my major? Surely, studying 2,000 Greek literature isn't always going to be the most entertaining of subjects. It wasn't always like that though. Initially I found the world of Homer, Virgil, and Ovid to be.. mysterious, and a sign of ones erudition. I still love Greek tragedies- Lately, I'm starting to find more comfort in tragic endings in the novels that I read then happy ones. Is that morose? Wonder what that says about my psyche? Anyway, as college went on, somewhere down the line I just floundered along in my studies. To say I regret this is only half true because the other part of me says, 'amor fati, learn from the past, self-reproach is a waste time'. Then again, maybe it had nothing to do with my major at all. Perhaps it was the poisoning of my body seemingly every other night for no good or even border line intelligent reason. Youthful folly is a lovely apologist euphemism for being complete dumb ass. I'm sure you've heard the saying 'hindsight is always 20/20'. Well maybe that's the case, but I happen to think hindsight is more like 20/10 with things as trivial and meaningless of the things I've done. If I haven't told you already, I'm in the process of applying to a couple graduate schools out here in Korea. Of course, I had to write a personal statement which I did. I sent my personal statement to one of my professors so that he could write a more thorough letter of recommendation for me. Being the gracious person that he is, he wrote me a letter of rec. and edited my personal statement without my request. Naturally, one of the things I avoided in my essay was explaining (I'd say rationalizing) my mediocrity during the last couple years. The professor whom wrote my letter of rec. openly pointed out why I had not written about my 'failure to apply myself'. To my dismay however, I cannot think of any intelligent equivocation or specious defense of why my GPA went from a 3.46 to a 3.0 during the latter three years of college. I want to re-rewrite my personal statement with an eloquent speech, 'don't mind my last couple years of college- I only pissed away a fairly strong GPA and landed in a puddle of academic malaise. I really do want to re-rewrite it this way but I don't have the vaguest notion of how to do so?..

After reading over this entry I've noticed that my aim starting out was to tell you about my 'typical Tuesday' yet I ending up rambling on about my woes as a student. I'm sure if you've been following my blog you aren't the least bit surprised I interpolated another one of my half-baked observations. My intention throughout my blog thus far will be to find out whether or not I can eventually write myself out of my facetious digressions and ostensibly pointless musings.

Absalom Absalom

I am completely stupefied on what to write in this blog anymore. Out of genuine concern for my life or perhaps just as a conversation 'filler', friends from home often ask, 'Zeke', 'tell me stories about Korea'. This question utterly plagues me to a where I have no discernible clue how I should answer. I've been in Korea long enough to where I'm used to babies staring at me; I've become used to sitting in the teachers office while other teacher's carry on conversations that I will never understand; I've become used the irrational xenophobia and unceasing hospitality. I've become used to it all. I'd venture to say that six months or so is the point in which novelty turns into the blase. I'm thinking that human beings can adapt or get worn down by anything. Whether a person lives in an exotic wonderland or dwells in the belly of a coal mine, a person, eventually, will get used to it and treat it as home. In the movie, The Shawshank Redemption, the character Red, played by Morgan Freeman, notably describes the process known as institutionalism whereby the characters in the film, 'come to love the walls that surround them'. Granted, my comparisons of prison and life here in Korea are a bit outlandish even extraneous but my point is that most of my life has now morphed into a strange duplicitous relationship of frustration and resignation. Many if not all foreigners that have been here a while are disdainfully irked about certain aspects of Korean society and culture that don't easily conform to their own 'rational' based societies; A favorite pastime of teachers here is the denigration of how 'odd' certain things are here. Some teachers usually talk about teaching here as if it were a tour of duty. For instance, 'wait until you're here three years and then talk to me about such and such pet peeve. It pisses me off when I hear teachers grumbling like they've attained some high and mighty status because they voluntarily choose to stay here.

Lately, school life has become a fairly predictable affair; most days are still filled with the regular joy accompanied with the cult like celebrity status I still exude. Other parts of the day I find myself in class just as bored and confused as to why I'm here as the students are.

I don't pretend to know a thing worth knowing

It’s been about six months (or is it seven, I cannot be sure?) on the small Korean peninsula now. I’m writing this blog on Word right now because my Internet for the first time does not work. One of the immediate things that come to mind while reflecting on my travels and time here is one of most neglected virtues in Western culture, patience. I’m not going to start lamenting the degradation of our society but I’m just going to say that it would’ve be nice if the teachers throughout my life stressed the forgotten value of having patience when things don’t go your way. Frustratingly, my Internet does not work for no apparent reason but through all my trials and tribulations here I’ve developed a sense of ‘let it be’ to borrow lyrics from the terrifically profound Beatles song. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not arguing for a form of carefree passivity like ‘The Dude’ from ‘The Big Lebowski’. In my twenty-four years I’ve finally figured out that to overcome obstacles be they, not having hot water in your apartment, not being able to withdraw money from the ATM, having cockroaches and other insects in your apartment, etc, one needs to recognize that they will not be solved all at once but IN TIME. I probably sound nauseatingly dry and obtuse when I make such a pedestrian insight yet I’m not sure many people truly understand even the most basic maxims in life. Perhaps I don’t understand things like this either? At least I’m aware of the only undeniable truth in life pointed out by Socrates; that the only thing I truly know is that I know nothing and everybody walks around thinking they know so much. I think knowledge has to start from this point and then move forward if you are to go anywhere.

I vividly remember arriving to where I’m currently living six months ago. One of the most frustrating things I can recall was that I did not even know where exactly I was on the map. If I got lost and took a bus to the wrong city or something I really could not tell anyone where I was living. Fortunately or not that never happened and as time went on I deciphered the bus routes, train schedules, and the myriad cultural rubix’s cubes. Perhaps a fitting and rather trite metaphor for my time here and perhaps life in general would be putting together a puzzle (I wonder if they have puzzles here incidentally?). In the beginning all I had were the pieces; maybe a couple by sheer luck happened to be right beside one another but the vast majority of them were scattered every which way on the table. The puzzle (life) I suppose cannot be seen at times. Maybe all you have is one section done and all you can put together are a couple pieces at a time. Being in Korea however, has taught me that it’s okay not to always see the big picture. In time, if you keep plugging away, the picture will slowly emerge and one day you will have forgotten all about how far you’ve come, and there, out of nowhere, there will be this beautiful mosaic. Change happens when no ones watching.

From 한국

For the first time in nearly five months (wow, can't believe I've been here five months!) I can't think of what to write in my blog...hmmm.. Maybe another sip of my orange colored fiber drink will help me with my writers block. They sell fiber drink at just about every convenience store e.g. 7-Eleven (they have that here and Japan), Buy The Way, Family Mart, or Mini-stop (the ones listed I've found to be the most popular if not all the ones they have here). In addition to finding the much beloved laxative that I enjoy after a healthy yet conspicuously vegetable/brown rice forsaken meal, you can also buy ginseng (which I often get), and aloe juice (another good one). Btw, the aloe juice is actual juice with sugar and the like; if you get a sunburn it's probably not the best thing to pour on yourself should you happen to come to Korea and think it can be used for duel purposes. If you're hungry you can buy these triangle shaped rice things wrapped in seaweed; inside the center is kinda like a jelly donut except instead of jelly they have different 'fillings' like tuna (I'd name the other 'fillings' but I got these maybe 3 times and didn't get the tuna 'filling' so I stopped buying these pretty much after my first week here). In case you're wondering (like me) if I spelled filling correctly, I found that 'fillings' has two Ls while filing, like filing papers in an office only has one L. Weird, wild, stuff! The irony is that I'm teaching English and losing it at the same time. I've actually misspelled a word and had my co-teacher correct me one time which was slightly humiliating (before you pass judgment I've heard from other teachers that they've made similar faux pas like mine before- you'd really be shocked at what an environment like this does to your English, kid you not). Oh, I almost forgot; two more slightly odd things they sell at these convenience stores: The first being dried squid/shrimp which hardly should come as a surprise to you if you are familiar with just about any East Asian culture (they love love eating squid and shrimp!!) They even have shrimp burgers at McDonald's (along with the pride of Korea, the bulgogi burger) and potato chips that are shrimp flavored. I accidentally bought the shrimp flavored chips one night while under the influence of alcohol and immediately noticed my purchasing mistake upon my first chip. The other thing that might be a little strange to you that they sell at these convenience stores are what I call, 'meat on a stick'. They usually have these in hot dog warmer upper things located right next to the cash register sitting next to their buddies, the fried chicken. For some reason every time I see these I always think of one of my favorite movies, 'There's Something About Marry'. In the movie, Ben Stiller, asks while eating a corn dog (something to the effect of), 'how come they don't have more sticks with meat on them?' Apparently, the writers of the movie never traveled to Asia because they indeed have 'meat a stick' sold at nearly every convenience store sold in Korea. Lastly, many if not all these convenience stores serve as fast food restaurants of sort. Most convenience stores have tables either inside or outside (or both) so you can eat you're food or have a beer should the need fancy you. Aside from those things mentioned above however, the convenience stores sell pretty much everything else you'd normally find in the States.

Other seemingly trivial news: I've finally figured out the train schedule which makes life a little easier. Unfortunately, I still haven't figured out the bus system around where I live; Every time I get on the bus I still have mild anxiety attacks if I don't recognize a place or surrounding. Can't think of anything interesting to write about for now and about getting tired so that's it for now. Ciao! Thanks for reading.

Englishee

It's been a couple months since my last posting and I've probably lost maybe half of my readers, all three of them. Nonetheless, I will begin anew with my tales from the orient. What a journey this has been so far! As with about every posting in my blog- I usually don't know where to start? Anyways, if you've been reading my blog I'm sure you've gotten used to the nonsensical inanity of it all. So here it goes:

I'm nearing the end of our school's first semester and I've been in the 'Land of the Morning Calm' now for about four and a half months. A predictability of sorts has finally set in: I have become used to the mangled English that might drive an otherwise sane literate person mad; the ad nauseam English phrases that are taught in English textbooks for example, 'how are you? I'm fine thank you, and you? (most students will answer 'I'm fine thank you, and you' in almost robotic fashion when asked how they are doing- some answer, it's sunny or it's cloudy (these are some of the ahem, lower level students) have all become normal yet still irritating at times.

If I can critique the absolutely awful textbooks for a moment- the reason many people are ghastly terrible at speaking English is most likely, in large part due to the way English is taught here. The textbooks are not situational or theme oriented like movies, shopping, etc. Instead they're kind of all over the place. Instead of having people build sentences on there own; the way you should do when learning a new language, especially English which demands creativity and originality; they have these already constructed sentences in there textbooks. As a result, many people, even after learning English since Elementary school can only splutter out a few sentences if any. Another ubiquitous phrase or word found here is the word 'delicious'. I speak for my fellow English speakers when I say, never in my life have I used the word 'delicious' so much until I arrived in Korea. Often when eating with fellow teachers I am asked, 'is it delicious?' (with a quizzical expression)? and the standard response from which I have become accustomed to giving if I like a dish, 'yes, it is delicious'. Sometimes at lunchtime now I often comment about how delicious the food is- I think it makes everyone happy because that's one phrase they can actually understand and it makes them feel good about their cultural identity (which unlike America food is part of their distinct identity). On a side note: Koreans love to hear complements about their food and country. It's probably because unlike America, which is a superpower, Korea is rarely ever talked about on the international stage except for of course, their brethren to the north. Americans in general, don't care all that much what new comers think of their country or at least they don't make a point of asking every person traveling to America what they think of American food (what is American food? Trying to think of something but nothing really comes to mind because we have so many cultures and types of food). Plus Americans and perhaps other western countries have a healthy dose of self-criticism (some may argue too much) i.e. we often are quite critical of our leaders, policies, society, and culture. Maybe it's because I don't speak the language but some of the Koreans that I have encountered usually don't take cultural, societal, political, etc. criticism all that well (it could very well because it's coming from a round eye but I'm not sure).

I only find it half-comical now when I see the police cars always driving around with their police lights (on the top of their car) flashing. They're never pulling anyway over for speeding or arresting them btw, they just drive around or are sometimes stopped with their lights flashing. Why they do this? In the words of the Kid Rock song (probably taken from someone a bit more wise them him), 'Only G-d knows why'? Or the juxtaposition between Korean society and language and driving rules. The former seems to have a million rules yet when it comes to driving they only have one basic rule here, try and not to get into an accident. Other than that you can do pretty much whatever you want on the road or parking- you can park on any side of the road or even on the sidewalk, you can even park in front of other cars in your apartment building (they solve this by putting the car in neutral and when the other person blocked in wants to get out they simply just push the car out of the way). Wheww, I'm tired of writing and am going to go work out and go to the hot springs (sauna and spa with 45 other Korean nude males). A couple things that I wanted to talk about which I failed to mention: couple t-shirts, the eating of dog and why they do, and teacher's day.

Almost forgot: Today (Sunday morning) I got up and for some reason couldn't think of the spelling difference between message and massage. When you're surrounded by people that don't speak English well it drags your own ability down- case in point if you haven't noticed from my recent blog. Until next time, stay well. Be the change you want to see in the world! :)

I'm Lovin it!

I woke up feeling fatigued and ill but strangely I feel alright again. I told everyone that I was suffering from the Swine Flu which elicited a few laughs. Last night we (some of the foreign teachers that live in my apartment complex- there are six or seven 13-15 story buildings around me called Kyung Hee Hak Sung (I think Hak Sung means apartment?) ventured into what we call downtown Asan also called Onyang for some drinks. There are about 50-60 foreign teachers scattered throughout the apartment complex but I only usually see and know about 20 of them. We live in, Sinchang- a small town of about...maybe 15,000-20,000 which lives and dies when the university is in session. Sun Chun Hyang university is the definition of a commuter school. During the week, students are out and about the streets, usually stumbling around drunk at night. The weekends turn the town into a veritable ghost town- when I arrived here, I came on a Friday and thought my life was going to end because a) I didn't know there were that many foreigners living next to me and b) I wasn't told about that the student's flock in masse to their homes on weekends. My experience is that Koreans tend to drink a lot and students are no exception. Alcoholism is a wholly concept/disease? /issue/problem in the West or U.S.- Koreans work very had and play equally hard. It's actually quite hilarious even now, seeing students and old men sozzled after they get done eating. When you go out to dinner, soju (the Korean hard alcohol similar to Japanese sake which gives you incredibly bad hangovers; it's half the alcohol percentage of vodka; has a smell reminiscent of paint thinner or nail polish remover and costs next to nothing, about 1300 Won for a bottle which is about a dollar U.S.) is just as much as part of the meal as rice. Unless you're going to Itaewon (an enclave in Seoul exclusively for two types of people: 1) moronic G.I.s who tarnish America's already soiled reputation one bar fight at a time, and 2) foreigners who wish they never set foot in Korea and desperately want to cling to all the amenities of home), western style bars are not uncommon but perhaps hard to come by. Koreans usually go to restaurants to drink with a group of friends where they spend hours eating, drinking, and probably denigrating foreigners (English teachers are just as much cultural ambassadors as teachers of English; Korea after all, didn't earn the name, 'The Hermit Kingdom' for nothing; Korea only started opening up to the West very recently and this still is a completely homogeneous, insular, and, isolated society vis-a-vis the U.S. or most western countries). 

       Today (Wednesday, April 29) we have off from school because of school board elections in which they elect the head school superintendent. I for one and probably many other teachers as well have absolutely no clue why we need a day off for this but like with many things in Korea, the answer to why things are done differently here are not important. I've found that you have to accept things for what they are; the more you try to look for answers about for example, why you don't shake hands (generally you don't but sometimes close friends do and it's not totally absent incidentally) but instead you share food when you eat at traditional and even many contemporary restaurants is beyond me? Or why the intercom in my apartment- there's a guy who starts speaking in the morning sometimes? I could go on but for some reason I'm blanking on the myriad occurrences of confusing seemingly inane things that go daily here.

          Let me explain how going to a restaurant works for those of you who don't know. Let's say you go to a traditional restaurant. Here you have at least a couple of side dishes (love the side dishes!) of different types of kimchi, and maybe eggs, seaweed, squid, and other stuff that I can't think of right now. A big misnomer to the uninformed is that there is only one vegetable type of kimchi. You'll soon find out there are many many different types of kimchi e.g. my favorite, the spinach kimchi (which I have in my fridge at the moment), the most common I think, lettuce kimchi, radish kimchi, and probably dozens of other types that I don't know of. Everyone then, helps them self with whatever side dish seems appealing at the moment. Bone appetite! 

Time Is On My Side, sort of..

Wow, my life pretty much since I arrived a little more than more than a month ago has not slowed down in the least! In fact my work schedule only seems to be getting more engrossing (next week I teach the after school program- an additional eight hours a week). I'm at my main school (Dogo Middle School- just learned the Korean word for middle school today incidentally) that I teach at Monday-Thursday from 8 am- 4:50 pm and with a few exceptions I'm able to get off a little earlier. Leave it to me to leave the States to essentially get a full time job! Oh and teaching even four days a week is a full time job for all you skeptics out there- when I'm not at school and I'm in/around my apartment I'm usually doing one of these things: Making lesson plans which I'm still learning how to do; cooking one of four dishes that I make that doesn't taste all that great but more importantly are healthy (I make real easy stuff like brown rice with eggs/tuna/chicken and the classic bread and peanut butter aka a peanut butter sandwich; cleaning my apartment because I think cockroaches are attracted to dirt or food or water or all of the above. (Btw, I really hate cockroaches of all the various kinds of insects I find in my apartment- maybe it's because they're the most plentiful and not the plentiful in a good way like, 'Thanksgiving dinner was plentiful'. I'm not all that scared of them like spiders or clowns but I really fuckin hate them because I seem to find at least one every damn day. Sometimes I'm like, "come on, really? How'd you get inside the draw and why were you chillin in there dude!? There's no food/water in there! You little friend have to look in the fridge where I keep all the food that I open now. Now I have to kill you not because I don't like you but because if I don't there maybe more of your annoying buddies hanging around my place". When I'm not cleaning/killing cockroaches/eating/lesson planning/exercising (I go to the nearby university to do this which is by far the worst gym I've ever been, save my eight grade middle school gym that I worked out in p.e. as I went through puberty), I'm writing emails/facebook/news for the five minutes that I have before I go to bed. Friday thankfully, is my mercy day which I teach two 40 minute classes at Sinchang Elementary school. My first day teaching elementary was last week btw, and it was awesome! Some of my middle schoolers have that adorableness still in them but it's really funny seeing a class full of munchkins. The main teacher is in the room with me when I 'teach' (more like sing songs and get to make a complete fool out of myself for 40 minutes) in case they have too much chocolate or something. My experience here is that the students in general (both middle and elementary) are incredibly more well behaved than in the States. Could it be because this is my first time teaching or maybe it's because they hit the students with long sticks (it really is not as bad as it sounds- most deserve it though) or make them squat on top of their desk/stand in some awkward position for a couple minutes when they misbehave? Either way, compared to insolent Americans, Koreans are pretty good. The first day was an introduction about myself which I'm sure very few understood. Then I had them make name tags which proved to be the most difficult tasks on the face of the earth (for my second class)! For the first thirty minutes they wrote their Korean name translated in English which I try to have the students break away from just because I simply can't pronounce their names correctly. For instance, saying Kim Hye Rye sounds a good deal different in Korean. I first realized that I should not pronounce names when talking or trying to have a common interest conversation with fellow teachers about the Major League Baseball pitcher Chan ho Park. His last name in particular sounds more like Pak (say it real fast) than Park. Anyway, I ended up finding a list of English names that the students could choose from and G-d willing, this Friday they will have their new English name tags provided they didn't lose them/eat them. 

      Instead of starting a new blog page I've decided to just start a new paragraph. So it's been nearly a week since I wrote what you've just read above. My insect of the week: gnats (small flies for my esl international readers, welcome). Yep, I'm pretty stoked about the new company as you probably are. Despite all my food (including fruit!) being in the fridge I now have gnats. Back to important human activities. This week I've started teaching the after-school program four days a week at Dogo Middle School. I teach 7th and 8th periods which start at 3:30 and end at 5:10. Afterwards I'm thoroughly tired as I'm sure the student's brains simply cannot retain any more information. At my school they have 9 periods by the way. You're probably like, they have nine fuckin classes (hopefully my swearing doesn't become a habit because I think loose swearing like in Joe Pesci movies kind of degrades the conversation/discourse; kind of like seeing Cindy Crawford in Playboy you know, it takes away from what's left to the imagination or what hasn't been said/seen)!!? Anyway, that was a a long digression (my ADD/lack of sleep kicking in) but yes, my school has 9 classes and that's not even that much from what I hear. From my understandings or more likely misunderstandings of Korea is that students go to school like a normal school day and then afterwards they go to 'hogwon' or private learning academies and repeat every class during their normal school day. The Korean educational system you might say is like the British health care system with both governmental and private components. Point being here is that Korean students go to school as much as any students in the world. A high school student for instance, starts his class-day around 7 or 8 and gets done around 12 pm (I kid you not). My co-teacher even told me that Saint Obama said in a news conference/sermon that he wishes Americans should go to school as much as Koreans did. I'm not sure if I agree- there's only so much information the brain can take until it goes on screen saver mode. The Koreans whom I've met that are around the same age seem educated, probably a little more than me (in hindsight, I may have smoked too much pot over the years), but aside from speaking another language which they're forced to learn since grade school, they don't appear other worldly like the Chinese I've met do. I should mention however, that Korea ranks number two and three respectively (why do we put that word? I'm going to start replacing it with, 'irrespectively' or 'not undeservedly' or something because it sounds artificially academic like using the word 'normative'- another bombastic word to prove that you went to school) in science and math which I guess is an achievement despite the fact that all of the best brains in the world still go to American universities (see list of top world universities or walk around UCLA south campus (where science/engineering/math departments are located) and just listen to how much English you hear if you beg to differ). Thank goodness America still attracts the best and brightest by the way, because when this stops America will be like a one legged man trying to run a mile; it might be fun to watch but after a while you'll get bored and watch the 5' 2'' Chinese runner with two good legs. 

     One last story I thought of mentioning while doing laundry- By doing laundry I mean pressing many buttons simultaneously until my clothes get clean. The clothes get way cleaner, I should point out, when you're not using fabric softener as detergent. So last Friday I went to the bank because it was payday last week and I wanted to reap what I had sowed, not in harvest but in Won! Yeepee! I went to the bank with my bank book- I literally have a small book that I use as my debit card (they have debit cards too but my employment organization did not provide me with one for some odd reason?) and just like a debit card they have machines (it's usually the same machine as the debit card one) in which you can put the small book in to withdraw money. So I did and saw they had an English button you can press and I pressed and did everything the machine commanded me to do. As you might guess the machine spit out my bank book repeatedly like a baby spitting out food. I then proceeded inside to ask one of the tellers for help. With a polite yet befuddled smile I asked the teller if she spoke English. Of course she didn't and I went through the body language of not being able to get money from the machine. Naturally she understood immediately and walked over to the ATM to help show me how to use it. As things would have it, with all her help my dreaded bank book still was getting rejected like a crumbled one dollar bill (I'm big into the similes right now as you can tell). This didn't perturb me because I had come with my travelers cheques that are good in over 191 countries around the world as a backup. I walk back over the counter and pull out the cheques and sure enough, that bank didn't exchange travelers cheques. I then walked outside and just stood outside staring into empty space- I saw an old lady examine me as she passed by. I must have stood there for about a good five minutes before I walked back into the bank to try the ATM one more time (no luck). I ended up being able to exchange my travelers cheques at another bank later that day but this story is a perfect illustration of how my day(s) sometimes goes around here. You might think I get depressed but I don't, I just smile and breath and everything seems to work its way out, eventually. I still can't withdraw money out of the ATM but who knows, maybe next week I will! :)

Thank you for reading and taking an interesting in my awkwardly pedestrian life. Annyonghi jumushipsiyo (Good night). 

Teach Your Children Well

My life has been fairly hectic still as I'm learning how to teach, trying to learn some Korean, and most importantly make new friends. I will do my best to try and regularly update the blog (at least once a week) but I've discovered the power of Skype and lately want to do that more than sit down and write this blog. Nonetheless, let me get started on this typically chilly Sunday morning. 

Teaching and my new school: Since I spend eight-nine hours a day Monday-Thursday and a couple hours on Friday teaching it is only natural that I tell everyone about my new teaching experiences. First off, teaching is extremely challenging! Anyone who says otherwise is either a) a liar b) a fool c) a bad teacher or d) all of the above. My week days start early. I wake up a 7 am in order to not miss my ride at 8. So far another teacher, Mr. Lee, has been picking me up on the way to school which sure beats taking the bus. The one day I took the bus as practice in the event Mr. Lee cannot pick me up I ended up getting lost or the bus just ended up going in the opposite direction of my school. That day my co-teacher had to pick me up and from then it was officially decided that I should get rides to school (for at least the first month or so). Of course, when I say co-teacher most of you probably have no idea what I'm talking about? Okay, in public schools all native English teachers (me) are in theory, supposed to be paired with a Korean English teacher, my co-teacher. Among their teaching tasks co-teachers are the main people responsible for my well being. In effect, they are like the the mommy's and daddies of native English teachers. Often times I feel sorry when I have to ask my co-teacher for a favor because a) co-teachers don't get paid for helping native English teachers (NET) out and b) she has her family, child to take care of and worry about. Despite all this my co-teacher, May (her English name- have no clue why she picked this one in particular?), is amazingly helpful and a blessing in this utterly confusing land. Within five minutes of meeting May (I feel kind of bad because I already forgot/can't even pronounce her Korean name), one of the first things she pointed out was that her English was not that good and she wasn't lying or being humble, it isn't. She knows enough English to get a rudimentary point across and have a basic conversation i.e. her favorite list of questions e.g. What did you do last night, weekend or what did you eat for breakfast/dinner? She loves to ask the last one because I'm pretty sure she thinks I'm starving and cannot go to the store for some reason because I don't know Korean. When I first moved into my apartment she came by to make sure I had all the basic necessities (again, she's like a parental figure) and she looked into my fridge only to shockingly discover that I only had a couple items. I explained to her that I am fully capable of going to the store, am not short on money, and just moved into my place. I still don't know if any of those reasons sunk in and she understood my situation but ever since then she has been preoccupied with me not eating. Another funny thing related to all this; She gives me food from the cafeteria to take home usually at the end of the week. I don't want to be impolite and be like, 'I eat the school lunch every day, why the fuck would I want to do so at home too lady'? So I acquiesce and because of it I have 3 pounds of rice, 1 pound of ultra spicy sauce (love this btw), half-a-pound of lettuce, and half-a-pound of Kimchi sitting in my fridge right now. Another thing I've learned not do while eating the school lunch. Do not comment if I like the food because each time I do that, they (the other teachers) either bring me more food as soon as I'm finished or they give me some to take home with me. While I'm on the food topic- school lunches invariably have white rice, soup, and of course, some sort of Kimchi with every meal. A frequent food served in the school lunches is octopus which I'm getting used to eating. During lunch time most of the teachers eat before the rush of students get to the dinning hall; all 7 or 8 of us gather around and here I am usually sitting right next to my broken English translator (Bless her heart). I usually listen in on the teachers conversations and try and pretend like I know what they're talking about (makes me feel better when I do this actually). After about ten minutes however, I'm back staring at my octopus or trying to guess what food I'm eating that day. Some of the teachers have some empathy for me so usually once or twice during the meal they explain what I'm eating in Korean or they compliment me on using chopsticks so well (this is a very common occurrence I've noticed- happens during every meal in which I eat with new people). Every time I get chopstick compliments I'm always amused- I wonder if they do not know how many Asian cuisines we have in the States, are their perceptions of Americans that out of touch with reality, can they think of nothing better to say, or am I really that good at using chopsticks (I admit, I am)? 

Lunch time is pretty indicative of another place, the teachers office. Our school, Dogo Middle School, only has 107 students. We have about 9 teachers I believe including me; as such, when I'm not in class teaching Engrish or trying to teach English, I'm in the teachers office. With so few students there are always a couple teachers in the office with me. Each teacher has their own desktop computer which is pretty cool. Like lunchtime I sit there while other teachers converse- not knowing what's going on but at least I have a computer in front of me so I can check the latest developments of Kim Jong-small's saber rattling and facebook for hours on end. May's desk is right next to mine but I try and not bother her asking trivial questions because she always seems tired and overworked (probably because she is). Sometimes I share some of interesting differences in our cultures. For example, last week I pulled out a 'normal' 8 x 11 sheet of paper that I happened to have in my folder from home. I elicited quite a reaction because they don't use our size paper in Korea (it's longer by a couple inches). She even showed another teacher our strange American style paper. It's little stuff like that I love to  show every now and then to the other teachers- it totally blows their mind and makes me a little closer to sanity knowing that I'm not completely losing my mind. 

I'm a rat in a cage: The teachers office has sliding glass doors surrounded by windows making the office a veritable human aquarium. This happens at least a couple times every day; While I'm facebooking or looking at some asinine youtube video at my desk I often look around only to see a couple students (girls more often then not) staring at me like I'm a visitor from the planet X. I smile back and give them a wave- they usually start giggling and run away in excitement or fear or maybe both. At my school I'm part rock-star, part alien, part ambassador, and all entertainment (kind of like home). When walking in the hall I usually get, hello, or hi (the two ubiquitous greetings every student regardless of how much English they know uses). I could go on and on about just my school but I'll save some more for a later time. 'Knowledge is the greatest good and ignorance is the greatest evil' -Socrates. 

Veni- I Came

EPIK (English Program in Korea) orientation overall was a blast. For all of those that don't know I work for a public teaching program funded by the Korean government. Technically, I guess you could classify me as a Korean civil servant (which sounds a lot better than- so what do you do? O, I teach English in Korea). Koreans, at least at the governmental level are obsessed with teaching their youth English. The reason behind this is totally beyond me given that Mandarin (which is also taught in schools) and Indian (or more accurately Hindi if India actually has an official language- not taught in school as far as I'm aware) should be far more useful over the next century than English will be. It goes without saying but the sheer numbers speak volumes about which continent will follow the American Empire (and yes we are an empire militarily, economically, and culturally speaking). Nonetheless, I'm stoked that Koreans love English so much because it has given me a job that allows me to travel and work overseas. Horray English! Back to my main point of telling you about our program orientation. Our eight day orientation was held at Dankook University in the city of Cheonan (located in the Chungnam province). We (EPIK teachers) lived in the dorms which I'm pretty sure were brand new and very nice. The bus ride to Dankook University from Incheon International Airport (the main airport if you're flying to Seoul btw) was two hours but it seemed like an eternity given how tired I felt after the 13 hour flight! The EPIK staff coordinated our flights to arrive at the airport around the same time; as such, we rode in a massive convey of buses to Dankook University. Getting outside the airport I quickly realized that one sweater does not keep you warm unless you live in Southern California pretty much your whole life. The first day of orientation was fairly laid back- the staff obviously realized that most of us were completely jet lagged so all we had to do was go for our medical checkups (you need a medical checkup to obtain your alien registration card 'green card'). Some people bitched about getting their blood and urine taken but I mostly lamented about how cold I was and worried about what kind of things they were testing for (thankfully, cannabis wasn't one of them or I'd be back at home:). Afterwards, close to dinner time, we gathered in the auditorium for our opening day ceremony. As with any opening ceremony it was a lot of 'welcome to ----' blah, blah blah, followed by some traditional dances- kind of boring but it was cool seeing how many of us were there in the auditorium. There were 500 teachers from literally every native English speaking country. Surprisingly I met loads (you can tell I've been hanging out with Brits, Kiwis, Aussies, and South Africans when I start using words like this) of South Africans; 30-35% of the teachers there had to be from South Africa (don't know why so many?). Americans made up the biggest contingent which to tell the truth I was a little disappointed to find even though I made good friends with a couple. The wake-up call (each room had an intercom) every was at 7:30 which was a little rough because of the time difference and my general sleep pattern of getting up around 10 everyday. Breakfast was from 7:30-8:30 (don't know anyone who actually made it to breakfast before 8?) and classes started at 9. Most of the classes naturally dealt with how to teach English and life in Korea i.e. the vast culture differences, how to cope with culture shock, and what to expect throughout our year here. The latter lectures were by far the most helpful because in my first week of teaching I've learned teaching is really trial and error (emphasis on error- more on that in a later blog). Most days classes were done by 5:30 and and we were free to do whatever we wanted. Like many Anglo-saxons often do, we ventured into nearby downtown Cheonan to check out the towns nightlife. The first thing I noticed is that many places in Korea do not have bars in the sense Westerns know them as. Most Koreans instead get together at restaurants and

drink there- if you're with a group of friends it can actually be quite fun. That being said, Cheonan and most other big cities do have true bars even though I didn't find many Koreans go there except to find Westerners maybe. I'm too tired to continue this blog and I think it's getting stale so I'll end here abruptly.. Until next time, Cheers! 

The Flight

I'll try and recollect my thought/emotions that I went through when I started this journey. Up until the day I left I was quite excited to be going to Korea- I mean this was the country that gave the world Korean BBQ, Kimchi, the most Great Leader Kim Jong-il, Kia cars, and of course, who could forget the influential pop music icon, Rain (inside joke if you know something about Korean culture or the Colbert Show)! Anyway, here I was full of jubilation (haven't used that word in a while- cool) essentially getting paid to travel (who in there right mind would pass that up?- btw, does that expression mean right mind i.e. compared to your left mind or right meaning morality/ethics?..anyway) but as I left I was actually pretty depressed from all the goodbyes. As with many farewells you have to figure that you're probably never going to see certain people ever again. My sadness however, quickly changed once we took off from SFO and I made friends with the girl in back of me (another EPIK teacher) and a Korean dude sitting next to her and discovered you could get free drinks on the flights (nice run-on sentence Zeke)! Best of all or at least the most humorous part of the flight was they, Singapore Airlines, served what some affectionately call, The Beast (Milwaukee's Best). It was kind of nostalgic leaving the States having drunk the Beast on so many epic nights playing beer pong haha. Now I don't usually like to push commercialism but Singapore Airlines is one of the most amazing airlines I've ever flown on (flown with them twice). Besides the ultra attractive flight attendants who wear exotic South East Asian garb they have a ton of cool shit for you to do for the short 13 hour flight. You can look at a Zagat guide of restaurants and hotels of the place you're going to, learn survival phrases of a language, play video games either by yourself or against other passengers, watch the forty odd movies/TV shows, or just sit back and watch the plane inch across the screen on the live flight map. After about nine hours I usually resort to the last- I find it to be an excellent test of patience. 

Foreword

         Where do I begin? I have had so many thoughts, wonders, questions, frustrations, and even a few worries over the past couple of weeks since my arrival. I suppose I should have started this earlier but as with everything else in life, 'better late then never'. Before I begin I must admit that I am extremely self-conscience and the ultimate form of one's own cognizance is best translated through writing (that is, if words can adequately describe the world at all). That being said, this blog (is blog plural by the way or what?) will probably range from my profound musings to the asinine debauchery that makes up my life. I think I suffer from a mild case of attention deficit disorder (a made up disorder I believe) and because of that I may digress often so be prepared. Oh, and when I put stuff into parenthesis that means I'm thinking of something and don't know how to insert my thoughts into the sentence; I have an unhealthy habit of doing this but what the hell, it's not like I'm writing a dissertation or something. I hope my writings are somewhat coherent and enjoyable but email, facebook, (why hasn't Microsoft word/Apple made this an official word yet- it has become such a frighteningly integral part of my life it ought to be!!) or call me if you have no clue what I am talking about in a particular blog or would like to know more. And one more thing before I get started on telling you or myself about my adventures here; you will probably notice my lexicon, grammar, punctuation, and the like getting progressively worse (or retrogressively worse?) over the course of each blog. Don't worry Mom and Dad, I'm not stoned, on psychedelics, or drunk (okay, I may blog a couple times while inebriated- love that word, probably one of the best euphemism ever). My English or Engrish as many Koreans pronounce the word gets worse by the day because I have to explain sentences while teaching and in life in very simple terms; I'm talking no more than seven words per sentence per sentence and forget about SAT vocabulary words or words of the day. Sadly I've noticed that in some of my emails and facebook (fb for short- this is when you know that facebook consumes your life and you are a slave to the 'social networking site') I write sentences like, I feeling exhausted from teaching or I mix up tenses or forget to pluralize words. Okay, I'm glad we've got all that taken care of- I think we can and we must start. Namaste.