Magic, Clowning and Korea...

I noticed pretty quickly that magic tricks are very popular over here. I think I mentioned that a couple of post ago. I have also found that the kids are really enjoying my clowning too. I haven't yet put on my red nose over here, but not a day has gone by that I haven't at least three or four or twenty seven point eight four six times, been a clown, either by mime, or acting incredibly gullible, or simply reacting to the kids in a highly visible way. The communications gap helps a lot. It stops me from wasting my breath on terrible puns that the kids wouldn't get anyways, and really focusing on the physical side of my humor.

I tried tonight to look for clowns and clown alleys in Korea, but apparently the South Koreans "Brokeback Mountain" was called "the King and the Clown", and so the internet is full of reviews and criticisms, in the way of any useful information that might be there.

On the upside I did find a Juggling shop in Seoul. For a given definition of "found." The website was made in flash, with no English button, and so handy-dandy "altavista bablefish" couldn't touch it. Oh well, I will have to ask someone bilingual at school to help me, and probably print the directions, so I can show them to a taxi driver next time I go to Seoul and say "chogi!" (there!(I think))

another day...

More teaching today (Tuesday) of the small kids. Fun.

I am writing at about 1 am here so I will keep it short. I have some ideas about teaching and how to improve the school some... they are just germs of ideas right now, but I thought I would mention it.

Actually that is pretty much it. We got cable in our apartment today. Watching Japanese Anime dubbed in Korean with no English subtitles is great. I watched a episode of Dragon Ball Z, which probably doens't mean much to a lot of you but I watched it on cartoon network in college and it is a pretty simple anime with absurdly long fight scenes and predicable characters so it was easy to follow in a language you understand three words in...

Teach...

So I got to teach the first and second graders today.

In the second graders class, we basically wrote words ending in "-ip" and "-in." It took our whole thirty minute class. It was only eight words and a sentence, a phonics exercise. I think some of them got it and others didn't, which I suppose is how teaching goes. In the first grade class we colored a picture of a zoo with bears and Giraffes, which I attempted to get them to say while they colored. I was told the main thing for them is simple exposer to English. So I can do this.

The afternoon classes I did with James, and it was all review/practice tests, and a great battery of coin and silly hand magic thrown in. They really really like magic here. They have many TV shows and specials with magicians, especially close up magicians in them. So all my limited trick actually get appreciated even if they are figured out. I also learn a great eraser traveling through the eyes trick from some of the kids in one of the classes. Maybe I will figure out a way to utilize magic tricks into my teaching here. They respond really well to it.

So Seoul...

Overwhelming.

Did I mention that yesterday? It was like going to New York, being from a small city, and not understanding English. The Greater Seoul area is huge, we hit it on the train about an hour out. Their subway system reaches an hour and a half out from the main terminal of both the train and subway. The station itself is huge. It has a couple of seven or was it eight? story malls attached to it, and a electronics market five stories tall full of independent sellers ready to make you a deal on cameras, computers, games, phones, just about anything that goes beep. They don't put prices on them either for the most part, you ask, they tell, and then you bargain.

I also got a taxi ride window tour of a part of a part of Seoul, as James, Beth and Abby and I went to Cosco's a warehouse store like Sam's Club, where I got my tortillas, and cheese, and then again on the quest for the hotel, where they were going to spend the night. It was a place they had not stayed before, and their internet reservation was written in English so the driver couldn't read it, and it wasn't where the internet said it was. But after stopping at the Hilton so the Driver could get a translation and put the name of the place in his incredibly cool GPS system we found it, and all was well.

James and I also took a quick trip to Inechewon, on the subway, the most Americanized and one of the sleazier parts of Seoul, because the Army base is there. Among other things, he showed me where to get good Mexican food whenever I became really homesick for it in a couple of months.

Also I found out that they are showing the Dead Sea Scrolls at the War Memorial Museum in Seoul. I think I am going to go back in a week or two, get a camera, and take a look at that.

If you ain't got Seoul...

So I was feeling better today, and I went to Seoul, and bought tortillas and cheese and a guitar.

Not a expensive guitar, and for a good reason I found out, of course, when I got home. It sounds fine but the frets are improperly filed around the edges, so they sort of catch your skin as it slides by if you aren't careful. But that is alright. It can be fixed, and I have owned and played much worse.

To get to Seoul, it is a two hour train ride, which was a interesting experience. I have never ridden on a train before, and I rather enjoyed it. The great thing, besides knowing you'll end up where you need to be, is that there are no sudden turns.

Seoul itself is quite overwhelming. Next time I go I am going to see if I can get together with Sean, the guy I met on the flight over, and get him to show me the sights. That, or I am just going to wander around.

Sick...

So today I have been sick. Not sick sick, just sick, and misplaced just about all I ate yesterday, in the toilet and sink. I ended up staying in bed all day sleeping and listening to Hober so I had something else to think about besides being sick and trying to sleep. Hober is a great internet radio station, with jazz, folk singer, and traditional music from around the world. It doesn't have any jarring music, and no commercials, besides the occasional station identification. But now it is almost seven pm here, and while I am not feeling perfect, I am feeling better. So I think I will be able to go to Seoul tomorrow.

A word about bathrooms... the facilities are the same here as they are in the US. except... bathtubs, they don't often have them here, just showers.... and the showers are the whole bathroom. The bathroom floor is about a inch below the rest of the apartment so the rest of the house doesn't flood every time you take a shower. I personally think this is pretty neat. However our apartments are exceptions to the rule sorta, because we do have bath tubs and we try not to flood the bathroom but between not having a shower curtain, and the stopped up drains, we do anyways.

C is for what?

C is for cookie, that's right I actually just made a rather delicious batch of Chocolate chip cookies. One of Mike's advanced students came over looking for him, and he interpreted the buttons which where written in Korean, for me. I guest-a-mated the measurements and guessed right. I saved quite a bit of the dough to make tomorrow to thank the cafeteria ladies for the use of the microwave/oven combo in our apartment. For Choclate Chips I used 56% Cacao Chocolate bites, which they sell in little plastic cans for 500 W. So... Mmmmmm....

We heat buildings through the floor here. It is wonderful. Whenever you go into a home or some place where you are going to stay a while, you take off your shoes at the door or just right inside it. And then you walk on wonderfully warm floors. The heat from the floor, being heat then rises from the floor, and warms the entire room. The only problem I have been having with it is I cannot yet get my shoes on and off quickly. They are not broken in. So that is fun. But warm....

If i were a rich man...

The way I have decided to do this is one topic or so a day. Lots of things have been happening, lots of impressions of similarities and differences but to go into them all at once as they happen simply invites nothing to say later. One such thing is money.

The currency is the won, which roughly translates into a thousandth of a dollar, or the tenth of a penny. It is actually a little more then that, but is close enough. So I now feel like a millionaire, and I just about am in Wons. But then again all the prices are adjusted accordingly. So it is 800 won for a canned drink, or 80 cents. Taxes are usually a part of the price so the sticker price is what you pay, unless you are in a market and bargain. Coffee is ubiquitous and cheap here. They have instant coffee (flavored too... instant mocha!) packets all over the place, with hot and cold water machines. They sell small cans of coffee in the small stores and grocery marts, and they keep them warm in a sort of anti-fridge. It is great for sipping walking down the street through the snow up hill to the apartment. It is much better then the "cappachino" machine coffee in the convenience stores at home. So I think I will be alright.

Oven! huzzah!

It is snowing again and is now picturesque again after being mushy yesterday evening.

We acquired an oven. There are three other English teachers besides me at the moment. Beth and James Jamison, who are married and have a two year old Abby, and Micheal, my roommate. I found a easily build able stove oven, consisting of a cardboard box and foil online. I told James about it, and how intended to cook everything, and when we went to lunch in the cafeteria he showed me a toaster oven just sitting there not being used, but said unfortunately that it only went up to 250 degrees, and so couldn't use it to really bake anything. I took a closer look at it and found that it was 250 degrees Celsius not Fahrenheit. Which is plenty hot enough to cook just about anything that we would cook. I didn't make a pithy comment about James being a NASA scientist, because I was too excited about the oven... and I didn't think of it at the time.

We asked the lunch ladies if we could bring over stuff to cook in it sometime, and they said that we could actually take it and put it in our apartments, especially if we promised to make them cookies. We did. As soon as I convert my money today, I am going to the store to get stuff to make chocolate chip cookies.... and they are getting a lot!

Did someone say Kimshi?

Now the moment everyone who knows Robert has been waiting for! The great question of this whole experience, and basis for many a amused look and concerned comment:

What did Robert think of Kimshi?!

Cold, crunchy and extremely spicy. In case you don't know, or have trouble looking things up, Kimshi is the national dish of Korea. It is made with "rotted" cabbage, but really that is not as bad as it seems, because, well, cheese is made of spoiled milk. And it tasted fine. It helped that I did not know what it was when I tried it.

The other English teachers and I went to a Chinese Restaurant in town for lunch yesterday after church, and had sweet and sour pork. LOTS of sweet and sour pork, and some kind of not exactly egg roll, sliced turnips, and Kimshi. We ate with metal chopsticks, which was different, and a bit difficult, because, I am used to lighter wooden ones, and those kinda egg rolls were tricky to pick up without stabbing which is considered rude. I say "kinda egg rolls," because they were more wedged shaped then roll shaped though that is what they tasted like. Hmmm... good!

Speaking of food, they don't do ovens here. Everything is stove top. Everything. I asked and apparently you could if you searched, maybe find a toaster oven for half a paycheck or so, or even better a microwave/toaster oven combo. This negates half the recipes that were sent with me, especially the deserts. I am going to search the all knowing online world and see if I can't figure out how to make a passive oven somehow that I can stick on top of the stove.

Finally, I would like say it is snowing in a quite picturesque way, and looks nice outside my seventh floor apartment... especially from inside my seventh floor apartment. Thanks for the coat PaPa!

Korea finally!

Well, it is Sunday morning here in Sabgyo, South Korea, my first full day here.

I got into the Incheon airport, on time at 7:35pm last night but since on my biological clock, it was 4:35 am, I went to bed as soon as I got to my apartment here in Sabgyo. My apartment is on the seventh floor of the building. I am sharing it with another teacher, named Michael. I am actually typing this on his computer since I do not have a monitor for mine yet.

The flight over was looong! I did not read as much "War and Peace" as I thought I would, because I talked a whole lot with the guy sitting next to me. He is from Korea, and had been in New York City, living with his cousin, studying English for a year. We exchanged emails so we can keep in touch.

I think this is all I am going to say for now. I am still trying to process things, and when I get them in a relatively ordered and concise form, I will let you know.

Going Going....

Well, I am packed. To the maximum weight limit that is free. I head out of DFW tomorrow morning, and arrive Saturday night in Korea, where Brother Lee will meet me and take me down to Sapgyo sixty miles or so south. So this is it for living in Abilene for a while. I am going. Really... watch me... here I GO! I will miss you all.

Peeka-boo with a elusive town

I am quite pleased to announce that I have finally located where I am going on Google earth.

This picture is of the Church and School where I will be teaching.

If you look across the street to the south, you can see the my future apartment too. To look at it yourself on Google Maps it is here. Just be sure to look at the satellite view since the map view shows nothing.

I also found a small entry on the town in Wikipedia. Apparently the population is about 26,700 people in a seven kilometer radius, making it a small city. However, if you look at it closely it is more of a collection of small towns and villages than a continuous city. Which is certainly fine by me semi-rural boy that I am.

The packing continues. After seventeen years of living in the same room, stuff accumulates. I have been putting off packing everything up for storage for two and a half years now. I have two days left. My books are done and my clothes are boxed or set aside for taking with me. But all this other stuff... Interesting? Yes! Memorable? Certainly! Worth packing up because I know I am going to cherish it until death, and then it will be a heirloom of my house? Weeeelllll.... maybe not. But it all has to be packed anyways. So on and on I go!

So it is less then a week before I am gone from Abilene. I have been here for lets see... about seventeen and a half years. All my schools from second grade through college were within thirty or so blocks of each other, and there is nothing like that to make a wide read and educated guy feel a bit provincial.

Dr. Cicero Bruce, one of my English Professors at McMurry liked to talk about provincialism a lot. It was, along with the great conversation of western literature, and the original seven liberal arts, one of his favorite literature as a way of life lectures. He spoke of how reading a text carefully and considerately, engaging the author in a sort dialog would make us become less provincials in time, for though the works in the western cannon of literature were written by people who have made our culture what it is, the works are products of a vastly different time place and culture, yet they are still undeniably human. By engaging these works we can sit with those authors and look at our own culture as it is, good and bad. So after reading so many of those illustrious works and also a whole bunch of sci-fi, I would like to think I am pretty well covered on this sort of provincialism.

Now I hope this journey into another culture half way around (almost precisely) the world for a year, will begin to polish off this education of mind and make me less (literally) provincial in the other sense. If you consider Texas a province, I can actually count on my hands how many times I have left it since I moved here... yeah... the number is eight. I went to Florida and New Mexico with the Boy Scouts. I went to United States of Mexico four times on mission trips, and I visited two friends out of state one time each, Arkansas and Missouri... oh wait, make that nine. I also went up to Colorado for the National Gathering Of Episcopal College Students.

So this ought to be a adventure. Possibly even Mythic. At least for me. No crones have accosted me and given me dubious fortunes, and have yet to receive any mysterious packages with ancient totemic objects in them.

No robots falling out of the sky with partial messages from pretty women in them either.
That last kinda disappoints me.

So if you are a pretty woman, and have a robot and a big sling shot, I'll be waiting.

Of course if you consider the pretty woman God, and the Robot the Holy Spirit (also God) and the message a calling, then I believe I have that, and you needn't bother becoming a computer scientist, no matter how pretty you are.

But now I think I am making this too complicated. I just really wanted to say I am excited about going. Finally. Huzzah!

The Story So Far...

Once upon a time, a boy was born to a marine captain and his wife. It was their first child and though the whole thing was extremely dramatic for them, involving well, childbirth for one, and a jar of Texas soil, a helicopter ride, the near death of their new son, a not so mysterious birthmark, and a stay at a Ronald McDonald house with a free Nintendo set, it was completely unremarkable to the boy because he doesn't remember a bit of it.

So, the boy grew up like all boys do eventually, as Puff the Magic Dragon found out much to his disappointment, and this particular one, eventually did gain memories, and siblings, and bikes, and legos, and scars, and books, and pets, and many things besides. He went to school, making average grades, friends, enemies and dreams. Then he went to college, read some more made decent grades and then graduated and decided to set out and seek his fortune. Which brings us, with no real explanation, to the present time... not quite in medias res, but almost...