Weekend Pics, and Go See Klimt in Seoul!

Soundtrack:
Nouvelle Vague (recommendation from a friend): Dancing With Myself- startlingly, a cover of an old Billy Idol punk song.

Anyway, hit play, and start reading. I really like this song.


First: from Andong (yep, the Andong Writeup seems to have been swallowed in the mists of time... if there's a loud enough outcry I might try to revive it, but Joe Zen and Fatman Seoul both did such good jobs writing it up already. . .)

Here is one great picture of me and my bud Juhee, on the train, in some nice light.
Girlfriendoseyo and I found this fantastic little tea room. The raspberry tea tasted like pulling off the road in the Okanagan valley and picking raspberries off a bush somewhere. So good.
the owner had a green thumb, too. Girlfriendoseyo was impressed by the foliage. I was mostly just amazed at the perfectly balanced flavours in the teas.


Walked up and down Namsan this weekend. Flowers (jindalae) were blossoming, which have han, I'm told.

These trees remind me of Dr. Seuss illustrations:

I liked the lines of this step/fence combination.

I saw Gustav Klimt and Youssef Karsh this week. The Seoul National Art Center, by Nambu Bus Terminal, was in fine form.



The two artists were, too. You should go see these shows (find the place) at the Hangaram Art Museum, south of the Han River, but north of Gangnam. You'll know Klimt from these paintings mostly--however, let me remind you that the difference between seeing a JPG of a picture on your computer screen, and seeing the actual thing (especially when it comes to paintings), is kind of like the difference between reading a car's engine specifications in an auto magazine, and being hit by that car on the street.
Judith, above, was there. The Kiss (below) was not: convincing Austria to give up The Kiss and send it overseas would be about the equivalent of asking America to send Abe Lincoln's log cabin on a world tour. National treasure, you know? However, the show was quite impressive (though the nude females were...uh...supercharged with...uh...not for children...energy). A recreation of the Beethoven Frieze was also there, and pretty amazing: basically a visual depiction of the Ninth Symphony, in a way. I learned a bunch about Klimt, and saw some amazing art, and was duly impressed.
Next up, in the same building, no less, was Youssef Karsh, the ridiculously amazing photographer. Here's a game: think of somebody who was really famous between 1930 and 1970. Now think of their most iconic portrait photo. Odds are about 50-65% that photo was taken by Youssef Karsh.

You may recognize some of his work.

responsible not only for this photo:

and this one,but also this one, and a whole host of others.
Plus, he's Canadian. (Karsh, not Winston Churchill)

We got to take these pictures, too.
the queen
and grumposeyo
Gimme back my damn cigar!

Then on Saturday I ate at one of my favorite restaurants in downtown seoul
Where they cook the food on this great squared gas grill that's all loaded with spilled-over deliciousness.

Watching the lady cook is fun. The food is just amazing: the best dwenjang soup I've had by about a mile.



Took this picture while walking around Bukcheondong with Girlfriendoseyo: missed the Walkabout tour that happened on Sunday, but saw some nice stuff anyway.


Most ironic book in the world (right up there with, for a dollar on the discount rack, all the evangelical apocalyptic milennial Christian books about "50 reasons why the world will end in on New Year's Day, 2000AD, and How To Prepare for Christ's Return"): "The Roaring 2000s: Building the Wealth and Lifestyle You Desire in the Greatest Boom in History" spotted by Danielle.

OK folks. that's it for now.

have a good one!

July 2006: Picasso and the Mud Festival (part of an overlong post)

I've split up this post, so that it's down to readable length. Originally it's from July 2006.

A few weeks ago -- I think the week before I went to the mud festival -- I went to a Picasso exhibit right around the corner from where I saw the soccer game.

Now this, this was fantastic. I know just enough art history, and art creation, to engage with Picasso in a way that I really enjoyed -- I wasn't all distracted saying things like "Well, Picasso's third major lover was very strong-willed, and that affected his lines in his paintings of female models during his blue period" (which is total bollocks -- I just made that up. I have no idea about the relationship between Picasso's biography and his art). But I DO know enough about art to make a few observations about how that man looked at the world, and how he presented his ways of seeing the world on canvas, so that we would start to look at the world in a similar way. THAT was amazing and fascinating. He has these paintings where it looks nothing like a crying woman . . . but it FEELS like a crying woman with every shape, colour, form, and angle. Your emotional reaction to the picture is exactly your emotional reaction to seeing a woman cry. He puts noses and eyes and shoulders in the wrong places, but he does it so that those features catch your eyes -- it's like he's saying, "I put these in the wrong place, or made them disproportionately large, or grotesquely misshapen, so that you'd know that I want you to pay attention to it." And then, once you looked at that misplaced shoulder, or leg, or finger, it would capture, exactly, the gesture of an arm, or an eye, even if it didn't have the "proper" form. A quote up on the wall of one of the display room (HUNDREDS of paintings and sketches and prints were on display) said something like, "I spend my whole life trying to learn to paint like a child." Every week in art class, I watch kids try to put the way they see the world onto paper, and some of them are starting to think in set patterns, but others still just play with shapes and colours as well as their hand-eye coordination allows them. Frankly, I wish I could create pictures as primally, and simply, as Ryan does, but everybody around him (except me) keeps telling him to "make the nose look like a nose. Make the car look like a car."

The other thing I loved about Picasso, truly loved, were the photos of him. He always had this fantastic look in his eye of a man totally participating in his life, eyes that could look carefully at something and love it, and see it, and see things in it, and even express it. He wore his genius lightly -- he didn't wear long black coats and dark hats and smoke cigarettes with long filters, and let the IDEA of who he was interfere with who he actually was -- there are pictures of him painting in his boxers, with a bottle of wine nearby and his belly hanging over his elastic waistband. Every picture made me think of a man who had the chance to do what he loved – create -- his whole life, who spent his whole life looking and trying to learn, and trying to find a purer, simpler way to think and live and then portray the world. I hope that when I'm an old man, I have eyes like that, too.

And in that vein, I will continue paying attention to my world, seeing and looking and trying to understand as much as I can without judging too much. Walking to work and hearing a cicada that must have grown up listening to John Coltrane's avant-garde phase. Smiling at the little boy and girl whose family works the bedding shop on the corner near my house who, if they see me or another caucasian, they'll stand in the middle of the street and just bellow "HELLOOOOOO" until they're right out of sight. And they really bellow, too. I'll continue sitting in coffee shops and shopping mall hallways and watching the people go by, and writing poetry and stories, and reading the same. Take care, everyone. Enjoy the pictures, and love your life, and find peace and joy in the meanings that fill your life, whatever they are.


In other news, I got a new laptop. This is the first bulk e-mail being written on my own computer, in my apartment. In fact, I'm in my pyjamas right now. It's a good little unit (the computer, not the pyjamas). It does everything I need it to do (the computer, not the pyjamas).

Last weekend I went to a mud festival in a village a little west of Seoul. Boy, that was fun! We smeared our bodies in healthy clay, played on a beach and in the sea all afternoon, and acted silly with thousands of other people, all smeared in clay and grinning goofily.

I played in the sea, throwing my body into these monstrous breakers as the tide came in. It was like being six years old again, riding my bike down a steep hill, or touching the tree branches above with my head as I jumped on a trampoline. The sea is awesome, and I hadn't played in big waves in such a long long time. It was really thrilling jumping into this thing SO MUCH bigger than I am, carrying so much power, and then being tossed around like an air mattress. Finally, exhausted and exhilirated, I walked home. . . the wrong way. I got properly lost, discovered an amusement park and then finally found my way home, too. The second day, it rained. I just took off my shirt and let the water fall on me -- better shirtless and wet than cold in a wet t-shirt, I say, and then I walked around and played anyway (as did most of the other people). Then, at the end of the day, just before my group reconvened to eat dinner and leave, I spend forty minutes in a mud sauna.

There was a bath house with special mud-enriched water (have I mentioned yet how healthy this mud was supposed to be? You could buy bars of mud soap!), and I soaked there, and showed a bunch of other western guys (first time sauna-ers) how to do a good salt rub. Then we went home. It was really fun.



Probably the high point of that day (other than singing "If I Only Had A Brain" with the silly Australian who approached me and started a conversation), was when a traditional Korean drumline, dressed up in full regalia, started playing, and immediately a dozen mud-caked westerners started a dancing circle. It was one of those spontaneous, surprising, just wonderful moments.

I did it, I did it, I diiiIIIIId it!

The White Stripes - There's No Home For You Here -- their best song so far, in my opinion. Ignore the slideshow -- scroll past. Just hit play and listen.



To commemorate my completion of DRAFT FOUR of my Violinist novella, I am finally posting. That's right, draft four. The draft where I'm proud enough of what I've written that I'll actually show it to people. One (maybe two) draft(s) away from what I'm going to start shopping to publishers.

Melissa tagged me with one of those goofy viral "Tag" thingies that goes around blogs.

I don't mind this one, because it's about writing.

The question was: give three tips for writing, and pass the baton to three of your blogger/readers, to answer the same question on their blogs.

Maybe it was supposed to be "how to write for a blog" but I'm going to take it as "how to work toward writing professionally"

Tip 1 (courtesy of the time I met Timothy Findley)

Write.

Just do it. Don't dream about it. Don't wish you had time to, don't think about the fame and glory that will come after you sell your first bestseller. . . just write. And if you're meant to be a writer, sez Mr. Findley, "You'll know."

Tip 2

While Mel pointed out that it's important not to make writing a chore or an obligation (at least not until you're a professional writer with deadlines and things), I say, don't make it a chore, but if writing's important to you, arrange your life so as to be conducive to more writing.

-Sometimes that means you have to make choices. If your job takes away the time and energy you used to have for writing, well, by keeping that job, you're tacitly voting with your timetable. There's nothing wrong with that, but be aware of it.
-Find a job where you have free time during your most creative time of the day.
-Surround yourself with people who help clear a space in your life to write, and who support you in doing so, communicate to people close to you how this IS a priority for you, and you appreciate their support.
-Disconnect your home internet if it's stealing time from your writing.
-Stop watching movies, sell your television.
-Live more cheaply, so you can take the lower paying job with MORE FREE TIME to write.
-Create a comfortable writing space in your home. Keep it clean, and use it.
-Get a really beautiful journal with quality paper, that's a pleasure to hold, and a comfortable pen that writes well for you, that makes a satisfying scratching sound when you write with it, so that you enjoy, and look forward to opening up the journal and writing in it.
-Get an ultraportable laptop, or a word processor, or a handheld tape recorder, and carry it with you all the time, so that you can write while waiting for your friend to arrive, instead of just staring into space. Fill your life with opportunities to write, see every spare moment as an opportunity to write, and carry with you the equipment necessary to TAKE those opportunities, and actually write!

3. Learn your own process, and be patient with it.

(bonus, 'cause Mel gave four)

4. Live as much as you can, and notice as much as you can, and take notes and internalize as much as you can. Travel, talk to people, don't wear an MP3 player -- listen to the world. Go out and do stuff, instead of staying inside when it's cold or rainy or too hot. Make friends with people who get you to do things you wouldn't normally do. Get wet sometimes, or sick. Remember what it's like. Pay attention to how things smell, feel, taste, all that little stuff. Do things that are out of the ordinary, to see how people around you react -- you might learn something. Get your hands dirty, and keep your eyes open.

Then. . .
(see #1)

I tag. . . I dunno. I don't have many readers. Dan? Deb? uhh. . .Cheryl? You still reading?


Facebook-related Mini-rant: once people FINALLY got smart enough to stop forwarding junk to their friends' e-mail inbox, facebook comes along, and suddenly ALL the garbage that it took me six years to wean my friends from forwarding to me on E-mail, has returned, like the killer in a bad horror movie, to clutter and litter my facebook profile and inbox. AAAAAAAAAAAAUGGGGGHHHHHH!!! It's even easier to forward things on Facebook (damn virals) and sometimes you even forward stuff without meaning to. well. . . it's just like e-mail, folks. If you forward the superstitious "forward to everyone on your list or you'll die at midnight" e-mail, you're a chump (and worse). If you forward it on facebook. . . YOU'RE STILL A CHUMP!

Sigh.

But I'm happy today. Happy as a rainbow banana.

When I finished writing my English Honours Thesis, I walked around TWU's campus for most of the morning showing my fifty page thesis to people around me, bubbling, "Look what I can do!" before I handed it in. That's how I feel now. I wish you could hold my fourth draft in your hands and share a glass of happy with me.

love:
Roboseyo

Christmas in the Rye

It's a common writing exercise to rewrite a story you've written in the style of some other author. It's actually good practice and a good discipline. Here's something that happened to me yesterday, told in the style of Holden Caulfield, the protagonist from The Catcher In The Rye (one of the best, funniest, most heart-breaking, and most often misunderstood books I've ever read). If you don't like words like hell and damn, maybe skip this one and read another post instead.


Christmas in Korea
by Holden Caulfieldoseyo

I guess if you ask me I'd say I didn't sleep enough or something like that. Sometimes you get some guy who says he needs like ten hours of sleep every night and it just makes you depressed as hell, as sad as when you hear lousy Christmas music in shops before Thanksgiving is even finished. I think about that guy sleeping ten hours a night, like he hates being awake or something, but I'm exactly the opposite. I'm the kind of guy who hates sleeping sometimes, so instead of laying in bed, I just do useless stuff like reading phony articles on the internet from some guy who uses the word "delineate" instead of "explain" to show off his hot-shot writing style, and you just know he makes quotation marks with his fingers during conversations. But, it's better than staring up at the ceiling when you can't sleep, because when you turn on the humidifier your mom sent you last November, that little hum gets you thinking about your mother and it just makes you lonely as hell.

So maybe it's on account of I don't always sleep enough, but sometimes it seems like the whole world is full of phonies. They're all over, but for example, today I stood next to this girl at the crosswalk who smelled like some kind of boutique shop green tea and avocado shampoo, and she talked on the phone like something special, and when I looked over at her, her scarf was messy but perfect as if she spent half an hour by the mirror tossing her scarf over her shoulder so it looked like she didn't care how it looked. Even when she knew I was looking at her, she didn't look over at me, even to smile or say "hi," so I looked at her perfect phony hair, thought some other girl in her office probably feels ugly or fat because this girl spends thirty phony minutes tossing her goddamn scarf over her shoulder in the morning, and the other girl has to wash her hair at night because her family's poor and maybe her mother has cancer and her dad lost his job in the economic crisis and they sleep on the floor and fold up the mattresses and put them in the goddamn closet every morning. Sometimes it makes you depressed as hell, these girls with perfect scarves and perfect smelling green-tea herbal scented hair and stuff.

So I crossed the street like a madman when the light changed, but everywhere I looked there was some other phony girl with perfect hair, or some hot-shot guy with the same haircut as his friends, wearing a sweater-vest or a zipper tie or something, and saying things like, "a little contrived, but well-meant, to be sure." And every shop played some lousy Christmas music that was all drippy and slow, or cheery and chippy, and it didn't feel like Christmas, more like some sweaty red-faced old man smiling so you'd buy more stuff from his deli, asking you to pay an extra quarter for "festive wrapping" instead of the usual pink butcher paper.

So I went into the subway station trying not to look at the hot-shots and phonies in the street, and looked up and down the platform for something that'd make Allie grin if he was with me, like a couple who really loved each other but they were just holding hands and looking at something together instead of making baby talk and poking each other's dimples, or some kids playing some kind of game, and their mom saying "quiet, boys, everybody can hear you" and them not caring anyway, with their hair messy instead of licked and stuck down with cruddy kids' hair gel. I get a kick out of watching kids playing on subway platforms like that, when they act like kids, and not just little adults trained by their moms to shake your hand and say, "charmed". Kids who are too quiet on subway platforms, with expensive coats and stuck down gelly hair make me feel depressed as a madman.

But there weren't any kids with messy hair playing on the subway platform. They just had their hands in their pockets waiting for the train. You take a kid, and you put her hands in her pockets and make her wait for a train, and I can't decide if I should go talk to her like she's a grown up and say "pleasure to meet you, little miss," or stick out my tongue and try to make her laugh so that she looks like a kid again. I'm quite childish that way, especially around kids much younger than me. Sometimes I make faces at little kids and I don't even care if their moms get upset. I'm not kidding.

Everybody at the subway station just walked up and down the platform like their spot on the platform was extremely important to find, and no other door or car would be right, and not even looking at other people, or only checking to see whose coat and scarf looked more expensive, and then I saw this old man leaning on the wall outside the elevator, with a cane stuck out at the floor so far away from his body he couldn't lean on it. Sometimes an old guy like that will just make you sad as hell, leaning against the wall like he can't stand, looking around, especially if he has a scarf that isn't tied up right, so that he looks cold, or if he has bifocals and you can see his big eyes looking around, or if his coat's open and his adam's apple jumps up and down like a madman when he swallows. But believe me, this guy was a great old man. He wasn't looking around for somebody to feel sorry for him at all. He had an okay coat and no scarf or sad bifocals, and he just needed to get over to the platform to get on the subway, but everybody was walking too fast to notice him wave his cane at them. He shuffled along the wall to the corner and waited all quiet for some help, without shouting or anything. Nobody noticed him except me, and finally I went over to him before I could start to feel sorry for him, and I put my arm out and said, "Do you need an elbow?" and he looked up at my face, but not into my eyes, like that might be too much.

I don't care about school or tests so much, but I can be pretty smart sometimes when I want to, and I knew right away that he didn't know any English, so he couldn't understand what I said. Instead of asking if he wanted help again, I just put my arm out so he could grab my forearm and get over to the subway platform. That old guy never even looked at my face, but he put his hand up like he'd been expecting me, and I swear instead of grabbing my forearm and putting his hand on my coat, he went along and grabbed right onto my hand. Then quick as hell, once his hand was on mine he started shuffling his cane and feet along the ground toward the spot where the subway door would open. I moved along with him and we got to the spot, but the subway was slow, so we stood there for about three minutes, me holding hands with this old guy who seemed proud, not in a phony way, like "I'll let you help me here because I'm a great old guy," but in an old, strong way, like a city tree that doesn't even know it's smaller than trees in the forest, because it's never been out there, and it's the best tree on the street.

He moved his fingers around a few times to get a better grip, and I lowered my hand so it was easier for him to hold on to it, and I felt kind of sorry for him, but at the same time I felt happy that he had somebody to help him keep his balance while he got on the subway. You take a guy who's feeling sad because there aren't any kids playing on the subway platform, and sometimes all he really needs is some nice old guy who'll hold his hand and wait for a train together, and that'll make him feel better more than some book or a song or a gift set of green tea herbal essence shampoo.

When the subway came, we shuffled into the subway and the old guy let go after he was in one of the special seats for seniors, and he gave me a crazy old Korean bow to say thanks, like I was a government official or something, and he finally looked at my face just the one time. Then I had to get off at the next stop, but I still think about him, like maybe he would have waited for twenty minutes and three trains before somebody else came to help him. Or, sometimes I think about all the other people on the platform saying, "charmed" and trading business cards, or not talking to each other at all, and how they didn't get to stand by an old guy who still took the subway, even though he couldn't even lift his feet off the ground very much, and he only had a lousy cane, not even a walker. For a minute, waiting for the train, I wondered what he was thinking, but now I hope he was just thinking something like, "the train'll come soon" and not something phony like "what a nice young man." I don't want to be a nice young man; sometimes it's just good to stand by some old guy and wait for a train together, that's all.

Bud, holy cow!

I just went to the Seoul Museum of Art, and saw Vincent Van Gogh. This guy...

you know the difference between looking at pictures of your friend, and actually sitting down and chatting -- you know the way NOBODY gets your vacation photos the way you do, just because bud, the food looks great in the picture, but they didn't get to eat it, and you did.

Well, dear readers, art is like that too. I didn't actually see Vincent VanGogh. He died. Quite a while ago, now. But if you think these pictures are impressive -- wow! You really gotta see them in person. The paint on the canvas, the little knots of colour, the texture that jumps out at you -- it's like the difference between a photo album and a person (which makes sense, but still didn't really click until I saw these in person).


This one was there. Girlfriendoseyo disagrees with me, but I think Van Gogh was overwhelmed by the sun. The sun seems so close here -- it strikes me even as being accusing. The sun almost totally dominates just about every painting where it appears in Van Gogh's work. The field is so mundane next to that glaring eye. You can barely even see the birds eating the sower's seeds -- they're totally irrelevant next to that sun.

I stared at this one for about three minutes without blinking. I don't know how, but Vincent got to me, like a fisher with his hook, he got a hold of something in me.


This next one wasn't in the exhibit, but you can see here, too, Van Gogh's feeling about the sky. I said to Girlfriendoseyo today -- Raphael's or Vermeer's paintings are so perfect, so realistic, it's like they're just seeing. Picasso's paintings are so intuitive, so emotional, it's like they're just feeling. Van Gogh sees and feels. It's amazing how raw and visceral these paintings are in person.


This one WAS in the exhibit, and Girlfriendoseyo and I were both totally gobsmacked. I just can not convey to you how powerful this painting is in person. I really can't. Even if you eat the computer screen where the painting is displayed, you won't be as deeply impressed by it as we were. Go, seek it out, and see it yourself.


This next painting was there too, the only of his self portraits (I think).

This one broke my heart, and also caught hold of me for several minutes: every line said, "dude, I've lived a f***ing rough life." He died at age 37, but this, one of his early paintings, already looks about fifty.


Everybody loves these next three. . . they weren't at the exhibit, but they might have been too much for me if they were. My old roomie Anthony once told me the story of his buddy, the self-proclaimed "biggest Bjork fan in the world", who, when he got the chance to see Bjork perform live, ended up having to leave the auditorium after the first few songs, completely overwhelmed with the power of his experience. I scoffed at the story then, and called dude an idiot for flinching away from a potential high-point in his life. . . but now I think I might understand a bit.

Considering how these three are still amazing, gorgeous, and fresh to me, even though they pop up of every tea room wall, on every Starbucks mug, in every poster-shop window. . . to actually see them in person, to have their impact amplified that much -- I might have to look away for a while, too, before staring into the sun like that.



Dear Lord, the man's night skies were breathtaking!

This one WAS there. In person, it's almost a different painting entirely.

And I wish I could explain what he does with flowers. . . but there's just no way. (This is why people write poems, I suppose.)


This wasn't at the exhibit, but again, look how he just lays his soul bare in the skies. The indoor still life paintings' backgrounds were totally flat and dull, but this Vincent fellow, he had some kind of a thing about skies.

Thanks to him, now I do, too.


Wasn't at the exhibit, but just -- wow. Just wow.


I love painters.
The German poet Rilke (my personal poetry hero) wrote, in the First Duino Elegy

"already the knowing animals are aware
that we are not really at home in our interpreted world"

And this is why artists draw -- because there doesn't have to be a story, or a meaning, or anything but a field and a sky. . . but that field, and that sky -- WOW!

Here it is! Be amazed!

We're right back to that again, aren't we? Can't that sometimes be enough? Can't that sometimes be the entire end and purpose of some art? As John Keats said,
"Beauty is truth, truth beauty,--that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know."

But with words, Keats had to say beauty is truth. These painters just show something beautiful, and they don't even have to add a single layer of interpretation if they don't want to, and they can just leave it at "here it is. be amazed."

(Girl With a Pearl Earring, by another Dutch guy who was pretty good: Vermeer. Here it is. It's beautiful. Be amazed.)

Yeah, sometimes there's other stuff in there, too. . . but there doesn't have to be. With writing, it's almost impossible not to add in a little pontification, a little theme or interpretation or explanation -- it's why I get bummed every time I read Wordsworth's Tintern Abbey -- he starts off with a "here it is. be amazed" and then starts adding other stuff. Sometimes in other poems, he got it right, got it pure, but often he was so busy explaining the perfection of his moments, or describing his own feelings, that he clouds the beauty with too many traces of his own voice -- kind of like an amazing photograph with a text line across the middle of the composition saying, "taken on a fuji finepix E550"

For your benefit, I've created a visual representation of what I mean. Which of these pictures would you rather have on your wall?




Here's a Picasso painting I talked about in a previous post.

I love about Picasso that he stripped away everything in his paintings except the things he decided were important for that particular painting.

Form? Not needed.
Proportion? Why?
Perspective? Does it serve the painting's main theme?
Conventional Placement Of Body Parts? Let's talk about that again later.

But what he DID keep in his painting, distorted, exaggerated, or rearranged for proper emphasis, maintained the exact emotional content of his subject, even when the recognizable form was long gone, and so, even though you wouldn't recognize her to pass her on the street, you FEEL this woman crying (the painting is named "La Femme Qui Pleure" - the woman who cries), more (or at least as) clearly and authentically than/as a hundred photos of women actually crying.


The other thing I love love love about Picasso is his face. Look at his eyes. Those are eyes that have been trained, for an entire lifetime, to see into the heart of things, and find wonder there. "It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child." That he not only learned how to SEE the world that way, but was also skilled or intuitive enough to translate what he saw onto canvas is as much a miracle as the way Mozart heard the music perfectly in his head, or the way Beethoven composed the Ninth Symphony while stone-deaf, or the way John Lennon, Paul McCartney, and George Harrison managed to be born in the same city, in the same era, and meet each other.

Even when he's very old, you still see a child in his eyes. You see a mind still open. Still dancing.

That kind of wise simplicity appears from time to time, in somebody's eyes. . . not even in every artist, though. My favourite poet, Rainer Maria Rilke, has a sharper edge in his eyes.

but it doesn't surprise me that someone who uses words (which are basically boxes, categories, and judgements impressed upon the things that actually reach one's senses) would have a sharper edge than someone who uses colours and shapes to lay bare his soul.



Would you believe that behind those eyes lies one of the finest religious-scholarly minds on the planet?

I hope, when I'm an old man, I have eyes as encompassing, innocent, and simple, as that.

But more than that, I hope they look that way because I've worked my whole life to see the world simply and wonderfully (wonderful meaning full of wonder, of course), and maybe even that I've been clever enough to transmit some of that tight-packed wonder into some books that other people can read.

How long does it take to write a poem like Rilke, or paint a painting like Picasso, or a story like JD Salinger?

A few hours, or a few days, or a few months. . . and an entire lifetime, of course.

I know, why don't you write about why you love to write/why you write, and what you like about literature? Your own philosophy of your art.

Just hit play and start reading. Soundtrack!



I said in the comments of my books post that the person who found my intentional error got to pick my next topic,

Mel won the contest, finding the intentional error and being kind enough not to mention the numerous typos. That’s right: Hamlet was written by William Shakespeare, not Victor Hugo.

Mel’s question was “Why do you write?”

Why SOME people write:

For legacy. Nobody remembers England’s top swordsman in the year 1603, but everybody remembers Billy Shakespeare was writin’ him some plays. Some pretty good ones, too.

It’s validating, even gratifying to see one’s name in print – if you go to the TWU Library, you can look up and read my honours thesis: something I wrote is in a library! That’s pretty cool, isn’t it? It proves that I exist, in a way.

But here’s my real answer: why do I write?

In my second year of university, I bought a bunch of pocket-sized notebooks, and began carrying a notebook and two pens everywhere I went. Still now, nine years later, I always carry pens and pocketbook. The book catches phone numbers and appointments and, more importantly, little things that I notice around me.

You see, if waking up early helps a person feel (and thus BE) more productive, and having regular quiet time helps a person feel (and so become) more spiritually centered, and keeping a dream journal helps a person remember more of their dreams, then journaling helps me feel like I’m paying more attention to the details of life, and inevitably, I DO notice more, simply from the habit of writing down what I see.

It’s not for posterity, that’s for sure: having all those notebooks cluttering my shelf was never the goal -- and going over old journals has rarely borne fruit in the idea department – maybe two grains of wheat in a pile of chaff. In fact, during my second year in Korea, I lost the journal of my entire first year in Korea, in a food court. It was gone forever, but I wasn’t really upset:

The greatest benefit of keeping a journal, I realized then, is simply being the kind of person who is in the habit of noticing, and who respects his own thoughts and observations enough to write them down. The habit of noticing may lead to realizations, and even self-knowledge; it may not lead anywhere except to wonder, and that’s OK, too, but by conditioning myself to be receptive, I become more of the person I want to be – one who sees the world like a child, as a place spilling out wonder from hundreds of tiny cracks that nobody notices, or that everybody else also notices, but promptly forgets (I don’t actually think I’m that special – I just think I entertain thoughts and observations that other people dismiss – my filter’s on different settings, is all).

The little details? They can fill a life up, I’m convinced, with wonder and texture, differentiating one day from the next, or, if unnoticed, their absence can leave a life blank and indistinguishable from day to day. I love my day-to-day existence. Ask anybody who sees me every day.

In summary: I write because it makes me into. . . I won’t say a better person, but it makes me more and more of a person I’d like to be around.

Then, once it’s enriched my own life, why do I write about it and share it? Well, if you see a beautiful rainbow, you point it out to your friends, don’t you? I hope to publish. . . maybe this would be like sending a picture of a really great rainbow to a photography magazine, or putting it on your wall, so even more people can go “well goldurn, that’s a purty rainbow.”

I have another conviction: that every human has a deep desire to know and be known. We yearn for connection. Whether it’s because we long for the closeness we had with God in the Garden of Eden, or because our transcendent soul reaches through dharma to pull us back toward harmony with the true nature of things, or because we’ve been genetically imprinted to be social creatures by aeons of natural selection favouring the humans that work better as a unit, the fact remains that communion with others is a fundamental desire for almost everyone.

Writing is a way to know and be known.

I can know myself by writing – the directions stories take reveal something about myself, and the important things in my life. It’s a common phenomenon for people to discover that the simple act of talking, or writing a problem out often gets them over the hump of solving, or coming to terms with it. In my own life it has certainly been true that the communications I have with friends near and far have helped shape my self-knowledge. I can also share, and connect, and maybe we won’t feel so lonely, if we know that we were both deeply touched by a John Keats poem, or a Salinger novel.

Next question: why stories, then, Roboseyo, Rob, Roboseyo? Wanting to tell a story has little to do with noticing life’s details and trying to be as awake and aware and mindful as possible. Wouldn’t poetry do nicely for that?

Ah, that’s true. Poetry does nicely for little details and textures in life, and poetry was an important outlet for me all through my schooling. But. . .

Arthur Lee and Love: Alone Again Or -- again, hit play and read on.



First of all, I love stories. Love, love, love, LOVE stories. It’s my conviction that stories are the most powerful way to learn something – that’s why cultural values are transmitted through folk tales, myths, fables and morality tales (if you don’t believe me, read a book of Korean folk tales notice how the different values praised in Korean vs. Western folk tales exactly parallel many significant cultural differences.) People understand nihilism better after reading “A Clean, Well-Lighted Place” than after reading a hundred pages of Nietzche. Holy texts use stories: every place you go searching for meanings, you find stories, for better and for worse.

The same way humans crave connection, I believe humans crave narrative – narrative gives MEANING, a purpose to the connections. A quotation from the Jewish Theological Seminary says, “A human life is like a single letter in the alphabet. It can be meaningless. Or it can be part of a great meaning.” We all want our lives to be part of a greater meaning. We want the random events of our lives to be part of a greater meaning, too. The story of us can be part of a great metanarrative like

“The Victory of Reason over Superstition”
“Humanity Careens Toward Ecological Disaster”
“Preparing for the Second Coming”
“Rising From The Ashes Of The Korean War”;

we also fit our lives into smaller narratives like
“The Courtship of Deb and Brad,”
“The Rude Guy at Work”,
"How I Learned to Stop Grieving and Love My Life"

and we even remember and define events and relationships with micronarratives like
“That Crazy Night Piper Tricked Me Into Drinking Bacardi 151,” or
“My Failed Attempt to Become a Tea Expert"
“The Rise and Fall of My Friendship With X”.

Scientists say the universe is made of atoms. My old Professor Szabo once said the world is made of stories, and I say the universe is made of meanings. Sometimes the meaning is as simple as "It is what it is", but reaching for meanings is our greatness. We're the only onese who could imagine ourselves improving our lot (another kind of narrative) rather than resigning ourselves to a life of hunting and being hunted.

So, Roboseyo, what are you trying to accomplish when you write?

I’m fascinated by stories, and by people, and the choices people make. Choices don’t appear in a poem, nor do characters (a poem is too focussed to ever catch more than a single gesture, a single facet) – you need a story for more than that. And if I can add some of the wonder of life’s little details and the poignancy of a person making an important choice, and the honesty of a character who seems to really breathe . . . well, that sounds like the makings of a pretty good story, doesn’t it?

I also believe that writing is an act of hope: hope that it IS possible to connect with another person, to write and be understood, to read and understand, to find a way for two minds to (partially) be one. It is an act of faith in humanity, that we CAN reach each other, and maybe even improve each other’s lives. Sometimes it takes a bit of courage to believe that, but I think writers must.

Of poetry, John Keats said once that “I feel assured I should write from the mere yearning and fondness I have for the beautiful, even if my night’s labours should be burnt every morning and no eye ever shine upon them” – John Keats, letter to Richard Woodhouse, 17/10/1818

He didn’t write to have people pat him on the back and say, “You’re a great writer” – he was given over to the beauty of the world he saw, and the best way he could express it was to write, regardless of who read it later.

Those moments of beauty and insight, those moments of choice and truth, are the ones we live for.

Sometimes, I think the job of a writer at its purest, is to get the hell out of the way – characters and images and stories come, and a humble writer, committed to serving the story, will interfere as little as possible as the story takes its most perfect form. This requires a self-critical eye, or, I prefer saying, the ability to listen to one’s own writing, and encourage it (like a parent to a child) to become its best self. If I try to control it too much (like a protective parent), the story will never be bigger than my own limited abilities, but if I can get lost in the wonders of the moments and characters I want to create, maybe I’ll move out of the way enough that they can take the step from my mind and/or senses, onto the page, without getting cluttered by my own ego.

(For a great example of a humble storyteller, watch Million Dollar Baby or Unforgiven – Clint Eastwood is a very humble filmmaker, willing to step out of the way and let a story tell itself; exactly the opposite of Martin Scorsese, whose films are great, but always seem to be saying “Hey, look at this guy! He sure is a great filmmaker!”)


Here’s a long quote from Flannery O’Connor, the subject of my University Honours Thesis, and one of the most influential writers in my life:

”People are always complaining that the modern novelist has no hope and that the picture he paints of the world is unbearable. The only answer to this is that people without hope do not write novels. Writing a novel is a terrible experience, during which the hair often falls out and the teeth decay. I'm always highly irritated by people who imply that writing fiction is an escape from reality. It is a plunge into reality and it's very shocking to the system. If the novelist is not sustained by a hope of money, then he must be sustained by a hope of salvation, or he simply won't survive the ordeal.

"People without hope not only don't write novels, but what is more to the point, they don't read them. They don't take long looks at anything, because they lack the courage. The way to despair is to refuse to have any kind of experience, and the novel, of course, is a way to have experience. The lady who only read books that improved her mind was taking a safe course--and a hopeless one. She'll never know whether her mind is improved or not, but should she ever, by some mistake, read a great novel, she'll know mighty well that something is happening to her.

Any questions?

My beef with Harry Potter, book Seven.

In case you doubted that I was a bad guy before:

<-- it's me. Time to rant about Harry Potter, book seven. (Maybe it's just sour grapes, and maybe I've officially become the contrarian ass who hates The Beatles, not because The Beatles are bad, but just for the sake of argument, and for attention. Or maybe this is my desperate plea, my cry for help to anybody who still reads my blog to post comments so I know I'm not just writing for the space aliens to read 3000 years from now, when they dig up our civilization. . . but here goes anyway.) My Beef With Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Now I'm serious: if you haven't read the book, DON'T read this post. It's ALL about Harry Potter Seven (and touches on the previous books). Yes, it's in my inimitable writing style, so you can read it for the fun of reading my words (hyuk), but if you plan on reading the book, and haven't yet SKIP TO THE NEXT POST BY CLICKING HERE. Any place where it says "SPOILER WARNING", I'm about to talk about plot points in the book, so if you don't want to know what happens, SKIP THIS POST AND READ PREVIOUS ONE INSTEAD. Also avoid reading the comments. The comments include spoilers, too. Or go here instead.

So yes, I'm spoiling the book in both ways: giving away the ending, AND pointing out flaws that will be glaring once they've been pointed out (like sometimes a friend makes a comment about another friend, like "He interrupts constantly" or "she ends every sentence like a question" or "really. loud. chewer." and, after that person mentions it, you can NEVER be around that person without being annoyed by those things yourself.) So don't read this post if you want to preserve the magic of old Harry Potter.

1. Let's just get this out of the way. YES, it's a good book. It's as readable as bacon is edible, that is to say, compulsively, irresistably so. Rowling is a master of storytelling and scene-writing, she creates interesting situations and her characterizations are full of energy and life. Yes, the book touches on all the important points foreshadowed in the previous books, and each of the characters, in one way or another, gets his or her due (except Snape and Dumbledore).

2. I have some problems with the book. Snape is as woefully underwritten. All through the series, Snape has been the most interesting character. The "Is he good or is he bad?" conundrum lent dramatic energy to every book. In this book, everything is explained (too late in the book), at a point where Harry can't make any more choices about what to do or how to feel about him. He's a total non-factor, except as a source of important information. . . about the BACKSTORY! Changing him from the dramatic lynchpin of the series to a source of exposition was a shocking disappointment.

SPOILER WARNING IN THIS PARAGRAPH Mainly, though, WE BARELY SEE HIM! Matt rightly said Snape is the Gollum of the Harry Potter series. Imagine if Gollum disappeared halfway through The Two Towers and didn't reappear until Frodo and Sam passed him at the foot of mount Doom, where, nearly dead of thirst from waiting for them, he only has the energy left to point and say, "Keep right past the fist-shaped boulder. Loose gravel there. Good luck!" and die. That's the level of short shrift Rowling gave Snape in book seven. As we learned in 2 Fast 2 Furious, it's a bad move to take the most interesting character OUT of the story.

3. There were points where I really felt like Rowling was just going through the paces -- as if she'd written out a chart of characters and brainstormed each one's "just dessert," and basically plotted her seventh book around making sure we revisit every interesting member of the Potter world somewhere or another. The first half of the book especially felt, at times, like a farewell tour, playing all the greatest hits one more time. Good for a fanfiction, not for the climax of the most popular book series of all time.

4. The Dursleys were barely despicable at all. Throw me a bone here!

5. Give me more in the epilogue! At least make it INTERESTING. Matt pointed out, after the climax of Lord of the Rings, there's another hundred pages or so of the Scouring of the Shire, another hundred pages of time to revel in Sauron's defeat, and enjoy Frodo's newfound asskickery, before the book finally ends. How quickly did Rowling wrap up this book? ELEVEN pages after Voldemort dies, the book, epilogue and all, is finished. It's like she got sick of her own series, and wanted to wrap it up as quick as she could. (PS: Wouldn't Return of the King have been better if they had 20 minutes of the hobbits cleaning up the Shire instead of having 28 minutes of "And. . . . it's over. . . no, no it isn't. Gotcha!" These guys made fun of the ending of Lord of the Rings in a really funny way.

6. Voldemort is dumb. (SPOILER WARNING) -Voldemort uses magical means to try and kill Harry four times (book one, four, five, early in book seven) and also as a baby. Each time, he fails. Obviously, its time to change tactics. If he had any brains, he'd have just given each of his minions a knife and said "disarm him, and cut his throat on sight." Messy, but effective. Bellatrix threatens Hermione with a knife -- wizards obviously know how to USE knives (unlike postage stamps, which they don't quite get), so why not? -instead, he insists on facing Harry himself, in the same arena (magical duel) where he lost many times before. ego? pride? stupidity. Then, in the final climax, when he didn't kill Harry THIRTY MINUTES BEFORE with his killing curse, he STILL tries to defeat Harry in a duel AGAIN! My buddy quotes an old Alcoholics Anonymous proverb: "Doing the same thing, but expecting different results, is insanity." Moldy-wart is BIGGER than Harry, and meaner -- he could probably have killed Harry with his bare hands if he wanted to, if he'd disarmed him. At least he hadn't already tried that and FAILED (four times).

-if he really fears death, why does he make so many powerful enemies, and try to take over the wizarding world, sticking his neck out so far, rather than holing up in a forest and working his dark, life-extending enchantments? (That one's courtesy of Gregg Easterbrook from espn.com)

-He should have read the evil overlord list.

-(MAJOR SPOILER WARNING) He's not scary anymore. By losing to Harry so often (see above), he loses the menace he had in the first three books, before they even arrive at the climax, and by STILL wanting to duel Harry magically after he came back to freaking life the last time, he proves himself obstinate and suicidally stupid. It's Darwinism, pure and simple: evil masterminds that stupid don't deserve to be in the evil overlord gene pool anymore, and must make room for smarter antagonists, like Darth Vader, the bugs in Starship troopers, Godzilla, and Moe, the bully in Calvin and Hobbes. In Lord of the Rings, Sauron is more frightening, BECAUSE we never see him. We see the terrifying creatures that serve him, and if Sauron is undisputed master of such monsters, he must be miles more terrifying than them! We don't need to see him to be frightened. Like God in Milton's Paradise Lost vs. God in Dante's Paradiso, the one shown and displayed loses his power and mystery and, ultimately, his impact. It's just more impressive that Dante's God was so great the entire epic poem had to end rather than us laying our eyes on His face, compared to Milton's God, who was so pedestrian he could be reduced to explaining theological excuses for why he allowed Adam and Eve to sin. I'd rather have Dante's God of mystery than Milton's Great Heavenly Explainer.



7. (This point is mostly Matt's, though I agreed once he pointed it out) Harry won by dumb luck, especially in the first two books, and in the later books, more because of who he was (The Boy Who Survived, selfless, brave, kind to house-elves, able to love, endowed with special powers because of the twin cores, because of the scar, etc.) than because of any real wizarding skill of his own. That was disappointing. I wanted to see Harry kick some butt, on his OWN steam, his own wizarding power -- I mean, he didn't learn ANY new spells after the patronus charm in book three (except apparating, which is more a dramatic device than a spell for fighting evil -- faster transitions when you can teleport magically) -- sorry, but if adult wizards can do the cool stuff THEY can, how could Harry have made it through year six of Hogwarts (much less defeat the greatest evil wizard in a century) with about five spells, and a lot of guts? When did Hermione learn all the cool spells SHE knew? Why weren't the books about HER, when she's obviously the most buttkicking wizard of the trio?


True to my evil nature,
I shall destroy your enjoyment
of the latest Harry Potter book!

Mwahahaha!

8. Too much wandering in the woods. Dissipated any momentum that existed at the beginning. Made Harry seem like a schmoe. Plus, Harry spent too much time resenting either himself, Ron, Hermione, or Dumbledore in the last two books. Eyes on the prize, son! Unless the book is Catcher in the Rye, and the writer is JD Salinger, self-absorption and resentment aren't appealing! Harry (and Rowling) could get away with it for one book (book five, when it actually WAS him against the world) but after three books of self-pity, sullen resentment, and occasional rage and/or outbursts, I got tired of it. It would have been much nicer to see him get through this book on righteous rage or noble purposefulness, or even hell-bent-for-revenge passion, rather than surly, resentful, and passive-aggressive confusion about the clues Dumbledore left him. Plus, right to the bitter end, he NEVER trusts his friends. All the way to the end, he lies to Hermione and Ron about his ability to see into Moldy-wart's mind. What kind of a hero is this kid, anyway? I've heard the Potter books criticized before for the kids never trusting adults, but by book seven, he's even lying to his friends!


9. Dumbledore does things (especially concerning the Horocrux he found in the Gaunt's cabin) that just don't seem to fit with the rest of what we know about him. Sure, they were important to the action and other, later plot points, but they were still pretty dumb for a wizard smart enough to discover twelve different uses for dragon blood, AND powerful enough to defeat the wielder of the Elder Wand in open combat. And how on EARTH does he turn up inside Harry's head in the chapter King's Cross? That chapter -- an entire chapter of exposition in the middle of the climax of an incredible, LONG book series, was the most awkward chapter in the entire seven-ilogy.

My Conclusion:

10. I think it was because somebody was pressuring her to finish the book in time to coincide with the release of the fifth movie. The book (especially Snape, the episode in Godric's Hollow, the intermnable "wandering in the woods" part, the episode in the Malfoy Castle, the awkward "King's Cross" chapter, and Voldemort's mental meltdown --what's worse than a brain-fart? a brain-shart?), just felt like they could have benefited from more ripening. My guess is that her deadlines were too rigid, and her crafts(wo)manship suffered, which is an unfortunate end to the series. I waited two years; I'd have been glad to wait one more, even three more, if you could have made book seven one for the ages, Ms. Rowling -- I would have thanked you for taking your time.

11. Go back to point 1 and remember that I DID enjoy reading it the first time, and Rowling IS a really good storyteller, and writes action better than just about anyone I've read. However, I just felt like she could have done better. Return of the King is the best of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, the jewel in the crown. This one was a bit more like the original Star Wars trilogy, peaking in the middle (books three-five; The Empire Strikes Back), and ending with a let-down. Yeah, the right people lived and the right people died, but it just didn't live up to the standard set by what came before. (Return of the Jedi -- come on. Teddy bears with bows and arrows?)

By the way, while I'm spoiling stuff everybody loves anyway, how did Fezzik learn that Count Rugen was the six-fingered man in The Princess Bride?

And there is no Santa Claus, either.

And Shakespeare was a plagiarist.

And I've been to Narnia, and it sucked. Bad food.

And babies smell bad.

(boy I'm a jerk)

This is too much.

Here's a silly video that circulated all around the internet a few years ago -- about in 2004 or 2005. It makes me laugh.


numa numa song


On a COMPLETELEY unconnected note, here's a cute popsong that I heard constantly (when there's a hit song in Korea, it's TOTALLY ubiquitous -- it's almost dizzying how much you hear a song when it's number one in Korea, walking past storefronts, etc.) in 2006. Even my little seven year old students would sing along to it. The artist's name is Hyun Yeong. Yes, she is at least somewhat serious.


nuna wei ggum - the sister's dream



Here's another pair of videos that caught my attention for TOTALLY UNCONNECTED reasons. Especially the Choruses. If you wish, you can ignore the imagery and just listen to the music, or you can watch the videos and muse on the objectification of women and the vileness of beauty culture, both in the West AND in the East.

I know what you're thinking with all these videos by now: CEASE AND DESIST ALREADY, ROB!


"Do Something" by Britney Spears




(yes, I just put Britney Spears on my blog. But I'm making a point here, OK?

Now, "Gonna Getcha" by Korea's own number one Pop Tart, Lee Hyori. In this one especially, pay attention to the loving fixation on stuff, especially in the transitions between dance sequences -- car, phone, clothes, those amazing boots -- so many materials to obsess over, it's almost like stuff pornography.




Not to be nothing but disparaging (how do you like THAT triple negative!), here's my favourite Korean songwriter/singer. His name's Kim Kwang Seok, and like Jeff Buckley, Stevie Ray Vaughan, and almost every other artist I love except Tom Waits and Radiohead and Prince (and a few others), he died young. He committed suicide (purportedly) because he was depressed from hiding his closeted homosexuality in Korea's very conservative society. Before his tragic death, this guy was about as beloved as a pop star can be in a country--every Korean my age and up can tell you their favourite Kim Kwang Seok song, and how they felt when they heard the news that he died.

This dude has a gift for melody, an incredibly expressive voice, and a real grace that I love. It's a shame he died and let the plagiarists take over.


This one's called "Letter of a Private" it was made for the soundtrack of the movie "JSA" which is remembered as a high watermark in Korean filmmaking; it's a story about low level soldiers on either side of the demilitarized zone (the Joint Security Area, or JSA is where North and South stand closest to each other), who become unlikely friends. If you ask nicely, I'll do a post about my favourite Korean movies, and one I loathe.




I really like the next one's melody -- my man Kim is a real wizard with a melodic line. I think it and his expressiveness are his best strengths. The song's title translates as "Please Wait"




This is my favourite Kim Kwang Seok song, the one that I think shows everything I love about him. It's also the only Korean song I can even come close to singing in the noraebang (karaoke room). The title is something like "I used to love you". If you're only going to listen to one of these, choose this one.





He even warrants a tribute: here's a tribute to him, recorded by some other big Korean stars. It's another of his best songs, rendered. . . adequately and lovingly, by some other people.



And one more upbeat one.