been having an excellent taxi driver week

Sometimes it's the little things in life that keep you afloat... especially when one's glorious wedding/family visit/honeymoon to the maldives/summer vacation suddenly morphs into a "worst working schedule I've ever had and the staff room air conditioner stopped working" return to work.

but i'm happy to report that I've had a startlingly good run of taxi drivers lately.

And as tribute to Taxi Drivers, who can be the best, or the worst thing about life in Korea, depending on the one, and the day, and the weather, here's some taxi driver music, also known as "Trot" or 트로트.


Wifeoseyo and I were in a taxi heading to the Seoul Station Lotte Mart, and as we passed Seoul Station, Wifeoseyo twisted around and gasped, "We've gone past Seoul Station! What are you doing?" to the taxi driver. As we came a little farther around the corner, it was revealed that the Lotte Mart was around the side of the main station. Instead of the gruff, bulldog snarl that a lot of taxi-drivers would offer when their passenger said, in effect, "What the hell are you doing?" -- this taxi driver looked ahead, and sang cheerfully, "Lotte Marteu" exactly the way the radio jingle goes. It cracked us both up, and turned the situation from possible mean to brilliantly fun. Lovely.

then, yesterday, I got off work, and wanted to test out another route home before the car wifeoseyo and I ordered arrives, and I start seriously considering driving to work. So I caught a cab, and asked him to take me home by way of a certain road that's less travelled by than the usual thoroughfares taxi drivers head for, when one asks to go to my new neighborhood.

As soon as I started talking in Korean, the Taxi driver started laughing with glee -- it took me a few seconds to suss out that he wasn't mocking me, but was simply impressed and tickled that I spoke Korean as well as I did (not THAT well... but I'll take it)

Then, he started telling stories in 85% Korean (but mostly simple enough I could catch the gist), about other non-Korean passengers he'd taken, which included a hilarious re-enactment of a conversation with some Arab passengers-

"You tomorrow airport come! Big cash!"
"No I taxi small! Five people my taxi small."
"Please you come tomorrow please cash money!"
"I sorry taxi small no five people sorry!"

he was laughing all through his own story, and the way he told it reminded me of the seven-year-old I used to teach who was so excited about his story that he stopped using words, and just acted the ends of his stories out with broad, comical charades, while his classmates looked on, bemused, with faces reading, "I have no idea what's going on, but it sure is entertaining!"

Then he went on to explain how Japanese passengers can't speak Korean OR English, and complained that English is hard. He took his little screen (which had been playing trot/techno, which he stopped at the beginning of the trip, and which I asked him to turn back on, because it was hella fun), and turned on an English tv drama, which we watched, all as he told me in asides, "I have no idea what they're saying," and then took a phrase from the show "How do you like that?" and repeated it as he heard it: "Hawyuulaee'det?" over and over, until it cracked me up again.

So yeah, sometimes things get busy, and air conditioners break down, and wallets get pick-pocketed... but there's always a funny taxi driver, a cute old lady, or a friendly stranger, to keep things from going too far down the dark road.

This Headline Reminds Me Of A Story

"Man Booked For Trying To Talk To Foreigners"

Funny headline... the story goes a few Scottish fellas were trying to have dinner when a drunk old man came up to learn English from them. He refused to leave them alone, even when the restaurant staff member intervened, and it led to an altercation between the old man and the restaurant worker.

Anyway, I've been approached for free English lessons, too. All of us have. Sometimes it's fine, sometimes it's wonderful: I don't mind if somebody practices their English with me if they're helping me to get un-lost in a new neighbourhood, for example, and used to tell my students to go down to Insa-dong and help people who looked lost for English practice. I also usually don't mind if the person looking for free lessons is funny, charming, interesting, or cute and female.

But there are also times, after a long day, or for the tenth time that day, when one wants to be left alone... and there are some places one does NOT want to be approached for free English practice.

For me, the worst ever was this:

It was two months after my mother had passed away, and my relationship with exgirlfriendoseyo was starting to come apart at the seams. Saunas were one of the few respites I had in my day, after managing a stressful new supervisor job, and having exgirlfriendoseyo not answer my calls, because she was studying for a test.

I went to a sauna, feeling like crap; frankly, close to tears. I sat in the cold pool, in the nude, of course, on my haunches, so that the water was brushing the bottom of my chin, and let the shocking cold clear my mind, when suddenly...

a very fat, very naked ajosshi (older gentleman) waddled into the pool as well, and stood directly in front of me, so that his big, fat gut, and his man-pieces completely filled my line of vision, put his hands on his hips, and rumbled, "Where are you from?"

I closed my eyes and tried to ignore him.

Not one to take hints, this ajosshi tried again. "Where are you from?"

I shook my head, which must be ajosshi sign language for "try to guess and I'll give you a free English lesson."

"America? Russia?"

I still had my eyes shut (floating man-bits, remember?), and I put my forearms into the "X" formation that Koreans use to gesture, "NO," and kept them like that until he waddled away. He ruined my sauna -- ruined that entire (otherwise perfectly good) sauna for me, forever -- I've never been back there since -- and may have set back my entire grieving process for a half a month.

Later that evening, I asked a Korean friend to teach me how to say "I want to be alone" -- a phrase that has come in handy from time to time.

To any Koreans reading this: do NOT approach foreigners for English practice in...

1. a sauna, or any other place where the foreigner you want to approach is partly or mostly naked, or partly or mostly sweaty
2. if you have seen the person be approached once or twice already, at the coffee shop, gym, or restaurant where you see them
3. if they have an unhappy look on their face, or if they're reading, or doing anything else where they appear focused on their task -- if their face is up, looking around, interacting with the world, go ahead. If their nose is buried in a book, back off.
4. in a sex-toy shop. It's never happened to me, but I can just imagine...
5. on a Saturday morning, if they have bags under their eyes (hangover = bad conversation)
6. if the foreigner is the opposite sex, close to your age, and he/she is with someone who might be their significant other
7. if the foreigner has his/her eyes closed (in the sauna, on the subway), or headphones on (in the gym)

On the other hand, it IS OK, and cool, to approach foreigners who...
1. are standing in front of a neighbourhood map, or looking at a map, and appear to be lost
2. are looking around the room, making eye contact with the people around them, and appear to be in a good mood
3. look bored, or lonely
4. are smiling, and climbing a mountain

and it is always OK to invite a foreigner to sit with your group, if you buy them drinks, and if you leave them alone after asking twice.

In general: don't invite a foreigner to chat, sit, or walk with you more than twice. Foreigners will be much more open to chatting with you if you give them things: food and drinks are especially effective. Laughter will do, if you're funny.

Foreigners aren't stupid, and we can tell which people approaching us just want free lessons, and which people approaching us are really, generally friendly, outgoing people who like meeting new people. If you're interested in me as a person, and not just as a walking dictionary, I'll chat with you. I have a pretty good nose for smelling ulterior motives by now. So take a real interest in us, and be fun company, or you won't get far.

We can also tell which kids are coming up to us because they're outgoing, and want to meet us, and which kids are approaching us because their parents told them to. Don't send your kid over to talk to the foreigner if he/she doesn't want to.

Just so's ya know.

Met a girl named Jenny. Also: a little notbeef, to balance things out.

By the way:

I had to turn on word verification on my comment board. Sorry: the spammers were starting to smell.
You'll also notice my blog suddenly goes back to 2003: blogger added an option where I can change the date of posting, so that I could retroactively date the early posts, which were e-mails sent to friends and family about Korea during my pre-blogging days, on the dates when I sent them, instead of having thirty-one posts on November 26th 2006, or whenever it was I started this blog. I'll also re-date things like supplementary or background posts, eventually, so that they don't clutter things up.


I've been meaning to put this up for a while, just so you all know what a nice guy I am, but I've been putting it off to be snarky (see previous post).

In case you ever doubted. . .

This happened a while ago now (back in April, in fact), but I wanted to write about it, because it was a nice experience.

I was bopping around with the staff-room nutter, Danielle, one fine afternoon. I showed her a nice little bakery by piccadilly cinema, and then, as we headed down one of the lovely little narrow alleys in that area, I saw a young, obviously foreign girl (white), and her friend, looking around with a kind of upset, worried, "what do I do now?" face.

Seeing as I've lived downtown for a while, I consider it my karmic duty to help out lost tourists, when I have the time -- because back in my first year, I'd have wanted somebody to come by and say, "Are you looking for something?" to me when I was lost. So I went up to the two young ladies, and asked exactly that.

"Uhh, yeah, um, I lost my wallet in the movie theatre, and my flight back to America leaves in five hours."

Oh gee.

Well, first I helped her find a PC room where she could find her bank's phone number, and then lent her my calling card so she could cancel her card.

Next, we brought her and her Korean friend down to the nearest police box to report the missing wallet. It was a cute little scene in there, as we went in, and Dani and I sat in a corner to watch, and slowly, the police box filled up with officers checking out the pretty young American girl in making a report. When we showed up, there were about four police officers in the room, and by the time we finished, there were about eleven in the small room, just milling about, glancing surreptitiously, and obviously smitten.

After that, we checked one more time at the cinema: no dice, and I suggested, "Well, we could stay here and worry a little longer about something we can't change, or we could go for a walk in a really nice park. What say you?"

We decided to go walking around in a nice park.

Right next to picadilly, where Jenny lost her wallet, is a really nice place called Jongmyo Shrine. I've written about it before, and it's one of my favourite places in all of Seoul, and it was close enough to take Jenny around a pretty piece of Korea's history before she had to catch the bus back to the airport. (Luckily, her plane ticket and her passport were in her bag, so she was out cash, some ID, and some pride, but not missing anything really crucial). In the end, it was a really pleasant afternoon. We gave her some cash for the bus to the airport and some munchies (practically had to force it on her), and wished her happy trails.

We told her to pay it forward, and pass our good deediness on to someone else, and I was glad to have a chance to help someone have a somewhat better experience of Korea. Frankly, helping out a down-and-out pacific northwester made me happy for a good three days, too.

So, all you veterans in Korea: when you see someone with the "where am I right now?" face on, go forth and do likewise. Remember: you were a newbie here once, too.

P.S.: for news of the goofy:
Here are some of the pizza crusts I must work hard to avoid eating in Korean pizza shops (generally I just avoid pizza altogether here):

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.

Malaysia report, part three.

Since I've already mentioned the most interesting characters I met in Malaysia, here are the nicest ones. These are in either the order I met them, or the order they appear in my diary.

(Days 1-3) Jimmy: you read about him in the "most interesting characters" section too, because he had all kinds of stories and comments about travellers from all kinds of places, who'd stayed at his place. He earns his spot on the 'nicest' list because he did all kinds of legwork/phonework to help us book our trip and our place in Langkawi Island, as well as helping us see the beach on Penang Island, recommending a place to eat near there, and taxiing us there and back.

(Day 5) Emma, the Kiwi (Kiwi:New Zealander = Canuck: Canadian) we met at the seven wells (or was it seven springs?) mountainside. It was our second day on Langkawi Island, we had rented a car and were driving around to some of the landmarks. We climbed about five hundred steps to get to this spot where there were pools cut into rock by a stream channeling its way down to a big cliff/waterfall, and they created chutes and gulleys where we rode natural waterslides, and while there, I started a conversation with a young lady and her father. They were both extremely well-travelled in Asia, the father was a teacher, and the daughter had just started university. This was the first lengthy conversation I had in Malaysia with another traveller who wasn't part of our own group. We'd just gotten our bearings on Langkawi Island, and it was a very pleasant to have a little chat about where we'd been and where we were going.

(Day 6) We took an island-hopping tour that brought us around to a freshwater lake, a grove where we could watch eagles and sea eagles feeding off the tidal pools, and finally to a DIFFERENT sun-drenched beach than the one where we USUALLY sat. On the boat was a honeymooning couple. The new wife had this fantastic glow about her, a light headdress (Malaysia is mostly a Muslim nation: headdresses were everywhere), and she spent the whole trip chatting with, and totally charming, our travel-mate Amy, asking her to take picture of her with her new husband, etc..

Something I noticed: look at the woman's feet in this picture. I saw that same foot stance a handful of times when I saw Malaysian women posing for pictures. Maybe it was just coincidence, but it's a good pose, and it made me smile every time I spotted it -- you know how sometimes you just notice something, and from then on, it makes you smile when you notice it again, like a friend's little mannerism, or some quirk in the way couples talk to each other, or whatever. (Conversely, ever notice something and immediately wish you could un-notice it - like a friend who's a noisy chewer, and once you've noticed, you'll ALWAYS be annoyed by that friend's chewing.)

Anyway, here she is.




Also on day six, on that same beach, I met Theresa and Raiden. I'd brought my juggling balls to the beach. (Juggling is almost as good as having a puppy in terms of "meeting people" tools -- except that puppies attract cute females, while juggling attracts kids and other totally random people [with cameras] -- any age, any type, unpredictably, from super-cool folks to bedraggled parents of young kids.) At the freshwater lake, I'd noticed Theresa and Raiden standing on the dock because she was wearing a very bright orange dress, draped and tied in a way I hadn't seen before. Then, at the last stop on the island tour, I started juggling, and they approached me, asked about juggling (I gave them a mini-lesson), and took pictures with me after we chatted about seasons, Canada, Korea, and Kuala Lumpur. Also, she's the one who told me to try Laksa soup, and I'm glad I did.


Here're Theresa and her boyfriend Raiden with me on the beach.




Also at that beach, I had a nice chat with an Indian couple who were also travelling; the wife was an educator, so we shared notes on education-y stuff, and the husband got a juggling lesson. He approached me with the line, "Are you giving busking lessons over here?" They were very sweet -- big smiles and approachable manner. The husband's smile reminded me of my brother-in-law Frank. (In fact, I saw Frank's Malaysian twin on the ferry back to Penang Island -- he was sitting on the ferry's deck and looking seasick, but his build, his hair, and his mannerisms were identical to how I'd imagine Frank, if he were seasick. And Malaysian.)

(Day 7) The next day, I had a really neat chat with the tour guide on another tour. He was ridiculously knowledgeable about the area's wildlife, the island's history and natural features (rich in limestone: we drove by a cement factory on this resort island, that TOTALLY threw us for a loop, but then I learned that before it became a resort island, its primary industries were limestone (concrete) and marble). He was really well-spoken and full of interesting knowledge, and made me think of my days as a tour guide, how I took a real pleasure in knowing, or finding out, the answer to any question the tourists could throw at me. We went through a bat cave (the sound of a camera's film winding disturbs bats, but we could take digital pictures), and saw a mangrove swamp. Mangroves are trees that adapted to salt water, and they have roots that come up about two or three feet above the water level, so that it almost looks like a tree on stilts. Neat trees. We went to a fish farm, and archer fish (fish that shoot a jet of water to knock bugs off low branches, into the water to eat) shot my thumb when I put it on the rail and wiggled it. They can hit a target at two metres!

In fact, this random clip from the internet looks like it was taken at exactly the place where the fish shot MY finger!





There was a family on our tour boat, from the Netherlands, no less! As the tour continued, I started a conversation with the parents, and by the end of the tour, the two daughters (Bee, seven, and Ella, nine -- exactly the age I teach) were chatting and asking me questions, too. They asked my age and I told them I'd say a number, and they had to guess if my real age was higher or lower. They agreed to play, so the first age I suggested was 161. "Lower!" "OK. Seven." "Higher." With much giggling, they found out my age. The younger daughter especially took a shine to me, asking me questions and telling me endless stories, and at the buffet lunch that ended our tour, she told me, "I want to take you with my family for the rest of our vacation." It was very sweet. The family lives in Japan, and the girls go to an international school there, so I asked them if they know any Japanese.

"A little."
"OK, how do you say 'Goodbye'?"
"Sayonara."
"Very good! How do you say 'stop biting my elbow or I'll cough on your shoe!'?"
"I don't know."
"How do you say, 'Hello'?"
"Konichiwa."
"Excellent! How do you say, 'Can you call the police? I think my puppy ate your bicycle'?"
"I don't know."
"Well you should study more! My goodness!"

Much fun. I don't have a camera, though, so none of them are represented on film. Sorry. I remember what they look like.

(Day 8) Rachel was sitting on the beach when I went out on my last morning to take my last dip in the water. I walked over and parked myself beside her and we had a lovely chat. She teaches dance to children, and she had a really nice, gentle way. She was there with some friends from her church group, and all their names were biblical names starting with R-- there were Rachel, Ruth and Rebecca. We joked that we got along because my names starts with 'R' too. We had a good, little chat about finding our way home, and wrote a very nice e-mail to me, to boot!

Here are the four things my friend Rachel loves the most about Malaysia.

1. It's really diverse. As a former English colony, and because of its geography, you'll see (some) English, Indians, Thai, Chinese, and Malaysian, all with regularity (and you'll also see all those influences on restaurant menus). This means most people are versed in many languages, and they all generally get along peacefully.

2. It's really easygoing -- everybody there's really laid back. That's nice.

3. Because so many cultures are represented, there's always a holiday or a celebration taking place, and all the special days -- the Muslim holidays, the Chinese ones, the Indian ones, the Western ones, and the Malaysian ones, are observed by their respective groups. The day after Christmas, we saw a Chinese parade in Georgetown, and near the end of our stay, we saw a lot of shops closed during regular business hours, because Muslim Hajj period ended -- the Muslims who took the pilgrimage to Mecca are supposed to have come back on that day, or week.

4. GREAT food.

Here's the drawback:

Every Malaysian I properly chatted with said they wished they could have four seasons. The sun there was so nice, and they all pined for snow! They even mention it in their e-mails! When I think about it a second time, I realize that it's true for me, too: I LOVE seasons. Fall and spring are my favorite things, and the cold of winter really sharpens me. Summer's probably my least favorite season (unless I'm on a beach or a walking trail), but it's true. Seasons are great. Don't take them for granted: especially if you live in a place where leaves turn red in the fall.

Oh yeah. Can't forget about this:

I met this lady on day three, Christmas Day, and she gave me some tongue within five minutes of my meeting her! Some of you may think that's a little fast, but once you see her picture, you'll understand why I had no choice but to go along.

Report on Malaysia!

I'm back from Malaysia, relaxed, fadingly sunburnt, and full of great stories. I didn't bring a camera to Malaysia (my two coworkers both brought theirs, and one of them is a shutterbug, so I figured we'd get plenty pictures), so I made a point of journalling every chance I got, to write down impressions, thoughts, things I'd noticed, before they escaped me, and I filled up almost an entire (small, to be fair) journal!

The trip was, to apply an overarching theme (without dismissing the rest of what happened) a journey of characters.

My favorite characters were:

The cross-eyed restaurant owner who'd ordered for us before we had a chance to say "actually, I DON'T feel like having redsnapper tonight" -- it took a concerted effort to get him to order something else for us that we actually wanted, but once he had, the dishes were quite marvellous!

Jimmy, the hotel proprietor in Georgetown on Penang Island. Two buildings down from his inn were some sketchy kinds of places with ladies in short skirts standing in the doorway, but he (in a crackled, raggedy old voice, with his gap-toothed mouth,) helped us do everything we wanted to do, including connecting us with a guest house on Langkawi Island (such a beautiful little resort island), taxiing us around, and storing my winter jacket while I didn't need it.

The guy at the Jam Band Cafe. His speaking voice sounded like a sore-throated man, doing an impression of a little boy disguising his voice to sound like an adult over the phone. (Follow that?) Then, when he sang, he sounded like the lead singer from Pearl Jam, if someone were holding his head under water and squeezing his larynx. Every break between songs, he'd go from table to table, asking people if they played an instrument, if they wanted to come up and jam with him, or else he'd introduce the next song in his unbelievable voice (and with a mullet to stop a bullet), saying things like "this soooong is a ... it's a song for people who want to hear songs with people, because people, you know, that's what it's all about, is people understanding and understanding you understanding me that life man, that's people. Sorry about me all this woof woof bla bla dadedah in the talking with all you people out there. . . " and so forth. Fantastic. For the rest of the week we'd occasionally start talking like him, for giggles and such.

The masseuse from Borneo who started chatting about music with me, and by the end of the hour-long massage was singing me full choruses of her favorite Rod Stewart and Destiny's Child songs, to see if I knew them.

The lady who sold me one of those lovely light cotton beach shirts, and talked in this singsong voice that was either an exhausted person trying to put on a cheerful face, a bitter, disillusioned woman being sarcastically chipper to the tourists she despises, or a second language English speaker using a style of intonation that's really cute or charming in her original language, but sounds incredibly forced and contrived in English. Couldn't quite get a read on her.

The taxi driver who took me across Langkawi Island on the way to a tour (also mulleted. . . this is making me nervous), and told me, among other things, "my wife left me to go back to the city. Didn't like island life, slow pace, didn't like that I have less earning power here than pushing pencils in Kuala Lumpur. I said she can go. . . but if she wants to come back, she might have to take a number!" and "You gonna stay in Korea long?" (me:) "I don't know. My sister really wants me to come back to Canada for good." "Well you tell your sister, if she can find a rich lady in Canada wants to marry you, you'll come back to stay." The guy cracked me up about three times a minute.

The main port in Langkawi Island was a town called Kuai, which literally means "gravy" because there's an old legend that some giants spilled some gravy on that spot. What a great legend! Forget myths and tales and narratives! Here's to random placenames from cute anecdotes about mythical beings! "Yes, this town is called. . . Missed A Spot, because after Velman the Giantwife washed the Titan Balgor's shirt for the first time, he spotted a wine stain, and threw his shirt down onto the very place where our city hall now stands!"
"What happened next, grandfather?"
"They went on to the next island, and spent the second night of their marriage where we now find the town called 'Bickering'"


Here are some pictures.


"Lah" is the saying Malaysians (apparently) use the way Canadians say "eh". We saw this sign encouraging Malaysians to learn proper English.
The music at one club was so terrible, Amy and I had to bust out some ballroom moves, while Antony took pictures. This picture won both "best action shot" and "silliest face".


Did I mention that it's really pretty in Malaysia? And that I had to wear shorts this day (December 27th)? That's right, it's true. Sucka!

(These pictures are from Antony's camera. That's why they're all of me and Amy together.)

August 26th 2004

OK.

It being fully two months since I've sent one of these
out, and those two months being quite eventful and
mostly excellent . . . it's time for some rob-style
catching up. (X-style is a totally acceptable
Konglish term -- if I want my hair cut like Justin
Timberlake, I just say "Josteen Teembohraikeuh style"
at the barber's and they'll figure it out.

In the meantime. . .

My general rule of thumb for surviving in Korea
without going off your rocker is to keep in mind the
rule of twos: every new endeavour takes two attempts
to get it, and every simple, mundane task takes twice
as long as it would in Canada, because of language
issues, etc.. However, something strange has
happened. Matthew, the new co-worker I told you about
in the last e-mail (who's no longer a new co-worker,
but an established co-worker), and I have some weird
knack about us (Mattie would call it good karma or
somesuch), whereby the rule of twos doesn't apply to
us. Somehow we do things together effortlessly.
(Knock on wood.)

During the last week of July, I had my summer
vacation. We decided to set out and climb a mountain
-- Jiri mountain, which many Koreans will tell you is
the most beautiful mountain on mainland Korea. We
managed to find bus tickets, rooms, places to sleep,
food, transit to odd, random bus terminals, find a
movie theatre or a nightclub in a strange city, all
with very little trouble.

Matthew has been hiking since he was six. I've been
hiking since I was twenty four. We managed, through
studying a map, to find the route up the mountain that
took less time, but, according to everyone we
consulted, was the hardest trail on the whole
mountain. I was carrying my backpack, and the routine
was this: Matthew hikes for twenty minutes, sits down
and waits ten minutes for me to catch up; I catch up,
he sits five minutes with me while I catch my breath,
bluster and whine, and then takes off again. Then, as
if to add insult to injury, about three quarters up
the mountain, when I was ready to collapse (this climb
was HARD, and I'm not exactly a tiger or an athlete),
he grabbed my bag, and carried it the rest of the way
to our destination, along with his own. It was quite
an experience -- somehow I discovered not just a
second or third wind, but a sixteenth wind somewhere
in me that I didn't know existed. The view was
amazing, and in two days we hiked a mountain that
takes most people four days. After the muscle
soreness subsided, I felt like a king, and that first
sauna after the mountain was one of the greatest
things I've ever felt.

Somehow everything went perfectly on summer vacation
-- from climbing the mountain to finding our way
around Kwangju, the city in southern Korea where we
played tourist, to the people we met. On the Saturday
before Jiri mountain, Matthew and I were in a
traditional Korean market; Matthew was going to show
me his favourite tea/incense shop, where they sell
incense made from a 600 year old recipe that's
apparently so good for you that it does everything
except raise your children. While in that shop,
Matthew mentioned to the really sweet, cute sales lady
that he burns the incense during his Yoga workouts.
She said "Oh! I study Yoga!" Matthew mentioned that
he also teaches Yoga, and she asked for his number; he
said, "We should get together some time," and she
said, "OK, but is it alright if I bring my twin
sister?" At this point Matthew and I exchanged a
glance that said, almost verbatim, "does life even GET
any better than this, or should we just both die now?"
and Matthew kept his composure enough to say "Yes."

The next Saturday (after Jiri mountain), we had dinner
with the twins, and it was one of the most enjoyable
dates I've ever been on.

And that whole story is to tell you that the reason my
e-mailing has trailed off is because I'm spending
about an hour every night now talking to a certain
twin on the phone. (As is Matthew with her sister.)
It's currently in that really fun "getting to know
each other, can't spend enough time with each other"
stage, but so far the outlook seems good. Her name has been changed to Exgirlfriendoseyo, and her English name (that I chose for
her) is Angelina Summer, or Lina. Feel free to
inquire about her if you ever want to read an e-mail
of me gushing frantically, even tiresomely, about how
wonderful it is to be alive. (Just ask Melissa --
she's had one already.)

And don't get too excited yet either -- we've known
each other for just over a month so far, so things are
still very early and tentative, but it's been a lot of
fun getting to know her, and I frankly never expected
I'd be in any kind of close relationship with a Korean
girl -- I'd always figured the cultural differences
were just too great to bother. But I bother now.

One of my favourite students just left the school; she
was a kindergarten student, one of the ones I saw
every day, and she was the funniest little sweetheart;
she had hugs for me every day, and a quick, ready
laugh. On the other hand, one of the boys who left in
June is back from Toronto, and he's as sweet as ever.

But he's not the one I want to tell you about either.
It's happened again -- last year, it was a little girl
named Serina, whose smile always came out when I came
to class, and who wrote me cards and letters telling
me she loved me. This year, it's Jina. She's stolen
my heart outright. She just moved to Korea recently
-- before Korea, she lived in Rochester, Minnesota,
where, naturally, she'd learned perfect English. She
has this funny middle American accent in the middle of
a bunch of Korean accents, she happens to have a
perfectly internalized sense for English grammar.
Really, there's nothing I can teach her except how to
do a monkey dance or tell a story about a
shape-changing, flying hippo with a straight face.

Here's the thing, though: she doesn't speak Korean.
She's moved to a country where the kids her age
haven't gone to school long enough to speak English,
and she can't speak their language. Today we were
talking about trying new things, and I asked her if
she'd been scared when she moved to Korea (two months
ago). She said she was, and I asked her if she liked
Korea better now than before. "Yeah."

Then I made the mistake: "Have you made some friends
now, so that you feel better?"

"No. Not really." She said it with a brave face --
not quite slopping over with a child's optimism, but
at least something better than bald stoicism -- and I
shifted the conversation quickly, before she could
start getting more homesick than I'd probably already
thoughtlessly made her.

After class, the kids were lining up to go outside and
catch their busses, and she was at the back of the
line (where she usually goes), and I picked her up and
gave her a hug. I said, "Jina, I hope you find lots
of friends in Korea."

Then she said "Me too," into my shoulder with a
forlorn voice that no child her age should ever need
to use -- unless it's about something silly like
"Hyongeun got pistachio nut ice cream and I wanted it
too, but I'd already asked for mango-strawberry." --
and with those two words she carried my heart away and
hid it somewhere in the dimple on her left cheek.

I told her I'd be her friend, and she said she wanted
to come to my house, and hugged me a hug with a little
too much loneliness and need in it.

Fortunately, her Korean teacher then shouted, "Jina,
let's go!" before I could burst into tears right then
and there, but all that's to say I've fallen in love
-- or at least fallen in compassion -- with another of
my kids, and I hope she'll be OK, and I wish there was
something I could do to help her adjust, but I can't
quite clone myself into a six year old who can play
with her, and I don't know if a twenty-four-year-old
goofball buddy is really what she needs to feel like
she can make it here in Korea. Seeing Jina go through
that rips the band-aid off my own homesick sores, but
I can handle myself; I'm holding out. I know where to
go to find Anglophones my age. I just hope she'll be
happy here.

In other news, I had a phone call from my mom and dad
in which mom said something along these lines, in her
most allusive voice:

"So, Rob, have you talked to Dan . . . lately?"
"Not really. I got an e-mail a few weeks ago."
"Hmm. You. . . might want to . . . call him. He may
have some (significantly said,) NEWS for you."

of course, by now there was no doubt he had news, nor
what its nature was, given the status of his courtship
with his girlfriend Caryn, so by the time I talked to
Dan the next Saturday, I'd guessed that. . . he's
ENGAGED (sorry to those of you for whom this is a
repeat.) He asked me to be his best man last
Saturday, and I said "of course." The date's July 2.

So I've decided I'm going to try and extend my
contract with this school until the end of May, so
that I can spend June in Red Deer with my main man,
and then probably spend part of the summer travelling
before buckling down on the rest of my life, or at
least the next step.

In health news, please continue to pray for my
grandfather, and pray also for my mother; if you
e-mail me, I'll tell you more details, but enough of
you who receive this update already know about them
that I'm not going to get into detail on it. But pray
-- if you're into that kind of thing.

Student quotes: "You are the funnily funnily funnily
Rob teacher." (from Daniel).

"I really liked going to the mountain. I have lots of
good mammaries."

"I want a dog. I'll buy a puddle."

"Why do you tell crazy stories like that, teacher?"
"I'm just playing with you."
"We're not toys, teacher."

"Three stickers if you can name the four Beatles."
"John."
"Good. There were three more. Any guesses?"
"Matthew, Mark, Luke?"

Penmanship error: My house is cozy became "My house is
oozy"

Remembered the spelling, forgot the meaning: "My
summer vacation is going to be superficial!"

A girl on the subway looks at the portrait of WB Yeats
on the cover of my Yeats poetry collection and says
"Harry Potter!"

A three year old marched up to my table at dinner the
other night (his parents had put him up to it). I
expected him to do something weird or hilarious like
take some food or start crying, or jump up and down
and run back and bury his face in his mom's neck.
Instead, calmly and properly as an ambassador, he
stuck out his right hand and waited for me to shake
it. In my wonderment, I could barely finish my meal.

Anyway, there are some of the bones, and some of the
trimmings, of my time. It's been sticky hot and work
has started to get tiring (especially the afternoon
business), but it just cooled down this week finally,
and I'm doing OK.

I need to wrap this up now, before the letter reaches
critical mass and implodes, so go in peace and
happiness, and bless you all.

Love always:
Rob Ouwehand

May 2004.

My jacket smells like saltwater.

A long long time ago (for those who don't already know), my ancestors (on my father's side) were fishermen; many Ouwehand fishermen still live in the village Katwijk (the home of the original Ouwehand) even now. My uncle owns a boat, my dad wishes he did, and I'm never happier than standing on the deck of a boat, or piddling around a lake somewhere in a canoe. Lacking these, even wet grass on bare feet at least pleases me a little.

But last weekend I went on a ferry tour of Baekdo a remote island off the southern coast of Korea, with a group of forty other foreigners. This was WONDERFUL. It was a quiet town of 1200, suddenly filled up with a bunch of foreigners eager to have fun and excited to be on vacation (it was a three day weekend). So our excitement was reflected by their excitement and curiosity at having us, and basically, we spent the whole weekend feeling like celebrities or something. Kids followed me to the pier where I went fishing, asking me questions I couldn't understand, much less answer (though I made funny faces, and that seemed to suit them fine). I think they thought my name was Canada, until my friend called me crazy for making funny faces, and then they thought my name was crazy.

(No jokes about that later, please.)

So along with the language guesswork and funny communication attempts by some cute kids (who may have never seen a foreigner before; whitey doesn't often visit Gumundo or Baekdo), I had a gorgeous weekend in the fresh air. Korea's ocean is really beautiful -- the cold early mornings and ocean air make you feel alive, and the islands off the south of Korea, because of whatever geological quirk formed them, are often smoothed, as if they are very old, but very tall -- like the long canine teeth of a dog sticking up out of the ocean. They would be visitable, but only if you could put rock climbing gear on over your scuba gear. And there at the top are those grey-green scrub plants that sprout in such grey and green places, and the water sprays up on your face, causing what I can only call the ocean squint -- I don't think I squint quite the same way in any other place -- and later in the evening I lick the corner of my lip and taste salt from the seawater that dried onto my face.

I love the sea. If I liked seafood as much as I love the sea, I might end up in some port village, or as a fisherman myself. (Unfortunately, I don't have the patience for picking out bones.)

During the weekend, I met a girl who is, as JD Salinger once said, "A verbal stunt pilot" -- the kind of person who rewrites song lyrics to fit inside jokes. Her name was Edisa, and she was the first black woman I've spent time with in Korea (I've seen some, but there aren't many here; Korea remains surprisingly racist toward Africans and their descendants. Korea's a very appearance-oriented culture, and employers ask you to include a photo with your application is so they can avoid people who are ugly, overweight, overage, or coloured "wrong" (too dark). Sometimes schools won't even hire people with Asian background because it's not as "other" as having white teachers.) She was good with a comeback, and willing to let me talk out my random thoughts (of which I've been having many). Together, we came up with the dumbest idea for a restaurant ever. Worse than "so I can say I have", a place that sells all those foods you'd only eat on a dare, like prairie oysters, haggis and blood pancakes. How about this (isn't this ghastly?) -- "Poachers" - a restaurant specializing in dishes made from endangered species. The slogan (of course) is "Good to the last one!"


But before I can really set into this story, we need a bit of cultural background.

The older folks in Korea are called Ajumma (mature woman) and Ajashi (mature man). Ajumma can apply to any Korean woman over 30, and any man over 20, depending on who's addressing him/her. By the mid-fifties, because they've "paid their dues," I guess, some behave a little less politely than most other Koreans, and care a little less about the general courtesies that are either the grease that keeps the wheels of society turning, or the B-S- that keeps people from acting out who they really are.

Ajumma, especially, is also a personality type, and the personality connotations are not too positive. Unlike older ladies (50 and up) in North America (pardon my generalizations here), ajumma is the one most likely to shove you as she dives for a seat on the subway; she's the one most likely to be rude to you in a restaurant, to touch your white skin, poke your curly hair, grab your love handles (out of sheer curiousity -- look at how big those cheese-smelling foreigners get!), comment that you're writing in your journal with the wrong hand (I'm a lefty), and you'll sometimes do what they say, however unnecessary, just so they'll leave you alone. This is the impression many foreigners get of Korean ajummas. Some of us carry a downright bitterness and resentment of the mature set.

Here's a video showing how the mature set is often viewed here in Korea. Pay attention to the music style, and the over-the-top rudeness of the older folks.



Ajashis have a similar reputation; they, and young men, can be the harshest judges toward foreigners. The most negative image of an ajushi is a drunken, middle-aged man swearing at the top of his lungs, possibly starting fights with his belligerent talk, hacking up loogies and spitting in the street, ogling girls, and maybe propositioning blonde westerners by asking them if they're Russian (blonde Russians are often recruited to work in the profitable prostitution industry here). Here's a reflection on that kind of ajashi, from someone who's writes about Korea much better than me: just to show I'm not just blindly generalizing or being unfair.

Yeah, this is the most negative stereotype, but (I've discovered) it becomes really easy to judge people when you can't communicate with them and, by communicating, prove such judgements wrong. Judging goes both ways, let's not forget; once a group of ajashi ruined my day (and most of my week) by arguing over who had to sit next to the big-nose (me) on the subway car; one ultimately chose the other end of the car, away from his friends, over sitting by the stinky honky. That hurt, so I can understand how easy it would be to dismiss ajashis in return.

Anyway, that's the background; sorry for so much explanation. Now the tour group was on a ferry, heading out to Baekdo, the scenic islands, and foreigners were scattered around the rear section of the ferry, so that a few ajumma and ajashi had to sit beside foreigners. One ajumma took it upon herself to propose a series of seat trades that would clump all the foreigners together in the middle section of the seats. (I also noticed that one of the LEAST desirable seats was next to the African-American woman I mentioned earlier;) I started to wonder whether this wasn't a racially motivated attempt at micro-segregation. Then, just as she was getting more emphatic (she put her hand on my arm and rocked me sideways, as if to roll me out of my seat), and I was getting quite annoyed, this music came on over the speakers. It was ajumma music; I can't even describe it to you except that if you took the sample music on an average three keyboards/synthesizers, played them at the same time as a karaoke song track, faster, to a disco beat, and then added shrill Korean vocals with echo effects, you might have something a little quieter. It haunts the foreigners; we just can't understand it, verbally, musically, OR culturally, but somehow the mature folks in Korea LOVE it.

Here's an (inexplicable) sample.



So that kind of music comes on, and suddenly, this same Ajumma who was starting to annoy most of us is in the aisle, DANCING! Not only that, she pulls her neighbour up to dance with her, and then, gets one of the foreigners up there with her, too! The rest of the ferry ride was one long dance party, with fifty and sixtysomething Korean men and women doing silly dances (point your fingers and shake your shoulders and knees kind of stuff) with a bunch of twenty and thirtysomething North American (and Irish) English teachers dancing along. Add into this the hilarity of the bad music and the fact we're boogieing with people our parents' or grandparents' ages, and the TERRIBLE dancing ('cause there's no other way to dance to music like that except badly), and mix in the excitement of the fact NOBODY in the room had EVER seen anything even remotely as odd and unexpected as white kids dancing with old Asians to terrible music on a scenic boat tour, and it was enough to make me smile for a week.

And wow, those ajumma are energetic! The lady who started it all hauled just about every single foreigner out of their seat for at least a little while. My friend took a lot of photos with her digital camera; I hope I can send a few along to you.

And the best part is this: now, next time a drunken ajashi sits next to me smelling of Korean alcohol and dried squid snacks, and brays about George Bush and growls, "Yankee go home", or an ajumma behind me in line pushes, even though I have nowhere to go and can't get HER on the bus any faster by pushing the people ahead of ME (happens), or butts ahead in line (ALL the time), instead of silently resenting them, I can smile, because hey, I've seen the other side of that coin, and it's pretty fun.

So it was a perspective I think I needed.

(ever notice how if you look at the cut on one five-year-old's hand, suddenly everyone has a scrape to show you? Or if you wake one up with a short tickle, suddenly you have seven sleeping kids? Kindergarten's so much fun. It's really fascinating dealing with kids that age.)

There's this funny quirk in speaking Korean to Koreans; when one gets into a taxi or in most other situations, one says a few Korean phrases (most often something like "how much is it?" "I'll have two, please, to go" or "take me to the Hongdai district, please" and then, the Korean will answer. Conversations with Koreans always involve a lot of context guessing, body-language reading and general "usually they say this next" experience, but after a foreigner shows that they speak a little Korean, Koreans always answer with one of two things:

"Do you speak Korean."
or
"Your Korean is very good."

Both phrases involve the phrase "hangug-mal" (literally, Korea speak), but it's difficult (other than by learning more of the language) to read which of the two phrases the Korean is saying, so one invariably guesses wrong, and the conversation either goes

"Do you speak Korean?"
"Thank you."

or

"Your Korean is very good."
"Only a very little bit."


Anyway, I'm enjoying my school, mostly; a few people are a little more curt and blunt than I'm used to dealing with (which requires more sensitivity and grace than I sometimes have to spare after telling a class to shush a hundred times in forty minutes.) I've been tired lately, so I think my students are getting to me more than they normally do. My patience reserves are low, as is my annoyance threshhold. I'll be OK once I kick this long-running, low-grade cold, and sleep some, I'm sure.

I had a student ask if, at the end of the month, if all the students in the class did all their homework, we could do something special -- I said "What kind of special thing?" "Go into the playroom" (Our school has play room equipment like in a MacDonalds for the preschool kids). "You can't do that," I say, "you're too big to play on that."

"Teacher, not to play on it -- just to break stuff." I howled. Absolutely howled.

Seen on the spelling section of a multiple choice test:

"Canada's national sport is _______"
A: ********* B: **********
C: ********* D: Hokey.

The preschool students also laugh hysterically every time they see me blink. I'm enjoying work, though I find myself staying late a little more often than I think I'd prefer. (though that's as much my choice as anyone else's; I didn't realize how long I was staying at school until I commented to my boss, who looked exhausted, "It's been a long day for you -- you've been at school almost since I got here this morning!")


Yesterday I went out with my friend Colleen (the one I met in the snowstorm of my last e-mail). She really surprised me by asking me what I was angling for in our friendship. After nearly choking on an apple slice, I took about a full minute to compose my thoughts (I realize how unfair such long silences are to my friends when they ask such loaded questions -- a sixty second pause allows people who ask me important questions just enough time to imagine I'm about to give the worst possible answer, but that's how I am, so deal with it. I like to choose my words on touchy topics.)

But fortunately what could have been a can of worms (had we had different ideas about the friendship) was instead a simple, "I enjoy being your friend and I'm very content to leave it at that."

Such topics, even when they are cleanly defused, are still risky, and feelings can be hurt accidentally by wording something wrong, or seeming too relieved (or not relieved enough) that the other isn't interested.


Take care, all.

Much love and ocean sprays on all your faces (hopefully the real thing, and not just the aftershave flavour). Thanks for reading this whole long thing; I hope it was worth the time for you, and worth the typing for me.

robouwehand