The top ten Blogoseyo Moments of 2009 - my personal favorite/significant Roboseyo moments of 2009
This is a companion piece to the other year-end retrospects I'm publishing this week, including:
The Top Ten Things Roboseyo Learned Personally This Year
The Top Ten K-Blog Stories of 2009
The Top Ten Expat Stories of 2009 (in the Korea Herald)
And to go with it: some of my favorite songs from 2009.
MGMT - Kids (note the zombie theme in the video)
1. Writing subtitles of supposed translations as the Korean swimming announcers' heads exploded over Park Tae-hwan's gold medal swim took a long time, but was eminently worth it. The post is mentioned more often in comments and e-mails than any other. Eat that, Dokdo is Ours!
2. On Ugly English Teachers and Racist Journalists
Choi Hui-seon wrote her four part hit-piece on English teachers just as I was leaving for my summer vacation, so instead of reporting with the freshness, this five-part series tried to pull together a few themes going around on discussion boards, while taking a look at the Expat/English teacher community as it stands today, and the gap between what we expect and what we get from Korea, and the gap between what Korea expects and what it gets from us.
3. Tony Hellmann, ATEK forming, and The Wagner Report
Blogging The Wagner Report was one of the most time-consuming single-posts of the year for me, but trying to shed some light on the content of Benjamin Wagner's complaint to the NHRCK, and trying to find a middle ground concerning the misunderstandings and bad blood stirred up between E and F series visas was hella stressful, but necessary. The formation of ATEK, and then AFEK, were both positive steps toward a more connected, and truly viable expat community in Korea. Unfortunately, Tony Hellmann - the subject of my first bold statement on the topic - found himself a target of some attacks, but hopefully everyone involved has learned a thing or two about what is and what isn't OK to do when you disagree with someone.
4. Travel Twofer: Morning Calm Garden and Kyoto
My two favorite travel destinations this year were Morning Calm Garden and Kyoto... Morning Calm Garden because sweet mercy, that place is beautiful, and the photos practically took themselves, and Kyoto because, though I didn't announce it on blogoseyo, it's where I proposed to Girlfriendoseyo. Plus, she totally said yes! And later that night, we totally French-kissed, too. Sweet! Other trips this year included Andong, Hanoi, Gyeongju, Canada (more Canada) along with day trips to Paju, Yangpyeong, Jaraseom, Yongin,
6. Freedom of Speech and what NOT to Joke about in Korea
I fired this post off after a really interesting discussion class. The way Korean freedom of speech laws work is way different than it is in North America. It demonstrates a very different view of public and private discourse: to oversimplify, let's say harmony ranks much higher on the cultural value list here than it does back in Canada, and possibly even higher than truth.
Radiohead: Four Minute Warning
7. Pro-Gamer's Tournament
Almost a year after actually taking the photos, I finally ran this write-up about Korea's competitive computer gameing tournament: online gaming is a fascinating cutural phenomenon in Korea, and worth a closer look.
8. The Korea Times Crashes and Burns, and other Media Hijinks (Yonhap, Kang Shin-who, Choi Yong-hee)
While Brian in Jeollanamdo and Popular Gusts had the most extensive (PG) and timely (Brian) coverage, Seeing Kang Shin-who cover English teachers was like watching a car crash in slow motion, and watching him run the Korea Times' credibility into the ground as he went was sad for one of Koreas's few English reporting sources. At this point, between the continuous embarrassment of the comment boards, the increasing number of simply asinine articles, refusals to print corrections, retractions or apologies, and expressions of straight defiance and contempt for its critics, rather than an attempt in good faith to improve, has me in a position now where I have to encourage readers to read the Korea Herald instead: at least they're actually trying to give expats a voice, rather than treating us with contempt. If you're going to get a subscription, I highly recommend the IHT/Joongang mashup: International Herald-Tribune (of the New York Times) and the Joongang Daily. Oh, yeah: let's not forget the Alien Graveyard (good lord I wish I'd bought a paper copy of that issue). It's pretty sad when a paper goes from being linked regularly at The Marmot's Hole, to being linked regularly by Dokdo Is Ours and Koreangov, in the space of a single year. (Yonhap News and Chosun Ilbo were other subjects of roboseyo media criticism)
9. Jon Huer and the Top Ten Favorite Things about Korea Survey
After a bunch more outrage over yet another Jon Huer essay that put words into foreigners' mouths, I challenged people to come up with their OWN top ten list of things they liked about Korea, and the results, published originally on The Hub of Sparkle and in The Korea Herald, were pretty fun to read. While Hub of Sparkle's down, and possibly out, the Korea Herald article is still up for reading.
10. Zombies Zombies Zombies!
Guilty pleasure of the year was zombie movies, and man they were fun. A few of my zombie posts... and also the one about the rise of the craptacle.
And, two bonus "Hurt to Omit" specials:
Only You can Save Roboseyo From Hating Korean Music! - loved the comments on this one. and this, the post/comment thread that inspired it.
and
How to get noticed in Kblogland
Service Bell, by Feist and Grizzly Bear
one expat's life in Korea
Thursday, January 07, 2010
2009: Year-End Blogoseyo Retrospective: Top K-Blog Stories
(some images taken from my flickr page)
Here's a look back at the year of K-Blogging:
(and of course, let's punctuate it with music that made me happy this year)
Band of Horses: The Funeral
Matt at The Korea Herald asked me to do a top ten expat stories of 2009, which you can read here. It got me thinking, first of all because lists are fun, and second of all, because I like to take a look back at things in December, so I'm going to give you 2009 in countdown form. I wrote a personal reflection list that you can read here... though I work hard on these personal reflection posts, they're usually the ones that get the fewest reads. Oh well. If the seven people I love the most are the only seven who read it, that's OK with me, really. All the rest is just icing:
The top ten K-Blog Stories of 2009 - the most significant, or talked-about topics on the 2009 K-blogosphere
1. The Korea Times - beginning with strife, and ending in a train-wreck. We should have seen it coming with Jon Huer's series of off-base, un-founded, or just generally ridiculous series of columns. Few commentators on Korea have stirred up so many forehead-smacks, or baffled, upset, or angry comment threads. Bloggers wondered why this guy, who seemed to be writing about an imaginary Korea, got a regular column, while their letters to the editor were going unprinted. In the late Summer, Huer called off his column series, apparently tired of all the negative feedback. Meanwhile, Kang Shin-who seemed to be trying to redefine journalism as a means to grind one's axes, and cause strive in the communities about which one wrote: his misquotes and distortions, which came so frequently, and reflected the same prejudices so uniformly as to make them seem intentional, rather than simply a case of carelessness, along with as his seeming hair-trigger readiness to give quotes to the webmaster of a hate-site - the Anti-English Spectrum - gave the impression that he had a hate-on for English teachers, and in response, it has become common knowledge among English teacher bloggers and NET blog-readers not to give interviews to a guy named Kang Shin-who, and generally to avoid the Korea Times altogether, as its reporting has mostly demonstrated contempt for the English teachers in its audience, and its only response to the criticism directed at it was not an apology, or a retraction: it has been a resounding, childish, "Are not, either!"
At the same time, The Korea Herald has moved into a clear lead as the preferred newspaper for K-bloggers looking to see their names in print, thanks in large part to Matt Lamers' excellent work as editor of the paper's Expat Living page.
2. ATEK and AFEK
For a few months this spring, discussion about ATEK heated up into a total free-for-all, with heated opinions on both sides. While the legitimacy of ATEK as an organization was much-discussed, the personal lives and characters of a few of the key players also got involved, in a way that moved off the comment boards and not only into real life, but into people's employment and legal situations. Update: AFEK, which started out as a snarky repudiation to ATEK, is developing into a community of F-series visa holders to be watched, and which could be capable of great things, and ATEK now has somewhere around one thousand members (as of January 2010.
3. Ben Wagner and Andrea Vandom
Ben Wagner has never been a member of ATEK, though one of ATEK's first public moves was putting its support behind Ben Wagner's complaint to the National Human Rights Commission of Korea. Prof. Wagner's argument that in-country HIV tests violated English teachers' human rights, and actually worked against the proper protection of Korean children, led to Andrea Vandom refusing to submit her health test results, and a constitutional challenge to the HIV test for English teachers. In June, Ban Ki-moon and other human rights heavyweights called Korea out for its stigma-inducing AIDS testing regulations, and on World Aids Day, 5 other migrant workers' groups also filed complaints to the NHRCK about HIV tests.
4. Benojit Hussain - general wisdom on the K-blogs was to walk away if somebody tried to get into it with you, but Bonojit bucked that advice, and went to the law, leading a Korean judge to award him Korea's first ever civil settlement for a racist attack -- something there isn't even a law for yet. It also caused Korea to take a look in the mirror, as regards racism here, and attracted international media attention, as well as prompting a big discussion on numerous blogs, and a wide variety of opinions on the topic.
5. Korea In the International Media - Barack Obama mentioned Korea's education system, Korea's single mothers were covered in the New York Times, Bonojit Hussain's case also made international headlines. Roh Moo-hyun's suicide and Kim Jong-il's succession, and arms dealing made the kind of worldwide headlines Korea doesn't like, but meanwhile Korean actors starred in a few hollywood movies, and a few Korean singers tried to expand the Korean Wave to America.
6. Jon Huer - some were annoyed at his articles, some were annoyed that The Korea Times would print them, many simply didn't recognize the Korea he described in the regular column Jon Huer wrote for the first half of the year. For whatever reason, and though someone who knew him once assured me he comes across a lot better in person, Jon Huer's articles often just seemed like he was making Korea up as he went along, and rubbed a lot of expats here the wrong way, especially when Mr. Huer applied his "blanket statement" style to expats. His columns ranged from positively ingratiating to harshly critical, even condescending and orientalist, but the one thing most of them shared was a tendency to generalize wildly, often in ways that made his readers wonder what country he was describing, and why he thought it was Korea, and where he got his views, and how long it had been since he'd updated them.
(English teachers with backpacks? Seriously? Happy new year: hope you have a good 1995, Mr. Huer.)
7. Swine Flu, Kimchi, and Festival Cancellations - there was the quarantine, there were rumblings of painting swine flu as a foreigners' disease, there were a number of highly entertaining "in Quarantine" blogs, and then, suddenly, finally, there was soap in the dispensers, and people covered their mouths when they coughed and stayed home from work if they felt sick. Well, not that last part, but still: sanitation awareness hit an all-time high this year, and that without a single mention of hazardous materials, downer cows, or spinal fluid. American beef quietly found its way onto Korean market shelves
8. Korean Stars go Global - Boa, Jeon Jihyun, WonderGirls, Rain's abs, and Lee Byung-hyun all tried to make their marks in America, with varying degrees of success. The Wondergirls were the first Korean band to chart on the Billboard top 100, Ninja Assassin got critically panned, but that was because of the Wachowski Brothers' failure to consider story an important part of filmmaking, Blood: The Last Vampire vanished like a dirty secret, without even a courtesy nod from the Kimcheerleaders who rallied behind D-Wars, and not that it's really saying a lot, but Lee Byung Hyun was possibly the best part of the summer craptacle G.I. Joe.. This was fodder for the Kimcheerleaders, of course, and the "Do you know Chee Eye Cho?" questions came fast and furious, while expats weighed the relative merits of the new phase of the "Korean Wave".
9. Rise of the K-Comedy Blogs - This was Dokdo Is Ours' first full year of operation, after starting in the middle of last year, and while comedy blogs (especially ones that frequently update) are hit or miss, some of the high points were memorable. Later in the year, Koreangov hit Twitter in a big way, and finally opened a K-comedy blog of its own, while a few other K-comedy blogs had a few kicks at the can, and faded, and other bloggers managed to crack the K-comedy quicklist simply because the topics were so funny: it may well be that next December, we'll be looking back at 2010 as the year of the rise of the K-boy dating blogs, as a handful of hilarious blogs about hooking up with Korean boys suddenly burst onto the scene this fall. Read more about Korean comedy blogs here.
10. The Marmot Hole Comment Board Implosion - Dongchim once called The Marmot Hole "Dave's For Ajosshis" and as the year wore on, the comment threads there got to be more personal, and less informative. The back-and-forth came to a head in December, when Robert closed comments entirely for a while; we should have seen this coming, with commenters like King Baeksu and Linkd leaving, with the return of Pawikirogi, and, worst of all, with the fact, as the year went on, fewer and fewer fresh voices and new commenters bothered to read, or add, to the comment discussions at what was once far and away the most lively and interesting comment board in the K-blogosphere. Nobody's going to eclipse The Marmot Hole's popularity any time soon, though for relevance, Brian in Jeollanamdo got to most stories sooner than the Marmites did in 2009. Now that moderated commenting is back on at The Marmot's Hole, who knows what the new year holds, but the challenge of maintaining a lively comment forum that doesn't get bogged down in personal attacks or axe grinding remains an elusive happy medium in Kblogland.
Stay tuned for The Top Ten Blogoseyo Moments of 2009... coming soon.
and here's a song called "Dragon's Lair" by Sunset Rubdown, a band starring Spencer Krug, a favorite indie artist of mine, from their album "Dragonslayer" (get it?)
anyway, here's the song. It's long, but I love how it builds.
Here's a look back at the year of K-Blogging:
(and of course, let's punctuate it with music that made me happy this year)
Band of Horses: The Funeral
Matt at The Korea Herald asked me to do a top ten expat stories of 2009, which you can read here. It got me thinking, first of all because lists are fun, and second of all, because I like to take a look back at things in December, so I'm going to give you 2009 in countdown form. I wrote a personal reflection list that you can read here... though I work hard on these personal reflection posts, they're usually the ones that get the fewest reads. Oh well. If the seven people I love the most are the only seven who read it, that's OK with me, really. All the rest is just icing:
The top ten K-Blog Stories of 2009 - the most significant, or talked-about topics on the 2009 K-blogosphere
1. The Korea Times - beginning with strife, and ending in a train-wreck. We should have seen it coming with Jon Huer's series of off-base, un-founded, or just generally ridiculous series of columns. Few commentators on Korea have stirred up so many forehead-smacks, or baffled, upset, or angry comment threads. Bloggers wondered why this guy, who seemed to be writing about an imaginary Korea, got a regular column, while their letters to the editor were going unprinted. In the late Summer, Huer called off his column series, apparently tired of all the negative feedback. Meanwhile, Kang Shin-who seemed to be trying to redefine journalism as a means to grind one's axes, and cause strive in the communities about which one wrote: his misquotes and distortions, which came so frequently, and reflected the same prejudices so uniformly as to make them seem intentional, rather than simply a case of carelessness, along with as his seeming hair-trigger readiness to give quotes to the webmaster of a hate-site - the Anti-English Spectrum - gave the impression that he had a hate-on for English teachers, and in response, it has become common knowledge among English teacher bloggers and NET blog-readers not to give interviews to a guy named Kang Shin-who, and generally to avoid the Korea Times altogether, as its reporting has mostly demonstrated contempt for the English teachers in its audience, and its only response to the criticism directed at it was not an apology, or a retraction: it has been a resounding, childish, "Are not, either!"
At the same time, The Korea Herald has moved into a clear lead as the preferred newspaper for K-bloggers looking to see their names in print, thanks in large part to Matt Lamers' excellent work as editor of the paper's Expat Living page.
2. ATEK and AFEKFor a few months this spring, discussion about ATEK heated up into a total free-for-all, with heated opinions on both sides. While the legitimacy of ATEK as an organization was much-discussed, the personal lives and characters of a few of the key players also got involved, in a way that moved off the comment boards and not only into real life, but into people's employment and legal situations. Update: AFEK, which started out as a snarky repudiation to ATEK, is developing into a community of F-series visa holders to be watched, and which could be capable of great things, and ATEK now has somewhere around one thousand members (as of January 2010.
3. Ben Wagner and Andrea Vandom
Ben Wagner has never been a member of ATEK, though one of ATEK's first public moves was putting its support behind Ben Wagner's complaint to the National Human Rights Commission of Korea. Prof. Wagner's argument that in-country HIV tests violated English teachers' human rights, and actually worked against the proper protection of Korean children, led to Andrea Vandom refusing to submit her health test results, and a constitutional challenge to the HIV test for English teachers. In June, Ban Ki-moon and other human rights heavyweights called Korea out for its stigma-inducing AIDS testing regulations, and on World Aids Day, 5 other migrant workers' groups also filed complaints to the NHRCK about HIV tests.
4. Benojit Hussain - general wisdom on the K-blogs was to walk away if somebody tried to get into it with you, but Bonojit bucked that advice, and went to the law, leading a Korean judge to award him Korea's first ever civil settlement for a racist attack -- something there isn't even a law for yet. It also caused Korea to take a look in the mirror, as regards racism here, and attracted international media attention, as well as prompting a big discussion on numerous blogs, and a wide variety of opinions on the topic.
5. Korea In the International Media - Barack Obama mentioned Korea's education system, Korea's single mothers were covered in the New York Times, Bonojit Hussain's case also made international headlines. Roh Moo-hyun's suicide and Kim Jong-il's succession, and arms dealing made the kind of worldwide headlines Korea doesn't like, but meanwhile Korean actors starred in a few hollywood movies, and a few Korean singers tried to expand the Korean Wave to America.
6. Jon Huer - some were annoyed at his articles, some were annoyed that The Korea Times would print them, many simply didn't recognize the Korea he described in the regular column Jon Huer wrote for the first half of the year. For whatever reason, and though someone who knew him once assured me he comes across a lot better in person, Jon Huer's articles often just seemed like he was making Korea up as he went along, and rubbed a lot of expats here the wrong way, especially when Mr. Huer applied his "blanket statement" style to expats. His columns ranged from positively ingratiating to harshly critical, even condescending and orientalist, but the one thing most of them shared was a tendency to generalize wildly, often in ways that made his readers wonder what country he was describing, and why he thought it was Korea, and where he got his views, and how long it had been since he'd updated them.
(English teachers with backpacks? Seriously? Happy new year: hope you have a good 1995, Mr. Huer.)7. Swine Flu, Kimchi, and Festival Cancellations - there was the quarantine, there were rumblings of painting swine flu as a foreigners' disease, there were a number of highly entertaining "in Quarantine" blogs, and then, suddenly, finally, there was soap in the dispensers, and people covered their mouths when they coughed and stayed home from work if they felt sick. Well, not that last part, but still: sanitation awareness hit an all-time high this year, and that without a single mention of hazardous materials, downer cows, or spinal fluid. American beef quietly found its way onto Korean market shelves
8. Korean Stars go Global - Boa, Jeon Jihyun, WonderGirls, Rain's abs, and Lee Byung-hyun all tried to make their marks in America, with varying degrees of success. The Wondergirls were the first Korean band to chart on the Billboard top 100, Ninja Assassin got critically panned, but that was because of the Wachowski Brothers' failure to consider story an important part of filmmaking, Blood: The Last Vampire vanished like a dirty secret, without even a courtesy nod from the Kimcheerleaders who rallied behind D-Wars, and not that it's really saying a lot, but Lee Byung Hyun was possibly the best part of the summer craptacle G.I. Joe.. This was fodder for the Kimcheerleaders, of course, and the "Do you know Chee Eye Cho?" questions came fast and furious, while expats weighed the relative merits of the new phase of the "Korean Wave".
9. Rise of the K-Comedy Blogs - This was Dokdo Is Ours' first full year of operation, after starting in the middle of last year, and while comedy blogs (especially ones that frequently update) are hit or miss, some of the high points were memorable. Later in the year, Koreangov hit Twitter in a big way, and finally opened a K-comedy blog of its own, while a few other K-comedy blogs had a few kicks at the can, and faded, and other bloggers managed to crack the K-comedy quicklist simply because the topics were so funny: it may well be that next December, we'll be looking back at 2010 as the year of the rise of the K-boy dating blogs, as a handful of hilarious blogs about hooking up with Korean boys suddenly burst onto the scene this fall. Read more about Korean comedy blogs here.10. The Marmot Hole Comment Board Implosion - Dongchim once called The Marmot Hole "Dave's For Ajosshis" and as the year wore on, the comment threads there got to be more personal, and less informative. The back-and-forth came to a head in December, when Robert closed comments entirely for a while; we should have seen this coming, with commenters like King Baeksu and Linkd leaving, with the return of Pawikirogi, and, worst of all, with the fact, as the year went on, fewer and fewer fresh voices and new commenters bothered to read, or add, to the comment discussions at what was once far and away the most lively and interesting comment board in the K-blogosphere. Nobody's going to eclipse The Marmot Hole's popularity any time soon, though for relevance, Brian in Jeollanamdo got to most stories sooner than the Marmites did in 2009. Now that moderated commenting is back on at The Marmot's Hole, who knows what the new year holds, but the challenge of maintaining a lively comment forum that doesn't get bogged down in personal attacks or axe grinding remains an elusive happy medium in Kblogland.
Stay tuned for The Top Ten Blogoseyo Moments of 2009... coming soon.
and here's a song called "Dragon's Lair" by Sunset Rubdown, a band starring Spencer Krug, a favorite indie artist of mine, from their album "Dragonslayer" (get it?)
anyway, here's the song. It's long, but I love how it builds.
2009: Year-End Retrospective. Personal - Advent
Blind Willie Johnson - Dark Was the Night
Frankly, dear readers, this was a tough year. Hella tough. Every year, around Christmas, I've written a personal retrospective on the year, and it's traditionally been among the writing I worked on the hardest, and was most proud of each year. This year, I'm going to give you a list of the things I learned, or realized and need to apply, because it was a really full year of stuff to be learned. Before I get into that, here's the big big, tippy-top high point of the year:
On Chuseok holiday, on a pretty little bridge in the loveliest neighborhood in Kyoto, Japan, Girlfriendoseyo and I got engaged. It was pretty sweet. I gave her a nifty ring and now we're working on setting dates and stuff. Anybody out there who can recommend a wedding planner who speaks both English and Korean?
But now, in list form, are the things I learned this year, in no particular order. Some of them have stories, but some of those stories pertain to people who read this blog, so this year's retrospective is going to be a little more circumspect than previous ones. Sometime this year I became circumspect. I'm still deciding how I feel about that.
1. Two things that comfort me are the sounds of ironing, and church. Church totally stomps ironing, though.
2. If I'm not working on improving myself, I'm in decline: human beings are too malleable to stay the same. If I'm not sure how I'm changing, in the absence of actual work on self-improvement, chances are I'm regressing in some area. That's something I learned in the absolute worst way this year. Nope. You won't be hearing the gritty details here. The first place to look to suss out the shape of that regression is where I spend my time. Without a goal, a guide, or a purpose for what I want to become, the combined stimuli of the ways I spend my time will decide for me. I learned this one when, for a while in the middle of the ATEK storm, which kept me crazy busy writing, moderating, and keeping in touch with various players, I assumed an important friendship would be around for me when I got back to it, and because of that neglect, it nearly wasn't.
3. Even when I think my friend is in the wrong, stand by that friend. The middle of a messy situation is not the time to let my friend know we're not on the same page; later, when it's just the two of us debriefing about the situation, is the time to have that conversation.
4. It doesn't take that much time a week working out, to feel a lot better.
5. It doesn't take that much money spent helping people, to feel a lot better. If you don't know yet about KIVA.ORG, then you need to find out, and help out. Seriously. Twenty-five bucks is nothing to most of us, but it can change a life.
6. Be generous with acquaintances but miserly with who I call friends, and who I trust. It helps to have a network of people and connections, but I discovered I need to be really sure about a person before calling them a friend, and be cognizant that usually adding a friend to the circle means having less time for the other friends already in the circle. I started learning this lesson back in 2008, and maybe it's a necessary step in becoming an online presence, but this is especially true of people I meet on the internet, and personalities that gravitate there. That's all I'm saying here.
7. It's worth my while to maintain ties with my family. Traveling back to Canada this summer was an eye-opener for me; it was so wonderful to see my family all together, that it caught me right off guard. Especially those of us who are a long time overseas, it's easy to go "out of sight, out of mind" but it's important not to. In fact, it was kind of shocking to go back and see everybody, like pulling off a bandaid and discovering that I'd missed these people way more than I admitted.
8. Remember my audience, not just in presentations, but in social situations. I hurt some of my friends with careless comments that, though funny, were disrespectful or hurtful to them. (Notice a theme? It's been a tough year friendsip-wise for me this year. I gotta learn to read people better.) This sensitivity is especially important when hanging out with people from a different culture, who might misread the wrong intentions my delivery.
9. Read books. After spending a long time mostly reading online articles and things, I finally started reading books again this fall. Books are great: they just get in deeper than blog posts and newspaper articles, and it's vital to look a little more rigorously at stuff from time to time.
10. I can't be friends through someone. The thing about friends of friends is that they're not my own friends yet, and it takes time and effort to turn those acquaintances into actual friendships. This is especially important in Korea, where people come and go, and the connection through which I knew someone might leave Korea before I have a chance to solidify that friendship, if I'm not on top of things. Gotta take ownership of that stuff.
Dear readers, I'm tired. This year has been exhausting for me, at different times, for different reasons, but sweet mercy, I want to lie in bed for two weeks... except that I'd probably feel worse at the end of that than I did at the beginning. I had a long talk with a friend, just this week, about seeking out quiet, and the way that without some time for introspection, and meditation, things can get hollow, and even worse, important things can be lost without noticing, if one doesn't stop to take stock.
But all that said... I got engaged this year! If I don't get at least twenty comments of congratulations on this post, I'm shutting down the blog forever.
(image source)
Frankly, dear readers, this was a tough year. Hella tough. Every year, around Christmas, I've written a personal retrospective on the year, and it's traditionally been among the writing I worked on the hardest, and was most proud of each year. This year, I'm going to give you a list of the things I learned, or realized and need to apply, because it was a really full year of stuff to be learned. Before I get into that, here's the big big, tippy-top high point of the year:
On Chuseok holiday, on a pretty little bridge in the loveliest neighborhood in Kyoto, Japan, Girlfriendoseyo and I got engaged. It was pretty sweet. I gave her a nifty ring and now we're working on setting dates and stuff. Anybody out there who can recommend a wedding planner who speaks both English and Korean?
But now, in list form, are the things I learned this year, in no particular order. Some of them have stories, but some of those stories pertain to people who read this blog, so this year's retrospective is going to be a little more circumspect than previous ones. Sometime this year I became circumspect. I'm still deciding how I feel about that.
1. Two things that comfort me are the sounds of ironing, and church. Church totally stomps ironing, though.
2. If I'm not working on improving myself, I'm in decline: human beings are too malleable to stay the same. If I'm not sure how I'm changing, in the absence of actual work on self-improvement, chances are I'm regressing in some area. That's something I learned in the absolute worst way this year. Nope. You won't be hearing the gritty details here. The first place to look to suss out the shape of that regression is where I spend my time. Without a goal, a guide, or a purpose for what I want to become, the combined stimuli of the ways I spend my time will decide for me. I learned this one when, for a while in the middle of the ATEK storm, which kept me crazy busy writing, moderating, and keeping in touch with various players, I assumed an important friendship would be around for me when I got back to it, and because of that neglect, it nearly wasn't.
3. Even when I think my friend is in the wrong, stand by that friend. The middle of a messy situation is not the time to let my friend know we're not on the same page; later, when it's just the two of us debriefing about the situation, is the time to have that conversation.
4. It doesn't take that much time a week working out, to feel a lot better.
5. It doesn't take that much money spent helping people, to feel a lot better. If you don't know yet about KIVA.ORG, then you need to find out, and help out. Seriously. Twenty-five bucks is nothing to most of us, but it can change a life.
6. Be generous with acquaintances but miserly with who I call friends, and who I trust. It helps to have a network of people and connections, but I discovered I need to be really sure about a person before calling them a friend, and be cognizant that usually adding a friend to the circle means having less time for the other friends already in the circle. I started learning this lesson back in 2008, and maybe it's a necessary step in becoming an online presence, but this is especially true of people I meet on the internet, and personalities that gravitate there. That's all I'm saying here.
7. It's worth my while to maintain ties with my family. Traveling back to Canada this summer was an eye-opener for me; it was so wonderful to see my family all together, that it caught me right off guard. Especially those of us who are a long time overseas, it's easy to go "out of sight, out of mind" but it's important not to. In fact, it was kind of shocking to go back and see everybody, like pulling off a bandaid and discovering that I'd missed these people way more than I admitted.
8. Remember my audience, not just in presentations, but in social situations. I hurt some of my friends with careless comments that, though funny, were disrespectful or hurtful to them. (Notice a theme? It's been a tough year friendsip-wise for me this year. I gotta learn to read people better.) This sensitivity is especially important when hanging out with people from a different culture, who might misread the wrong intentions my delivery.
9. Read books. After spending a long time mostly reading online articles and things, I finally started reading books again this fall. Books are great: they just get in deeper than blog posts and newspaper articles, and it's vital to look a little more rigorously at stuff from time to time.
10. I can't be friends through someone. The thing about friends of friends is that they're not my own friends yet, and it takes time and effort to turn those acquaintances into actual friendships. This is especially important in Korea, where people come and go, and the connection through which I knew someone might leave Korea before I have a chance to solidify that friendship, if I'm not on top of things. Gotta take ownership of that stuff.
Dear readers, I'm tired. This year has been exhausting for me, at different times, for different reasons, but sweet mercy, I want to lie in bed for two weeks... except that I'd probably feel worse at the end of that than I did at the beginning. I had a long talk with a friend, just this week, about seeking out quiet, and the way that without some time for introspection, and meditation, things can get hollow, and even worse, important things can be lost without noticing, if one doesn't stop to take stock.But all that said... I got engaged this year! If I don't get at least twenty comments of congratulations on this post, I'm shutting down the blog forever.
(image source)
Tuesday, January 05, 2010
2S2 Gains Momentum... Introducing 2S2 Wonju
My lovely friend Danielle has chosen to start up a 2S2 Pocket in Wonju, where she lives. Personally, I'm thrilled. You can read more about it at the 2S2 Community blog, or at Danielle's own blog. If you live in Wonju, or near it, or know someone who does, I strongly recommend showing up in support of strengthening community connections, and support.
Danielle, you rock!
Danielle, you rock!
Sweet! Fresh Snow~
You may have heard that we had a record-breaking snowfall early on Monday. It was sweet.
Modern comedy is too fast paced. Nobody appreciates a really delicious awkward pause anymore.
And because I love snow, I went out in the snow to take some pictures. Jongmyo Shrine and Changgyeonggung were my destinations, and it was great. I'm going to write this post quickly, so please pardon lack of organizational coherence, etc.. If it really bugs you, well, you got what you paid for, didn't you?
This was built in a snowpile in myeongdong.
Palace and grounds.
Jongmyo Shrine and Grounds
liked the snow pattern on the roof here
tracking across fresh snow is such a joy. I couldn't even tell you why.
liked this wonky tree. cool-shaped branches
everybody was out there with their cameras, taking pictures of everything.
The ajosshi playground in front of jongmyo shrine.
The fresh snow was deep.
and wet, later.
barely felt like Seoul.
All around myeongdong the snow had been scraped and broom-brushed (can you believe people use brooms to clear snow in Korea? And nobody has a proper snow shovel.
Chunggyecheon at night always makes me happy.
ze han river. taken from a subway car.
more on my travels this christmas break, and a look back on 2009, coming soon on Roboseyo
Modern comedy is too fast paced. Nobody appreciates a really delicious awkward pause anymore.
And because I love snow, I went out in the snow to take some pictures. Jongmyo Shrine and Changgyeonggung were my destinations, and it was great. I'm going to write this post quickly, so please pardon lack of organizational coherence, etc.. If it really bugs you, well, you got what you paid for, didn't you?
This was built in a snowpile in myeongdong.
Palace and grounds.
Jongmyo Shrine and Grounds
liked the snow pattern on the roof here
tracking across fresh snow is such a joy. I couldn't even tell you why.
liked this wonky tree. cool-shaped branches
everybody was out there with their cameras, taking pictures of everything.
The ajosshi playground in front of jongmyo shrine.
The fresh snow was deep.
and wet, later.
barely felt like Seoul.
All around myeongdong the snow had been scraped and broom-brushed (can you believe people use brooms to clear snow in Korea? And nobody has a proper snow shovel.
Chunggyecheon at night always makes me happy.
ze han river. taken from a subway car.
more on my travels this christmas break, and a look back on 2009, coming soon on Roboseyo
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