End of an Era (of darkness)

I am still working on my Osaka summary giganta-post, and I have to get up early tomorrow to go to the immigration office in Korea, and fill out yet more paperwork in aid of completing my visa changes.

New advertising slogan : Red Tape Korea (replacing Dynamic Korea)

I have no idea how a government as bureaucratic and worshipful of red tape as South Korea's can survive on such a low tax rate. How does this country keep it together?? Mind you, I wonder the same thing about Canada, for different reasons.



My da' retired and his bash was this Friday. It was an important day for me as well as for him since a lot of the 'what' and 'why' of what I do is based on his frustration with work and the working world. Anwyay, I can't do better than to cut and paste my sister's description of the party and some appended back and forth comments between us. (hope this is Ok, sis?)

Hi half-moon bear (she really calls him that -ed) Although you weren't at the party, you were there. We displayed your photo in a prominent spot in the family room, and many a guest were asking about you. MoMo read your letter out loud, and we were all very touched. I might even say that dear old Dad was misty eyed...The party was fun, about 40 people showed up over the course of the evening. There was a keg of beer on the deck, and enough barbequed chicken legs to feed about 150 people. Because, of course, this was Dad's "Free Beer and Chicken Party" (after an old John Lee Hooker album). During the toasts and speeches, a few of Dad's old friends said some very nice words about him (!!) and told some great stories. I'll do my best to relay some of these to you

I realized that many of Dad's good old friends are his outdoor buddies. There's a neat bond that develops between people who camp, hike, paddle together. (birds of a feather risk hypothermia together -ed) One friend of his, Lance, made a wonderful toast. He scolded Dad for using old camping pots that should have been replaced long ago, but attributed it to Dad's Scottish thriftiness. In the same spirit of thrift he presented Dad with a set of pots--newer, but still well used--only if he could get the old pots in return. He also presented him with an old Peterborough beaver tail paddle, explaining that Dad has always envied his collection of paddling gear. Finally, he presented Dad with a pot containing a number of native plants that he had grown from seed. A number of other people told great Hiking Stories. It was fun.

Grampy made a lovely toast, telling a story about how, when growing up in Willowvale, Dad would come home from school for lunch and explain to Nana that he would likely skip out on the rest of the day and have a "nice little half holiday." Of course, Nana would shoo him back to school. Grampy closed the toast by wishing Dad the best as he has finally reached his true half-holiday.

Grandpa told the old "when I first met HMB sr." story. It had everyone in stitches. At the end of the evening almost everyone had gone home, but a few old friends stuck around and drank some scotch with Dad before finally calling it a night.

My reply:

The Free Beer and Chicken party is so perfect! I can remember the cover of that album in the living room of the old house. It sums up his sense of 'fun' , do you think?
HMB
ps. how did Grampy seem to you?

Her reply:
Well, in some ways Grampy is doing well, in that we weren't sure if he'd be healthy enough to come out to the party. Not only did he fly out, but hestayed up quite late that night and seemed to be having a good time. I think he must have put all of his energy into it, wanting to be a part of the fun.But overall, he's far weaker and thinner than I've ever seen him. His balance isn't so good, so he's using a cane. Nana is doing quite well, but you can tell that she's pretty worried about him.

An open message for Father Time : If I ever find out where you live I am personally going to beat your fucking head in with that cane.

Osaka? Yousaka!

this was written two days ago in Osaka. I couldn't read 'publish post' and 'save as draft' since it was in Japan-letters -ed

The Japanese keyboard is an amalgamation of every kabbalic symbol devised by cults both dark and light so if there are some stray keystrokes here and there - let:s say it gives the text some local flavour.

I had a bad feeling that something would go wrong today, can you guess what happened? Yes, I missed my flight during the visa run. I thought 3 hours lead time for a 10am monday flight would be enough, but apparently it is not, not by an hour. \Did you hear that internet people? If you are going to INcheon airport from Jangahn you need to allow at least 4 hours by taxi and limousine shuttle. 4 freaking hours\!!!

With my head already on the chopping block I had to lie like I:ve never lied before. I told black filthy lies, blamed it all on the airline and then redoubled my lies with twice the ferocity, using the best dad voice I could muster until finally the airline and hagwon were suspicious, but baffled enough to let me stay here overnight. \an extra day in Osaka might be interesting, but not a great career move - sound familiar?

First observation - the Japanese are short! I thought it was just Korean propoganda, but they really are a race of lissome cute little people. A lothlorien of the Orient, a wee folk who will never apologize for enslaving women for sex during wwII. No wonder their halfling enchantments hold men like Big Duke in thrall. \the hobbitsian character of every public space and high tech doodads like the hand dryer that :sucks: your hand dry makes it like..well, like Japan.

Speaking of wwII, I am reading *My Country* by Pierre Berton and it is superb! \every story is a nugget of Canadiana gold - crafted so as to take out all the boring parts, and leave the violent, gross, erotic, heart-warming, inspiring and just plain cool things that makes History so wondrous. Sort of like a Canadian History bathroom book, but better. After every chapter I wanted to call up Ken and Gavin, Mr. Canada, and Aaron and just talk. But that:s an itch I can:t scratch, melancholy sets in. These stories need to be shouted from the highest Regina bungalow, to the lowliest Dene hall so start spreading the word. Berton rocks.
Thanks to Bruce, my patron as usual, for leaving the book behind - you will not be left behind, my friend if you tell me where to find you.

as I head to Nankai to try to find a capsule hotel that charges less than 100$ a night I leave you with the words of Billy Bishop, my aforementioned link to wwII.

Three more pilots lost today. all good men. Oh, how I detest the huns. I loathe them with all my heart. they have done in so many of my best friends. I:ll make them pay, I swear.
-B. Bishop

I:ll never forget what they did to our boys
-gramma Wallace

Olympic Park

Here are some photos I took of Olympic park near Jamsil a few weeks ago. I took these while I was hanging out with "Jack", one of Bruce's acquaintances. Bruce described him as 'a bit of a nerd who now has the money to hang out with the cool guys'. I guess that's pretty accurate although I don't know about that last part. Jack was fun to hang out with - he just wants to talk about anything in English, and he bought me a couple of beers while we lounged around the park (crawling with children since it was the Children's Day holiday). One thing about Korea is you can and will see people drinking anywhere in public, and it's OK. At night you will see drunken folk from all walks of life, and their walk is usually wobbly and meandering. I guess they have to deal with the unrelenting pressure somehow.



Jack and I haven't hung out since then; it's my turn to call him. The problem is that Bruce had tons of free time to do whatever he wanted, including hanging out with someone for a few hours during the week. I don't really have the luxury, although I should probably use my time better.

Take this job and love it...or else!

who-do-you-work-with.html
not-another-one.html

I'm such a bitch. I really enjoy spying on this particular former co-worker because a) I'm a terrible voyeur, and b) because we had a bit of a falling out during the time that I worked with him.

Here's the whole story, or at least what I can remember (hopefully only the interesting parts).

Brett likes fashionable street clothes and vinl records. He likes to keep up on all the latest slang, and he uses it to admittedly hilarious effect. He is a bad speller, but he is a good teacher, I believe, since he knows how to keep his students in line and to entertain them at the same time. It doesn't take long for anyone who meets him to realize that Brett is cool.

Brett's job is to be COOL. It's what he does. So yes, he is good at it, but I have a natural disinclination for the relentlessly cool. I'm talking about those who are not willing to go out on a limb once in a while (show me the silly!), those who don't use some form of self-deprecatory humour, or at the least, those who can't laugh at themselves. Actually, that last part is only true if the individual in question persists in laughing at others, which Brett most certainly does. Dude even picks on his own girlfriend (a beautiful human being inside and out), relentlessly, in fact. And when the tables are turned I rarely heard him say something along the lines of 'ooh, got me there', or 'good one'. Brett's role is to poke fun at your expense and your job was to laugh with him about it. I'm not innocent when it comes to lampooning the culls, but this sort of thing has to be tit-for-tat, and after a while I stopped laughing. In the end I had to shut him down a couple of times with a humourless and stern response, and he stopped targeting me. It would have worked out better for our friendship, I'm sure, if I had been clever enough to riposte with a cleverer barb of my own, but what can I tell you; I have a terrible esprit d'escalier - just look in my profile. I also tend to organize my thoughts better in print than in person, which has been an egregious disadvantage at times...I digress.

The above links were the posts I was waiting for, the ones that describe his coworkers and the situation at work.
I'm a bit disappointed that there are no juicy descriptions of my personality, appearance or teaching performance. I would have expected something more about myself and Ally, especially after the way I moved out of her place. Think: screaming, yelling, profanities, two suitcases hastily packed while she bangs on the door that I locked through an ungraceful act of force. It's as close as I hope I ever get to domestic violence. After that I was positively the bad ex.

Yet, out of everyone, I got away unscathed. Is it because I am so adept at flying under the radar? Is he self-censoring out of fear of e-reprisals? I don't think he knows that I know the Savage corp. and its wicked ways. I would like to post some comments but daren't. I can't risk having this blog discovered by anyone from Y_____ hagwon lest I am blackballed, ousted or finked on. I can probably come out of the closet in six months since I won't be renewing with this outfit.

Grant from the other hagwon has agreed to take me on as his full-time foreigner when my contract ends. I'm counting the days, especially after my review today. I was basically told that I teach at the same level as a beginner, that I'm boring, my voice is too quiet and I don't use the board enough. That may all be true, (especially the voice part, and I'm working on it) and I do want to become a better teacher, but frankly, after giving this company so much of my free time, and gracefully dealing with so much inter-cultural, international bullshit, I'm choosing to stand unrepentant about my teaching performance. I may have come in late several times but I've never missed a day of work, or a single class, and that can't be said of some of my compatriots. I didn't receive any similar criticism at D____ campus; hellz, even Brett let me off easy. I ALSO got very good feedback from the adults that I taught at hagwon deux. Sorry Lynn, either fire me, or fuck right off.

The class in question - a problem class that was in fact, so bad that the previous teacher left the school after only two months, behaved very differently with a counsellor watching them. They became sullen and they clammed up. This took me by surprise, and I couldn't get any kind of a discussion or 'groove' going. I'm used to wasting time getting the class back on track, quelling the minor rebellions and squashing the deluge of irritating korean speakers, so my time management was thrown off as well. I had to pad the homework review and since I was getting nothing interesting from the reading I cut that part short. The school director was pretty harsh in her criticism, I felt, and I briefly considered just walking away. It would be easy to find a job with half the responsibilities and hours of unpaid time. That, however, would be giving up and I don't do that anymore!



Today's picture is from the 'Megabox' movie theatre in Coex mall, a vast warren of upscale shopping debauchery, a televised video game tournament hall (oh baby!) and other modern wonders that may be shown here in future installments. It is a movie display (the Koreans love their schlock horror - espcially in the summer) and you can see where the extra money from raised ticket prices is going. I gots to get me into the display design industry! I took this photo while I was entertaining my replacement at hagwon deux. Call him "Shaba Shaba". We went to go see the last Star Wars film, but it was hopelessly lined-up. Shaba seems like a decent chap, although weird in ways that I'm not familiar with. He ruthlessly negotiated the contract with Grant, awkward for me, but I guess you get what you ask for in this life. You go, my semi-semitic weiguk brother!

Food Safety Rangers

One of the more amusing programs on Korean non-cable TV is ' Food Safety Rangers'. A group of health inspectors are pursued by a cameraman who then records all the atrocities that occur in University kitchens as well as mom-and-pop galbi joints. What makes it particularly compelling is the background commentary, although I can't follow it at all. The actor providing the voice-over gets progressively more excited as the Rangers team busts violators and eventually, at the climax of a scene; let's say a grill with whole pieces of leftover pork on it; his yammering voice cracks in excitement in a pitch suitable for world cup soccer goals.

I don't really think about how safe it is to eat here, but I assume there must be dirty kitchens in Canada also. What we don't have is a group of dedicated televised culinary gumshoes who uncover the grime and mold and spoiled produce that passes muster in Wendy's or Albert's.

So I finally have internet.
I have so much to write but it's all jumbled up in a fuzzy chronology. I think I will unleash the torrent in easily digestible paragraphs, limiting myself to one topic and one mixed metaphor per post.



Today's picture is a typical scene of the skyline in Seoul. They just can't build fast enough. I need more cranes! MORE CRANES!!!