Liaison at the 포장마차 / bOtTLe caFé, Gwangju, Korea

Liaison at the 포장마차 (street food cart)

The man was short, his white cap matched his scuffed white track jacket, I think, though I didn’t get a good look at either. He was already done with one stick of 오댕 (processed fish cake) when I turned to look at the couple; his thin lips were chewing, smacking, stuffing the stuff past his teeth. The 오댕 stick was marked on the end with red paint, and it had flaked a bit on the tips of his fingers. He grabbed another stick and I stole a look at his companion. Her hair was dyed a shade of brown/red, the same shade I find my college freshmen favor, finally freed from 6 years of forced middle and high school dress code conformity. She was maybe 42, or perhaps 34, not any older than 45 and certainly not 29. Her shirt was unbuttoned one too many, not totally obvious but certainly adding to a general sort of atmosphere about her. Her hair stood out, mostly tucked behind ears, a few strands escaping at the temples; here in Korea, it stood out in much the same way a belly button ring would stand out on a mom-aged woman back in the States. Her glasses were framed with an ornate, spidery kind of wire that looked like it might frame the borders of the diary of a teenage vampire wannabe. She was the sort of person who you could tell was wearing a lot of makeup from say, 50 feet away, at a glance. The possibility of high boots disappeared under the sheen of gray business pants, and the frills of her white blouse contributed to the overall impression that she was just off work. She seemed simultaneously too well poised and too much sex for this man in the ratty white track jacket, loose khakis and blown out sneakers.

They spoke to each other in clips of sentences. I caught “one more?” as they reached into the bubbling broth for more fish on sticks, piling up spent sticks like kindling in front of them, fueling up for some ferocious activity or perhaps refueling after the same. I noticed the way they conjucated verbs - he spoke in 반말 (informally) and she in 존댓말 (respectfully). The woman at the cart blithely stirred the two vats of 떡볶이, and I munched on my 순대; we all ate around the 포장마차, brought together by the food there glistening, propped up on metal trays or laid out resplendent and magnificent, sugar glazed and spicy and marvelous, a cornucopia of Korean fast food. 닭꼬치 (chicken on a stick) sat lined up like matchsticks, and at their stick/feet sat hard boiled eggs, looking oddly and intensely fertile and glaringly unpeeled and white against the glazed brown of the chicken on their sticks. The man nudged his companion, he was ready to go and started walking, strutting and stretching his legs an impatient 10 feet from the truck; she looked back at him and asked “국물?” (broth?), and she ladled some of the 오댕국물 into a paper cup and he stuck his hand out and had at it, in the same way I imagine a hawk might approach a paper cup filled with broth, if gripping a paper cup was ever a possibility for a bird of prey. She handed the vendor a fiver and grabbed her change over the nubs and nodules of steaming food, and they clipped and scuffed their way down the street behind me.

As they left and I sighed and I took it all in, at all this food filling every possible surface of the transformed rear of this woman’s truck (it was indeed just an elaborately unfolded truck, blocking the end of a pedestrian street in Gwangju downtown), an end of a toilet paper roll serving as napkin/papertowel/whatever else, unfurled a little too much and blowing in the wind, the edge of chill in the late September air breathing a growing reminder of fall weather, and the street itself, this truck food cart in the middle of sidewalk and street with cars rumbling past, neon lights of cafes and banks and shops pulsing and situating the stroller or the street cart eater in the exact center of Korean society, at the epicenter and the keystone of it all, happening all around, as said eater munches on sugary/spicy fare in lieu of dinner. I had a little more broth in a paper cup, paid my 4,000 won (a little less than $4) and kept walking.

bOtTLe caFé, Gwangju, Korea

I was a little hesitant to go in, alone, but something about the gray painted steps and the Spanish music enticed me. The decision was made for me, thankfully, my feet dropped, one in front of the other, all the way up the steps. I nearly don’t remember the decision to just, enter. The music was loud upstairs in the restaurant, it was some sort of Spanish rhythm with instruments I can’t name but would like to. The lights were incandescent and you could tell – the light reminded me of an artist’s loft in a warehouse, or an Ikea, or a Home Depot with smooth painted concrete floors with snaking white cracks built right in, smooth and imperceptible to a finger’s touch (though I didn’t touch the floor, I’m guessing). The clientele was entirely, 100%, Korean girls in their 20s gesturing gently to each other and smiling.

I was greeted by half a dozen servers in white chef’s aprons, befuddled that I was alone but happy to see me. I indicated I wanted to sit at the front, on one of the two chairs conspiring with a couch around a coffeetable in front of a screen projecting some sort of movie featuring an Orthodox Jew shoveling his sidewalk. The sound was off (Spanish music had changed to something reminiscent of snake charmers and woven baskets).

I sat down in one of the chairs, which looked like it might be more comfortable on a porch somewhere tropical, and instantly felt like I was on safari, and knowing that this reaction was very misplaced, I continued to relentlessly believe it. The feeling was intensified by a very odd plant/tree – with a stick of a palm tree’s trunk and what looked like a tiny aloe vera cluster of fronds at the top, the palm-like trunk veering sharply to the right at the top, as if swaying to a windy day in a Dr. Seuss book.

Each and every table and chair in this café is different, and it's intentional. Curved back wooden chairs sneer across a white table at their straight backed metal counterparts. The center cushion of the couch opposite me is a different brown than the others. A leopard-ish print pillow sits against one side of the couch, waiting.

A menu arrives, and I order a glass of house red, and it comes in a kiddie swimming pool a couple of minutes later. I open my laptop to write something else, and then I started writing a sentence or two about this café, and then I couldn’t stop.

This place gives you an entire repurposed wine bottle full of water and a glass to start, and I had slurped ¾ of the way through mine before I even realized it. I guess I’d been thirsty.

P.S. They just gave me free nachos.

Dunkin' Donuts, Korean style

Carrot donuts, spinach donuts, glazed tofu, and broccoli. Boston, are you ready for all that??

An unexpected hike

Last week, I went on a run toward a spot on Google Maps where a road disappeared into the foothills of Mudeung Mountain. My plan: go for a quick hike after the run, and if I was too tired to run back to take a taxi.



Here's the very edge of the paved road, disappearing into meadows with burial mounds in the valley.



Since I was planning on running for only about an hour, I didn't think I'd need any water, and I had my wallet just in case. But there were no convenience stores out here, only farms. I almost turned back when I stumbled upon this 약수 (literally medicine water, basically fresh stream water) at a tiny temple, which was just a shack on the side of the road.



Close-up picture of the shrine outside the temple, the red ladle is what you use to drink the water, I just scooped it with my hands right out of the stone bowl. The mat is for your knees as you do the traditional 108 bows.



After drinking I walked up the dirt path you can see in the above pictures to find a hidden lake in the meadow with a bold "NO SWIMMING" sign. I was hot enough that I almost disobeyed, but I ran into some fishermen there so I decided not to. I ended up chatting with them for a little while after asking them how the day's catch was going (not well). One of the fisherman's daughters is a student at Gwangju University where I teach. Drank some beer and ate some snacks with them, and then, properly refreshed, continued on the path up to higher ground.



I could see on my GPS that if I walked for about 30 min or so and cleared the next ridge, I'd be at a bigger lake with another temple and a road back to civilization, so I decided to follow the mountain paths in that direction. As I reached the top of the ridge, caught a glimpse of Mudeung Mountain with some wild flowers.



The white spots in this picture are wild cherry blossom trees in the hillside.



As I came down the other side of the ridge I could see a large lake, dammed on one side. On the bottom left of the picture you can see a cliff, this was a stunning vantage point and a great view of Mudeung Mountain, and the valley below. Wonder why more people don't hike this way? Probably because of the "산입금지" (don't enter the mountain) sign posted near the dam in this valley. In my defense there wasn't a sign on the valley where I came in! ^^



As I hiked back toward the road in the second valley, came across this female Buddha statue at a small temple. Hanna looked at this picture and said 무섭다 - scary!! By this time I really needed another drink of water, but had to walk another 30 minutes on a lonely village road until I found - huzzah! - a tiny convenience store, and a main road where I could flag down a taxi. An hour's run turned into a 3 hour adventure, totally worth it.

MUD!

At 대천 (Daecheon) Beach in 보령 (Boryeong) in Korea, there's a whole lot of mud.

Today the copy machine sounded like a dying dragon. I half expected a curl of grey smoke to come out of the paper load tray.

Had an Office Space moment -- "PC load letter?? What the fuck does that mean?!" Of course for me it's the mysterious Korean words that light up in red, stopping my precious copies for some unknown reason. But I got it sorted out, and now the kids can fill in the blanks in the lyrics of MJ's "Beat It" and Weird Al's "Eat It". ;) Who says teaching English can't be fun ! :D

A flower from the flower festival whose name sounds like "song-sa-hwa" (I'm butchering it, I know. The inner petals curve up when the longer and thinner ones emerge, and the name evokes something in Korean meaning "never meeting", in a kind of lost lovers sort of way. 

The entrance to a "flower festival" in Mokpo with Becky's host family ... I think this picture pretty much my time here -- goofy antics with middle schoolers (Ka-ram and U-ram are the two kids on the steps, Becky's host brothers) ... amidst the beauty of ancient temples and Asian architecture. I think I forget that although they might seem exotic, to them it's just home. My trip to the mainland last weekend (had Friday off as well) took me to a Buddhist tea temple in the mountains ... I'll be writing a much longer entry about that one in the next few days. Just to whet your appetite -- I drank out of tea cups that were over ... three hundred years old! :D 

Becky-si came to visit! chillin on the beach. 

my runs take me past some beautiful views ... 

tangerine trees, right along the streets 

my little fuzzy buddy (AKA the floor pee-er and that annoying lil buddy you'll one minute be stealin your bread and the next be curled up in your lap) -- Jeong 

clouds and sunset during a minor typhoon on Jeju Island 

Had the hot version of Omija (the native Jeju mountain tea), and it tasted a lot different than the iced, I think mainly because the iced was 50% sugar. ;) Still sweeter than most teas that I've had, it was ... very distinctive, with a strange red color that separated out as it sat, like the stuff in miso soup. Not the best tea, and I didn't finish it. The tea-shop though, was Heaven. That was it's name! And it had all sorts of bits and bobs and arty things all over, a great ocean view, and plush couches for seats. Think I'll bring my laptop and do some writing there sometime.

My fellow teachers have been amazing the past few days. On Tuesday I went out for dinner and drinks with all of Daesin Middle School, and then a few teachers and I went ... BOWLING! They couldn't really speak much English, so we communicated with smiles and high fives. And man, are they good. Last night some of the English teachers in other middle schools in Seogwipo City took me out to dinner and tea. :D Every Thursday we have a discussion group where they practice English and talk about whatever subjects are of interest. We were talking philosophy, teaching theory, and even relationships! My coteacher doesn't have a boyfriend so we were trying to set her up with someone at my school, the other guy in the group is getting married in January and still has that starry love-struck look in his eye, and one woman who looks about 25 revealed that she's 38 and has been "learning to tolerate" her husband! Korean culture is so surprising sometimes, they have a word, "hwan-tae-ki", which means the ten year marriage anniversary during which time you usually can't stand your spouse's idiosyncrisies. They have an expression, "I couldn't bear to see even the back of his head." Yikes ! Heheh, so much fun to learn about the way other cultures see the same problems we have. They seem a little more honest than we are sometimes.

Teaching has been going real well, I'm getting a better handle on things as time goes on. The kids are cute as hell, and class is something I look forward to each day. Next week's going to be fun, working in a lesson on the Simpsons and after school activities! Okay well gotta jet for school, hope everyone has a great weekend :) Love, Henry.

A stroke of brilliance -- found a Calvin and Hobbes comic online and deleted the dialogue, and had the students fill it in with the introductions and greeting words and the words they know. One class had Calvin saying how crazy Suzie was, and one class had him demanding that she give him birthday presents. I know if I were a student, that would be something I'd want to do. :)

Just wanted to let you know that I just uploaded a boatload of pics. Enjoy! :)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/24563232@N00/

Well I'm sitting here in my "teacher's office" -- yes, I have an office! Have I said that before? ;) It's the second day of school and I'm eager to get started. This week I've been talking about greetings and introductions, having the students practice introducing themselves, and then passing out some questions for them to ask me so that I can get a conversation flowing, and so that they can get to know me. It's been going pretty well, it was tough in the beginning to get the class to pay attention, but by the fourth class I was doing a lot better. It's surprising how much you can learn so quickly, even in one day. Psyched ot get this day started ! :)

Americans get a kind of celebrity welcome here, and I've had people shouting "Hi, my name is" from all the way across the playground. The girls sometimes scream and run away, or scream with joy and want to take my picture. Haha. The kids are pretty chill, and some of them come into the English room to watch DVDs during lunch time ... got to watch bits of School of Rock and Spiderman yesterday. It's gonna be a good year. :)

Hey everyone. :)

So yesterday I went into work with my host mother, who works at the International Convention Center here, which is one of the most massive and elaborate buildings I have ever seen. She is the head pasty chef, and I got to play around with dough, weigh dough, cut 1000 bananas off of their stalks, mold dough, stuff dough with cream, fling dough at the other workers (heheh) and putting dough in the oven. I know that if this whole English teacher thing doesn't work out, I've got a baker's job all set up.

My favorite part (and you other ETAs will appreciate this) is when I got to stand out in the serving line during lunch and dinner. During lunch I was giving out supa (watermelon) and I was only supposed to give two pieces, but of course you'd get the old ladies who weren't satisfied with their watermelon and pointed out the one they wanted, or just reached their grubby little crinkled hands into the bucket and served themselves. Then you'd get the ones who'd come up with these big pleading eyes and and ask for three pieces instead, or like 15 pieces for their entire table. I was under strict orders to give only two pieces, but of course they didn't listen. They'd come in packs to intimidate me, the foreigner with next to no Korean skills mysteriously wearing a chef's hat. (Yeah, I got the whole thing - big hat, shirt and apron. Stylin. Pictures soon to come in the Flickr account (link to the right). But yeah, it was even worse with the bananas. I got really good at saying andeyo!! (stop it) and han-man (only one!) but of course they'd come with their toothy grins anyhow. We used to pester the ajjimas (Korean name for aunt, also implying a married woman over 35-40 or so) who worked at our dining hall in Orientation for more watermelon or spicy chicken or whatever (the best stuff was always guarded and dished out in portions). We'd make up these elaborate distract-and-grab plots. Now I know how they feel. ;) But really, it was a lot of fun ... and since they didn't understand English I could play around all I wanted.

AJJIMA: "Oh [five] Supa Chuseyo!" (this is her like third time to the watermelon patch)
ME: "Ohhhhoo! look at you! Back for more. Andeyo! You've had your fill."
AJJIMA: [unintelligible Korean gibberish}
ME: "Well, it's no use, you're just going to grab them anyway. Okay, I give up. It's fruit, it's good for you, eat up my friend."
AJJIMA: [toothy grin]

a word on tea: the convention center didn't serve any, but my host mother made some while we were doing food prep in the morning. score. i'm now officially a major iced tea fan.

My host brother Kyeong-Hwan with Jeong on his head. :) 

Oh! Forgot to mention ... drank Black Omija tea the other day in the International Convention Center here in Seogwipo, it's grown on Mt. Halla in Jeju and is unique to the island. Hooray for rare teas! It was almost as fruity as juice, and since it was iced tea the perfect end to a hot day. Yesterday I hung out with my host brother and Jun Hyeok, one of the middle schoolers I taught in the Camp Fulbright classes a few weeks ago and who lives a couple apartments over. Good kids. :) In the evening we went to the World Cup Stadium down the street (they hosted the soccer world cup in 2002) which has become sort of a town square for this side of Seogwipo. Tons of families were there rollerblading, running around, playing soccer etc. My host dad and I played some badminton and we had a few volleys maybe in the 40s or 50s before we dropped it ... and I found out that my host mom is a mean hacky sack player, worlds better than I could ever be! After that, ended up sleeping ten hours last night and I definitely needed it. Today I'll be going to visit Yakcheonsa, a Buddhist temple right outside Seogwipo and apparently the largest in Asia! :)

I gotta make this one brief, I'm battling my host brother Kyeong-Hwan in Quake 3 (he loves the railgun) ... but I had the most amazing day. Woke up at 6:45 because I didn't know if I should bid the family farewell in the morning ... turns out that they usually don't make breakfast but they made one especially for me this morning - sausage, bacon, eggs sunny side up, homemade apple turnovers and rolls, and fruit. The food here is to die for. Played with the dogs and games with Kyeong-Hwan in the morning, and then left for the school with my coteacher Kim Soo-Hee. Turns out the vice principal is a jolly fellow fond of singing random songs whenever he likes (my kinda guy), majored in English so he speaks pretty well, and a lot of fun to be around. We went out for lunch at this place that served a sort of bibimbap (rice and veggies and eggs mixed together) only with squid tentacles and some clams ... it's a lot better than it sounds guys. You learn to love the tentacles. Sat by the beach and enjoyed the view until a storm rolled in ... best wind ever on a humid day. Got to watch a 2 inch spider sense the weather change and actually roll up her web in front of us, it was fascinating. We all spoke enough English to laugh and make jokes which was very nice. Got to see my school and meet hundreds of people whose names I'll hopelessly never remember ... for the first week. I've gotta get them eventually though! ;) Saw the "English Zone" of the school which is wallpapered in really cool notable quotes in English - Emerson, Einstein, even Cicero ... and really random adages like "Finder's Keepers" which was posted above a urinal in the bathroom. Don't want to guess on that one. I have my own office ... !! Okay well, a desk and one half of a room, but hey ... my own office :D Went out and got a bank account, looked around at cell phones and figured out they were a little too expensive, and it looks like my host family is going to give me one of their old ones. They love technology here, I'm typing on a maybe 24 inch flat screen computer, and they have a wall-mounted flatscreen in the living room which is ungodly huge. The lap of luxury. ;)

I was about to fall asleep in mid-afternoon in Kim Soo-Hee's car when she told me that my host mother wanted to visit her at work. She works as a cook in an International Convention Center next to the World Cup Stadium. It's a ginormous building with amazing views, they host all sorts of international conferences all year. I thought I might be going to see her kitchen and maybe have a bite to eat, but when we meet her she motions us around this cavernous maze into a side door of ... a Chinese tumbling show ! Did you guys see Ocean's 11 with the little Chinese man and the two-pole jumping act? Well picture that times a hundred. These kids were maybe 10-15 years old jumping all over each other, juggling beach balls upside down, swinging and tossing each other from swings 25 feet in the air, and man. Wow. The day got better and better. :) Did of course end up meeting her ajjima work buddies in the cafeteria, eating some good kimchi and rice and noodles and soup, and then sitting up in the ocean view lounge that had a 270 degree view of the best beach in Korea.

:D

Well my host mother just brought me some keom-cha (lemon green tea) and some cookies, so I'm going to go sit outside in the living room. Goodnight all. :)

Homestay Day 1
Cups of green tea (nok-cha): 3-4 (they already know i love tea!)

Oh man there's so much to talk about. Got to know my coteacher really well on the way here, and we just made our flight by like 4 minutes. ;) She is easy to talk to but I think doesn't get the same humor so sometimes the subtleties of the conversation are lost. Unfortunately I don't know if she's going to be a good activity partner, she doesn't like being outside and doesn't even know how to swim ! But she does like to go to noraebang. :D Her favorite thing to say about me is "You like .... everything!" I shocked her when I said I didn't like coffee. ;) Today I'm going to my school, meeting my vice principal and having lunch, and then going to set up a bank account and get a cell phone. What a day !

My host parents are both very sweet and have made me feel welcome. The first thing they said was, "do you like dogs?" --- :) :) They have two of them, um-sheh (sp?) and jeong, both sort of pug-like mutts that are absolutely adorable. They climb all over everyone and love to bite and play and yip like the little lapdogs they are. They are so loved by the family, the father kisses them all the time. My host father likes to take photographs, watch sports and play badminton ... there's a World Cup stadium right around the corner from the house (I can see it from the balcony) and he and his friends play there every night apparently, I asked him if I could come play too. My host mother works as a cook at a nearby convention center and made the most delicious meal last night ... bulgogi, noodles, kimchi, pancakes, the works. Oh my god, amazing.

My host sister is off in Malaysia and Hong Kong right now as part of a championship English speaking contest. Looks like I'll have an interpreter when she gets back next week! My host father is a taxi driver and speaks a little English, and my host brother and I have been bonding for the last hour or so this morning over video games, and I've gotten him to talk a little too. He says things like "good gun" and "one more kill!" I can already tell we're gonna be buddies. ;) He showed me this cool first person shooter game called Gunz Duel where you get guns and swords, and right now he's playing Quake 3 in my room. Okay well, gotta go put on my first day of school outfit ... let's see if I remember how to tie a tie ... ;)