The Aftermath

I feel guilty (a little) for having neglected my blogging. Honestly, the last 2 weeks in Korea were jam-packed with grading, travel, injury, and preparations to come home. I will clarify...

The weekend that students went to the Boreong Mud Festival, I decided to stay on my own in Seoul. Best decision ever! Despite the pouring rain, I went to Jogyesa Temple on Saturday. I had a tour by a very kind man who was brave to speak so much in English (and with Buddhism, the concepts are sometimes difficult enough to express in your own language, much less a second one), and he was very patient with me. I had a chance to meditate in the great hall by myself for a precious little while. I wanted to return to the temple the following week, but it was the last week of the program and I was too busy with grading and speech-writing to return.

The following day, I went to the sauna by myself, and as I expected, wondered why in hell I'd waiting nearly 3 weeks to go! It was marvelous - soaking in hot spring-fed baths, scrubbing all the dead skin off (you would be amazed/disgusted by how much dead skin comes off!) and then more soaking and lounging in the steam room and actual sauna room. Glorious!

Spending the time alone was very good for me, but I also got to have dinner with one of the student volunteers, and enjoyed the time we had to just sit and be relaxed. So much of the time in Seoul was running to and fro, with large crowds of students, and having a lot of fuss made about most things. This weekend was the quiet before the storm...

The program ended on July 23 with a graduation ceremony in which I gave a speech to the students (I was very honored to have been asked). Leading up to that was a crazy week of reading and grading student work, the students falling asleep in class due to lack of sleep, and my attempts (eventually successful) to get my plans together for a trip to Ulsan, the city I once worked in.

I was very sad to see the end of the program, but by now I've taught enough of these summer programs to be slightly inured to the depression that can easily set in after an intense schedule that forges close friendships. Everyone was exhausted by the end, but thrilled with our efforts and the experiences of our four weeks together. I felt very bad, however, for one group of students whose film was not screened due to technical difficulties. My heart ached for them - I've experienced that myself, and I know how heartbreaking and disappointing it is.

My time in Ulsan began with me spraining my ankle while getting into a taxi (only I could manage that, I'm sure). The injury has not been totally debilitating, however, and with inexpensive acupuncture easy to come by in Korea, the healing process was sped up. I enjoyed seeing my former home and some of my students from years ago - still working on their English language skills and still with the most wonderful sense of humor. They were very grateful that I remember them and that I took the time to visit. I promised them we'd always be like family, which is definitely true. I spent a day at a creek with my former director and her family, gingerly stepping on the rocks and dunking my feet in the cool water. I also spent a lovely day at the beach with my former room mate. Got a little sun and enjoyed the waves. My friend and I did some shopping together - she made sure I was able to get the things I wanted to bring home as gifts.

After returning to Seoul, I had to pack all my stuff, say good bye to dear friends, and spend one last morning at the sauna (spring-fed bath house). All of a sudden it was time to leave my little apartment, and it seemed as if 5 weeks had flown by in the space of days. Off to Incheon Airport, then, last bits of duty-free shopping, and it was time to board. The flight was uneventful, and to my great surprise, went by quicker than the flight over.

Now I'm still in the clutches of jet-lag, but each day is getting a little clearer. I spent the first 48 hours in a fog (so much so that I double-paid for my first meal back in the States - a wasted $25 that the waiter apparently felt was his %100 tip). I've been sleeping a lot in the late afternoons, and waking up at 3:00 a.m. covered in sweat, disoriented and not at all sure what time it is or where I am. This is my least favorite thing about traveling to Asia - the return jet lag. Ah well, it'll pass in a couple more days.

Now I have to sort out my memories, photos, and things to do this week. Slowly get back into life as it normally is, but not without some profound if not entirely obvious changes... more on that back at Fred In The Can.

I'll be posting more photos here, however, so keep checking for those. There are tons more photos - going through them is a chore, but one that is worth the effort.

And so, from my couch in Upstate New York... it's great to be home, but I do miss my Korea.

becoming lush

This morning the buzzing whine of cicadas seeped through the closed windows. I opened the one closest to my bed and heard the sound that tells me it is summer.

Cicadas in the U.S. sound different from the ones here. I rather like the Asian breed of cicada - their buzzing sort of murmurs and pulses like a wave, rather than just droning and then dropping off like the ones back home. Either way, that sound is the mark of deep summer, where things are growing, working, spreading, seeping. Becoming lush.

I've been in Korea two weeks, now. Sort of a flash in the pan to the rest of the year, but very productive. I'm so happy to be here (now that the issue of money is no longer an issue), yet what I'm really looking forward to is spending a few days in the Ulsan area, where I lived back in '02-03. The countryside will be a relief, as will the smaller city that I know much better than Seoul. I hope to see all my old friends there, and enjoy a night of samgyapsal and soju. If all goes as hoped, I'll ride the bus from Seoul to Ulsan with my former director from the school I taught for. But even if that doesn't happen, I will enjoy my bus ride. After all, I'm making a film called "Korea Dreambus!" aren't I?

I've worked on the opening bits to the script for the film, and now I have to start playing with my footage, all B-roll. I've decided to focus now on the personal story, and leave the orientation video until I get home, because that should be relatively easy. I do have a couple more interviews I want to get before I leave that will take the place of the few that were unusable from three years ago.

Today is our day off in the middle of the week, though students certainly have plenty to do, and I have some things to accomplish as well. I'm hoping to make time later to visit a temple that isn't too far from here on the Metro. If I don't make it today, hopefully this weekend.

Friday the International Office has planned a "mid-term party" for everyone. They've rented out a bar and there will be food and drink available for students and faculty. Then Saturday they have some other thing planned - a performance by Nanta, sort of a Korean "STOMP" but with cooking and food. I saw something like it when I was in grad school and it was really fun. And at some point hopefully this weekend I will also make my way to the "sauna" which includes hot spring-fed baths, sauna rooms, a swimming pool, and a place to lie around and relax. It's a Korean thing, but I do love it, being a water baby. I am lamenting the absence of swimming pools here, so the sauna will be my water fix for awhile.

Until next time...

Uphill

Getting to class remains a challenge (up trillions of steps in the noon-day heat and 90% humidity), but class itself is starting to gel. For one thing, the tech works and I could show my DVD clips today. It's a bit tough on some of the students who are taking class in the morning. Round about 2:00 I see their eyes glaze over. I know it's not their fault. I try to give them a break around 2:15 so they can get some coffee or water and stretch their legs. It's also that I can get some coffee and stretch my legs.

Speaking of legs, Korean women are damned skinny. I mean really - a Korean-American student I've befriended who lives in L.A. says even she thinks they are abnormally skinny. I guess Americans aren't the only ones obsessed with looking like models. These girls dress to the nines just to go shopping, with all their super-bling hair, purses, shoes, jewelry and makeup.

OH YES - just now I heard some guy hock a lugey outside my window. Yessss...and as one of my students pointed out the other day, you don't always hear them spit it out.

Back to the Korean girls - yeah they like to look me up and down on the subway. I wish i could hear what they're thinking: "she's so fat...look at her ankles...those shoes are so five years ago...where's her bling?...I bet she's American." Don't get me wrong, I don't particularly care what they think of me, but it makes me feel better to know that I am actually eating, not starving myself. I seriously wonder if these girls eat.

Going out with my little gang in the evenings has been fun, though I took last night off. The students went to either a water park or an amusement park, and I stayed in. Slept a lot, took the bus on my own to the E-Mart where I bought a cheap desk lamp, a shirt, some suction-cup hooks, and a notebook. I chalked it up as a huge success.

Making the small things work are the greatest successes. Knowing how to go grocery shopping on your own, getting the tech to work in your classroom, figuring out how to put together a desk lamp with no directions and no screwdriver. These are the things that make life what it is in S. Korea.

I've also got some script written for my film - but I have yet to get the hard drive up and running. I will need some help with that, I suspect, based on my failed attempt before I left the States. One problem at a time, you know. Soon, though, very soon...

This weekend I am going to the sauna, and hopefully also to Bongeun-sa, an historic Buddhist temple in Seoul. I'll probably go by myself unless students want to go with me; most of them are going to a baseball game. I need some quiet meditation to ground me.

The only real problem I have at the moment is waiting for my airfare reimbursement until next week. First it was "this week," then Friday, now it's "next week." Meanwhile, I have bills to pay and my stash of Korean Won is dwindling at an alarming rate. I am not a big fan of how things have been organized here, but to some extent I know that is cultural, and to every extent, there's not a thing I can do about it, so I have to keep my wits about me and keep calm. There's a Korean word for that, but I can't transliterate very well. It's something like "chim chak ha geh itta." Yeah. That.

Photos coming soon!

Touch down

The Eagle has landed (again). I'm in Seoul, more or less in one piece, about to head to a discount department store with the students to pick up necessities, led by our fearless leader Chun.

I'm definitely jetlagged, definitely sleep deprived, and I left the U.S. with a cold, which has only hung on during transit. I'm hoping after a couple nights' rest it'll be gone. I don't want to start teaching on Monday with a cough.

It's great to be back, even in my present condition, and I'm deriving extra, vicarious thrill from the students' reactions to things so far. This being my third time in the country, I still have a period of adjustment, but I now realize how much I actually do "get" over here that a new-comer has yet to experience.

Will check in later with more detail once I'm back to normal (whatever that means).