I like colored pens. I think I like them a little too much. Gels are glorious, ballpoints are beautiful, and felt-tips are freaking fantastic.
You think you can stop at one, you know, just for color coding your grading. Maybe one color just for mistakes with articles? Suddenly it's the second time in a week, and you find yourself powering through the late-night Timeworld crowds, hearing the soft click of the 0.3mm turquoise and the 0.25mm magenta burning a hole in your pocket. Finally you get home, sit down, get out the paraphernalia, and look for the right place to poke. There: a wrongly capitalized letter in the second sentence. You unleash the tide of fuchsia judgment and...
Ahhh.
It's a terrible affliction.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Summer Intensive in Every Way
The first way I mean that is the freaking ridiculous heat and humidity combo Daejeon has going on currently. I remember saying I had much more specific requirements for places that insist on including "South" in their monikers, and Korea has accepted my challenge with vengeance. Every day is in the mid-nineties with humidity in the same range. It's brutal. I am planning to move to Antarctica.
The second way I mean that is in the scheduling. Summer intensive period brings with it two more hour-long classes per day. It is a lot of children. They are bored. There is nothing more dangerous, Internet, than bored children. They threaten my sanity daily. On the bright side, I now get out of work at 9:40 p.m. instead of 10:40, so the night is younger when I get out, more like a sprightly 35 than wheezy 49. Of course, on Wednesdays, when I teach 7 classes, six of them in a row, I feel closer to the 49... Let's call it a draw.
The third way I mean that (originally, I was only going to write two, but today has changed my mind) is in annoyance. Avalon just told us that it will be fiscally unable to pay us our full salaries on payday. We will receive half when we are supposed to (the 5th) and the rest of it 10 days later. Supposedly. The exact words were, when pressed, "it's not a guarantee." Ah well, another day, another... 50¢
All that being the case, it is not a terrible thing to be me. Choir has started back up, which makes me feel like my life has resumed from the dull sluggery of vacation. It's always nice to be returning to a company, where you feel like you know people and have a social place to come home to. My job sometimes does not feel as real to me as the time I spend schlepping to and from Seoul. You know when you take a shower, and there's one part of you that you have to wash in order to feel clean? For me, it's my hair. I can't feel clean, even if I've taken a CDC-approved decon shower everywhere else, if my hair's not washed. In that same - totally irrational, I know - way, I don't feel like I'm really back into the swing of my life without choir.
It's nice to be back (even if "back" means torrents of sweat and hours of cursing the concept of adolescence).
The second way I mean that is in the scheduling. Summer intensive period brings with it two more hour-long classes per day. It is a lot of children. They are bored. There is nothing more dangerous, Internet, than bored children. They threaten my sanity daily. On the bright side, I now get out of work at 9:40 p.m. instead of 10:40, so the night is younger when I get out, more like a sprightly 35 than wheezy 49. Of course, on Wednesdays, when I teach 7 classes, six of them in a row, I feel closer to the 49... Let's call it a draw.
The third way I mean that (originally, I was only going to write two, but today has changed my mind) is in annoyance. Avalon just told us that it will be fiscally unable to pay us our full salaries on payday. We will receive half when we are supposed to (the 5th) and the rest of it 10 days later. Supposedly. The exact words were, when pressed, "it's not a guarantee." Ah well, another day, another... 50¢
All that being the case, it is not a terrible thing to be me. Choir has started back up, which makes me feel like my life has resumed from the dull sluggery of vacation. It's always nice to be returning to a company, where you feel like you know people and have a social place to come home to. My job sometimes does not feel as real to me as the time I spend schlepping to and from Seoul. You know when you take a shower, and there's one part of you that you have to wash in order to feel clean? For me, it's my hair. I can't feel clean, even if I've taken a CDC-approved decon shower everywhere else, if my hair's not washed. In that same - totally irrational, I know - way, I don't feel like I'm really back into the swing of my life without choir.
It's nice to be back (even if "back" means torrents of sweat and hours of cursing the concept of adolescence).
Virtual Room of Requirement
Internet, I require a micro-pig. You know, whenever you have a minute. I will take this model in whatever color you have available.
Saturday, July 17, 2010
A moment of linguistic alchemy
From one of my students, whose English name is (no kidding) Obama, to his friend John:
"Put a sock in your pie hole!"
"Put a sock in your pie hole!"
 |
| John is the one on the upper left with the enormous hair, Obama has the glasses. |
Sunday, July 4, 2010
Vacation Cetera
Performance Weekend
I. Pirates, catch me please!
Great consternation and woe.
Gravity wins. Ow.
Food
I. Mom doesn't eat meat
Spicy is not her fav'rite.
"Why'd she come?" asks G.
II. Mom likes daikon lots
I think it's disgusting stuff.
Where's the lasagna?
III. No meat, no spice Mom
Finds Korean food she likes:
Dulsut bibimbap!
IV. You want the fish grilled?
(Many looks of confusion)
Result: delicious.
V. Special white, house white
Why, mysterious difference?
More cc's: "special"
The Hotel
I. Mom thinks whispering-
Conspiratorially-
Elevators, sly.
II. Seventh floor sauna
Naked ladies everywhere
Shame I'm no straight man.
IIa. Twenty-five won scrub
Many layers of skin, then -
Oh, look how we glow!
Busan Market
I. Swimming eels in tubs
Kitschy Buddhas wave smugly.
Busan Market: grand.
II. Mung bean pancakes, hot.
Flowered shoes for just ten bucks.
Good day for shopping.
III. Brown dirt becomes art:
Pots, tiles, vases, plates and bowls.
Gracious potter smiles.
Busan in General
I. Busan transfer tune
Cheerfully whistles to say,
"Disembark, dingbat!"
II. Mom's lost her ticket
Exasperated, I sigh.
Hello, role reversal.
III. TV everywhere,
Not Mom's very favorite.
She desires silence.
IV (The World Cup):
Shouting Korea
They don't kid about the name.
Red Devils have won!
Weather
I. Blue sky? Hard to tell.
Raining for so very long,
Harder to believe.
From Mom, about her own adventures (I will try to get her own account of this day and post it later, which may help explain some of the following. Know that we both found this place on a map and in Mom's guidebook, but the locals had no freaking idea this entire temple thing was there. It made finding the place pretty difficult, though after the trek she underwent in order to see it, it becomes kind of clear why the locals don't know it):
I. (섬버사):
Locals are in awe!
Mom finds mythical temple
Should have worn Nikes.
II. So hot, so weary
A foreigner made welcome
English? No, just grace.
III. Mom's in a temple
I am vacationing right:
On the beach, with book.
IV. New York to Tokyo,
Man's harrowing tale: two days
Thirty thousand miles!
Unpleasant Surprise
I. Vacation ho! What?
Avalon was just kidding.
Early meeting, Wed.
II. Snores drive me from bed
I have a revelation:
Don't sleep in the tub.
Addenda
I. I have so much loot
I will look so very posh!
... so nice to see Mom.
(She came up with that last line, there).
I. Pirates, catch me please!
Great consternation and woe.
Gravity wins. Ow.
Food
I. Mom doesn't eat meat
Spicy is not her fav'rite.
"Why'd she come?" asks G.
II. Mom likes daikon lots
I think it's disgusting stuff.
Where's the lasagna?
III. No meat, no spice Mom
Finds Korean food she likes:
Dulsut bibimbap!
IV. You want the fish grilled?
(Many looks of confusion)
Result: delicious.
V. Special white, house white
Why, mysterious difference?
More cc's: "special"
The Hotel
I. Mom thinks whispering-
Conspiratorially-
Elevators, sly.
II. Seventh floor sauna
Naked ladies everywhere
Shame I'm no straight man.
IIa. Twenty-five won scrub
Many layers of skin, then -
Oh, look how we glow!
Busan Market
I. Swimming eels in tubs
Kitschy Buddhas wave smugly.
Busan Market: grand.
II. Mung bean pancakes, hot.
Flowered shoes for just ten bucks.
Good day for shopping.
III. Brown dirt becomes art:
Pots, tiles, vases, plates and bowls.
Gracious potter smiles.
Busan in General
I. Busan transfer tune
Cheerfully whistles to say,
"Disembark, dingbat!"
II. Mom's lost her ticket
Exasperated, I sigh.
Hello, role reversal.
III. TV everywhere,
Not Mom's very favorite.
She desires silence.
IV (The World Cup):
Shouting Korea
They don't kid about the name.
Red Devils have won!
Weather
I. Blue sky? Hard to tell.
Raining for so very long,
Harder to believe.
From Mom, about her own adventures (I will try to get her own account of this day and post it later, which may help explain some of the following. Know that we both found this place on a map and in Mom's guidebook, but the locals had no freaking idea this entire temple thing was there. It made finding the place pretty difficult, though after the trek she underwent in order to see it, it becomes kind of clear why the locals don't know it):
I. (섬버사):
Locals are in awe!
Mom finds mythical temple
Should have worn Nikes.
II. So hot, so weary
A foreigner made welcome
English? No, just grace.
III. Mom's in a temple
I am vacationing right:
On the beach, with book.
IV. New York to Tokyo,
Man's harrowing tale: two days
Thirty thousand miles!
Unpleasant Surprise
I. Vacation ho! What?
Avalon was just kidding.
Early meeting, Wed.
II. Snores drive me from bed
I have a revelation:
Don't sleep in the tub.
Addenda
I. I have so much loot
I will look so very posh!
... so nice to see Mom.
(She came up with that last line, there).
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Japan
I. Children "singing" high
Stretching what we call "music"
Can we muzzle them?
Oh, Japanese PA systems! Is there nowhere a choir of piping prepubescents does not belong? This was Mom's and my first impression as we landed in Fukuoka (Hakata) and caught our train to Nagasaki.
II. Hospital wants cash
Endoscope "to see deep throat"
We do not charge him.
My mother had a bad case of laryngitis (it turned out) so we had to go to a hospital in Nagasaki, where a very nice otolaryngologist (ENT doctor) met with us and examined her. His English was great, especially in comparison to pretty much everyone else we saw there, but he did say quite clearly that the endoscope was to see her "deep throat." It was the chief moment wherein our diplomatic negotiations were most threatened by our need to giggle like my students. (The alternative last line, actually very accurate and demonstrative of great generosity on his part with regards to uninsured foreigners and expensive tests, but hilarious in light of the phrase previously uttered was: He does not charge us).
III. Japan likes hard cash
ATM: "Invalid card"
Three cheers for Starbucks!
This was the most miserable part of our adventure. While my mother sat in the hospital waiting room, I told her (with the foolish confidence of one who places great faith in the Visa and Mastercard logos) that I would pop over to the Post Office (which is apparently where you get your strange foreign money in Japan) and get the cash to pay the hospital. I'd be back in a few minutes, I said. It would be no problem, I said. Oh, how I lied. Hours and three stops with minimal English and seven receipts later, I still had no yen.
I tried to call the hospital (I figured asking for the only person with my mom's obviously Western name wouldn't be that hard, but it was). The lady at the bank I was currently in helped me as much as she could, finally saying, "Your mother? She go out." I walked back, intending to go to the hotel where I thought she'd go. When I passed the hospital, a twinge of doubt assailed me as to my assistant's accuracy in translation, so I popped in to see and sure enough, there was Mom, still waiting for me. The hospital - and this was a ray of sunshine I totally hadn't expected - said it was fine for us to go away and come back tomorrow to pay them. So we left, and continued the ill-fated mission to find money. Many maps were helpfully drawn to other places who helpfully drew us yet other maps and apologized in bewilderment for their machines not accepting our Visa card. At long, long last (it seemed) we came upon a Starbucks and Mom said to me, "surely corporate America will help us in our hour of need!" (I'm paraphrasing). We went in, ordered, and Internet, I was not emotionally prepared when our card went through. IT WORKED. We proceeded (not having eaten so far that day) to burn a swathe through their food stores not unlike Sherman on his way to the sea.
IV. Nuclear bullying
My grandfather's legacy
He thought, "I'm helping!"
So the next day, which ended with a revelation (at 10 p.m. after speaking to another American guest at our hotel) that money could be had from 7-11 (of all places) in quantities not exceeding 10000yen at a time for four times (it is possible I had to light black candles, dance around widdershins and recite the backwards names of Beelzebub. The world will never know), we went to Peace Park. It is a very beautiful, open space with fountains and statuary.
Peace Park exists because Nagasaki is the site of the second nuclear bomb dropped in World War II. My mother's father worked on the Manhattan Project. She is a total pacifist, and it is especially hard from that perspective to think about someone you love believing strongly enough in a war to participate in creating the bomb. She could not tell me exactly what my grandfather thought, as it seems they did not out-and-out discuss it, but she did say she truly believed he thought he was helping; he thought he was doing something good. That led our conversation around to just and unjust war, nationalism's unbridled power, and the classic: man's inhumanity to man.
When I was in poli-sci classes in college, it would sometimes hit me very hard how casually rooms of exceedingly young people talked about leveraging the power of the bomb to accomplish political goals. I imagine that to be effective in politics, you cannot afford to be constantly overwhelmed by what we have done, and by what we have the power to do. I hope, though, that there are still people making important decisions who are just as bowled over as I am.
In total: not as vacation-like an atmosphere as could be devoutly wished, but the kind of adventure that teaches you you can land on your feet, even if it is a long fall and you land in a latté you could have bought in Connecticut.
Stretching what we call "music"
Can we muzzle them?
Oh, Japanese PA systems! Is there nowhere a choir of piping prepubescents does not belong? This was Mom's and my first impression as we landed in Fukuoka (Hakata) and caught our train to Nagasaki.
II. Hospital wants cash
Endoscope "to see deep throat"
We do not charge him.
My mother had a bad case of laryngitis (it turned out) so we had to go to a hospital in Nagasaki, where a very nice otolaryngologist (ENT doctor) met with us and examined her. His English was great, especially in comparison to pretty much everyone else we saw there, but he did say quite clearly that the endoscope was to see her "deep throat." It was the chief moment wherein our diplomatic negotiations were most threatened by our need to giggle like my students. (The alternative last line, actually very accurate and demonstrative of great generosity on his part with regards to uninsured foreigners and expensive tests, but hilarious in light of the phrase previously uttered was: He does not charge us).
III. Japan likes hard cash
ATM: "Invalid card"
Three cheers for Starbucks!
This was the most miserable part of our adventure. While my mother sat in the hospital waiting room, I told her (with the foolish confidence of one who places great faith in the Visa and Mastercard logos) that I would pop over to the Post Office (which is apparently where you get your strange foreign money in Japan) and get the cash to pay the hospital. I'd be back in a few minutes, I said. It would be no problem, I said. Oh, how I lied. Hours and three stops with minimal English and seven receipts later, I still had no yen.
I tried to call the hospital (I figured asking for the only person with my mom's obviously Western name wouldn't be that hard, but it was). The lady at the bank I was currently in helped me as much as she could, finally saying, "Your mother? She go out." I walked back, intending to go to the hotel where I thought she'd go. When I passed the hospital, a twinge of doubt assailed me as to my assistant's accuracy in translation, so I popped in to see and sure enough, there was Mom, still waiting for me. The hospital - and this was a ray of sunshine I totally hadn't expected - said it was fine for us to go away and come back tomorrow to pay them. So we left, and continued the ill-fated mission to find money. Many maps were helpfully drawn to other places who helpfully drew us yet other maps and apologized in bewilderment for their machines not accepting our Visa card. At long, long last (it seemed) we came upon a Starbucks and Mom said to me, "surely corporate America will help us in our hour of need!" (I'm paraphrasing). We went in, ordered, and Internet, I was not emotionally prepared when our card went through. IT WORKED. We proceeded (not having eaten so far that day) to burn a swathe through their food stores not unlike Sherman on his way to the sea.
IV. Nuclear bullying
My grandfather's legacy
He thought, "I'm helping!"
So the next day, which ended with a revelation (at 10 p.m. after speaking to another American guest at our hotel) that money could be had from 7-11 (of all places) in quantities not exceeding 10000yen at a time for four times (it is possible I had to light black candles, dance around widdershins and recite the backwards names of Beelzebub. The world will never know), we went to Peace Park. It is a very beautiful, open space with fountains and statuary.
Peace Park exists because Nagasaki is the site of the second nuclear bomb dropped in World War II. My mother's father worked on the Manhattan Project. She is a total pacifist, and it is especially hard from that perspective to think about someone you love believing strongly enough in a war to participate in creating the bomb. She could not tell me exactly what my grandfather thought, as it seems they did not out-and-out discuss it, but she did say she truly believed he thought he was helping; he thought he was doing something good. That led our conversation around to just and unjust war, nationalism's unbridled power, and the classic: man's inhumanity to man.
When I was in poli-sci classes in college, it would sometimes hit me very hard how casually rooms of exceedingly young people talked about leveraging the power of the bomb to accomplish political goals. I imagine that to be effective in politics, you cannot afford to be constantly overwhelmed by what we have done, and by what we have the power to do. I hope, though, that there are still people making important decisions who are just as bowled over as I am.
In total: not as vacation-like an atmosphere as could be devoutly wished, but the kind of adventure that teaches you you can land on your feet, even if it is a long fall and you land in a latté you could have bought in Connecticut.
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