Wednesday, November 26, 2008

This Is Necessary



This has always been one of my favorite movie clips.

Happy Thanksgiving.

I know for most of you this is coming a whole day early, but I wanted to use my forum to express my heartfelt Thanks on Thanksgiving. From my parents who have always supported me, my family who have always loved me, to my friends who I've always relied on, and everyone else who I've had the pleasure of meeting in my life. Thank you so much for anything and everything you've ever done for me. I know for a fact that without you I would find myself in a far different place, and more then likely a far different person. Thank You for all the memories we have, and all the memories to come.

I'd like to take a moment to wish a Happy Thanksgiving to my Grandparents Stuchell and Mason. I don't know where I would be in my life without your constant love and support in any of my endeavours. Your support helped make my current dream come true. Thank you and I miss you.

To my parents, I don't know where to start. I love you and want to say thank you for everything. You have always supported what I do in my life, and have always been there whenever I fell. I could not have asked for anyone better then you as my parents. You have done an excellent job as my parents, and I can only hope that I do as good of a job when I have my own children.

Hollie, well sis, I don't have a clue where to start. Thank you for being the big sister that every little brother is terrified off. Kidding, but thank you for being my sister. Thanks for being someone who I could always approach and expect an honest answer from. I learned a lot from you and I expect I will still learn lots from you during the course of our lives. I hope you and Mike have a great Thanksgiving.

To my friends, honestly guys, you rock. Without you I would never have grown from being an awkward teenager who couldn't talk to girls to an awkward man who cannot talk to women. I miss you guys lots, I especially miss the BBQ's at the cat house and all the good times, and honestly all the bad times we've had together. I wish you were all here right now so you could experience some of the joy that I've found in my current occupation. I'll see some of you in Feb. when I make a short trip back to San Diego.

To anyone who may feel left out, I apologize but I can only manage so much sappiness in one post. Maybe at Christmas I'll get every single person, but I doubt it. I love you all and I will see you whenever our paths cross again.

Monday, November 24, 2008

I've Been a Bad Boy



Yes, I know that there may be some of you out there in Cyberspace who are a little upset with me. I do apologize about the lack of a consistent narrative the past month or so. In all honesty I've written two or three posts that I have not published, because I just don't think I am able to convey the culture in the proper way. In this frustration I have forgotten why many of you may actually be reading my blog. For most this is a way to keep tabs on what they're favorite globe trotting person is up to, and as such I should remember that I do need to have a running dialogue about my life and adventures. Well, I guess I should seriously stick to the misadventures, because those tend to happen more often. Alas, onto the embarrassing things I've been up to recently.

For starters I have made several comments in recent blogs about my exploits with the local womenfolk. Well, honestly it's turned into some of the most confusing dealings I've ever experienced. I mean, if you look at some of the women I've dated in my lifetime I tend to date very complex women. Yet, even with this complexity I was normally able to reach some level of understanding, where I could anticipate and interpret them correctly. Korean girls on the other hand, I just don't get. I mean I don't even think it's the language issue because some of these women speak English very well. I guess it just boils down to the fact that being a foreigner, you are hot stuff, but you are also just a curiosity to most. Confusion reigns supreme normally when it comes to foreigners trying to figure out Korean women. SUPREME I tell you.

Anyways, onto some of my more entertaining exploits. In all honesty most of these came from this weekend because well, this weekend was very entertaining at points. First off, let me tell you the normal process for finding a motel in Korea. If you are located in an area you know then it's quite easy. You just walk to which ever motel you like and just ask for a room. However, when wandering around neighborhoods you don't know in Seoul it becomes quite the challenge. There are some motels which you spot and just instantly know you won't walk in the door. Like the motel down the dark alley in Itaewon on the street that was 90% owned by the Russian Mafia. Ya just probably shouldn't walk into that place and expect to get a room that doesn't charge in twenty minute intervals. However, the hardest thing about finding a motel in Korea, is the fact that most the time you just can't find one. They are everywhere, but at the same time they are nowhere. Motels tend to bunch together in enclaves and sometimes, you just cannot see them. Another problem is what I've seen fit to dub as the, "ohh they're foreigners looking to stay the night they can only have one room" treatment. This happens several times, and basically they offer you a room, but the second you ask for two rooms they suddenly do not have any openings.

This weekend was a walking joke as we tried to find a motel. Besides deciding not to enter several establishments, and being told by several others that there were no openings, I must tell you about the motel we stayed in. Well, honestly it wasn't that bad for 40,000 a night. Yet, the reason this even matters is the old lady who was manning the desk when we checked in. Mind you this is at 10:45 at night. As we very tiredly sauntered into this establishment I started talking with woman who was working there. Now normally this procedure is very standard, and this time it was. What makes it so noteworthy however was the fact that this lady had fifteen wafer thin slices of cucumber on her face as we did it. Now I'm all for beauty treatments and what not, but honestly I don't really know what good can come out of have 15 wafer thin slices half hanging off you face as you sell someone a room for the night. It took every once of self restraint I had not to laugh at this woman because she seriously reminded me of the vegetable gremlin from Gremlins 2. Anyways I will update some more in the next day or so as I get some pictures in from friends. Warning many of these pictures will show me just hamming it up. Some just might even be cute. However, I seriously doubt that. Anyways here are a few pictures from life recently.

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

What the hell is this White Crap?


As a person who had spent the last 13 years of his life living in San Diego I have had precious few encounters with a white powdy substance. This substance has been known to invoke both intense excitement and severe depression. It has also been known to cause students to act in strange and uncontrollable ways. This substance can cause flashbacks to days of yore when men were men and sheep were nervous. Wait, scratch that, I'm not in New Zealand. Needless to say though, as a California boy, what the hell is this white stuff that is falling from the sky. Well honestly by now you all know that it is snow. Yes that's right, SNOW. It's snowing in November here. Winter has finally set in after a very wonderful and glorious fall. Fall here is really awesome because the temperature is really nice and it's actually fun to be out and about.

I must say that this city is exceptionally pretty with a nice dusting of white. Then again even L.A. would look nice with a dusting of white. Wait, it wouldn't, LA would still suck. Anyways, it has been really pretty out here the past few days and sadly I think that it will be shortly leaving us. The weather is just too warm for the snow to stick around.

Monday, November 3, 2008

Update

Well, the last few times I've written my blog I've kept it primarily about cultural differences and small things that really don't have much to do with my day to day operation of life out here. Well, this blog, will be no different. Well actually it will be different. I'm going to give you a quick rundown of the past few weeks.

In all honesty the past few weeks have developed along a pretty standardized schedule. I work some, drink some, and then sleep when I can. However, as boring as that sounds I do have few events that have happened in the past few days that I want to talk about. This past weekend my school held an English pop-song contest. Now, this is truly my definition of hell. Twenty groups of students performing bad English pop. I mean we're talking about hearing Dancing Queen and Honey, Honey by Abba. Wanna be, by the Spice Girls, etc. What made this even more torturous was the fact that it was Saturday morning the day after Halloween. Needless to say my head may have been hurting a little bit and I might not have gotten that much sleep.

Now after I have said all this, it actually turned out to be a lot better then I imagined. It honestly was really cute at times and well, some of the groups did a good job. The kids also really enjoyed it, and I guess it was fun. Even if I was hungover it was pretty fun. The music was abysmal but ohh well.

I guess now that I should get to the biggest piece of news that people will find interesting. I actually had a date last night. I know, Will had a date. The end of the world is coming, wait no that's tomorrow if Obama gets elected. Anyways it went very well. We had sam gyop sal, which for those of you who don't speak Korean is Korean BBQ. What's even more impressive is I managed to get a second date out of her. I don't know when exactly it will be because she works two jobs but I do know what it will involve. It's going to involve me cooking Chicken and us drinking beer. That was her idea. I volunteered to cook but it was her idea for Chicken. I'm actually relatively scared as to what I may have gotten myself into on this. The primary reason for that is because I don't have a BBQ here, and we all know that cooking on a BBQ is where I'm most comfortable. Ohh well, things will go well, because this girl likes me for some reason.

Alas, today is sports day at my school and I'm going to go take some pictures of my students and basically harass them.

Sunday, November 2, 2008

Korean Fire Drill.

Well, we had a fire drill the other day at school. Now many of you who are products of the public education system in the United States, and well any education system in the United States are well aware of the countless fire drills. Well, here in Korea, its is completely different. I recently found some pictures that another teacher took so I'm going to post them to show just exactly what I'm talking about.

Now, in the U.S. a fire drill is an evacuation and assembly drill. The goal is to empty the campus of every student in a quick and most importantly an orderly fashion. Here, half the school didn't participate, and the other half was already outside when the drill technically started. Another point of difference I should mention is that, a fire drill here, really just means a fire show. For starters, the fire truck was there shooting water into the air to impress the students. Another point of departure was the lighting of, and use of a smoke canister that some of the students had to walk by.

Well, if that wasn't enough, for those pyros of you in my small but utterly devoted readership they decided to light cardboard boxes on fire. Then have a few of the teachers take turns hitting it with fire extinguishers. When the teachers failed to get the boxes out, the firemen who previously were busy shooting water in the air decided to take out the flames with some precision water shots.

If that isn't enough, they also do a casualty evacuation drill for the teachers during this time. This involves many different drills. One of which involves the movement of an injured student. While this may be good practice, it was more ridiculous then you'd think. First, they moved him in a wheel barrow. They then transferred him to a legitimate hard board stretcher where he was immobilized. After the immobilization they transferred him into an ambulance and off they drove.

I sit here and wonder about the image these drills give my students about fires. For many of them these drills are a time where they get to sit and laugh about what the teachers are doing. For others it's just a cool show to watch because there are flames and large geysers of water being shot out of hoses. Either way, I feel that if there was a real fire in this school, the students would not know how to evacuate safely, and I am honestly worried that in the case of a fire several students would be injured or worse because it would be utter chaos.