Monday, May 31, 2010

Two Great Weekends.

Ahh, the weather has finally warmed up. While not as awesome as it was last year, this spring it seems has finally taken complete hold. With the weather finally warming up we teachers tend to start doing stupid things outdoors. While most of these things are relatively safe, they are still quite fun. It all began two weeks ago with great beach party. It was organized by yours truly and consisted of about 15 teachers eating and drinking at Mallipo beach.

The day began with everyone loading up into vehicles and driving to Mallipo which is located about 40 kilometers from Seosan. It takes about 45 minutes to drive though because of the speed limit. For the first time I drove my motorcycle out. It was a beautiful day for a ride. The fact that about half the ride was also on a two lane windy road made for a good time. About the only bad thing was the vehicle disinfectant I had to drive through. Korea has been dealing with an outbreak of Foot and Mouth disease in cattle recently. One of the preventative measures they are taking is to spray down vehicles when the leave an infected area. Well, I didn't know that I was going to have to drive through one of these "car washes." I guess it also helps that I was behind a delivery truck and couldn't see around it. Needless to say I was not pleased when I realized that I was going to get sprayed.

When we arrived at the beach we checked into our pension (beach house). Our place overlooked two beaches and was quite nice. I quickly set to creating several things that needed some time to cook. The first of those things being 4 pounds of BBQ beef that needed at least 7 hours to cook. The other two things were a selection of drunken watermelon, and drunken pineapple. These needed to soak in alcohol for a few hours to acquire the desired effects. After my cooking prep time we headed down to the beach to bum around for a few hours. We drank, played Frisbee, Wifle Ball, and Football. After that we returned to pension to clean up and eat ourselves merry.

The highlights of the day were honestly the company and the food. The water was too cold to go swimming in. You could only spend about 5 minutes in the water before you were nice and frozen. The food we ate was pretty epic. I attempted, and did a decent job at Salsa Fresca. There was probably about 6 pounds of steak, plenty of corn, grill potatoes, chicken, burgers, cream cheese stuffed peppers, etc. There were also plenty of snacks, and the aforementioned 4 pounds of BBQ beef (I love my crockpot by the way). The company was also wonderful. In general the teachers that I find myself spending time with love this country. We enjoy our time here and while we have frustrations, we wouldn't change much, if anything about our time here. Our conversations were wonderful and the night progressed with people drinking way to much.

The following weekend was another wonderful expedition. However, this time it was not to a beach, but down to Waegwan. David's brother is still stationed with the US Army in Korea. We decided it was about time that 6 of us went down there to visit him. As much as we like Mark (David's brother) and his friends, we really had ulterior motives. We wanted to shot at some army guys. We went down there to paintball. It was also a chance for a roadtrip. We had several people drop out, and those that came from Seosan could all fit into one small vehicle. Given the fact that the two big guys, John and I received the front seats. I drove, only three hours and completely across the country, while the rest talked, napped and had a good time. Upon arrival we sat down for dinner and started drinking. Well let me rephrase that. I started drinking. Everyone else had been drinking the entire time I was driving *quick sidenote, it is completely legal to drink in a vehicle, provided the driver is not drinking*. After dinner we headed out to a few bars to play some pool, darts, and shoot the breeze with people.

The next day, we geared up and headed out to play paintball versus the American soldiers. Well, that was the original. For those that have ever spent time in the military you know what's coming. The paintball was a little bit of a fiasco. While we had reserved the course, the JROTC was using it for most the morning. In typical military fashion, the base, while having a paintball course, all the guns, gear, and paintballs you need, did not have a way to refill the Co2 canisters needed to fire the guns. For that they had to drive 30 minutes to a place in Daegu to fill the canisters. They only had 6 Co2 tanks. The original plan had been to play 6 on 6 teachers versus army. We played several 3 on 3 matches and surprisingly held our own. It helped that guns kept having problems and most the times the problems happened to the army guys. We also did a few one on one matches and a few three on two and two on one matches. In total we made the six canisters last for a few hours of paintballing. Everyone had fun. Everyone got shot, and I even managed to nail Mark between the eyes. It was pretty great.

After paintball we went back to our motels to shower and the headed to Mark's apartment for a BBQ and festivities. The food here was awesome. I had a legitimate home made chilli for the first time in two years. This is something that I've been craving for a while. I would make my own but I don't know if I can get all the beans I need to make it. After eating we drank and had fun for several hours. There was even a cash poker game where I won 70 dollars. I could have had about 200 if I played one hand that I folded out of. Oh well. On Sunday, after a quick shopping spree on base to pick up some essentials, we headed back for Seosan. The drive was just as nice up as it was down and the weekend ended with a contented smile and a few welts from where Frasier lit me up during paintball.

Thursday, May 13, 2010

A Guide to Korean Movies.

One thing that many people do not know about is the thriving Korean movie industry.  Korea is know around Asia for producing and exporting mass media.  Whether it is through music (no matter how much I complain about the stuff it is catchy), television, or movies, Korean mass media is in demand.  I have talked several times about the music, ok I'll be honest.  I have complained several times about the music here.  However, in my defense I complained about Brittney Spears and company back in high school also.  Today I'm going to take some time to talk about Korean movies.

Korea has a thriving movie industry.  Not only is it thriving, but the production values are not far below those of Hollywood.  No, they don't have the money or financing to produce something as technologically stunning as Hollywood did in Avatar.  The big budget special effect flick is not something that happens often in Korea.  It comes down to simple cash.  Hollywood studios have far more of it then Korean studios.  Even with this lack of cash, Korean studios are producing movies that rival those being made in the United States.  Now granted for every Shawshank Redemption there are numerous Battlefield Earth's, but the following movies are excellent examples of Korean cinema.


The Good, The Bad, The Weird:  Sure, the title is a complete rip-off.  Yet, this movie sets a high bar for the emerging genre of Asian Westerns.  Copyright issues aside, this movie is just fun.  It has humor that translates across cultures.  There is enough action, shooting, and backstabbing to make Clint Eastwood blush.  You don't have to be Korean, speak Korean, or have ever lived in Korea to enjoy this movie.



Thirst:  A Korean vampire movie.  I was intrigued by this movie after it showed up on a list of good movies that you probably missed.  This movie puts a new spin on the traditional vampire story.  Gone are the sharp teeth and the sucking of blood from the neck.  However, the desire for blood is nowhere near extinguished.  In fact, the desire for blood is not because of hunger.  I won't say anymore less I give away parts of the movie.  The movie is kind of like Twilight without all the emo teen angst.  That and if you include some awkward sex and serial killing.  All in all the movie was a fun and unique look at the traditional vampire story.



Haeundae:  This is one of the movies that violates what I talked about earlier.  This movie was a big budget special effects spectacular.  These movies don't come out every summer because the Korean film industry cannot afford to produce them.  However, I felt it important to note that even though they don't happen often, they do happen.



Tae Guk GI:  This movie is honestly one of the best war movies I've ever seen.  Had this movie been produced by an American studio, and in English it would be challenging the likes of Saving Private Ryan, Band Of Brothers, The Pacific, Black Hawk Down, etc.  It is an entirely engrossing film.  It successfully shows how brutal and horrific the Korean war was.  Most Americans do not understand the Korean war.  All we know about it is what we saw on M.A.S.H.  Here are the simple facts about how brutal this war was.  South Korea suffered: 137,899 soldiers killed, 450,742 soldier wounded, 373,599 civilians killed, 229,625 civilians wounded, and 387,744 civilians abducted or missing.  I want you to stop and think about those numbers, because that was only on the South Korean side.  The North Korean and Chinese casualty figures are well over 1,000,000 dead.  I highly, highly recommend this movie.  You don't have to live in Korea, you don't even have to like history.

Monday, May 10, 2010

The Second of May.



It may be a week late, but having finally had my camera returned to me I can now post some pictures and talk about my birthday.  My birthday this year, was a great occasion.  While I did not receive an awesome present like I did last year, and honestly I wasn't expecting one either, having everyone out and about because of me was more then enough.  I guess it is at these times that I realize that for some reason people actually do enjoy my company.  I'd think that after a while they would get sick of random awkwardness that comes along with being my friend.  Oh well, enough with the boring diatribe and onto the gory details, or at least what I can remember of them (isn't that normally the case).

This year the party started at 5:00 on Saturday.  We headed off to a Korean BBQ restaurant that could hold a party of 20 people.  We went at 5 because I wanted my friends who were bar staff to be able to come and join us.  No we were not asked for our AARP discount cards.  The dinner went off without much of a hitch.  We sat, talked, drank, and ate for two hours.  We enjoyed Korean BBQ in all it's glory.  It's weird but you'd think that after almost two years of Korean BBQ that I wouldn't want to eat it anymore.  However, when you find something good you find something good.  While at the restaurant Paul, Panda, PJ, and Hong (RnB bar staff) bought me small cake and gave me a small present.  It's rare that people embarrass me by giving me a present, but this was entirely unexpected from them.  I received a gift box with about ten condoms and a couple of latex gloves. 

I think that this present deserves some explanation.  Last year on Jenny's birthday I told Paul that as a gag a lot of times we give something completely unexpected to someone for their birthday.  He didn't quite understand what I meant and I told him that we would give them something like a box of condoms.  At this point he proceeded to hand me a box of condoms and told me to give them to Jenny (January 2009 is where this story takes place).  I told him at the time that it's entirely unacceptable for me to give a girl a box of condoms because A) I was friends with here but not that good of friends with her, B) she's a girl and that's just presumptuous, and C) when a guy gives a girl he sorta knows a box of condoms it means that he wants to use them with her.  That is the reason why I got this present from them, and I was honestly embarrassed and surprised that they remembered the entire exchange between us.  However, in one light I guess it goes to show the way that we have bonded over the past 20 months.  

After the dinner we headed out to a local Norae Bang for some horrible Karaoke.  Honestly, half the fun of this is singing songs that you know you can't sing, and just trying to get through them.  When you have a room full of people who can't really sing, nobody really cares how bad you sound.  It's only when someone arrives who can actually sing that we realize just how bad we really are.  We walked into the Norae Bang at 7:30 and we quickly escorted into the VIP room.  No, it's not that special of a room, it's just the room big enough to fit all of us that I had a friend make a reservation for.  As we walked in I found out that my friend Seung Hee, who was conspicuously absent for most the night, had decorated the room with balloons and a banner.  There was also several cans of spray foam, that really shouldn't have been there.  It's like silly string but foam instead of string.  Needless to say this stuff ended up getting sprayed on unsuspecting people several times, including me.  Pictures have been included.  We sang out hearts out for two hours and continued to imbibe alcohol at an unwise pace.

When we stumbled, out of the Norae Bang we headed down to RnB.  It was there that we rejoined the staff at RnB.  Yes, they were working, but they were also part of the party because many of us are good friends with them.  The drinking and partying continued, as did my friends mission to get me stupidly drunk.  Sometimes when we play darts we make a bet that the loosing team has to buy the winning team a round.  It's a normal bar bet.  However, this night the bet was changed (without my consent I must state) to the loosing team has to buy and do a shot with me.  This was just a bad idea, but at the point I was not paying enough attention to really notice or care.  Right around midnight the staff at RnB started their fire show.  Once again the normal show is relatively simple.  You get a cocktail and some flames.  However, my show, was a flaming spectacle.  The dual fireballs of 151, plus a flaming cocktail show are awesome.  Hong even started throwing a white Malibu Rum bottle around that was filled with sparklers.  This was the first time I ever saw her taking part in the show with something that would break if dropped.  At the completion of the show it is required that whoever the show was for must chug a rather large cocktail.  Well, once again, not thinking better of it I downed the cocktail and continued to have fun.



When the show had finished I received a call from Seung Hee telling me that she was going to come say hi for a minute or two.  I met her outside of RnB because I needed some air, and if I was outside nobody would be buying me drinks.  After talking for a few minutes she had to go rejoin some old friends who had come back into town.  Less then five minutes after walking back into RnB I received another call from her telling me to come outside because one of her friends wanted to see me.  Yu Sill who I had met several times wanted to wish me a happy birthday.  It was then that my Korean friends decided to drag me off to a restaurant/hof (restaurant/bar).  I walked into the place and was quickly inundated with questions from the couple of people who I hadn't met.  I was also quickly handed beer and soju to drink because it was my birthday.  Well, it's rude to turn down a drink when it is offered to you buy a Korean so I sat and talked with them for a little while.  Upon leaving I checked in to 501 where a few friends were located who wanted to wish me a happy birthday.  Upon arrival there I finally realized that I probably shouldn't be drinking any more and should head home relatively soon.  I sat down and talked with my friends, and a majority of this conversation is lost in an alcohol induced haze.  After what I think was about 10 minutes I headed out the door to find my apartment.  I woke up the next morning in my bed, and I had to wait for until 7:00 that night for the world to seem like a place I wanted to inhabit. 


On Sunday night I went over to Seung Hee's home and her mom had made me the traditional Korean soup that you eat on your birthday.  The soup consists of seaweed and beef.  It's actually an awesome soup.  I spent about an hour eating and talking with Seung Hee and then headed home.  I wasn't in the mood for anything more then that, and the thought of more alcohol surprisingly didn't sit well with my stomach, my mood, or my general disposition at the time.



It was a wonderful birthday, and while I didn't see the sun rise like I had originally planned to, I cannot complain.  I was surrounded by good friends and good people.  In all honesty I cannot ask for much more on my birthday.  Being surrounded by people who care for you is the greatest present you can ever be given.  Knowing that people are there because they are your friends and want to celebrate something with you is a special feeling.  They weren't there for money, food, or alcohol even though we did have two of the three in massive quantities.