first glance

Buddah’s birthday. Finally a day to rest and take some time to myself. I feel spent from teaching as much as we have been. Been out of touch for quite some time settling in and getting used to the space of my life as it is now, in Korea. Finally feeling like this life is our own, our place is our own and our work is our own.

So much to say about so much. So settle in with a nice cup of coffee or a good drink and read on, my friends.

First, where the hell are we, anyway? Well, we’re in Gwangju. We’re in the southwestern part of the country about an hour from the bottom of Korea. It’s a fantastic city. Full of public art everywhere—sculptures galore on every corner—art schools, art openings. Fabulous stuff. We hit up an amazing artist in residency opening a couple of weeks ago. Tremendous art. Check out Jim’s flick site for all the photos (www.flickr.com/photos/jimmerdcheshire). The highlight for me was a room full of wall-sized wood block carvings based on images from the 1980 Gwangju Democractic People’s Uprising (which I’ll get to in a minute). Incredibly powerful. Creativity swirls in this city.

So the uprising. In all the years I studied political movements and large-scale uprisings and revolutions, I never once learned about the armed resistance that happened 27 years ago in Gwangju. In the spring of 1980, there were democratic protests all over Korea against the military dictatorship government. From May 18-May 27th, students and citizens in Gwangju took up armed resistance against the government all over the city. The story is deep and profound. Ultimately, the resistance was squashed, but over time, the impact of the protest infiltrated the fabric of the Korean government. In 1987, the country was able to hold full democratic elections.

All over the city of Gwangju, there are monuments and parks and statues and museums and photographs commemorating the experience. Last weekend, Jim and I went strolling through most of them. The event makes the spirit of this city truly unique and inspiring, and certainly is reflected in the general disposition of the people of Gwangju.

And our place. The apartment is pretty spacious. We’re on the ground floor of a 20 story building—there don’t seem to be any other living spaces aside from very tall industrial le corbosier-type apartment buildings in korea. Middle class apartment living is what’s aspired to here. There are buildings as far as the eye can see in this city. Ours particularly reminds me of the scary building that was featured in “Dark Water,” the freaky Japanese movie. I swear it's the same one. Anyway, I like our place, with a few exceptions. We have two bedrooms, which is great. I’m writing from my very own desk at the moment. Unfortunately, we have an apartment that was home to many smokers over the past three years, so the walls are yellow with smoke. When I moved the bed in my room to rearrange the furniture, I found cigarette butts. That’s hot. Smoking in bed is *HOT*. It took us a while to figure out our heating system. We have to turn on the heater to get hot water every time we want it. The floors are heated here in korea. The hot water runs in pipes beneath the floor and makes the room and floors nice and toasty. It’s an amazing invention that would do well in SF. I would have killed for toasty floors in my apartment. In general, I’m digging our neighborhood. It’s quiet and residential and is close to a bunch of good places to run. So, on the off chance that it’s still light out when I finish work, I can actually exercise. Woohoo!

So, the teaching. The thing that takes up the most space in our lives here. We landed on April 30th and started teaching on May 1st. No joke, we’ve been working since the day we moved in. The kids are fantastic. They are cute and funny and even when they’re bad (and sometimes they are very, very bad—so all you people who thought that they’d be better behaved b/c they aren’t kids from the states, recognize!) they are so funny. I never imagined that I would be spending my days teaching shorties to say “today is sunny” or having a hilarious conversation with my older kids about why they need to learn to say “rice” instead of “lice.” We do work a lot—I work from 9:30 am to 7:30 pm every day. Which kind of blows. But I’m hoping to get some leeway with the bosses in the next couple of weeks. I will be starting to take some pictures on my kids to post. There aren’t any real problem kids in my world, which is nice. Yesterday, I walked by another teacher’s class and the kids were trying to climb out the windows of our four-story building. Awesome!

In general, korea is pretty hilarious. Seeing as I don’t know the language, I can’t read many signs or labels on anything, so I have adventures every time I try to go out in the world. This was my favorite one: after feeling pretty crappy for a day or so with the beginnings of a stomach bug, jim and I went out for the day in search of some food that appealed to me and to hit the park near us and explore. We found a lovely little Japanese fusion place and had some great sushi. I headed to the bathroom, and when I got there, I saw that there were two toilet stalls—one with a standard flush toilet and another with an electronic version of the craftmatic adjustable bed in toilet form. So of course, how could I *not*? So, I sat down on the lovely cushioned seat, and to my right was a panel with a series of buttons and dials. All in Korean of course. Almost all of the buttons had some kind of fountain-like image on them—perhaps this was an extra-special toilet, I thought. A biday, for sure. Not so interested in the water-filled experience that afternoon, I started to look for the “flush” button. It was no where to be found. I stood up, thinking that if I got a better look at the panel, I’d surely find the icon that vaguely informed me if I pushed it, I would find the flushing mechanism quite pleasant on this electronic space ship toilet.

Alas. There was nothing that pointed in such a direction. Only fountains of many kinds. So, I pushed one. And this very small tube started moving down from the inside of the toilet and then angled itself up at what would be the behind of the proud user of this porcelain throne. Unfortunately (or fortunately), I was actually standing completely upright at the moment. And the spray of water came directly at my white tank top, fully soaking the side of my shirt. I pushed myself up against the side of the stall, waiting for the water to stop. But it wouldn’t. So, I pushed a button that I thought might be the power. And it went off. Retreating into its place inside the electronic craftmatic toilet. But, I couldn’t resist another try. Why? Because I couldn’t. And the toilet still needed flushing. I pushed another button, hoping that it would be the answer. But alas, the toilet started making a very strange sound, not like flushing at all, but more like vibrating. Fearing the soak again, I turned the thing off. Laughing my ass off, I pushed open the soaking wet door, washed my hands thoroughly, and crept back to my seat on the floor in the restaurant (we all sit on the floor, people. It’s asia).

As we left the restaurant, we noticed huge plastered japanime porn pictures lining the walls of the stairway to the street, directing us to the 2nd floor for unknown pleasures. Though I thought I might be well suited for a possible wet t-shirt contest in such a place, we opted to head on down the road to the Buddhist temple I was itching to see.

And so it goes in the land of Korea. You never know what you’re going to find.

Other funny things that have happened so far (and no, I promise, I don’t spend all my time in bathrooms here, but they sure are funny here):

• Using the bathroom in the seoul airport and finding the “etiquette bell” next to the toilet. I thought maybe they would play some groovy jazz, but it turned out to just be the sound of a toilet flushing—you know to cover up all those nasty sounds…I think yanni would have been a better choice.

• Stopping at a rest stop bathroom during our bus trip from seoul to gwangju and entering a palm tree, tropical wonderland of a space. One of the artists at the opening we went to had fabulous shots of these bathrooms. Check out Jim’s flickr site: www.flickr.com/photos/jimmerdcheshire

• Being woken by a strange announcement in our apartment at 6 am the first morning here. Strange for many reasons, really. It was a loudspeaker announcement coming from a speaker *in our apartment*. It was preceded by a three-tone bell, very communist propaganda-style feeling. It was also in Korean. So whether they were telling us that the recycling had been extended to new hours in the building (you can only go between 6 and 9 am) or that there was an atomic bomb that was about to go off in the convention center next door, we would have no idea. Though startled by the whole experience the first time, it had gotten easier to handle each time. I just smile and nod and believe that news of a nuclear war would surely not be delivered with such niceties as a three-toned bell. Someone probably just blocked the service entrance again…

• Getting lured into the Canadian Lobster restaurant by the hearty lobsters and king crab in the tanks outside (all the seafood restaurants have giants tanks of their delightful food outside their doors, it’s bad ass) and accidentally ordering grilled lobster which actually came served with grilled cheese on top. I swear. Grilled cheese lobster. I swear. Fucking Canadians.

Oh, and we ate live octopus last Friday night. Oh yes I did! I squirmed off my chopsticks, but I did it. We ended up at this little joint that looked like someone’s back porch. Tanks of fish and octopus lined the front wall. They chopped the octopus into pieces, they some sesame oil on it and served it on a plate. It was writhing all over the place. It wasn’t as cool as the scene in “Old Boy” where he grabs the octopus and bites it’s head and it’s tentacles wrap around his face. Not that cool. But it was still dangerous and daring. Apparently, you have to chew it really well as the creatures tend to stay alive for a really long time. Their suckers can get stuck on your esophagus…and you can DIE! Woohoo! Danger, intrigue, risk! As my friend said, “This might be the first time I’ve eaten anything that actually tried to get away from me.”

And last night, we learned how to play a very fun and totally bizarre Korean card game called Kododi and drank good German beer made by our new friend Song at his brewery in town. He lived in Munich for 15 years and learned to brew there. He opened an very funny brew haus in downtown Gwangju that apparently has karaoke, but we haven’t seen it in action. Every time we go there, he makes us “Songwiches”—fresh baked bread, salad and his home-made sausage all put together in a yummy Songwich. Totally awesome. We love this guy.

What else? Oh, there’s a foreigners bar where they have trivia every Thursday night. We checked it out a few weeks ago. And our team *kicked ass*. We were tied for first right up to the last round against some crazy aussies. Then, we flailed at questions about what disease afflicted Prinicess Di just after her divorce? (bulimia) And what is the most common disease in the world? (tooth decay—totally an unfair question. Whatever) In the end, we were tied for second. And so they asked for a tie-breaker. Being cocky and bossy while very drunk, I stepped right up to the front of the bar ready to take on whatever trivia question they could throw at me. And as I turned to the MC, he pointed me to the bar where I met my opponent, a giant dude from Michigan or something. We would be doing shots of some unknown blue liquor with our hands behind our backs. The first one to successfully drink all *three* shots would win. Trying to back out, they pushed me to the bar. Of course, I failed miserably. Couldn’t even get the booze down my throat while the MC made some very choice remarks about my skill or lack thereof. Jim got a fantastic shot of me just as I lost miserably. Ladies and gentlemen, I am not 22 anymore.

So, there you have it folks. I hearty post after a long silence here in Korea. We’re settled and working and enjoying every day here. Even when it’s hard.

I miss you all very much. Please write or call. And you can send us goodies to the school!

I’ll post a wish list soon!

xoxoxo

the korea kid