Dear Korea, |
South Korea | April 14, 2010
Dear class of 2010,
Don't drink soju in the middle of the week.
If I could offer you one piece of advice for your time in Korea, that would be it.
Studies have shown that drinking mid-week may think you can use a subway train as a personal dance space or fit an entire kebab into your mouth at once.
In reality, you will just end up falling over and throwing up or dropping most of the kebab, picking it up and eating it anyway and then throwing it up in a tea cup.
This will seem normal to you at the time. It will however, not seem so normal the following morning when the alarm goes off for work.
Brave souls continue to conduct studies on this very issue each and every working week in the hopes that their research will find a solution for us all.
Their results are well documented on Facebook and COPS.
The rest of my advice, is not,. However here it is anyway.
Don't be late for work. Seriously, don't be.
It is OK to turn up to school hung over and spend your day sleeping in the nurses office.
It is even OK to leave early for an appointment. But arrive at work one minute past the designated time and you will face the icy chill of co-workers. In that moment you will look back at the night before and wish you had not succumbed to soju. You are not hiding it as well as you imagine.
Don't worry about the future. Well worry, but realise that spending a year in Korea to work out what you want to do with said future is this generation's absinthe induced trip to Paris. It worked for Hemmingway and Wilde and I'm sure their parents told them they were wasting their lives back in the day. Just make sure you have wild stories to tell your grandchildren when they announce they are running off to a random Asian country instead of going to graduate school.
Do one thing every day which scares you. Like facing down an adjumma on the train.
Sing. In a Norebang. Not the street. Koreans already have the market cornered on drunken antics.
Don't be reckless with other people's hearts - you'll be seeing an awful lot of them over the coming year. For a city of 11 million people, Seoul is an awfully small place.
Brush your teeth after lunch. .
Don't waste your time on Facebook. Reading what your friends are doing when you are not there can be depressing. And also kinda stalky. The days are long - find something else to fill them. Or your newsfeed will be two miles long.
Remember the compliments you receive are because Koreans think all foreigners are beautiful. Laugh at the insults. Most of the time they are compliments in Konglish. As a general rule Koreans are blunt. This is why they are so funny.
Keep at least one bank statement. It may be the only time in your life you see that many zeros in your account.
Avoid the bakeries.
Don't feel guilty if you don't know what to do with your life...but try and work it out before you wake up and you are 50 and standing in Itaewon feeling bitter about how things turned out. Drink plenty of water. But not from the tap.
Be kind to your new friends. You'll miss them when they are gone and you have re-contracted.
Maybe you'll find Nutella, maybe you won't, maybe you'll stumble across crumpets, maybe you'll develop a love for a food you never wanted at home before. What ever you do, don't whinge about it every too seconds or complain too much about kimchi and spicy foods. It was your choice to come here and it's Asia. They have different food. Deal.
Use your body. In every way you can. Communication is 90 per cent non verbal. Act like you have never acted before and you will find toilet paper or get a pharmacist to hand over contraceptive pills.
Visit a jinjibang. Revel in your nakedness. Ignore the stares. Men you're bigger, women, you're whiter and chances are you have less hair. There is a lot of full bush action happening in that place. Keep your eyes up.
Look at the pictures on the packet but don't expect them to reveal what is inside the packet.
Do NOT look in the subway mirrors at six in the morning, they will only make you feel ugly.
Get to know your co-teachers, they own you and you never know when you'll need to call them because you are locked out of your apartment.. Be nice to your building manager - he is probably the one who will let you back in.
Understand that friends come and go, because this is Korea and that is the way things go. Make at least one friend you plan to keep in contact with. Because no one else will find your Korea stories quite as funny.
Visit Korean Cupid once but leave before it makes you say things like "I only date Korean women now". Visit Zen bar in Hongdae once but leave before you hear things like "We were only ever just friends".
Travel. You are living in the half way mark of the world and Asia has never seemed so cheap.
Accept certain inalienable truths: adjummas will barrel you over in the subway, old men will spit on the footpath in front of you and if you are tall and blonde people will assume you are a Russian prositute. You are not the only one this is happening to.
Respect your elders. They have canes and bad attitudes and will take you out if you don't give up that seat.
Dont expect anyone else to support you. We all earn about the same. Street food is cheap. Ramen is cheaper. Learn to love both.
Don't allow a Korean hairdresser to mess too much with your hair, or by the time you walk out you will wonder how you ended up with a blunt fringe and a-symetrical hair.
Be careful whose advice you take - people who have been here too long tend hate life. They know everything and anything about Korea except how it feels to look at it through fresh eyes and their advice is coloured by bitterness and sprinkled with bad facial hair.
But trust me on the soju.
Blogging | March 19, 2010
Hey K,
I have been a social hermit for a while now. Sorry. It is nothing personal, but with Alex gone and oma.....I'm just a little emotionally drained.
But drip by drip I have been filling up the tank again and a lot of that has to do with you.
You and the fact that you are completely crazy insane mental. Thanks for that. It has really helped.
Really. The child you sent me to say he wants to "very much sex Princess Jasmine"? Loved it.
Snow, then yellow dust, then blue sky, then snow, then blue sky? Gold.
Getting my building manager to walk into my apartment, find me coming out of the bathroom, scream and then flee my apartment? An absolute classic.
I assume the building manager was coming in to tell me the pest control man (not the same one you sent who was trying on my skirt that one time when I walked in - another one) was coming.
However I found out about him the hard way when he came in, saw I was in the shower, screamed and fled the apartment. Seriously - the man only saw my ankles. I may be no oil painting but a little ankle never hurt anybody.
But after those two incidents, I appreciate the stern talking to you gave my building manager, in the guise of a co-worker, to stop coming into my apartment - even if it is only to let the pest control man in.
Yet there is my beef.
After seven months, I should be able to tell the building manager to stay the hell out of my apartment. Korea - why haven't you downloaded into my brain yet?
Your language is hard. And illogical. But that is mostly because I just don't get languages.
You know that. It was part of the deal. I walk into your schools, pretend to know the finer points of the English language but mostly spend my time correcting Jew to zoo and chopping off the extra e sound your people put onto words like orange and sheet. (For the last time Korea, it is not orange-ee or sheet-ee. I don't even know where you got sheet-ee from but it has to stop.)
Strangely though, it seems I have to learn your language. Here I was thinking the language of love was universal, but apparently not. Because Korea, I get the feeling that you just don't understand me. Which is fine. I don't really understand you either.
I have become excellent at charades but you and I both know that it is time for that to stop. Mostly because I have a friend coming to see you who was in a relationship with you for about four months ten years ago and she has forgotten more Korean than I will ever know.
Also because I am sick and tired of not knowing what is in my food.
So you win Korea. We said we wouldn't change each other, but this is one battle I am too tired to fight any longer. I'm sucking it up and going to at least pretend to learn your language.
I said pretend because while there are many things you may force me to adapt to, procrastination is one thing you shall never beat out of me. But we shall see. I imagine if you send the building manager in one more time, that will probably force the issue between us.
Yours,
Me xoxox
Blogging | February 20, 2010
Hi Korea,
Don't take this too personally. But I am sad today. Really, heart-wrenchingly empty vessel like sad. And wishing I was anywhere but here.
Well not anywhere. Home. Australia. With my family.
My oma died today. At 5am. She slipped away in her sleep, with flowers on her bedside table and neatly brushed hair.
But not me. I wasn't there.
Which is silly to think about because even if I was in Australia, I don't know if I would have been at her side at that time in the morning. But I like to think that I would have been. She was at my side for all the moments which counted and she supported me in ways I will never be able to thank her for now.
I saw her just one day before I left for you. She was in hospital, having taken a fall at her home and fracturing her pelvis. In what had been becoming more frequent in those last visits, she did not recognise me.
Her mind was in the past by then. I was a five year old little girl, her long-deceased husband was paying regular visits to her and she had lengthy chats with her dead brother and sister.
But she was still my oma. She told me that travel was good for a person's soul and the best education one could give themselves.
She told me that family was not a place but something you took with you and built upon no matter where in the world you were.
She punched the doctor through the curtain which seperated the public hospital beds after he accidently bumped her while examining the patient next to her and then, with innocence in her eyes, she took in his shocked expression and apologised if she had hit him too hard.
She wondered how the woman in the bed across from her had managed to get so fat and then decided to ask her. Loudly and without remorse.
She told me that she didn't know me but she thought I was lovely and when I returned to Australia she would love for me to stay with her and tell me about her travels.
She told me that her beloved third husband Joesph had been an amateur writer and citizen journalist and how proud he would be that her eldest granddaughter had become a reporter.
She then told me that she could not be prouder of all her grandchildren, Alisa the beautiful teacher and Jason, the image of her own son Alex.
And after I had been there for almost two hours and she had begun to tire, she turned to me and in her watery blue eyes was a spark of recognition, one I had not seen for months.
She clutched my hand and told me "Life is hard. You just do what you can. Be healthy, enjoy it and most importantly, be happy. That is the most important thing and we forget. Be happy."
I hope she is happy now Korea. I hope that Joseph came to carry her on, that her siblings Ira and Alex were waiting for her and she knew how loved she was.
Part of me knew that it would be the last time I would see her as I left the hospital that day. I scrambled in my bag for a piece of paper and pen to write down what she had told me. I needn't have bothered. Her words are scored on the heart which is so heavy at her passing.
Selfishly I wanted one last visit with her. I wanted to tell her all the things I had been unable to voice, how much I loved her, how thankful I was for her steadying and guiding influence, how much of the person I am today I owed to her.
But she wouldn't have listened.
She just would have shrugged in her Lithuanian way and offered me something to eat.
So I'm telling her now. Oma, I love you with all my heart and I will make sure that if my family does grow, that they will know you through me. And I will live my life in a way I hope makes you proud.
I am sorry Korea. Today, I just want to be home.
Me
Blogging | February 2, 2010
Dear Korea,
OK. This is a little awkward. So I am just going to come out and say it.
Just as soon as I take a deep breath.
And another one.
Actually, on second thoughts.....no. No, you deserve the truth. We have, after all shared a lot these past five or so months. Honesty is the least I can give you.
So.......my husband is coming to visit.
It's OK though. Really. He is fine with the fact that you and I are having a little romance and has actually expressed a desire to get to know you a little better himself.
To date he has been a one country kinda guy, but as he gets older he is open to a little more....experimentation.
And so with you and me getting along so well, he'd like to give it a try.
A relationship as it were.
With you.
Now, don't freak out. It is not as if we promised each other we'd be exclusive. And I think it will be good for both of you. Honestly. He is very funny. And handsome - I am sure a lot of your ladies will like that. And he really likes spicy foods and long walks. He's not into yoga but he has been known to dance in the rain.
I don't expect you to love each other straight off - but if you could make an effort to get along with him while he is here - well, who knows what could happen?
If you really hit it off, I wouldn't stand in your way. But this is a decision that has to be made between the two of you. I am staying out of it. I may try and nudge you both in the right direction - but really, I can't force chemistry. It is either there or it is not.
So, that's it. I hope you can open your mind enough to at least give this a go. Who knows at the end of the month, you may just part amicably with no ill-will but no desire to see each other again. That's cool. I won't hold it against either of you. I mean, he married me, not the country I am living in. And you took me in on the understanding that it would just be you and me for a while. So if either of you are not feeling it, it's cool.
Having said that, let's not completely discount love at first sight. It has happened.
Anyways, he is arriving on Saturday the 6th at around 11.30am. So if you could maybe put on something nice - you do look great in sunshine - and not give him too much of a cold shoulder (Australia never gets cooler than 10 degrees towards him. I think if you went all ice-princess on him, he might get the wrong idea. I mean, I get it. It's just you and you don't mean it and you are always very warm hearted for a few days after your icy mood. But for my sake - if you could just play nice and not go all Siberia on him?) I think you two will get along fine.
Phew. I do feel better getting that off my chest.
Just think about it.
Yours always (or at least until my visa runs out),
Me xoxoxoxoxoxox
Blogging | February 2, 2010
Dear K,
First of all - thanks for the other night. I had a blast.
The bloom of new love does usually make for some late nights.
But almost six months into our new relationship and the honeymoon phase is yet to end.
You are still shiny and sparkly to me Korea and I hope you never lose your shine.
Although, I will admit, I was less shiny and sparkly the morning after the night before - tumbling into bed at 7.30am on a Sunday does not usually make for my best look.
But I am awake and recovered now - and my voice has come back after all that singing we did together, so really everyone is a winner.
I realised on Monday that my voice had returned while I was on a train.
You may recall that moment. It seemed to cause a lot of mirth with your people. In case you have forgotten, I will refresh your memory.
I was sitting on the train, listening to my iPod and minding my own business while playing solitaire on said iPod when I noticed everyone on the carriage was looking at me.
Really Korea, that was a little rude. Staring like that. But in hindsight, I guess I would have stared too.
I mean how often is it that you see a white woman singing to herself on the train?
Not too often judging by the looks I was getting.
Now obviously, this is not my first time with public humiliation.
My list.....well, I won't bore you with it. I do like to keep the romance alive.
But the last time I suffered humiliation of this type was when I was 20 and riding on a bus in Brisbane.
I looked up and realised I had been singing "I'm like a bird" out loud.
Seriously - personal music players should come with some sort of warning when it picks up your voice singing along.
You are a technological genius - work on that.
But while a bus full of bemused BrisVegas-ites was a slightly humiliating audience, it has nothing on a carriage full of shocked Korean faces.
But only one of those faces looked really red. In face, he couldn't meet my eyes.
And then I realised why. He understood English. And my solo had been to Etta James' "I just want to make love to you."
Now, I did not want to make love to theSoju strange red faced Korean man, but I am pretty sure that he thought I did given that he ran off the train at the next stop.
Ran Korea. Ran.
But the rest of the carriage just sort of settled back to normal having had no idea what I was actually belting out.
And for that I am grateful. Very grateful.
I know that you have your government spending tons of money on English education.
And as an educator in that system, I can tell you that it is not working too well yet.
But that's OK. Because it means I can actually tell people what I am thinking when they stop right in front of me.
I can give the people who walk slow on the escalator or bump into me without saying sorry a piece of my mind.
I can talk about the people around me on the phone to English speaking friends and they have no idea.
I mean sure, when I am at school with my Korean co-teachers I occasionally hear 'Amy" and then have no idea what they are saying.
And most lunch times I am the quietest person on earth, as I sit in a Korean only air space.
But outside of those school walls and I am a one-woman venter.
Or belter-outerer, depending on the occasion or where I am. Like a train carriage for instance.
So thanks again Korea.
Thanks for not really understanding anything I say.
It makes those public humiliation moments a little easier to handle.
Love ya,
Me
xoxoxox
South Korea | January 19, 2010
Dear Korea,
I had to write again and say thank you.
Honestly, I didn't know you listened to me.
I mean, well, I thought that maybe you humoured me and smiled and nodded, but I really didn't think you were taking any thing I said seriously.
And then I wake up this morning and it is 10 degrees outside.
A whole 10 degrees above zero.
Do you know how happy that made me? It was like a belated Christmas present which had been kicked to the back of the room and forgotten about, only found when you pack up the tree and do that massive clean afterwards.
I walked outside wearing four less layers.
I felt so free I did a little dance in the courtyard between all those shops in my neighbourhood.
Yes, maybe your people thought I was a little strange.
And yes, that one woman moved her children away from me.
And I am pretty sure that another one sprinted off to get some sort of authority figure.
(Yes, I know, we have been through that. I do remember the policeman you sent to tell the yellow-haired sir that dancing was norebang yes, street no and for the most part I have tried to limit my dance performances to my own home. For the most part. Sometimes the groove zone comes and I just can't help myself.)
And today, I really couldn't. Help myself that is. I felt free, I felt unburdened. I could lift my arms above my head without fighting the weight of a thermal undershirt, shirt, two jackets and a cape.
So thank you Korea. Today, with your whole 10 degrees you have made me smile. Others might complain about the rain you sent along with it. Not me. Not today.
Stay warm K, stay warm.
Yours in dancing in the street,
Me
xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxox
South Korea | January 18, 2010
Hey K!
How have you been? It has been ages since I last wrote. Yes, I know. Ages. Sorry.
But when one is running around trying to find things to burn just to stay warm it is a little difficult to find time to write to your country.
You've turned very cold towards me Korea and it confuses me.
I mean we were getting along great and then BAM! Minus 20. BAM! Worst winter since records began. BAM! Frizzy hair and scaly skin.
But I have discovered that happiness is one of those little pocket warmer things and a heated subway seat. Genius Korea, total genius.
And as for the scaly skin that I am sure that giant snake in Harry Potter would thumb its nose at, well you have me a solution for that as well.
The amazing adjuma.
I admit that when I first walked into a Korean bathhouse I was a little scared by the overweight women dressed in their finest grandma undies and flopper stoppers but after my first scrub down, I was hooked.
So about once a month, I let a strange woman scrub dead skin off my body for the bargain price of 9000 won.
It's a sort of ritual. I walk in, they laugh at my lack of hair, I try and dodge the flying skin hurtling off the other women lying on the pink plastic tables, they take my money and slap a table, I lie down, they talk about me like I am not there, I tell them I am not Russian, I am Australian, they say "ahhhh Gang-ga-roo" and put their hands in front of them like little roo arms, I smile, they smile and then they take their magic brillo pads to every part of me.
Yes Korea. Every part. I am not sure when you started this little shindig of an idea, but I have to say, it is very effective.
Anyways, usually I am pushed off the table about a half an hour later, slightly dazed by the whole experience and sent on my way.
It's a routine and I like routines.
But then came Amazing Adjuma.
I hadn't seen her there before. I think Korea, you sent her as a little gift because it had been so cold and you knew I needed a scrub down like never before.
I wandered into the scrubbing area and saw my usual woman stand up to greet me.
Then AA stepped in and my usual woman took a step back.
The woman was huge Korea. Sumo Wrestler huge. Huge like an unholy alliance between P Diddy and Simon Cowell's egos huge. Ginormous.
The only part of her which didn't jiggle was her giant Terminator like arms which I am sure had been surgically attached to her body in a laboratory.
And she wanted me on her table.
I think. It was hard to hear her over her hugeness. That and she shot out Korean like a verbal assault weapon.
Eventually you sent a bilingual naked Korean woman to help me.
BNKW - She wants you to sit in the hot pool for 30 minutes.
Me - Oh, I have done that.
BNKW - translates
AA - Pow, pow, pow, pow, bang, bang, pow, wham
BNKW - She wants you to wash off your body paint. Points to tattoos.
Me - Oh, they are not coming off.
BNKW - translates.
AA - Explosions, crashes, cars driving through water barrels, mushroom clouds.
BNKW - I am not going to translate that.
AA slapped the table. I jumped on. She grabbed me by my foot and spun me to the other end of the table.
AA - RUSSAN?
Me - No. Australian.
AA - HARRUMPH
Then she preceded to give me the scrub down of my life. The other adjumas stood clear.
AA was so huge that when she pulled my foot against her for leverage, part of my tootsie actually disappeared inside her stomach folds.
She pulled me around the table by my big toe. My big toe, Korea.
Women in the bathhouse couldn't help but look as the poor white girl was owned by the Amazing Adjuma.
They watched her with a mixture of fear and respect.
She flipped me over and attacked my back. She pulled me off the table by my poor big toe and demanded I shower.
I did. She slapped the shower when some spray hit a woman on another table. I was scared and stopped showering. She then took the shower hose, turned it up and blast me before ordering me back on the table.
She then covered me with a bottle of baby oil and gave me a slap down. I am sure you would call it a massage Korea, but it was a slap down.
Then she spun me around by my big toe so my head was at the other end of the table and washed my hair. AA was annoyed she could not remove my hair from my head and throw it in the washing machine, so she washed it like your mum would when she was angry at your little self.
As she tried to scalp me, I couldn't help but laugh. More Koreans came to watch the crazy westerner laugh in the face of the AA.
For her part AA started laughing too. But in that evil way a Bond villain has. And then she dumped a bucket of water over my head.
Grabbing my big toe again, she pulled me from the table and threw another bucket of water at me.
She then demanded 30,000 won. I paid it. I'll admit I was a little scared Korea. I may have had a foot over her and at least 40 years, but she, well she was Amazing Adjuma.
A glance at the clock told me I had been on her table for more than an hour. It felt like an eternity.
My skin stung from where she had scrubbed off any semblance of heat rash, or any piece of skin which dared form a bump.
AA told me to get out of the spa without getting into any more pools.
She then followed me out and handed me a cotton tip to clean my ears.
And stood there so she could watch that I followed her directions.
Satisfied, AA slapped my back and walked back into the spa.
I don't know if I will ever see her again, Korea.
I don't know if I want to.
My therapist said the nightmares are normal and will fade in time.
I do know that once my skin had healed and the swelling in my big toe had gone down my skin felt incredible.
Like silk.
So thank you AA. I hope it is enough to know that you have touched me in a way I have never before been touched.
And thank you Korea for sending her. But I am not sure if I can handle anymore gifts like that for quite a while.
Stay warm K,
Love me
xxooxx
Louisa Jones is the pen name for a recovering journalist who randomly decided to leave her very understanding and patient husband for a year to randomly live in Seoul.
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