A Moving Experience; Part I

So,

With Yvonne gone... betraying me and leaving me here alone in Korea, all of a sudden I was left with a three bedroom apartment and a gigantic rent. The first month she was gone I spent cleaning the aparment up and tossing out things I no longer needed as well as walking (by backpack) the things I did need (the microwave was an adventure in itself). Finally, I was in a spot where I could give notice to the Ajjumah, so after finding a small rooftop (sort of) in Mapo-gu I did. That weekend the landlady came up into the apartment and pointed out what she wanted to keep, that we had added to the furniture that was already there. This included two desks, a really nice bookcase, kitchen table, four chairs, and some kind of thingie that keeps kitchen stuff. We agreed that the nasty old mattress and the broken bureau should go.

I could have stayed until the 9th, but my new lease began on the 1st, and I wanted to give the landlady time to re-do the floor and wallpaper (a pretty normal procedure because it means you don't need to fix any real underlying problems like mold, or problems with the floor). So I told the old lady I'd try to finish moving on my three-day weekend.  On Monday, the third, the dickhead son shows up without warning and decides all the furniture has to go (completely reversing all the planning I had made with his mother the weekend before), and that it has to go right then (even though I'm not technically supposed to move out for a week) - typical Korean "fuck planning! WE DO NOW!").

This meant that I'd have to move all the shit downstairs. This I did alone - the prissy little dickhead of a son beamed, gave me two gloves saying "Korea working glove, best!" a process that exhausted his English. Then the lazy POS just watched me. Then it was off to the district office to fill out the recycling center to fill out the paperwork. In the car he attempted, in is broken English, to figure out someone as apparently out of shape as I am could so easily manhandle the furniture. I didn't mention that gravity had been my strong assistant and since I didn't care a shit if the stuff got dinged up it wasn't so much a "moving" as a semi-controlled fallling.

All this unplanned bullshit took the afternoon that I was supposed to be moving away to the new place, and cost a few paltry bucks in recycling (in this way, Korea is awesome. For less than 40 bucks they hauled it all away). Worse than the waste of this entire day was the additional "oh yeah, fuck you foreigner and your stupid foreign plans") way, that I had to be there in the morning to pull the recycling into the street - when I was supposed to be in a meeting with two Korean professors.

Complete freaking lack of planning by a complete moron.

At the same time, on the other side of town, the guy in my new place is freaking out, because he needs me to inspect the place for cleanliness and get the key, or he can't get his deposit back - and he needs it to apply immediately to his next house. The landlady for the new place is in Busan, so she can't check it out, and consequently I have to make it over there to get the next step done.

Finally, as night falls, all the bullshit with mama's boy ends and I cab over to the new place and take the keys, and call the landlady and tell her the place is fine. In fact, the place is filthy.. the dude has no idea what cleaning is. Here are are a few representative before and after photos (Click to Embiggen)..

Above the sink (before) covered with mold

After, the miracle of soap having been applied 

Behind Stove

Under Stove

The Miracle Of Soap

Random Smudges on Floor Previous Tenant could not see.

First Swipe... still need to work the baseboards and to the right.

So there was that, and the process of cleaning continues as I move things around and get the big stuff done. The place is quite cold, as you will shortly see, so I've been concentrating more on getting the place to stay warm, than to be completely clean.

TOMORROW - INSIDE THE THING.....

Sweet Potato Pie in the Sky!

M9636y first or second (in chronological order) favorite student 서유미 came to the literary event and brought me a gift of sweet potatoes.

Which, being out of town, I could not get to until tonight. However... grabbed me some of them taters:

Chopped them hard and gave them a bit of a baking/boiling.



In a pan did onions, mushrooms,

and some super common Korean vegetable I cannot name.. but it looks like this:

And when that was all cooked..

Mmmmmmmmmm...

Korean food... don't live with out it.

Thanks SYM!

aaah... so after Yvonne left for the Empire in Decline I drank until the weekend and then through it. The place was pretty boring without her and alcohol does consume time, if even at the cost of a few brain cells and more notches back out the belt.

That became pretty damned boring and mornings horrible. So Monday I began going back into work (even though there still wasn't hot water to shower and the electricity was only on in half of the apartment - thank god the half of the electricity with the AC). Work provided me with good entertainment as I had to work on a paper co-written with two other professors about the difficulty of translating allusions from a minor culture to a major one. This took all the way til the last day, the Friday, and the time working on things was good. Still, boring at home, as the weekend reminded me, and I was still trying to get the smell out of the refrigerator from the rotted food (dating back to when we returned from China to find 0 electricity, a nightmare I have skipped right over). I was mopey even though I was busy.

Last week we began another paper, so again there was stuff to do, and when the weather was good I walked in and out of work to try to keep the Vitamin D and endorphins and what not swirling. This was all good til Friday when I got utterly drenched in a sonagi of epic proportions. It blew in, blew up, blew away, and left me a rag. I had all my electronics double wrapped so they were safe, but the clothes weren't. LOL.. I ran from bus stop to bus stop catching them when I could and scurrying to the next stop when I had to. Inconvenient, but rain in 30 degrees is actually refreshing, and it was my pride hurt more than anything else.

It all cleared up so Saturday I could go shopping & take a nice long walk prefaced by a bibimbap breakfast. These were involved, as I walked the Itaewon/Gyeongnidan loop to the cheapest store around and then lay down for 20 minutes that turned into a 2-hour, drooling, snoring sleep. Woke up logy, but had an academic event to go to. Skidded down the hill and had a piece of pizza for dinner (first piece of remotely unhealthy food this week) and got to the place with 10 minutes to spare. Kept circling where it should be according to the map(s) and only kept ending staring at the Finance Center. IM'd the organizer, and I was in the wrong part of town. By now the event was 30 minutes over, and my nap-head had cleared, so I didn't want to go a lecture on the Joseon Dynasty and its architecture. IM'd my regrets and headed for the 405 before remembering in the other direction, the 402 would drop me off just above my house, without need to walk uphill or take the maul bus. Start toward Deoksu Palace, beyond which lay the bus stop.. and thought I heard a burst of electric guitar and bass.

It quickly went away. But when I passed Seoul City Hall/Library I saw a massive setup for a drum show. Not much going on, but I thought I'd wait, the night was nice and people were being cool. Then, early, a high-school rock-band jumped on-stage and began playing an odd bit of the old rock n roll. And I mean *really* old rock n' roll... like this (Note particularly, the old dude at the end who was drumming along - he was mad into it and went spectacular when the drums went solo):


I even stayed as they played "Hold the Line (Love isn't Always on Time). You don't really realize how many "L's" are in that song until you hear a Korean try to sing it.

Quite a few, actually

Still, they were quite palette cleansing as was the next chant/drum bit... but when the drum circle came out I began to have Grateful Dead flashbacks and had to get the hell out of there. The 402 bus came just 2 minutes after I hit the bus stop, and I flew home. Began work on my video for the LTI Korea contest. Super Productive day.

Today downloaded an album that only had one seeder (so I feared disconnecting as the dude hadn't been online for days. Once that concluded went out for coffee and writing, and walked down to the Hangul museum to give it a full look. Pretty nice and I'll be talking about in on www.ktlit.com tomorrow, for anyone interested. Content and lots of glitz for the kiddies. Also went over to the bookstore of the national museum, bo make sure something I'm already certain of, that they wouldn't have any fiction for sale for foreign visitors (something I did see in China, and that caused me to buy a book of Chinese fiction - haven't started reading it or anything^^ but I do have it and will someday read it). Of course, even though the Hangul Museum had an entire floor dedicated to the writing process and a cafeteria/book/Made in China store?  No books.

Again the god of city busses was with me, whisked home, light cleaning, and sorting the photos from the last few days. Turned the fridge back on, and now it smells of bleach not rot (I suppose I'll have to swish that out next week or so), but for the moment can hold vegetables again, which is "A Good Thing I Suppose!"

I think I'm getting into the swing of this bachelor thing. Next big trauma... move to smaller place. At least it can be put off til after Yvonne swings through again and when she leaves I have to repeat the cycle described above.^^

The Park outside my front-door is prettier than yours^^

Walking over Namsan to work today and the Ajjeoshi have been busy planting (All photos can be embiggened by clicking)...

Flowers that would never naturally sit next to each other

The Korean "Azalea"

Tulips (They are original to Korea, doncha know?^^)

The occasional potted plant^^

More flowers..

And a shot of Seoul Tower I should have taken when the trees were covered with blossoms (and with a phone better than an iPhone 4^^)

All this splendid beauty will last about one more week, until the jangma comes. Alas.

Another Day in Pure Land Buddhism

Wandering around the campus today trying to find the hunger striker rumored to be in the monument to Buddha. Couldn't find him, but with Buddha's birthday coming up I was able to snap a photo of the three elephants in the quad with lanterns rampant.

Also.. did find a different protester, a student who has built a small encampment on the top of one of the lights on our outdoor basketball court. Like the phantom hunger-striker, the student is protesting against the totally botched presidential succession process (in, what, month 3?) here at Buddhist U. He promises not to come down until the problem is solved.

The sign on the left says to rebuild democracy (or democratically) and the sign on the right says not (or do not), but as the sign is twisting in the wind, I can't see what is not to be done.

Fun campus.^^

Flashback Friday

The trip of 1000 miles begins in the martini monkey bar, at least at San Jose International airport. And I didn’t take my anti-psychotic drugs so my stomach should be in a fine acid-fueled frenzy by the time I hit Houston, much less land 4 hours later in Harlingen (completely non) International airport.

I went and found my gate.. passed the security check without a hitch.. and discovered that there was no bar once you passed security. So I had to pass back out of the secured area in search of a drink. No doubt this will ensure that I will have to undergo a complete cavity search on the way back in. While I will enjoy this to the fullest, I think it is also proof that the terrorists have already won.

The martini monkey (monkey martini?  I’m too lazy to stagger outside and check) bar features an odd combination of reggae tunes and truly bizarre retro covers of classic rock – think The Doors covered by a cocktail lounge band and you’re getting close. “Come on baby light my fire” just doesn’t sound as convincing coming out over the desultory tinkling of a melody-murderess playing a thin piano.

Or perhaps I have expectations that can’t be met. And maybe that is what this particular trip is about. Escape from work as it just seems completely wrong to give a flying fuck if the incompetent can teach the ineducable the idiotic. Why should I care if more morons flock to De Anza to sooth their fever dreams of success through education? It’s all the same system, and I suppose it keeps a few people out of jail.. god knows it is much cheaper than our jail system.. anyway, this kind of existential navel-gazing can, I know, be destroyed by alcohol, so I think I will have me another beer.

Gack! Now we have a reggae-based cover of a classic tune. I can recognize the tune but can’t even begin to name it. Sounds like a drum-beat ripped from “Little Drummer Boy”..

Aah.. “All I need is the air that I breathe.”  A terrible enough song when it was performed the first time (I have a hard time giving it the credit that saying it was “written” would confer).

To add to the unreality, there’s a tv in the corner with the sound turned off and a dyslexic in charge of the captioning…  they just referred to someone’s bout with cancer as “a testicular Kansaser.”  Glad now that I’m not traveling to Kansas.

And a news flash from the war on people.. Minnesota reports that corporate profits have hit an all-time high while corporate tax receipts are declining. Bush’s work is done, I suppose… Minnesotans in positions of authority are “confused” by this news, since to understand it would be to admit that they have sold their constituents down the dirty river with a combination of tax-cuts, relaxations of protective regulations, and the slow gutting of unions… 

Anyway, that’s merely a diversion from the “what the heck am I doing?” question. Closely related to the “what’s wrong with drinking and reading your life away?” question.  And the “why work?” question which flows naturally from the previous two questions.

And then… then.. while in the bathroom I hear the redoubtable bass line to “Watching the Detectives” and it’s also coated in a nasty piano and string treatments.  My world has ended.

And even almost 3 hours of napping on the flight to Houston could not bring it back. This may be because I woke up in the land of the processed hair and twang. Maybe, maybe not. It could just be me.  I sit here in the margarita bar at Chili’s trying not to drink another damned beer, but probably certain to do it.

And now the flight to Harlingen. Did get to observe a bunch of angry people, pissed off about previous flights and taking it out on current airline employees, or heating up on big old plates of nachos and bitching about their close personal friends and relatives…

Ya gotta love people, as some 1970s song once posited. Or negatived.

I can’t be certain.

Why I love Korea #3027

Because someone invented soju-based toothpaste!

OK.. not really.. but sure looks like it.^^

Strangely? I will likely not be surprised.

Random click-baiting for an article

LOL.. why in the name of Gawd would Adolph Hitler's past surprise me?  Did he work for a Jewish charity? I thought pretty much everything was known?

Day Five - Not very exciting

Shopping, massage, and the trance-dance/fire show. 

The first two just as you'd think they would be, and then during lunch the power went out in Ubud. Inconvenient timing as I hadn't been to the bank, but up at the top of town there was a bank that was running on generator and somehow also had a satellite connection, so the ATM's could work - other places had generators, but were apparently reliant on local Internet relaying that was also down.

With money in hand, we watched the show, which was interesting, though not what we expected from a "fire dance", with a lot more narrative and chanting about the course of true love and the devil's interference with it. Again, cool dancing. Then a short but awesome segment of some dude in bare-feet kicking burning

coconut shells around and stomping on their embers.

Power finally came on, so a quick dinner, and then back to the hotel.

See.. not very exciting

I bet you wish you had that 3 minutes back.^^

Dinner by Torchlight

.

Tour-ette's Syndrome "Bali-Bali is NOT "bbali-bbali"!

Day 4 of full tourism was spent on a, tour, because if you don't put the 'tour' in 'tourism,' what do you have?

We got up for a pre-tour breakfast and the lovely fellows who run the hotel had made us something special to mark our anniversary, Balinesian pancakes, mangos, strawberries, and a scoop of ice-cream, all formed into the shape of a heart. Yvonne was entirely swoony about the breakfast, though not so much that she didn't despatch it with great vengeance and furious anger.

Then, into the shuttle bus (this time it was only the two of us), and off to a painting cooperative, wood-carving place, and silversmith. Here we bought a few things (no doubt earning our driver a bit of a kickback), and then piled back into the van to head to the Museum of Natural History (I think?) in Denpasar. On the way, it began to rain furiously, at points flooding the road. Snug in the van, we just enjoyed how it changed the scenery.

The Museum was pretty ordinary, and for the first time here we were kind of hounded by an artist/tout who wanted to sell us an Indonesian calendar for 20 dollars. What he thought I'd do with an Indonesian calendar was unclear, though he vigorously lobbied for it.

Then, the traffic jam from Hell and the decision to cut out the visit to "white sandy beach" in order to make sunset in a temple on the ocean, and then dinner on the beach. Even cutting the one destination, were were at least 2 hours in a traffic jam, part of which was caused by a police action that inexplicably stopped traffic on one of the main arteries downtown.

The temple was cool, if overrun by Chinese tourists, who make Korean queuing and walking behaviors seem highly civilized, and one stupid young woman even got into a threat/fight with one of the local monkeys, which the monkey won in resounding fashion, screeching and baring his teeth, which caused the girl to almost fall over in her retreat from the concrete path to the dirt.

We waited for a sunset that was pretty obscured by clouds, and then high-tailed it out ahead of the people watching the fire-dance (we have tickets to a local version for tonight) and off to the beach, which was quite nice. The tables were on the sand, there was traditional Indonesian mask-dancing, one of which was really awesome. It features super-scary music with a gamelan, drums, and some other instruments I couldn't name. There was a 5-6 note central riff that almost sounded like the tune to a children's sing along, but it was surrounded by menacing (think Sympathy for the Devil) drumming, and slightly off tone music surrounding it. The dancer was also wearing some amazing vibrating extend-fingernails, and the whole thing was quite chilling, though for all I know to Indonesians it was the innocent story of young love.

Tragically, no photos of that until I return to the homeland.. I took them with the iPhone, and can't find a decent software to get them on Yvonne's computer (and dare not call down roaming charges).  Instead, below, find pictures of three more monkeys.

It was a seafood restaurant, so Yvonne ordered steak and beef sate.^^

Back to the hood for one drink, exchange of gifts (all carved wood, since it was our wood anniversary) and then sleep, as we were both still pretty burnt from the previous day.