Two weekends ago the face, nay the image, of England came to Korea. And no it wasn’t Margaret Thatcher, although a 24 year-old boy can dream, can’t he? Maybe in heaven Margie, maybe in heaven. In fact, it was Mr. David “Posh Spice” Beckham who came to town to play a little soccer against Seoul FC two weekends ago. It didn’t take much convincing for any of us to fork out a few won (Korean currency) and watch the man who is synonymous for bending the soccer ball. The rest of the L.A. Galaxy was there too, but I am not sure if anyone really noticed. The game was good, although Mr. Beckham really was the main event. People would cheer and yell whenever there was a corner kick and Dave (we’ve got a pretty close relationship, he said Dave, or D-Beck, was okay with him) walked towards the ball and crossed it back into play.
I also witnessed one of the best examples of why I love Asia and perhaps specifically Korea while attending the game. Chuck (a fellow teacher) and I were taking a little break from the action to buy a hotdog (and most likely a beer or three). A little boy, who was no older than 10, went up to the counter in front of us and purchased a hot dog of his own. He seemed very content and excited to eat his food, as all ten-year olds are when it comes to hotdogs. As the boy left we saw the young teenager behind he counter reach into her wallet and pull out the equivalent to a dollar and put it in the cash register. We were curious as to what just happened and inquired. In understandable, but broken English, she explained that the little tot was a dollar short for his frankfurter and she didn’t have the heart to tell him. So, instead of making a scene and telling this little guy that he was short some money, this young woman put a dollar of her own into the till. The remarkable part is, the minimum wage, which she is bound to be making, is $3.50 an hour. So Chuck, being the down-right-decent fellow that he is, balanced the karmic forces of the universe and donated a dollar so that all would be fair. It was the commonality of her gesture that made it remarkable.
The end of February marked the end of the school semester, which meant that many of our students graduated and our teaching schedules were all mixed up. To mark the end of Kelly’s contract and the teaching of two of our favourite classes we decided that we would make a pinata and have a snack party. We spent a few nights at the end of the month, sculpting and perfecting our masterpiece. In the end we were both pretty pleased with our Nemo pinata. The students also had a little going away present for us too. It was a nice day to be a teacher.
This past weekend Chuck and I decided to visit the small town of Gongju as per Lonely Planet’s recommendation. It didn’t have the greatest writeup ever, but it was a quick trip and easy to organize. We made the best of an okay situation.
This dog had a full leg cast on. But what else would you expect in Gongju?
Our first fun experience occurred when we went to get some information at the information booth (slightly redundant I suppose) and the woman behind the glass asked us to come in and edit their very poorly translated brochures. So if you ever find yourself in Gongju attending the Baejek festival and start reading about the “rich history and cultural breadth of the Baejek people” than you’ll know who wrote it. I think I might have to try and work that into my resume somehow too: International Information Consultant has a nice ring.
Being a small town, we were a little unsure where the nightlife and the popular people might be hanging out. After careful deliberation we decided that the bowling alley must be where all the hip “peeps” would be. We saw a giant bowling pin on the top of a building when we got into town and headed back there later on in the evening. Usually I wouldn’t mention the number of beers I’ve had, but I think it is important to know that we had been drinking steadily all day. We walked into the 6 story building and started asking people where the bowling alley was. A few people told us that there was no longer an alley in the building, but that didn’t satisfy us. So we got our MacGyver on and decided that we could probably find the bowling alley that didn’t exist. We went up a few floors and decided that this was a residential building and it seemed unlikely that there would be a lane on, or above, where people lived, so we headed to the basement. There was no sign of business occurring down there, but we were certain there must be one, so we started to open doors. We opened one door that was slightly ajar, poked our head in, said “hello” and were motioned to enter by the two women in the room. They showed us to the only table in the middle of the room. At the time we thought we were in a restaurant without any reason to think differently. There was no menu, signs on the wall or any pictures so we started to name off any Korean food we could think of. “Dong Kaus?” “Dulsot bibimbap?” Nope. But they did have kimchi jiggae, which is a spicy soup. We sat down and a little girl in her pyjamas came and joined us. She was the cutest child I’ve ever seen, I think the accompanying photo will attest to this. She said “hello” to us in English and then Chuck and I started teaching her how to respond and properly annunciate “How are you?” and “I am fine thank you.” After a while she got an English book out and we started reading her a bedtime story. One of the women was on the (home) computer beside the dining room table and the other was in the kitchen cooking us up a feast. The two of us ate the best jiggae we’ve had and shot the shit for about an hour in there. We said our goodbyes, and paid 10,000 won for our meal, although there was no register.
We woke up the next morning and started asking some questions. It didn’t take long for us to conclude that we actually weren’t in a restaurant. We just opened a door in a residential complex, sat down and started ordering food at a person’s house. If you ever come to Korea you’ll realize if a restaurant doesn’t have bibimbap, than it’s not a restaurant. These kind women just started making us whatever food they had in their house and then quoted us a reasonable rate for their time, effort and grub. And that’s why you should never drink all day long. Then again, maybe that’s why you should drink all day long. It’s a tad debatable I suppose.
This room had a 1000 pint-sized bronze Buddhas. It was like ice cream for your eyes.
Erotically and Exotically,
Yub-ba-say-Dro
P.S. I installed a program some time ago that is able to track who comes to my blog and how they get there. Since early November, 4 people have come across my site by entering “Korean urinal.” Some other interesting searches have been “camera room sex noraebang” and “hillary clinton fundraiser in korean museum.” I should probably try and work that into my resume somehow too.
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