Bupyeong/Bucheon

Basically I've called Bupyeong and Bucheon home for the past two years, and I was pleasantly surprised to find a few videos on youtube about both of them. Have a look:

Bupyeong:



Bucheon:

"Alrigh Lads, We Nee'a Talk"

<--Deokjeokdo. defn. A small Korean island near Incheon. Well known for its inaccessibility, fishing industry, minbaks (small "motels" where you sleep on the floor) and attractiveness to loudmouthed drunkards.

I had all of last week off and so for the second of the bookending weekends me and some buddies decided to head over to Deokjeokdo for soju soaked good times. We got that, sorta.

Friday night was Canada Buddy's last night open for business at its old location, and all shots of liquor were discounted. I decided to celebrate by trying one of each, including the mythical Bacardi 151, and long story short I didn't last very long.

I also woke up Saturday with a hangover the size of Montana. So the ferry ride over wasn't much fun.

But by the time we got there I was more or less in the spirit of things and the day/night went according to plan. Drinks were had, games were played, people were met, bonfires on the beach were lit, etc etc. There were incidents, there always are, but nothing extraordinary.

Having lost the other two (lightweight) members of our party around 3 or 4 Dave and I staggered back to our minbak and collapsed beside them. They were awoken, still drunk, and eventually we forsook slumber in lieu of bombastic conversation.

Earlier in the day Bryce (who, let it be said, in a bombast competition would probably place well) had brought up the movie Dumb & Dumber and specifically some moment in it when someone screams "Gaaaaaaaary!!" funnily. He'd been doing it all night. I guess you had to be there. Anyway, a few hours before the cock was set to crow he'd been screaming it over and over again in our room, and we'd matched him with inadequate interpretations and general mirth and whatnot.

So when I slipped open the door to our room and stood just outside to smoke a cigarette, and when the conversation continued unmuffled, a neighboring door did the same and from it emerged a very blonde, very British, very pissed off young lady who stomped over to me, thrust her wiry finger in my face and accused me and my cohorts of keeping the whole place awake all night (justly, I might add). I countered with the ineffective "c'mon, we're just trying to have a good time," which she volleyed back to me by way of some sort of cockney defamation, which was immediately seized upon by the Mississippian Bryce as indecipherable and idiotic. The confrontation was then escalated by the insertion of curse words and of Chloe, a sizable Irish lass I'd once before pleasantly greeted and conversed with but who can apparently go from zero to cunt pretty fast. Anyway, there was shouting and whatnot but we backed down and went back inside.

But it wasn't over yet.

At this point I would hasten to remind the reader that I was drunk, and thus not fully accountable for what happened next.

We continued our conversation in our room, at first quietly discussing the problems we had with Chloe in specific, and then less quietly discussing the problems we had with her country in general. We knew she was sitting right outside, well within earshot, and it must be said provoking her wasn't far from our minds. Or should I say: mine. Anyway, some things I recall saying, a bit too loudly:

"Fuck all you potato eatin micks."
"Fuck Bono and his stupid fucking glasses."
"Fuck that snake scaring motherfucking St. Patrick."

And so on. At the time, it was hilarious. It became less funny when our door slid open.

Chloe it seemed, despite being no belle of the ball, was not traveling alone, and into our tiny room walked four or five husky Irishmen. "Alrigh Lads, We Nee'a Talk," said the ringleader. "Oh, fuck," thought I. "Let's step outsi'a," he said. And so we did.

To quote Martin Short: "here's where the story gets weak." There was no fighting. There wasn't even any pushing. Hell, we hardly argued. In fact, instead of bludgeoning each other, we sat down at the courtyard table and finished off a bottle of tequila. I daresay we even became friends, well...at least polite acquaintances.

Eventually everyone staggered off to sleep (except for me, what can I say, I have the stamina of an ox) and I took this picture. Jodie, the ringleader and first into our room can be seen slumped over in his chair, passed out on Jose Cuervo.


All in all, not a bad night.

JIFF, part the second

I saw four movies while in Jeonju, three of them were good, if not great; all four were memorable, if not necessarily for the right reasons.


First up was a Romanian film called California Dreamin'. It was the story of an American Army communications unit that gets stranded in a small town whilst enroute to the conflict in Bosnia circa the late 90s. The starry eyed locals and the indifferent passers-through get up to all sorts of hijinks you can probably imagine for yourself, in the end the Americans leave the town in the throes of a civil war (metaphor, anyone?) and more or less worse off than they were before their idyllic existence was violated by the Americans. It was alright, just too erratic and poorly acted for my tastes.


The acting was definitely better in the second movie I saw, 'In the Valley of Elah,' which was also a story about American soldiers albeit with a much more somber perspective than the first film. The "Valley of Elah" was the setting for the biblical battle between David and Goliath, and our film's David is Tommy Lee Jones, the father of an Iraq War Veteran who was murdered by his colleagues shortly after returning from the war. The Goliath of the picture is the military infrastructure which attempts to thwart his investigation into the murder. It was really well acted and pretty touching, a bit slow at times maybe, and tho I'm no Iraq War fan even I at times thought it was a bit over-the-top anti-American (especially the final scene) but all in all it was the best film of the four.


Another film I'd heard good things about but hadn't been able to catch on the internet or at Yongsan was this one, 'Jessie James.' I liked it. Again, the acting was good, and again, parts of it were pretty moving, but it was a bit too in love with the idea of itself to be great. I really enjoy the whole "anti-Western" motif, tho, and what was so striking and memorable for me about this flick was how there were no heroes and no perfect characters - everyone had a dark side.


The last film I saw was the one I was most excited about, which possibly contributed to why it was such a disappointment for me. I love zombie movies. Love the hell outta them. Would marry them if I could. And George Romero is the king of zombie movies, and we're not talking about someone who's cred rides on what he did in the 70s (hello! Wes Craven), he's made good stuff lately. But this ain't good. The script is so awful, the lines are so flatly delivered, and the acting is so terrible that I just couldn't get into it. I'm willing to forgive quite a lot in a zombie movie (heck I even enjoyed one or two of the seemingly writer-less Resident Evil movies) but the problem with this movie was the writing was so upfront and so message-driven. Instead of killing fucking zombies in all sorts of gory ways the motley crew of 20 somethings and their surly whiskey swillin' philosophy professor scamper around the Pennsylvania countryside debating the nature of the media. "Is something real if it's not on TV?" "We live in an age where everything can be seen everywhere by everyone." "You have to keep filming or it doesn't exist." Blah blah blah. Shut. The. Fuck. Up. And. Kill. Some. Fucking. Zombies!

All in all tho, no regrets, I enjoyed the heck outta Jiff.

JIFF, part the first

This is a long weekend in Korea, with Monday being Children's Day or Buddha's Birthday or some other bullshit holiday which I can't specifically recall. So, too, is next weekend. This fortuitous arrangement of the stars means those of us in the public employ have the whole week off.

Friday, for me, also happened to be a half day because my students are taking exams. So when I'd finished my "work"day at 12 I scrambled over to the Incheon bus terminal and hopped on the next bus for Jeonju. Why?

JIFF - the Jeonju International Film Festival. There are quite a few film festivals here in the Korea, and my attempts to attend them previously have all met with something less than success. I spent one frantic Sunday afternoon with Dave rushing back and forth to theaters learning about all the different ways Koreans can say "sold out" during the Bucheon festival. And tho I've wanted to attend the more renowned Busan Film Festival both of my years here in the Korea, there've been calendar conflicts both times. (<--That's Jeonju, btw, and yes, it looks like everywhere else in Korea, too.) So when I read about this on-line, and saw the lineup of films being shown, I wasted no time getting my azz down there. I'll go through the films I saw in a later post, let me instead herein relay why I'm home on Sunday evening, a full day or two earlier than I'd planned on returning.

The trip down was cake. No problems. And when I walked out of the Jeonju bus terminal there was an information booth that was 1)actually manned by someone and 2)manned by someone who could speak English pretty well and helped me with maps/directions. Friday night I had no trouble getting to a theater, seeing a movie I wanted to see, getting a room for the night at one of the dozens of motels surrounding the bus terminal(s), getting dinner, etc etc.

But then came Saturday. I was planning on seeing four films Saturday, and I didn't have any real trouble getting tickets or getting around during the day. I saw a film at 2, at 8, and then at midnight. The midnight show was a triple feature, and I'd planned on staying for the first two. But the first film was so horrible and I was so exhausted by the time it was over I decided to hop in a taxi and head back to the motel district.

So, I jump in. "Odi kasayo?" he says.
W:"Bus-uh terminal ka jusayo."
TD:"Mwo bus-uh terminal?"
W:"Han-bon."
TD:"Mwo yo?"
W:"Hangul mal ul chal molayo."
TD:"(Angry sigh)"
W: "Cham ship man yo. (Desperately searching pockets for map) Igo ka yo. Igo yo."
TD: "Igo mwo ae yo?"
W: "Han bon bus-uh terminal kinchinayo. Da kinchinayo."
TD: "(mumbling curses)"

Let me translate: "Where to?" he says.
Wayne: Bus terminal go to please.
Taxi Driver: What bus terminal?
Wayne: Number 1!
Taxi Driver: Uh, what?
Wayne: Korean well I don't know.
Taxi Driver: Egads, I hate dealing with ignorant foreigners.
Wayne: Little time give me. (pointing to map) This go to. This!
Taxi Driver: What is this?
Wayne: Number 1 bus terminal it's ok. Everything's ok!
Taxi Driver: Fucking jackass.

Well anyway eventually we got there. I was so relieved when I stepped out of the taxi. I was going to get my bag which I'd stored in the terminal lockers, get a motel room, get a bottle of soju and have some fun with channel 18 on Korean cable. I was less relieved when I noticed that the bus terminal, which I was sure had to be open 24 hours, was as dark as a cloudy night and as empty as a baby's head. That meant no bag. Well, so what, I'll just get it in the morning and use the motel's toiletries. I was even less relieved, however, when I started down motel alley behind the bus terminal and noticed, oddly enough, that everything was dark. The familiar hum of the neon lights upsayo.

Now, I've been around the block. I've been to more than my fair share of Korean cities. I've arrived late, much later than the time it was then (around 2AM). And I have never known motels to shut down so early. Let alone all of them. I was surrounded by a good two dozen motels, all of them as accessible to me at the moment as the moon.

Well, ok, no problem I thought. I'll just find a sauna and spend the night there. I've done that a few times, and tho it's less comfortable than sleeping in a bed, it also happens to be much cheaper. So I started walking. And walking. And walking. No saunas. No motels. More walking. More walking. Still no saunas. No motels.

Finally, in the distance I see neon lights that read, in Korean, "Mo-something." It must be another motel district, I thought. So even tho it was a good mile away I kept walking. And once I got closer, sure enough, I could make out this "district" was comprised of two motels sitting side by side. I approached.

I got close. 200 yards away, the first one flicked its lights off. Shit. I started running. I made it to the second one before they closed for the night, dashed in, and encountered two crooked backed helmonis. "Hana olmaeyo?" (One how much?) "Derka derka upsa." (We don't have a room.) Cackling laughter. "You fucking dried up cunts." Ok, I thought that, didn't say it.

I walked back onto the street. I was in the middle of nowhere, with no prospects for finding a place to lay my weary head. Ok, I thought, I'll go back to the party district, maybe there'll be something there, if not I'll find a PC room and hunker down until morning.

To try and cut this already way too long story short, I did make it back to the party area, I did find a PC room, wherein I was able to search for saunas online and discover where one was, which I was able to reach in a taxi and where I spent a more or less restless 4 hours until morning.

The film I'd wanted to see most was showing Sunday afternoon (Francis Ford Coppolla's latest, Youth Without Youth) but I was so exhausted I headed back to the bus terminal (after some trouble, again, communicating which terminal I wanted to go to) to retrieve my bag.

I get there. It's open. I go to the locker. I type in my number. It says I owe another buck. I try to put it in. It won't take my money. I try again. Still won't take it. I try all different variations in coin, it won't work. I try my key. It won't open. My shit is stuck in there. All of my clothes, my cell phone, everything is irretrievable. I approach someone for help. She tries. It still won't work. We approach an employee of the bus terminal. She doesn't know what to do. Someone else tries. It still won't work. Finally, this helpful college student comes over and figures out we need to push one more button.

Yes! I've got my stuff. I buy coffee for everyone who's helped me with the locker and then go buy a ticket for home. "Chigum derka derka yo," says the clerk. ("The bus is leaving now.") I look at my ticket. Sure enough, it says 7:40, and so does my watch. I race downstairs to where the buses are departing just in time to see the Incheon bus, my bus, pulling away. I start chasing it, duffel bag flopping on my back ridiculously. I bang on the bus's side. It stops, praise Jeebus. I get on to the half empty bus, filled with cackling adjumas, pointing and staring at me.

You fucking dried up cunts, I think.

Crazy Cows

Do you live in America? Do you eat beef a few times a week (I know you do, because Koreans have informed me that Americans eat cheeseburgers every day)? Did you know that you're taking an awful risk?

Well, you are. American beef is dangerous. So dangerous, in fact, that ever since President Lee Myung Bak lifted the S Korean ban on it the threat to the Korean people has been the number one story on the news. Not, you know, surging oil prices, or the sinking Korean economy, or the Chinese shenanigans surrounding the Olympics, but rather the dire and deadly threat posed by American beef. So dangerous that hundreds of people held a candlelight vigil in downtown Seoul the other night, not for some recently-tragically departed young person or some moral social agenda, but because Koreans now have the option of eating American beef again.

Maybe I'm in a bad mood. Maybe it's that one of my students blurted out "fucking USA" in class the other day. Maybe it's the succession of anti-American sentiment I encountered at the Jeonju Film Festival (see a later post). But it seems to me the media in this country will seize any opportunity they get to try and whip up anti-American hysteria, and I'm a little sick of it.

Some other US/Korea beef stories:
No government officials likely to eat US beef on TV
One million Korean netizens favor impeachment because of beef controversy

The World's Greatest Intellectuals

Foreign Policy magazine is conducting a readers' poll which I just participated in, asking who are your 5 favorite public intellectuals (iow: smart people who go on TV and get published in something with the word "Times" in its name). I basically voted for the people I knew something about and liked, not that there's anything wrong with that - that's the basic idea, unfortunately of the 100 options listed I only knew who about 20 of them were. Well, that's the problem with democracy after all, that the ignorant get to vote alongside the educated. The five I selected all happen to be minor heroes of mine (the last being the only living man I'd call "my" hero) so I thought it was blog-worthy.

Anyway, my list, in no particular order:

Umberto Eco - author of one of my favorite novels (Foucault's Pendulum) and a linguistics/literature/history essayist
Gary Kasparov - the greatest chess player who ever lived who's currently a liberal activist/politician in Russia
Noam Chomsky - basically the one man who speaks truth to power in American politics
Richard Dawkins - author of the amazing "The God Delusion" and the best public atheist out there
Christopher Hitchens - my personal hero, atheist, ex-Trotskyist, damned neo-conservative/Iraq war supporter, scathing wit

Erection Day Kraziness

One thing I will definitely miss about Korea is the random drunken (usually) craziness of the place. This is a country where piss-drunk old guy is a legitimate and substantial demographic subset.

Which brings me to a story. I had yesterday, Wednesday, off because of, as one of my co-teachers put it, "Big Assembly Erection Day." Ok so I added the "big" there, but the rest is true. Koreans and their troubles with "r," another thing I'll miss.

Anyway I went into Seoul with Joey and we wound up at Hooters in Gangnam, then eventually returned to Bucheon and shared a pint or six at the local speak easy over a chessboard. Us two and the two bar-gals were the only ones there for most of the evening, until 10ish or so when in came a solitary drunken adjoshi of about 60 or so.

I knew he was trouble as soon as I saw him because he was "walking" like one of the zombies in Night of the Living Dead. He more or less ignored us and approached Spung Jee, the owner of the bar. He started saying something weird and loud which we later figured out was meant to be "what's up?" but which sounded sort of like "wherz op?" Anyway she eventually started talking to him in Korean and asked him to leave. Of course he wouldn't.

By this point he was trying to get our attention and kept asking us over and over again "wherz op?" and "djyu speech Engarish?" We ignored him. So he started trying other languages. All he really knew how to do apparently was count in four or five languages, most of them I couldn't really figure what they were but I did catch it when he counted to five in Spanish and French. Why of course he felt compelled to do this I can't say.

Eventually the police were called and they were surprisingly punctual and effective. They confronted him, asked him to leave, and when he refused they escorted him out, but not before he surprisingly made an attempt to lunge at me for some reason. I can't say why, as I'd ignored him during his whole multilingual tirade, but maybe that's the reason why. I dunno.

Anyway, I'm gonna miss that kind of shit.

Geumchon

I was directed to the following video and thought it was pretty good. It sums up the Korean-waygookin experience pretty well, I think.

Plus, I really dig the adjumma visors they're wearing. Check it out-

Kickin it in Geumchon

Free Tibet? Really?

Like most people, I don't really give two shit's about Tibet. Perhaps that sounds too harsh. All I really mean to say is that it's not on my radar screen at all. I don't get up in the morning and think "I wonder what's happening in Lhasa today." But thanks to the inordinate amount of free time my current position affords me, I've been able to follow the news coming out of there lately. If you don't know, there have been all sorts of protests centering around Tibetan independence day and depending on who you trust more either a dozen or nearly 100 rebels or freedom fighters have been killed.

Again, like most people, I think if a group of people want their independence, and if they have a separate culture, language, religion, etc etc...well, then, they should have it. But I also recognize it's not always that simple. One need look no further than the history of my own country to see that.

It's a complex question, and as such I was really interested in the video below. Depending on your POV it's either Communist propaganda or an honest re-evaluation of Chinese and Tibetan history. I'm not educated on the subject so I really can't render a thoughtful opinion, but if I can borrow from Stephen Colbert and trust my gut over the facts then I'd have to say I'm inclined towards the former of those two possibilities.

Flat Stanely

I recently had a visitor here in the Korea. My cousin Natalie, who's about 6 years old, was asked by her teacher to dispatch the ill fated Flat Stanley who, as his name suggests, was flattened in some sort of mishap involving a large book and then appropriately enough realized life is too short and that he wanted to see more of the world while he still can. And so he was sent to me.

The idea is that I "show" him around town, take pictures of him at a few interesting places in my community and send him back home better traveled and perhaps a little wiser. Having done that, I would now like to show you some of the fun he and I got up to during his all too short visit.

Stanley at Bupyeong station, near my apartment. I live down the street that runs between the two buildings on the left.
Stanley on a hill overlooking my school and some apartment buildings.
Stanley at the front door to my school. Don't ask me what all that says.
Stanley in Bupyeong's annoyingly crowded underground market. Whenever I walk from my apartment to the station I have to go through this miles long maze of distracted ajummas.
Stanley considering his options in front of a (surprise!) Korean restaurant.
Stanley getting ready to board the subway.
Stanley overlooking the Han river and the 63 building in the distance.
Stanley in Gwanghwamun, Seoul.
Another shot of Gwanghwamun.
Stanley in front of Duksugung Palace.
Stanely in front of the statue of King Sejong.
Drunken Stanley annoying some Koreans on the late bus ride home.

The North

I want to go everywhere. You name the place on this planet, and I want to visit it. But the country I want to visit more than any other lies about 100 miles north of where I now sit. It's been my hope that during my time here in the south that I'd be able to make it there, but for westerners, and especially for Americans, that's a difficult proposition.

So second to actually visiting myself...this will have to suffice. It's called "The Vice Guide to North Korea" and it's a video account of how one guy got in and got to look around. If, like me, you share a fascination for the last isolated outpost of weirdness on this little blue orb we call home then you should check it out.

Believe it or not, I miss Burger King

In my old life, as a frequent fast food patron, Burger King was pretty far down on my list of places to get my greasy fix. But here in the Korea my options are pretty much limited to McDonald's, McDonald's, or McDonald's, which can really get old pretty quickly, and so the following video not only made me laugh but made me start craving a Whopper...


Human Head Found In Hamburger

Starship Kimchi

I wish I could claim credit for that wonderful headline, but the author of this article has to be given his due.

The article is basically about S Korea's first astronaut, and all of the trouble Korean food-scientists have gone to in order to ensure that he has his kimchi whilst in orbit.

It's worth a read for its lighthearted look at something Koreans take very seriously, and for nuggets of insight like this:

"It is hard to overstate kimchi’s importance to South Koreans, not just as a mainstay of their diet, but as a cultural touchstone. As with other peoples attached to their own national foods — Italians with their pasta, for example — South Koreans define themselves somewhat by the dish, which is most commonly made with cabbage and other vegetables and a variety of seasonings, including red chili peppers.

Many South Koreans say their fast-paced lives, which helped build their country’s economy into one of the biggest in the world in a matter of decades, owe much to the invigorating qualities of kimchi. Some take a kind of macho pleasure watching novices’ eyes water when the red chili makes contact with their throats the first time. And when Korean photographers try to organize the people they wish to take pictures of, they yell, “Kimchiiii.”

Good Lord

I liked this, two of my favorite people...Patrick Stewart and Ricky Gervais.

Another crazy dog story from "the Korea"...

No, not one of my own making. A 52 year old man in Jongno, Seoul (that's one of the good parts of town, btw) stole his landlady's dog, killed it, and was trying to eat it when the fire department showed up (because he'd created a small fire in preparing to roast the chihuahua).

And to clarify, whenever I write "the Korea" it's not because having repeatedly dumbed down my vocabulary and also having succumbed to the persistent grammatical errors Korean English speakers make that I have lapsed into some sort of strange anti-grammar dialect, rather it's because "the Korea" is one of the repeated mistakes I hear Koreans make that seems funny/charming to me.

Another would be adding pronunciation to the final letter in words like orange/strange/change, so that it's pronounced "orang-ee/strang-ee/chang-ee." I also enjoy how easily Koreans confuse "fun" and "funny," so that often they'll say something like "I went on the roller-coaster, it was very funny."

Anyway, digression ended.

One more picture...

This one just got uploaded to facebook...me chomping on a chicken's foot in our hostel on New Year's Eve...

Pictures of You

Actually, pictures of me, but I just really like that Cure song. And besides I'm you to you, it's only for me that I'm me, not you.

Anyway, from the last few months, including my recent China & Thailand trips:

My Christmas pileup (half of it, anyway)-

My classroom, the "English Only Zone"-


The front of my school, on a typically frosty day-

A giant golden bell that some sky god dropped to the earth, that's my guess anyway-

Buddhist younglings-


Can you imagine having to stand like that for eternity? Ouch-


Some palace in Bangkok-


My own private beach (mas o menos) in Koh Samet-


Looking the other way-


My bungalow was the blue-roofed structure obscured by the coconut trees, the hammock, and the other elements of paradise in the foreground-


The Beijing gang, from left to right- Joey, Julie, Dave, our hero, Feizal-


Me and Joey in Tiannamen Square-

Also in Tiannamen-


In front of the entrance to the Forbidden City-

Our biggest feast of the trip, Peking duck was a part of it but in the foreground you can see a dark brown hunk of meat on the plate there. That was donkey. And it was good-

Korean/Dogs News

Koreans are making international news lately because of something they want to do to dogs, and not, it's not eating them. It's cloning them. For about $125,000 you can bring long-dead Fluffy back to life and right the wrong done by the slow braking bus driver.

I don't have any moral issues with cloning but like every other Matrix-reared child of the late 90s I've been conditioned to be wary of technological progress and can't help but wonder if this is the first step down a road that leads to something like the zombie dogs from Resident Evil.

If these Cerebus wannabes do show up I guess the Koreans can eat them. Problem solved.

Counting Cash

Did you know that people around the world count their money in different ways? Well, I did, because I'm a seasoned world traveler and all [/dubious self-promotion], but I didn't know about all of the varied ways, especially in Asia. And I can confirm that the Japan/Korea portion of this video is 100% accurate, except they do it much, much faster than he does. Watch:


How People Count Cash? - Watch the top videos of the week here

Another School Shooting

Well, it's happened again. Some lunatic with access to firearms killed 5 innocent people and himself in Illinois recently. Here's part of the reason why:



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