Chaos Revisited

Turns out, I have strong circumstantial evidence that North Korean officials read my blog. Before I get started, thank you for reading. As you may recall, I stated previously that North Korea is part Dr. Evil, part Wille E. Coyote; that is, possessing desires for world domination, and matched with an inability to do anything about them. And just last night I wrote:

...there is that crazy little bastard of a neighbor up north, who, at any given moment could decide to provoke a war.

Better yet, I listed it as a positive for South Korea. A little bit of unpredictability to spice up your life! So, it seems that the North Korean brass read my post, and thought, "Yeah, we'll show this little smart ass" (though it was probably the Korean equivalent), and they went ahead and did this:


OK, North Korea, you have my attention. This was, more or less, the largest exchange of firepower between the two countries since the signing of the armistice agreement in 1953. North Korea fired over 200 artillery shells at the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong while South Korean and US troops were performing military exercises. Two soldiers (both South Korean) died in the attack, which leads me to believe that North Koreans have terrible aim. I shouldn't make light of any soldier's death, but seriously, two hundred shells for two lives and fewer than twenty injuries? That's the best you can do? I guess artillery is not included with horseshoes and hand grenades in objects where being close counts.

There has been a lot of speculation as to the meaning of these attacks. First of all, it is only about 6 months after the sinking of the Cheonan, a South Korean warship, that cost about 40 sailors their lives. Secondly, it has only been six weeks since Kim Jong Il named his son as his successor. Is this the last hurrah of a dying despot? Or the emergence of a new breed of crazy in his son? Most experts are leaning toward the former, but the escalation in activity this year begs many questions.

South Korea, for their part, are more or less stuck between a rock and hard place. Any escalation with North Korea could get out of control very quickly, cause the won to quickly drop in value, and be extremely costly to their long-term economic growth. Oh, and the North Koreans have nukes. That said, they can't just sit back and wait for North Korea to attack again on a whim.

The locals don't seem terribly concerned about it, and well, when in Seoul, do as the Seoulites do. The subway ride home was almost surreal, a war nearly broke out less than 150 miles away, and everyone was on their cell phones, playing video games and relaxing after a long day of work. TVs were on in every restaurant I passed, but they were not tuned to the news networks, they were watching the South Korea-UAE soccer match.

I think there's a lesson here for Americans, who, it must be noted, often panic over much smaller threats than nuclear annihilation. As such, I will stand by my original assessment of why a little chaos does a country good. Real threats make small, every day annoyances and concerns appear to be precisely that: small. In a strange way, today was the best day I've had in awhile.

Top 5: Reasons Why Korea is Better than Japan

Of the 200 or so pages from the JET Handbook, the part I remember most distinctly was the section on how culture shock affects the average JET participant. It even had a nifty little chart so you could follow your excitement or depression. Right now, I would be in the "Negotiation Phase" of culture shock, which Wikipedia describes as:

After some time (usually three months but it may be sooner or later depending on the individual), differences between the old and new culture become apparent and may create anxiety. That sense of excitement will eventually give way to new and unpleasant feelings of frustration and anger as you continue to have unfavorable encounters that strike you as strange, offensive, and unacceptable. These reactions [...] are typically centered on the formidable language barrier as well as stark differences in: public hygiene; traffic safety; the type and quality of the food [...].[4] It's a very hard period for the people who need to adjust to a new culture, especially for those students who study abroad alone without families. In this period, people might feel that their lifestyle is totally influenced. Their biological clock is in a mess because of the time difference, they can't work well and can't rest well either. In addition, they might feel sick and lazy; they might get tired doing anything no matter how easy it is.

Yeah, that's about right. Add crummy weather and shorter days in there, and it's even more appropriate. However, I have experience and knowledge on my side. So, in an attempt to stay positive, here's my Top 5 Reasons Why Korea is Better than Japan.

Qualifications:

• The reason must impact my life directly.
• This is a general list, nothing to do with my personal life or work situation.
  

The List:

1. Better Food: The Japanese might describe their food as "subtle," to my American palate, which isn't happy unless I'm adding extra barbecue sauce to my twice-fried, chocolate-covered Twinkies, "bland" is probably the better word. The Korean dinning experience is a fantastic feast of spicy, but not too spicy, dishes, brought out in rapid fashion in an attempt to overflow the table with tasty goodness. Great...and now I want some bulgogi.
2. Fewer Dirty Stares: It's much more comfortable to be a foreigner here. One might think that this is due to being in a much larger, much more metropolitan city, but I've actually experienced better treatment in other cities outside of Seoul.
   
3. Weiguk>Gaijin: This sort of goes hand-in-hand with the last one, but weiguk just doesn't have the same "punch" as gaijin. And Koreans usually have respect enough not to say it directly in front of you. It seems like I'm given much more leeway to be foreign here too, whereas I always felt like I was offending someone or about to in Japan.
4. Better Looking Women: Korea is #1 in the world in elective plastic surgeries per capita. And it shows.
5. Chaos Factor: One reason Japan always made me feel so uncomfortable was due to its pristine condition. Everything was neat, orderly, and clean. No one broke the law, even as far as jaywalking. Heck, even ambulances "rushing" to the hospital would go the speed limit. On the other hand, I've always felt that Korea had a certain "vibrancy" to its streets and back alleys. You can grab some delicious street food, and then jaywalk in front of a cop.* Furthermore, there is that crazy little bastard of a neighbor up north, who, at any given moment could decide to provoke a war. Some would argue that this last point detracts from my argument, but I like it. Safety is an illusion anyway, and it adds a little spice to life knowing that you're not completely safe.**
   

*This, on the other hand, could never happen in Japan. First of all, there was a tragic lack of street vendors. Secondly, the combination of eating while walking (major no-no) AND jaywalking would probably make the average Japanese citizen's head explode.

**For the record, I'm probably a good deal safer here than in any American city. At least here I know where the threat is coming from.

The Dentist and Other Horrors

I went to the dentist for the first time since I lived in Japan. That's over three years at this point, for those keeping score at home. Unfortunely, I had the most painful teeth cleaning experience of my life, with an extremely polite, albeit sadistic, Korean woman doing the honors. My screams of terror and pain were punctuated only by her sweet voice repeatedly saying, "Oh, I'm sorry." I couldn't see the gleam of delight in her eye, but I know it was there.

On the other hand, I will not have to go in for a root canal, as I had feared, but I will have to return to have three cavities filled. Joy. I had suspected I would need a root canal on a tooth that had been worked on while I was in Japan. The cavity filling was performed without Novocaine, with the Japanese dentist telling me in broken English, "Raise your hand when it hurts." It has never really felt right since, so I feared the worst. Turns out, this was just my own paranoia, and there is nothing wrong with the tooth. I do have a cavity on the tooth directly above, so it might just be displaced pain, which I remember very well from having "dry sockets" when I had my wisdom teeth removed.

In spite of all of this, it is nice to be able to afford such procedures. For most of my time between Japan and Korea, I could not.

In the last three months, I have also struggled to find a decent place to get my hair cut. My hair is very demanding, and needs to be cut very short to avoid the dreaded Jewfro. This has been a struggle my entire life, even back home. I actually found a great place to cut my hair in Japan, well, at least for the first 10 months. Then, inexplicably, the man who normally cut my hair was absent that day, and he was replaced by a rather mean-spirited woman. She had a nasty attitude the entire time, and when she was appearing to finish up without giving the sides and back of my hair the clipper treatment they so desperately needed, I asked her in my best polite Japanese if she could possibly use them. She was resilient at first that I did not need the clippers. I persisted and basically refused to get up until she gave in. Finally, she relented, bitching the entire time about me and at one point even screaming in my ear that I was acting like a child. Needless to say, I never returned to that place again.

I've not had any experience approaching that one yet, but I've left the salon both times so far with a feeling of disappointment; not because they didn't do a good job, they did, but because I knew that within a week, my hair would be back to Jewfro length and I would have to be back in the barber's chair shortly. Quite frankly, I have neither the time nor inclination to be getting a haircut every 2-3 weeks, so hopefully I'll figure out a better way to convey to them precisely what I want. And yes, I am due for another sheering momentarily.

Blast from the Past: The China Chronicles Part 2

Preemptive editors note: This article? Complete crap. This is the second column I wrote in the summer of 2005 for The Daily Beacon. Read it at your own risk, and keep in mind I was fighting a nasty sinus infection and on Chinese antibiotics (really).

Mountains are, by their nature, difficult to hide. Amazingly, this is precisely what Beijing has been able to do to me for the past…oh…week and a half. You see, there is a rather large mountain range rising majestically behind the university to the north, however the dust, smog and general pollution has caused them to simply vanish leaving yours truly completely unaware of their mere existence until yesterday.

Needless to say, the air here is bad. I’ll certainly think twice before complaining about the pollution in Knox-patch (again). On top of the exceptionally bad air, it is hot-very hot.The first day after arriving, I decided to hit up the Beijing Zoo as pandas are decidedly adorable. So I headed out and the heat and humidity consumed me-the high that day was 41 degrees Celsius, or roughly 1,000,000 degrees Fahrenheit (give or take).

I’ve certainly had to readjust my definition of “dirty.” After taking multiple showers on the most taxing days, I’ll come home after a “normal day” completely drenched in sweat and think to myself, “eh…not too bad.”

Despite all of this, the trip has been amazing thus far. Beijing is an amazing city. There is always, ALWAYS something to do here. You can visit “old China” at the Forbidden City and Summer Palace or you can visit “new China” for some drinks at a club. And there’s always Karaoke. The Chinese love their Karaoke. As our first week at Tsinghua has taught us, they love singing in general. The first thing we’ve had to do at the university is to overlook a campus-wide singing contest. They’re doing it to learn English and doing it with more zeal and pure joy than any group of college-aged Americans would be expected to. Of course, if you told the entire sophomore class at UT to learn and perform a song in Mandarin in a week, you would probably be told to do something anatomically impossible by most of the students. Unless UT just scored a touchdown, and the song happens to be “Rocky Top,” we ain’t singin’ anythin’.

Speaking of that delightful albeit not-to-flattering song, guess which one us folk from UT performed? That’s right, we got up there with fellow Knoxvillian and local music legend Todd Steed and sang “Rocky Top” with pride, emotion, and most importantly-completely out of tune.

However, “Rocky Top” was perhaps the best song performed in the competition. After that it was Michael Jackson’s “Heal the World” and the rest getting far cheesier from there. Granted, I know that these students do not have full access to many popular songs in the west-but seriously, “Heal the World?” Come on…
So I guess the Karaoke stereotype is at least partially true. Although the biggest misconception about China still remains, namely that it is a communist country. The only thing communist about China anymore is the party in charge. But the party doesn’t even believe in the principles set forth by Marx, Lenin or Mao. The Chinese love capitalism.

Don’t believe me? Trust me, they’ve taken capitalism to the extreme. During this trip I have been charged to park my bike, charged to use (disposable) chopsticks that they gave us at a restaurant, and charged to use a public toilet. And these are not even the big things. I paid to leave flowers for Chairman Mao at his mausoleum (only to have them returned to be resold out front), then I left his tomb to enter a market where you can by all the Mao memorabilia my little heart desired.

I paid to climb the tower that Mao used to use to overlook Tiananmen Square. I was curious at first why I could not bring my camera only to find a man standing at the top taking pictures which I could buy for twice as much as I paid to get up there in the first place. I bought one…

When I went to the Great Wall the bus dropped us off no where near the wall so we had an option of either walking up a cliff or taking a cable car. We took the cable car to find that it only brought us about half-way up the hillside. Amazingly enough they had an incline train that we could ride once we got there. Weird. Of course, the train didn’t even take us all the way up to the Great Wall and I was half expecting a man trying to sell us camel rides for the rest of the journey.

Top 5: Side 1, Track 1

So, I could not in good faith start a series of "Top 5s" without paying omage to the movie (and to a far lesser extent, the book) that inspired me, High Fidelity. For those of you unaware, John Cusack's character, Rob, often likes to categorize life into tidy Top 5 lists. Anyone who has attempted their own lists, has inevitably come to the conclusion that the list is never tidy, and never complete.

However, it is a fun exercise, and it does reflect how you are feeling at any given moment. Some lists are ever-changing; they are a day-to-day evolution, with no true final answer. For instance, while my Top 3 favorite movies rarely ever change, 4 and 5 frequently do.

Qualifications:

• The song must be the first from a full-length LP. This means no EPs, singles, second-side first tracks, or first tracks from the second disk from a double LP.


• The song should make you excited to listen to the rest of the album, so it can't just be a great song on an otherwise crap album. Basically, you shouldn't want to put the album away, after listening to a very distinct high point, right at the beginning. (This is the "don't climax too quickly rule").

The List

1. "One Angry Dwarf and 200 Solemn Faces" Whatever and Ever, Amen, Ben Folds Five: When I first bought this album in high school, this was immediately one of my favorite tracks. In fact, it was one of only a few tracks I really enjoyed upon first listen. However, years later, it remains one of my favorite tracks by Ben Folds and Whatever and Ever, Amen is easily my favorite album of either Ben Folds Five, or Ben Folds. Over the course of several years, the other tracks found their way into my heart, one-by-one, but they never replaced my first love off the album.
   


2. "Safe European Home" Give 'em Enough Rope, The Clash: In High Fidelity, rob lists "Janie Jones" from the Clash's debut album in his Top 5 Side 1s Track 1s. However, I always thought their follow-up album, Give 'em Enough Rope was a much better listen, albeit, not as "ground-breaking" or influential. It's not my favorite Clash album, but I think it's way underrated, and I love this first track. "Safe European Home" is a powerful number to kick off an equally powerful album. The incorporation of fast-paced ska and reggae rhythms were a signature for the group throughout their career, and especially so on this track.


3. "Stacked Actors" There is Nothing Left to Lose, Foo Fighters: To paraphrase those mildly-amusing Dos XX ads, "I don't often listen to the Foo Fighers, but when I do, it's this album." There are very few weak points on this album, which makes "Stacked Actors" that much better. Or rather, it's one of the best songs on their best album. The song starts off pretty hard, but it's just a tease, as it continually takes you through fast paced peaks, and slow, melodic lows.


4. "Next to You" Outlandos d' Amour, The Police: Like the aforementioned Clash, The Police started as a punk band and ended their careers as much, much more. Unlike the Clash, their debut is not so much seen as their masterpiece as much as it is "just another album." Once again, I strongly disagree with the critics, and enjoy hearing the beginning stages of their musical evolution from punk-band to 80s pop-rock icons. "Next to You" is one of their fastest paced songs, and a real ass-kicker. While the album itself has some gapping holes (most of Side 2, for instance), it also has some great tracks, including "Roxanne," a song that barely cracked the Top 40, but has become one of the band's most recognizable hits.


5. "Jacqueline" Franz Ferdinand, Franz Ferdinand: While their big hit, "Take Me Out," may never be replicated by the band, Jacqueline is the epitome of what Franz Ferdinand is about. It's sexy, seductive, playful, and at the end of the day, rocks your socks off.
   

November, in all its Glory

So, it's been awhile since my last post, and not out of laziness or lack of anything to talk about. In fact, two weeks ago today I sat down and wrote a blog entry that I never posted for a variety of reasons. 1) I learned from my Japan experience not to just go nuclear over something upsetting, particularly in a very public way that can concern parents and other family and friend-types. 2) Due to various issues at work (which I will discuss in great detail, shortly), I was either too busy or too preoccupied to sit down and write.

The big news that sent all of us teachers into hyperventilation, mass-panic, and never-ending behind-the-back complaining about the management, was a move of our campus to a new location. It will be more than twice the distance to commute for us, and there are no restaurants or banks around the new location.

Those are three pretty big hits considering how: we already work 10 and a half hours each day, the school lunches are usually inedible, and we need to go to the bank several times during the month to pay bills and send money home.

The only positive to off-set losing these ammenities will be teaching slightly nicer environment.

As a result, I think I will try to get into the R&D department at our school. They are remaining in their current location--the building where the school is currently located--and they work shorter days. This would be great for me for several reasons, including being able to study Korean more, and spend more time with the pup.

I'll let you know how this situation continues to develop.

As for everything else, we were hit with a hell of a week last week. Normally, if we have report cards due, it's considered a "busy week." But last week, we had report cards, grading monthly test essays, and an open class to prepare for. Open classes are where the parents are invited to watch what we do in the classroom, which is needless to say, stressful. As an extra joy, one of our teachers is currently in a hospital with a broken jaw, so I was selected to do the open class for her. Despite all of this, I was one of two teachers to get my grades in on time, so gold star for me.

Well, I guess that brings you up to date. It's November now: the days are getting shorter, the weather is getting colder, the initial excitment of being here has worn off, but my mood has not been too bad. The JET handbook talks about October and November being the worst months for culture shock, so I guess I'm doing OK. That said, send love, keep in touch, etc.