The Games People Play

My students pulled me in to a game the other day. It took me a few turns to get used to t, but it is dead easy and like many koreans games, perfect for the sadist who likes to punish his or her friends.

Everyone starts with their fists closed and thumbs down. One person call out a number and everyone must immediately lift none, one both their thumbs. The idea is for the lifted thumbs to not total the number called. If they do equal the call, then the caller wins the round and gets to punish everyone, plus they get another turn until they call wrong.

The punishment depends on the call. If you call, say, three, and three thumbs are lifted, then you get to slap everyone else's hands. The losers place their palms together as if they want to pray, fingers pointing forward. The winner then slap their hand together over the loser's hands using moderate power. In this case they will slap three times, finished off with one hard slap to a side of the winner's choice.

Pubic Baths be fun.

The public baths slash Jimjilbangs are interesting places with people running around naked and generally doing strange things in front of everyone. In general us western types don’t like walking around naked with everyone staring at our hanging bits and we also don’t really like having other people’s hanging bits displayed to us either. In a Jimjilbang you don’t have much choice though, so you get used to ignoring the people around you. Sometimes, however, it is not all that easy to ignore what is happening.

I was in the unenviable situation where I had to sleep in Central Spa to take the first bus out (just to arrive at my house at 8:00, shave, brush my teeth again, get dressed and leave the house to be at school by 8:30). It was at this particular visit I saw a few things that I feel I need to share.

First, the Blackburn vs. Man Utd game was on, so there were men sitting around staring at their darling Korean football player, Bak Ji-Sung. Did you know that Korean broadcasting considers, for the purposes of highlight packages, Bak Ji-Sung running on to the field a significant event? This event is so significant that his, make sure you get this, running on to the field, needs to be shown before attempts on goal, or fouls, or whatever. Just in case you didn’t read it the first time, he ran on to the field. That’s it. Nothing else.

Also, did you know that, like children, Korean men think that every time BJS touched the ball there is an opportunity for a goal, and that when he doesn’t score from am non-chance, then there is reason to complain? (To be fair, it was a small minority, but it is more fun to say that everyone was like that.)

The second thing that was just off was when a guy was standing in plain sight, blow drying his gonads for two minutes, and if this was not bad enough, when he finished doing that, he proceeded to blow dry his arse for about 60 seconds.

The third thing was very off was waking up in my bunk at about 2am because the guy next to me is getting in to his bunk is the noisiest way ever, just to assaulted with the sight of his forest of a small bush that hides his jingly jangle. Apparently he did not receive clothes when he checked in. This same guy was making strange sounds throughout the night which naturally makes me turn my head, just to see him sleeping on his side with his little brush in my direction.

I suppose I should mention that the bunk beds in a jimjilbang are all connected with about 20 or so in one row and only a little wooden “fence” separating the people.

As I was cleaning up to go home I had my forth weird experience. There was a guy in the very hot pool, squatting with a very wide stance so that his leathery pouch and arse hole was just touching the water. Why didn’t he just start polishing the wiener right there?

POSER!

Birthday Songs

it was the birthday of one of my adult students yesterday, so I sang her a few birthday songs. I started with “happy birthday to you”, flowed in to “생일축하 합니다” and ended it of with “Veels geluk liewe maatjie.”

They told me the Afrikaans song reminded them of a children’s birthday song. Rightly so, because it is a children’s song.

the song they say it reminded them of was:

왜 태어났니? 왜 태어났니?
얼굴도 못 생겼는데
왜 태어났나?

Translation is something like this:

Why were you born? Why were you born?
Your face is so ugly.
Why were you born?

King Tut’s Octopus.

Normally people are not allowed to do this, but since she was invited, a woman selling squid and octopus products came to visit us. Apparently the stuff is bought directly from the fishermen in order to give them a better price for their labor, but that is not what attracted my attention.

What DID attract my attention was something in the samples that she gave me. It was something I had never tasted before. It was something a bit thicker than my thumb and cut in to coins. It had a rather soft, smooth texture with a chewy rind and tasted a lot like octopus. I knew I liked it and immediately wanted to know what it was.

The lady had left to market her products to the other teachers, so I peeked in to her bag to see if I could figure out what I was had sampled. What awaited me was one of the ugliest things I have seen in Korea so far (food wise, I mean.)

What I saw was what looked like the tentacles of a rather large octopus that had been mummified quite recently. Even thought I knew I would end up giving most of the stuff away, I also knew I HAD to get some for a photo and a blog post.
This is the result of my photographic efforts.

* A fellow teacher informed me that this it is called Mooneo (문어)

English Note Books

The beginning of the year sees the return of the English note books. These are just normal school note books, but the cover has something that indicates that it is to be used for English. To be fair, most note books in the shops say that. It seems that English one of the few languages where you need to take notes. If you put in a few more minutes of browsing you will also find one or two that seems to be intended for Chinese or Mathematics.

There is a large shop in town that displays, quite literally, stacks of note book. I will sometimes go in when I have nothing better to do and read the cover pages. I also just wait for my students to come to class and then read their covers.

Some of the English is really good, to the point where the students have no idea what it means, because it is essentially a small essay on the cover. Some if it is really bad. Bad how? You know, confusing R for an L and vice versa, capitalization, punctuation, incomprehensibility, the normal things.

Then there are the "English" note books that display pictures of Paris or Rome. What exactly the French, who are not known for their love of the English language, are doing on the cover, not one will know. At least you can make the claim that it has something to do with travelling.

Today I saw the best of them all. The cover had something indicating that it was an English note book, but then half of the cover was filled with Dutch. I read it, I'm Afrikaans remember, and the whole thing describes the colonialization of the world by Europe and at that particular point in the text, how Portugal conquered some or another territory. What that had to do with English no one will know, but there it was.

Over the next week I am sure I will see a few more covers I didn’t notice before, and I can’t wait. It is always nice to have a distraction from the Noise Makers.

Dokdo is ours, YEA!

People have told me I am a sarcastic person. I have no idea why they would say that, but I must admit that I like sarcastic humour. Because of that Dokdo Is Ours has been one of my favourite blogs from the very first post I read. This post had me crying with laughter. Unfortunately you have to have been in Korea for a while to truly appreciate the sarcasm here. If not, and you are not American, then imagine everything you think about Americans and apply it to Korea, times two, because Koreans truly do seem to think they are the only place that matter in the entire world.

After having said all that, I also believe that, like all other countries, people with the annoying and extreme opinions scream the loudest. I have found many Koreans who do not think this is the centre of the universe and do believe that they can learn a lot from other countries.

Palli! Palli!

This is so typical, but it is also still amusing.

This morning at about 09:30 I was told that my adult class will have their closing ceremony tomorrow at 11am. I suppose the school have known about this for a while already, but in true Korean fashion everything is left to the very last. Suddenly it was important to find out who actually attends the class and phone them to inform them of the event.

The school gave me a list of the initial attendees in the beginning of the year. A third of those people never showed up and many of them didn’t come back after the first lesson. I am not sure what the school is telling the people, but it seems they don’t realise I only speak English. I made my own list at the beginning f the year, but quite a few people have come and gone, that I just got fed up and didn’t update it any more.

The teacher in charge brought me the initial list and asked me who was still in my class. I don’t know anyone’s Koreans name! I have 500 middle school students with Korean names and their names all sound the same. All the names are combinations of just ten sounds. In one class I have three girls with not just the same names, but the same family names as well. There are girls with the same name in a few other classes as well. Anyone who has been here for a while knows that it is nearly impossible to remember all these names.

I happen to have the phone numbers of two of the adults on my phone, so I gave him those. What he does with it is now up to him now.

*****

Found through Roboseyo.

Korean Dinosaurs

Brian posted something relating to an article about dinosaurs in Korea. At one point in the article someone refers to Korean Dinosaurs. KOREAN Dinosaurs! Because we all know that a few million years ago, when Koreans were hunting Raptors…

Like the Korean Jesus in Myeongong I thought I would tray to find a picture of a dinosaur and edit its eyes so that it will look Korean. After a short search, I realised that my skills were just not up to doing that sort of job in any time short enough to make it worth while. I did find this though:

Could this possibly be a Korean-like Dinosaur?

P&T B*******

I have always looked at Koreans in amazement, and sometimes, I am sorry to say, distant, at the way they let their little ones walk around without anyone to look after their safety. Being from a Western culture, my main concern is with adults who might abduct, molest or even kill.

I’d say that in this country road safety is a bigger issue. I cringe every time a little one runs across a road, even a quiet road, without any concern for possible cars. We all know how taxis drive in this country and very often other drivers are just as bad.

With these ideas in mind, I stumbled upon the video clip and though it had some relevance to Korea. I include part one and two because there are a few other things in there.

I love statistics, and this clip uses it in a magazine type way. Sure, statistics, or numbers if you prefer, can be made to show anything, but the numbers here are still interesting no matter how you look at them. I also find the statement by the interviewee right at the start of the second clip interesting. Sure, feelings do matter, but just because something is horrific does not mean it is more likely. Unfortunately though, if someone WANTS to believe something, then the truth is irrelevant. Dare I mention religion here?

P&T Bullshit Stranger Danger Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3:

It's all about the looks.

Will this have any effect in Korea? Somehow I think it will just be water of a ducks butt.

Dove -Onslaught
by firat

 

Today, when we had a little competition in class, quite a few students said "You are handsome", instead of "Thank you", when I gave them hints. I generally don't take compliments well and this seems even emptier than most, like they are saying it just to make me feel good, not to observe on something they might actually think.

Was Jesus Korean?

During my trip to Seoul a few weeks back I was staying at Myeongdong Guest House. The rooms can be small, but for a little bit extra you can get a nicer double room. The owner speaks very good English and ends up getting a lot of foreigners from places like China. For someone who does not know anything about Motels yet and sucks at Korean (I really am trying to get better), an option like this is nice and stress free.

Myeongdong has a cathedral. It is not to bad, but they are working on it, renovations I think. The odd ting about it right now is these odd coverings that are painted with the image of the cathedral itself. It is a bit of a strain on the eyes.

The think I loved was the statue of Jesus in the front...

Taiwan reckons Koreans believe they invented the world. It seems that Yahweh send his son forth from Incheon to bring his lost Jews back to Koreanism.

Coreanity.

In 1949 Adidas, formally Gebrüder Dassler Schuhfabrik, was registered by a Korean man named Adolf Dassler. Mr. Dassler decided to combine the first parts of his name and surname to create the registered company name, giving us Adi + Das, or Adidas. This was a moment to be remembers as Korea’s most famous clothing brand was born.

Despite other countries in the same climate zone and many countries on same latitude, Korea has managed to be to only country in the world to have four distinct seasons in one year.

Even though a South African company is the biggest supplier of paper to Europe (last time I heard so I might be wrong), Korea actually has the best paper in the whole world.

Korea, with its lack of coffee plantations, produces the best coffee in the world, because instant coffee with powdered milk and sugar already added is better than real brewed coffee.

Purely because Japan has more money than Korea to lobby the United Nations, Korea, by international law, owns Dokdo. Let us not forget that said –do(island), is in fact not a –do, because you cannot independently support life on it.

Korean sport is the best in the world because one Korean swimmer won a gold medal at the Olympic Games.

So says a man whom I see at least once a week. The list goes on in what I have started calling Coreanity, although I am thinking of calling it Coreanism. If any of these statements seem strange to you then you are not alone in thinking than.

This man is just one of many who seem to treat Korea as a religion in that no proof is needed for anything. If you believe it then it must be true and if anyone dares to say anything to the contrary the Big Ginseng Man in the sky will smite you till you are deader than a, a, something Korean, because something Korean that is dead will be deader than anything any other country can, um, be dead.

A translation of the world according to Taiwan, but note what THEY say about Korea..."Claims to have invented the world"
(Image linked from Muddled Yam)

Junior Zebra

The t-shirt says: "As the child of a white mother and a black father, I got called Zebra and Oreo Cookie in school"

I am not usually politically correct when it comes to race because I feel people need to grow up and not get on their little black horses about every little race related remark or name, but this one goes a little bit to far. I know that few Koreans understands what the shirt says, and I know that quite likely it was not meant as an insult, but still, it is not very nice. It's funny in an evil way, but not nice.

The really scary thing is that this is something children here will likely say to a child of black and white parents. The one boy in my school is naturally darker than the other students, therefore his nickname is "Black". Other students never let a chance go by to point this out to me.

Party Season.

I love how everything in this county seems to be in seasons. South African doesn’t seem to do much using seasons. There are the four seasons and in nature, but everything seem to start at the same time and finish at the same time. Food wise we get the same food all year round and you can watch most sports, TV programs and all kinds of other things all year round.

Here in Korea nature seems to happen in short spurts. After a full day of rain yesterday the tiny snails are out I force and they are all going in the same direction. I would love to know why. Maybe one of the richer snails is throwing a party next week. On the road to school there were elementary school children picking up snail for what every reason and I had to step lightly a few times not to get the souls of my feel al slimy.

Speaking of seasons, here are a few interesting facts about Korea:

1. The national food is Kimchi and can cure almost anything.
2. Hangeul is the most scientific writing system in the world, which sounds great, but does not necessarily mean it is actually all that scientific.
3. In Korea, using an electric fan while you are sleeping can kill you.
4. Where all other countries in the world have only three seasons, Korea has four. Count them. FOUR!

Yesterday during interviews with the students the one student said: “Korea had four seasons, how about Africa, urm, South Africa?” At my mentioning that we do have four seasons the students was very surprised, and not just a little.

How can Koreans actually believe rubbish like this, or rather, how can the education department allow rubbish lie this to be taught? I can understand that people might have misconceptions of the rest of the world when it comes to things like culture, but this? How on earth can only one county in the world have four seasons? Are there on other places on the same latitude? Have then never heard of things like the beauty of Europe in autumn or seen New York’s Central Park on films during fall?

I suppose you can argue that countries on the equator have only one season, but for basically every other country in the world there are four. If you think about it then Korea does not really have four seasons at all. You go from winter almost straight in to summer and then almost straight back in to winter. The transition seasons are relatively short here.

At least I can console myself that Koreans are a very scientifically educated people, unlike everyone else in the world.

I really need to do a post on the strange things people in South Africa believe in. You will laugh at some of the things the black people come up with, but at least they have the excuse that many of them still grew up in the mountains and had to go fetch water for cooking and washing.

It seems staring season might turn in to envy season. Yesterday the physical therapist asked me very excitedly where I got my Crocs and how much they were. I gave her the site, but when I went home I found out there is an actual Korean site. Maybe in a few month I can proudly walk down the streets with my worn out Crocs while everyone shows how behind the times they are with their shiny new shoes. *wink*

WE KNOW SCIENCE!

This is hilarious.

A few weeks back the Korean public was angry about the mistranslation of a statement my the US Ambassador. The translation made it sound like he said Koreans should learn science. The ambassador said something along the lines of: “…should learn the science and facts about BSE…”. The likely highly paid government translator and oh so professional media translated it as: “…should learn science and the facts of BSE…”. Notice the absence of that little word THE? A translator should know what a great impact that has on meaning. Professional translators know they have to translate meaning, not just words.

Considering this, here is a bit of interesting official advice from the “Cultural Guide for Migrant Workers in Korea – USA” (Apparently the USA is the only country that speaks English. They don’t speak it in England). The guide says:

Dangerous electric fans

In summer many go to bed with a fan on. In some cases a fan turned on too long can cause death from oxygen deficiency, hypothermia, or fire from overheating. A fan with a timer can help prevent such dangers: you can set the timer before going to bed for one to two hours' run. Do not forget to have the windows open for ventilation.

 
from: Cultural Guide for Migrant Workers in Korea

Well, so much for the “Don’t insult our science knowledge!” argument. I admit that there are many strange things modern people believe, but have you ever tried to convince a Korean that this is not true, using obvious arguments? Try it, but don’t be too serious about the whole thing. It is fun.

How did I not watch this?

I can not believe it took me this long to watch this clip! I am sorry to say that it will only make sense to people who have lived here for a while, but here it is. Everything they mention in the clip is just So Korea.

Watch out for the padded bras and the completely irrelevant image, two elephants mating, at the Noraebang (singing room). I loved how they drank Casu (Cass) and how they go to the market to look at pigs faces. I was actually staring at a guy shaving the eyebrows of a pig head in our market yesterday.

Time for a few more "visuals"

I haven’t had a real photo post in a while, so I thought I would do a few this week. For today I thought I would show the beauty that is Couple Shirts.

In the first photo the couple set is not that obvious because you are not looking at the couple from the front, but in the second photo it is quite obvious. At least in the second one the shirt colours are not the same.

June wanted me to get a set, but I told her the only way we get it is if mine says “She forced me to wear this.” And hers says “I owe him now.” I would like to add a bit more sarcasm or irony to it, but I fear it will be completely lost on 99.9% of the people who read it and I’m being generous now.