5 Things You REALLY Should Do In Korea

The Korean Tourism Board is extremely lame. If you were to follow a prescribed list of things to do by them, your stay in Korea would probably look like this:

1. Visit a folk village. Watch a traditional wedding. Realize how odd it is for people to be dressed up in traditional garb and faking a wedding.
2. Visit Insadong. Buy Korean postcards. Eat a traditional meal and then have your tour guide tell you how kim chi is rated the healthiest food in the world. You don't care.
3. Visit Seoul Tower. Take pictures. Look at all the dumb couples that have put love locks on the love fence.
4. Go shopping in Myeong Dong. Buy the same shit you could back home.
5. Visit a palace. Read about Korea's boring history (compared to neighboring China's, especially).

This is what you SHOULD do:

1. Visit a jim jil bbang (sauna). Most are 24 hours, so you could spend all day there. Sleep, eat, watch TV, shower, bathe, go to the steam room, get a haircut... all while either in PJs or naked. And don't forget to get a body exfoliating scrub from the random worker at the bathing room... who's probably naked too. Twice the fun if you're foreign-looking.



2) Visit Itaewon, the foreigner-dominant part of Seoul, AT NIGHT. The place is incredibly cosmopolitan -- you'll see Americans, Middle Eastern people, Asians, Africans roaming about. I'm sure Koreans get a kick out of being a minority coming here. Don't mess with GIs. Eat a variety of food. Visit a club. Take a walk up Hooker Hill.




Next, go to a spot where there's a night life and...

3) Scope the eye candy. Maybe it's their fashion sense. Maybe it's the plastic surgery. Maybe it's the diet pills. Maybe it's because fat girls get looked down on. Korean women are held to a high aesthetic standard. Forget the social commentary, just enjoy the view.



4) Walk around the area and look for Koreans blacked out on the street. Public intoxication (and sleeping) is not a crime. This can lead to some surprising sights.



5) Try to get into a booking club. Waiters drag girls to your table -- it's like a nightclub and speed-dating put together. The whole thing is very "Korean," so don't expect to understand it at all, just enjoy.


That's how your visit to Korea should look.

Raaaandom text messages

My old co-worker keeps sending me odd text messages:

"lying on the grass with chatting the clear sky n the droning of the cicade! ru enjoying your break? ^^"

This girl needs to put the SAT vocabulary-prep book down.

The Stares

It's something I still haven't gotten over here in homogenous Korea. 

If you're a white person, you will get stared down. If you're a black person, you will get stared down. If you're a Middle Eastern person, you will get stared down and then they will ask you "how much for a kebab?"

I'm of Southern-Chinese descent. People think I am Korean here. Hell, people get confused when I tell them that I'm not, as if me being Mongolian, Japanese, or Vietnamese is impossible. So, I blend in.

As a Korean-looking person, when I start speaking English, the whole around me stops and stares -- their wide-open eyes (as wide as Korean eyes can get) and jaw-dropping expression say to me: "you are Korean... but you speak English??" This country has seen many white people, so it's not too surprising for many Korean. However, I'm a different group of foreigner. I get the stares more than white people.

It's difficult

It's hard to keep up with this blog. Everything that was once novel is now simply part of regular life.

There isn't much of a community for this type of blogging either. The few expats in Korea blogs I do follow kind of suck too or no longer blog.

With that said, there's not much more I feel like writing about in this blog.

Peace out.

Music Critique

Today, I had a class on music critiquing. I taught the students some commonly-used phrases to critique music ("It's got a good beat", "It's catchy", "It's nothing special"). We then proceeded to watch 10 music videos of varying genres.

The songs I played were as follows:

1. Justin Bieber - Baby
2. Bach - Cello Suite #1 Prelude
3. Foo Fighters - Everlong
4. Miles David - Summertime
5. Benji Benassi - Satisfaction
6. Bob Marley - Stir It Up
7. My Chemical Romance - Helena
8. Kenny Chesney - She's Got It All
9. BB King - The Thrill is Gone
10. Usher - Yeah!

I instructed them to critique the music using the phrases we learned, but some opted to write their own individuals responses, to my delight:

Bach
-"sorry to Bach"
-"this music is trash"

Foo Fighters
-"he shake his leg too much"

Bob Marley
-"Musician's hairstyle were cool"
-"I like the beat and lyrics very funny"
'stir it up, little darling, stir it up'... I suppose it is a bit funny


My Chemical Romance
-"Bass guy makes me angry"
-"Don't you have any respect for the dead?!"
he noticed they were dancing at a funeral. nice comment

Usher
-"the girl is so sexy"
-"scary"
overall, the students liked this genre/song the best. hopefully this'll mean they are more familiar with hip hop and i won't have to see godawful Korean dancing at the clubs

Kenny Chesney
-"fuck"
there were surprisingly positive ratings for country music. americans-not-from-the-south probably don't have as high an opinion on country.

Justin Bieber
-"gross"

Bach
-"NOT AWESOME!!!!"

the one song that got the most shit dropped on it was BB King. the music wasn't well-liked and many students commented how he was making awkward faces (feelin the music ... just a tad too much).

BB King
-"he look stupid, sorry BB King"
-"singer appearance very dirty"
-"singer's voice is very embarassing"
-"let's fight"

Crossword Puzzles... you're doing it wrong.

I made a crossword puzzle for my students this week. Although they understand the concept clearly, they sometimes fail terribly when finding the answers to the clues (and when I say fail terribly, I mean that it's worse than Kirstie Alley trying to fit into a size 1 pair of jeans).

One class of students today were particularly lazy and did not feel like doing the puzzle. I looked at my one loud-mouthed student's paper in the back -- it was BLANK. I encouraged him to give it a try. I came back 5 minutes later and I saw that he filled out a couple of answers. I was actually surprised he got one in particular:

Clue 15 Down: The word "ad" is short for _____.

It was a 13-letter clue that I didn't expect the slacker to know. I looked at what he wrote and saw this:

"STEPHEN HAWKIN"

He was referring to the theoretical physicist, Stephen Hawking. I burst out with laughter. The student who wrote it wasn't laughing at all though.

CROSSWORD PUZZLE FAIL.

Other worthy mentions:

Clue 7 Across: Edison made the first light bulb = Edison ____ the light bulb.

8 letters... "CUCUMBER"

Clue 2 Across: The Simpsons and Spongebob Squarepants are _____.

8 letters... "EHPSWOWO"

Clue 15.5 Down: What is the comparative form of "hot?"

6 letters... "HOTDOG"

Everything that glitters isn't gold...

I saw a picture of a famous Korean girl band without any makeup on.

How do I know they have no makeup on? They look "tired" and also, these girls don't have that universal Korean red hue on their cheeks (from blush) that even the lady collecting cans has.

First, let's take a look at a picture of the band, 2NE1, with makeup:

Quite attractive, but after a wash and that 5 kg of makeup comes off...

... please brace yourself...

... are you ready ??

*runs and hides*

It's not that they are unattractive (they are very cute), but it's just that they put on a shit-load of makeup. I mean A LOT. They put it on like a Russian does with sunscreen on his first vacation to Hawaii. I even hear they use paint-rollers to apply their makeup.

No matter how many times I see before/after makeup pictures, I never tire of seeing them. I think it's important too:

For women, it helps reassure them that the surreal beauty seen in magazines and music videos is actually not real; professional makeup artists and photoshopping does wonders. (I mean, c'mon, I haven't seen a single woman in Korea with a zit here!)

For men, it helps remind us that the gorgeous girl in the club is actually normal-looking underneath it all... as Outkast once said:

"Better come back down to Mars Girl, quit chasin' cars
What happens when the dough get so low

Bitch, you ain't that fine
No way.. no way.. no way "

SImple, Yet Entertaining

What games did you play in your recesses in middle school? I remember playing b-ball sometimes and pogs (milk caps)... though most of the time was spent hanging around try to look "cool."

My middle school students like to play a game I like to call "Kai Bai Boh -- slap!"

Kai Bai Boh is the Korean name for "rock, paper, scissors" (we call it 'jon ken po' in Hawaii, though I have no clue why).

KBB is quite simple: two people play and the winner gets to hit the loser. Despite the complexity of their academics (learning excel function code and learning about asymptotes for example), they are entertained by giving and receiving physical abuse from friends.

Though KBB seems like a simple game, some have suggested that it is quite intricate in nature. Although everyone has an equal chance of winning, the psychological factors can possibly give a tremendous advantage to one party. Maybe that's how I went 0-3 with a student yesterday.

A Bamboo Girlfriend

I planned a group activity in my class. We were studying advertisements in class, so I decided to have my students choose a product and then try to convince me to buy it. One particular product befuddled me: a bamboo girlfriend. One group member explained to me and the rest of the class that you can sleep with their product at night and it will keep you cool. He then asked me if I had a girlfriend. "No." He then said that I can sleep with it if I am lonely.

"A bamboo girlfriend??? This kid must be smoking kim chi," I thought to myself.

After class, my Korean co-teacher explained to me that traditionally, Korean people slept with a bamboo piece during the summer. The bamboo material stays cool and it made summer nights more bearable. Aha... so my student wasn't puffing on the magic dragon afterall.

Ladies and gentlemen, this is "jukbuin," which literally translates to "bamboo wife" in Korean.

Shit, I could've used this during the summer.

Beijing

A lot has happened since I last updated. Let's see...

-Went to the ice bar in Hongdae (Seoul). The temperature was about -5 C. It's basically a giant meat refrigerator where you waltz around taking pictures and dance to the hip hop music blaring overhead. They also have frozen piss there... which is from people trying to break the how-long-you-can-stay-in-the-ice-bar record, without leaving. The record stands at about 12 hours by a group of crazy Americans.

-Finished my summer camp. I enjoyed the smaller ratio and most of my students honestly wanted to learn. I was also able to remember everyone's names! That's quite a feat for an American looking at names that look similar like Jae Hyun, Hyeh Yun, Dong Eon.

-Went to Beijing!

Beijing is quite an illustrious city, full of life, tradition and funny smells. An acronym entry would be suitable, I feel.

B is for the public bathrooms that don't have stalls or even dividers... for the TOILET. Believe me when I say the first trip to the bathroom with other men in there was an awkward experience.

E is for the great things to eat. From delicious meat kabobs of the Muslim-Xinjiang area to one of the best eggplant dishes (and dishes in general) I've ever had to plain ol' fried noodles, China has some incredibly tasty food. Korean food seems simple and lacking in diversity in comparison.

I is for cheap intoxication. It costs me about $.50 for a big bottle o

f domestic beer. Even when going out to fancy bars or clubs, the drinks were still reasonably priced. Domestic beer is watery though... about 4%.

J is for all the juice and water I drank. It's about 32 C, humid, and the pollution is stagnant in the lower city atmosphere sometimes -- it looks like fog, but it's actually just Beijing pollution.

I is for indecency (well, it's not really indecency, but moreso a culture difference). Chinese tourists visiting the sites in Beijing all let their kids roam free with no diapers. When nature calls, the children simply go off the trees or bushes to urinate and even drop the deuce. Even historical sites like the Emperor's former Summer Palace were not free of little kiddies leaving some brown dumplings on the royal garden.

N is for the non-ethical people (I had to get that N in there, didn't I?). Beijing is full of hustlers and most people who run businesses, whether they're street merchants, rickshaw drivers, or bars, will try to rip-you-the-fuck-off if you give them an opportunity ... or if you look like a foreigner. Every tourist should always look at or declare prices before ordering/buying anything.

G is for all the beautiful northern Chinese girls. They're tall and they've got curves. I need to borrow my friend's picture of the Hooters girls to serve as evidence. The girls in Beijing are now in a heated competition with Seoul girls for my affection.

Overall though, it made for a great vacation.

There's A Hot Pepper in His Pants

Last week, we had an unofficial all-male training for the male teachers at my school. Just like for everything else, I was the last one to know about, as my co-worker told me about it just the day before it would happen (on a Thursday, when I was planning for the weekend!!). Thanks for the promptness, guys.

The events that unfolded at the training were quite amusing. I can't really say what happened at the training because it was a strange beyond words and slightly incriminating, but I can say that there was a lot of singing, dancing and ambiguously gay moments (hm... that sounds like a typical weekend in SK when you're hanging with Koreans, actually).


(As you can see in the picture below, there was a lot discussion about academia and teaching methods at our "training")


I will share with you this though, the basis of my title:

We were eating dinner at our little country-side hotel. Throughout three hours, we had kim chi, sashimi, tempura, duinjangjigae (rotten bean soup), beer and of course, soju. I thought I was going to throw-up at times from all the food and beer filling my stomach, but I somehow managed to persevere through the food onslaught. Midway through the meal, one of the P.E. teachers suggested we all try a green pepper.



Oh, the ubiquitous green pepper: the side dish that is always sitting there at my table at Korean restaurants, and despite not having any nutrition or flavor, the Koreans still eat them. They usually dip it into a red, spicy and sweet sauce first and then take a big bite out of the pepper. People frequently fan their mouth to show how hot the pepper is after eating it, to which I would love to respond: "then don't eat the fucking pepper."

So we all took a bite out of this pepper (which was curiously cut into pieces this time, rather than being whole, as I usually see it). I bit my piece and chewed it thoroughly -- there was no pang of pain... it was not bad at all. After about 8 seconds, like the killer whale springing up from beneath the frozen ice to snatch the sea lion as it drinks water, the spice hit me -- my face got warm and my eyes started to water. I drank some tea water to cool off my mouth. When that didn't work, I opened a beer and drank that. There was unspeakable pain allover my face. Through the tears building in my eyes, I could see the PE teacher laughing hysterically. "It's special-made go chu or pepper -- Chong Yang go chu. Very spicy!" said the PE teacher. Thanks for the letting me know AFTER I ate it.

Everyone was having a good laugh at my suffering when the vice-principal, in his drunken state, stumbled over to me and started yelling English nonsense. He then pointed to his penis and started yelling, "CHONG YANG GO CHU!!!!"

I tried my best to laugh, though the spice of the pepper immobilized it. "Your penis is a hot pepper???"

"YES-UHHH!!!!!" he said in his thick accent. Laughter erupted.

After everyone calmed down and the fire burning on the dance floor of my mouth has subsided, a teacher explained to me that "pepper" and "penis" are both pronounced "go chu" in Korean. I was relieved -- I was thinking it was weird that a grown man would say that there's a hot pepper in his pants. Actually, it still was kind of weird anyway.

P.S. my co-worker later explained to me how the Koreans eat the hot peppers: they take one bit and then swallow, so as not to squirt the spicy oils allover the inside of the mouth.

3 K-Enigmas and Flip-Street

Here are three things I don't understand:

1 - My students have finished final exams... and there are still 2 weeks of school left before summer vacation. Ok, so what is the incentive for my students to pay attention these next few weeks to the lesson?

2 - Koreans drink no water at lunch. Fuck those little metal cups at the lunch room -- I need a big-gulp-sized cup.

3 - What the hell is my address? I've been here for over 3 months now, and no one has told me my address. Apparently, you can get by in Korea without knowing it, since my bills seem to find me anyway.

***

Trip to Flip-Street

I went to the Hyewha stop by Dongdaemun to visit what I like to dub "Flip Street," a short stretch of sidewalk that is filled on both ends with Filipinos, Filipino lunch stalls, groceries, and of course, bootleg shit. It was actually an interesting trip, because as I walked towards it, the mobs of Korean people around me eventually became a mob of Filipino peoples.

My friend recommended the diniguan, or as Filipinos affectionally call it: "Chocolate Soup." Sounds appealing and it kind-of resembles chocolate too... after you poop it out. I'm open to try things once, so I tried it. It wasn't too bad, though it was a tad salty. I thought the little chunks in there was tofu. It turned out to be coagulated pig's blood.



After eating, we walked over to Dongdaemun. Here was a very interesting sight: a police alcohol checkpoint at 2 PM. Yes, 2 PM. In my mind, I was cycling through possible reasons why people would be drinking at 2PM on Sunday, but then I concluded that it's just what Koreans do.



Dongdaemun is one of the lamest places in my opinion -- all there is to do here is shop. Nevertheless, there was a decent view of the waterway in the area.

Carry a Big Stick

Everyday, when I come to school, there is a teacher who waits between the front gate and the main building of the school itself. I don't know his name, but I see him everyday and wave to him. I can't be sure what he's there for, but I am guessing that he is supposed to "greet" students in the morning. Notice I wrote "greet" with quotations -- he is not friendly to the students, but rather is quite grumpy and clutches a stern, wooden stick in his right hand. I've nicknamed him "The Enforcer."




The Enforcer seems to be placed so that the students calm down and behave themselves before entering the school. He sometimes pulls students off to the side (I assume these are the troublemakers) and have them just stand. Everyone is supposed to be in school by 8:20, so when I come late, I often hear The Enforcer yelling "PALI PALI!" to the students. I'm assuming in Korean, Pali Pali means "hurry the f*** up you slow, degenerate bastards." The students frantically start running after hearing him.

The Enforcer inspires punctuality and instills fear. I want his job.

Party Don't Stop Till 6 in the Mornin'

I've always felt as though I missed out on the fun college experience because I opted to stay home for my college years. Having already graduated and seeing how much fun Korean college kids have at the many drinking establishments furthers that notion.

Never too late though, right?

I went to Seoul this past weekend to meet up with some other public school teachers I met at a teacher's conference we had the other week. It was a long trek to Seoul from Yongin: over two hours, due to confusion and a couple wrong trains.

We met up in Hongik University, or "Hongdae." The area is the place to be on a Saturday night -- young folks in their 20s all gather here to eat, drink, sing and dance. The place is crowded with people and I was loving all the beautiful girls walking around. The place really is amazing -- there just isn't anywhere that is so bumping and full of young people like Hongdae in Hawaii. Being so far though, a journey into Hongdae meant that I would be staying up all night, until the transit opens in the morning.

We hit it off with some Korean BBQ and soju. The weather has been extremely muggy, so I did not really appreciate being 10 inches away from a gas fire and hot plate. We then went to a Western bar to kill time, and eventually headed to a little club that had an all-you-can-drink menu for 10,000 won for 2 hours (about $7.50). At first, it was only us there drinking and dancing (or sitting on the side, in my case). After a while and many rum and cokes though, the place started getting busy and I got drunk enough to dance. Unfortunately, I got too drunk, to the point that I was no longer thinking about having a good time or trying to meet girls -- I was just thinking about going home.

Everybody started walking around and eating, while I just followed and had my head down the whole time. I was dead-tired by 1 AM. I don't think the teacher's schedule of working at 8 mixes well with staying out late. So much for partying all night. We rested several times in the early morning. I was lying down at the park where a guy kept playing his god-damn hand drum and after tht, we then took a nap at the benches in Hongik University. Before, I laughed at all the Korean guys passed out on the streets and barely-able-to-walk drunk girls, but now, I had become just like them.

The ride home was a terror -- there were about 25 stops and it was a very shaky train. I was hungover and tired as hell and nauseous. I ended up taking a lot of breaks in between to put my head down on my lap. The blooming morning sunlight didn't help me at all. I'm sure the many other spectators just looked at me and thought, "well, here's another degenerate, alcohol-abusing youth." I just wanted a nap.

I finally got home over 3 hours after I had left Seoul. I was sticky, my clothes smelled like barbequed pork belly, I had various stains on my shirt, my pockets were filled with random handouts that people gave me in Hongdae, and I smelled terrible. I walked over to my bed and my face met the pillow.

I'm thinking maybe Hongdae again, next week.


***

There were many great sights of hordes of people, of funny Koreans dancing to hip-hop, of drunk guys sitting on the ground right outside of clubs, and especially of the zombie-like crowd on that first bus out of Hongdae. Unfortunately, in my drunken state, I only managed to take these 2 pics. That picture on the left was this ridiculous trash pile the morning after our partying and the one on the right was of a Yager dispenser.

A Vicious Cycle?

Having been in South Korea for over 2 months now, I have been seeing a lot of Korean women everyday. One simply word usually comes to my mind when I see a very attractive girl here:

"day-ummmmm"

The modern-day Korean woman is on the tall-side, slender (but not skinny), and is very pretty and made-up. Interestingly enough, Korea has an exceptionally large rate of plastic surgery. I have to wonder: are Koreans pretty only through mass aesthetic work, or are so many Koreans naturally pretty that the average-looking one wants something done to fit in? It's the old chicken and the egg, honestly.

I heard a statistic from my co-worker that around 60% of women here get something done. I am not one to debate the merit of plastic surgery, but I think it's a reasonable solution for someone who's fugly and wants to have a easier time in life with the opposite sex (esp. if you're a girl). As empowering a procedure as plastic surgery may be, there is a huge underlying problem: what happens when you decide to make babies with someone who had a lot of things done?


Let's take for example this pop star chick:



This is Hyo Yeon from the group SNSD (I just googled "korean plastic surgery"). To be honest, it seems that she was given a good thwack from the ugly stick at birth. I mean, it looks almost like she had a full sex-change from boy to girl. Seeing the before picture, I'm guessing Hyo Yeon is eternally thankful to her surgeon for what he did for her looks AND her career in entertainment.

Now, let's say I married her, did the hibbity-jibbity, and then 9 months later, out came a kid. I would be expecting a child with decent height from myself and great facial features from it's mom. Instead, I'll get sasquatch. And when little Sasquatch turns 7, he/she'll need some plastic surgery. And a vicious cycle starts.

Not Exactly Barney

Here in S. Korea, there are a lot of English-learning programs. Some seem to be better than others. I think it's amazing that around 4-5 channels on cable usually have English movies and TV shows and another 2-3 usually have English learning programs on.

I am extremely impressed with the children's programming, especially this one show called "Hello Dharma School." Dharma is a spiritual term used by Hindu and Buddhist philosophy to mean the righteous path. The show doesn't have any fun-loving purple dinosaurs like "Barney the Dinosaur," but I think the kids will still find much joy and excitement from "Bob the Buddhist Monk!"





On this show, kids will learn valuable Buddhist lessons as well as useful English phrases such as, "I will not drink or take intoxicants."



Also, they will learn "I will not kill living beings."




And let's not forget, the most useful phrase of all: "I will not be involved in sexual misconduct."




In place of the "I Love You Song," Hello Dharma School ends every episode with a 5-minute reciting of Buddhist scriptures.

(Note: the show is real, but no, the monk is not named Bob and no, they do not actually read scriptures)



Random Snack of the Day: Rice tard. Am I the only one that thinks this is funny?

I Don't Have A Sweet Tooth

I have not been a fan of sweets since I was a little boy that enjoyed going Trick or Treating for candy on Halloween. I have always naturally preferred my food salty and fatty. Foods like cake, ice cream, or brownies never made me feel satisfied and sometimes they made me feel a little sick.

The Korean typical palette unfortunately, tends toward the sweet side. Everything I have tasted here has either a tinge of sweetness or is sweeter than it's supposed to be, such as:

plain bread
french fries
ketchup
chips

Fuck, I'm starting to get pissed off because I can't find snacks that don't taste like they were made for a glycophilliac 5-year old girl.

Spaces that Confine Our Relationships

Growing up, I accepted the space bubble of men. I never questioned the issue of why us men had to sit with one seat between them at the movie theater -- I just accepted it. As you would guess, it blew my mind when I saw President Bush holding hands with that Saudia Arabian prince many years ago:

Being the mature individual that I am, my initial reaction was, of course, a mild chuckle. Following this, time was spent questioning the male space bubble -- the issue obviously must be a cultural-social issue and not a naturally-occurring rule if men in different parts of the world can acceptably lock hands.

I guess I am learning more as I grow older and meet different peoples. My male students have been a great teacher of this: their randomly telling me, "I love you" and their "touchy-feely" attitude has really led me to seeing male relationships in a different light. Because they are not gay at all, but they are just building relationships with other men in the way they see fit.

They are not gay, but sometimes, I really have to wonder:

(Background: We were watching Mulan and this one student wanted to get a better view, so thus, the human booster seat was concocted. Some of the other students thought it was funny too, but it wasn't at all a taboo thing like it would be in America... *mild chuckle*).

I Get More Sleep Than My Students

I haven't been able to communicate with my students much, but I've talked with them enough to know that most of them go to an institute after school. Yes, after school, they have even more school. After talking with some of the teachers about this issue, I've come to the realization that Korean society is heavily competitive for white collar domestic jobs. The students have to / are forced to study hard now so that they can get a good grade on the college entrance exam and get into a good college so that they can have the best chance of getting a job (possibly one not even related to their study) after graduation.

I was talking to one of my students today and after a couple hours of break after school, she goes to an institute to study math and finishes at midnight. She goes to bed at 1AM and then wakes at 6AM to get to school. She's maybe 14. I go to bed at 1:00 AM, wake up at 7:20 in the morning, sit on my bed for 15 minutes while trying to "really" wake up, and then groggily walk to work 5 minutes away. And I'm 24.

Feel surprised? I am. It really doesn't seem healthy for my young students' development to be sleeping so little and to be trying to learn so much in a single day -- I mean, have you ever heard of trying to pour water on a full sponge? I dislike the idea of putting so much importance on academics, but all I can really do is to make sure I don't treat my own kids like that.

Beer at the Movies

There was a little surprise at the movie theatre when I went this weekend:
















I love beer, and I enjoy drinking anywhere, whether it be in a bar, in a park, or on the street. So dear reader, can you imagine my excitement when I saw beer for sale at the concessions? I was more excited than a Saudi Arabian man is after seeing a woman's exposed shoulder.

I'm not one to suggest that we should adopt this practice in America, but I do think we should look at the pros and cons of it.

Con: Considering the large markup at the concession stand, one could probably expect a beer for a large sum of about $6.50.

Pro: Better $6.50 on beer than on a greasy, salty bag of popcorn and ju ju bees.

Con: The availability of beer at a movie theater may destroy the friendly family atmosphere of the movie theatre.

Pro: Well, actually, I think movies like "The Hills Have Eyes" and the Saw series have already done that.

Con: All the beer will cause a 127.9% increase in bathroom trips.

Pro: Increased bathroom trips can be a plus too, if the movie being watched is the newly released, "Terminator Salvation." I would prefer to have T-1000 impale my brain rather than having to watch that movie again.

***

Random pics



I was walking around Kangnam, Seoul when I spotted this Cold Stone Creamery. They had a wheel of fortune and a costumed man on stilts to attract customers (or to scare children, I'm not sure which).
















My favorite restaurant in a place called "Hansot," where I can buy lunch boxes like this for real cheap (about $2.80 in this case).





















Unfortunately, the frosty remnants of winter have finally waned away. In it's wake are my old friends, warm and humid. Well, fortunately, there is a water fountain right next to me in the park, just in case I have the sudden urge to go frolicking in jets of water in the middle of the day.

I miss my friends. The thing I miss the most is probably hanging out, drinking and being lost in a drunken haze of laughter. I need to find that here I suppose.