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.