In the fall

How do you follow a post about getting your first tattoo in the capital city of a foreign country? Apparently you don't. You just write nothing in your blog for a long time until people forget that you even exist, and then bam! An unpleasant reminder, clogging up their timeline and ruining their lives. Let's jump in.

Autumn is here! Technically. Autumn has already come and gone; the trees are bare again, the days are gray and every single person I see looks at me with astonishment, asks, "Cold?!" and points to my short sleeves or lack of a jacket. I usually point at my own face and say "Canadian," which is often enough to explain it. I think I appreciated autumn a lot more this year than last one. I traveled around more and took in more of the scenery. Chloe and I went to a park overlooking Seoul one weekend which was quite gorgeous. The park was several paths through a type of wheat field, with an excellent hilltop view overlooking the Han River. As I was typing that sentence I realized I should just post a photo, but nonetheless felt it necessary to continue typing in order to point that out.

This is much more enjoyable than my writing

Oh yeah, and then my corworkers and I climbed a mountain! Our boss took us to a park in Cheonan as part of a team building exercise. We split into separated groups and raced up the trails along the mountainside, trying to beat each other to each checkpoint. Our team eventually won despite our lack of athleticism and my four or five heart attacks. 

Not pictured: out of shape, heavily panting camera operator

It was nice getting out and appreciating the scenery a little more. Last year I think I spent most of my time bumming around Pyeongtaek or taking trips into Seoul. It wasn't too long after I had moved here so I was a little wary about travelling outside of my bubble. Korea is a lot of cities and towns, but has some real natural beauty once you get outside of all that. 

So that's a few things that have happened since my last post, but I guess the biggest change has been the start of the new term. As of Monday this week I have all new classes, students and a new classroom on a different floor. And we have two new teachers! They've been settling in this week, learning the ropes and getting to know the students. It's interesting; you forget how many little things are involved in this job until you have to explain them all to a new face. All the grading, paperwork, reports, meetings, lesson planning, mock teaching, and then the seven hundred things you have to remember when you're actually running your class. It's overwhelming how much you get used to with experience, and how much becomes second nature over time. Still, the new teachers are adjusting well and seem to be coming along excellently.

It's nice having some new faces, especially given who they replaced. I won't go off on a rant here; I didn't start this blog to shit on people who unquestionably deserve it. Suffice to say our previous teachers were so clueless and incompetent they practically un-taught their kids to speak English, and now the rest of us have to sweep up the pieces of their idiocy. Their methodology and class management were so atrocious that we frequently reference them as benchmark examples for shitty teaching. Like, "Make sure you cover as much of the material as you can during your class. You can't just skip over sections you don't feel like teaching the way Such-and-Such used to." Fortunately for us they had the decency to leave early, so hopefully the door of Korea hits them in the ass on the way out. But you know...not gonna go on a rant...

So that's life here these days! Hope you enjoyed the pictures and skipped most of the words.

Today's title:

Rose tattoo

Yes, I did it! I am one of The Marked now! And soon I and the rest of my tainted comrades will be hunted down for crimes against Not Having a Tattoo. It's a little belated, but mainly this was how I wanted to mark my first full year of living in a foreign country. I mean, originally I was just going to write a blog post about it, but I figured I'd go with the option which was less painful for the rest of you.

From left to right: Justin Tisdale (not pictured)

Actually, I've wanted to get a tattoo since before I even came to Korea. Nothing ever really seemed meaningful, so I told myself that if I made it a full year without losing my job / losing my money / losing my sanity / losing my arm I would find something that made sense to me both in design as well as symbolism and personal expression. And behold! Some boxes.

Well actually as I explained on the original upload of the picture: the 감 (or "gam") is a symbol from the Korean flag which I originally believed stood just for the classic element "water." I had been thinking of something to get that was meaningful to me and also represented my time in Korea, and a symbol from the flag seemed appropriate.

The Joseun dynasty stole my tattoo design for their dumb flag like 130 years ago

The 태극 (pronounced "taeguk", or the yin-yang symbol in the middle) was not an option because, as far as tattoo designs go, it's been done to death. So that left either a vague white surface or one of the trigrams in the corners, and since I am already something of a vague white surface myself, I settled for the latter. But which one to choose? When considering just the classic elements themselves, they all have a certain significance to my time here.

The top left corner (when facing the flag) is the 건 ("geon") and it represents air / heaven. Well, I did fly through the air to get here and then flew across many other countries in southeast Asia, so that's something. The bottom left is the 리 ("ri"), which represents fire. That one was a little harder to pin down. I don't know, I like spicy food I guess? Not much of a contender but still an option. The bottom right is the 곤 ("gon"), representing the ground / Earth. Definitely feel like I've explored the Earth more since leaving home, so that's certainly up there. And then there's the 감 ("gam") in the top right, which represents water. The design was by far my favourite and it symbolized the ocean which stood between me and my home.

I started looking into it though, and the gam stands for more than just water. I was instantly drawn in by how much I connected with the overall symbolism. In nature it represents the moon, which I've always been interested in as a link between cultures and time. Every society had some kind of mythos about the moon, irrespective of language or distance. The gam represents the son in familial relationships (hi mom!), as well as the virtues of intelligence and wisdom. Plus it represents the direction North and the season winter which serves as a constant reminder of home (so yes, my tattoo also includes a joke about Canada being cold).

So that's about it! The only other thing I considered was the direction of the slant. If I copied the flag, the gam should slope upwards towards my head instead of downwards towards my chest. After much consideration I chose downwards towards my chest for the important symbolic of reason of "Ah okay, that looks cool." I won't go on about the process of getting a tattoo / how much it hurt / tattoo care because this isn't a tattoo blog (or an anything blog, really). This has already been a wordy enough diatribe for what could have just been, "Check me out I got a tattoo." It's too late to open with that though, so I'll just close with it.


Today's title:

Midnight lullaby

It's me, that dude whose face you fortunately don't remember as well as you once did. Everything is going well here, no major catastrophes or anything, so if you clicked into this post looking for something compelling you have wasted a perfectly good click. My classes have so far been a mix of fun, interesting and massively frustrating. It's a nice balance; even the frustrating ones at least yield something to complain about over drinks after work. But not at work. No. Never.

Some of my classes are incredibly rewarding though. I'm teaching a one-on-one class with a student at Rookie level, which means he is at a very beginner stage right now. When I started teaching him a month ago, he had literally zero idea what I was saying at any given point. He barely knew the English alphabet, and though it was difficult to cross the communication barrier at first, he started picking up on the material and now he is progressing into short sentences and more complex pronunciations. Seeing the results of your efforts pay off every week is incredibly gratifying, it's kind of hard to describe.

And then you have kids in advance-level courses who don't know what words like "not" or "walk" mean, but that's what the screaming pillow under my desk is for.

Autumn is finally here, thank Whatever. Still the odd hot day but the temperature has at least settled back below the iron-melting inferno of July and August. It's nice weather for getting out, which may be why this month I've written one post about bicycling and another post about nothing because I'm lying. Chloe and I visited Gyeongbokgung Palace recently in the evening, when large parts of the palace were illuminated by stylized lighting. It was gorgeous and the weather was beautiful; we spent an hour walking around the palace grounds on Sunday. There was a short light show projected onto screening on one of the buildings which was pretty fantastic. Plus we managed to get in on a limited run of tickets because guess who's a foreigner? This guy!

It's like a house but bigger and with more things

I get most of my fresh air in the evenings actually. This is partly because of the late work schedule and partly because I'm too lazy to wake up at a reasonable hour. I usually go out for walks or a bike ride just after midnight, and I've discovered some neat stuff. I found a stream with a bike trail running along it that bisects the town which I had no idea existed until recently, which has been nice to ride along despite the occasional mouthful of spider web followed by quite a bit of screaming. 

I've also seen some weird things around here, man. I followed the highway to the other side of the train tracks, and it turns out the expression "the other side of the train tracks" is quite astonishingly accurate in Pyeongtaek. I think that end of town is populated exclusively by haunted farming equipment. The other night I saw an intercity bus heading out of town with all it's lights on and a solitary passenger sitting alone at the front, but it was several hours after the last bus was scheduled to leave town. Oh, and just earlier tonight I saw a guy in a really nice suit talking on his cellphone while walking down the direct middle of a four lane road for some reason. At least, I assume he was talking on a cellphone. I didn't actually see a cellphone. I hope he had one.

That's it from me right now. Stay tuned for the next blog post which will be written in all of the Korean I can speak, which as of today is about three words incorrectly.

Today's title:

Bicycle! Bicycle! Bicycle!

In my previous post I talked about how I was going to post a mashup of all the things I hadn't talked about yet to celebrate the past year. I have decided to continue my legacy of Not Following Through on Stuff by abandoning that idea completely. To be honest I typed out a couple drafts and just tremendously hated it for some reason. So maybe I'll subject you to that in the future, but for now it's back to business as usual.

We're into the second week of our new term (my 5th so far) and things are going well! My schedule has completely shifted; I am now working in the April branch, teaching more fundamental lessons to younger kids. In fact it was what I was originally hired for before I got switched to the normal CDI program and it's been a lot of fun. My lessons are a little more involved and my overall number of teaching hours is lower, which leaves more time to get caught up on prep work, grading and...well, posting dumb things here. I've also taken over the classroom of Sara, a teacher who had worked here since I was first hired and who recently moved down to Pohang. Being in her old room feels a little like dancing on someone's grave, except with more games and snacks and such.

New room, new curriculum, new students, same old backpack I've had for eight god damn years

You know what I've been up to a lot since I last posted? Biking! I have a bike now and am turning into some kind of bike guy. People around town will say, "Who's that lumbering jackass who almost hit me with their bike the other day?" and there's a significant chance they're talking about me.

Practically, having a bike here is pretty great. It takes about half the time to get to and from work as walking, and most of the ride back is downhill. Getting downtown is easier, and while not quite as fast as a bus it has its own set of advantages. For example: not having to ride the bus. Plus even though it is late summer it still gets pretty hot in the afternoon, and the less time spent out in the blistering hellscape the better.

On top of which it's also a lot of fun. I forgot how much I actually enjoy biking as I haven't done it much since I was younger. It's nice to go out for a ride through the rice fields or just cruise around town looking for things. There's a guy who runs a shop near my apartment who I go to for supplies (still haven't gotten used to sitting on a bike seat without a generous amount of padding) and he gave me some directions to trails around town that I have yet to explore. I can't wait to get out a bit more when the weather properly cools down. And then it will be winter and I'll just be annoyed again for totally different reasons. Ahh nature, you are an actual bastard sometimes.

So that's what's up with me these days. Thanks for reading!

Go away!


Today's title (I didn't want to go with this because it was the most obvious, but I did some research and learned there is a preposterously huge number of songs written about bicycles so I gave up):

Dear home town

Holy actual crap, it's been a year!

In fact it's been just over 53 weeks since I wrote this very boring post prior to my flight to Korea. Boy do I remember that day well too; it was almost like a roller coaster, except with a track made of anxiety and a safety bar made of more anxiety.

I've decided to celebrate by making a mock-up list from the past year of things I haven't covered yet in this blog. All the fun little moments that kind of got lost in the day to day shuffle of living here, kind of like a Greatest Hits list. Or like a clip show. You know how when you're really into a TV show and then all of a sudden they do a clip show to fill time and you feel really annoyed so you don't watch it? Well yeah, it'll be like that.

But that's not this entry, because this time I have to talk about how my freaking parents came to Korea! They were here on my turf, in my apartment and everything! I have proof, check it out:

See? That's them, on my terrible couch next to my terrible guitar

As far as surreal experiences go, this was definitely up there. I had gotten so used to relaying things about South Korea to family and friends back home that I hadn't adequately prepared to show people first hand. But damn, it was a fun and all-too-short few days when they were here. I got to introduce them to Chloe for the first time (who finally admitted I was right that she had no reason to be worried, which brings the total number of arguments I've won to a comfortable 2 out of 7,000) and the four of us took a trip down to Haeundae Beach in Busan.

I forgot to mention to my parents before they came here that Korea is about 10 million kilometers closer to the sun than Canada is though. God damn was it hot in Busan. We visited Oryukdo Skywalk on the first day and hiked along the coast, then traveled out to Yonggungsa Temple on Sunday. Mostly we just went to different places, sweat a ton, said, "It's too fucking hot let's go," and then went somewhere else. But then we drank a lot of beer and passed out on the beach, so pretty good overall!

Back to Seoul on Monday! After dropping off some stuff in Itaewon, we visited Insadong market (almost a year to the day after I first went there) and then saw Seoul at night from the top of Namsan tower. On Tuesday we attempted to visit Gyeongbokgung Palace but found the gates barred for the day. So rather than risk international incident by storming the palace in a bloody coup, we simply took a boat cruise on the Han River, then met Chloe in the evening to see a baseball game. Have I talked about baseball games in Korea here yet? Man oh man. We should talk.

Ah, but all good things must come to an end. It was pretty tough saying goodbye on Wednesday. I didn't really appreciate at the time, but I had never gone so long without seeing my parents as when I moved here. It was much harder to watch them go this time even than the first time I left, because I know now how long it may be before I see them again. When I wrote that first post a year ago, I thought by now I would be writing my "I'm back in Canada!" post and wrapping this thing up. But such is the passage of time; you never really know what will come to pass. I still feel homesick, but sometimes now I look around at my tiny apartment - terrible guitar and terrible couch and all - and it feels like home too. That never used to happen before.

But there's a bright side here: with all the amazing gifts my parents brought me, there's a lot less Canada for me to go back to these days!

Yes, that's a full case of beer. Eat it, customs.

Thanks for the great visit, mom and dad. I love you!

Today's title:

Surprise, surprise!

How to Have a Birthday in a Foreign Country: The pointless, ham-fisted step-by-step guide you thought you never needed and were right

I turned 26 on Monday, and if my memory is correct this is the first time I've celebrated a birthday outside of Canada. Even the year I lived in the United States, I'm still fairly sure we were at the cottage in July. So a new first for me! I think. It really doesn't matter, because it was a hell of a lot of fun. So what do you do while you get old in Korea? Well...

Step #1: Travel! Get off your ass and go somewhere!

The weekend of July 16th my girlfriend, fellow teachers and I traveled down to Daegu, where many of us had never been before. Daegu is a lovely city nestled among some of the higher mountains I've seen since arriving in Korea. Most of the city sprawls in the valleys between the tree-covered slopes, so every view from any kind of height is backed by some really gorgeous scenery. Daegu is also a pretty big city (the fourth largest in the country after Seoul, Busan and Incheon) with its own monorail system to complement the separate subway line.

We rented a large flat near downtown Daegu and arrived early on Saturday morning. We were then immediately drowned in the torrential downpour of rain, which showed up just to say, "Fuck you Justin, this is why you never plan anything." But it was okay, because after loading up on meat, vegetables and ten breweries worth of beer, we barricaded ourselves in this incredibly nice place and proceeded to party. My original idea was for a chill night of drinks and jamming together, which turned into an insanely fun and ridiculous night of Korean BBQ, drinks, cake, drinking games, drinks, jamming and drinks. 

I spent most of the next day being hungover, but we still managed to fit in some sightseeing against all of my wiser instincts to lay down and die. We got some lunch at a local market and visited a famous bakery for some of the most amazing pastries I've ever had. We also visited Hillcrest Eco Park, which is a really nice park on the side of a mountain. There we explored a green tea garden, saw some animals in a small zoo and, of course, baked cookies. On a mountain.

I'm not gonna lie here: it was one of the greatest birthdays I've ever had. Check out the video below for some shots from the trip, courtesy of the wonderfully talented Elaina Wi!

Step #2: Whoa there! Settle down and relax a bit too! Jesus Christ, man!

Yeah, it was a pretty intense weekend. The weekend before my actual birthday was a lot more relaxing, but no less fun. Chloe and I explored around Coex Mall on Saturday, which is a pretty massive mall in Seoul. We got some steak for dinner on Saturday, which I think is the first steak I've had in over a year. It was also the most expensive meal I've had here, but damn was it worth it. I miss steak. 

We had a very restful weekend overall, which was nice. We've both been working so much, it was nice to just take a load off for a couple days. Chloe cooked 미역국 (miyeokguk - a seaweed soup traditionally eaten on one's birthday) which was incredibly delicious and, due to it's amazing health benefits, probably the only thing keeping me alive after all the meat I had the week before.

Step #3: You've spent too much money, idiot. Go to work.

I had to work on Monday, which to be honest was-

Step #4: Work's over now PARTY AGAIN!

Cool! Monday night a few of my friends came by my place for pizza, drinks and music. And then my managers showed up at my apartment, with more beer and cake! I was a little overwhelmed; it's hard to put into words how grateful I am to have such amazing people in my life. 

I'm a damn lucky guy. Thanks everyone!

Today's title:

You will be waiting

"Hey Justin, what's been happening since you returned from your vacation?"

It's a question on nobody's minds, but I figured hey, it's preposterously late at night so I might as well write an update. I figure if I update this blog nine times this month I should be right on track with my previous average, and having done so my readership should have dropped to exactly zero so...you know, problem solved.

Damn, it's been almost two and a half months since I returned from the Philippines, hasn't it? What do I even say here? I've visited a few places since then, like Jeongju (lots of amazing food and traditional houses, definitely a great place to go for a crash course in pre-20th century Korean culture) and Pohang (went fishing with some other teachers from another branch of my academy then partied in a pub by the beach). I could go into more detail about each of those but, knowing me as well as I do, it seems unlikely that I will.

As of posting this I've been in Korea just shy of 11 months now, and I don't know if I've posted this for sure in here yet, but I've already been talking with my bosses about extending my contract for another year! It's exciting; I feel like there's still so much here that I want to do and it's gratifying to know that I have a lot more time to do it in. Plus of course things have been going very well with my girlfriend; we have been dating for over four months as of now. That's been interesting in and of itself; one of the traditions for couples in Korea is to celebrate every 100 days, so we were able to enjoy that together a few weeks ago. So life here has been going pretty fantastic overall! I'll have to post something celebratory on the anniversary of my first full year living abroad. I'll have to actually goddamn remember to do that in the first place, but hey, it's something!

The only problem right now is the homesickness. Maybe it has something to do with it being summertime, and seeing lots of my friends and family post pictures of things happening in Canada that I'm missing out on, but I've been feeling unaccountably homesick the past few weeks. It comes and goes in waves, and a few of my fellow teachers have been on a bit of a nostalgia trip lately, so it least it seems like it's not just me. But I miss some things about being home. I miss my cottage, and I miss Canadian beer (the beer here is plentiful but it tastes like how beer would describe itself if it was vaguely embarrassed). And of course I miss all of you reading this.

To be honest, it makes me pretty sad not to be a part of people's lives in the same way anymore. I'm watching people I've known for years get married from 10,000km away. I'm not around in any kind of meaningful way, so I don't even have the option. There's a strange kind of helplessness to being so far away. I feel like the guy from The Martian except there's food and chairs and stuff.

It's funny how things change, I suppose. Looking back, I was so anxious about actually travelling here that I remember thinking, "Don't worry, it's just for a year and then you get to go back." And now, homesick as I am, the fact that I'll be staying for another year still makes me really excited. There's so much still to do and see. And there's tons of things I'll miss about Korea when I move home, so I guess I'm screwed either way. But seeing as that's the case, might as well enjoy myself when I'm here!

Don't wait up!


Today's title:

Some Sunny Day: The Philippines (Part 2)

Baler was much less intense.

I didn't sleep the night before my bus, mostly because 4:00am does not exist as a wake-up time for me. In fact it's a full hour earlier than I normally go to sleep. But I made it to the station on time and, because I'm an idiot, forgot to buy coffee or something to eat on the way. The bus from Manila to Baler took over six hours, which was fine by me because it was quality time I got to spend looking out the window at stuff. I'm not even being facetious; Luzon is a beautiful island and we passed some really cool scenery.

The landscape is dotted with the odd volcano rising out of an otherwise flat area, and for a long time out of Manila it was mostly fields and farms. Eventually though the landscape began to ascend and we drove up a very long, winding mountain road past some amazing landscapes. The mountains are covered with thick green forests with large, crystal blue lakes lying between them. The view was stunning to the point where I didn't even mind the incredibly slow pace with which we drove up the mountain. In fact I missed that speed very much when we started down the other side at a pace which made me wonder if the driver didn't just shift the bus into neutral and leap out the door.

I took a tricycle from the bus station to my cabin in Dela Torre beach; a simple, rustic shack on the shore of a beach dominated by large black volcanic rock formations and shallow tide pools teeming with aquatic life. I actually spent most of the first day sleeping because I was god damn tired exploring around the beach itself, trying to find different sea creatures. There were crabs, star fish, sea urchins and small fish which would periodically leap from one tide pool, bounce off a couple rocks and land in another pool several feet away. Between that and the rock formations it was probably the most interesting beach I have ever visited. White sand beaches are fun and relaxing and all, but if you want to spend a whole day saying, "Oooh! What the hell is that?!" you might be missing out. I'll post a link to their AirBNB page right here. No wait, here.

God damn I already want to go back

The people in Baler were incredibly friendly. The family running my resort helped me get settled in and the owner, Eric, drove me into town several times to help me buy supplies (beer) and show me some good restaurants (that sold beer). There was a group of Filipino 20-somethings a cabin down from mine who invited me over the first night to drink some brandy and hang out for a while, which was a lot of fun. Everywhere I went people just wanted to chat; children and adults alike would stop to say hello, ask where I was from, if I was enjoying my trip and everything. I'm also featured in the photographs of about a dozen strangers who were visiting the same things as me. I don't think I've ever met people so openly and effortlessly friendly as in that town.

A lot of my time was spent relaxing by the water and reading, or otherwise taking trips into town and exploring the area. On Thursday however I managed to get out and really see the area. I climbed a gorgeous trail up the side of a mountain to Mother Falls, which was an exhausting but very worthwhile hike. I then went to the Millennium Tree, which is the largest Balete tree in Asia at 60 meters tall. I crossed Baler's hanging bridge which was only a little bit terrifying and ended it with a swim at Sabang beach, the main beach and surfer hangout in Baler. I was going to try surfing lessons as it was remarkably cheap there (350 pesos for board rental and one hour with an instructor) but decided that spending the last day in Baler humiliating myself in front of everyone was a less than ideal finale.

The final Friday and Saturday were spent largely in transit - another six hour bus back to Manila on Friday and the flight back the next day. And that was my trip! It was fun, fascinating and relaxing at the same time. I loved it there and would love to go back, despite the risk I run of bursting into flames the second I step off the plane.


Today's title (I like this cover):

Some Sunny Day: The Philippines (Part 1)

I'm back from the Philippines with tales of adventure and only a few sunburns! And some blisters. And a bunch of sand all over my stuff.

I'm going to condense my time in Manila into just this post since I wasn't there very long. To start, Manila is...well let's call it an intense city. The heat was oppressive and I began sweating profusely before I even made it out of the airport. Also I will never again complain about the traffic in Korea now that I have seen what can only be described as every action sequence from Fury Road all happening at once at every god damn moment of the day. Traffic lanes don't even rise to the level of a suggestion; they're more like a weird modern artifact that no one really pays attention to anymore. Weaving through traffic in a taxi without wearing a seat belt (not by choice - none of the cabs I took even had them), dodging tricycles, jeepneys, buses and other cars with chaotic abandon while "Staying Alive" by the Bee Gees plays on the radio was exactly my first experience in Manila. 

I suppose this does have a benefit for the locals though: there were at least a dozen times when the thought, "Dude if you just get me there alive I'll pay you whatever the hell you want, I don't even care anymore," popped into my head. People spent so much time warning me about pick-pockets in the city that they failed to mention, "Oh but don't worry, you'll be killed in a fiery explosion on the highway long before anyone gets the chance to rob you."

The warnings about pick-pockets are actually why I have very few pictures of Manila. Petty crime there is quite high so I opted to leave my phone locked in my room. It's a shame though; I saw some pretty cool stuff while I was there. During the first day I spent a lot of time exploring the neighborhood around my apartment, trying some of the local food and, well, sleeping. I barely slept the night before getting on the plane, and I'm pretty sure the pilot was drunk based on the fact that it felt like we kept jumping the curb the whole flight down. Point is it was a long day.

The next day though I visited the Mall of Asia, which is one of the largest malls in the world (the 11th, I think) and has a fantastic boardwalk along Manila Bay. It was on the boardwalk that I tried balut for the first time. If you don't know what balut is, Google it! Film your reaction and send it to me in a video. It was delicious so I don't give a crap. I explored around the mall for a while and had some drinks on the boardwalk as the sun started going down on the bay. 

After the mall I took a taxi ("Ahhhh! AHHHHHH!!!") up to Fort Santiago, and it was here that I really started to regret not having my camera. The fort is over 400 years old and has some amazing remaining architecture. I explored around here for a while, walking along the old battlements along the river and reading a lot of really cool stuff about the history of the fort, most of which I don't remember because I don't have any damn photos of it. The fort also houses a museum in honour of Jose Rizal, a national hero and key figure in the rebellion against the Spanish. I had never heard of Jose Rizal before, but his story is truly captivating. The museum itself was amazingly thorough - clothes Rizal wore; letters he wrote; a huge timeline of his life; even a piece of his vertebrae recovered after his execution was featured.

No I did not make that last one up. There was a piece of his goddamn spine in the museum.

So that was Manila! Pretty cool overall. I had a great time there and managed to get out without anyone stabbing me in the face or taking my stuff (well, mostly; a tricycle driver did "accidentally" take me to the wrong part of the city, and then "forgot" how to get to Sampaloc, and then demanded I pay him full price, and being that it was dark and a bunch of his friends were around and what he was essentially scamming me out of amounted about about five bucks I just let him have it, that son of a bitch). Tune in next time I remember to update this thing for part 2!

Today's title:

Fever

Just a short update so that I can at least say I wrote something this month. I'll be leaving for the Philippines in two days (What! Yes! So excited!) and as such will be too busy sleeping on the beach like a homeless man to do any updating in here. This will be my first proper vacation since I started working here almost nine months ago.

Damn, it's really been nine months too. I can't imagine where the time has gone, but it probably disappeared into an alcohol-related blackout. Things are going well, not too much to update but I wanted to document a few things. I finally made it down to Busan this past weekend which was just an impossible amount of fun. We visited Haedong Temple first, then spent most of the night partying in various locations around Haendae beach. The beach itself is gorgeous and we spent the better part of our Sunday lounging around there with a bunch of other teachers from the area. All in all a great weekend; I can't wait to go back and see more of the city.

I'll have to update with adventures in the Philippines when I get back since I lack the ability to see through time, but one thing occurred to me recently that I wanted to talk about. I realized I've been sick in Korea - like with just mild colds and so on - way more often than I ever have anywhere else. Most of the time it's a mild cough or a sore throat but every now and then something more serious will crop up. I missed work a few weeks ago because I was coughing so hard that it started to actually affect my balance and I spent the entire day laying in bed praying for death. But I was also watching Dragonball Z so it was a pretty okay time.

I'm not sure really what accounts for this though. At first I thought it was just foreign germs and introduction to a new environment, but I feel like I've been here long enough to rule that out. My current theory is that it stems mostly from working in a closed room with a bunch of kids and poor ventilation. Even under the best conditions, children are little more than walking vectors of disease with no discretion. One of my students recently tried to whisper something in my ear and ended up just coughing directly in my face. So scratch that - I think I know exactly why I'm getting sick.

But all in all it's not too bad, and only once or twice has it been anything particularly serious. I could always cut down on the drinking and be cleaner generally. But I'm not going to do that. See you after the Philippines, whoever is still reading this!


Today's title (This is obviously not where the song originates, but I'm a dork and I loved this episode so shut up)

The kids are alright

I normally make a point of updating this at least a couple times a month, but shortly after Japan everything kinda went directly to hell in a nightmarish tailspin and I kinda let a few things slide. Not that this is all gonna be ranting but I do have about twelve hours of that to get out of the way first. I'll try to cut it down to ten.

First of all, our former Head Instructor quit before the end of her contract. According to the terms of our contracts with the company you're supposed to give as much as 8 weeks notice of this so that they have time to find a new teacher, get them processed through the litany of paperwork involved in moving here, fly them over, train them and move them down. She informed me she would be quitting about...let's be generous and say 30 hours in advance, and that I would most likely be taking over as Head Instructor. So go me! Battlefield promotions worked out really well in Starship Troopers, so at this point I'm optimistic in a "brick to the face" sort of way.

To cut a tediously long story short, it all worked out in the end. I mean aside from the lack of sleep and the stress headaches and the constant punch spasms. The last few weeks have actually been really fun, and it's been nice getting to know our new staff members. One of them is actually from Canada, if you can believe such a ridiculous thing. Whoever heard of someone from Canada? Now that everyone has more or less settled in it's back to the ordinary swing of things. I'm enjoying a really bizarre mixed schedule this term where I spend half my time in the April branch, which involves teaching much younger kids a more simplified curriculum. It's been a riot so far, because kids at a certain age are really damn weird.

One of the boys in my Tuesday/Thursday class is constantly quoting stuff from Wrestlemania. It's hard to even explain how odd this is. Wrestling isn't really a thing here, so for him to be extremely familiar with an English-based show about wrestling is odd in and of itself. And it's astonishing how much he knows. He's familiar with wrestlers who died before even I was born and I have no idea where he's picking it up from. There might honestly be a satellite dish in his brain and he's just projecting everything he picks up verbatim without really understanding it, but I mean, that hardly ever happens.

There's another girl, probably about six or seven years old, who has seemingly decided that I am a problem and need to die. I don't even teach her, but I did wave at her once while sitting in the foyer during break. She stopped in her tracks and stared at me, unblinking, for three straight minutes. Nothing I said or did made any impact on her from that moment. She didn't look angry, or scared, or even confused. No expression whatsoever. At one point I turned to my co-worker and said, "This is the most terrifying moment of my whole life," and I meant it.

So that's life here so far. I would apologize for the lack of updates but I'm probably the only person still reading this and I don't really give a fuck what I think. Things are going great, the weather is getting warmer and I'm gonna be travelling to the Philippines during my vacation week in April. Actually I don't think I have a single free weekend until at least next month, which is still hard to get used to. I had virtually no social life this time last year and now I have more social life than I can physically process.

Korea, man. It's a fun place to be.


Today's title:

Big in Japan (Part 3)

On day 4 I'm pretty sure I walked over more of Japan than there is Japan to walk on.

I visited the Meiji shrine in the morning. At least that was the plan, except I went to the wrong place. There happens to be an area called Yoyogi Park which is right next to it, and if you walk through the wrong entrance because you aren't paying attention like an idiot you'll end up wandering around there for a couple hours. Which is what I did, but I'm not complaining. Yoyogi park is awesome. There's a bird sanctuary as well as a really nice grove of trees from a couple dozen nations all over the world. I realized I was in the wrong place by the time I got to the furthest end, but that's when I saw a sign advertising bike rentals for two dollars an hour.

So then I spent the next hour biking around Yoyogi Park. This alone would be worth going back to Japan for in the spring. The park was already beautiful when only half the trees were in bloom and the trail system wound through a few groves and along a small creek. I kind of forgot why I had ventured out in the first place; the thrill of being on a bike for the first time in years was starting to go to my head.

I left shortly after returning the bike and started to head back out to Meiji shrine. The shrine itself is huge, somewhere between 70 and 80 acres and I'm pretty sure I covered most of it by foot. Even though there were tons of people visiting at the time, once I got far enough in I didn't see a soul. The shrine itself was built to honour the late Emperor Meiji who presided over a large cultural expansion in the early 1900s. I toured around the inner garden for a while before making the trek to the actual shrine part of the shrine. I had intended to visit the treasure museum as well but for reasons beyond my understanding it was closed. It's ok though because it was only a hundred miles out of my way by foot.

I made it to Shinjuku in the late afternoon, which was good because it gave me time to stretch my legs and finally get a little walking done for a change. Getting out at the wrong station, I decided to walk uptown a few blocks and visit the Park Hyatt hotel, where Lost in Translation was filmed. The original plan was to have a glass of Suntory in the New York Bar at the top of the building, but a few things got in the way. The first being that I was not dressed for how extremely nice that building is, and the second being I was broke-ass. Including the cover charge, my first drink would have cost me about $40. So I decided looking at it was probably good enough.

After this was another trip up the Metro building to see Tokyo at night (if you're in the area, DO THIS, especially if you can get into the North Tower), and somewhere in there I think I sat down once, and then day four came to an end.

On the last full day we visited the Tokyo National Art Museum to catch a travelling Terracotta Warriors exhibit as well as explore some traditional Japanese artwork. There were some truly stunning relics dating back several thousands of years, as well as some artwork that completely failed to translate into cellphone-camera phone. You'll just have to go there and check it out.

That evening we had some drinks, hit up some arcades and watched a chain-smoking guy dominate at Street Fighter IV for a half an hour. And that about does it for my time in Japan! It's a pretty cool place overall. Which I guess is self-evident based on the massive walls of text I've been pumping out for the past week. It was a lot of fun and I'm hoping to go back during my time in Korea. Until then, I once again leave you with the eccentric words of Tom Waits.


Today's title:

Big in Japan (Part 2)

Day two is when things got weird.

First we took a tour of the Imperial Palace. Not of the palace itself, mind you, just the grounds that surround it. It was pretty gorgeous. I should point out that most of the things we saw which involved nature in any way come with the caveat that it would have looked nicer in the spring. The things I saw were undeniably beautiful and the weather was great, but it was still early February. Lots of the trees were bare and some of the flowers hadn't quite started to bud yet. That being said though, the Imperial Palace had some pretty fantastic grounds and architecture. There were a few old structures still remaining which used to house the samurai who guarded the emperor that looked really cool. 

Afterwards we went to the Shibuyah Crossing, which is rumoured to be the busiest intersection in the world. I wouldn't be surprised at all of this was true. There were so many people that for a moment I couldn't even see myself through the crowd. There was some great shopping to be had in this area, including a massive Tower Records with music from all over the world. We spent some time here before moving on to Shinjuku, which is where the real craziness was: the Robot Restaurant.

To save you some googling, the Robot Restaurant is basically a two-hour long show where people dress in crazy costumes and do awesome stuff. There was a girl in a silver-white wig just rocking the fuck out on some drums, a dude playing a bass guitar wearing a horse-head mask, a synchronized Michael Jackson dance including the famous lean during Smooth Criminal and of course the show itself. The "plot," if it can so be called, was basically this: there once was a peaceful forest planet, and then the evil robot empire invaded, and then they fought. There were people riding giant mecha-tanks, lizards, sharks, a giant monkey flying on a giant moth that breathed fire. It blew my mind to pieces and then blew up the individual pieces. 

Before going to the Restaurant we actually met up with our friends Sara and Olivia who were headed there at the same time. I believe before the show they told me, "We can't stay out and drink too late because we have to be on an early bus tomorrow." About thirty minutes later the first intermission was called and something to the effect of, "Eh, fuck that," was said, so we drank a lot. When the show was over we went to the Golden Gai district and found the world's tiniest pub and drank entirely too much beer and sake for three people. 

I woke up...somewhere, on day 3 and proceeded to get incredibly lost on the Tokyo subway system for about an hour. It turns out if you get on a train heading in the wrong direction on the Tokyo subway, you can't just get out and cross the platform and get on the other train. Because sometimes that train will be on a completely different line and you'll wind up in, like, Alaska or something. But day three is also when I got to have Japanese sushi for the first time and go to the top of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building, which has an excellent observation area for free views of the city. Day three was a pretty chill day of shopping, drinking and ramen, which was nice because I was nursing the sort of hangover that could end a career.

I slept well that night, which was good because day 4 would bring just an unreasonable amount of walking.

Today's title:

Big in Japan (Part 1)

I'm back from Japan, and what an adventure it was! I fought the robot hordes, I conquered the Imperial Palace, I soared above Mt. Fuji and I drank the island dry. I'm going to roll these posts out over the next few days, mostly because I have a lot to say but also because I want Facebook to shut up about me not posting to my page enough. You happy now, Zuckerberg? You see what you've reduced me to?

Ahem. I may not have slept much. 

Friday evening after work, I caught a late train up to Seoul. The plan was to head up early so I could get to the airport in time for the 9am flight on what was guaranteed to be an excessively busy travel day. Plus I wanted to stay in a jimjilbang for the first time and figured this would be a good opportunity. For the uninitiated, a jimjilbang is basically a public spa and bath house in Korea which also provides basic sleeping accommodation. It is also where the concept of awkwardness goes to lift weights. Nudity abounds, so if you're uncomfortable with that you'll probably miss out. However once you get over that it's actually pretty neat. I was staying at a place called the Silloam Fire Pot Sauna near Seoul Station, which has a really great semi-private sleeping area and some awesome therapeutic fomentation rooms and hot tubs.

I only had about five hours there, most of which I intended on spending asleep, or I would have explored the facilities more extensively. Unfortunately for the way my stupid brain works, 1am is basically when I get a second wind of energy so I spent all but about 15 minutes wide awake. After essentially laying there awake until 4:45am I decided to get up, take an awkward shower / soak in a hot tub and head to the airport.

The flight was uneventful and short, which I think is the nicest possible way to fly. I managed to navigate to the hotel with more than a little help from Trevor, another teacher at my school with whom I was travelling. Were were staying in the Akihabara district of Tokyo, which is basically a city within the city that was built entirely for nerds and geeks of all kinds. So basically paradise. We spent the better part of that day wandering around Akihabara and visiting various hobby shops and video game stores.

I honestly can't even describe how much cooler stuff in Japan is. There are rows and rows of games that never make it over to North America in every shop I visited. The shops themselves are mostly for retail but also include displays of the owner's collection of rare not-for-sale stuff. One vintage game store had an Atari 2600 with the E.T. game cartridge inside that I insisted on at least trying to steal. There were models of characters from various anime and Nintendo games that I was familiar with and it was a struggle against the "still a child" part of my brain not to buy basically everything.

Afterwards we went to Tokyo Station to explore around and visited Ramen Street - which is exactly what it sounds like - for dinner. The food was incredible and our server was gorgeous so...I mean yeah, 10/10. All in all a fantastic first day. Must remember to be more succinct next time or reading about my time in Japan will take longer than I actually spent travelling there.


Today's title:

Don't think twice, it's alright

Holy hell it got cold all of a sudden. Realistically it's not actually that cold, only about -10C (for my non-Canadian readers this is basically beach weather) but it's been comparatively warm lately so it feels a dozen times worse than it is in reality. The other day I stepped out of our building to get some lunch in between classes and forgot to grab my jacket. One of the women who works at a cellphone retailer on the first floor started yelling things at me and pointing to my bare arms. I don't know much Korean but I can recognize "Put a jacket on you stupid son of a bitch!" in basically every language.

January is well on its way at this point and my second semester as a teacher is nearing its end. Next week is level-up testing for my students which basically means I get to sit around while they do work, which is virtually no different from what I currently do (Just kidding, current and future employers, I'm a very hard worker, no need to check that CCTV footage like you're absolutely going to). After that it's only a few more weeks until the semester ends and I get a whole new group of students.

And, as it should turn out this time, a few new teachers to our school as well!

I'm not sure why I feel so anxious about this. It's pretty typical of life as a foreign teacher; you come in on a set contract at, most likely, a different time than most of your co-workers. Contracts end regularly every three months or so, and if you stay here long enough you'll eventually watch the entire staff change from what it used to be to something completely different. So I guess that's part of it, really. It's not just that I've grown comfortable with the people I currently work with, but they've become very good friends and I'm going to hate to see them move on. 

The other part is that, now that I'm one of the more experienced people at this school, I suppose I'll have to actually show people around a bit if they've never been here before. Which they haven't. No one's been to Pyeongtaek, not even people who actually live there. The thought of that is strange as well; even as I approach the six month mark, I still feel kind of new. I'm still discovering things and learning stuff, which I guess is pretty normal for living in a foreign country even after a few years.

On the other hand, I have settled into a pretty regular routine, and I feel like I could probably be fairly helpful if I actually tried. It's hard to explain really but I probably know a lot more than I know that I know. Holy crap does that sentence ever not make sense. To put it another way, I lived in Kingston for a few years and when I actively thought about it there wasn't a whole lot I could say, but when I actually started to describe it to someone else I kind of realized that the knowledge is actually there. It's just buried somewhere in the mess of other nonsense that is my brain.

So overall I think I'm excited! Maybe a little nervous but excited nonetheless. We'll see how it goes.

Today's title:

Next year

I think I was originally planning on doing this on New Year's Day, but the thing is we partied pretty hard and I'm only just now waking up again. So before I stumble over to the toilet and vomit out my central nervous system, let's talk about the holidays!

They sucked!

Actually I had an amazing time the past couple weeks. Christmas Day we got out from work early and went up to Songtan for dinner and drinks. On a whim we decided to check out a little Irish pub off the main street and ended up having a great time there. I even helped the  bartender change a keg half way through the night because I apparently have an infinite capacity to consume beer. I also discovered this bar has an honour wall that you can get your name on if you drink more than 100 pints so now I know what I'm going to be working on for the next few months.

I managed to have a glass of scotch in hand when the ball dropped on New Year's eve so already 2016 is off to a good start. I also have a few resolutions I'd like to work on, so I'm gonna list them here. If my hopes and aspirations for the future are of little interest to you (they are) you can just skip ahead.

1. Maintain weight loss - The food here is too god damn good and the beer is too cheap and easy to get. It's not fair. As a result my weight has gone up a little bit. Not a terrifying amount, but I would like to lose 10-15 pounds and then maintain for a while. My work isn't as physically demanding as it used to be (I used to work in a warehouse which involved a lot of lifting and walking and trying desperately not to choke someone) so I need to adjust my workout a bit. Shouldn't be too difficult - I'm still ahead of where I was in January 2015, which is a start.
2. Travel more - Future Justin, if you're re-reading this entry in like six months and you still have places to travel that you haven't been to yet I will punch your face. This winter has been bizarre, which is making it hard to schedule things. It's been warm enough that getting around generally isn't much of an issue, but I don't want to travel way out in the country and get caught in the freezing weather which is evidently weeks overdue. Still, I'm compiling a list and making plans. I think I've settled on Thailand for my vacation next semester. You read it here first, kids!
3. Learn Korean - I've been looking into some local language tutors but am having trouble working that into my schedule. Basically though I would like to learn more of the language, either through a tutor or Rosetta Stone or something. I've picked up the alphabet, can read at a preposterously slow speed and understand bits and pieces but I definitely want to learn some conversational basics at the very least.
4. Stop doing that weird thing I haven't told anyone about - Seriously, that's enough.

All in all it was a pretty enjoyable holiday season, if it can even be called that since I worked exactly the same hours as every other week of the past four months. Damn we work a lot. Considering this is the first time I've spent the holidays away from family though, it actually went pretty well. There were some melancholy moments here and there, but not nearly so many as I expected. The best part is I was lucky enough to be with an awesome group of people who were all in the same boat as myself, and I think we managed to make it fun. Or at the very least I had fun. Literally gallons of fun.

Today's title: