Return of the Kings: Walker Hill $10,000 Tournament

Last weekend I went back to Walker Hill for the big tournament which I had won my way into by flexing serious Texas Hold'em skills. Funny thing is, I actually suck and proved this at the very first table of the tournament. After winning four hands in a row I foolishly went all in against a wily old Chinese gentleman who made two pair on the river. It was just too early in the day to make that kind of move. So I was out after playing for less than half an hour. A man had feelings, so I went into a gambling fugue and played roulette for, like, ten hours. I ended up about 40 bucks up when I emerged from the fugue. So it was a pretty good fugue overall. I believe I ate some Korean food during this period and I definitely went to a bathroom that looked like the escape pod from an art deco space station.

This week has been short because Chuseok is upon us. A sort of Korean Thanksgiving, Chuseok gets me a Friday off and sees many Korean children coming to school in traditional Hanbok, or awesome gowns. Some are rather traditional while others make the child look like the patron saint of '80s neon. Gifts have been prevalent: I am up two pens, a bouquet of flowers, aftershave, and a bottle of wine. I gave my kindergartners a bunch of colored pencils which have rainbow graphite (!) and my Korean teachers got pears. Everybody likes pears, right? They were Asian pears in fact, and I didn't mean anything by that choice. Asian pears just happen to be the most delicious.

Happy Chuseok!

My students are brilliant and hilarious

Two things happened at school today.

My kindergarten class has been taking note of the sunrise and sunset times over the last month. Then at the recommendation of an engineer friend of mine, I had the seven year olds plot the declining amount of daylight on a graph. Yes. Then we predicted when the sun would set next week.

In a first grade class:

Me: So how else are ants like people?

Student: They both have babies in eggs.

Me: People do not have babies in eggs.

Another student: Edison! Edison! Thomas Edison was born in an egg!

Then I laugh hysterically for about a minute. And then:

Me: Thomas Edison was not born from an egg.

Then another pause...

Yet another student: A lot of Koreans are born from eggs.

A man has feelings

Three recent things that created in me an emotional reaction. Two of these three things were plays. These had subtitles while the third thing involved a translator.

I saw the traveling Broadway production of Rent in Seoul and it was amazing. The cast was great and the music was soaring. I was totally swept up in the joy and sorrow of the show and got to see a bunch of Korean people cheering for two black guys making out. The show had subtitles projected on big screens on both sides of the stage and it was of great interest to me which words in English the subtitlers thought Koreans would understand. "Sexy", "hot", and "sweat" all made the cut.

I saw another play in Seoul called Pleasant Hotel. This was a Korean show, in Korean, about the "comfort women" during the Japanese occupation. This was powerful drama and it illuminated for me a history of which I was mostly unaware. Thank goodness for the subtitles in English. Awesome performances by the four women who portrayed different responses to forced prostitution. One of those shows you walk out of and have nothing to say. Just thoughts and feelings.

Finally last week we had parent/teaching conferences. I had heard a lot about how involved Korean parents are in their kids' educations, but meeting and discussing in person was incredible. Now that I'm writing this, it's hard to explain why exactly this experience was so affecting, but by the end of it I was the happiest I've been since coming here. I felt affirmed in everything I am doing and the reasons I'm doing it for.

Observations on traffic

Driving here is dangerous to think about. While I haven't seen any accidents during my two months in Korea, I have imagined dozens. People drive here with an aggression I stereotype Californians as possessing. I've been on a bus that was simultaneously occupying 4 lanes of traffic. That made for scary thoughts.

Last weekend I stayed out too late in Seoul and found that the subways stop running at midnight. This seems ridiculous in a country that so into partying. Whatever the case, I was faced with the need to get home and this meant I'd be biting the bullet and taking a cab all the way back to Anyang. This was the longest I'd spent in a taxi cab and I don't think I ever want to do it again. Either I go home before midnight or I crash wherever I'm at. I am like Cinderella.

I was really lucky because my taxi driver was an escaped convict who spent his time in prison studying Nascar crashes. He drove dual-footed, alternating between gas and brake at about the same pace Neil Peart goes between the snare and kick drum. The goal of driving is apparently to take up the slack between you and the car in front as quickly as possible. This also applies when approaching a red light.

The funny thing was when a mini-van attempted a rather aggressive passing/cutting-off maneuver which prompted my driver and all other taxi men on the road to start honking vigorously. No one rolls like a cab unless you're a cab, word is bond.

I also recently passed by some couch sections and office furniture on the side of the road. My buddy and I considered this a sign and so we loaded a loveseat onto two rolling chairs and proceeded to ferry it back to my apartment. This was definitely a strange sight for passers-by, enhanced by our curious appearance. Yeah, two white guys stand out here. Plus we were awkwardly manhandling furniture down the street. Plus I am tall and slender and my friend is short and stout, so we kind of look like a pair of Disney movie henchmen. No doubt bringing the couch back for our boss to use for kidnapping puppies.

Make Mine Extra Dark

This morning as I rode my bike to school, I decided to detour past the 7-11 to pick up some delicious Milkis ("New Feeling of Soda Beverage"). Outside was a Korean guy maybe a little younger than me, sitting in a plastic chair at a plastic table. On the table in front of him were two empty, crushed packs of cigarettes and a lighter with the metal part on top broken off. The guy was sleeping, with his arms crossed for warmth (or security) and in one hand was a cellphone (his?). I guess somebody never called last night. Or did.

The kids are (possibly) alright

The first week of the new semester has come to an end and I am one week dumber, having given freely of my intellect to the greedy minds of these sponge-like children. Here is the class update:

Kindy: We are catching up in the math book, in which I inherited from my predecessor a two chapter backlog. The young'uns continue to impress me with their ability to grasp new concepts. Fractions and probabilities were cake but now we're stepping back somewhat and reviewing tens place and the like, large scale counting. In science we are talking about seasons and exploring the notion of our currently diminishing daylight.

First: There used to be two different classes of advanced first graders which I taught. The classes were cleverly divided so that, while both were full of bright kids, one of them had all the crazies and one had all the calm. Now it has been shuffled up and both classes are replete with crazy. Calm suffers. We are reading about a police dog that does backflips.

Third: My third grade class is wonderful. They are polite, well spoken, and fun. I had to teach them the terms "qualitative" and "quantitative" today during our grammar class to really get at the meat of a discussion on adjective use.

Fourth: This one's a doozy. These kids have all, to some degree, studied English in an overseas immersion type of program. One guy in this class speaks better than lots of people I went to college with. Now that they're back they're full of piss and vinegar and up to the challenge of delaying my lesson plans by prompting rich and lengthy digressions. I'm gonna pull some Richard Feynman stuff on them. I've threatened them with Kafka lessons. They are clever and quick enough that the ordinary learning schedule is simply not enough, so I'm bringing outside material. Yesterday we did a little song analysis on the Beatles' "She's Leaving Home". Then for grammar class I made them rewrite it in the past tense. Mua, ha, ha!

Last night at dinner, one of the bosses mentioned interest in starting a theatre arts type of class or program. I am going to do all I can to get this off the ground.

Statement of Fact

Pouring a shot of Soju into your glass of Korean beer (Hite or Cass, take your pick) produces a delicious concoction which can only be described as alcoholic honey. But not like mead, because that stuff is never as good when you get it as you think it will be when you order it.

Recipe:

Pour 1 shot of Soju
Pour into a beer glass
Top with beer

Instructions:

Drink until you are happier.

Let's have a festival!

In other news, tonight I was taken out for dinner by the bosses, which has not happened in a long while. I'm not the new guy any more. It feels good.