Patchworks and Metaphors

A former boyfriend loved metaphors.  He used them dramatically and unironically.  I loved that he loved them, that he shared my passion for words and language.  I too love metaphors - little truth nuggets.  They tend to break down, though;  metaphors and analogies.  They have a nasty habit of driving you somewhere and dropping you off to either get caught up in distracting scenery or tossing you away from points being made.  What? I had a nasty habit of tearing down his metaphors.  That's right.  Even though it was a quality of his that I admired, and even though I love that metaphors, by nature, are imperfect.  I couldn't help myself.  It's easier to tear down than build up, and it's...

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Interesting Google Search Suggestions

 You know that moment when you go to Google something and it starts suggesting random goofy things and you completely forget what it was you were trying to search for and decide to take a bunch of screen shots of different combinations of Google suggestions instead?  Yeah, that one.  Well if you want to avoid that moment, I suggest refraining from typing in questiony search terms, especially ones like "is it ok to..." Here are the results of a few different searches on Google.kr.  I'm not sure if the searches are different in other countries, but I imagine they are. Apparently there are a lot of concerned pregnant zumbaers.  ...

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Strange things happen here

My co-teacher has decided to extend her duties to include acting as my personal PR rep. - her latest mission has been cultivating an aura of mystery around me.  Allow me to explain. I'm at school for 40 hours a week, from 8:30-4:30.  I teach 23 lessons a week (40 minutes each).  This means that over half of my time is free for lesson planning and, more often, desk-warming -- a term we use for being paid to sit at our desks and - you know - look pretty. (Or dishevelled as the case may be.) 20+ hours of free time has provided me with excellent opportunities to chat with friends/family, read articles, blog, and generally allow my soul to be sucked online.  In spite of the enormous productivity of this...

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Off to Everland!

This Saturday, I went with a group of friends to Everland, South Korea's largest theme park (with a high annual attendance, ranked at 13th in the world).  It's a mix between Sea World, Knott's Scary Farm and Disneyland -- with a zoo, water park, kid's rides, animal show, and two large rollercoasters.  Oh, and three dollar churros.  Everland also has an American Adventure section, complete with a flashing disco area and walls with old US movie posters, as well as the only burger place in the park.  (Which was a cleverly disguised Lotteria.  Sneaky Korea, sneaky.) Everland (which unfortunately makes me think MJ's ranch before Peter Pan ) is a mad crazy crowdedlikeastreetinathirdworldcountry...

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Curriculum Craziness

Over the last seven months of teaching in Korea, I've had to teach some strange words and sentences to my students.  At the beginning of each lesson, we listen and repeat and memorize the vocabulary and phrases, which means that my students have committed some really odd things to heart. This includes phrases like "I'm going to go inline skating" and "What is this?" "It's a sensor." One of my favorites was the video dialogue about the "house of the future" in which the characters exclaim: "Look! The robot is cooking."  "What a surprise!"  I honestly had more of a problem with forcing my kids to memorize "What a surprise!" than "Look, the robot is cooking!"  If there was a situation in which a robot was...

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The phenomenons of living as an expat in Korea

Today I will be describing a few of the mysteries inherent in Korean expat life.  (No, I won't be discussing fan death.) The Truman Show Effect stalker shot It happens all the time -- when talking to a local shop owner, bus driver, or waiter, struggling to use my rudimentary (read: practically non-existent) language skills, the Korean I'm talking to will suddenly break into some very decent English.  Apparently they enjoy watching me flounder, but can only take so much. (In Sweden, most expats complained about the opposite problem - Swedes hearing your non-native Swedish and immediately switching to English, not allowing you to practice. Ever.)  Or, more...

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You know you're in Korea...

 A couple months ago, I was inspired to handwrite some comicy type stuff that happens in Korea.  As it turns out, this isn't my skillset.  But, I recently found them again, and thought I'd share.  Just because. ...

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Seoul Writer's Retreat

Retreats are glorious. I belong to a creative writing group in Seoul called the Seoul Writer's Workshop.  It meets every week (alternating between poetry and fiction), and has been a great way to meet other writers and give and receive critiques, and generally slow the brain atrophication process that set in after graduation. Atrophication. This weekend/week is the Korean holiday of Chuseok which is generally described as a Korean Thanksgiving - a three day holiday for families to gather and eat.  Or, for expats, a three day holiday to travel around Korea/Asia; in my case, on a writer's retreat in Jeungpyeong-gun, a couple hours southeast of Seoul. And so it was that I found myself nestled in a pension surrounded by breathable...

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