"You know self-hating Jews, right? Well, I'm a self-hating Korean. Probably the only one too."

With another interesting weekend here in Korea nearly in the book, I sit down at the ol' computer to bang out yet another recap of life here in Korea. Overall, it's pretty slow going right now, as my school just wrapped up finals last Thursday, meaning we have 2 more weeks of useless class left. Stupid, right? I'm not sure whether I'll be asked to actually teach the kids, which would be impossible, as they are definitely clocked out now that exams are done. But, judging by Friday, where the co-teacher asked if I had anything prepared and I obviously didn't given the zero notice as to what was going on, then just recommended I play Hangman with the students. Okay. So we shall see. In other news, the weather has been gorgeous, well, at least compared with the shitty weather you guys have back home. The temperatures for the last week have been sitting around the high 30s to low 40s for highs and somewhere in the 20s for lows. This of course means that we have absolutely no snow, and judging from the forecast, I won't be celebrating a White Christmas. Which could be a problem considering I'm supposed to go skiing next Saturday. Of course the slope can make snow, but with the highs being in the high 40s for the next two days and with the lows not even creeping below freezing, that may even be impossible. And I was really excited about "Korean skiing/snowboarding", which is the exact same as skiing anywhere else, except you add another 1,000 or so "obstacles", aka Koreans, to the slope. I don't know why I expected it to be any different than everything else. Wherever you go, you are knee-deep (literally, in this case) in Koreans.

This weekend's adventures took me yet again to Seoul. Sadly, Seoul is starting to feel a bit dull. It's probably the fact that it is a cold, rather soulless concrete jungle. It's got its sights, sure, but in general, it has the same boring lifeless architectural look as every other Korean city, just bigger. Tons of practically identical and drab apartment building clutter the sky with countless divey shops and stores nestled in between. I've heard that Seoul is attempting to address these issues, but I've yet to see results. Maybe someday. The goal of this weekend's quest was a Korean/English language exchange program meeting in one of the university districts. I'd been keyed in on it by Max, Yangpyeong's native "gyopo" (Korean word for a Korean who moves to another country and becomes a citizen there, Max's family moved when he was 5 months old and he's lived in New York ever since), as he speaks quite a bit of Korean and really wanted a chance to use it. Obviously, my Korean is not at a real conversation level, but I wanted a chance to actually use it at all beyond just simply ordering food or buying things. As I've addressed in previous messages, despite being in a country where everyone speaks Korean, Korean conversation is difficult, as we have no Korean friends, since apparently no Koreans between the ages of 18 and 40 exist in our town. Speaking with the teachers is a possibility, but they all wanna practice English and most couldn't really give a fuck about you learning plus what exactly do I have to talk about with a middle aged mother or father? The answer: absolutely nothing. I could talk to the soccer club about soccer, and penises, I guess, but that doesn't lead to terribly deep conversations. Thus, the dilemma. Anyways, we headed to Seoul to try our hand at speaking Korean and picking up some Korean chicks (I hear that is quite common, foreign dudes looking to satisfy their "Yellow fever" and Korean chicks looking for the elusive and terribly valuable ivory "tusk"). Simply finding the place was a chore, as it was supposed to be a "cafe" but when we went to the location in question, we found an apartment building where the cafe should be. I had joked when we couldn't find the place, that it was all a ruse where they mug some foreigners and take their cash, or it was actually just a big orgy. Honestly, the environs seemed to make my bullshit sound somewhat plausible, which is frightening in its own right. Eventually, we found out that the cafe was in the basement of an apartment, and as we traveled down the stairs, we passed through a cage door at the foot of the stairs. Okay, now we are thinking that we are most certainly gonna get robbed or fucked, probably both. Turns out that the actual room was pretty decent, with a bunch of furniture and big screen tv set up. The turn out was pretty solid, with around 20 people total. The Korean learners were from all over, from an Australian English teacher to a Finn working at the embassy here to a Korean orphan who was adopted by a French family, and now speaks French (native language), English, and Spanish. Hearing fluent English with a French accent fall out of a Korean looking guy is one of the strangest things I've seen since I've been here. Not sure if that is more or less strange than the Korean looking guy who speaks English with a fucking Russian accent that I met in Hongdae. Weird. The Koreans were pretty far ranging themselves, from university students to just various professionals looking to improve their English. One of the better English speakers was a cardiologist who's been to numerous conferences in the States. Maria, isn't your dad a cardiologist? Has he ever met this guy at one of his conferences? I think his last name was Kim.....Does your dad remember him?

Anyways, the exchange was good overall. Most of the foreigners were pretty much beginners, so it turned into more of a teach Korean, rather than speak in Korean time but it was fun none the less. The group headed out for drinks afterward, then a few of us grabbed some dinner when that died out, as some of us couldn't survive on shit Korean beer and bar snacks for sustenance. At dinner, I got to converse with two of the more interesting characters, the Australian and the self-hating Korean. Yeah, I know. I didn't think they actually existed. The Australian seemed to be the standard Aussie here in Korea, his existence revolving around 2 things: getting drunk and having sex with Korean women. Some of his stories were quite intense, as he actually got so drunk that he just passed out in the street in Hongdae, then came to when he felt some Korean digging around in his pocket to steal his wallet. His Korean is pretty damn good, which means the Korean chicks don't have a fucking chance. The real "character" was the self-hating Korean. I'm not talking just a little hate, this is "I want Korea to be wiped off the face of the map" kind of hate. The hate is probably related to the fact that he loves everything American, and that Korea is absolutely nothing like the US in so many ways. He lived in Brooklyn for 3 years, so his English is really good, and really fucking foul (pardon my language.....hahah). I believe he called Rain a "faggot" and dropped the f-bomb more than me, which is quite a feat. His criticisms were valid ones that seem to be common with most young Koreans disillusioned with the bullshit traditions. Why do we need all these politeness levels and variants? They borrowed the politeness stuff from China and Confusianism, yet the Chinese don't even bother with the shit anymore (so said another Korean who is learning Chinese from some Chinese friends). The Self-hating Korean really hates the job culture, where his managers just sit around and don't do shit, yet the lower level employees must blindly follow without criticism (come to think of it, that doesn't sound too much different from home). He really hates the businessman culture of getting drunk every evening. Seriously, wander any city street starting around 7pm (yeah, they must go straight from work to the bar and just pound them down) and you are bound to see numerous packets of suit-clad businessmen at fall-down drunk level. It's not like the Self-hating Korean doesn't enjoy binge drinking, far from it. He just likes to keep it to Friday and Saturday. The duo informed Max and I of another language exchange group that has a big party once a month, where, from the sound of it, much "cross-cultural exchange" takes place, just not necessarily of the language variety. Obviously this peaked our interest. Poor Max wants to meet some Korean ladies, but they don't want anything to do with him, as he looks like a Korean, but can't speak good enough Korean to pass as a native. But, as long as he sticks close to a whitey, he won't have any problems meeting Korean women. Seriously, I still can't get over this country's fascination with whiteys. I'm starting to think my mother doesn't even love me as the people here do. Sorry mom, but these people are pretty damn obsessed.