Down Home Country Living....ya'll

Another week has come and gone and wouldn't you know, shit actually happened. Life never ceases to amaze me.

First off, I finally got confirmation of a SMOE interview. After all the months of waiting and cussing and waiting some more, I have an interview date: July 21st. If you were keeping track, I started the application process some time in April. Yeah, a fuck ton long time ago. Screwed up the first application back in April, started the second one at the start of May, waited till the middle of June on references to come in, had the recruiter lose one of the references, then once shit was squared away, waited another 2 weeks to hear from SMOE. The very definition of prompt, if I do say so. But the wait is over, and in little less than a week I get to show off my pretty white face. Course, this means that I once again have to steel myself to keep from saying anything stupid or incriminating (see every other interview...ever). But I think I'll be okay. The guidelines and suggestions from the recruiter on how to conduct myself during the interview were terribly thorough, but amusing as it felt to me like rules to follow when dealing with wild animals. "SMOE is a very proud and confident creature, do not belittle or insult it. Remember you are in its den, so please show respect and reverence. Do not ever look SMOE directly in eye. Do not approach or attempt to pet/touch SMOE unless it has given permission to do so. And most importantly, do not feed SMOE, as it survives on a very specific diet." But, if I am being interviewed by some manner of bear or wild beast, I should be okay, as I seem to get along with them much better anyways.

Secondly, I gots vacation coming up. Yes, all three weeks of it. In a little over 2 weeks, I'll be hopping a plane to the Philippines to sit on the beach, swim, and some other stuff that I haven't planned yet. 2 whole weeks to spend there and I haven't really planned a thing yet. Jamie and I figured we would would just play it by ear, cuz we are two wild and spontaneous and free-spirited dudes and that's how we roll. Jamie has started talking about Philippinas with considerable excitement. I'm not sure his intentions with them, but I assume it has something to do with them being able to speak English, so he can finally talk to someone about the riots in China and the presidential mess in Honduras. I'm a little worried cuz that means I might have to talk to girls....ewwwwwww. And as soon as I get back from the Philippines, I'll probably be hopping a plane the next day to Japan to visit Collin and Lauren and hopefully sight see around the parts of Japan that aren't Tokyo. Swine Flu has complicated the whole mess, as its suddenly broken out in big numbers recently here in Korea. That has confounded the general populace as Koreans eat plenty of kimchi, which protected them from bird flu several years back (I shit you not, people actually believe that shit), so it stands to reason that they would be impervious to swine flu as well. But, ahhhhh, kimchi is too spicy for foreigners, so they aren't immune, that's where its getting in. And with summer vacation on the horizon, the foreign teachers will getting the fuck out (can't blame them) and naturally bringing back the disease. To protect the kiddies from the germs, the Ministry of Education is recommending that all teachers returning from abroad sequester themselves away from the kids for a week after arrival back in the country to ensure that they aren't infected. Logical and safe procedure, no problems there. Unfortunately, the our Korean co-teachers have taken this as reason enough to force us to move around/cancel our vacations, which they cannot legally do, obviously. Already I've heard stories of schools not allowing their teachers to go on vacations, as the additional 7 days of home quarantine would interfere with the schools plans, so tough titties on the foreign teacher. My school asked about this and I simply "forget" to tell my school that I'd be going to Japan and returning the day before classes start. I'm gonna handle the whole thing like I do any illness: if I get sick, I shall stay away from the school to avoid possibly infecting other people. Common sense, cept that policy doesn't apply in Korea, except for swine flu. Maybe this whole scare will get Korea to look at how they the idea of sick days (non existent) and illness prevention. I can hope at least.

As for this past weekends fun, I headed out to Amy's place in the country country for some good ol' country fun, like cow tipping, getting hammered on homemade moonshine and stuff. Our hoedown began with lunch at one of the town's restaurants. The food was delicious and the owners were friends of sorts, as their grandaughter studied abroad for a year in, get this, West Bend (why West Bend, I have no idea), so naturally, she has gotten to be good friends with Amy. You know you're in the country when the menu for the restaurant consists of 2, count 'em, 2 choices. Normally the menu has a whopping 5-7 things plus drinks. From there, it was on to the town's gorgeous park/sports complex. Now, what really irks me is that Amy's metropolis of maybe a couple hundred folks (if you add in farm animals) has several tennis courts, a nice blacktop basketball court, some badminton courts, and a mouthwatering artificial soccer field, while my town, the freaking capital city of the goddamn county, has only dirt soccer fields. Sure, we have all the tennis courts and badminton and basketball courts, but really nobody cares about those sports. Since nobody ever uses the field (I mean seriously, who is gonna use it? The cows? The old ladies when they're not tending their rice paddies?), I made sure to get my money's worth. Even when the rest of the group had finished playing and were relaxing/socializing/enjoying each others company, I kept playing, with myself (hey, don't judge me). Soccer or human interaction? No brainer, really. God, I miss soccer and grass, or in this case grass substitute. Once I had finished my business it was time for dinner. With the help of Amy's landlords and some Korean accomplices, we grilled up some grub the way it oughta be: no frills, no side dishes, just beef and stuff to dip/dunk/slather on said beef. Our Korean company naturally suggested the noraebang afterwards, so a caroling we a went. Highlights included: us realizing we know way too many of the lyrics to way too many shitty Korean pop songs, the Koreans delivering with some English pop songs (always amusing when people who can barely converse with you manage to knock an English song out of the park), and Mr. Jamie Jackson attempting to sing the Bee Gees in his closest approximation to a falsetto (Ouch). After the singing, we all crashed, being the said excuses for UW grads that we are. Started drinking at 5-6ish and in bed asleep by midnight. Sad. Sunday morning brought adventure, as we had to somehow get to the train station, a 45 minute walk away, in torrential rain. Now in the States, you could just wait it out, and you'd be good in a hour or so. Not so in We attempted to call the taxi, but he hung up on us twice. We called in some backup from Korean allies and they relayed to us that the taxi man already had 2 pickups scheduled for that time and that he didn't know how to tell us that, so he just hung up. Swell. We decided on the bus instead, so we slowly moved towards the bus stop, one organic mass of flesh and umbrella (we were a few umbrellas short). What we didn't know is that no bus was coming today, a Sunday. Lucky for us, a generous man driving by offered us a ride and we arrived to the train station, more or less dry.

The rain though, all I can is "ugggggggg". I know that right now is technically the rainy season and I've been warned to bring an umbrella to school every day, but geez the amount of water that has fallen from the sky has still amazed me. Thursday and Sunday saw entire days of torrential rain, I kid you not. No periods of sprinkling between downpours, no eye of the storm, nothing. Just massive droplets falling all day long. As a result, the roads and my town overall are under water. The Han has swallowed up any and all parks and running paths along its banks. I find the whole thing pretty ironic, as Yangpyeong's slogan is "Clear water Yangpyeong", cept the Han is anything but clear at present with all the mud, dirt, soot, grime, and shit that the river picked up off its banks. Korea's national slogan, "Sparkling Korea" isn't holding up so well either. Ooooops.