Episode 25: In Which DFM Feels As Though He Is Stuck Inside Of A Hollywood "Body Switchers" Movie, And Receives Mana From Heaven (Jjinpang Too)

With the "daily grind" starting to wear on me, this Friday I received "mana from heaven" in the form of a much needed day off from work. I'm still not sure exactly why I received a day off, but it had something to do with a teachers' convention type activity the school was holding.

Hyenii (the English teacher at the school with the convention) invited me to see a movie with her and her friends. Since long time readers will remember I've been trying to see a Korean movie in a Korean theatre since I first came here, I of course jumped at the chance.

The movie was called Season of Good Rain (well, that was the English translation anyways). It was about a Korean business man on a trip to China for his construction company. The company had a contract to rebuild part of the country, after a devastating earthquake the year before. While there, he runs into a woman he used to have feelings for while they both studied in America. Over the course of the film, the man tries very hard to rekindle the possibly romantic feelings they both shared while studying in America. However, in a cruel twist of fate the woman is constantly riddled with guilt over having feelings for her old friend on this, the one year anniversary of her husband's death in the very earthquake that brought the man there in the first place.

We had chosen this film because I said I wanted to see something Korean. Ironically though, since the Chinese woman could not speak Korean, and the Korean man could not speak Chinese (in the film anyways), all of the dialogue between the two characters was carried out in English.

The Chinese woman's English was not overly strong, but she managed alright. I could tell though that the Korean man had studied quite a bit, as his timing and pronunciation were almost "fluent." Unfortunately some of the scenes lost a bit of their emotional value, since the "timing" and stressing/accenting of the phrases were just a hair off, and consequently did not quite convey the same meanings they should have. Knowing it would be an utter disaster if just about any Westerner I knew were to try and act out an entire movie in Korean or Chinese, I still had a lot of respect for the actors for trying.

After the movie Hyenii and her two friends (both females) asked me about my thoughts on the film. They were a little disappointed though, as my strongest feelings revolved around the use of a panda in the obligatory montage scene. Pandas, as I explained, are in my opinion the most pointless animals on Earth (from an evolutionary perspective), in that they are more or less unwilling to defend themselves, and eat a diet of nutrientless bamboo. They still remain on the planet almost solely because of human intervention, and will probably be welfare mamas for the rest of the species' time on Earth.

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I also had made plans to go back to Namhee's church this night. In-hye had told me on Sunday that Scott Brenner (a famous American Christian musician) was coming to give a performance at her church this day, and I told her I would come.

I wondered about the wisdom of inviting an English speaker to sing to a congregation consisting entirely of Koreans. However, continuing with the day's theme of irony, Scott Brenner sang about 85% of his songs in Korean. He has a Korean wife, and his ministry has been based out of Korea for over ten years. I really didn't see that one coming.

The Scott Brenner event was exciting, and the church band and back up singers were really impressive as they had no problem playing any of Scott Brenner's songs. Furthermore, I have yet to see normally quite reserved Koreans make that much noise and approximations of dancing at a church. Indeed I have been to a Van Halen concert in Edmonton, Alberta, that was a funeral compared to tonight.

The first hour was really lively, but since the concert started at 8:00 PM at the end of a long week, it was inevitable that the overworked Koreans would start to die out after that. The whole event lasted until 10:30 PM, by which time most of the once lively audience members (including myself) were sitting down and trying not to fall asleep.

I had hoped to get something to eat with In-hye after the concert, but it was quite late, and I had still had to get back to the subway station before the trains stopped running from there (it was at the end of the line, and would be one of the first stations to end service).

At home I knew I only had some rice and an apple to eat, and I had not eaten this day since lunch, so I was pleasantly surprised and relieved when I saw a jjinpang merchant in my neighbourhood on the way home.

As I've mentioned in the past, street vendors seem to offer specific food with the seasons - every season will see a new fruit and/or snack becoming popular. Since my first taste of the sweet mashed up maggots-like bean paste inside a steamed bun back in March, I have been having withdrawals. But tonight I was able to get three Pizza Pocket sized jjinpang buns for about $1.50, making this one of the best days yet.

Episode 24: In which DFM Steps Into A Time Machine, And Eats Diarrhea

My week may have been uneventful, but the weekend made up for it.

For starters, the latest Sasuke episode came out. This is a big event for me, because unlike the UFC which puts out about two big shows a month, Sasuke (my favourite sports event) is only run twice a year. During Sasuke 22 (the last episode), someone made it to the final stage for the first time since Nagano Makato achieved Total Victory in Sasuke 17.

This year was extra exciting, as 16 people cleared the first stage (I've never seen more than five since the producers completely redesigned the course for Sasuke 18). Also, three of the four original Sasuke All-Stars still competing made it to the third stage; the first time this has happened in about four years. What's better yet, the producers released the first Kunoichi (Women's competition) since 2007. I'm currently waiting for my download of it to finish, and then the fun will begin again.

Later that evening, Hyeun-A made the trip across town from near Itaewon to have dinner with me. Being the lady's man I am, I hadn't actually bothered to figure out where any good places to eat were, so the first fifteen minutes of our date were spent trying to find a suitable restaurant (in my defence I only had two weeks to prepare). Eventually Hyeun-A spotted a tiny kalguksu restaurant though, and we were able to eat.

Kalguksu apparently describes any soup that has heavy, thick noodles in it. Hyeun-A tried to translate the menu for me, but somehow something was lost in the translation, and I ended up with patkalguksu (red bean noodle soup) that was kind of bland, while she had the kalguksu that didn't look like diarrhea.

After dinner I took Hyeun-A for a walk along the stream near my house. I have wanted to walk or run down the paths next to this stream since I first saw them, but had not found that magic combination of time and specific inclination until this. I can say it was a big disappointment. I thought on a Saturday night the paths would be peaceful and quiet. Instead, it seemed like everyone with a bike or set of running shoes was out on the trails in traditional Korean fashion - neither riding/walking on the left or right, but rather scattered randomly across the width of the trail, making for a stressful night of constantly having to move back and forth.

What's more, where I live, I'm used to using the bike trails as a medium for easy, traffic light-/stop sign free-transportation to somewhere important, by way of some place beautiful. However, bike paths in Seoul are always built along the dirty streams and rivers, and right next to the noisy, busy roads, and never seem to go anywhere particularly useful. People just travel to one end of a straight path, turn around, and then head back the other way.

On Sunday I went back to Namhee's church. Like last time, Namhee's friend In-hye wanted to pick me up from the subway station. I sprinted up the stairs to our meeting point and noticed a small white car, just like In-hye's, parked in the same spot as last time. I got in the back seat and said "hello." I had noticed that In-hye had a different friend this week but didn't think much of it. However, when the woman kept saying "no, no" in Korean and pointing up ahead, I noticed that "In-hye" appeared to look about twenty years older this week. When I looked ahead where she was pointing I noticed the real In-hye trying to wave me down about three cars ahead in another small, white car. This event of course produced a hilarious story that would later be told and retold, by In-hye, to anyone who would listen at church.

Namhee's church's service is entirely conducted in Korean, so I didn't understand much of anything that was said. However, the songs are quite catchy, and the church kindly put the words on the overhead screen in large print giving me an opportunity to practice my karaoke (I believe I mentioned this last time).

Additionally, since I recently bought a Korean-English Bible, I use the sermon time to read ahead on whatever scripture is the topic for that day. Today's topic was about two sisters who are so desperate to have children that they get their father drunk and rape him, thus producing two sons who go on to father a great line of The Lord's People. I wonder how Rush Limbaugh justifies that one?

After the service, In-hye invited me to a youth session. There were dozens of University aged Koreans there, and surprisingly they all seemed to speak English to some extent (and many to a great extent). Never-the-less, I was called to the front by the pastor and I introduced myself in Korean to the gathering. As usual, this went over quite well, and made me somewhat of a minor celebrity. It also helps that I've learned how to say "I am Namhee's friend" in Korean.

After this meeting, and another "smaller group" meeting, an even smaller group of just the smaller group leaders went out for barbecued pork, and invited me along. I have to say this is the first time I have been out eating with a group of Koreans and I was the oldest person at the table. It was a little weird.

Most Koreans think that it is hard for me to use honorific verb and adjective endings in the presence of elders, but since I'm always in the presence of elders I've become quite proficient at it. Ironically (for Koreans), I have the most trouble using the "non-polite" verb endings, because I never get to practice them. (In Korean, the same sentence must be said in three or four different ways depending on the age and/or status of the person to whom you are speaking.)

(My new friends [left to right]: Su-min, Su-ji, Won-jae, In-hye, and Min-seon. Min-seon actually studied English in New Zealand. Consequently, she peaks with a slight New Zealand accent, which is really weird to hear coming from a Korean. A good "weird" though.)

The meal consisted of some part of a pig which I was unable to ascertain, as well as the skin of the same pig presumably, barbecued in the typical Korean fashion - at our table. The meal was delicious, and the meat seemed to keep on coming, and I must have ate through two servings myself. Everyone was impressed with my chop-sticks skills, and I of course told them how much I loved eating Korean food. I made a big deal about how much more I like Korean food than Canadian food, but when we went to pay the bill though, the stores owner told us the pork had actually come from Canada. Oh well, at least In-hye will have another funny story to tell.