Ire hab the pouagra, pwease.

My time here in Korea is coming to an almost immediate end. My parents are now in Korea, and I have since left Yeosu (with an offensive amount of luggage and a resulting back injusry) for Seoul to live the rest of my days in Korea as a tourist. I think that perhaps the best indication of my personal growth and adaptation to this country is the fact that during my 'If I had a million dollars' lesson, one student wrote: "pouagra, cabior" when asked what he would eat and I could discern his meaning as being 'foie gras and caviar." Seriously, hooked on phonics worked for me.

In truth, I will miss the bizarre relationship between Koreans and English. Somehow it is both a language too foreign to chance a conversation in, but the perfect language to advertise and add street cred and visual interest to anything from T-Shirts to billboards. If I were the English Language, I might be a tad put off by being played so hot and cold. There's a comparison to be drawn between this and Western use of Eastern language in tattoos.

As someone who enjoys playing with English more than my students seem to enjoy playing with themselves under their desks and school uniform blazers, I have a certain built-in fondness for anything that might pass as wordplay. I'm more than game for a little intentional misspelling and bait-and-switch word usage, maybe this is why I can't help but smile ear-to-ear whenever I go t-shirt shopping.



Besides being able to shop in the women's section again, shopping in Canada is going to be terrible in comparison. Will I engage in it anyways, absolutely-I have a problem. Does a crack addict give up crack altogether when they return from a vacation destination where they experienced better crack? Well, maybe. I don't even know if crack addicts are prone to vacation... Are there even varying qualities of crack? Clearly, while largely comprehensive, my Degrassi Drug Education has left stones unturned.

Servicee

In English, service can mean a lot of things. If English is your first language, you can vouch for me when I say that none of these various meanings is synonymous with "free." Think again, chingus! Here in the Land of the Morning Calm, it means just that. When first I experienced this bastardized form of the word it was in a context that was confusing as all hell. It was at a Korean BBQ restaurant and a waiter brought a few bottles of Cider over to my table saying "servicee". I thought: no subtlety there, this young buck thinks he's giving excellent service and is pointing it out in the hopes of a tip, fair enough. I mean, before leaving for Korea I had read enough sources to indicate that the Korean grasp on nuance wasn't the most developed. However, I had read and heard form the same sources that tipping in Korea was a faux pas. How worldly this young gentleman must then be to be extorting a foreigner for gratuities! Not. The. Case. In reality, we were being given free cider. A welcome alternative and a great welcome to Korea!

Such random acts of servicee (herein after referred to as RAS) have peppered my time here. It will happen when you least expect it and oftentimes the items that are doled out as servicee are completely random and often of no relation to the situation or the purchase pre-cursing it. In Canada, sometimes when the gas station overcharges you for a bottle of water, they will throw in a free chocolate bar. Bonus! Maybe it will be beyond its allocated shelflife and the kind shopkeeper thinks that the bottle of water will be just the thing to wash it down. These two items are related. In Korea, maybe you'll run into a Ministop to replenish your beer supply and BANG; RAS! Tuna. A single can. Beer and tuna would be hard to associate using even the '7 degrees of Kevin Bacon' method! Never mind the fact that I was, on the occasion in question, in the midst of drinking said beers at the quaint table and chairs just beyond the doors of the Ministop. I mean, the cashier knew I wasn't going home. And if her intention was that I eat it with my beer, she might have been so kind as to provide me with disposable chopsticks like she did that one time when I bought yogurt. On that particular day I received two counts of RAS to the tune of the aforementioned chopsticks and the subsequent lip slivers.

So, yes. This falls under the "Things I will miss" section of the final countdown. When at home I begin being denied free upgrades and random items after shooting people a profile highlighting my 'high nose' or making my biggest 'round eyes', I simply don't know what I'll do.
I mean, I have not paid for toilet paper this year! And it's always been the classy, scented, animated kind. You know, the kind that's been long outlawed in North America for irritating a certain delicate pH balance, if you know what I mean. If you don't, that's cool too. Probably for the best. Vaginas are weird. I mean...

Art for adolescent boys

Maybe the Art teacher doesn't speak English.

If ever there was a doubt before, there isn't now. Chung Deok Middle School is a cranking out some winners. The gems shown above are just some of the many masterpieces that dotted the hallway on display for Parent's Day. Gold stars, all around.

Back to school, back to school, to prove to mom I'm not a fool.

Welcome, March 2nd; the first day of a new school year in Korea! It's a new season and there is a fresh batch of grade 7 boys who welcome me to the school with screams as though they are all Justin Bieber fans and that I am the Bieby himself.

If only cowbell could cure this particular fever.

This, first day of the 2011 school year, was full of fun things. Some of which fall into the "Things I Will Miss" category while other things (and people) will belong in the "Things I Won't Miss" column. I will of course miss the waygook-fever and the fact that my new Vice Principal is an ex-English teacher who will understand me when I am sent to him with all of my questions and concerns by a co-teacher whose biggest job seems to be saying "oh, really?" whenever I tell her that I don't speak Korean. To her credit, she does this rather well.

I will not miss the incomprehensible lack of logic and/or organization that characterizes my daily life in a Public Korean Middle School. No, no I can't tell what my schedule is after sitting in on the staff meeting conducted entirely in Korean; no, no I don't think that it is a good idea to replace the only English computer in the school with a Korean one the day that school starts and leave the boxes from the new one and remnants of the old one strewn about the English lab. Yes, yes I do think that the previously mentioned action renders my desk-warming time, during which I was supposed to plan this semester's classes, even more useless than its very name suggests. Everything that I saved on that computer is obviously gone, baby, gone. And, though I honestly didn't do any planning over the break, I had 10 months of powerpoints and lessons from last year on it, so I'm still chalking it up as a loss. A huge one. One that might drive me to drink.

It seems worth mentioning that as of 5 p.m. on this, the fateful first day of a whole new year, I have yet to be given any direction as to what I am supposed to be doing today, this week, or the rest of the year. I have missed lunch because there are no bells today since the schedule is different. Isn't a different schedule a good reason to employ the use of bells? No, probably not. After missing lunch, I got a call on my hand pone from my co-worker (not co-teacher, never my co-teacher) asking where I was and saying that he was looking for me. Cool. You know where he didn't look? The only place that I ever am. Bitch ain't got nothing on Nancy.

drip, drip, drop

So, this one time, when my friend from home was visiting:

We were slightly sleep deprived and very much used to spending time on buses. During one such bus trip, while on the way to Gwangju from Yeosu (a common leg, for me), we fell asleep for the majority of the trip. I was awoken, rather rudely, while Becca slept on beside me. As for what woke me up, there is no delicate way to put it. I was woken up by the sound of a constant stream of urine being expelled by the man next to me into a plastic bag. In his defense, I think he thought I was sleeping; I was wearing shades, after all. In my defense, I was not sleeping, and ewwwwwwwww.

Absence makes the heart grow...indifferent?

Though I must say that I had initial reservations about my ability to maintain a blog, I will admit that I harboured hope that I might become addicted to it like I am internet television. Wrong. My apologies to the few (father...) people who attempt to keep tabs on me by following my blog. Turns out you keep up with it more than I. I will now, for the umpteenth time since undertaking this blog, promise to try to do better. You know, for the 2 months that I have left.

Speaking of the 2 months I have left - I ONLY HAVE TWO MONTHS LEFT! What gives, Father Time; you sneaky, speedy bitch? In all fairness, one could hardly argue that I did nothing to speed it along as I have crammed a hell of a lot of Korea into my year here, taking less than 3 weekends off in the whole of the year. It is my shock that I have mustered such stamina at my ripe, old age that causes me to brag about such numbers. Proudly, I have not said 'no' to a weekend's festivities due to dwindling funds or lengthy bus rides to and from. Not once. As a result, I have seen a lot of Korea and a lot more of Asia than I thought would be possible with the relatively limited amount of vacation days that I am granted in my contract. Have I lost a lot of sleep? Yes. Have I slept in ill-advised places? Yes.

Have I gone against doctors' orders and boarded an air-conditioned bus while suffering pneumonia just to make it to a Tigers' game and be busted by my school by being on TV? Yes.

Am I positive that photos of mine and my friends' shenanigans will land us on a promotional banner or website for one of the festivals we ravaged? Quite.

Will these same photos be sufficient in foiling my plans of running for office in the future? Most definitely.

While it is all well and good to applaud myself for the life I've squeezed in to the past 10+ months, all I can focus on is what I need to cram into these next 2. For example, I need to post entries on this here bloog about my trips to Malaysia and Indonesia. I also need to show my big brosephine a hella good time during his short stay here and then regroup for my parents' arrival at the end of my contract. I also need to log face time with the friends I have made over the course of the past year. A certain couple of ladies have either kept me from losing my sanity or lost theirs right along with me; allowing me to remain sane, at least comparatively. Mercifully, these two lovelies are both from Canada and I have little doubt that I will see them again in the future, though likely not as soon or as often as I would like. As for the other people that I have met and not hated, I think I should see them in the future as well, both the Canadians and otherwise. The Canadians because I travel the True North Strong and Free side-to-side a good deal, and those from abroad because I live in the world's best country and who wouldn't want to visit? Jerks, that's who.

Going back to the beginning of this entry where I halfheartedly promise to be more (at all) vigilant about updating this beginner’s blog: from now on, I am just going to enter little anecdotes about Korea and label them as things that I will either miss, or not miss, about Korea.

Number 1:

I will miss the way cabbies see foreign fares as a way of getting free English lessons.

This particular point falls under both headings because sometimes this situation is awesome and sometimes it makes me want to tuck and roll out the cab, ya' heard? It is awesome when the cabbie in question already speaks a tiny bit of English and tries to communicate with you and prompt you for pointers on pronunciation while you struggle through his/her valiant attempt at actual verbal exchange. It is terrible then the cabbie in question speaks no English, asks if you speak Korean, to which you respond "no," all while becoming increasingly heated while yelling at you in Korean and asking for English translations. To premise, I maintain that Hangul really is the German of Asian languages and whatever it is that he or she is saying sound a lot like threats and verbal attacks.

Christmas in Korea

December 25th, 2010.

This is the day that marked the first Christmas that was not spent with my family. The first Christmas that all 5 Prymacks were not celebrating together. I must admit that I do see some satisfaction in the fact that I was the first one to miss a Christmas at home. Not because I wouldn't have preferred to be home with everyone, just because I think that it would have been harder to be home and have one of my other family members absent. Especially since I had long been preparing myself for this since it seemed inevitable with an older brother in the military and a younger brother constantly jet-setting around the world for to fight with swords. For me, it was as though Christmas didn't exist. Korea doesn't celebrate Christmas, so there were scarcely reminders except for the Christmas movies that I watched on my laptop and the Hanson Christmas album that I listened to on my laptop. To be fair, I do both of these things year-round if we are counting Love Actually as a Christmas movie.

My Christmas was celebrated in a way that allows for many a parallel to be found with the way I celebrate at home. And here's why:

1) I ate until I felt sick

2)I drank before noon

3)I was in great company

4)I wore pajamas for most of the day

5)I got to watch my family open their presents thanks, skype!

It was dissimilar also, obviously. And here's how:

1)There was no turkey

2)There were no hugs from my family sad face

3)There was no egg nog

4)I took my friend to a Korean hospital where she was outfitted with a Darth Vader-esque mask for her sweet bronchitis/former smoker's cough

So, as I said, we did not eat turkey. Tragic, though it was, we did manage to eat until we felt sick. Which I always find to be a sign of a job well-done. What we DID do was produce a spectacular college-student-grade feast featuring pasta with chicken and mushroom sauce. This dish was partially produced in a kettle. We also had a salad. We also had more cheese than I would ever advise. And nuts. And fruit. AND OLIVES. So, I was happy. I was even happier since there is photographic evidence of me wearing a Santa beard for the duration. Both as a beard and as a sweet eyebrow-hair statement - an obvious nod to Einstein.

Perhaps the most touching part of all of the festivities was when a song featuring the lyrics 'Christmas in Korea's a new one for me. Trading your sleigh for a Jeep...' came on in the midst of our exchanging of Secret Santa stockings. Le Tear.

Countdown to Christmas 2011 has begun.