The Not-So-Blind Date

Posted on October 4, 2014 by baileysaywhat Standard 1

Fade in from black, desk at an office, roughly 7:23pm, Thursday 10/2/14.

BAILEY, a late 20-something woman in workout clothes, is about to go play volleyball with fellow teachers in 30 minutes. She sits at her desk reading about the various antics of her guilty pleasure, K-Pop’s BigBang.

YOUNG MALE KOREAN CO-WORKER (YMKCW) enters, spots BAILEY and proceeds to her desk.

YMKCW: Do you want to go sogating (blind date) with my friend? He’s from Seoul.

BAILEY: What? Are you serious?

YMKCW: Yeah, he’s coming down tomorrow night to visit me and wants a date.

BAILEY: Whoa, um, this is so sudden.

YMKCW: He’s really tall. Like 180cm. He looks like T.O.P from BigBang.

BAILEY: Hahahaha what did you tell him about me?

YMKCW: Nothing. Here, talk to him.

BAILEY: He’s on the phone?! HE’S ON THE PHONE RIGHT NOW?! HE’S BEEN LISTENING TO EVERYTHING WE ARE SAYING?!

YMKCW: Yeah.

BAILEY: (whispers) hang up! HANG UP RIGHT NOW. (hits YMKCW multiple times on arms, body, one swift kick to shin)

YMKCW: Why?! He doesn’t care!

BAILEY: I CARE YOU IDIOT OH MY GOD (mouths) GET OFF THE PHONE HANG UP

YMKCW: (drops phone in BAILEY’s lap)

BAILEY: (whispers) I don’t even know his name!

YMKCW: XX

BAILEY: (clears throat), Uh, yeboseyo [hello]?

XX: yeboseyo? Hello?

BAILEY: Hi. [in Korean] I’m Bailey

XX: oh, your Korean is so good! I’m XX.

BAILEY: I know. I mean, bangawoyo [nice to meet you] (makes faces at YMCKW, who is just sitting and grinning like an idiot) How do you know YMKCW?

XX: We went to school together in Australia.

BAILEY: Ah. Your English is awesome.

XX: So you work with YMKCW? Do you call him Mr. X?

BAILEY: (laughs for 23 solid seconds) DO I CALL HIM MR. X?! No, usually I just say “hey idiot” or YMKCW-oppa.

XX: Oh no. No. You can’t call him YMKCW-oppa.

BAILEY: Uh…why? He’s older than me. He’s a friend, who is a guy, and I am a girl and he is older than me…by Korean standards…shouldn’t I say oppa?

XX: Yeeeesss…but you shouldn’t call him that. It makes him too confident.

BAILEY: OK, I’ll stick with “idiot” instead. So I’ll see you tomorrow?

XX: Yes, I think so.

BAILEY: OK…bye? (hands phone back to YMKCW, who then leaves the office on the phone, BAILEY runs over to twin teachers THING 1 and THING 2) OHMYGODYOUGUYSDIDYOUHEARTHAT?!

YMKCW re-enters. BAILEY, THING 1 and THING 2 attempt (in vain) to look casual and unaffected by the recent developement.

YMKCW: So, what do you think? (goes back over to BAILEY’s desk and sits down. BAILEY follows.)

BAILEY: Yeah, he sounds nice. So, tomorrow night?

YMKCW: Yeah. So, like, brings lots of other female teachers too.

BAILEY: (growing suspicious) Okay…well…I’m going out to dinner with a bunch of people tomorrow night. Should I just text you afterwards?

YMKCW: Yeah. Just…who else will be there?

BAILEY: (suspicion heightens) why are you looking for other people?

YMKCW: So my friend can have choice.

BAILEY: Wait. So…so he can choose?

YMKCW: (oblivious to any problem) yeah. So if you don’t like and he don’t like then he can have more choice. Is smart.

BAILEY:

**This is NOT a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are neither the products of the author’s imagination nor used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is not coincidental. Some names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals.**

Thailand.

Posted on August 3, 2014 by baileysaywhat Standard Reply

At exactly 6pm everyday all Thais stop moving and stand still. They do not talk. They do not blink. Having had ZERO warning about this, I naturally assume 3 hypotheses: 1) Rapture: ruled out because all their clothes were still on, also, bodies still here. 2) Doctor Who/Torchwood aliens-are-on-our-frequency/Children of Earth: ruled out because no one started talking with alien voices demanding blood or nukes or kryptonite. 3) Someone just hit puberty and their X-Men power is stopping time for JUST Thai people, not foreigners.

Unfortunately, as it turned out, the Thai national anthem plays at 6pm and all Thais have to stop moving and walking and like stare straight ahead until it’s finished. Me and the 2 other foreigners I could see just gingerly stepped around the Thais and made wary eye contact saying “WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING HOW IS IT NOT AFFECTING US” in eye language. Then they just suddenly started walking again and it was back to normal…BUT FOR THAT 34 SECONDS IT WAS TERRIFYING.

>>>>

Thailand is booze and cheap souvenirs and cheaper viagra and hookah and ladyboys and studying and river and lights and more studying and then teaching and street food and good people and sweat and muay thai muscle and cabaret and magic. This is Thailand.

It’s hard to wrap up the 4 weeks in words, but here’s a video link below to get you started. I rode on the back of a bike, got a (reputable) Thai massage, walked where Bradley Cooper has (State Tower: Hangover 2) and got to meet the most awesome people from all over this earth. It was hot and humid as Hades (I imagine) and I didn’t once feel like I was gonna get murdered or robbed.

I can’t wait to go back and be a proper tourist: temples, tigers and sand between my toes. See you soon, Thailand. ขอบคุณค่ะ

PS: A CELTA wrap up post is coming!

A Response to ‘Women Against Feminism.’

Posted on July 30, 2014 by baileysaywhat Standard 1

iwantedwings

Imagine this:

The year is 2014. You are a white Western woman. You wake up in the morning in a comfortably sized house or flat. You have a full or part-time job that enables you to pay your rent or mortgage. You have been to school and maybe even college or university as well. You can read and write and count. You own a car or have a driver’s licence. You have enough money in your own bank account to feed and clothe yourself. You have access to the Internet. You can vote. You have a boyfriend or girlfriend of your choosing, who you can also marry if you want to, and raise a family with. You walk down the street wearing whatever you feel like wearing. You can go to bars and clubs and sleep with whomever you want.

Your world is full of freedom and possibility.

Then you…

View original post 1,400 more words

90 Minutes of 90% Naked Dudes.

Posted on July 20, 2014 by baileysaywhat Standard Reply

So I decided since work on my CELTA is finally lightening up, to treat mahself and go see a show or two this weekend. Sometimes you have to accept that living the dream is going and doing stuff even when you’re alone, which can be daunting to a single white female in a huge, notorious city like Bangkok.

I don’t remember where I heard about Muay Thai Live: The Legend Lives (MTL:TLL?), but I decided to shell out for the premium seat (about $40) and go with no expectations and see how it went.

It went gloriously. I first had to find a Bond villian’s underground ticket office off the Hwai Kwang subway stop on Friday to pick up my paper ticket since the email said I couldn’t pick it up at the central office on the day of the event (STOOPID). Then yesterday the boat shuttle from the condos didn’t run at 5pm like it’s supposed to (ALSO STOOPID) and I had to catch a cab to the BTS to a free boat shuttle to the Asiatique, this huge mall area with the stage.

When I got there I wandered around buying everything under the sun for about 2 hours; surprisingly fun and usually cheap stuff. Then I found my way to the stage, which I had thought was outdoors according to promo pics, but was actually indoors, thank Jesus for air conditioning.

My seat got a free upgrade and I sat next to 2 guys from Singapore who giggled with me the whole time. See, this thing is like 13 super ripped dudes and 1 girl (who plays like 3 damsel-in-distress characters) running around in booty shorts actually hitting and kicking and ass-whooping and actually whooping and COMING OUT OF THE FLOORS, GUYS. There were holes in the stage, the stage split apart at one point to like, loose the souls of hell, there was crowd involvement…I have never been to Medieval Times, but I imagine it must be similar.

7:47-8:17 A tiny, badass old lady in chunky heel red boots talks in Thai about starting MT franchises. This is super, butt-asleep-in-church boring, but there are 14 cameras that I can see, so I keep a polite, strained, constipated foreigner smile on my face. She ends her speech with the image at the bottom of this post and all English speakers let loose a half-hidden snort.

8:18-8:22 Some gifts are give to the old woman by some middle-aged guy in a suit. No idea why, but if they’re giving out free gifts I could attempt to smile bigger or pull down my v-neck shirt. Y’know. Whatever.

8:23-8:25 Our “host for the evening” is introduced over the loudspeaker as she comes out in traditional wear, whining in baby voice about how if she was pretty we would clap louder. I live in Korea and already have 2 ovaries, thanks very much, so I am not moved by whining and am inclined to not clap and I let fairies die everywhere.

8:26 The booming god voice announces “MUAY THAI LIVE: THE LEGEND LIVES!!!!!!” and the lights go down. There is an impressive amount of coordination of the the many screens on par with megachurch levels to announce that we are in 16xx year (I don’t remember, there were too many glistening chests to remember) in a kingdom called Ayutthaya and then you hear loud boy whoops not unlike when the cafeteria opens or youths on bicycles in the Buttercream Gang want to scare a girl, and about 12 scantily clad boy/men run out calling to each other, play-fighting, running down the stairs of the audience to the big square stage (see map at the bottom).

I immediately start quietly laughing because every.single.one of these guys is ripped as heck and is doing their best to authentically play-fight and laugh and involve the crowd and I hurt for them doing this like every night. What must it be like to do this and then come back down from it and like, buy antacids at the 7-11?

Anyways, ACT 1: involves these boy/men discovering the beginnings of Muay Thai and they all play fight each other until some dude walks in to the screen splitting in two like a damn stargate and fights them all and wins and then they all realize HOT DAMN THIS DUDE IS THE TIGER KING and he came to fight the mere mortals IN DISGUISE. Someone call J.Lo because I think Maid in Manhattan is like, getting copyright infringed on.

ACT 2: 17xx (again, glistening chests are distracting) in Ayatthaya has some poor dude who’s like a master fighter all chained up in some pseudo-colosseum and they free him to fight like 8 different opponents who start COMING OUT OF THE FLOOR OF THE STAGE LIKE NINJAS (but not ninjas because this is Thailand and we are not racist about “all Asians”) and there’s like twins with murder axes and HE DEFEATS THEM and then a drunk guy who fights with/for his jug o’ booze and then a tiger guy like comes out of the audience stairs (not *down* the stairs, like the platform opened out the halfway up the stairs and he slithered [yes, slithered] out and cat screamed like 3 feet from me) and he beats him too and then finally he gets the thumbs up from Joaquin Phoenix and is allowed to leave.

ACT 3: Also 17xx but later-ish, some warrior and his clan of 4 vs some other clan of 4 and their legendary fighter and OH MAH GAWD WARRIOR A’S CLAN HAS A DISGUISED WOMAN AND IT’S *HIS WOMAN* and she tried to help and SPOILER ALERT: dies to spur him on to kill everyone else. He falls on her prostrate body and sobs a bit like this is Outlander or something (PS: this actor cannot be only Thai, the whole time I actually thought he was a white dude with a bad dye job and a spray tan, but at the end he had a Thai name so I’m thinking he’s mixed) and carries her limp, toes-perfectly-pointed body out.

ACT 3B: all the dudes come out and perform the kata? Is this the right word? Anyway, they show the 12 moves/form of Muay Thai off and badly lipsync the overhead voice that calls out the names; it’s like Who’s Line with the subtitle game.

ACT 4: modern day, we see a scrawny kid in painted-on black jeggings and black converse with a black t-shirt and black blazer bound up the stairs. He looks at the kata chart and pretends to do some moves. She of the whiny voice saunters on stage and teases her boyfriend (of 5 years, according to the English translation on screen) of liking Muy Thai better than her (GOOD CHOICE, BRO). Bro assures her that’s not true and get’s down on one knee to prove it with a tiny red box. We fade over to just her subconcious that jumps up and down and squeals “YESSSSS” and go back to her complaining “I don’t believe you love me if you’re proposing in the alley like a dog” or something (RUUUUUDE, GIRL THAT BOY IS HOT AND HAS PUT UP WITH YOUR WHINY VOICE FOR 5.LONG.YEARS). He then reminds her (and us) that his dad is chief of police and they probably shouldn’t be in the alley since “they’ll be coming for us soon.”

This is called foreshadowing, kids, and it took all of 14 seconds for him to walk 2 steps away and run his hands through his luscious locks and the bad guys kidnapped April and the Turtles came…jk jk but really she got taken because the bad guys CAME IN ON ROPES FROM THE CEILING and took her back up and ~~Bro~~ (what was his name? crap. Something basic. But Thai. This dude only knows one color, anyways. Let’s call him Mike.) Mike is like “whaaaaaaa? where is the whiny love of my life” which then starts his sequence of fighting everyone on his way up to the big boss (seriously just like a video game, including some ladders work not unlike Super Mario Bros.), who he defeats. He discovers Whiny trapped in the floor like a 18th-century ship stowaway and asks again if she’ll marry him. She says yes, he puts his blazer on and someone offstage throws her a sarong and they ride some gondola thing up into the ceiling saying “thanks for coming to our wedding” and she throws her plastic flowers to some old dude in the audience and shouts “YOU’RE NEXT.”

And SCENE: credits roll and the 15-ish actors come out in their costumes on stage and then say thank you and bow and then rinse and repeat that 3x to all the different areas of the stage and we clap for about 3.56 minutes and then get up.

God’s voice comes back to remind us that the actors will be available in the lobby for photoshoots in about 5 minutes. I try to decide if I want to debase myself in taking a photo with more muscle mass than a Gold’s Gym, and decide to head out. But then as I’m walking towards the stairs, I hear repeated shouts of “HA” again and again and the crowd is slowing down and I realize that the actors are shouting before every.single.picture to like truly hold their poses and muscles. I’m impressed and decide “no one I know is here to be embarrassed of me,” “I’ll never see these people again” and “JUST DO IT ALREADY, YOU BIG BABY” and use my LC basketball elbows to slowly work my way to the front. I’ve already decided that the big bad video game boss was the hottest, and he’s standing on the side of the cast with his enviable body in just jeans and half-zipped leather jacket. When the photographer finally decides it’s my turn, I grab him by in the arm and pull him to the middle (where I’m supposed to stand) and all his co-workers are whistling and giving him hell and I’m laughing and then HE TOOK OFF THE LEATHER JACKET AND…

and they’re all cheering and I’m cheesing and we took a photo and I bowed and he bowed and then we unfortunately did not ride into the sunset together because it was 10 o’clock and the sun had set and if there’s one thing I’ve learned watching drag shows, it’s that you’re unfortunately not allowed to touch the talent unless you’re handing them money…and I’d kind of already given him money by buying a ticket. I ran down the red stairs and into his dreams.

gahhhhhhh want to touch…

Then I decided that I probably wasn’t gonna get another chance, so I decided to ride the huge Bangkok Eye ferris wheel and when I got to the front the guy said, “just one” and I said “just one” with the biggest, shit-eating grin on my face. And then I saw the world from up there and it was magnificent.

In review, MTL:TLL was a great experience; I would definitely recommend it to someone who wants to see Muay Thai…but doesn’t want actual blood to happen. I was thoroughly impressed at these guys and their level of fitness and professional technique. According the website they are all stuntmen and/or former MMA/kick-boxing/MT champs. I know it’s scripted, but those hits were most definitely connecting. Clearly they aren’t at 100% full strength, but the muscle memory required to fight 8 different people for 20+ minutes at a go and choreography fighting is happening with 10 other people with weapons on the stage is pretty impressive. As is the commitment to fully ham it up and act in front of a couple hundred people, screaming and hyping it up genuinely. I’m pretty glad I went; and not just for the photo. Although I’m pretty loyal to my boxing family, Muay Thai looks pretty dang cool. Now, if only I could just STAY CLAM, I could Muay Thai onwards!

The Long Overdue Wrap Up Of A Whirlwind Week In The West

Posted on July 19, 2014 by baileysaywhat Standard Reply

Let’s get in our Tardis and jaunt on back to the week of June 20-28, when…too nerdy.

A month ago, I spent a week back in the states…too boring.

#MURICA. JUNE 20-28. (THAT’LL DO PIG, THAT’LL DO)

So I got to go to my various homes and here is that story.

**For best experience, play song**

I hopped in a plane at TAE with a dream and no cardigans, off to Seoul for 9 hours. How did I fill those 9 hours? GREAT QUESTION, YOU DIDN’T ASK! There is a jjimjilbang (Korean spa) in the bottom floor of the airport and I went down there to explore and paid less than $10 to sleep for 5 hours and soak in the hot/cool baths. If you remember my previous naked jjimjilbang horror story from last summer, don’t worry: this was nothing like that. I mean, there was nakedness, but no emotional/physical scarring. Just blissful sleep on a hardwood floor and solo soaking. I didn’t see another soul near me the whole time. Incheon Airport earns my vote for best.airport.ever.

I then slept fitfully through about 11 hours of flight until I landed in God’s glorious green Promised Land: Western Washington via Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. I squealed as I hugged my mom and two sisters and we (almost) all went on a mutual pee break before starting the drive back to Chez Bai(ley).

Upon arrival at the Nest, I discovered my dad, our dogs, and my Nana’s homemade Raspberry Pie. And although my body didn’t know what time or day it was, my stomach started hyperventilating at the thought of real, Washington raspberries (I left last year before raspberry season and it almost killed me [y’all know my blood was almost exclusively Diet Coke, raspberries and David’s Original Salted Sunflower Seeds before Korealand]).

I spent 4 sleepy, blissful days with my family at home: going on a lunch with my Dad at Boundary Bay Brewery and exploring a farmer’s market after which my dad proceeded to disobey me and keep snitching the artisanal whole wheat sourdough bread we got for dinner. Belated Mother’s Day (and early Brianna birthday) pedicures lady-times, steaks and lasagna and just lazy, jet-lagged, 4am happy-for-a-Keurig moments with the people I love and who put up with me living far, far away.

**view from the end of our driveway**

THEN THERE WAS YOU, ARKANSAS.

From SEA>PHX with Brianna then PHX>LIT solo, then I was back in the land of Sonics, sweet tea and hogs fans. I was wearing shorts (I know. I flew in shorts. I wear shorts now, thank you boxing) and a tshirt and just felt like everything in life was clicking back into place as I hugged Michael, was gifted a nice, cool can of Diet Coke and we headed to the place where I cried, sweated and loved: The Apple Store.

And there you all were.

The cool tones of the heavy tables, the immediate straightening of iPads that my fingers couldn’t stop caressing, the dulcet tones of indie-pop and cobalt tshirts. Oh, yes, and the people. My husband, the Bearded One, rustled out of his perch of power; the now ear-pierced Trace, my host and stylist; Abs, who although he had promised me his voice would startle me when I returned TOTALLY STILL STARTLED ME; and Lisa and Rampage and Everett (update: still smells like I imagine Jake Ryan smelled outside the church with Molly Ringwald) and Jonathan and Patrick and and and and all of you. God, everyone. Even if I didn’t like you, my heart was so happy to see you. Even if I met you that day, I was so, so happy. I forget how a place becomes a home. And while Arkansas is gracious and accepting, the people that work at that Apple Store are in a special class of magic. Thank you guys for molding me, loving me, and most of all, for missing me. I only teared up once. Or twice. Counting is irrelevant.

Look at these gorgeous people. Such family. Much love. We Ross shopped, Birks shopped, strange-drag-white trash-awesome-shopped, we ate (Chipotle, Damgoode Pies, Shipley’s Donuts, Whole Hog)…and I just cannot say enough about these people. I am most myself around them. I want to be better and aim higher and laugh more and make them laugh. I don’t really feel worthy of them all missing me, but then again, that’s what I think a friend-family is. They have seen me cry and grow and fail and win and cry again and hopefully there is a time where we will all be in the same place again together and continue doing that.

OK, no more sad sad, onto Tulsa!

There’s truly no better way to start off a road trip than with Shipley’s Donuts. In fact, I just called Ruth Bader-Ginsberg and we stamped that into law. You’re welcome.

Michael and I began the drive to Tulsa and talked and laughed and I cried and we listened to music and it was strange, doing it again a year later, in the same car and same drive and just a better life place. For both of us.

We wanted to swing by the revamped Woodland Hills store, so I alerted the local paps and got this reply, which is hands-down “Why I Love Jeff Smith 101.”

After more hugs and intros and people I also love, I hugged Michael goodbye again in Tulsa and strutted into the Mayo Hotel as the very classy doorman (bellhop?) let me weep a little on the marble floor and 9-floor-long elevator ride behind my huge sunglasses.

Thus began 36-hours of wedding: rapid 20-minute change into dress, new birks, some semblance of make-up and jump into a huge truck to the rehearsal dinner.

Sister Act.

Then the next day, I got to sleep in a little and go do mini-boxing workout (already out of shape from 1 week of non-jump roping…) with Dad as the other Bailey ladies had to go and sit for their hair/makeup preps. I spent the morning sweating, then drinking fantastically strong coffee, going on a long walk around downtown Tulsa with my Dad and talking about life. I’m really glad I had no data on my phone this trip; it really made me want to wring every drop out of being with my family for such a short time. And being able to just SIT and watch dogs in fountains and drink water and talk with my Dad was priceless.

We then hoofed it back to the hotel as I showered and started my relatively simple get-ready process, watching Alien on my laptop as I curled my hair, my Dad yelling out plot points from the other room. I snuggled on my dress and off all 5 of us went to the trolley. YES, TROLLEY! to the church.

The beautiful thing about being family and yet not in the wedding party was a) not buying a dress, b) not doing that all-morning in a suite getting ready thing, and c) relaxing, having no job.

Oh, everyone has to take pictures? Haha, not us!

Then we laughed, we danced, we sang, we ate, we danced some more and Jordan and Luke were married. I shoved everything into my suitcases…which surprisingly had a lot of room left HAHA WAIT FOR THAT IN THAILAND HAHAHAHAHA…and slept for 3 hours before going to start the next leg of the journey: TUL>DFW>ICN (no spa this time)>BKK.

Thank you beyond measure to my families in Washington, Little Rock, and Tulsa. You lighten my soul and I will be back in two shakes of my two sizes smaller butt.

Until then…

…in Bangkok.

Bangkok Beginnings.

Posted on July 7, 2014 by baileysaywhat Standard 2

My jungle hair, a video and a view from the The Hangover Part 17a: Bangkok Boogie Bonanza. Or something like that.

Goodbye, Year One. 안녕, Year Two.

Posted on June 3, 2014 by baileysaywhat Standard 1

I have been in the faintly kimchi-scented arms of Korea for a year now. Over a year, really, but my second year’s contract started on Sunday and it feels like I just got on the plane in Seattle, all teary and very accepting of the free white wine to begin this journey. So, naturally, I used the historical records of the age, Twitter, to check out this past year. Shall we?

I remember arriving with Steven and our cab driver was going 152kph and I was so jetlagged that I didn’t care and there were so many bugs and what are these letters that look like a pre-Tetris nightmare IS THIS EVEN A LANGUAGE and I slept.

I still feel this way about k-pop videos…but also a fondness for their frighteningly robot cuteness and underage smiles.

Little did I know this would not be the first time this happened…

Coworker: hey guys, I have a goodbye breakfast I made for everyone, come get some bagels BUT IT WAS LIKE A COUP, Y’ALL AND I JUST WANTED A FREE BAGEL AND IT WAS A TRAP.

Also, unfortunately, something I’ve had to get very used to hearing. Koreans are very matter of fact when you’re not measuring up to their ideas of beauty. “what is wrong with your hair?” “teacher, you are so fat” and it is so just…factual. Not intentionally rude…it’s like they are just informing me “the earth is round and so are you.”

And so I began my love affair with why adult students are 235% better than kid students.

You guys. There was so much shouting in this meeting. I straight up grabbed Roy-Gene’s leg and was squeezing tears out of my eyes to keep from laughing at the ridiculous, unnecessary drama.

Playing a zombie was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made for my personal life. Fake blood, contacts, blood condoms and new friends.

Look! Skills I learned in Korea!

Sometimes you are all really, really far away and this country considers hugs to be kisses. AKA you do not hug someone unless they are your best friend or you’ve been dating for 164+ episodes of a Korean drama (see below).

BUT THEIR PARENTS WERE KEEPING THEM APART AND HE WAS SO RICH AND SHE WAS SO POOR AND AND AND…

Bailey got low, low, low, low…but I was wearing Nikes. No Reeboks.

That’s free advice for you. Use it.

Another day in the life.

THE BEST start to vacation and feeling like I was conquering the world that ended with me pulling a Bridesmaids in Ilana’s bathroom…and I played all the characters…

Yay! I got an apartment! Shit! The cleaning ladies stole $100+ worth of my stuff and threw most of it away.

This could just be an overall statement about Korean guys in general, but this specifically was a boyband at a k-pop concert that my friend Marty got me tickets to. It was so magical. There was so much guyliner that it was like Pirates of the Caribbean #24

Korean apartment life, guys.

And now we’re to the present–where I’m now pretty much like a boxing badass and I sweat through all of the clothes. I’m feeling like I’m finally discovering this non-skinny powerful body of mine. And I get to hit things to get it. It’s great.

I have met the most glorious people here. And not a day goes by that I don’t think of my friends in Arkansas. My family at home. My Tulsans. I use Apple exorbitant patience skills. And ORU chaplain face. And my dad’s “the work is finished when it’s finished” life advice. I’m home for a blink in June in all 3 of those places and if we can connect, I want to. Korea is where I’m finding more bits to myself and I’m so honored to call it home for (at least) one more year.

I Promise This Post Only Mentions Miley One Time.

Posted on May 5, 2014 by baileysaywhat Standard Reply

Wow. Been awhile, yeah? Having just passed my 11-month anniversary here in Korea-land, it’s getting harder to write about the everyday. While I still like this place, it’s not all LOOK ANOTHER INSANELY CUTE COFFEE SHOP and OH MY GOD THESE PEOPLE ARE TINY I AM SHREK and ANOTHER TEMPLE?! everyday. Because that is true everyday and my head (and yours) would explode if I wrote about it weekly. Or monthly.

Really, what I have now is mostly emotions, which Roy-Gene has told me that no one wants to read about. How I feel about life. Love. (And other mysteries, am I right early 2000s Christian gurlz?!)

Well, in things that have happened recently, I joined a boxing gym. I know. I will be looking very J.Lo in “Enough” with my tight, tan, Latin body in black Lycra any day now. Have I always been such a big sweat-er, you guys? I mean, I could wring out my clothes and hair every night leaving this place, which is just a 10-minute walk from my apartment. My co-worker Angela talked me into going with her, and I’m glad she did. Although I will confess that going to a Korean-speaking-only gym freaked me the heck out. Sometimes I just look at Angela (who is half Korean and brilliant), our 샘 (“saem” being the Korean shorthand for teacher) and two other Koreans in our class laughing in Korean and feel like the most brilliant ghost-pale, fish-out-of-water ever. Then again, sometimes I feel like a tall, unbeatable Amazon as the teacher chants “jab, jab, double jab, 1-2” and I beat the hell out of the training mitts.

In sadder news, I’m sure many of you guys (I hope all of you) have no doubt heard about the absolutely horrifying ferry disaster here in Korea a couple weeks ago. It’s easy to think we’re removed from all that, but we’re not. If over 200 hundred high school kids had died in an accident in the states, you guys, we would be losing our shit. Sorry for the language, but it is overwhelming to think about children, CHILDREN really, with so much life to live, going out in this way. Something preventable. Something that could have been handled so different. Texting their parents from inside the ship as they’re trapped. It’s horrifying. And just as horrifying is the kidnapping of over 200 high school girls in Nigeria right now–parents not knowing if they’ll ever see their kids again. This ferry disaster has reverberated so much through the country; the government has actually forbidden all school trips until the end of first semester, which is the end of June.

Because the Village (DGEV, aka my workplace) is a week-long intensive immersive camp-like overnight experience, we’re included too. This has caused no small amount of problems as BAM, we have no students. There are teachers who have already been hired and ready to fly out here that had to be delayed by 6-8 weeks because there’s no kids to teach. We’ve still got a few Kindy programs (as they’re not overnight) and the occasional 1-day field trip and (THANK MY STARS) the Adult Programs as they’re exempt. But it leaves us with a lot of time on our hands to lesson plan, clean classrooms and create unnecessary drama, of course. Which I am *far* too classy to go into. Right now. Because I don’t really care about it and kind of want to talk about happier things.

So, due to boxing taking up 7:30pm-around 10:30pm of my nights this past week…it’s safe to say that I’m spending a lot of time with these people. Angela, Irene (who has FANTASTIC English, and who’s Korean name is Da Som 다 솜) and No San (노 산 aka the Machine because this guy jump ropes for TWENTY MINUTES without stopping JUST TO WARM UP. Seriously. Before I knew his name I just called him “Machine” in English and Korean. His box jumps are like watching someone dunk from the free throw line. I’m in awe. And a little bit of unrequited crush on his skills.) We all worked out 5 nights this week, M-F, and then we went karaoking (karaoke-ing?) after working out on Friday. Do you recall me saying how sweaty I am post-workout? Still have NO idea why we went, but we left the gym at like 11 and went to karaoke, then drank makkoli (rice…alcohol? it’s sweet milky goodness served in like a Winnie-the-Pooh pot that you ladle out) and ate chicken and more alcohol. We got home around 3, comfortably drunk, still in said workout clothes…and I promptly woke up at 7:30. Stupid body clock.

THEN THESE SELF-SAME FOOLS are all “let’s go hiking tonight” and I stupidly, stupidly agreed. I finally dragged my butt out of bed around 11 to have Roy-Gene and his plus 1 make me breakfast, went downtown on a ladies day with Brooke and got my nails done (I look like 12-year old Ke$ha did my nails) and headed home to get ready to go hiking AT 8:30PM AT NIGHT. Yeah, I think the alcohol was still in my system. Because the Machine is not hot enough to make me break a leg on a Korean mountainside in the dark (although I will confess that I *did* do my hair in a really cute ponytail and put on some winged eyeliner so sharp that it could cut glass) and I clearly had not thought it through. It hurt.

It hurt. It hurt so bad, you guys. My toes. My calves. My butt. Things I didn’t even know were like, growing in my legs hurt. And of course all the Korean old ladies are trucking by with their murderous ski poles and professional hiking gear as I’m trying really hard not to alert everyone in a 5 kilometer radius that I’m sucking wind and am convinced that my lungs are going to like, invert or something. At one point I did legitimately wonder how they would airlift my body off this damn mountain.

And here’s the Sunday school lesson/point to the title of this post: mountains. And if this comes off super cheesy, I apologize. No, you know what? I don’t apologize. I really don’t. Because this here is my blog about my feelings and if you wanted out, I really doubt you made it this far. And if you did make it this far and don’t like this…well…

Mountains are weird. All you can think when you’re climbing it, when EVERYTHING hurts is, “when will it be done?” “when can I rest?” “will it be worth it?” And you can’t really see anything through the trees. You’re all “oh look, a peek at the moon through these two huge branches” or “wow, I guess that’s *kind of* where I live with those lights?” but you’re not really getting a good look. You think about how other people are passing you and should *you* be going that fast? and do I look ok? can they tell that there’s a hole in these pants where my chubby thighs are rubbing together? or that other people are coming back down and you wish you were them and how happy they must be.

And then. Finally. When you least expect it (mostly because all the signs telling you how far you are happen to be in Korean so you really have no idea when the torture will end), you’ve made it. You’re at the summit. And it doesn’t hurt anymore. And you feel a little like crying but you can’t because it’s weird enough that you’re the only 2 foreigners on a Korean mountain hiking at night, you don’t need to be the white girl crying in front of Buddha, a couple hundred Koreans who are praying to said Buddha and the 3 people that you get messy sweaty with 5x a week. And my God, but it is gorgeous. The city is breathtaking. The air is different. The twinkling lights are a marvel as you look how far you’ve come and you can’t believe you made it. That you did that. Your two exhausted, sore legs did that. In the darkness. With a couple people you barely know. It’s so worth it. So worth the pain, the frustration, the not-knowing-when-it-will-end.

And in that moment, I swear we were infinite–but that moment can’t last. You can treasure it up in your heart, but sooner or later you have to go back down the mountain. Which is somehow infinitely worse than climbing…because it’s so easy to slip and fall in the dark (even though the trail is quite well lit, it’s still a wet, stone set of unending stairs and gravity would still do it’s job). And if anything, you have to be more careful because you’re tired from your previous fight.

I just couldn’t help but think as I was on Palgongsan that half a world away, my younger sister, Brianna, was graduating from my alma matter, ORU, with her Bachelor’s of Science in Nursing with a crapton of well-fought honors and how we have to choose what mountains we are going to climb. She’s at the top of her justly-deserved mountain, and now has to climb back down and drive across the country (which I do not miss doing just a year ago with her; that is a DRIVE).

And because I’m me, I can’t help but think too about love. YES ITS BECOMING THAT POST. I remember the only other real hike I’ve done in my life, Church Mountain in my senior year of high school almost 10 years ago (OH MY LORD) and thinking the same things now as then. You can’t see when it’s gonna end. You can catch peeks at where you’re at, but it’s not the whole picture. An everyday occurrence in Korea is being asked your name and if you have a boyfriend. And it kind of wears on you over and over as well as being told the reason you don’t have one [SIDEBAR: S Club 7’s “Never Had a Dream Come True” just came on in this coffee shop and I really feel like I am in a rom com with Hillary Duff and like someone needs to come walking around the corner] is “because you’re fat. You know, you have a pretty face, but you’re fat. So, you’re not going to get one until that changes.”

And of course, I’m working on that with the aforementioned Million Dollar Baby workout business because I’d like *for myself* to be fitter, but I’m trying to remember that someone quite fantastic has wanted me before, when I was just as heavy/big/”unappetizing” as I am now (although I have extremely slowly lost about 20lbs in Korea…somehow) and that’s important to remember. But love lives are a mountain, like anything. Suddenly, out of nowhere, you’re at the top and it’s worth the pain, the tears, the extremely present pain in your butt muscles and you’re incandescently happy, Mrs. Darcy. You can’t stay at the top forever, you’ve got to come back down with your sewing machine leg shakes and drive back to chimek, but still. ~~You~~ I *will* have more than just peeks at the view. There will be a mountaintop that I’m not expecting. And it’s going to be worth all this bullshit. I have to believe that whoever you are, you’re going to be worth it. With all your faults and weirdness, with all my strange quirks and emotional diatribes, I’m going to want to stare at you while you sleep and hold your hand in a movie theater and know how you like your coffee or that you hate coffee and love tea or water or 소주 and you really like my butt in pencil skirts BUT I will draw the line at feeding you because that ish is weird to me. [PS: S Club 7, you LIARS, no one has come around the corner but old people and babies]

And yeah, that’s strange to type on a public blog about my life and Korea, but hey, if you made it this far, you should’ve known. Because if I can’t believe that it’s going to be worth it someday, there’s really no point in climbing the mountain. I will give up. I will not even try. And that would take away a really essential thing that makes me me, and then I wouldn’t be me. SO META. I hope. I believe. I hate the pain and the burning and the futile, fleeting peeks at things, but I believe that the climb is so worth the journey and the top and the bottom and the in between of this life.

I’m going to cue up Miley’s “The Climb” and blow out of this coffee shop and trip in the crosswalk and not meet some hot doctor-type because right now, I’m climbing this mountain solo-style. You show up when you’re ready, 남친. I’m not waiting for you to live my life. I’ll just keep climbing and you’ll show up whenever you’re supposed to because my world is not defined by this mountain. It’s not defined by you. I’m still me, regardless of when you arrive. But damn, hurry up! My butt hurts.

Champion Professional Mountain Climbery.

Posted on March 19, 2014 by baileysaywhat Standard 1

Growing up in Lynden, I kind of hated the Pioneer Museum. Yes, Phoebe Judson is a saint, she named Lynden with a ‘y’ instead of Linden because it was prettier….blah. I realized that there were a lot of places around Daegu that I didn’t know, and started my vacation last week with a $5 tour around Daegu. An entire tour bus, a non-English speaking guide, a driver and…just me. Do you see where this party train is going?

We began by checking out the Bullo-dong Tombs in eastern Daegu (Dongdaegu), which are huge mounds of dirt where it is thought the rulers of the area in the 5th and 6th century AD were buried. My guide was (is?) a professor at Yeungjin College, my employer, and had a laugh or two with me in the sunshine as we walked along a bunch of graves. His daughter is a pharmacist (or going to pharmacy school?) in LA, and he told me how he misses her.

Next we visited a brass museum, which was a little forgettable since pouring molten hot metal and beating it with sticks *sounds* like my jam, but really isn’t. Well, maybe *actually* doing it would be, but watching videos of it just isn’t. Then we drove to Mt. Palgongsan and Donghwasa Temple, where I fell truly, madly, deeply in love with some lanterns. This is when my Korean and Chinese speaking guide began to warm up to me as she watched me chase grains of rice around a bowl with chopsticks in vain. She has a 4-year old daughter and is expecting her next one, a boy! in just 4 months. Sidebar: I have got to stop hanging out with so many gorgeous pregnant women because I am not carrying another life and I haven’t figured out how to dress as classy.

By far my favorite part of this tour was the Daegu Safety Theme Park, which might be a slightly tragic translation error for somewhere with a memorial of the Daegu 2.18 Terror incident in 2003. Just like everywhere else I was the solo person accompanied this time by a Yeungjin graduate (YJC IS EVERYWHERE THEY ARE BIG BROTHER), Josh, who took me inside this huge room that was actually a hydraulic lift to watch a super sad video dubbed terribly in English about the attack that claimed 198 lives and injured over 147 more. Hearing a girl call her mom on a cell phone and say “There’s smoke, I can’t breathe, I love you” in Korean just broke me. As the video ended and the lift went down to the floor I stepped out to see the actual subway car they had transported to the park. I can’t really remember a time in my life where I could reach out and touch where someone had lost their life. It feels strange to me that my favorite tours aren’t sunshine and lollipops and aquariums but places like this and Alcatraz. Where life, messy and heartbreaking, happens. (“I’m sorry” written in Korean at the memorial, below)

So then I got on a bus to Mokpo, 4 hours away, and discovered that I had told my host the wrong week that I was coming. This prompted a flurry of filling out my CouchSurfing profile, AirBNB, Facebook, and attempting various smoke signals to try and find somewhere to stay that night. I was kind of nervous excited (read: terrified) about maybe sleeping in a jjimjilbang and kept repeating that Helen Keller quote: “Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all.” I arrived in Mokpo to see Jenna, a high school friend, arrive with blankets and a place for me to stay with friends of hers that night.

RISE AND SHINE, YO, YOU GOT A TOUR IN THE POURING RAIN TO DO! Another day, another guide with almost no English at all, 4 museums, a lunch where I put a whole clam in my mouth and raw oysters too, 5 Koreans over the age of 50 and then…then…I climbed a mountain.

On our Mokpo tour there was a couple in their 50s with maybe 1% English to my 2% Korean. So we had pretty much just done a lot of smiling at each other for about 4 hours. The tour ended and the guide asked me, “you want to climb Yudalsan?” Thinking it was all part of the tour still, I said “YES!” only for him to jump in his car and leave me looking at the two of them as they gestured to get in their (very nice) car.

Now…Single White Foreign Female 101, Chapter 2: “Liam Neeson Will Not Always Be There” ($39.95 on Amazon) dictates that getting in the car of a nice looking couple with which you cannot communicate is not really the *best* idea. But in the spirit of Ms. Keller and saying “yes” to unknowns (Improv Comedy 201)…I got in. We drove about 5 minutes to the base of the mountain (please, nobody google how tall this mountain is, I know I was no Bear Grylls here but I’m proud of my tiny accomplishment) and the rain is starting to just dump out. I’m in dark jeans, wool socks, Nike Frees, a deep green hoodie and my 8-year old black North Face fleece and my hosts are in full-on Korean hiking gear. If I looked like a natural-colored wayguk bear waddling around, they looked like a flower garden full of the happiest, brightest poppies you’ve ever seen. So we started climbing. The rain got worse. Station 1. I feel good. Station 2, it’s getting slick. Station 3, fog. Summit. A glorious, rainy, happy heart. I wonder how I ever work indoors. I grew up in the Pacific Northwest. I belong here on top of mountains. It’s in my hair, my eyes, my joy. Rainy, cold, wet, and the Koreans are laughing at how happy I am. I’m thinking of Marty and Mr. Kredit and home and here and wishing I had someone to share it with. But you can’t wait for someone else to live your life, right? At least, that’s what I keep telling myself.

Going back down was treacherous but we found a surprise temple as we came back–hello, Indiana Jones, where are you? My hosts asked “jowa Soju?” which means “do you like Soju?” and I answered back with a slang phrase taught to me by Freddy Richmond, the cool, smoking older brother I miss dearly: “hanjan harkayo (lets have a glass).” Which I meant as a joke…and then we started driving around a shipyard and I was quite convinced that I was about to be cut up for parts. They’d tested me out and found I was halfway competent at climbing things (aka lots of stairs) and were going to sell my organs to the shipmongers. Which was fortunately not true as they then took me to a restaurant where we ate live octopus (낙지) and Soju! I only wish I’d taken a photo…but then you wouldn’t have seen all the tentacles squirming, which was kind of the coolest thing ever. I know that kind of luxury isn’t cheap and they wouldn’t let me pay for it either. NakJin and JeongSun: Thank you for teaching me about friendship without words; it’s not something I’ll easily forget.

And then…Seoul. I took the KTX going aaaannyywhere…to Yongsan Station. I putzed around eating kimbap outside a palace and walked around Bukchon and another palace before my 2o’clock tour of the Bukchon Hanok village. The village is full of hanoks, a style of wooden houses that grew in popularity in the 1920s and 30s as Seoul expanded. The area is carefully preserved and yet very modern. For my Arkansas friends, think Hillcrest. Tulsa friends, think Blue Dome district. Old, historic, and full of too many hipster artists to count on both mustaches. I then went down to Itaewon, the foreigner district, for an hour to hunt down a few cans of Diet Coke and a new shirt or two before attempting to rendezvous with my host for the night. As I sat on the floor of Nowon Subway Station…I started to feel…off. I secured secondary housing (the second time this week, if you remember), as my host thought I was again coming a different day (do I need to set my clock differently or something?). And as I walked into her place, I pretty much became *that* scene in Bridesmaids. If you know, you know. I was every character in every place in her tiny bathroom. I nominate me for worst houseguest of the ever.

After surviving the night, I pretty much crawled home to Daegu and the safety of my bed. Which only took about 9 hours to do, but still. MADE IT.

I had a difficult time with this vacation. I requested it over 6 months ago to go to Hong Kong with college friends, but plans fell through in January. I only get 2 true vacation weeks of my own (we have to take 2 at Christmas) per year, and here I was, *wasting* it (or so I thought) as I bounced through Korea, a county I already lived in. Work was very slow this week, with people having mornings or whole afternoons off and I was angry that I was gone on an easy week. Angry I had to use this time and felt like it was wasted. Friends were in Thailand or Bali or the Philippines and I didn’t even leave the peninsula. And then I got sick and had to come home from Seoul on Friday rather than Sunday.

I’m instead trying to focus more of my world on positives:

1. I didn’t have to teach at all this week.

2. I climbed a mountain.

3. I ate live octopus and soju with absolute strangers.

4. I saved some money! I think!

5. I saw some really old, unique places in this world that I may never have seen otherwise.

I leaped. A little leap, but it felt kind of good. Next time: bigger leap.

Acting out.

Posted on February 23, 2014 by baileysaywhat Standard 1

I should write more often. But because I should, I won’t. I don’t. It’s been over a month now since my last post, and that’s ok. Things here at the Village keep on trucking; we’ve had a lovely and slow 3-4 weeks thanks to exams and grade changeover in the Korean schools. Most of us had the opportunity to co-teach with several different coworkers, giving some new insight and ideas into classrooms and management. I was most definitely blessed to see a big variety of classes and work with some of my favorite people and see how they run their classrooms, which is great.

I’ve just signed here for my second year at DGEV, which will renew as of June 1. I’ve found a lot of happiness in teaching our university and adult students, and without further education on my part, I wouldn’t be able to do that at a university or college in Korea. I’m really honored to have the chance to lead the Adult Program with my 6-year partner-in-crime-and-chocolate, David Brown. He’s heading out April 1st, but he’ll get me up to speed and then we will have a large ceremony where he will transfer his power to me by the ritual passing of the sock puppet, a hallowed tradition.

On a personal note (I mean, clearly this website is all about me, so of course it’s all personal), I am positively chuffed (thanks Brit friends!) to say that I did my first real acting yesterday. After a power-course of rehearsal all day yesterday, Daryl, Nikki, Rae and I produced something beautifully insane and genuinely fun. We were one of 8 groups participating in the first ever Daegu 10 Minute Play Festival. Our story, “The Zister Sisters” was written by someone in the Carolinas, and depicts 3 strange sisters’ attempt to check their mother into a nursing facility. The youngest sister, Edith (Rae), is lovably, laughably lost, 20 and still waiting on her Hogwarts letter. Elaine (Nikki) is the middle sister, and hasn’t been home for 10 years–she’s currently sporting an English accent and some suggestive business wear. The oldest sister, Edna (meeeeee) is fed up with the fact that she has to care for their 86-year old mother, Edith, and herself, having just divorced Ben Isaacs, “a rich old one-eyed Jew man from Detroit” who cheated on her with the produce lady from the Piggly Wiggly. Hilarity ensues as the sisters clash and the director of admissions, Fleming (Daryl) tries to keep the peace.

I thought I was going to mess everything up. All 3 of my castmates have done acting (Nikki was even in the Les Mis film, SHE SO LEGIT) and I was convinced I *was* the weakest link, goodbye, embarrassed that 10 of my friends from work paid money to see me ruin the thing. BUT I DIDN’T RUIN IT. It was funny and great and magical and I didn’t throw up and my voice didn’t shake and I love, loved hearing people laugh. It was like a superpower. I even got a message from a friend of mine who I really respect as a writer with a lovely, warm compliment and I’m just bursting. I’m so grateful to my friends for coming, for laughing, for buying me drinks after and most of all, for putting up with me.

(me, Rae, Nikki and Daryl)

People I am lucky to call friends and work with (plus Marty and Elins, who came too)!

Bailey Say What

Diet Coke. Comedy. Kimchi.

Category Archives: Uncategorized

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Thailand.

A Response to ‘Women Against Feminism.’

90 Minutes of 90% Naked Dudes.

The Long Overdue Wrap Up Of A Whirlwind Week In The West

Bangkok Beginnings.

Goodbye, Year One. 안녕, Year Two.

I Promise This Post Only Mentions Miley One Time.

Champion Professional Mountain Climbery.

Acting out.

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