“‘Pokemon’ Is Short For ‘Pocket Monster'” and other things in Japan

Posted on July 29, 2015 by baileysaywhat Standard 1

Not my best title, I know, but I’m writing this over a month later after returning from Japan, so…a lot of brain cells and one egg have died since then, so I’m not on top of my game. Yep.

It always felt that my time in Asia wouldn’t be complete without visiting Japan. For $50 you could fly from Busan to Osaka and stuff yourself full of sushi, roll in piles of Doraemon swag and perfect the art of karaoke, so that was the easiest decision ever. I finished up 2 years of work at K. Hogwarts and left for 10 days in the land of the rising sun.

Continuing with my Philippines tradition, I went makeup-less and packed just a backpack to carry on my flight, only to run into one of my bosses at the airport, so it was a great start to the trip. After landing on the island airport of Osaka (no, really, it’s an island)

I realized that I couldn’t remember the address of the hostel I was staying at, and in immigration there was no wifi…so I lied and wrote “friend’s apartment in Osaka” and cried a little in the line after copying the phone number of the guy in front of me. Sorry Marty (and Japanese immigration official) and random stranger. I just was dumb and forgot about the paperwork part, I didn’t pre-plan to fraud everyone I JUST WANTED THE DORAEMON SWAG.

After renting a data ‘egg’ and slowly, awkwardly reading train signs, I made it to Osaka Station. I…was not prepared. It was like Seoul Station on crack. There are at least 7 lines running out of there, and sub-stations and new letters and new solar systems and *cue hyperventilation and hypoglycemia* someone finally came out to help me because I was sweaty and awkward for too long. I finally made it to my hostel in Osaka, and it was perfectly cute and quaint–Air Osaka Hostel via AirBNB in Kitagaya was warm and friendly. They also included a map that pointed out some awesome hot springs (that I visited twice), a delicious, cheap restaurant (again, twice) and a sushi place (once, because money).

LOOK AT THAT DESTRUCTION. I am the destroyer of Japanese foods. I also visited the Pokemon Center in Osaka and…well…

Squeeeeeee. I never got into Pokemon as a kid, but who doesn’t like Pikachu? I bought myself a soft little squishy Pika and a coin purse because anything less than a 1000 yen note (around $8USD) is a coin. SO MANY COINS. Also of note, the only ONLY song that plays in the Pokemon Center? The Pokemon theme song in Japanese. On loop. I fear for their employees because they must walk in to work hoping for–

After more Osaka explorations, including a 3-story Sanrio (Hello Kitty) store, Osaka Castle and a peaceful, rainy Shinto shrine:

I then lovingly tucked my Pika into the backpack and took off for Fukuoka!

In August 2014, I got to lead a program of 60 Japanese students from Aso College, in Fukuoka and 60 Korean students from my parent school, Yeungjin College in Daegu. We mixed together the students for a 5-day, 4-night English intensive camp, and it was one of my favorite teaching experiences ever. So I was unbelievably excited to see several of my Japanese students again–they even let me stay with them, they COOKED, we talked–it was so much fun. Plus, OWL CAFE.

You pay 1500 yen (about $12-13) to hold these handsomes. The first 15 minutes you read some safety tips, including “please don’t forget owl is rapacious bird” and “when you see hate signs while you touch owls, please stop touching owls right away.” I don’t know what a hate sign is, but look at this bro, who was bestowed the name “Nuts.” HOW COULD HE EVER HATE SIGN?!

The next day, after a delicious homecooked meal from Tati, my students took a taxi WITH ME to the airport. They refused to let me pay and they even bought me some Pika swag from the Fukuoka Pokemon Center! I’m so happy to have met them and been their teacher and their friend too. I was a little sad to go on to Tokyo, but off I went, backpack bulging with Pikas and gifts from the Super Daiso that I had gotten lost in. Thanks so much to Tanya, PJ, Tati, Ryota and everyone else I got to see!!

In case you are planning to go to Japan, you need to know that Narita Airport is in the middle of ~~Egypt~~ nowhere, so plan accordingly. I made it into my hostel in Tokyo’s Shibuya district around 10 at night, a little lonely and ready to eat my own hand. I walked up the four flights of stairs, ran down to find food and smack into a guy staring at his smartphone exactly the same way I had been 5 minutes before. I asked, “Are you looking for the Geekhouse?” He looked up, and stammered “ah 애, yes” and when I looked closer, I saw the telltale signs of Korean 20something guy–Carhartt and white socks with white tennis shoes–I replied “진짜?!” and laughed, watching his jaw drop. It had only been 6 days, but I’d already missed speaking in Korean and feeling halfway knowledgeable in a foreign country. He threw his bag upstairs and we got ramen and a beer together on the corner, talking about our lives in Korea and our travels in Japan. When we figured out that we wanted to see the same areas the next day, we ended up walking around all of Shibuya and Harajuku together–Won Geol and I, the photographer and the makeup-free white girl. (You can see him peeking his head into my otherwise flawless pano of the Meiji Jingu below)

Over my last 2 days, I discovered a shop that sold $20,000 original, single, hand-painted animation cells from classic Studio Ghibli films like “Kiki’s Delivery Service” and “Totoro,” stood in Shibuya Crossing, the busiest pedestrian intersection in the world, and walked an hour back to the hostel, letting myself crack a little and grieve about leaving Korea soon.

I left Japan after not-so-gently shoving my Pika and all his friends into my backpack, and hoping that Peach didn’t have weird restrictions on carry ons since my bag weighed as much as the Sherpa I would need to carry it, and headed home to gimbap and soju, ready to live up my last 2 weeks in Korea. Pictured below is me and my Pika:

A lot of people have asked about the differences between Japan and Korea, especially my Korean friends, so here’s a brief list of things I noticed that may or may not be unique in my experience:

1. It’s quieter. There’s less noise, less ambient music, less screaming, less “Oppppppppaaaa” and less honking. Every city I was in was just calm. Even the busy areas–even in Shibuya crossing, it was remarkable. No one is talking unless they have to. Everyone is respecting everyone else’s space. Even Won Geol said, “it’s more quiet than Korea,” so I feel this one is true.

2. The food–obviously these are different places and no one does a food like a home country but DAMN. The ramen, the udon, the SUSHI, my god, the sushi, where is this drool on my chest suddenly coming from…? But wow. Japanese food is glorious, full-bodies tastes. From restaurants to home-cooked meals and even convenience store sushi, I never had a bad meal.

3. Hot Springs/Onsen: Korea has jimjjilbangs (짐찔방) but while similar to Japan, there are some definite differences, chief among them, not staring. This matters when you’re a very naked, very white, very alone, chubby white girl. If they did stare then they were truly CIA-level because I felt perfectly calm and alone. Also, fun fact–the onsen I went to switched sides every other day. I went on one day and the door was the left one, and the next day, it was the right one! Amazing. However, had I never been to jimjjilbangs in Korea, I would have been quite lost in Japan.

4. They drive on the left side! I guess somewhere back in the deep recesses of my lizard brain, I knew this, but after about 5 minutes of confusion, I realized that something was wrong with the street and it was not opposite day. This did a number on me because not only do you have to be conscious while crossing the street, you also have to be aware what side of the street the bus comes on, an error I made while standing on the right in Fukuoka, watching the bus I was meant to be on drive away. Across the street.

Anyways, that’s all for this wrap-up–you can see more pictures on my Facebook of foods and owls and temples–I’ll try to sum up the last month here in America this week and we will be *GASP* up. to. date.

ありがとう, Japan–thanks for the best food, and even better people. Especially you, immigration guy. I’m sorry I was shady I DID IT FOR THE POCKET MONSTERS!

How Not To Start A Vacation: Philippines Style

Posted on June 4, 2015 by baileysaywhat Standard 1

You know how people are like, “don’t plan out your vacation! Just let it take you where it will and you’ll discover blah blah blah its the journey, not the destination?”

Such crap. I mean, like, half crap. At least when it came to my Philippines trip.

*sidebar: this coffee shop I’m at right now has an amazing, killer iced Vanilla latte. Think Sonic cup ice and creamy, glorious vanilla tears of a mermaid–it’s great. However, I was like, YES, I would like a chocolate muffin with it and this muffin tastes (and has the texture of) ground up Cheerios boxes. Not Cheerios. The cardboard box that holds and smells faintly of Cheerios. Like, I wouldn’t feed this to ~~chickens my worst enemies~~ anyone. But I bought it so I am damn well gonna eat it. Stupid pride. Anyways…*

Philippines. I finished up my aforeblogged Jeju trip on Monday, May 18 (happy birthday, older bro! You’re 30! I should shut up now!) by flying back to Daegu in the morning, then showering and discovering I’d been attacked by what looked like angry gnomes…I had countless bug bites, scratches, scrapes, tiny sunburn on the tops of my feet (knew I’d missed somewhere…) and the cheesy maiming of my thunder thighs. Everything hurt in that shower. Did I really want to leave the country again for 6 days? I mean, sure, the $168 round trip flight from Seoul to Clark was too Dutch to pass up and I am an adult female woman person who has pride, power and is a badass mother who don’t take no crap off of nobody so HELL YES we are going to go and…have fun…and whatever. Also, it was my last week of vacation at K.Hogwarts, so I *had* to use it.

Everyone who knew I was going to the Philippines was all “OH MY GOD EL NIDO EL NIDO PALAWAN (that’s it, right? I have a sneaking suspicious it might be Padawan but that could also be a Star Wars thing) YOU’LL LURVE THE BEACHES” and I’m all, “please look at my skin tone and tell me about how perfect I am for beaches and snorkeling, please.” No. I was going to the MOUNTAINS and having HIKING TIMES and FINDING MYSELF like that lady from Oprah…stuff.

So I get to Seoul, get on the flight, and immediately, start to have a weird feeling about the trip. Not enough to break aviation law, but I did have a “which sickness gets me off of here without thousands in fines” thought and I will confess to thinking about throwing nuts at a steward but I did not because I am not a chaebol lady pre-apology. I shrugged it off and said to myself “IT WILL BE AN ADVENTURE,” confirm texted my AirBNB host about the car picking me up, and then departed from Korea.

I landed to…nothing. Wait, that’s not entirely correct. I landed, went through customs, whole shebang, got the stamp, got my bag searched, walked out the doors to…nothing. No sign for the car I had previously arranged. No person saying any version of my name, mangled or otherwise. Just looking at about 200 Filipino people looking at me as they were sitting, and waiting, for other people that were NOT me in the 84 degree heat at 11:22pm at night.

I could not figure out what brand of cross-cultural muckup I had walked into here. I frantically tried to connect to the semi-shady free wifi spots at this tiny, useless airport (that $168 ticket price tag is starting to make sense, isn’t it?) to check my AirBNB app for something, anything from my host to discover why my already exhausted, possibly hungover, bug-bitten, sunburned, cheesy maimed ass was alone in a new country and up shit creek. To add insult to these various injuries, I was an IDIOT and forgot my foreign credit cards. I know. I blame it on the Jeju magic; I’d still been in Korea in Jeju, so I was able to use my Daegu bank cards and Korean ATMS (my Korean cards wouldn’t work here. I checked). I was now in a foreign country with just under $404 in Philippines pesos FOR THE ENTIRE 6 days.

I used 400 ($9) of my precious pesos to buy a SIM card to contact the AirBNB host, since she’d given me her number to call her in the event of…anything. Nothing like hearing the message “this call cannot be completed as the receiver is either out of service or this number has been disconnected” to make your heart sink. I hadn’t eaten in almost 9 hours, and it was just past midnight and hot and dark and I was, to be frank, scared. Yeah, I was. I was alone, and knew no one in this country. I don’t want to lie to you guys. I wasn’t totally in panic mode, but I’ve seen “Taken” and I couldn’t go back into the main airport without a ticket (which I wouldn’t have for 6 more days) and I was rapidly approaching some unattractive tears. I had no credit card to get any more money, I had no sleep options (this airport is 15 minutes from anywhere), and I was feeling really dumb about the whole trip.

I frantically tried to book different places on AirBNB, since I could use my credit card number online to pay, but since it was past midnight, I couldn’t book for the night I was currently living (18th/19th), but rather the next night (19th/20th). I still hadn’t cried by this point, but this wasn’t a moment of pride for me. In desperation, I posted an SOS on Facebook, which prompted a text from my best friend saying “you know your mom is going to freak out, right?” Yeah, I did. But it felt like a legitimate post to throw up there since I was literally sitting against a wall in a strange airport in a strange land without any plan other than “don’t get kidnapped or robbed or sold into slavery.”

At this point, a guy wearing an official-ish badge walked up to me and asked in a not-unkind way, “what are you doing?” By now, I’d been pacing around with a constipated look on my face for about 2 hours. It was just shy of 1am and as I blurted out my story, he said he knew of a close hotel. I informed him that I didn’t have much money, which probably was mostly sold by the fact that I only had a small backpack on and smelled like anxiety. He said his job was “taxi chief” and that he knew of a good, cheap place that was safe, including “guard have gun,” which, after living in Korea for so long…is kind of unsettling…but whatever. I’d already created a frightening backstory for a lot of the guys walking around the airport, so the word SAFE SAFE SAFE was circling my head like little Disney birds. He bundled me into a cab (500 pesos) and told me the hotel would probably be about 1200 pesos.

It is possible that in the dark of the cab, to the dulcet tones of 1980s Whitney, that I maybe shed a few tears of thanks and frustration but I hid it real real well under all the makeup I was not wearing. But you can’t prove that.

10 minutes later, upon arriving at a hotel that looked not unlike the motel/gas station from the movie “Cars,” I paid 1400 pesos (you win some, you lose some) and collapsed in twin bosoms of air conditioning and fast, fast wifi and actually, did, cry for about 30 solid seconds. I opened my messages to read replies and tips from friends from all over the world, plus family who was praying for me and a message from a college friend who hooked me up with names and numbers of her dad’s missions contacts in the Philippines. It was almost 2am in Angeles, and I was exhausted in every sense of the word. Despite the fact I was 88% sure there was a lipstick cam in the ceiling (it just had that vibe), I stripped down to my underwear and tried not to think about the sheets as I passed out.

I woke up 7 hours later to some emails from AirBNB customer service (awesome, awesome people) and messages from more people (yet, never ever heard from my original AirBNB host by email, messenger or phone). AirBNB hooked me up with some credits and helped me book a place that night. I spent the rest of the morning lazing about in the air conditioning and watching some form of an “Underworld” movie before deciding to check out and walk to my new place. But since this is getting long, I’ll save the rest of the story for tomorrow–including tips on how not to pee yourself on a 5.5 hour bus ride!

TL;DR First night in the Philippines:

Unemployment Day 1: Let’s talk about Cheesy Thunder Thighs

Posted on June 1, 2015 by baileysaywhat Standard 2

It was with the happiest, Disney-villain gusto that I woke up at 9:24 this Monday morning to no alarm. No dulcet tones of BigBang’s “BaeBae” (it’s grown on me, guys), no “Cruella DeVil” 5-minutes-before-the-bus-leaves-get-yo’-ass-UP alarm, nothing. It’s like vacation BUT IT WILL LAST FOREVER or at least until August-ish. I hope. You know what time it is, y’all, it’s time to:

I’m curled up in the mothership, enjoying a horse-sized iced vanilla latte after going to the bank and transferring money home LIKE AN ADULT (after staying in bed until 11:47am LIKE A CHILD), and I feel good. Sure, this latte cost as much as the cab ride over to this side of town but I’m happy with it.

LOOK AT HER SEXY VANILLA CURRRRRVES.

It’s so strange to think that there’s nowhere I need to be. I have these 5 days to move stuff out of my apartment and into suitcases/friends’ caves before I leave for Japan for 10 days next Monday. I have no idea what I’m doing in Japan, which is a terrible/wonderful thing according to my Philippines vacation 2 weeks ago, wherein I landed at 11pm and my AirBNB host went COMPLETELY AWOL and I was stranded, sticking out like the tall, sweaty, uberwhite uberwomensch that I am.

But we’ll get to the Philippines in the next post. Right now, I need to back up and tell you about winning the field of dreams of Jeju while getting fantastically maimed.

It was Thursday, May 16, and I had just landed in Jeju for my second “Jeju Furey Beach Volleyball Tournament,” where my team’s name was “William Shatner Face” (say it 3 times fast and you’ll get where our minds were at), where we sweat, sunburned, got bit by a host of radioactive spiders, and I got scalding cheese on my lady bits AND THAT WAS JUST THE FIRST NIGHT. Here’s a visual of what was dropped on me:

You know like, when you get fajitas and it’s all steaming and they’re like, “do not touch this hot metal thing in the middle of the wood trough we brought you human piglets?” Yeah. Like that. Dancing front the table onto my uncovered, lily-white, Snow White-esque upper thighs and into the stuff of LEGENDS. If you’ve figured out the gist of our team name, just imagine the kind of jokes we made of THIS incident–which, by now, is past the “blistering fields of delicious, cheesy thigh pain” phase and into “Pink post-surgical scar where they hid the drug-filled condoms” phase, aka it’s definitely almost healed. Also, I artfully hid the burns in following picture because Photoshop.

Friday was spent on the southern side of the island as I got my tourist self on and visited all 3 big waterfalls of Seogwipo and wrote a lot in a journal and had generally awesome solo white girl travel times ~~while sipping on tea and meeting Mr. Darcy~~ and then traveling on a bus full of 35 high school boys practicing their English on me “YOU LIKE DRAKE?!”

I really loved these places, chock-full of tourists (like me) as they were. There’s just no bullshitting with a waterfall. It’s not a museum or a monument or something man-made. It’s powerful and peaceful at once. The color of the water here is just unreal. It feels like you ran into a Totoro tunnel and came out in a different world where your other worries and cares are gone. I could have sat for hours except rocks are not the most comfortable seats, y’know? But if you are lucky enough to get to Jeju, screw any other tourist spots (except maybe climbing Hallasan, which I have not done:( but heard is also naturally wonderful) and just get to these waterfalls and bathe in their serenity.

Saturday began volleyball times. I’d played with a different team last October and had only met one member of my new team, so you know I made a great first impression with le cheesy thighs of power and grace. We slowly warmed up on Saturday, getting to know each other’s positions and strengths and alcohol tolerances. I’m very proud to say that I drank an entire bottle of Hallasan soju (한라산 소주) in a scant 6 minutes and 43 seconds, beating everyone else on my team and establishing myself as alpha wolf of the drunk tank.

After a restless, sleep-ish night, we went on to win our bracket/division and I promptly ran my championship exhausted ass into the ocean and waved at you guys…what, didn’t you hear me? from the sandy, gorgeous, alcohol-infused sands of Hamdeok Beach.

It’s my second time going to this tournament, and both times, it was stupid fun. The typhoon of last October and the glorious weather of this round, the people who I recognized and those who remembered me as “Dan Quick’s friend,” it was all awesome. Thanks to the other members of the heroin centipede (really, you don’t want to know) and here’s to cheesy thunder thighs forever.

Bonus pics:

*post ocean run WHY WAS THE TIDE OUT THE WATER WAS SO SO FAR AWAY model look*

*Sunday morning 6:30am sunrise. Magical.*

*Hamdeok Beach being a lovely little volcanic wench*

*I might have had a ~~slight little~~ extreme sports crush on this Korean guy’s skills*

Next time: Adventures of Ma’am in the Philippines!

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.

Pros vs. Cons vs. Chimek

Posted on January 21, 2014 by baileysaywhat Standard 2

Few things are more sacred in Korea than chimek. The ritual so awesome it got a celebrity mashup name, chicken and mecju (beer) is known pretty much the moment Korean kids enter the world through the portal of cuteness and stickers from whence they come. It’s super social and frankly, super awesome to have fried chicken and beer as plentiful as Starbucks in Seattle.

However…it’s not something you usually do alone. And here I am, solo white female wayguk (foreigner) on her laptop watching Dr. Who, having ordered a $16 basket of chicken and 500ml beer on my own. If I’m being honest, I only know of like 5 restaurants in Chilgok, and most of them are social-oriented. I haven’t really found places for people desperately alone…or maybe I’m just not looking and MAYBE I JUST REALLY WANTED CHICKEN, Y’ALL.

I got off campus on the 2:20 bus thanks to the generosity of David Brown and 3/8 of my soul sold to the scheduling gods—hanging out with my friend Elins on the ride in as he tries to teach my brain how to not insult people in Korean—so I decided to hit up the CGV and see if there were any movies worth watching. After soothing my soul with the baby blue pools of peace that are Chris Pine’s eyes in “Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit” (sidebar: when have financial analysts ever been SO DANG HOT), I meandered over to one of my favorite Chilgok coffee haunts: Coffea Coffee.

I like it for the cement wall atmosphere, not for the fact that the bathrooms are OUTSIDE and you need a passcode to get in them. I put off peeing for 2 hours until I was ready to eat my own arm off (and also ready to go into kidney shock or whatever [insert Brianna medical term]) and went. Way in…good. Wait 4 minutes as employee having smoke break is chatting on the phone in the stall…painful. Way out…APPARENTLY I SET OFF SOME KIND OF ALARM AND SO I JUST RAN. Yeah. Reaaaaalllly classy way to represent all foreigners: setting off the bathroom alarm in downtown ‘burbia. At one point I pretended to talk on my phone in Spanish. THE SHAME.

Having run and following the whims of my stomach, I stumbled into Okkudok, gateway to chimek heaven and personal torment.

Me: “Hi! Aanyong haseyo!”

Dude: “Aanyong haseyo.”

Me: “Uh, one. Hanna. Hanbyeong.”

Dude: (weird look)

Me: “One person. Solo.”

Dude: (holds up one finger) “…hanmyeong?”

Me: “Yes! Neh! Just…solo. Hanmyeong.”

Just so you are aware: hanbyeong means “one bottle,” so God only knows how that sounded.

And then I walked over the bridge over Terabithia, into the Daiso, and bought DB a water bottle because I’m afraid his kids will all be mutated due to him reusing the same cheap, single-use plastic water bottle for the last 4 months and then sat my butt down at Starbucks, ordered a $5 tall vanilla latte and just planted. I’m about 10 minutes away from the bus, which comes in at 9:25 to go back to the commune.

I totally didn’t start this one as a “let’s do a play by play of the most exciting Tuesday EVER,” but there it is. I started it to talk about my feelings about being 8 months in and needing to make some serious decisions about the future. But in classic me mode, I’ve put it off with rambling about the mundane for 40 minutes.

So at DGEV, you need to make a decision about renewing when you are 8 months into your 12-month contract. Which for me is February 1, aka about 10 days from now. In November/October I was convinced I wanted to go to Chicago in June for 4 weeks of training at Second City Improv. And while that’s still something I want to pursue, I’m not 100% convinced it’s the right step for right now. I…kind of like Korea, you guys.

I’m sitting in a Starbucks and there’s…46 people that I can see in here and all of them are (or at least look) Korean. Not a single foreigner. And that doesn’t scare me. It’s…kind of normal. It’s kind of nice to sit and just listen to the static of not understanding other people’s conversations. And it’s not unlike that game on “Whose Line” where you can make up whole conversations that people are having based on their body language.

I like the people I work with: Koreans, foreigners, whomever and I finally feel in my stride at work—I’m co-chair of the Adult Program with DB, I’m part of the Social Committee, I have free room and board and gym and heat and water and a HUGE bathroom all fo’ no’ moneys. I can probably name about 100 Korean words or terms, and can slowly sound out words in Korean and write them myself. Most importantly I have about 3 insults I can use, which is gold in any foreign language.

I told one of my Korean friends that I was thinking about staying another year here and was really surprised when he said, “that is good…and bad.” I said, “Don’t you want me to stay?” “Yes…but you are sad.” GUYS. WHAT. I actually feel mostly happy and good (at least *decent*) at my job now and don’t curl up in a ball and weep missing you all most nights. But it’s totally taken me aback and I’ve been questioning it the last 9 hours. Which would probably freak him out knowing how much trauma that’s caused me. Am I sad? I don’t…think so? I don’t feel any more sad than I did living in Tulsa, or Little Rock. Sure, life is up and down and sometimes you’re in a relationship and it’s great or you’re in a relationship and you’re lonelier than when you’re single and you see couples everywhere and some days the job is magical and you teach an old person how to FaceTime their kid in Afghanistan and sometimes you’re screamed at because a rich, drunk 24-year old dropped his iPhone in the lake over the weekend and OF COURSE it’s your fault as the creator of the device itself and sometimes your students laugh and love you and sometimes they sleep and mumble about how you’re a fat waygookin and sometimes you fall asleep texting someone special and sometimes you fall asleep heart wrenchingly lonely, but that is the same anywhere, not just in Korea. So…what I’m trying to say is that I don’t feel exceptionally sad.

tl;dr that last paragraph: I *think* I’m not sad here.

I kind of feel like I’m at the point of excitement and joy about Korea, learning Korean, and exploring things and people that I should have been when I arrived…it’s only taken me 8 months to get here.

BUS BUS BUS

I love public transit here. Cheap, simple, reliable DEAR GOD WHY CAN’T I FOCUS WAS IT THE CHICKEN IT WAS THE CHICKEN, WASN’T IT.

OK, so, back to decision time. Let’s list it:

Pros vs. Cons

Pro: free room and board and gym and shuttle and wifi and utilities

Con: it’s kind of out in Egypt and is a real buzzkill on weekends to get into Daegu and meet non-work people

Pro: living overseas! Widening horizons!

Con: sometimes you’re not really in the mood to stretch and it’s really frustrating, also, language is really difficult.

Pro: new people!

Con: you miss old people (old being relative) a lot. A LOT. Technology is a shallow representation, but kind of better than nothing. Insert clip of “Lonely” by Akon.

Pro: Cash moneys

Con: is there a con? I don’t think it’s corrupted my soul yet…

Pro: build up a resume of international work

Con: have no home base

Pro: Koreans are almost always awesome and loving and kind and funny, especially if you’re willing to try their language.

Con: Koreans are sometimes mean and very blunt and straight up rude to foreigners.

Pro: re-signing another year means +$1000 bump in pay plus another round-trip airfare to anywhere. As well as a favorable look at my evaluation and potential annual bonus.

Con: brain dislikes the idea of another year adrift with all things in 3 different states and 2 countries, as well as heartstrings snapping as I spend another year away from relationships.

So…clearly I’m not any closer to making a decision, but here’s where my brain is currently at:

Night Blogging Is For Idiots, And I’m One Of Them.

Posted on December 17, 2013 by baileysaywhat Standard Reply

If you asked me what one of the stupidest things you could ever do is, night blogging would be in the top 5. Behind hotdog-eating contests, black tar heroin and Snapchat, #4 has got to be night blogging. #5 is probably texting and driving or something mundane like that.

We’re all so brave in the darkness, aren’t we? It’s why we love campfires and candlelight and sitting outside under the moon. Our secrets scurry back like roaches into our hearts when the sun rises or the fluorescents come back up.

Jetlag is kind of a bitch, you guys. I haven’t posted since mid-November and I thought I should squeeze one more in before I turn 26. Or in Korea, pre-28 (you’re like 1 when you’re born and then everyone gets a one-up mushroom on January 1st. So I was 1 for about 13 days and then turned 2). Lovely system, that.

When I first went to Korea I would wake up at 4am, then 5, then 6 until now I have to roll out of bed by 7:45 in order to shower, sprint into the caf, grab a piece of toast and setup my classroom by 9. Versus here where I’m going to bed at 12am, 2 and now 4am and sleeping later. Is it supposed to get worse before it gets better?

I got in bed at midnight, then decided to start watching “Gangster Squad” as it’s one of 4 movies in my iTunes I hadn’t seen (because I forgot to load new ones up, sigh), promising myself I wasn’t going to watch the whole thing. Good lie, self, it’s now 3am. So then I turned off the laptop (you sense foreshadowing, grasshoppers) and rolled around in the dark for 24 minutes trying to mentally write a letter and just getting more and more upset.

SO WHAT DO I DO?! I get up and sit down in my closet and go through bins of my old stuff from high school. What a perfect way to soothe your troubled, emotional, teary heart, huh? “Dang I looked good then.” “Why did I think that outfit was great for picture day?” “I wonder what happened to her?” “WHY do I have so many people’s senior photos?! And Tolo pictures from people I’ve never met?!” “I wonder how much weight I’ve gained since then; oh look, here’s my dresses hanging up in my closet…maybe…” no, no, I refused that. Mostly because I’ve tried it before while in college and I know if it didn’t work then it’s not working now.

Being home is weird. It’s not the first time I’ve said that either. I’ve now lived not-in-Lynden for 7 years. Tulsa, Little Rock, Korea—I’m making a wide loop around this little town. I know that everyone has that “I’ve-grown-and-I-don’t-fit-in-the-same-emotional-(and-physical)-shape-that-I-did-before-and-how-do-I-reconcile-adult-me-with-old-me-that-everyone-here-knows” dilemma. Which I’m sure compounded with attending my now-high school age younger sister’s basketball game tonight. The same court where I slid and sweated and laughed and cried and spent hours and days and years of my life on. To see my same coach. To see some of the same parents. To see old teachers. And strangely, to want to hide.

I love seeing my family, I don’t dislike the hard-working feel of this place, and there’s about 20 people I miss dearly here…but for the other 89% of you…if I look like I’m on the phone, I’m probably not. I don’t have a SIM card for this country no mo’. I just don’t know how to act around you.

It’s weird to think about turning 26 tomorrow and looking at my old ACT scores (31, y’all) and my sports tshirts and the smiling, makeup-less face of my younger self. What would she think? Am I happy? Did I think I’d be married? Did I think I’d have more stamps in my passport? Did I have any concept of what Facebook would be like? Would she be proud of who I’ve become? Let’s cut the shit—am I proud now? Am I happy?

I don’t know the answer. I can truthfully say I’m happier than I was 6 months ago. God, that move was difficult. And for as much training as I did with customers and coworkers at Apple, I was not prepared for Koreans (who are lovely, amazing, gracious people, but it’s different), for children, for “WHAT DO ALL THE SIGNS SAY” 100% of the time. You keep expecting there to be a relief but you’re living there now. The mission trip does not end in 2 weeks, dear.

I finally feel comfortable in my job. I know the right jokes, the right timing, the right mix of clownish foreigner and how much soju I can drink before spilling state secrets. I have now taught from 1st grade to 60+-year old government employees how to hopefully speak better English…or at least how to murder each other at dodgeball. I have Korean friends (I know! I haven’t scared them all away with my crazy!), and I can write my own name in Hangeul (unfortunately that is due to rote memorization and not because I have mastered the language).

In short, I’m comfortable. I’m 6.5 months complete of my 12-month contract. I have enough deodorant to last through the inevitable rise (and subsequent fall) of the Terminators, and enough Korean skills to not embarrass my school in public.

But having just crested and now starting the downhill slope of the summit begs the question: “What’s next?” There’s a finite end to this contract, unless I wanted to renew.

Options:

1. Move back to Arkansas, love all my friends to bits and have no idea what to do with my life/job but be very well-fed by Trace, well-entertained by Abs and well-loved by Beard and Co.

2. Enroll in Second City Summer Intensive for the month of June in Chicago, learn to act and write improv comedy for 4 weeks…then…dunnos…move to somewheres and hopefully implement said learnings.

3. Renew contract with DGEV or merp over to some other school and stay in Korea as a teacher.

4. Move back to Lynden/Whatcom Country and watch my sister continue to grow up and be gorgeous and amazing and being with my family and learn to cook and not be selfish and live far away and have no idea what to do with life/job but at least I would be with family. Maybe become a sports coach.

5. Pursue potential opportunities with tech-based IT consulting firm that hunted me down on LinkedIn and wants me to do Field Support work as a Mac/iOS technician for Facebook Korea (Seoul) or Facebook Australia (Sydney) and move to said places for at least a year.

6. Become a reclusive hobbit, wither, die, haunt you all as a Internet ghost. Marry Benedict Cumberbatch’s ghost and have tiny detective ghost babies and a pet pterodactyl.

The thought of going somewhere new and ripping my heart of out another place might just kill me. Truly. I’m still not over you, Arkansas. I love really deeply and I just want to give and love and find a home. When I decide you’re mine, it’s over. You all get down deep inside of my heart and though I hide it with snark and putting my face in my iPad, leaving is traumatic. It gives scars. Imagining that pain again, so soon, makes me having to consciously think happy thoughts and rock back and forth.

I open my heart and eyes and my arms to any feedback or comments anyone reading this might have, and thanks for listening. Especially you, Benedict Cumberbatch. We need to decide what to name the ghost babies.

PS: Mom, I’m sorry, but I’m gonna need a Venti tomorrow/today.

Zen.

Posted on November 16, 2013 by baileysaywhat Standard 1

After feeling slightly, lovingly chastised from my Nana last week as she told me how she checks for my blog every Sunday and I hadn’t posted, I’m back with a post about finding some tai chi or whatever, early on the posting schedule because I gots stuff to do tomorrow!

Myself and Marty, a newer teacher from BC, Canada, and I decided we were going to go and see Thor 2 last night. It would have been the second time for me and the first for him, but hey. Why pass up an opportunity to see Chris Hemsworth’s muscles and Tom Hiddleston’s pained looks?

So off we went, and met up with Roy-Gene at HomePlus (Korean Walmart) after we discovered that Thor 2 didn’t play until 8:30, was 2 hours long and our shuttle left at 9:40 and neither of us wanted to pay $20 for a cab because we’d miss the shuttle just to see said muscles and faces. So we decided to go shop for irrelevant things (and yes, I can hear some of you saying, “but you’re a person with iThings! Why didn’t you just download an app or consult with the great and powerful Cupertino and know what time the movie played before you got there?! Well, little sassmouths, I tried and the CGV app is all in Hangul [Korean] and there is no option to switch it to English. Also my link with the mothership terminated on my last day. I can no longer predict iPhone releases or what size iPad is the best fit for you either, so there).

After Marty and I had each bough a frivolous, excellent hat (mine makes me look like Amelia Earhart, I’ll selfie it soon) and rung out, the three of us decided to head back to the Donga/Daiso/Chilgok IC4 “aka our pickup by the shuttle” area. Having an inordinate amount of time and being relatively fit (read: have 2 legs, will walk), we all decided to walk along the river back rather than take a $3, 3 minute cab. You know, I would have been fine with the cab but heck, why not walk.

IMMEDIATELY these two take off at bat-out-of-hell-speed. I had just bought a donut and was totally fine with hanging back and eating it alone slowly, lovingly as the brisk November wind whipped through my greasy hair and the river babbled away on my left and older Koreans walked by me swinging their arms dangerously.

This past 2 weeks we’ve had some staffers from the University of Colorado: Colorado Springs (UCCS is the partner school with Yeungjin College for DGEV) visit, which they usually do about every 5-6 months. This time they brought a therapist, Dr. Field, with them to talk about resiliency in education for students and educators, which was a great topic and opened my eyes more to what motivates students and also how we can not all go crazy being here. I kid, I kid. Kind of.

I put off wanting to talk with her one-on-one for a week and then had a slight panic attack on Tuesday that she was leaving Thursday morning and I wouldn’t get to run my current dilemmas past someone who is a professional and might actually talk me out of my tree (which is a tall, knotty, difficult oak). She graciously agreed to meet with me and hear me out about life.

Guys. Therapy is such a weird word. Such a loaded word. Really all it is is just talking. Talking to someone who can help you untangle the rats nest you’ve made of your thoughts and memories and hopes and dreams and fears. I’ve gone in a couple times to talk with someone in Arkansas and it was truly one of the best decisions of my life. It was put best to me as “if there’s something up with your foot, you would see a doctor. No question, right? So if you’re worried or there’s something you need to talk out why wouldn’t you see a doctor?”

There is something wonderfully, gloriously freeing about telling a stranger who has no reason to root for you, no obligation to be in your corner all your life and having them look in your eyes and say “that’s a lot. You are allowed to feel overwhelmed. Your feelings are valid.” It’s like opening the doors at the end of Legally Blonde and walking into the whiteout.

It doesn’t solve everything (or sometimes anything) other than your own anxiety about being anxious about your feels. I want to just dump all the pieces of my life and push them across the table and then look up, hopefully, and say, “how do I put it together? What should I do?” But a therapist is neither a genie nor a toothless gypsy soothsayer. Unfortunately. That would be kind of awesome. But really, I don’t know how legit advice would be from someone who lives in a lamp or who is lacking in good oral hygiene.

Regardless, it was the 110% right decision. She even said “I think you’ve already decided what you want to do. Trust yourself.” I’m almost 6 months here, guys. 6 months of looking back to missing all of you in Arkansas and Washington and Oklahoma and 6 months of looking forward nervously trying to figure out “what am I gonna do?” And I’ve realized that with so much past and future that I’m missing the present.

Yeah. That was kind of cheesy. You may slap me 1 time the next opportunity you have. 1 freebie. But truly. I’m trying to think of things I’ve done here in 6 months and there’s so much more I ~~wanted~~ do want to do. And now it’s about to get cold as Jötunheimr up in this place and the opportunities for traveling and hiking are getting slimmer.

As I walked behind Roy-Gene and Marty, I realized that I didn’t need to speed up. If they wanted to walk fast, go for it. I’m walking along a river in Korea. IN KOREA. There’s maybe 3 of you reading this blog who will ever be able to do that. And here I am worrying about job opportunities when I get back in June, 6-7 months away. There’s a mammoth, gently-curving monorail being built along the river that makes all of the neon behind it look like the world Blade Runner was supposed to be. My donut was nothing like the Lynden Dutch Bakery nor Shipley’s (long may they prosper), but it was a donut. I’m healthy. I have legs that work. A threadbare NorthFace. Jeans without holes in the thighs (for now). Sturdy fake Converse that carry me. A comfortable bank account where I can buy faux-Amelia Earhart fur hats and peanut M&Ms and a random pomegranate. An iPhone that I can take pictures and capture my sights.

How unbelievably stupid and selfish to not breathe deep the crisp November smells of crackly, decomposing leaves; bow and whisper “anyong hashimnikka” to the Koreans getting their brisk walks on at 8:26pm; and just rest in the moment. This moment. This moment to remember and treasure and just be in. I don’t need to look forward nor back and miss out on being here. Just walk and tear off pieces of donut and breathe and take another step and be in Korea in this time and place and hop on stones across the river and swing my plastic bag and just smile. I’m happy. My heart is pulled in a lot of directions but it’s resting here. And here is blessedly, beautifully happy.

40 Days and 40 Nights.

Posted on November 3, 2013 by baileysaywhat Standard Reply

This is why I don’t do journals. I skip a day, or a week or a month and now I’m all THERE’S TOO MUCH TO SAY WE MIGHT AS WELL CURL UP IN A BALL AND JUST EAT CHEEZITS AND WATCH DR. WHO, Y’ALL. I realized today on my countdown that there’s only 40 days and 40 nights (still not over you, Josh Hartnett) until I land in Seattle for Christmas. Apple pies, Diet Coke and family times!

Ok. So its been almost a month since you heard these thought-to-word patterns (hold on I just remembered I have to message someone congrats on Facebook) and I’m back.

This is what’s gone down:

Zombie play is complete! While it was a great ol’ time, I am exhausted and was ever so glad to rest up this weekend. I also fulfilled a lifelong dream of losing part of my voice as well as hanging out with some super-cool people. Next week is the 24-hour play festival and though I’m terrified as heck, I think I might try to write something.
I got a phone. Well, to be honest, I took my unlocked iPhone 4 with me, but finally got a SIM and some service to call the friends I’ve made (you and I both know I made them all up, honestly).
Celebrated 5 months in Korea on Friday–Steven and I both wore jean jackets to commemorate the fact that I viciously tweeted the following on the first day I met him:
Saw Thor 2 and fell madly in love with Tom Hiddleston all over again. Have barely restrained self from googling “tom hiddleston girlfriend” for now. FOR NOW, I SAY.
Dressed up all last week–thank you DGEV!–as zombie, Spider-Man, Ursula from The Little Mermaid (which confused the Koreans a LOT) and a vulcan from Star Trek (which REALLY confused them as they though my vulcan ears were “hobbits.”)
Visited an American military base, Camp Carroll, in Waegwan, about 20 minutes away. Is it possible to get anxiety attacks there? I was the only foreigner with 10 Korean adults on a field trip–and we’re all eating amongst a sea of American camo at Pizza Hut, Subway and Popeye’s Chicken. It’s really weird to see no Hangul (Korean) writing and to only hear so. much. English in one place. I felt like I wanted to say hello to the military people but didn’t because A) what would I say? and B) I don’t want them to think like 10 Koreans kidnapped me and are keeping me for themselves or something.
I have had the most wonderful, sassy adult students this month and it gives me hope. The Ulsan City Officials group of 7 that were so high that we could have moralistic conversations in fluent English, the Daegu City Officials that all hugged me and tried to set me up with their sons–they’re so lovely and I miss them already.
Drank booze out of a ziploc bag at Bunny’s–it was magical and I can’t wait to do it again.
Missed Apple peeps immensely as new iPad launched, Mavericks released and WHAT IS THIS iPHOTO AND iMOVIE UPDATE YOU GUYS?!
Watched the amazing, breathtaking Colorful Daegu Festival 2013 parade and even made a video about it here! (sorry, no can embed) https://vimeo.com/78453759
Took a shameful amount of selfies that I can only 64% attribute to my Halloween costumes…

And now I’m heading off to bed to sleep and prepare for the next week of whatever. Maybe I’ll even shave my legs if I’m feeling adventurous, you know, for TOM’s sake (yes, I already googled it I have no self-restraint). See you in a week!

In which I actually get to be a professional Zombie.

Posted on September 8, 2013 by baileysaywhat Standard Reply

GUYS! I MADE NEW FRIENDS! I’m so excited! Not that my co-workers aren’t great, but it’s good to make connections outside of work (which I was turrrrrible at doing in Arkansas [although there were a few of you]) but they were all friends of work people. And if work people were busy, I was pretty much just chilling with my best best frannnn: Netflix.

So a couple months ago the Daegu Compass, a magazine for foreigners in Daegu, posted that there was a theater troupe about to put on a production of “The Princess Bride.” I put the date in my calendar, creeped all their Facebook/website posts, and thought how cool it would be to be a part of it, and promptly put it out of my mind.

Two weeks ago, DB and I attended said production of “The Princess Bride.” The story was word-for-word the cherished favorite it is everywhere, and I again revisited the stalkery of FB/website of The Daegu Theatre Troupe. I asked a few co-workers what they thought. I remembered being TERRIFIED by the DTF (Drama, Television, Film) majors in school. Then I saw that they were going to put on a production of “Night of the Living Dead” and that auditions were September 7th. I put it in my calendar and fretted about it for 2 weeks.

But now that DB has moved off campus and Roy-Gene is probably going to go and do the same, I’m stuck either getting to know new co-workers (bahahahahahaha except for like the 6 of you I already like) or branching out. So yesterday I went out, got brunch with Leslie and Colleen, then headed to the YMCA to be brave. I got a coffee for the nerves, and frankly, as a hand prop. You know when you can’t figure out what to do with your hands and you need to look productive? COFFEE CUP. Doesn’t matter that it was empty by the time I walked in and I couldn’t find a trash can for 4 hours, I *looked* like I was a coffee-drinking, put-together person in bright orange shoes.

Theater/theatre, drama, acting people kind of scare me. Sometimes, they can be jerks. They have such a small club and they all like, crew together and it’s sometimes hard to break in. Sometimes they are amazing and welcoming and take you under their beautiful, lavender, feathered wings. I already had a back-up of “If they’re crazy, you can leave. You don’t have to stay. We’ll buy a fish and that can be our friend.” I resigned myself to “this may not go well and it’s ok we can survive.”

I have never been so happy to be wrong. We meet on the 4th floor of the YMCA building and I sit down next to this girl playing a game on her iPhone. Apple products make me feel SAFE, don’t judge me! I FEEL YOUR JUDGEMENT. I sat like right next to her. I didn’t know if this was going to be ok because there were a lot of empty seats. It’s kind of like taking the stall next to the already occupied stall when there’s like 20 stalls in a bathroom. Luckily Jill was awesome and my trust of someone else with an iPhone proved correct as she was also a n00b there and had just moved to Daegu from Seoul about a week and a half earlier. The theater people started to arrive and the in-jokes and clear demonstration of love between them began with the gift-giving of food. And not like, cookies. Tupperwares full of of pasta and peppers began to float around and I recognized many of the actors from the recent production of “The Princess Bride.”

The 2pm meeting of “here’s us, here’s what we do, here’s what’s new” was great and surprisingly really open to us newcomers considering what a tight-knit group this clearly was. At 3pm scripts and sign-up sheets were passed out and Jill and I started running lines together. We actually ended up auditioning together and switching roles to read with Gareth, an awesome New Zealander who says “girl” with venom and better than anyone I’ve ever heard. Jill and I ended up leaving about 5:30 after exchanging info with some people and decided to grab a burger and beer (and a double gin and tonic and a Georgia Peach Iced Tea) at Traveler’s and just hang out and talk for 3 more hours and be friends.

Needless to say: everyone was great and made us feel like we were welcome and part of a team and invited us out and to be friends. I made several new contacts and I got cast as a zombie. LIFELONG DREAM ACHIEVED. There’s going to be so much makeup and groaning and eating of brains and just plain FUN, GUISE! I’m so glad I did this.

IT MAKES ME WANT TO DO A DANCE! A BEAUTIFUL DANCE LIKE TH–but no. I’ll contain myself.

Bailey Say What

Diet Coke. Comedy. Kimchi.

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In which I actually get to be a professional Zombie.

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