a moving experience

Pics from just the other day:

Joe, you're free to defend yourself in the comments section.


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nostalgia: part 3

Here's another series of pics from the winter 2006 intensive term.

The following five pics are from a play my class did that was based on the Korean story called "The Tiger and the Dried Persimmon." The story involves a series of humorous misunderstandings in which a tiger, who has no idea what a dried persimmon is, somehow convinces himself that it must be the most fearsome creature around.

The next group of pictures, below, are from a second skit we performed. The skit was titled "What to Do with a Dead Kevin"; yours truly wrote the script and directed the action. I play myself, as you see, and am accidentally killed at the beginning of the skit. The rest of the story involves the students' attempts as passing me off as alive when a coworker saunters in. I'm puppeteered into gesturing, eating cake, and even talking. Both skits-- Tiger/Persimmon and Dead Kevin-- were a blast to perform.











This last set of pics from that wonderful semester shows me with my Intensive Level 2 class-- faithful attendees to the end.











A really fantastic group. Some of my best memories are from that semester.


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...nope

The National Pension Office and my old hagweon have talked with each other, and the conclusion seems to be that the trouble lies entirely on the side of my old hagweon, which despite having claimed to pay (and despite having given me pay stubs that do indeed show deductions for pension), gave not a cent to the National Pension Office.

So the NPO told me there's nothing more they can do. I offered to let them have the forms I filled out plus all the other paperwork, but according to them, it's up to my previous employer to provide me the money they failed to pay into the pension plan.

I have the sinking feeling that this means that the hagweon will simply reimburse me the pension I paid into the plan. Meanwhile, the National Pension Office will not match the pay; as far as they're concerned, there's nothing more they can do for me (jeo-hui-neun amu-geot-do hal su eopseoyo-- "we can do nothing"). This is because there's some sort of three-year statute of limitations on solving pension difficulties, and we're beyond that now.

This assumes I see my money at all, of course. The guy at the hagweon's accounting office, who spoke shaky English, said the process might finish "in six month," which could mean either "in six months" or "in June" (the word for "June" in Korean is yu-weol, literally, "Month 6"). Neither sounds promising. They're supposed to email me next week with some sort of news.

So not only am I getting a thousand dollars less than expected in pensions from my current job, I'm also likely to receive nothing from my previous job-- a loss of $2200 in total. Not good.

Wanna do me a favor? Buy some Walk-related products. (More designs are on the way!)


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just like Jack Bauer

I'll be going dark within the next 24-36 hours as I pay my final phone bill and cancel my service. After Saturday afternoon, your only contact with me will be through email. A reminder to readers: my Walk-related email address is

kevinswalk [at] gmail [dot] com.


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better seats (will not be mine)

I'm flying Delta from Tokyo/Narita to Atlanta, but I won't be enjoying these new, hi-tech seats, which won't be available on Delta flights until about 2010.


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national pension woes

My previous job, the one I had before coming to Smoo, was at a hagweon* (an extracurricular institute; in this case, a language institute) in Kangnam, the rich part of Seoul that is, as the Korean name implies, south of the river (gang = river; nam = south). I had thought that obtaining the roughly $1200 I am owed in national pension would be a cinch, but as I found out yesterday (Thursday), because I had a different foreign resident's ID back then, matters weren't so simple.

I walked into the National Pension Office with all my documents at the ready-- plane ticket, old bankbooks, passport, alien registration card, and the 10- or 15-page form I was required to fill out (well, not every page: only 6 or 7 pages). I quickly learned, though, that my current foreign resident's ID provided no access to my payment records from 2004 to 2005. That was the first obstacle.

So I had to call the office of my former employer, but since I didn't have the number, I had to ask the National Pension Office employee to track the number down via Internet and give it to me (she wasn't willing to do this at first). I called my branch and was told to call the guy who hired me, Bob, at a different branch. Bob turned out to be quite helpful (I'd been dealing with buck-passing all Thursday, so this was a relief); he was able to track down my old foreign resident's ID and give it to me. I thanked Bob, hung up, and relayed the number to the lady across the desk from me.

Second obstacle: the lady punched in my old number and found my records, only to discover that I had no pension funds, which looked suspiciously as though my old hagweon had decided not to fulfill its end of the contract. By law, a teacher is supposed to pay about $100 per month into the pension fund; while a university might have its own (stingy) pension plan, a hagweon is supposed to match the employee's payment, meaning that I should have had about $200 per month stored up in pension funds for this job. Having worked at the job for a little over six months, I should have had about $1200 or so stored up. This was the money I was hoping to have sent to my US account.

So I called Bob again and told him the situation. He said he'd have to dig around a bit and discover what was going on, and that I should call him the following morning.

So that's where we're at with national pension. It's entirely possible that my previous place of employment has somehow skunked me on this. Even though my own personal payment records show that my ex-employers did deduct pension from my pay, the National Pension Office has no records of such funds. This whole mess is one huge mystery. We'll know more in a few hours. Yeesh.

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*"Hagweon" is often annoyingly mispronounced by English-speaking foreigners as a drawled "haah-gwaaahn." More properly, it's "hah-gweon," with the "eo" in "gweon" being somewhere between an American English "aw" (as in "saw") and an American English "uh" (as in "fun"). The entire word should be pronounced with a certain tightness in the speech organs, and should be spoken briskly, not drawled with lazily protracted vowels.


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one thing I won't miss about Korea

There's a lot I'll miss about Korea, but one thing I won't miss is the goddamn fat jokes. I get this every day, and I got it again tonight when I bumped into two female staffers while waiting outside for my buddy Tom. When Tom showed up a moment later (we were all standing out by the school's front gates), we talked a bit about where Tom was working, what I was doing, and so on. Both of the ladies were a bit confused about Tom's and my plans, and Tom joked, "Yeah... a lot of people confuse Kevin and me because we look so much alike."

Both of these ladies speak English fairly well, but as is true of this culture as a whole, they failed to note Tom's good-natured sarcasm. In reply to this, one muttered to the other in Korean, "Keun-dae, Tom kireum-i eop-neun-dae..." --i.e., "But Tom doesn't have any fat on him." Then she giggled, saw that I had understood her, and waved her hand in that "wipe the table/deny the truth" gesture while saying, "It's just a joke." Yeah, I've heard that before, too.

The problem, alas, is that the woman who uttered this joke isn't particularly thin. I held my tongue, though, and simply explained, laughingly and in Korean, that you just-- don't-- say that sort of thing to a Westerner. I felt as though I were schooling a rude child in basic politeness.

Of course, Westerners who've experienced Korean culture know that Koreans are generally blunt to the point of rudeness about more than just your appearance. Some Koreans even highlight this as a sort of national virtue: one of my Korean colleagues, for example, compared Korean frankness to Japanese reticence and proudly noted that the Korean way is more honest. (Not knowing many Japanese people and never having lived in Japan, I have no real basis for comparison on this point, so please understand I'm merely relaying information, here. Do the Japanese openly crack fat jokes? Do they do it in front of fat people? Or are they more reserved, joking only in private?)

Actually, I agree that honesty is generally a better policy than, say, an unreadable reserve that hides all thoughts and feelings under a cloak of faux civility. But I think honesty also has its limits. If, for example, I had commented on how fat this lady's ass was and had followed that up with an, "Oh, that was just a joke," how would she have felt? Even in Korean culture, fat jokes don't make people happy, and no girlfriend (of any culture) who asks her boyfriend whether her ass looks fat is prepared to hear the naked truth. Sometimes, diplomacy-- just a modicum of sophistication-- is called for.

I've developed a thick enough skin after years of this abuse that I don't fly into a rage every time I hear such stupidity; I usually offer a humorously self-deprecating response, brood a short while, then forget the incident... until the next time I experience similar stupidity. And I'm aware of the blunt Korean answer to my problem: "Just lose weight!" Here again, I agree-- I'm not into so-called "fat acceptance."* But even if I lose weight, that won't address the deeper problem of culturally sanctioned rudeness toward the fleshy (which, to be fair, is far from unique to Korea).

Of course, I've made my share of fat jokes, so this rant is probably as much for me as for any of the other insensitive people out there. I suppose a fat person might justify telling fat jokes much the way Rodney Dangerfield pointed out the importance of relativity: if you want to look thinner, hang around people fatter than you. Fat people may feel they have license to joke about fatter people.

So while I'll take many pleasant memories away from my time in Korea, one thing I won't miss is this country's disconcertingly frequent rudeness, and the general insensitivity that makes it possible. It's true that my own people, Americans, purvey their own special brands of rudeness, but that's not the focus of this post. We'll save the rich topic of Yankee jerkiness for another time.

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*This has nothing to do with aesthetics and everything to do with health. I've seen curvaceous, Rubenesque ladies whom I'd consider quite sexy. In fact, women who lack curves, as seems increasingly to be the case among Hollywood stars, strike me as a bit sad in their attempts at attaining the "Dickensian waif" state.


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humble thanks (5)

I spoke too soon. As of tonight, I'm just about at the $1000 mark with donations. Wow. My hope had been that I might make my goal of $6000 sometime during the one- or two-year-long walk, because I knew I'd have enough money of my own to sustain me for most or, very likely, all of the journey. But to be, already, one-sixth of the way toward that goal is nothing short of amazing.

Thank you, folks.


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gettin' it done

So far today...

1. We got the "transfer pension to US account" problem more or less solved. (Korea veterans know I say "more or less" because, well, this isn't a linear culture and I'm dealing with two bureaucracies: that of my school and that of my bank.)

2. We've sent a package of Thomas Covenant books out to Jeff in Busan (might take a few days, Jeff... I sent the package via regular mail).

3. We've paid for the three extra days' stay in the dorm.

Now we've got to...

1. Visit the National Pension Office (haven't had time the last few days).

2. Get a set of coughillegalcough DVD copies from the local copy center.

3. Have dinner around 7PM with my buddies Tom and JW. Probably at the local Outback in Namyeong.

4. Pack the rest of my crap up. It won't take long, which is why I've allowed it to slide, but it needs doing if I plan to ship everything over to Sperwer on Saturday.

5. Get a new set of contact lenses. Far cheaper and quicker to do here than in the States, where it's ridiculously slow and expensive.

6. Say some goodbyes to people in the neighborhood. My coworkers joked that the Chinese food delivery people will be sad that I'm gone: I gave them a lot of business.

7. Upload all those promised photos and videos.

8. Give the studio a final, thorough scouring.

9. Create more CafePress products so I don't have to rely on donations. As much as I appreciate them and am humbled by them (hard to believe I've already received close to $700! thank you again!), I'd still rather earn my money.

That last item might have to wait until I'm home, actually. I'll have time for image design when I'm back; I understand that my dad has a brand-new scanner, and I know he has a better version of Photoshop Elements than I have (mine is an ancient version 2.0), so we're set once I'm back in northern Virginia.

OK... more later.


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on human freedom

The following comes from an email to a friend written on December 3, 2007. It's been edited for content and style, as well as to preserve my friend's (and my) privacy. I'm slapping this up here after having been inspired by some excellent writing over at my friend Malcolm's blog regarding the nature (and the very existence of) human freedom. If I understand Malcolm correctly, he thinks human freedom is an illusion; that we believe we possess it arises from a strong but ultimately false intuition rooted in such things as our concept of "I" and what it means to act freely.

What follows isn't meant to be academically rigorous; think of it more as a meditation on an interesting issue. While I'm not sure Malcolm and I see eye-to-eye on this, we seem to be in fundamental agreement that it doesn't matter what the objective reality is. I think, in fact, that when most people ponder the question of whether we actually possess free will, they conclude that the best thing to do is to act AS IF they are free, as opposed to taking the slacker's way out and adopting a kind of moral nihilism of the "we're not free, therefore we're not responsible for our actions... so let's go throw bricks through shop windows" variety.

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The subject of human freedom is deep and wide and not really amenable to neat summarizations, though my own gut feeling, which I may or may not have expressed before, is that the free will/determinism dichotomy has a whiff of the artificial about it-- that the truth is, in fact, that these two things are not-two in the Zen or philosophical Taoist sense. Our minds, being analytical, tend to create separation and distinction, but the truth lies somewhere "underneath" or "beyond" our mental processes. Freedom is what exists in and through determinism and vice versa.

You talked about the heart-hardening passage in Exodus and about how it bothered you. I know where you're coming from. The problem with notions of radical voluntarism (all is God's will-- Jeff Hodges was discussing this on his blog w/relation to Islamic conceptions of God) is that, for Westerners at least, there arises the question of responsibility. If everything is God's will, including our thoughts and actions, then how can God find us accountable for anything? One version of this problem is the debates that have long surrounded the Calvinistic doctrine of double predestinaton. If we're predestined to go where we'll go, how are we responsible for getting there? The track was already laid out before we were born! Another, related version of the debate comes in the question of divine foreknowledge-- a subject I've probably beaten to death while simultaneously having only scratched the surface.

It's not just a Christian question, either. When I gave a lecture on Zen at Howard Divinity School in DC, one astute listener asked me a question about karma and freedom: if your current situation is determined by your accumulated karma, and if this is true from moment to moment, then how can a Buddhist say that you can choose to break free of the vicious cycle (Buddhism does, after all, accept that there is a such thing as human freedom: you make karma even as you're subject to it)? That day, I was stumped and I gave some sort of lame answer that the listener accepted, but not cheerfully. Nowadays, I'd probably zip right to the not-two answer, but I'd do so in the knowledge that I'm merely hinting at a nondiscursive truth, not something that can be laid out in a neat Aristotelian schema.

Back to the Bible, then: I'd agree that the Bible provides a rather conflicted picture of, say, the fate/freedom question. I think this is appropriate and represents a good opportunity for thoughtful people to wrestle with the scriptures, because ultimately we each have to arrive at The Answer (or maybe it's just My Answer) by this process. The Bible is one huge kong-an in that sense: the only worthwhile answers that come from it are expressed in how we live them, not how we say them.

For me, the Pharoah passages are compelling, but what truly takes the cake is the case of Judas Iscariot, an eternally fascinating character for me. If you look at Judas through, say, a Hindu lens, you see that he is merely following his dharma (here understood in the more Hindu manner: law, role, function, duty-- "what you must do, go and do quickly"), a dharma already set out for him. Judas' part in the cosmic drama of the Easter story often fills me with pity (which I suppose sets me apart from Dante Alighieri, who consigned Judas to the lowest circle of hell), but from a godlike perspective he was doing no more than what water does when it follows various paths down the rough trunk of a tree.

However, from a modern Western Christian perspective, there's this question about fate and freedom: Jesus seems fully aware of Judas' impending betrayal, and he (Jesus) even makes himself complicit in his own demise by sending Judas off to do what must be done. Judas here is seen as part of an immense divine plan: for redemption, someone's got to do the dirty work. For us moderns, it seems unfair that Judas might simply have been a puppet, one who gets punished merely for fulfilling his assigned function. The fact that Judas is remorseful enough to kill himself resonates with us modern folks, too: was part of his mind standing helplessly by, watching him perform the betrayal yet unable to do anything about it?

I think I mentioned that I may, in fact, be a closet compatibilist. I'm not a flaming compatibilist like Daniel Dennett, who sees no contradiction between determinism and freedom, but I have my own vaguely held and largely intuitive reasons for thinking he may be on to something. Many Christians are, of course, compatibilists once they realize their beliefs may lead to logical contradiction (e.g., predestination and freedom); they simply accept on faith that they stand in the face of a divine mystery. If they do this honestly and earnestly, I can't say that I resent them, but I think my inner Zen monk wishes they had gone through the effort of really wrestling with the problem. Real spirituality is work, in my opinion, and a person can only benefit from grappling with tough issues, even if a given bout ends in stalemate or defeat.


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coming soon

I have a whole mess of photos-- plus two videos-- to blog, so stay tuned.


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humble thanks (4)

Contributions from another few people have boosted my funds up W250,000, or roughly $250. I won't know the dollar equivalent until I've made the exchange at the airport on Sunday, but again I'm wowed by people's generosity, and will do my best to be worthy of it.

Thank you.


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almost gone

My work station at the office is just about empty. Two more things need doing: I need to clean up the desk's surface, which is looking pretty rough, especially behind the monitor and CPU, where the last great war between two implacable dust bunny factions is occurring; and I need to grab a bunch of data files from the computer's hard drive. No, not porn, fool! I'm talking about the mess of documents I created for all my classes over the past three years-- not because I have any intention of turning them into a huge book, but because I don't want to have to reinvent the wheel, wherever I may end up when I'm back in Korea.

And that's about it, as far as the office is concerned. I've got an early dinner with coworkers tomorrow at 5PM, a meeting with two of my three replacement teachers (yes, that's right: I'm so large it takes three normal-sized people to replace me), a trip to the National Pension office (where my expectations for pay are now significantly lowered, given the shafting I've gotten from Smoo), logos and tee shirt images to design, contact lenses to buy, videos to edit and slap on the blog, dinner with friends on Thursday evening, funds transfers to take care of, packages to mail off to several of the peninsula-bound, and one last shipment of mortal possessions to haul over to my friend Sperwer's place. Much to do, much to do.

But not at my office. For all intents and purposes, we're done there.


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saeng-gak bo-da... (pension woes)

I found out two things about my pension payment today: unlike what I had been told, the pension payment from Smoo will not be wired directly to my American account. Instead, it will be wired to my Shinhan bank account around May 10, which is precisely the sort of snafu I wanted to avoid. This means I need to make extra arrangements and pay extra fees to get my money.

Worse, I've learned that the pension amount will be a full thousand dollars less than anticipated. This may be my fault for not having checked the pension scheme down to the nittiest, grittiest detail, but the general expat assumption is that the government (or, in our case, the university) exactly matches whatever funds you pay into your pension plan. Was this a bad or false assumption? Is my university an exception to the rule?

What a fool I was for thinking I'd have my payments matched; I now know that such is not the case at Smoo. I paid a little over 4.4 million won into my pension plan, which meant, in principle, that I would get another 4.4 million won from the university upon leaving the country. Instead I was told by a supervisor that my total payout would be about 6.2 million won, not the 8.8 million (4.4 mil from me, 4.4 from Smoo) I would have liked to have gotten (before I knew these figures, I had been assuming a payout of 7.2 mil, roughly W200,000 per month, based on my putting about W100,000 per month into the plan, plus W100,000 from Smoo, for three years).

I've enjoyed working at Smoo-- I truly have. But the entire campus is amazingly stingy about pay. We work longer hours than at other universities, and do so for less pay. It's obviously silly to complain about this after three years of working here (and I'm again reminded of the parable of the vineyard workers, the most industrious of whom complained about being paid the same as the Johnny-come-latelies... the reply? "You knew what you were to be paid before you started the job!").

My buddy Tom keeps quietly urging me to try his university when I come back to Korea. I might think about it. While I'm eternally grateful to my bosses, my coworkers, and my students for their various kindnesses, I can't say I have much love for whatever offices or committees set the campus budgets and dole out the pay. I heartily agree that some things are far more important than money-- one's sanity, for instance-- but if one can safeguard one's sanity while also earning a bit more to live on (you'll recall that I'm not getting rich anytime soon), isn't that better than abusing one's own wallet?

It's a shame that an otherwise decent university should leave me thinking such thoughts, and while I'm normally good at viewing such problems positively, at a time like this it's hard to see the up-side. I don't blame my immediate supervisors for the situation; they're not the ones who control the salaries, the pension, etc. But someone's responsible for this. I blame them.

OK... end rant. For now.


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Pesach!

To those readers of a slight or pronounced Jewish persuasion, my best wishes for a wonderful Passover. Pesach started yesterday (the 20th), and continues until next Saturday.

My first Jewish story:

My brother Sean has a Jewish friend who, a few years back, came over to our family's house once and had dinner with us. Blunt-spoken person that I am, I started talking a bit about religion and then asked a question about the Jewish perspective, but instead of asking "What's the Jewish perspective?" I asked something like, "What do you people think?" The room temperature dropped a few degrees.

See, this is why I could never be a politician. While not a gaffe on the scale of Michael Richards's infamous N-word meltdown, my utterance doubtless seemed pretty damn rude to our guest. Sean's friend remained polite and I did my best to recover, but I'm sure the damage was done and I was mentally tagged "Asshole" by both Sean and his friend.

So this is a heads-up to all the non-Christians I plan to meet as I trudge across the mainland: if I mistakenly say "you people" in reference to your entire tradition, please understand that I don't mean it derisively.

My second Jewish story also involves house guests, but this time it was our entire family that made an inadvertent mistake. I was teaching French at a Catholic high school in Arlington, Virginia at the time, and because our language department planned to host a group of French teens who would stay with us for two weeks, I was asked to house the chaperones. My mother busied herself preparing a meal for our guests: spaghetti with ground beef and pork, plus, of course, parmesan cheese.

At that point, we didn't realize our guests were Jewish, and that they did indeed eat kosher.

When Monsieur and Madame arrived, we all laughed about the mistake and a new dinner was quickly made.


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tendered (almost) without comment

My apologies for the bad Korean and horrifying penmanship, but...

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humble thanks (3)

More anonymous contributions have driven my funds up to $443.01. This really blows me away. Thank you, all.


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shil-mang (la déception/disappointment)

My brother Sean almost never writes me, so whatever I learn about him, I learn from his Facebook updates. I see that he has just become a fan of* The Wonder Girls.

Many Koreans are into that whole "guilt by association" thing. On this particular point, so am I.

Ah, Sean.

Sean, Sean, Sean.

I'm so ashamed. How could you do this to our family?

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*The "become a fan of" function allows a Facebook member to announce their liking of X, be it a music group, a city, or whatever. Facebook is full of useless crap like this. For more on Facebook's insane time-wasting potential, see this article.


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birfday

My buddy Charles turned fort-- uh, thirty-five yesterday, and he seems ambivalent about it. I'm going over to his place today to rag him. He's making pizza; I'm bringing cheesecake. My heart, already overburdened, is going, "Noooooooooooo!"*

Happy 35, punk.

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*If I'm not mistaken, Wikipedia (or some other possibly unreliable online source) notes that "Noooooooooooo!" (of varying lengths) is, along with "I've got a bad feeling about this," a line that occurs in every Star Wars movie.


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...so that's that

As of an hour ago, I've finished teaching at Smoo. The feeling, right now, is one of sudden stoppage-- the fact that I'm no longer a teacher here hasn't sunk in yet (for those tuning in late: no, I wasn't fired).

Over the next few days, I'll be slapping up more nostalgia photos and messing with your head by scattering photos (and a vid or two) of the most recent crop of students through and among the older pics. You shouldn't have any trouble following: since the 90s, Quentin Tarantino has trained us well in tracing nonlinear narratives.

The office is quiet. It's Friday, and Friday is something of a "down" day in terms of class activity. Most of my own classes were Mon-Thu deals; the only Friday class I had was the Pronunciation Clinic, which met for an hour a pop, lasted just six weeks, and probably included only about three days of actual instruction.* Now it's just a matter of clearing everything out of the office, boxing everything up at home, throwing away everything unneedful, and shuttling most of my belongings to the people who have kindly volunteered some free space on my behalf. I am, as always, amazed at the various kindnesses I've received.

Pics later.

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*The first session was diagnostic: I got voice recordings from the students and analyzed their weak points. The fifth session was the final exam and the sixth session-- today's session-- was the jjong-party. We drilled pronunciation the during the second session, worked on intonation in the third session, and did rhythm during the fourth session. No time for a comprehensive review in class, but I did have students come for 30-minute one-on-one sessions with me during the week to help them improve. This latter idea wasn't in the course description; it was something I'd volunteered to do for the students. It made for a weirdly symmetrical closure, too: when I came to Smoo in April of 2005, I immediately began giving one-on-one sessions to students who wanted more face time. Back then, too, I had students signing up for available time slots.


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my last big day

I have only a single class to teach on Friday, so I view today, Thursday, as my actual final day of teaching. My Current Events English class told me on Wednesday they wanted to have a jjong-party (i.e., an end-of-term party), so today, everyone brought something to munch. We sat around and talked; one of my male students, Mr. Kim, took some pics and videos with my camera, which I proudly display (or link to) below. Another student also took some pictures with my camera, and the first video to which I link below was shot by me during my students' midterm exam on Wednesday.

Enjoy.

Here are the videos (I'll be putting up a link to my YouTube "channel" soon):

1. Students taking the midterm.

2. Farewell party: first look.

3. Farewell party: second look.

4. Farewell party: third and final look.


I can't tell you how much I enjoyed teaching these students. I'm glad my time at Smoo has ended on such a positive note.

Until next time, my wonderful students!


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hey, what's the big idea?

My brother David recently wondered what this blog was about. Well, it's about a specific project called Kevin's Walk, but the walk doesn't actually begin until late May, so I have some time to muck around, give my tiny readership a chance to get to know me, and basically lay the groundwork for what's to come. Don't be surprised if you see posts about politics, religion, fart humor, and whatever else comes to mind. Once the walk begins, the blog will snap into focus, but in the meantime, just sit back, settle in, and enjoy the meanderings.

IMPORTANT UPDATE:

[NB: Please check out this What's the Big Idea? post before reading what follows.]

What would a typical Kevin's Walk day look like from your perspective? Well, let's suppose you're a member of a religious community-- say, a Presbyterian who knows I'm arriving. Let's further assume today's Monday, though I suppose the day of the week doesn't matter much if we've made arrangements beforehand. The schedule might look something like this:

4:30PM: Kevin arrives, bedraggled and sweaty, at the church or at the residence of a church member. (This will have been decided in advance.)

4:35PM: Kevin greets whoever's there to greet him; round of handshakes, photos taken, polite silence regarding the stink doubtless wafting off Kevin's body. Kevin broaches the uncomfortable subject by asking where he can shower and change his clothes. A volunteer says, "We've arranged for you to go to the Jones family's house; you can shower there now and come back here, to the church, and then you'll spend the night at the family's residence." Kevin offers his thanks.

4:35-5:30PM: Kevin walks over to the Jones's place (no vehicles for Kevin unless he's seriously injured!), sets down his backpack, showers, rinses out his clothes, puts on a clean set of clothing, and announces he's ready to walk back to the church (or to stay there and have the talk).

5:35-7:30PM: Dinner (optional; giving food to Kevin is ALWAYS optional) and religion-talk at or near the church (or at the Jones's place), which will be recorded (possibly transcribed later, or the sound/video file will simply be uploaded).

7:35PM: Kevin discusses his next destination with the people he's been talking to. This might involve the use of Google Earth or Google Maps or something more old-school. The end result is that Kevin will have a physical set of directions describing a PLAUSIBLE and LEGAL walking route to his next waypoint.

9PM: Kevin will be at the Jones's place, using their computer (if they have a decent one) for the next 1.5 to 2 hours to upload photos and blog some brief insights.

11:15PM: Kevin will sleep wherever he's been told to sleep.

6:15AM: Kevin wakes up, brushes his teeth and performs other morning necessaries, collects the clothes that will have dried, packs his gear, thanks the Joneses, and heads off to his next destination by 7:15AM.

Comments: This routine can vary, of course. If I arrive somewhere later than anticipated, for example, this might necessitate a rescheduling of activities. If it turns out I have to stay in a certain area for more than one night, I'm not against staying at different residences so as to distribute the burden of caring for me among several people/families. I might also say "yes" to hanging around in a certain area to earn some extra cash for my trip. Other factors that might vary include food, sleep location (someone might prefer that I camp in their yard rather than enter the house), places to hold the religion talk, etc. I might end up needing several days to walk to a given destination, which means I'll be camping. Nothing is written in stone.



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"Speed Racer"?

With its bubble-gum color schemes and shamelessly unrealistic CGI, the Wachowski Brothers' latest effort, "Speed Racer," doesn't exactly bring back that Saturday morning cartoon feeling. I've watched the previews and have seen the featurette, and the overall impression I get is that the movie will be a two-hour riff off the podracing scene from "The Phantom Menace" (itself a cinematic reference to the charioteering scene from "Ben Hur"), but with a wilder palette and "Matrix"-style camera work. The brothers should have gone whole hog and made the movie entirely CG. After having gone through the Star Wars prequel trilogy, I'm not all that keen on the fusion of CGI and live action, unless the CGI is compellingly rendered (as is arguably the case in "Revenge of the Sith," though Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings movies are better examples of what I mean).

Should I see "Speed Racer"? Right now, I'm leaning toward "Nah."


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frank

One of the most interesting aspects of working at a Korean women's university is the occasionally hilarious or thought-provoking text message. In my three years here at Smoo, there's one message I've received two or three times that's been both disturbing and funny. It has appeared in various forms, but usually goes something like this:

Teacher! I can't come to class today because it's my period.

I mention this because I got such a message just today. Incredible, how frank these girls can be. Maybe I should be teaching English expressions like "on the rag," "riding the cotton pony," and "PMS-ing."


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humble thanks (bis)

The contributions continue to roll in, and we now stand at $343.01. As always, my sincere thanks to all and sundry. I'm still wavering about putting up a Hall of Fame for contributors; too many of you have privately emailed to say, "Please don't list me" or "If you list me, use my superhero alias," or something similarly frustrating.

Anyway, I am sincerely grateful for the various kindnesses I've already received. This bodes well for the walk. My current plan is to save all contributions for as long as possible. One cool thing about PayPal is that your stored funds can actually earn a wee bit of interest (approx 2.8%; it varies) while they gestate. Over time, this can make up for the 4% chunk that PayPal bites off each transaction.

If all goes according to plan, I'll have about $14,000-$15,000 in the bank by the time the walk begins in late May (minus the monthly scholarship debt and the plane ticket to the Vancouver area). That doesn't include donations, which I'll be storing on the side (in PayPal) and holding for as long as possible (the goal is to reach $5000; see here for a detailed explanation). If I finish the walk before my main supply of money runs out, I'll be giving the donations to charity. If I dip into the contributions I've received but still have some money left over when the walk is finished, then as per what I wrote in the post about finances, I'm still giving the rest to charity.

Thanks again!


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this may be in poor taste, but...

Folks who don't know me might not be acquainted with my sick sense of humor.

Time to get acquainted.

The biggest, baddest English-language Koreablog, the Marmot's Hole, is currently hosting a YouTube video of the torch-lighting moment of the 1988 Seoul Olympics. Robert Koehler, the Hole's founder and the writer of the post in question, remarks apropos of this video:

"Why the release of the doves was discontinued after the 1988 Olympic Games..."

Enjoy the sight of sizzling birds. I know my brother David, who's as sick as I am, will get a kick out of this. For me, the humor of the video lies in the buildup: the booming announcements about the torchbearers in three languages, the grand, sweeping music that served as a background to the runners who took the torch on its final lap around the stadium, the slow rise of the platform that brought three torchbearers level with the lip of the Olympic Flame... the doves perched so innocently atop the Flame's tower, unaware of what was about to transpire, and then...



This is what it tastes like when doves fry.


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how many folks have traversed the country?

I was curious to know how many people have walked across the continental United States. This article claims that no solid figures are available, but guesses that the America-crossers might number in the hundreds.


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was denken Sie?

Do you think this is good advice on how to raise boys?


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Saturday packing

I spent Saturday evening at the office, grading student journals* and beginning the sad process of clearing out my work station. I managed to fit most of my mortal possessions into three medium-sized boxes; I got the boxes from a local mom-and-pop store being watched over by a guy with a gut at least twice the size of my own; he and I had bowed to each other in the past whenever I walked by his store, but we'd never talked. Tonight, when I suddenly asked him whether I could have two or three boxes, he responded with a "What for?"-- which caught me off guard. I explained that I was leaving Korea and needed to pack up my office things, after which he rummaged around and gave me three boxes. Here are some pics of Saturday night's efforts.

---

*Some of my students are convinced the word "journal" refers only to the content of a journal and not to the physical journal itself, which is a bit of a problem whenever I say, "Hand in your journals."


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nostalgia: part 2

I want my readers to have some notion of the life I'm leaving behind here in Seoul. To that end, I'll be slapping up pictures from various end-of-term parties and "bazaars" that we ran.

Here are scenes from a bazaar our department held in the winter of 2006, about a half-year into my three-year stint at Smoo:

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on comments and "censorship"

When you walk into my blog, you're walking into my house. If I'm considered responsible for the blog's content (as a homeowner is responsible for the condition of his home), then I am equally responsible for the behavior of my guests—i.e., my commenters. This means, on one hand, that I should try to treat my guests with a modicum of civility, toleration, and decency. It also means, on the other hand, that I should be true to myself: my patience and tolerance are not infinite, and far from allowing people to begin ego-driven pissing contests in the comments section, I will nip all such attempts in the bud. Comments are already monitored; they appear on the blog only with my approval. Comments that are not of a constructive nature simply won't appear; they'll be deleted before they see the light of day.

Notice what I'm not saying: I'm not saying I won't tolerate disagreements. Quite to the contrary, I'm keenly interested in hearing different points of view. But disagreements must first pass the tests of civility, rationality, and relevance, or they won't be aired.

Some oversensitive folks decry such an attitude as censorship, but this comes from a misunderstanding of what censorship actually is. A person who wishes to express an uncivil or otherwise negative opinion about this blog, the blog's author, or the author's personal project is, of course, free to do so, but will have to do so somewhere else. Censorship is the active suppression of free speech; the speaker is hounded; his posters, his signs, his websites and so on are hunted down and eradicated by the censoring party. Censorship is not the same as being responsible for what happens in one's own house.

So if, for whatever reason, you feel the need to say something that isn't particularly constructive, I won't stop you—unless you're doing it inside my foyer. I hope we're clear on that. As long as I'm the one who's responsible for this blog's content, I'll consider all reader comments to fall inside the scope of that responsibility and will handle those comments as I see fit.

I should also note that I prefer comments not to be anonymous. It's easy to hide behind anonymity, and hard to respect people who choose that path. I understand that some people wish to keep their actual identities hidden for various personal and prudential reasons, but even such people can adopt a specific screen name and return to this blog using that screen name consistently. If, for example, someone with the screen name Boogerman69 becomes a recurring character in the comment threads, that's fine with me; Boogerman and his (or her!) style will become familiar to me and to the other commenters.

I do not, of course, respect the use of sock puppets, i.e., the use of several screen names by a single person to make it appear that several different people are commenting. This, too, is an example of cowardice and immaturity.

So yes, I'm draconian about my comments section. Having chosen to maintain such a section, I've also chosen to keep it nicely mown and pleasing to the eye. If this troubles you, then simply surf or comment elsewhere. Or start your own blog.

As I did.

a week before good-bye

I'm not actually leaving Korea until the 27th of this month, but my classes finish next week, with the 18th (Friday) being my final day of teaching. Hard to believe that my time at Smoo (you newbies might not know that that's my nickname for the school where I teach) is almost up-- three very pleasant years.

Smoo has definitely been the best gig I've had since coming back to Korea in 2002. When I was in Seoul from 1994 to 1996, I worked at two different language institutes (and did a stint teaching business English at a large firm in Yeouido), and from 2004 to 2005, I did the same. Let me tell you, the move from such institutes (called hagweon in Korean) to a university like Smoo was like the transition from night to day: while the pay suffered a slight decrease, the stress level went way, way down. I've been lucky, in all my jobs, to have worked with decent (and in many cases excellent) coworkers, and to have taught great students, but the main problem in all my previous jobs boiled down to two things: unreasonable schedule and unreasonable management. In this job, far from working 44 hours a week (as I'd done in my 2004-05 gig), I generally teach only about 20 hours a week-- high for the typical Korean university, but low from my "hagweonic" perspective. I'm also lucky to have bosses who, whatever their quirks, have been humane and understanding to me. This in turn has made me much more willing to go the extra mile for the school, which I've tried to do in different ways: by holding extracurricular French classes, by having one-to-one tutoring sessions (students could sign up for a time slot), by creating ad posters for our program, cooking full meals for our end-of-term parties, and so on. I would never have done these things at any of my previous jobs.

So it's going to be a sad good-bye next week. I look forward to going home for a while and doing this trans-America walk, but I'm also sad to be leaving this life behind. I've got a job where I like-- love-- what I do, where that love and effort are appreciated, and where I feel very much at home. Luckily, I do plan to come back to Korea when the walk is done, so however sad this good-bye will be, it won't be a "good-bye forever."

And now... I've got an 11AM pronunciation class today. Final exam for these students. Next Friday, we're just partying.


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into the belly of the beast

I admit that this little problem makes me nervous. I'm beginning to think that I should bring only one carry-on bag with me when I go home. Or no bag at all.


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perhaps a church worth joining

Glenn Reynolds of Instapundit writes, "A RELIGIOUS SYMBOL outside a Tennessee courthouse. Will the ACLU complain?"

By the way, if you're into hilarious takes on religion, go to YouTube and type "Betty Butterfield" in the search window.


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the tension mounts

All of South Korea is holding its breath in anticipation of tonight's space launch, which includes a "double first" for Koreans: astronaut Lee Soyeon will not only be the first Korean in space: she'll be the first Korean woman in space. Best of luck to Soyeon, whose amazing adventure has been faithfully chronicled over at Mike Hurt's fine blog (see especially here and here; these links have videos with Soyeon, who is Mike's friend).


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trip prep continues

Among the many things I have yet to do before I leave the peninsula is visit the local branch of the Seoul Immigration Office to obtain a bija yeon-jang, a.k.a. a visa extension. My employment contract's ending date is the 24th of this month but my plane ticket is for the 27th, thus requiring a three-day extension.

I'm about to take off and get that now. Vish mee laaaahk.



UPDATE: You obviously didn't wish me luck. It turns out that the local branch of the Immigration Office no longer services residents of my part of town, which means I need to take a cross-town trip to the main branch. Not gonna happen in rush-hour traffic, I fear, so I might save this trip for Friday. There's no rush: in principle, I have all the way until the day before my contract expires to get this taken care of.


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from the Maven

This link contains some great travel wisdom, not to mention wonderful quotes from Anaïs Nin and John Muir.

(Thanks, Maven!)


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for the HTML-savvy, a question

This Blogger template has one major annoying tendency: the line spacing changes before and after graphics, horizontal lines (done with the "hr" HTML tag), and other such doodads. What changes must I make to my template to make ALL line spacing absolutely consistent?

(To see the problem I'm talking about, scroll down to the "the NEW logo" post and compare the line spacing before and after the graphic.)

UPDATE: Thanks to HK for the quick response! Problem solved. I want to have your baby. Oh, wait-- that's the chick's line...


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scratch n' sniff

Magnolias and cherry blossoms in Korea. Unfortunately, the Korean word for "cherry blossom" bears a disturbing phonetic resemblance to the phrase "butt goat" (beot-ggot). Having said that, I feel the need to remind you that this blog's main focus is religion, not bestiality. Despite whatever links might exist between the two concepts, please put said links out of your mind and just enjoy the exposed plant genitals on display at Jelly's fine blog.


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perhaps there's justice after all

This makes me very happy. A recent comment about tolerance got me thinking: tolerance has limits. I can't tolerate the existence of a man like Fred Phelps, or of a church that feeds on his hatred and falsely styles it love.

UPDATE: Somewhat related to the tolerance theme touched on here is this post over at Malcolm's place, which focuses more on the question of Europe, Islam, and tolerance. Malcolm's piece is more germane to the remarks made by Max in his comments to this previous post.


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Nathan writes in!

Here's part of what my friend Nathan Bauman wrote me:

Hi Kevin,

I've just emailed our press release to:

-Douglas Todd of the Vancouver Sun (he's the religion and ethics writer for our daily broadsheet)

-the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (I called to check that they got the press release)

-The Tri-City News (a local thrice-weekly paper)

-The Coquitlam Now (a local thrice-weekly paper)

-The BC Christian News

Better update that website soon! I just hope this press release thing works out. I think I've done a good job on it, but the idea has to catch their eye...

Nathan's been doing a lot of work behind the scenes to help make this walk happen. I'd normally say that I owe him my firstborn child, but because I have no children, I probably owe him a few vital organs instead.

Thanks, Nathan!

If anyone out there has notions of how to get the word out and get religious communities interested in this walk, please write in. We're always looking for ideas.


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the NEW logo

Not being satisfied with the previous logo-- an image that increasingly came to remind me of a bunch of dirt clods-- I've opted for the following image, a variant of which will shortly appear above as this blog's new and slightly more interesting-looking banner:

The symbols you see, from left to right:


Jainism: the hand of ahimsa (nonviolence, no-killing)
Islam: the crescent
Shinto: the torii
Hinduism: the holy "Om" (also called "AUM")
Buddhism: the 8-spoked Wheel of the Law
Sikhism: the Khanda
Judaism: the Magen David (Star of David)
Christianity: the cross of Jesus
Baha'i: the 9-pointed star (9 connotes perfection in this tradition)

The above logo satisfies several requirements at once: you see a guy with a backpack walking along, which we automatically associate with treks. You see red, white, and blue, which represents the United States of America. And you see nine symbols of various religions, which should imply, even to the casual observer, that the walker is somehow walking past or through or among these traditions. I think this is a much better logo than the previous one, even though this logo will be harder to render as a black-and-white photocopy.

Enjoy!


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Happy Anniversary, Mom and Dad!

It's April 6, and my mother and father today celebrate their forty-first year together as a married couple. Dad's retired, and unless I'm mistaken, Mom's supposed to be retiring this year. They deserve the rest; both have worked at hard jobs.

I love you guys! See you soon!


UPDATE: I just got news that Mom might hang on until early next year.


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fundraising update

I'm humbled by the people who've taken the time to contribute something to Kevin's Walk. As of a few days ago, my PayPal account currently boasts $294.76 (the weird number comes from the way PayPal takes about a 4% nibble from every transaction).

Thank you, thank you, thank you all. I'm thinking of setting up a Contributor's Hall of Fame to show my appreciation. I'll be tasteful: the list won't reveal amounts, but I still want to lift up the names of the folks who've been so kind to me. If you'd rather not appear on such a list, please email me at

kevinswalk@gmail.com

Walk on!


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nostalgia: part 1

As my time in Korea draws to a close and I ready myself for the return home to Alexandria, Virginia (where I'll spend a month with my folks before beginning the Walk), I find myself in an increasingly pensive, nostalgic mood. You'll have to pardon me, in this case, because as I think about the potential health benefits of the upcoming Walk, I can't help remembering that, although I've never been skinny, there was a time when I was a lot less, uh, substantial than I am now.

Here's me in 1995, not looking skinny at all, but still thinner than I currently am:

Here's a 1994 shot that shows I was a bit thinner the previous year:



And finally, here's a shot from 1991 that has me pining for the old days:



In later posts, I'll be showing you pics from the life I've lived for the past three years-- the university I'll be leaving, and the students who've made an impression on me.


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