Ice

Despite the seeming monotony of existence, life is never stationary. Time keeps moving forward along with our hopes, dreams and relationships with people. What is ironic, perhaps, is that disintegration is also a form of forward movement.

Someone once showed me a series of photos documenting a bird that had died in his yard. Everyday at 5pm when he got home from work, he would take a picture of it, which is either morbid as hell and slightly degrading to the memory (or lack thereof) of this blameless creature, or complementary—proof that something compelling can most certainly come of death and rot, that even in death, there is purpose—a sort of reluctant martyrdom.

This weekend was good. I had a lot of happy moments and I didn't feel entirely alone for the first time in awhile. Sometimes I think it is better for me to be independent, that I don't need anyone, that becoming close to someone else will lead to more sadness, which these days, I no longer believe I can handle. I am not a clingy person. In fact, I am the opposite. I am sure people often become annoyed with having to pursue me, attract my attention. Hope for the clouds to leave my eyes and make me focus on theirs. I wish I were more accepting of affection, but I think I sometimes fear losing the beautiful numbness to which I've become so accustomed.

I am always cold. Frozen, in fact. This weekend, for a moment, I became so warm I thought I might suffocate. But perhaps asphyxiation isn't really such a terrible way to melt the ice lodged in my eyes.

One of my favourite fairy tales is an old, Norwegian story about a magic mirror made of ice. The images one saw in this mirror caused everything, despite its goodness, to appear ugly, repellent. This pessimistic mirror existed in a realm unknown to humans, in a time well before mankind's characteristic bitterness and cynicism. It was owned by a terrible little goblin who in a fit of rage cast the mirror from his home in the sky. The looking-glass shattered into billions of tiny, icy slivers, invisible to the naked eye, but terribly affecting.

Down below on Earth in a small village, a little boy and a little girl—beautiful, simplistic children, who despite their poverty, enjoyed every aspect of life and had been best friends since birth—were playing. The little boy, looking upwards to catch sight of the birds in the sky, did not feel it when the shard of ice pierced his eye and by extension, his very soul…(we all know the old adage…don't make me get cliché..). He finished watching the birds until they flew out of view, then continued his game rather robotically.

Though he'd always been a very joyful, sensitive boy, he now felt very little, if anything at all. But, because of the shard's magic properties, he was unaware that anything had changed at all. His blue eyes, once the color of the sky on the balmiest of sunny summer days, eyes flecked with radiant, warm light, were now the color of a frozen over pond in the bitterest of January cold. When he closed his eyes partway, his blonde eyelashes resembled icicles, unmoved by the temperate wind that blew through the countryside where he had lived his entire life.

Gradually, as the weeks and months passed and he grew, he became cruel, uncaring for the feelings of others, unable to show remorse for the bitterness he now unjustly felt towards those closest to them.

If memory recalls, the story goes on about all of the boy's many misdeeds, how he finally leaves home and breaks his best friend's heart in so doing. Though he had been unkind to her, she had always believed in his innate goodness and had sought to melt the ice enveloping his soul, though in vain. As the tale continues onward, the little village girl decides to go in search of her lost friend and travels throughout Norway's most northern, frozen land, suffering many hardships and nearly losing her life to the frost and the cruel creatures who thrive off it. She finally finds the boy within the palace of the Ice Queen, where the mirror's magic was strongest (it had been created within) and the boy had lost all memory of sunlight and happiness. He was hopelessly devoted to his new queen as a slave would be to his master, and blinked dumbly at the sight of the wretched, ragged, shivering creature that stood before him, imploring him to come home.

I don't remember how the story ends, but I expect in the children's version, the boy is able to recognize the girl, sheds tears of shame and repentance (his first in a decade) and in so doing, melts the terrible ice which had gripped his life in a stranglehold for so very long. If there is an original, un-bowdlerized version of the story somewhere still in existence, I expect that it ended badly for the girl, most likely in her tragic, hopeless demise after realizing the scourge the mirror had released upon the world, the irreversible plague which had affected so many. Still in possession of a delicate heart, she is overcome by the extremity of the cold and perishes. I simply cannot recall.

Perhaps, though I am not so hopeful, the ice has begun to thaw for me too. I must be one of the mirror's unhappy recipients. I got an email from my mother this weekend. It seemed final, like actual effort was applied in its writing. She is tired of me. She is bored of my self-indulgence and lies and unwillingness to be a different person for her. Strange, because I don't know why she thinks the situation with us is any different now, or that it's all my fault. I wrote her back. Twice. She probably hates me more, though she will never admit it.

I had spent Friday night in Seoul after an evening in Hong Dae. I was sitting in a PC room reading her cutting words when I felt the unfamiliar welling up of tears in my eyes. Silently, I typed while a friend watched and brought me tissue. The PC room was cheap. A mere 1000 won for five minutes of misery and empathy. I've never experienced anything quite like it. It was almost surreal. I tried to disregard it, but we walked to the subway in utter silence. The rest of the weekend had a sad tone to it, but I decided to stay in Seoul, keeping busy.

Saturday, I returned to Hong Dae. I wandered around alleys with piercing parlours, bought something for my sister in an Indian man's store, and ate Vietnamese food, which was really quite good. We went to several bars, though we didn't drink too much this time. One bar, I think it was called 'Jamiroquai' (after the singer) was pretty laid back, though the stools were literally falling apart and the menus were written on the backs of cut-up Heineken boxes. Upon attempting to use the washroom, my friend broke the key in the lock. We decided it would be wise to leave shortly after…

We also went to a tiny place called 'Las Vegas Western Bar', which I really wasn't too fond of. It was really eclectically decorated with odd bits of this and that from around the world—oddly enough, the collection, trapped under the bar's glass and strewn around the window panes had nothing to do with Western culture or Las Vegas at all…African statues with erections, filthy old coins from Vietnam, random playing cards, a stuffed bear with a pair of children's panties on its head…the usual. (ha…) The waitresses were a little too chatty and wouldn't leave us alone. It was the first time I've seen a white girl (a tall blonde Russian) working anywhere other than as a teacher or in the military…Just a girl with a regular job…They gave me a free shot of a much too sweet Vodka mudslide (basically chocolate milk with a tiny bit of instant coffee flavouring and a drop of alcohol), which was nice, but I was feeling a little claustrophobic with the attention.

When we emerged outside, it was snowing heavily. I was amused at the overall fascination with snow. I was just trying not to get hypothermia…Instead, I have no voice currently (I haven't smoked a damn cigarette since Friday), have been coughing heavily, and been doing my trademark sniffing (I, of the deviated septum, yes). I promised a real snowball fight when I felt better and had mittens on…

We ended the evening in a very empty little bar where really terrible music was playing. Luckily, there was an Ipod with decent music on hand and the waitress was willing to take requests…We ended up chatting to a man who came in later, who taught us a bit about Korea and invited us to come to Daegu, which I am very interested in doing. The rest of the evening was a blur of neon and swirling snow and taxis.

Sunday was much of the same. I bought a good friend a beautiful mother of pearl mirror in Insa Dong. We ate sundubu and drank soju, despite some major ordering problems—we had no desire for soju, but were actually in search of juice or tea or some (very needed) coffee. I tried Jujube tea and listened to music that made me think of childhood—screechy Indian music with potentially obscene words in them (though who could ever really be sure)—at a tea shop called Little India Café. Bollywood stars just may be worse than their American counterparts (I learned much while flipping through some culturally appropriate magazines…), though not by much, admittedly…

I've been so sick and so cold all week at school. I have a new class on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays for gifted students who want to learn how to write essays. It seems like it could have potential, but now I have to stay at work until 10:30PM. Monday was unpleasant and I was so exhausted. I kept my coat on all day and sat so close to the little space heater in my classroom. My boss is giving me his humidifier, as I've been sick on and off since getting here.

Perhaps it is ironic that Korea's first real snow occurred on a weekend when I felt I was beginning to thaw.

Escape

In high school, I once stood before a panel of judges in what is perhaps the most damaging activity a person could ever choose to do—I was a member of my school's "Intellectual Olympic" team as the official expert in the areas of literature and art. The point of this blog is not to reminisce about a not so distant past. Neither is it to tell of the social Hell of high school—that's a given and anyone who tells you otherwise obviously didn't go to Galt...Rather, my point (and I do have one, although perhaps it is not so much as a point as a catalyst into a different thought) is that last night I was thinking about how one of the judges asked me to tell him what Pop Art was. Standing there, in front of hundreds of people I didn't know (we were competing at a school in Montreal, not that it would have made a difference as I knew no one at Galt either), I babbled on for a bit to give myself a chance to think (the sound of my monotone voice can actually be quite meditative), and then, finally, I launched into a rant about how a lot of art can be intimidating, lofty, pretentious. We recognize that it's art because we stand in awe of the sheer genius of the sculptor's work, how the slightest quiver of a brush can damage an expression, change the meaning forever.

We go to museums to see 'art' because it is so precious that the protection of velvet ropes (soft as they are, they do have a certain authority about them…) becomes necessary. People love this 'art' because they know they would never be capable of such genius—an impossible endeavour. We may call this art 'popular' for a small, somewhat elitist portion of society, but in truth, sometimes images bleed into one another. One landscape becomes barely more memorable than the next. One dead aristocrat, battle-scene or biblical moment becomes not more striking, chilling or more sentimental than the next...We love it all, but this 'art' has nothing to do with our lives (upon reflection, perhaps that is why we enjoy it so much). It is an ancient part of someone else's history.

Pop Art, on the other hand, is for the people: the popular mass society; the strange; the angry; the addicted; the passionate. Pop Art is messy, imperfect, and often cheaply mass produced so as many people as possible will get a chance to see it. Its point does not follow Pater's Victorian idea of 'art for art's sake,' but instead elicits a reaction, be it joy, fear, disgust, anger, sadness or nausea. Pop Art wants to make you squirm. It wants you to question the artist's motivation and to realize that though it is undeniably art, perhaps it really wouldn't be so impossible to create something just as good, just as provocative. Pop Art essentially gives anyone the green light to call themselves an artist (whatever that is—it's highly open to interpretation…), just so long as the work they produce is seen, be it in a loft somewhere, a garage, or a freezing warehouse. To be seen is all that matters.

Late on Saturday afternoon, after I'd taken care of some business, I went again to Insa Dong, the traditional marketplace area, a space that simply (and so endearingly so) vibrates with life, color and artistry. Wandering around, we came upon a tribute to Andy Warhol, he of the multi-hued silkscreen Monroes and Campbell's Soup notoriety. Apparently there are many galleries in Insa Dong, and we did stop in a few traditional ones with beautiful pencil portraits for sale, but this awe-inspiring, many layered space just might be my favourite, as its strangeness had a very sublime, dreamlike quality to it, literal and nonsensical and plastic all at once.

Upon entering this open-air, freezing cold building/warehouse, the first noticeable thing is part of the large ceiling, covered in little shimmering yellow Christmas-tree lights and open blue umbrellas. The lights looked like stars, I thought, and I imagined that had it been warm enough, I would have liked to lie down and get a better view upwards. Maybe, I thought, I would pretend like the sky was falling and that I needed to catch an umbrella (a la Wile E. Coyote) to protect myself from the dangerous stars catapulting to Earth.

In true Pop Art tradition, there was also a place where one might purchase a mug or a plate and paint whatever they pleased: Art for the masses. We were going to try it—and I'd still like to at some point—but we would have had to wait a week or two to return to retrieve it from the kiln's finishing touches. Everything is uncertain—who knows if I'd even be able to find this place again—or if I wasn't just imagining it in some feverish moment of delusion (I've been known to have them)—a fairy palace where time doesn't exist and that will disappear and change locations if ever exited.

There was a staircase to another level as well, decked out with weird little space cadets with rather android like qualities—their arms and legs kind of petered out into rounded-off points and their expressions made me laugh, as even with the long water/opium/hookah (?) pipes jammed into their O-shaped mouths, they gave off the sense of looking very constipated, yet blissful, like whatever they were smoking had prevented any movement, the utter inability to walk, and formed these bulbous little bodies which the skinny, feetless legs could never support. I loved it. The sign said "don't touch."

We also saw giant plastic flowers of all varieties and colors. The sunflower was cool and I recall leaning down to have my photo taken with a pretty purple, somewhat faded African violet (?), not realizing that these things weren't nailed down, were very lightweight and could just roll around at the slightest touch. I very nearly ended up on my ass. I was amused and thought of Alice in Wonderland after she'd grown to a "very respectable 4 inches" and had to deal with rather bitchy flowers.

Additionally, though less striking, were 'shoetrees,'—not in the sense of the word we know, of course, but rather, actual trees, the branches of which housed trees of all colors and styles, sealed hygienically in plastic baggies. I wondered if any of them matched, though on second thought, to wear matching shoes is of probably very little concern to the artist. There were also these kind of gross, white, rather phallic objects with brown splotches on them, not dissimilar to nipples. I think the point of art like this is that the artist wants you to feel as though it's a piece that's open to interpretation, but everyone automatically associates it with something perverse. The artists wants us to go away thinking that we have dirty minds, are sexual deviants and contemplating the possibility that the person next to you may have seen something purely innocent in it. We came to the conclusion that it looked like a structure one might encounter in Whoville, or anywhere else on Dr. Seuss' fertile mindscape. I could go on, the warehouse was richly packed with things both sacred and profane—all subversive as hell, all thought-provoking—but I won't, because this is not meant to be a book, but a humble little blog with but a few loyal subscribers…(:

Later, we explored many booths and stores—I bought a fan and a little green stone that I had hoped to make into a necklace, but I fear I may have lost it…I have come to the conclusion that many Korean artisans tend to have wonderful and strange ideas about the things they make. There were all these little wooden key chains and statues that really reminded me of Tim Burton's The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy…I thought fondly of the "girl with nails in her eyes," "Stain Boy, et al, and became very nostalgic for some of the cool comic book shops in Ottawa…Oh, Silver Snail, how I miss your dollar bin….ha.. Anyway, these little statuette/ key chain things are basically little men decked out with spikes (or other unpleasantly sharp objects) through their foreheads….Little zombie Frankensteins. I thought they were adorable. My heart melts at the strangest things…

We tried to get our picture taken with these two people dressed as teddy bears, but there were just too many children who wanted it more, so I wasn't very assertive about it. A weird guy who loved that we were North American started rattling off all the Americana he could remember. He had no point at all: Batman, Spideman, Superman, Brad Pitt, Madonna, Hulk, etc. We nodded fiercely, encouraging this little bout of insanity, and as he rubbed his hands with glee (I don't often get to use this word, but it's the only appropriate choice in this case), we made our escape. Maybe he thought we were bonding….hah..

I know North Americans are often objects of interest here in Korea, but sometimes it gets a little tiring. Maybe sometimes I'd like to be invisible and not worry about scrutiny. It is then that I wrap my scarf tighter, pull my hat lower and narrow my shoulders inside my warm winter coat. But really, they are going to stare regardless. On the subway, lots of Korean guys in their 20s like to practice their English with me and will just start saying "Hi" a lot. On Saturday, a slightly drunk older businessman type kind of leaned in a little too close to my face for comfort, pulled a crumpled paper plane out of his pocket, zoomed it around my eyes, and finally deposited it in my had as he was getting off the train….Lovely, guy, I'll cherish it forever and ever…

We went to a Vegetarian Buddhist restaurant for supper and it was great, just a nice, chill atmosphere with a lot of variety to choose from. It's the first exclusively vegetarian place I've encountered since coming here and I was grateful to eat something I recognized for once. I like everything, except the green bean dish, which tasted bitter to me, like sucking on an aspirin.

We went to Hong Dae, somehow ended up at Tin Pan (after a few relaxing drinks at a much quieter, more awesome bar) and drank shots, apparently. We decided to pull an all-nighter, stay up and catch an early morning train. I was really tired, but not very intoxicated. We met some 'interesting' (it's a very all-encompassing sort of word) people at Tin Pan who invited us to tag along to a Norebang. I'm not into singing, as I am tone-deaf, but I enjoy watching others do it, even strangers. It was pretty great. I finally got home about 9am after a really great day that I seriously needed—I'd had a rather depressing, unhealthy week, which I still feel very sad about, as the events leading up to it seemed somehow special and impacting.

I was not angry this week. I was just confused and resigned and desired some form of escape. But, as I've said so many times to so many people, how much farther can I really go? I've spent many years, my whole life, in fact, hiding out in my bedroom, turning off my phone, blending into walls, closing the light. No one here but us ghosts… And yet, upon reflection, I want so badly to be a part of something more important than myself. Maybe it is vanity that I rarely let that happen, or maybe it is fear. I hope people remember my rare moments when I really try to expose myself for the human I happen to be. I still find it difficult to come off that way. Humans, myself included, tend to make me physically ill.

I've met many people in my life. I tend to know them for short amounts of time. Never a repeat performance. I've never argued with any of them, really, except for family, but somehow they all just vanish into the night. Maybe that is why I feel strange and sad whenever I've told a secret. It's like I'm just passing on information. I am someone to remember, not to know. Or maybe people think that a couple of intense days is all they need to know a person. I'm sure that this may sometimes be true. One day, I'll fade, become translucent. I'll be a passing thought, that kind of makes you smile or maybe it will make you sad, or sentimental. I never really know how people see me. I never will. But, then, because of how I am, sometimes I think I like this—There is something mildly Romantic about it all—Rather like The Lady of Shallot a woman trapped in a tower, her only means of looking out into the world, a magic mirror. Her descent means alienation, banishment, misery, unhappiness. I know it's not the same thing. I do go out more often these days, I do speak to people, but I often feel very disconnected. It's rare that I feel comfortable. It hasn't happened for awhile that I do feel okay with others, and so I am confused, like I don't know who I am and perhaps I never will.

I am concerned about change. Even though I hated life as a child, I figured that if anything changed, it would be for the worse, because what good could possibly happen to us, to me. I honestly believe that we live in a culture of shame and guilt. These two are the only tangible sentiments people really instil on their children. Everything everywhere is constantly criticized. If it's not being criticized outwardly by someone else, you're doing it to yourself, making awfully sure to self-edit and censor your actual feelings because you know nothing in this life can be kept secret for more than a few moments. I treasure those moments while they're happening, because later, after the jubilation has passed, when we're in a public place and parting ways and I have been removed from the heady happiness of a warm place and a nice person to myself, the self-criticism comes to torment me and I experience an enormous, unbearable urge to leave where I am and run home to proceed to dwell on every sentence uttered, every possibly obnoxious look, strange posture or uncomfortable silence. I hate that I am this way and I know I 'm not alone in mental mind fucking, but I think I may be a more extreme case.

Before I decided to drop everything and come to Korea, I'd seriously considered seeking some sort of "help" (although I have my doubts about whether it would improve anything at all--it may just be the only thing that hasn't been tried, a convenient solution to my messy mind) but I can't actually foresee improvement in my current state. Everything culminates. Everything in my whole goddamned life has culminated to this moment, now, where I feel kind of nauseated, with my cramped fingers and my heavy eyelids, and where I am writing this blog as a means to avoid doing other, unhealthier things. I forget nothing. I repress nothing. It's all on the surface and I've become so ashamed of it, so guilty for seeing it in myself when I wake up, that I can't leave the house until it's been conveniently tucked away in some back pocket or other. Someone once called me a "delicate child of life" and I laughed at his reference to Thomas Mann. I felt it was out of context.

And so here I am with all my wisdom and headaches and weight and loneliness and guilt and denial and memories and disgust and moments of wanting to act on impulse so, so badly. Perhaps I am even nostalgic for 2 weeks ago. Should I feel stupid for thinking this? Maybe, but I can escape everything but my thoughts.

I have turned on my telephone. Sometimes I answer and sometimes I don't.

Oblivion

This weekend I let someone take pictures of me. Having been told my entire life to 'not look so miserable,' most pictures of me and other people result in my face being stretched into a ridiculous Chesire Cat sort of smile. Everyone knows it's fake, but most people keep their own mouths shut about it, as they realize the fabrication is more a result of effort on my part, than deception. This weekend, I was told to "be myself," to not smile if it wasn't in the cards. That was some mighty ironic foreshadowing, because I feel smiling is beyond my current capabilities.

My name, "Aletha" means 'truth.' In Dante's Inferno, Aligeri's character travels to Hell where he comes upon seven rivers. The final and most elusive river is called "Lethe," a river which to drink from means everything and nothing at the same time. Drinking from this river, every personal truth is revealed. One single drop upon one's tongue means to know oneself, and blissful or otherwise, the truth will make you complacent since Man's ultimate desire has always been the quest for knowledge or happiness—but maybe these two are more closely connected than we—the collective, naïve, isolated mass of beating hearts and throbbing minds—think.

So, for one terrifying and beautiful moment, like a nifty magic trick, all is revealed. The smoke dissipates. The mirrors are cracked and crumble away. They fall to the dirt in tiny piles of finely ground dust. And for a whole minute, there is no need to be paranoid or suspicious. The burden of having to wonder is lifted, and maybe for the first time ever you can accept your sadness or your happiness as genuine and not just as a part of a series of convenient escapes. Sixty seconds go by…And then, just as easily as it came, everything is lost, for Lethe is the river of Oblivion. Lethe is beautiful and fascinating but highly forgettable. No one ever regrets forgetting Lethe or having taken that first little sip because they will never think of it again. As for Lethe, it remains in the Underworld, stationary, willing to share the little it can offer, but ancient and oh so tired with the life-burdens of countless bright-light seekers who have visited and rested by its shores, searched for meaning in its reflective surfaces, and then, having drunk their fill, calmly wandered off to Death, unaware of the second chance their new lives will offer them. They are without memory, veritable tableau rasos (blank slates).

Can Lethe really reflect? I don't know. It may have its more lucid moments…I imagine that like a pair of wide, dead eyes, a traveler of the depths might search steadfastly for that entire minute, trying to see inside, to find a source for the new feelings of overwhelming captivation and confusion. But, only able to catch a mirror image, the traveler gives up after that moment and decides to concentrate on himself…Just looking out for number one, Doll, and ain't I fine? … Narcissus did the same thing to Echo and I'm sure it's happening to some forgettable soul as we speak, as it will for time immemorium.

So, click flash, I stopped smiling my silly cattish smile. I gazed into the lens. I made eye contact. I let him search my face for traces of life. I told him that my only philosophy to existence (or otherwise) is that everything rots and revives. I wanted to tell him the story of Lethe. ..Instead, I drank some gin and muttered something about how I wanted a tattoo of the words "Entropy" and "Optimism" because they're the only things that make sense to me.

I cannot—should not—connect with people. Once I do, it's all over—and when I don't for this same reason (I learn from experience), it's generally over anyways—I guess I must have very few purposes. I have never had anything genuine in my life and have never expected to (as I don't feel I have ever particularly deserved it), but hardened to disappointment or not, my feelings are constantly being very hurt. The waters at Lethe always maintain the same depths despite innumerable visitors. Likewise, I have no desire to shed tears for strangers as appealing as they might have been. I have never wanted anything from anyone, so I am disgusted with myself for being so trusting. It won't happen again. I really ought to know by now that like me, other people are pretenders too. Sometimes it is the only way to even be in the same room as another person. When I don't lie, I am too revealing—which is the worst, most scary thing of all for one such as myself. Peel away the layers, guy, you'll find onions don't make me cry…

One of the worst feelings is that I may have caused unhappiness to someone else. That is something I may only reserve for yours truly. I sincerely hope it works out for those directly involved in this situation which I shouldn't even be a part of. At the subway station in Seoul I started to feel very depressed. I lied and said I was hungover. I cursed myself for having spoken at all about myself, for having stepped beyond the looking glass for a moment, when it's undeniably so much safer and warmer in my own fucking head. I hope I manage to find my way back soon. It's far too harsh out here. I shouldn't have stopped taking my pills this week. It was a stupid idea. I just wanted to not need to rely on what feels like pretence. But I guess if that's what the world needs to spin, why should I be special? I've been having some more than unpleasant thoughts the last few days. My old counsellor from university emailed me to check on how things are going here in Korea, I forwarded her this blog. I wonder if she is concerned…

I went to Dongdaemoon this weekend and bought some praying hands on a hinge that open up to reveal beautiful and intricately hand carved Buddha statuettes. It's lovely and I'm going to stare at it tonight while I damage my lugs and heart and should the taste prove too foul, perhaps my arms, with my Raison Blues, my current raison d'etre.

I need some sensory deprivation. I wish I had a bathtub so I could sit in the dark in body temperature water and simulate the womb or something. The 'mother' would be shocked at my desire to have any wish to retreat into her, but it's really more the hiding that I find so appealing because no one will come looking—why would they?

This weekend was frigid. With one exception, cabs wouldn't pick us up. We called the driver 'Joe' and his seats were leopard print. His English was decent and he wore a flamboyantly yellow shirt and a black vest. We taught him to swear in English and I don't think I've ever been so elated to hear someone use the word 'fuck' in my life. There was something just really cool about this guy and for 6000won and a 20 minute cab ride, the price was right. There are apparently no bars in Dongdaemoon or Jung-no 5. There were no tours going on at the Buddhist temple either, but it was beautiful nonetheless. I took pictures, of course, but who knows if I'll want to keep them once they're developed. No regret, just more sadness. Eyes a little less bright.

Antidote or Poison

I woke up this morning feeling rather strange. I keep my bed in a small area of my apartment with sliding glass doors and normally I keep them closed because otherwise I get to listen to traffic all night long. In my last apartment in Ottawa, when I lived in the basement of a really old house, I was terrified to sleep most nights for reasons I have yet to figure out, and woke up constantly, sure that my sleep was too heavy and unnatural, that my heart was giving way and that like all the useless words I've spoken to equally unempathetic people--words that have long sinced drowned in extra large cardboard coffee cups with recycled paper sleeves--my breath would sputter out and I would vanish into obscurity.
In any case, I would catch myself before falling entirely asleep, and sure that my sleep was actually death, I would jump out of bed and try to listen to my heart to make sure it wasn't beating too slowly or too quickly. Sometimes my paranoia lasted all night, everynight for days on end. I kept a full-length mirror on my apartment door, which I could see from bed, and sometimes I would glimpse a flash of light (a car's headlights reflecting from my window, no doubt) and become certain that some person had entered my apartment. The light just seemed too like movement and last year, in my advanced state of antisocial behaviour, the idea that something could be moving around in my room while I was trying to sleep (and not die) terrified me beyond belief. I bought a new doorknob with a better lock shortly after--but it really didn't make me feel better. I began sleeping with my face under the covers--and maybe that's why I felt like I couldn't breathe.
Finally, in utter exhaustion, I would convince myself that this wave of sleep coming up was safe, that it was only mild and that I wouldn't die, and if I did, well, why was I so afraid--that I had had the same thoughts the night before and managed alright. And then, everything would come together so perfectly and I could tuck my mind safely under my pillow (for quick retrieval in case of emergency), and the outsides of my eyes woud close so entirely that is felt like they had turned inwards. My floor would be left flooded with this memory of an ideal second--this blissful shutting off of my damn thoughts--that maybe I didn't appreciate as much as I should have, especially given it's fleetingness and the time and energy it generally takes me to mop (metaphysically or otherwise).
Anyway, this morning I woke up feeling paranoid as hell, this feeling that my space had been invaded and that I was surrounded by fog--that maybe the apartment was on fire or that I had left the gas on--of course everything was fine--but for nearly 7AM, I guess it just seemed far too dark outside--I'd have figured it would have been much lighter.

I dreamt last night--many fragments:

I'm sleeping in a very strange room on a very strange bed. It's a huge room with no floor. There are about 10 beds in this room with 9 other undisclosed people sleeping in them. The beds are set up like a sort of puzzle, as they are elevated at different heights and attached to strange metal rods that look like corridors--Kind of like K'Nex or an amusement park ride. I have this overwhelming feeling of not being able to move at all. I am absolutely paralyzed. I have a white sheet over me. Everything looks very clean. I see a mouse crawl up my corridor. I look down and finally see a floor that is covered with mice of all different colors. I am grateful that my bed isn't closer to the floor, though I am beginning to feel some motion sickness, like I'm moving around mid air. The mouse comes closer--I wish it wouldn't. I hate mice. It decides to crawl up my body and despite my efforts to prevent it happening, it crawls into my mouth and down my throat. Another one does likewise several moments later as Mouse #1 begins to eat my stomach from the inside (don't ask me how I know this). Mouse #2 has gone North, however and I'm sure it is eating my brain. Mild discomfort. Some anxiety.
I wake up and take some tylenol. Headache. I take the Prozac (2) for the first time in 3 days....Went back to sleep.

In then next dream, Maya and some guy are about to travel somewhere together. We're all sitting in mom's living room. I am by the fire, feeling annoyed at having to listen to voices when all I want is some quiet. Maya and the guy keep leaving and going together into the bathroom and for whatever reason, they start throwing all the contents of Maya's backpack down the toilet. Sitting in the living room, I realize I have to pee. I finally convince Maya to let me have the bathroom, which I am ever grateful to use. I flush. The toilet backs up books, jewelry, clothes, and of course, some lovely sewage. I panic, certain that it's all my fault. I can hear them all talking in the livingroom--Mom is saying something about a funeral and how "they took her urn out into the yard on sunny days, not realizing that in life, she was known for her aversion to bright light." There is laughter. I search madly for a plunger. I start plunging it all down. It's an awful mess and I feel so sick. Finally, it recedes and I am relieved. No mess on the floor. The last thing that comes up and just won't go down again is a library book. What seems like a long time passes. I just can't return the book, obviously because of where it's been. I write the librarian an anonymous letter and the librarian tells me to send him a Barbie and Ken doll wrapped in yellow paper and labeled B & K in black marker.

I wake up having to use the bathroom and with a really sore neck. It's 7am at this point (the same 7am mentioned earlier) and I have a really strange feeling of loneliness and complacency. It's an odd mix.

It's 2:16am..Taking a sleeping pill soon.

Focal Points

As ever, I remain faithful to my promise to write a weekly blog. I'm not sure how many people even read blogs anyway (all those damn words…) but I do think it's a good idea to have a sort of chronicle to look back upon.

This has been an eventful week, and work was admittedly pretty stressful mostly because of some scheduling changes and the fact that perhaps playing Scrabble all last week (when my voice was dead) set a precedent in class—one where quite a few of my students feel that it is perfectly acceptable for their parents to be paying major won for 3 days of board-games lessons per week…In any case, the children were not on their best behaviour and the little ones get really rude, even, blatantly ignoring me and carrying on their own conversations in Korean until I agreed to play Bingo. I get very little respect with these younger ones and it's strange how much a difference a few years can make—my other elementary school class—9 to 12 year olds are so well-behaved and only ever speak in Korean to translate for whoever else doesn't understand. I tried a sort of Round Robin fairytale storytelling thing with them to try and get them not only speaking in English—but thinking creatively as well—a concept that often gets them looking at me in a very confused way. I'm not saying that they have little creativity, but so far, it just seems that they become very confused when I try to do something outside of the book. I think Koreans must have a very prescribed sort of approach to education—The boss just does word for word translation with them in his classes .I looked at some of the sentences—just random phrases taken from books and the newspaper it would appear, often written in ways that no living English person actually speaks, unless of course said person was stuffy, pretentious, and spoke in the most flowery language used since the such Romantic poets like Byron….it's all a little much, I think. They really don't seem all that applicable to me, but whatever. Apart from that, the weeks are going by very quickly. The work week is very long—that I won't deny—but it seems that Friday rears its glorious head so very frequently...

Korea is the last place I imagined I'd get a chance to practice my French. The new Korean English teacher, Miss Kim, who oddly enough doesn't really seem to speak much English at all, came up to me on Tuesday and asked me whether I understood French. I was a little taken aback. Apparently she studied in France for 4 years, so she's extremely good. I am out of practice—my accent sucks—but at least I can communicate with her now and we're not just uncomfortably sitting in our office area, back to back, without ever uttering a syllable to each other. The boss took everyone in the school—me, Miss Kim and the receptionist out to lunch on Wednesday and at least this time he was considerate enough to ask me what I wanted to eat instead of just ordering some awful mountain of pork. The receptionist doesn't eat meat—only fish and beef and chicken, she says, to which I had to bite my tongue (I am worried about what she considers 'meat'). We ate tofu, kimchi and lots of vegetables and cooked rice. It was alright, but my boss keeps telling me that he's worried about my eating. Again, because I am North American and not heavy, he imagines that I never cook, never eat and never go grocery shopping. But my eating is a subject I do not wish to discuss with him. It's none of his business.

I went out for a drink one night this week with another English teacher in my building—A nice British guy who's self-conscious about his apparently advanced age (31). It was a good opportunity to actually check out some nice little chill bars in my city. We went to a couple of places and had a drink in each. I didn't really care for the first place—a very industrial looking place with lots of red lights and drunken Koreans. I felt like other than the bargirls, I was the only female there. It was kind of awkward. I drank beer (priced at a very un-worthwhile 8000W), which I found disgusting, as I am not a beer-drinking girl, but the only alcohol they had in the place was purchasable at ludicrous prices by the bottle. My British friend started chatting up a Korean guy sitting beside him at the bar—in front of him were about 20 empty bottles (I don't know how these people manage to function—this was at 11pm in the middle of the week). The Korean and his friend were planning on going to a nightclub—it was explained to me later that they were going to see some Russians dance around in g-strings.

Everyone is married in Korea—if you're 30 and single, there is something wrong with you. Most successful men are "businessmen"—whatever that means—no one ever tells me what area of business any of these businessmen are actually in. The wives of successful Korean businessmen are homemakers, like the spoiled women in my 'mother' classes, who have told me that they've (none of them!) never worked outside the home. I think infidelity must go on a lot in this country-- Prostitutes from Russia are a big thing here, strangely enough. I haven't seen any, exactly, but then it's not as though I go around looking. I have seen little vans where hookers are apparently driven around (spreading the love and the disease, I'm sure) like cattle at a fair. It was also explained to me that barber poles with double lines are essentially code for "get laid here—hookers somewhere in the vicinity"). It's all pretty sad. There are also little photographs of girls –advertisements—that I always see in the gutter and on the filthy, polluted sidewalks early in the morning before the city cleaners with their awful orange cowboy hat-uniforms have had a chance to throw them away. I find it all a little depressing. Interestingly enough, I never really see any public displays of affection—except for those repulsive "couples t-shirts" I sometimes see some lame people wearing, to advertise their affection). I wonder if people are really that modest or what? Today I was watching a couple in their late 20s standing in front of me on an escalator and the man was kind of trying to discreetly touch his girlfriend's ass…or put his arm around her. The woman kind of shuffled her feet a bit and the man put his arm around her neck, just an innocent little embrace. She squirmed away and gave him a rather not nice look that snarled "what the fuck, man? There are people on this escalator." But then again, maybe she just doesn't like him very much. I know very little about couples and relationships, as I don't really feel that I've ever particularly been in one where I had to see the other person more that once a week—so I could be way off…but whatever, it passes the time, making up stories about other people's lives for my own entertainment.

On Saturday, I had plans to meet a person I met on the internet at Seoul Station. I realized once I got there that though I'd written down his friend's cell-phone number, I'd forgotten it on my table all the way back in Bucheon. Of course, though I keep promising people that I will get one, I still do not own a cell-phone (I wonder if that makes me eccentric, as even 8 year olds seem to carry them around). I had no idea how massive Seoul station really is—unlike other smaller stations, it is virtually impossible to find anyone, anywhere. With several floors, a few waiting rooms, and about 10 separate exits, I was starting to feel a little hopeless about ever finding this person who I'd never actually met before…I kind of wandered around for half an hour and then went to the second floor and just stared at the influx of people from above. It's almost hypnotic, actually. They just kept coming. So much movement and so constant. I nearly got vertigo. I kept my eyes peeled for westerners and after awhile, figured I'd just go home and call him to apologize and explain about my un-preparedness. I was on my way to where I was going to catch the train and decided to walk outside (they keep buildings far too warm a lot of the time—not my school though—although the boss-man finally cracked and bought me a space heater for my icebox of a classroom) and it was actually really mild yesterday---too warm for my scarf and winter coat. So I'm walking (if you can call it that—I decided to buy a pair of heels yesterday, although I have the worst feet in the world and zero practice wearing anything but flats and sneakers for more than a couple hours at a time), sure that under my socks my feet were raw and bloody, and this guy comes walking right at me. I got a little freaked out (haha), but it was okay—the person I was trying to find found me, which is pretty impressive.

Anyway, in a bid to actually appreciate Korea culturally, we walked around Namdaemun Market, which I found really great. We also stopped and looked at this massive and ancient gate (built in the 1300s) which I found incredibly intricate and gorgeous. There is really nothing comparable in western architecture to old Asian palaces. The ceilings even had paintings on them and I think the whole structure must have been hand carved out of a million logs. I took a picture, not that it will do any justice to how beautiful this place is. What strikes me most profoundly is how old Korea really is and how young North America is. It is intriguing, I think, to have such a real sense of history and to actually mean something as a people. But it does bother me that American influence is so apparent in younger generations. I'm really getting sick of seeing people in hip-hop clothing (fupu?—they mix up their Bs and Ps sometimes and so most of their cheap knockoff clothing is ridiculous and in dire need of a good editor), or girls carrying around their Louis Vuitton bags and balancing on tiny stiletto boot heels (because everyone else has them…). There are many beggars in the Namdaemun area. It's pretty awful. I saw a guy with no legs pulling himself on a wooden plank with wheels, and lots of guys passed out on the grass or in one instance, on a staircase—either he was really really drunk, or mildly, um, dead, because a cement staircase is no place to sleep.

The market is incredibly vibrant, crowded as hell, and just generally a really exciting place to be. Like I said, a lot of knock-off name-brand clothing is sold, as well as t-shirts with really bad English (Konglish) on them. Really bad, like in some cases, the translation is so direct that together, they're just a string of nonsense words. I plan to buy a lot at some point. Souvenirs. I did buy some magnets of little Korean girls in traditional dresses—they're pretty nice and I'll probably send them to my mother. At the moment, they are on my metal door in my apartment, as my fridge is not that kind of fridge (more plastic—fake wood plastic, to be precise--on the outside than metal). I also bought a cheap pair of sneakers like the kind I used to wear all the time as a kid. It was necessary, because I was beginning to feel like I might just cripple myself…An afternoon of feet torture was sufficient. All sorts of food are for sale in the Market. I don't think I'd eat most of it though. There's something about squirming insects in wicker baskets that just doesn't whet my appetite. And the repulsive little silkworm pupa reminds me of nightmare insects…How anyone could actually put one in their mouth and proceed to chew is beyond me…Also available were chickens, just sitting out in the sun, doing their thing. I don't know how long they were there, but it looked like poison waiting to happen. The worst were the cow heads just sitting there in a pile, covered in either a thick brown red liquid (or maybe that was blood or muscle—I really don't know—up until yesterday, I'd never seen underneath a cow's skin before—don't ask me why, it's just never piqued my interest. Anyway, I took lots of pictures and I'm definitely going to need to get a photo album (as well as a digital camera soon). I tried getting a shot of this crazy guy dressed in really awful women's clothing trying to sell some equally awful clothing and he yelled at me to get in the shot with him. I have great expectations for the shot where he's placing my hand on his oversized tits.

After the market, we found a couple of decent places to drink and I consumed quite a lot of gin and tonic. We found a place that played really rock cool music with Hedwig and the Angry Inch posters and fantastic paintings of Rock Icons. There was even a guy with a guitar sitting at the bar that was pretty obliging with requests. I am jealous of musicians. I wish I could play some lovely Smashing pumpkins tune whenever I wished. I want to go back there again. It just might be my favourite place so far. Anyway, I think that I had some pretty interesting conversations last night and did a lot of really cool things and it was a pretty fun--albeit tiring—to go out drinking with someone I'd only just met. But I guess everything is pretty random and spontaneous here, as everyone keeps telling me. I was pretty hung-over and exhausted this morning. I bought some coffee at the subway station and took one sip. I really needed it. But then, the muscles in my hand decided to atrophy and I dropped the whole thing on the escalator. It was pretty embarrassing.

On the subway, I got momentarily lost because I took the express train and didn't realize I had to get out a Guro Station. I somehow ended up on the green line and looked around for someone to ask for directions. I ended up talking to this guy from Bangladesh (another innocuous "businessman) because I thought there would be a chance of his speaking English—which he did…He was going the same direction as me, so luckily, it worked out. I still felt drunk though and he kept asking me all these questions and talking about religion (he is Muslim) and how he is going to send me a copy of the Koran in English and be like my "elder brother" if I ever needed anything—"because a person can end up in Heaven or Hell," etc. I wonder if everyone realized I was still plastered. I was really not in a talking mood and was not really up for questions about my family and whether I had a boyfriend or not? Everyone was being really nice to me. Everyone who understood English pretty much piped in on the conversation. It was really bad. Why do I always pick the religious to ask questions to?

Anyway, it's nearly 3am and I'm getting a bit tired and feel I've written quite enough. In any case, I had a great time Saturday and am thinking of going to Insa Dong next weekend and maybe some sort of cool museum—like the kimchi museum (gotta love that old cabbage) or the Robo Park (who doesn't like robots?). I still want to go to a Buddhist temple, though. There're too many things I want to do…

Control

I wish I could control every aspect of my life. In my youth (and I realize some would argue that my youth is now, although I feel very old and so tired sometimes), I had this vision of myself when I reached the age of 22 as a brilliant, beautiful and jubilantly happy individual; A woman who never felt restrained by the world and people and all the emotional pollution that both produce so prolifically. Once I became an adult, I would not be haunted by physical insecurity, I would not be terrified of looking people in the eyes, and I would have a group of close friends who dropped in to see me in my fabulous and immaculately clean apartment on a daily basis—just like on television.

I was having a conversation with my mother on the phone the other day, and I mentioned to her that my boss recommended I touch the children more—apparently I am too humourless as a teacher (they just don't get sarcasm, is all…) to also be so sterile-seeming as well. I realize this sounds strange, but I am just not used to touching people. My mother is a teacher and she said that with "problem kids" teachers always make physical contact (a hand on the shoulder, or tousling the hair, etc). Well, I was never a "problem kid" and I can't think of a single incident where a teacher laid a hand on my shoulder (a physical reminder that there will be consequences to actions?) without me looking alarmed and pulling quickly away…I was one of those children who "didn't like to be touched." I hugged my grandparents when I saw them because I knew they expected it, it was the chore to remember, my brother, my sister and I, as we patiently waited our turn to participate in this strange and semi-embarrassing hugging ritual. But I never really hugged out of genuine affection for anyone. I refused to be hugged by my parents, as I hated them. Hugs from "the father" (who had a very Machiavellian perception of affection: Fear=Respect. Respect=Love) felt like suffocation; a stranglehold that would cause me to lose my balance on the eggshells we were all walking upon. Hugs from my mother felt unemotional, staid, an action performed more out of her notion of what a mother should do rather than genuine maternal feelings towards me (her depression and my unaffectionate personality allowed her to accept my silence and seclusion as complacency with our "relationship"). I disallowed all physical contact after a certain point, but I think by then, no one in my house really felt much like hugging anyone anyway.

Today, even though I am extremely sick, I went to E-Mart in search of a pharmacy. I explained myself as best as I could, and spoke so the technician could hear that I have laryngitis (I've got next to no voice right now). I was given a couple of boxes of something or other and she threw in a bottle of Korean medicine gratis—a token for the pathetically sick westerner with the runny nose. I tried it—it's repulsive. Anyway, after that I went and sat in the park for awhile, as the weather was actually mild today. I observed people, mostly other women about my age. I felt like comparing…I saw girls with their friends, giggling like maniacs, women with their boyfriends, looking quite comfortable holding hands. Ladies with their babies, bouncing them up and down. These people all looked pretty happy, I thought. These aren't the sort of people who need to work up the confidence to order at restaurants (they butt in front of me in lines and push me out of the subway….lol). These aren't the sort of people who pretend the doorbell isn't actually ringing like mad, if the house is messy and no one is expected. These people don't need to get drunk to make friends. Korean girls hold hands with each other all the time, I've noticed. Drunk Korean men walk down the street with their arms slung over each other for physical support. And that's fine.

I just thought that one day I'd reach a certain point, have a sort of epiphany, see the goddamn light (without going blind like Oedipus Rex), and just not give a fuck about what other people thought about me. One day, I would roll out of bed, realize my place as just another living person on a planet inhabited by 6 or 7 billion more individuals who, when closely examined, were really not all that different despite the latest and greatest in sociological research. I would go about my business approaching life anew. I would be a human phoenix; proof that people can change for the better, proof that youth and beauty can be a reward for destroying a less vibrant self. I would get a kick out of interacting with people—other members of my species. I would marvel at how amazing it is that on a daily basis, I breathe the same air as innumerable people, make fleeting eye contact with possibly thousands. Maybe, that brief second of eye contact or watching someone wait beside me at a pedestrian light will be the only time I ever see that person in my life. And maybe I'll remember what they look like, let that face get imprinted in my subconscious and allow it to somehow work its way into all those dreams I just don't remember. Perhaps in all those lost dreams, we are friends and get together and watch terrible B-movies, and drink Bloody Marys every Wednesday night.

Yes, as a child, I figured that one day I would be in control. My hands wouldn't shake, I wouldn't get headaches, eating wouldn't be an ordeal or ritualized. I wouldn't wonder about how many floors I would have to jump from to still stay alive. The only pills I would take would be bright orange multi-vitamins in the morning. I wouldn't feel inferior to just about everyone. I would grow up and be able to look people in the eyes. Every laugh I heard wouldn't spark paranoid thoughts and potentially unfounded inner seizures of utter humiliation. I would recognize the strengths that I did have and be okay. I would forget the horrible moments of my life, and not hide behind the defence of being a complicated person who didn't get enough attention as a child primarily because she was afraid to ask… When I became an adult, I would be perfect. Nothing would be beyond my grasp. Perhaps I was never really childish enough to actually ever grow up, emotionally. Maybe if I'd been more naive, less exposed to bitterness and rejection, things would be different. But maybe the idea of "perfection" has just become so convoluted in my mind that it itself is my restraint. Maybe my own mind is what's holding me back. If I had never had a vision of a proper life filled with happiness, confidence and purpose maybe it could have happened by now, as I wouldn't have spent most of my life lamenting its failure. Is hope really a constraint then? If I stop hoping for anything to change, will I get what I want—will I have control? If I want to be sociable, if I want to be wonderfully self-satisfied, I can have it, you say, crazy mind of mine…? And if I want to disappear then, I guess I should be able to do that too.

Numb

What can I say, really? Time seems to be progressing quickly and I keep meeting interesting intelligent--as well as irritating and boring--people from all over the place. The problem is that I usually meet these people when I am out drinking on the weekend, and what they learn about me and what I learn about them is most likely terribly skewed by the entirely different personality I seem to develop when I've had 2 or 3 strong drinks.--I'm not even technically supposed to be drinking because I have bad reactions whilst on my pills, but I don't exactly have the best history of heeding 'very good advice.'

I never drink lots--it doesn't take lots to get me really drunk these days. I think I may have even lost a bit of weight since I've been here (don't worry, people...). After 1 strong Long Island Icetea on Saturday, I was ready to become sociable, handled the general bar-flirtations well, and was ever-ready with witty commentary. A veritable social being. After a few drinks, I am quite the intriguing person, I'm sure, but I often wonder how much of my drinking personality is contrived especially for the purpose of communicating with other people. I am not a sociable person, I'm really not--the awful thig is that I'd really like to be. I just can't seem to handle a lot of chattiness, giggling and basically just a general sense of pretend-or otherwise calm when I'm my regular self.

Of course, now that I'm on 'mood-altering' medication, I don't quite know what my "regular self" is at this point. It really bothers me that I can't be like normal people without my daily green and white gel tablet, a bitter little pill which I've come to regard with much contempt. It's in a massive bottle. I've got a year's supply. I don't feel any better since I've e been on them and I've often felt terribly depressed since I've started taking them. Maybe I'm just to stubborn for pills to work. I am sure there must be some psychosomatic loopholes where Prozac is concerned.

My doctor told me that I was to email her every 2 weeks to talk about any potential reactions--I haven't yet...oops. I started on the pills immediately before leaving for Korea, so I haven't been to a therapist or discussed the things I normally would discuss with one in quite a little while. This sad little blog will have to be my therapy. It's almost perverse in a strangely fulfilling way allowing strangers to read my thoughts. It's like whispering things to someone sitting in front of you on the bus. I could disallow it, of course--I think Myspace has that option--but it's almost a little exciting. I'm a little strange that way. Let no one say I never reached out to humanity..

But yeah, my doctor said I might become really depressive while on the pills. She said that if I began to think awful little suicide thoughts I should stop taking them--which seems a little warped to me--rather purpose-defeating.. I have thought about death obviously--my own, I mean, ut when have I not, really? Don't most people at some point consider their options? I haven't fashioned a noose, bought any exacto knives (they all seem to have happy little Asian cartoon characters on them and the idea that I'll die and be discovered next to a knife with a picture of smiling-happy-best-friends-with-freakishly-large-anime-eyes-and-hearts-and-terrible-'konglish' on it makes me feel a little too ridiculous and melodramatic. I think this is just the way I am--This is how I've always been. I guess I'll still take them, like it or not, but a lot of the time, I'm still going to feel terrible.

On Sunday, I stayed in bed all day because I just felt so tired. I didn't feel like eating and I didn't feel like sleeping. I just kind of watched the clock and did some thinking. At about 630pm, I finally peeled myself out of bed, drank some milk and went for a walk. I bought a maroon scarf--exciting, I know--you don't have to tell me!--I need to be more motivated when I shop.

I went home, I went online, watched tv but couldn't really manage to focus long enough to see or understand a show....I do get English television...I just felt really out of it. My eyes feel like they're getting blurry again and I think I may need to find a place to get an eyeglasses prescription here in Korea. I felt really tired and nauseated (maybe I will start having migraines again...?) around 11pm, so I decided to return to the tomb of blankets that my bedroom always inevitably becomes. I was in no mood for consciousness that night, so I took a sleeping pill and was outuntil at least 6 the next morning. I didn't feel like working on Monday, needless to say--The school is always freezing and I'm just not feeling very dynamic at the moment. Go figure...

The Korean English teacher has left, so I don't really know what's going on with classes today. Hopefully I won't have to take over Cathy's duties in addition to my own. There are no other teachers here other than the principal and after my little tantrum, I doubt he likes me very much (it wasn't a full-out tantrum, but I was very confrontational, which I find difficult to do and unpleasant as hell. I felt like I was going to break down in tears--If I actually was able to shed them--that's how awful being assertive for me is...). Anyway, the problem was that my boss neglected to pay me on the 8th--my regular payday (according to my contract). And, on the 9th, he was supposed to take me to register for my Alien card becasue I need it to stay in Korea, legally. He told me that he would come pick me up at 10:30am on Thursday. Of course, he didn't show up and I got extremely upset. When I called his cellphone and then the school and didn't get an answer I began to think he was avoiding me and shirking the what he owed me--like a paycheque and all the clauses promised in my contract. I'd basically run out of cash at this point--I had brought well under $1000 with me to the country, so it's been a pretty frugal 5 weeks.

I ended up panicking, calling a friend and meeting her for coffee and a cigarette outside a convenience store near my apartment. This was at about 12:30 ( I have to be at work at 1:30 and my first class of the day was at 2pm). All of a sudden, my boss appears and asks if I've been calling his cell phone. When I glared at him and stammered the affirmative, he acted all surprised about my mentionning the Alien card. So, in a mad rush, he consents to take me to get it done and we speed all the way to Incheon's Immigration office in utter silence, fill out the paperwork, run up and down staircases rather than waste time waiting patiently for elevators that never come, and then speed ack home to Bucheon in what feels to me like an even more pinched sort of silence. I felt terribly uncomfortable. I asked him about getting paid...He said to me that I'll get it 'today.' However, by the end of the day, I am still broke and go home with a disgusting nervous feeling in my stomache and a sickening 'thudding' sort of headache. I call friends and am given the advice to be agressive, to demand my money first thing Friday.

Friday afternoon, I slink into the office and wait half an hour. I need to work myself up. At 2pm, I knock on the boss' door and ask if I will be paid today. "Yes," he says. "Can I be paid now, then?" "Yes," he says again, but doesn't make any movements towards his desk or wallet or anything. I am becoming very agitated. I say, "Umm...then pay me now please. I was supposed to be paid on the 8th--2 days ago..." I begin to feel a little faint; I am sure I must look green. He tells me I must wait until the end of the day. I consent and go back to my area. I am highly upset at this point. I am fidgetty and angry. I cannot focus on planning any lessons. I waited for another half an hour and knocked again on his door. This time I reminded myself to make eye contact. I forced myself to stick to it. I have problems looking at people squarely. I sometimes blur my eyes to make it easier. I told him that if I wasn't paid by the end of the day, I wouldn't come to work on Monday, that I must always be paid on the 8th of the month, that I don't enjoy being confrontational, but that I equally don't enjoy having to ask to please be paid. I mentionned the contract, how it says the school would pay for me to take a course or join a gym, like the former teacher, Rob did. I told him I wanted to join a gym as well, and that after I paid and registered I would bring him the receipt and expect reimbursement.

At the end of the day, I was paid and we had a conversation about my teaching style (which he knows nothing about). Apparently I need to be more 'entertaining.' I think you might see wherein lies the problem...

I think I want to stay overseas for a little while, but I don't know how enjoyable it's going to be to work for this man. This biggest perk of this job is my apartment, which is really nice. Everything is difficult for me here, but I guess it's still better than being stuck at home.

Sometimes I feel like I've totally missed out on life. Why does nothing bring me joy? My boss keeps saying he's concerned because some students don't have fun in my class. They want to be entertained, he says. I am not an entertainer, I am a teacher, I tell him. If I play games all the time, they'll never learn a thing and only speak in Korean--but I guess they'll still feel like attending (and therefore paying) his institute. Maybe he'll fire me. Fantastic...I'll play games, I guess if it makes him leave me alone. I can't talk to people at work anyway...The other English teacher doesn't really speak English and the boss isn't so great himself. In the other classes the students have at the school, apparently it's mostly translation stuff, so they only speak Korean in class (even though it's a school for learning how to speak conversational English...)--which is ridiculous. I can't really understand Korean yet and don't speak it, so yeah, it's a bit hard for me to 'lead' the class, as requested, when all the students are speaking in a language I cannot understand--probably about me... fuckers are making me paranoid...My boss also mentionned to me today that Rob (the former teacher) spoke some Korean (he was here for a few years and is married to a Korean lady) and that because he is male, the kids probably repected him more. I thought I was doing a pretty good job; the students seemed to understand everything in class--they are ale to have conversations and answer my questions, but if I'm just a boring asshole, maybe I should just go home. I'm feeling pretty bad.

Ghost Pain

I have such a terrible headache today. I think I'm getting sick again. I have a terrible scratchy feeling in the back of my throat, like my esophogus is going to come up and tangle with my tongue. I stayed in bed until 25 minutes before I had to leave for work today, even though I set my alarm for three hours before and cautiously opened my eyes to check on the time every half an hour or so. Getting up has never been so difficult. Today was hard for me. I just felt really out of it. I look kind of peaked today and my fingers are kind of shaking a little too much for comfort. I had terrible dreams last night. I recall two of them..

The first was strange and concerned dad (but most of them that do, generally share that trait). There was definitely more to it, but I only remember the ending, so I am going to write it down now before I forget:

We're in the house at Bolton Centre. Dad is still sleeping in the 'red carpet room' in the basement. I notice mom has been quiet (unusual) a lot lately. I go to ask dad what the problem is with mom and notice dad's hands aren't right. They are artificial--except they aren't--they're just not his. There's 4 fingers on each hand. The fingers aren't normal; they're long and thin, without nails and filed down to points. The skin is light brown and contrast badly with dad's dark skin. "What happened to your hands?" I ask. "Turned green and fell off." "Why?" "I'm being blackmailed," he says, "Your mother, too. If we don't do what they want next, it's my right foot, then my left testicle, left foot, right testicle. They've already taken your mother's womb." "Everything's replaced?" I ask. Dad answers, "It always is."

The second dream is one I've had before and really bothers me--It's terribly graphic and terrifying:

A girl in a short skirt is running and falls down. Her legs open like scissors. No underwear. Vagina opens and I have no idea which way her legs are spreading, but slowly, terribly, so fucking gradually, she is torn apart. Starting from this point, her skin is peeled back, her internal organs are visible, she is like a layered art exhibit. The worst part is that it is all happening so slowly. Suddenly there is no girl. Just a tangle of mush, red. Then I wake up. I go back to sleep, and finally roll myself out of bed when I realize I have less than half an hour to get myself looking presentable and ready to teach children..

I''ve had lots of sleep problems before, but I don't think I've remembered dreams quite so vividly since childhood--I had lots of nightmares then, too. Getting a little scared to sleep. Maybe this is just another issue to add to the list...life is fun.

4 weeks down

I feel incredibly awkward--or rather moreso, here in Korea. My mother called me this morning before work and asked how the job was going. I told her that it was okay--and I suppose it is--but that many students were shy, that I have to teach a group of 7 and 8 year old monsters and that I feel uncomfortable on Tuesdays and Thursdays under the scrutiny and pained expressions (I hope it's not me...) of the mothers' class--a group of women in their early 40s prone to absenteeism, bitchiness and a complete unwillingness to participate. When asked to read out loud, the woman at the first desk simply shook her head and said 'No.' After that, none of the others would either--I guess a sort of precedent--the stigma of being called on--was sort of established in that first class 4 weeks ago (I cannot believe it's nearly been a month and that I'll soon--finally!--be getting paid.). The class has been difficult to teach ever since. I always have to allow them to read aloud together, which makes it far too difficult to hear how well or badly everyone is pronouncing certain words--which of course means I can't single anyone out, correct them and thus, help them learn...and I want them to..It's just frustrating...

But yeah, honestly, on that first class that I taught alone on my second day at work, after Rob, the guy I replaced, left, I was so sick (I had a cold for about a month), could barely speak, and I had the incredibly paranoid sense that I was being mocked by this group of housewives who were ignoring me and speaking amongst themselves in Korean. Finally (perhaps my begging them to 'please try' sounded pathethic enough in myy scratchy, coughing, jetlagged voice), I could hear one voice actually applying some effort over the 3 or 4 others' mumbling incomprehensibly. The voice belonged to a woman calling herself the obviously anglicized name 'Sue'--I have a real problem pronouncing all my students names well--and they don't all choose English names--generally only the younger kids have them (although I have two middle school boys who've chosen to be called 'Lobster'--he thinks it sounds like 'rockstar'-- and Ringo, which are dumb names to be sure, but at least memorable..) Anyway, Sue is the strongest in my mothers' class, was the first to arrive that first teaching day, and essentially was the only participator in class. The others arrived 15 and 25 minutes late for the 1 hour class and I had to re-introduce myself and explain (for the 3rd time) the point of what I was trying to teach them (possibly Wh-Questions, but who knows at this point).

The lady who was 25 minutes late, a very chic looking woman with obvious talent in the make-up applying department, had also forgotten her book...Knowing that I'd been in Korea for all of three days at the time and didn't know a word of the language (I'm borrowing a language CD from someone, because I am so frustrated at not being able to make my point across and always having to go places with other people--or at the very least my sacred Lonely Planet phrasebook), these horrid women would more than occassionally start chatting loudly, talk into their fucking cellphones, and simultaneously break out laughing--at my expense I'm certain...I guess to them I am just some stupid Western girl who looks too young to be teaching anyone let alone a group of married women...Age is VERY important here, as it determines social ranking--everyone asks me how old I am...I don't like it). I felt like utter shit by the end of that first hour. I suppose I'm used to it, but I think it maybe just hurt a little more this time because I was trying really hard to look like the sort of person who should be teaching--a cheerful, patient, diligent type who is unconditionally understanding, perhaps? In Canada, I am none of these things.

In Canada, I rarely smile, hardly make eye contact and never wear color. In Canada, if I leave my house at all, I am always in a rush, never satisfied, and am proudly antisocial. Here, I am just not able to be any of these things. I can no longer use angst as my excuse, which is miserable, as it is my favorite one. haha. No, I guess, so far this experience is making me examine myself even more (yes, it's horrid, even more self-scrutiny--I'm not sure if it's healthy). I'm trying to determine which parts of my personality are legitimate and which parts are just part of the persona I'v assumed...So far, a month later, I can honestly say that I still feel just the same, but am realizing my acting potential (that is--I am not really a patient, calm, organized, 'together' person and I like wearing black for fuck's sake--but for the sake of my job, I will pretend to be a little different)--and I am becoming more sociable--or maybe that's just the Prozac...or the soju...I've been to some good parties at this point, in any case. I've met some interesting (mostly drunken at the time, however) other foreign (Canadian, American, British, Australian, Irish) teachers and a few English speaking Koreans...I guess I'll just say that I've singled out a few people who are more interesting than the others, and somewhat (though not quite) likeminded..It is with these people that I socialize with, mostly. Because without them, I would probably have yet to have seen or done anything outside of the street I live and work on (I've been taken into a different area of Metropoliton Seoul every weekend so far--I plan to go to a museum soon--I have a guidebook and I have actually become brave enough to attempt the subway system on my own without getting hopelessly lost (got there and back--to Yongsan--without incident on Saturday.

Anyway, it's been pretty surreal for me so far. Everyone stares at me, some giggle, lots of guys my age like to say hello..I wonder if the older people resent my presence in their country--outwardly they are very hospitable and polite, but I must admit, I can see where they're coming from--Why should they have to learn English? Although Bucheon does admittedly have plenty of foreigners, walking to and from work everyday, I am the only western-looking face on the sidewalks--when I am brave enough to walk them...Scooters, motorcycles and bicycles all ride on the tiny pedestrian walkway (where vendors are also selling fish, vegetables, chestnuts, etc) and the drivers are really quite unapologetic about very nearly running a person over.

Anyway, you all know I am a paranoid person...Koreans are pretty nice when I try to speak to them directly--sometimes they appear a little too eager to help me perhaps--it makes me wonder if their smiles are somewhat deceptive. Are they smiling because they think I am strange to look at--I often catch little children at my school,who I don't teach, peeking over the frosted glass window of the teacher's room where I hide out when not in class. Maybe younger kids have never seen anyone who looks like me.. So far, though I've obviously taken out the facial jewelry, the holes in my ears and face have been counted, and the issue of 'teacher's face' has created quite the ruckus among my 12-14 year old girls--one in particular (Jin Sun) who keeps telling me that I am 'so beautiful' and that she is ugly and needs to get plastic surgery (it's a big thing here, apparently and I notice it a lot in women) on her face--she says her mother told her she needed to 'change it'--particularly her eyelids (or lack of them) and her nose. Apparently plastic surgery is common here, especially for eyes, because Korean women like to emulate their favorite actresses and pop stars, who of course are not totally outside of the lure of that comparitively young evil--the West.

Anyway, things are getting better than when I first got here..I stayed in today (Sunday), however, because I've just been feeling a little depressed the last few days. I'm not sure the anti-depressants are really helping me, but I'll keep taking them I guess. It's bad, I guess, when you reach the other side of the world and still no real sense of happiness or joy is palpable. I am still victim to all my bad habits, unfortuantely and I struggle to keep my thoughts and my commitments and my obssesive little behaviours separated. Lately, when I am at home and inside, I even forget where I am. I could be anywhere, really, and still be the same. Sleeping is particularly strange for me here and I dream a lot. I've been talking in my sleep a great deal as well and I tend to wake myself up drenched in sweat (but I was told that night terrors would be a side-effect to my pills). I guess I'm a little stressed out with what's recently been going on at home with my parents and court and being filled in on all the gory details of my father's further descent into insanity and scariness. My mother thinks he may have had a stroke. Maya, being Maya, wrote a short, traumatic little story about our lovely homelife as children and wants me to illustrate it--which I will--I have bought art supplies and have done a few sketches--once I feel a little more comfortable---It's incredibly hard to follow everyone's advice and "move on" when they all keep rubbing my nose in it on a daily basis...The nightmares don't help either...More later.

.

I don't really have much to say except that I've wasted reading week being very very very depressed. I have so much work to do and I can't really seem to get started and I am beginning to fear for my life. I am completely isolated as ever, but it seems to weigh on me more. If I die, no one will know about it until I am late on rent. I am being self pitying but it is also a pragmatic way of looking at things as I tend to go weeks at a time without talking to anyone at all. I may get "help" this summer but I'd really rather just disappear for awhile--not that I could afford it--I cannot stand much more of my condition and it seems that things need to change. I don't care for prescriptions but my generally unhappy and morose (yet functionally witty, I might say) demeanour has been replaced with the inability to even fake smile or get out of bed so I don't know. Noone likes you when you're down, not that I've ever been sufficiently "up" or convinced of my being "liked" on any sort of regular basis, so as soon as school ends, don't expect to hear from me for awhile. Best of luck to my friedns I hardly ever talk to.

22 idle years

I wish I could hold together the structure of my thoughts, but they jingle around in my head like tacks, their little red haloes lessen the tiny stings by half. Pity.

I've destroyed myself again and I feel as though my skull bleaches itself without the necessity of death or rot. My misery is a pretty fucking arid place.

I wait for telephones that will not ring and if they do, the voices that speak will come from mouths whose words burn hotly behind stupid tongues that manage to chastise and congratulate in the same tone.

I push everyone and their beautiful deliberate walks away from me, nice things said I roll my eyes.

No flowers--I have allergies.

No chocolates--I am not hungry again.

Nothing heart shaped unless it's still bleeding and in a cool jar.

That's just the way I am. Too worthy to be worthy. Take it away.

Let me rot and wallow in my lonely little melodrama that no one wants to see.

Let my bones protrude and the vein above my eye show through my skin when it becomes like the paper I would be writing this on if it weren't for the convenience of my keyboard

It's got three sticky keys that I have to use a knife to pull uppp.

Let the room fill up with smoke because no one will object if the pack goes down and my lungs dry up.

I'll make the room smell of secrets, here where your words are not heard, no desire needs to ever be felt at all because we leave that at the door here.

Right by the umbrellas that I never remember I have.

Boredom Exercise #1

He made his way down the narrow aisle of the city bus with the painful sort of clumsiness common to the very old. His hips were wide and covered by an ancient looking blue sweater vest, ill-fitting, stretched out, and reaching to his knees. He settled into his seat, without ackowledging either of the two people who, upon his approach, quickly removed themselves from the bench at the front of the bus. This section, clearly marked with red and black stickers, silhoutting photos of an old, stooped over lady with a walker, a baseball capped person on crutches and an exaggeratedly pregnant woman, is taboo for the young, healthy and barren. In the summer this apparent VIP section reeks of body odor, alcohol and the thick perfumes of elderly women in floppy hats who clutch cloth shopping bags and often make conversations with reluctant drivers, attractive teenage girls, or sometimes, in the spirit of the one-sideness of most bus discussions, simply chat and laugh to themselves. Highschool kids at the back giggle, sitting in their little groups of three or four, sometimes slightly too loud for politeness, while professionals, black-jacket-starched-collar-sensible-shoes, look to their peers, engage in a momentary silent and collective eyebrow raise and proceed to shift around uncomfortably in their seats, as though disconnecting themselves from the potential contagion, saturating the upholstery of the seats, that is old age and senility.