"Metrosexual men would resent any implications about their sexuality, and never consider themselves anything but 'real men.'"

Oh, lordy. We're really going to talk about this, aren't we.

When Young-Kyung (my youngest co-teacher) explained to me last night that this symbol marks parking spaces reserved for female drivers, I was dumbstruck. Apparently, these "privileged" parking spots are commonly found outside of department stores. Ugh.

I told some of you that "blurring gender norms" was this week's english-teachers'-tea-time topic (incidentally, also chosen by Young-Kyung). I was excited when I found it out (maybe my co-teachers aren't as heteronormative as I thought!), but I'm afraid the result was discouraging, to say the least. The conversation centered around whether the "shocking" behavior of so-called "metrosexual"* men should be acceptable. My co-teachers all agreed that while they had no problem with men "dressing up, styling their hair, going to the salon, or wearing makeup," no woman in her right mind would ever want to marry such a man. Their main concern about "metrosexuals" was that accepting their behavior would lead to an increase in what they called the "homosexual problem." Thanks to Harisu, the topic of transgendering was briefly discussed, but predominantly dismissed as a hormone defect, an illness to be pitied.

I was so uncomfortable and upset that I could barely speak. I did my best to explain that I view sexuality (not to mention style of dress) as a personal choice and believe that all personal life choices should be accepted. I explained the difference between transgender, transvestite, and homosexual to my confused co-teachers, and also explained that "no, Harisu's husband is not gay, because Harisu is a woman." See here for South Korea on transgendering and marriage.

I told them that I had many homosexual and transgender friends, and that I found their personal choices just as acceptable as the choices of heterosexual people. I'm sorry guys, I couldn't come out to them, I just couldn't.

I wanted to cry after the "tea time," but instead I went to my last class of the day and made them laugh with my comic strips and satoo-sensei acting style (i.e. I am two people at once, perpetually jumping around the room and using papers with "Gary" and "Semin" [the textbook's name choices, not mine] written on them). This week, Semin tells Gary to watch out because there is a car coming, but Gary has his head up his ass and gets hit by the car anyway. His elbow breaks. The class thinks it's hilarious when I fall down and yell "Ouch!" while clutching at my elbow.

I can't talk about gender and queerness anymore right now. It's making me depressed, and I have productive things that I want to do today. Like Korean class, I am going to Korean class every Saturday now. Just know, all you lovely and brilliant friends, that I love you and miss you to distraction.

So, in conclusion:

Look at that smug little asshole, perched up on the ceiling where he thinks I can't get to him. He's been torturing me for two days. He hides during the day and only comes out at night when I'm half-asleep to bite any pieces of skin left uncovered by my blanket.

I took my world map, rolled it up into a pole of sorts, turned a flat-bottomed cup upside-down and put it on the end of the map, and stealthily smashed the little fucker. Take that, asshole.

*Why do people call it "metrosexual," anyway? The connotations have everything to do with style of dressing and toiletry habits, and nothing at all to do with sexuality.

il-il-il-il

Seoul likes filtered water. Everywhere, there are water coolers with as much near-boiling/near-frigid tasty water as you could possibly want.

Ergo: the water cooler for my apartment building is in the hallway on my floor, about 4 meters from my door. I frequently leave my door ajar as I go to fill up my water jug, and I did so last night at about 1 in the morning. Only, last night was a windy night, and a strong gust through the hallway blew my door shut. It's self-locking.

The last time I felt like I was losing myself here, I stayed up all night skyping and writing postcards. This time, I sat outside my door for upwards of 7 hours in nothing but my bathrobe, intermittently filling my water jug with hot water to keep myself warm (it's cold here now, did I tell you? Last night was a quite the windy thunderstorm, and I would have loved it if I had been under my comforter). I didn't have a cell phone with me, so I couldn't call my co-teachers or my building manager, so the only thing to do was to wait until the building manager arrived at about 8:30 this morning. By the time I got back in my room, I had a slew of missed calls from Park Mi-Ran, wondering where I was. I'd been having a rough night before I got locked out, so I'm sure you can imagine that I was on the verge of tears when I described to her why I hadn't arrived at school that day. She was quite concerned, and convinced the vice-principal to give me the day off so that I could rest and warm myself up. (Maybe they're worried I'll get swine flu?) The day off was really nice. I spent it drinking tea and eating boiled eggs and reading and napping and trying not to think about lesson plans. I may or may not be recovering from my 2-3 day slump.

I've been having a rough weekend of it. I couldn't really tell you why. I feel utterly incapable of preparing for my classes. I feel sick-ish. I am panic-stricken and convinced that I am not doing and will never do anything worthwhile. (Did you know that my greatest fear is stagnation?) Then, last night, I got a confirmation of sorts that a friendship which I knew to have ended has been severed more completely than I thought, and I still don't understand what I did to make this person hate me so much.

I am at my worst when unshakably convinced of my own worthlessness, and I was certainly convinced of it over the weekend.

Don't take this post too hard, though. You should know by now that I have these days sometimes, no matter where I am or what I am doing. At the risk of cheapening my own emotions, I might go so far as to say that, quite simply, the honeymoon period of my stay in Seoul is over, and I am now faced with a more realistic picture of how hard it will be to build myself a life here.

On the up-side, I killed 4 mosquitoes while I sat out in the hallway, which is totally a record for me with Korea's mosquitoes from hell.

the mountains climb themselves

1. 무궁화, mugunghwa (mugung = eternal, hwa = flower), hibiscus syriacus, rose of sharon: the national flower of Korea.


2. I just banged my knee against the corner of my desk, and then had the strangest urge to lick the tiny film of blood that has formed over the scratch.

3. When you say you like hiking here, be prepared to follow through. They don't fuck around with hiking. Two of my co-workers have taken me hiking over the mountain behind the school so far, and many more offers are pouring in from others to take me mountain climbing on weekends. Wednesday's steep climb made me want to die (but in a really good, happy way). Some of my co-workers hike over the mountain to work. Contemplating joining them.

4. Lesson planning, lesson planning, revising, lesson planning, "do you have any suggestions?", revising, lesson planning. Most of my C-level kids can't read English.

5. I made a 2nd grade girl cry today, then felt like a useless turd for the rest of the day. The first day I taught her class, I made all of the students do short introductions of themselves in English. She was shy, that day, and it was obvious to me that she didn't want to get up and introduce herself, and she wouldn't meet my eyes, etc.... but golly. Today I asked the students to practice a dialogue in pairs for a few minutes, and when I got to her and her partner to check up on them, they weren't talking. So I asked them if they had any questions. Do you understand? Do you what I asked you to do? Are the words hard? Do you need help pronouncing them? No response. Her table partner tried urging her in Korean. My co-teacher, Shin-Jeung, came over and tried urging her in Korean. She wouldn't speak in Korean or English, wouldn't meet our eyes. Please try, please repeat what I say (pointing to the dialogue). Nothing. This is English conversation class, you have to try to speak. Don't worry, you can do it. Please try. She started tearing up. Oh, fuck. I didn't mean to make you cry! Next class, I said, I'm going to ask you to speak again. Finally, a nod of comprehension, and a meeting of my eyes. What on earth should I do? How do I help her?

6. Goddamnit, stop serving fish patties for lunch. But those pheasant eggs are delicious, mmhmmm.

7. Just discovered aloe juice with aloe pulp at the supermarket. This might well replace my love affair with mango juice.

8. I feel overextended. Can you tell that I feel overextended?

9. But sometimes, over-extension makes me happy. Maybe this is one of those times.

10. The mosquitoes here have quick reflexes. Think killing mosquitoes is easy? American mosquitoes are lazy. Korean mosquitoes are fast. It land on your foot --> you start thinking about your foot --> that damn-ass mosquito is out that bitch. Tricky mind readers.

I just killed one, though, that had been torturing me for a half-hour. Damn, I love killing mosquitoes.