bikini tribal

disco thong sandals! (RIP)

Obligatory photo of La Casa Rosada.

BALLZ

[the corpse of] Ulises' grandfather is in here.

Alexi's roommate (left) and creepy-ass landlord (right).

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

kiwi licuado, SO GOOD

KY gel valentine's day heart-shaped balloon.

tourists are welcome here?

jesus guarding over the children('s playground)

IT WAS THE BABY

doll/dyke

dyke/doll

THE FUTURE

pam-mom meets pam-mom, suckles tits

for papa, from agus and mama

choripan of DOOM

at the Eloisa Cartonera collective, we painted books.

I painted this one. Obviously.

then the city FLOODED. THRICE.

ewwwwwwwwwwww

skype 3-way

audra and ulises at the outdoor milonga near feria

el caminito in la boca

SHE'S FUCKING THAT HORSE

what would lar-bear say.

red cow-print tango shoes!

and then he told me I was a god

6 Feb. 2010

I've been dreading this movement but now I am moving (because it is time to move) and it feels like coming home a little, somewhere along the line airports ceased to be confusing and unknown places and became something like my comfort zone. Once more I am not searched at customs, though I have a shaving razor in my carry-on and I'm carrying several hundred dollars of converted currency that I was really supposed to report. #privatemeat is a cheese "whopper" in the lounge outside customs, I guess I eat cheeseburgers now

if I still have enough ₩ for wine. On the bus from Seoul I teared up briefly - it felt like I was leaving Korea - I am leaving Korea. Passport control asked me if I was coming back to Korea and I said yes - that's true, and I'm positive I projected the vulnerability in her tone. How strange that there is even the option to not come back but outside of my job there is nothing really to hold me here and I don't know why I am cleaving so tightly to Korea when it was so easy to leave Michigan.

15 Feb. 2010

They'll serve my cappuccino after I finish my panqueque 55, they don't drink coffee with food here. Korea doesn't drink any beverages with food, unless it's alcohol (I'm thinking about Korea a lot here). I've only just found out that Argentina is usually considered a third-world country, I'm not even sure what that means. The fact of my American privilege more obvious than it has ever been before (more obvious than in Korea? where I am given a job only for speaking English, where even the oldest person at the table sometimes treats me as the honored guest. I have things these people do not have and have no expectation of ever having. (Not all of the people, I mean, I don't know what I mean.

16 Feb. 2010

("Oh! Girls from Michigan are beautiful!") I imagine that everyone who sees me and Audra together here forms the assumption that all girls in Michigan don't shave their armpit hair. I finally managed to keep my eyes closed the whole time with two of the leaders, maybe I didn't even want to open them

Told me I was so tall and beautiful that if I would only dance my height (instead of trying to fit myself to the height of my leaders) I would have the world at my feet because I am a god ("sos Dios"?)

17 Feb. 2010

"Hola Leo, dame un poco de tu fuego" -Oscar, I don't know what it is about me that makes all the middle-aged porteños think I'll respond to the most saccharine and obvious pickup lines they can muster. "La vida es corta" is another

FUCK TANGO IS THE WORST THING EVER FOR MY SELF-CONFIDENCE IS THIS REALLY WHAT I NEED NOW?

24 Feb. 2010

I wonder if Korea will feel like home when the plane lands. I feel like a raw nerve right now - we're on the highway out of BsAs, I don't know if I'm ready for my sense of reality to shift again so soon. Nelly Furtado "I'm like a bird" just started playing in the taxi, we're at the toll booth. I'll definitely blog about that when I get home.

There's a strong "tow wind" which has "decreased our flight time substantially" - to 8 hours! Originally, flight time was 12 hours between Buenos Aires and Johannesburg, or something like that (though I can't be sure, flight lengths and times have been blending together these days) and I thought: OMG! only 8 hours! what a relief!

Turbulence is a side-effect of the strong tow wind, they've told us. I like the turbulence when it happens, it reminds me that there is a world outside, that we do not exist in isolation in this claustrophobic space. Most of the windows are closed - the window across from me was still open for a while and I could see some sort of horizon through it (though it was dark out, and we've been above cloud-level this whole time - maybe the horizon was the line between our layer of clouds and pure sky?) I liked that horizon, but my window view is gone now. It's light out now, I can see a corner of someone's open window and the real light from it is a relief from the darkness of the cabin, though I'm the asshole who turned on my reading light while most other people are still trying to sleep - I'm sorry! I tried to sleep, really, but I couldn't and the darkness and inactivity was making my head feel too tight, I needed light and OH NO now I can't even write anymore if this pen dies.

[pen didn't die! don't worry <3]

26 Feb. 2010

I've gotten so comfortable in seat 38A, by the window, that I'm dreading leaving it a little, leaving it means I am getting terribly close to Korea, terribly close to having responsibilities again.

새해 복 많이 받으세요!

Today was the first business day of the new year, which means even though most teachers are technically on vacation right now, a lot of people, and especially the head teachers, were supposed to come to work today. There was a celebratory lunch, with persimmons and rice-cake/dumpling soup and sake and wine, and all around me, all day: 새해 복 많이 받으세요! (sae-hae bok manee badeusaeyo! = Receive a lot of luck this year! = Happy New Year!)

Winter classes commenced this morning, as did approximately 30 cm of snowfall - which is highly unusual for Seoul. I've been told that the last time Seoul got more than 10 cm of snow TOTAL over the course of an entire winter was 10 years ago. 30 cm in one day is absolutely unheard of. But despite that, very few schools canceled winter classes. Since the roads were horrid and nothing was canceled, the subways were a warzone. I've gotten pushy about my subway etiquette, but twice I had to let a crowded train pass and wait for the next one. People propel each other on and off the trains, I was being pushed forward so quickly that I lost all balance or control of my steps, and had a moment of panic when I realized I was crossing The Gap Between the Train and the Platform and not able to Mind it in the least (i.e. I couldn't see where I was stepping, but knew that somewhere down there was a gap big enough for my foot to fall through). It was terrifying, and it put me in a really bad mood. Luckily, there was a 10-minute walk through the snow to calm me down.

3 students showed up to students' English camp, which technically starts at 8:30 am but doesn't really start until 9 am. That means 13 students woke up, saw the snow, and decided it wasn't worth it. I don't really blame them.

But only 1 teacher was absent from teachers' English camp, and that was fun. A few teachers that I truly didn't know could speak English are attending, and their grammar is perfect and their vocabulary is huge and I really can't figure out why they haven't spoken to me before, since their enthusiasm today showed that there are a lot of questions they want to ask me (about English, about life in the U.S., about my life in Korea, etc). Anyway, it was fun.

I haven't written on this blog in what feels like ages. I guess ages = one week when I'm addicted to telling you all everything (not everything, never everything, but I try) about my life here. It doesn't feel right for you to not know what is happening.

I just realized this is going to be a long post. Prepare yourself, or give up now, whichever you prefer.

I have 2 important things to tell you:

1. I've decided where I'm going for my 3-week February vacation: Buenos Aires, Argentina, to meet Audra-friend and be silly and dance tango together. Financially, I'm being a little irresponsible, and setting myself back about a month-and-a-half paying back my student loans, but I've been working hard here, and I have both the time and the money to make the trip, and a good friend to spend time with while I'm there, and I don't know when all those things will coincide again, and anyway what I mean to say is I just really want this, and so I'm going. I've bought the ticket: Feb. 6, Seoul --> Hong Kong --> Johannesburg --> Buenos Aires, 35 hours total in transit. I can't wait.

2. I was talking to Park Mi-Ran the other day, and she was telling me about some changes our school might be making to their admissions process for the 2011 school year, which would allow students from all over Korea to apply, whereas right now only students who live in Seoul can apply. In theory, that would mean that instead of admitting a group of underprivileged and largely unmotivated students who have done poorly in Seoul's middle schools, my school would admit a group of students from rural Korea who have never before had a chance to receive a big-city education and who would (probably) be highly motivated. It would be exchanging one group of students who never had much of a chance in the Korean education system for another group of students who never had much of a chance in the Korean education system. But Park Mi-Ran really hopes the change happens, because she is excited to be able to see the students working hard and to be able to watch their English improve. With our current group of students, it's sometimes hard to see improvement. With a few exceptions, they're not very motivated to learn English.

Anyway, I am getting close to the important thing I have to tell you. About half-way through my conversation with Park Mi-Ran, I realized that she was telling me about these possible changes to try to convince me that I should renew my contract at Seoul Electronics High School. It made me really happy to know that she wants me to stay, that she wants to continue working with me. What she doesn't know, and what you maybe don't know, is that with or without the projected changes to school admissions, I really really really want to stay, I think, I really really really want to renew my contract. The time hasn't come to make the final decision, yet, and it won't come for at least another 5 months, but you should know that I'm seriously considering staying in Korea for another year beyond my current contract, maybe even longer. I'm in love with my school, both the teachers and the students, and I have a lot of goals here. I don't think I'll be ready to leave until I'm satisfied that all of them are complete: 1. become proficient in Korean, enough that I can carry out any necessary conversation without resorting to English; 2. become a confident English teacher, to both high school students and adults (subgoal: get my TEFL certification); 3. travel the Korean countryside extensively, climb a lot of mountains; 4. travel to places that are more convenient to travel to from Seoul than from other places I am likely to live in the future: China, Japan, Vietnam, Indonesia, New Zealand, maybe India.

In conclusion, I feel (and have felt for a while) that I am in this for the long haul. That feeling is subject to change, of course, as my time here continues and my perspective shifts, but right now, I'd put the cap on my time here at somewhere around 3-5 years.

Are these 2 important things I have told you making you unhappy? I hope not. Realize that I am doing both of them not to hurt or avoid any of you, but because I feel that these decisions are what's best for me right now, these are the things that are making me happy.

I don't even remember what a milonete /is/ anymore.

I went to meditation club for the second time today, because I thought about it and realized that I wanted to. I don't know if I'm doing it "right" (if there is a right way to do it), but I find it relaxing and feel calmer than usual afterwards. Which I like, and want to continue.

My first class today went really well, and I felt for the first time as though I was getting the hang of teaching. The other two classes I have on Thursdays were not as smooth, but who knows, maybe one day I will feel as though I've got the hang of it again.

I've found another tango place that offers beginner and intermediate lessons (as opposed to Tango O Nada, which only offers advanced lessons). It's called El Tango Cafe. But I need to call them to get their schedule for sure. Shy Pam/the Demon doesn't want me to call them. @warmandbarky @bird_esque if you have the time, would you mind harassing me about this a little?

tango, or NOTHING.

NOTHING, you understand?

@bird_esque @warmandbarky @gambolholic I FUCKING FOUND IT.

Starting this week, Monday nights are tango lesson&milonga nights for me. Hold me to that, will you?

My co-workers are all very consistently concerned (part 2): that I don't like spicy food. Which is true, usually. Those of you who have gone with me to Indian restaurants know this well.

But my former habits notwithstanding, I've been eating everything I think I can stomach from the school cafeteria - which means a helluva lot of spicy food. I don't even blink at kimchi anymore. And I'm pretty sure that my spice tolerance has gone up significantly over the course of the past month. (Sidenote: I'VE BEEN HERE A MONTH. WEIRD.) At first, I needed to drink cold water after every meal and my mouth would still burn for 10 minutes or so... but now my mouth doesn't burn at all, and more and more frequently I join my co-teachers for hot rice tea immediately following the meals.

All of that, with one notable exception: Wednesday this week, I took a serving of hard-boiled egg cooked in soy sauce with vegetables that I thought looked like sweet peas. Hey, I love sweet peas! I'll take a big bite of them. But as we all know, they were hot peppers, not sweet peas. My mouth flamed and my eyes watered profusely, and I had a good laugh about it with the other teacher (all of whom had known to avoid the hot peppers, of course). Now, every time they tell me about a Korean food I haven't eaten before, they say: "It's a little spicy, but less spicy than hot peppers." Giggle giggle. It's great.

I taught shy girl again today, and she spoke! Just a little, just for a second, but it made me really happy and relieved.

Thursday after work, I was invited to join the teachers' meditation club, and why not? I've never really tried it before, but now seemed like the perfect time.

It lasted two hours. There was a professional meditation therapist visiting the school this week, so the club took 4 times as long as it usually does. And everyone went around and shared their feelings in Korean - I had no idea sharing feelings was a part of meditation! - and of course, I was the only one who spoke in English (though there were 3-4 people there who could what I was saying). Several of the teachers shared their feelings for extended periods of time, and many of the club members started crying while they were talking. I felt really awk. It probably would have been really emotional if we spoke the same language, but as it was, I just didn't understand.

Parts of it I really enjoyed, and found useful. But I don't know how I feel (hehe) about the sharing of feelings at the beginning and end of the session. I haven't decided if I'll return to the club or not. It meets every Thursday.

Teachers' choir is wonderful. After practice today, they served snacks which tasted like Devil's Food cookies. Only they were chocolate-dipped rice cakes. Dduk dduk dduk. Man, that chocolate really hit the spot.

Tomorrow evening, I'm visiting Park Mi-Ran's house. She's offered to teach me how to make [a dinner dish the name of which I can't remember, which consists of sweet potato noodles, served cold with steamed vegetables and suchlike], and then take me night-time hiking with her husband and her on the mountain next to her house. Lordy-Lou.

The End! Heartz.