The Aftermath

I'm not even sure anymore if aftermath is one word or two... But I would think that if I split it into 2, then it would be something like, "after math, you have to go to history." I'm just gonna stick to one word because I'm too lazy to type it into Google and check. This is what my English has become.

This week was fairly eventful. I was the MC for the play contest at my school. Everything turned out fine more or less. Since I basically wrote the whole script by myself, I got to pepper it with a lot of my humor, which was surprisingly appreciated by the audience and teachers. I'll translate part of our dialogue for you as an example of what my humor has degraded to:

Co-MC: Hey Joe, have you ever performed in front of people on a stage?
Me: Of course! Ever since I was a little boy, the crowds loved me. When you look at my face, don't you immediately think "ACTOR!" Brad Pitt has nothing on my looks.
[Insert whatever hand/facial gestures you find make the dialogue funnier, and that's what I did] ;)

My classes play went pretty well. I thought we would win a prize, because (since I also wrote our play) the script was witty, my classmates made some amazing props, and we all acted fairly well. I had a bunch of fun doing it though. I always enjoy events like that. I think it's a great bonding experience for the class unless they take it too seriously and start fighting... which happened. Luckily, things smoothed over, at least on the surface, and we were able to push through it.

After the play contest was over, I was hanging out with some classmates. I decided to drop by the police station to find out if they could fingerprint me there. I went with a German girl and an Indonesian girl. When we walked into the police station, everyone stopped what they were doing and just stared at us. I walked up to the desk, and the officer at the desk panicked and said in Korean,"It's a foreigner. Hey you! Come talk to him." Another nervous officer approached me, but before he said anything, I just started speaking to him in Korean.

"Hi, I need to get fingerprinted because I need to change my visa. Can I do that here?" Needless to say, he was a little bit surprised. All he could get out was, "Why?" Seeing as we haven't studied criminology in my classroom yet, I do not yet know how to say "an FBI criminal background check is required" so I just answered, "I just need it to change my visa." The Indonesian girl chimed in, "He has to send it back to America." Because she was the only one that looked Asian out of us, the police then ignored me and started talking to her. "We don't have the fingerprint cards here, but if you bring your own, then we can do them for you blah blah blah." What's the lesson I learn from this? No matter how proficient I get at this language, they will always prefer speaking to someone they believe is a native speaker.

I also went to a language exchange event this week. Some guy came up to me and my classmates in our school and asked us if we wanted to participate. It sounded pretty lame to me, but I figured that if I went with my classmates, it would at least be a little bit fun. Normally these events just turn into Koreans trying to practice their English. And if you want to practice your Korean, the conversation usually doesn't progress past "What did you eat yesterday? Was it good? What is your favorite food? WOW YOU SPEAK KOREAN SO WELL!" However, this event was all in Korean. It was really nice. I made some friends there, and I hope to back and do it again sometime soon. They had us doing some weird activities though...

(Forgive me if my English breaks down in this section. What was said doesn't translate very well.)

 They asked us to pick a paper color that represented our spirit/mood/heart that day. Me, being the artistically minded person that I am looked at the colors very carefully. I saw blue and thought, "Hey, I like blue" and picked it. We then sat at a table where they told us to "draw anything we want, but it has to represent our what we were feeling." Although artistically minded, I seemed to be struggling in this area for a while. What is representative of anger? Draw a picture of someone punching another person? What is representative of happy-go-lucky? A smiley face? What is representative of depression? One guy standing alone while everyone else has a date? I guess I should have paid more attention to my feelings growing up. After staring at my blank blue sheet of paper for a while, I had an idea. "Hey, I like music!" (My mind usually only speaks to me in 4 word sentences that consist of "Hey, I like [insert noun]") So I drew music... sheet music.

After this exercise was done, they evaluated our artwork. My Indonesian classmate had drawn a tree with all different colors of leaves next to a park bench on a sunny day. They told her, "Oh, this is a beautiful picture! You have a very bright personality because you used all these different colors blah blah blah. Normally, people who only pick one color are a little bit dull. They are usually under a lot of stress, especially if they choose black." It was then that I looked at mine; I had drawn the whole thing in black. When they asked for my paper, I lifted it up like a 5 year old boy holding up the cookie that he was caught stealing. I disguised my apparent stressful/dull personality with my award winning copy-written Joseph Lee signature smile.

The next activity we did involved looking at different pictures of objects, picking 2, and making a story involving those 2 pictures. A pretty good language practicing exercise I guess. Involves creating and presentation in a different language. I was determined to do better this time. I would show them just how creative I was. There were 2 animals among the pictures we could select: a cat and a snake. I chose them thinking that I could come up with a decent fable. Unfortunately, we were then supposed to draw the 2 items we chose. Drawing animals: my worst nightmare. I thought the story I came up with was decent though. I created a fable of a cat and snake playing together one day when they saw a mouse. The then started fighting each other because both of them wanted to eat the mouse. In the end, the mouse got away because they worked against each other. Moral of the story: it is better to work together to achieve your goals.

After I told this to the person inspecting our work, I was rather proud of myself. Not only did I say it in Korean, I also made it up on the spot. After I patted myself on the back for a job well done, the Korean "inspector" followed up with "Joe, are you under a lot of stress right now? Normally stories involving fighting are caused by people under stress. You should probably go back home and rest a little bit blah blah blah." I guess I just come off as a stressed dude. Maybe next time, I'll write a story about a stressed guy that came to a language event, was told too many times he was stressed out, snapped, and wreaked havoc on the event. I can only imagine what they would say to that.

On a final note, I went over to my cousin's house last night and made real American brownies. Like from the Betty Crocker box mix kind of brownies. (Not sure what brand it was, but I remember seeing the box and recognizing it as an American brand name.) I currently am in possession of these brownies cause my cousin happens to be awesome and sent most of them home with me. This is literally the first American dessert I've had in almost a year! I'm so excited, so I'm gonna stop writing now and start enjoying this delicious chocolaty goodness with some ice cold milk! You now have permission to be jealous. If you want to, also feel free to grab a piece of blue paper and draw in only black to let your subconscious express itself.

A Degrading Cycle of Destruction

Honestly not much to write about this week. Life has been normal if not just a little bit more busy than normal. As my Korean improves, my English degrades. As my English degrades, I am constantly at a loss of words. As I'm constantly at a loss for words, I begin resorting to speaking like a 5 year old. As I begin to speak like a 5 year old, I realize that life becomes much more simple. As life becomes much more simple, I realize that it actually isn't, and so I resort to thinking about things as a 5 year old. And the cycle repeats. Or the circle... Or the big round thing...

This coming week, I will be the MC for a 'play contest' that my school is doing. Each class has to write a play and perform it for my level (level 3). My co-mc has graciously not done much and left a lot of the script writing to me. It involves writing an introduction for each play, and then a few other random interview questions. There are a total of 21 classes in level 3 which means introducing 21 plays. Anytime you feel like bursting into tears while reading this and thinking of the horrible plight I've been put in, feel free. I will even take condolences in the form of lighting candles or even holding a moment of silence. Honestly though, it hasn't been that bad. Truth be told, I would rather do it myself. It takes less time not having to bounce ideas off of someone else. I've also gotten quite a bit better at typing with a Korean keyboard. I do still have trouble when I'm typing Korean because when I think of the 'm' sound, my finger moves towards the 'm' key. However, the 'm' sound in Korean is actually where the 'a' key is. It begins to mess with your mind when you start switching back and forth.

I'm really beginning to miss the lack of instruments that I can play here: none. Thankfully, there's an actually piano at the church I go to, and they are more than happy to let me use it after the service. I've been a bit occupied these past few weeks, but I definitely plan on using it a lot in the future. I'm also really considering bringing my guitar back to Korea with me when I go home. I'm sure my neighbors won't really appreciate it, but hey, what's life in a paper-thin walled apartment if not interesting.

Occasionally, I keep you up to date on the music scene here in Korea. Anytime there's a super popular song, I try to include it in my blog post. Just in case, like 'Gangnam Style', a song becomes popular in the States, you heard it from me first. This particular song has been playing for about 3 months now, and it is rare to walk down the street and not hear this song playing at least from every other store front. This particular band is fairly new to the music scene. Minus the hair coloring, what they are wearing is pretty much the current suave style in Korea right now for the 20s age group... minus the tank top and the bow-tie. Tank top suits have a better chance of coming in style than bow-ties. Interesting plug: one of the band members is actually Chinese and graduated from the language program that I am a part of now. Who knows, today it's his turn. Next year, I'll be on the cover of a pop song.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3dezFzsNss

The Leaves are Changing!

It's fall here in Korea... FINALLY. A break from the constant heat and humidity and an introduction to the harsh cold of winter. As a result, the leaves are starting to change. This year, since I'm not working full time, I can appreciate them a little bit more with... MOUNTAIN CLIMBING! Korea has a lot of really cool hiking trails that I'm just now discovering. My classmate and I are going to attempt a pretty difficult climb later on this week. We are going to leave right after class at 1 and try to make it up and down the mountain before the sun sets. We're going to have to book it, but it's going to be sooo worth it. I'm really excited about it actually if the tone is not coming across in the writing.

We took midterms this past week. I've definitely had better scores, but I console myself with the knowledge that for most of them I just had some major brain farts. I just wish brain farts could be smelled, because in that case I would know when they're happening. My scores were as follows: Speaking 80.5, Listening 78, Reading 91, Writing 95.9. As usual, writing is my strongest point. And yes, the running joke that my listening needs improvement in every language blah blah blah. When my teacher gave my listening and speaking test back to me, she gave me a face like I had failed. She almost had me for a second. It doesn't cross the Korean mind that maybe a B or a high C is... I don't know, average and therefore acceptable? She kept saying, "Joe, I don't understand why your score was so low because you do so well in class." I'll add 'brain fart' to my list of Korean vocab words I need to know. Put it right in between 'stop staring at me' and 'why on earth are you walking so slow?'

I'm really enjoying the new church I'm going to too. It's very internationally focused. Trying to combine all of the cultures of the world under Christianity. It's a cool and exciting experience to see, and it's really giving me a heart for the people of the world. God has done a lot this year to show me how the rest of the world functions, and I will never forget all of the lessons I've learned and hope still to learn. I wouldn't trade this experience for anything else. I get to study a new language while learning about other world cultures and habits, and I also get to make friends with a lot of them. I like to think it has changed me for the better, but I guess I always like to think I'm changing for the better.

At church this week, we had a potluck. The idea of it was a combination of all of the different countries' harvest festivals: Thanksgiving... and all those other ones. (I'm so internationally savvy.) It was awesome! I got sooooo much free food that I didn't know what to do with it. So I quickly put it in my stomach and got more. I was going to take a picture of my plate as a representation of all the different food that was there, but my appetite shoved that thought aside a bit too quickly. I got to play a bit of piano after church today and fount out that I pretty much have nothing memorized anymore and have lost my ability to play by ear :( Oh well, nothing like starting from square one, right?

I was in Seoul with a friend and came across this temple with some kind of flower festival going on. I'm not much of one to stop and smell the roses, but this was something else. The way the had them arranged was just really cool to me. So now you get to at least pretend to enjoy the pictures. Actually, you don't even really have to pretend since I'm not there. Feel free to guffaw and cajole me all you like as you look at these pictures and experience complete and utter disappointment at both my writing and picture taking ability.