Back on the blog

This is the singer we have gone to see every night,. They are really good. Sort of Thai folk songs. At this point in the night I was worse for wear from whiskey, but was fun.

Earlier that day, we went to slide down these cables from tree to tree. I cannot say how amazing it was. I would do it ten times a day if I could. A little scary, though. Like I said, the videos do not show how high up it is.

Breakfast view.

Crazy moon. I have some better ones. Will try to post those later.

So, the thing is 35 meters up (although I could swear it was higher). You start out low and just practice. Then you go up a bit higher....you can see Nok climbing the ladder up one of the trees around 45 seconds. Where the ladder starts is already way up there, so you can imagine. Huge Elephants looked about the size of my cellphone, haha.

I was ok, I think especially after the rock climbing Scott and I did. But I just made sure that I was very mechanical in following what the guy said, since I really didn't want to plummet to my demise there. ^^ I thought Nok would be scared, but she said that after the roller coaster in Korea, this was nothing. So funny, all the Thai girls who she talked to before asked her if she wouldn't be scared. They wouldn't go.

The best thing was the second to last jump, where there is just this huge tree on the other side. It must be a hundred years old, and I remember looking at it supporting the cable. Amazing. Too bad the rides only last like 20 seconds.

Scoot, if you come here, we are getting a hotel next door to this place and going every day, hahaha.

Christmas Day Celebration

Here are some photos of what we were doing on Christmas Day. We received guests all day. So recent but so long ago. Work here we come.
Here is the food, which was delicious, thanks to Nok and her friend Gania. Of course, being that Nok planned everything, this is a very small sample of what was actually served.


And the traffic, but the lights make it better.

The Thais really got into the Christmas spirit, even though they had no idea about a lot of it. A lot of them knew what the gifts were ahead of time....Where is the surprise???? Anyway, as you can see, they jumped in head first.
Here is Nok (left) with Ba, a friend, in front of the Christmas tree. Nok filled it with Christmas presents. I supplied our new humidifier. So happy to have that.

This is Gania putting out the food that I am still eating a half week later. Really good and filling. Franzia provided by the military base. Oh yeah!

Even wrapping presents was no obstacle. Ba was pretty good at it, while Nok got somewhat frustrated with it.

HwaSeong Revisited

So, it has been about 5 years since I first went to the fortress in Suwon. We showed up late, but it was still nice. The walk up the wall was steeper than I remembered, but it is not that bad. I had forgotten it was a UNESCO world heritage site. Had some Dak Galbi, which put me in a good mood for the hike.
Enjoy.

This sign just says "Korea" but in a a nice, formal way. Just looks cool, especially as it is just placed in the middle of nowhere at the top of the wall next to a look-out (got to protect the king).

Here is Nok experimenting with Korean fashion....oh, what have I created.....



Us eating DakGalbi. Will be my parting meal here, I think (or one of them).

Where have all the liberators gone?

And funny, this from MSNBC (the 'liberal' media?):
[Muqtada] Al-Sadr, who is believed to be in Iran, was not at the protest [against the US-Iraq withdrawl withdrawl--oh no, surrender!], though he wrote a sermon read by his representative, Sheik Abdul Hadi al-Mohammadawi, calling the United States "the enemy of Islam."
"The government must know that it is the people who help it in the good and the bad times. If it throws the occupier out all the Iraqi people will stand by it," the sermon read, using common rhetoric for the United States.
Did you spot it? Did you spot the funny, laugh-out-loud weasel phrase in this article? This is what people like Chomsky mean by 'biased media', although it is so subtle that a quick scan will usually miss this.
Will give you a second to go back and see....what part of this article could only have been written in the US or by a US proxy?
KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING
KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING
KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING
KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING
KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING
KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING
KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING KEEP LOOKING
Ok, get it? And the answer is: "using common rhetoric for the United States".
That is so awesome. Implying that we would not relate the 'occupier' with the US? Even if we assumed that I approved of the invasion (oh, shit....it wasn't an invasion...maybe I should take a page from the Japanese....achem...the 'advance' into) Iraq, what would not make the US an occupational force.?
Recap: they went in, killed tons of people, hung the ex-leader (bastard though he may have been...sure Rumsfeld was sad) then took over every aspect of the society. They set up a government that cannot do anything without final approval from the US, via various channels.
Fair enough. If you are for all of this, that is your opinion. But don't try to convince us, however subtly, that it is not an occupation.

HAL is watching me (us)

Oh, yes, HAL is right here in my building. I see HAL everyday on the way to my apartment. It can actually be pretty creepy, depending on the lighting at any given moment. Why is HAL in my building and what purpose does he serve, you might be asking. Actually, he is just the superfluous eye ball of the fire extinguisher stand:

Well, here's to old HAL, and that I never have to disarm my HAL, although watching that scene makes me want to watch all of 2001 again.

Leave Me Alone

This character trait of mine has been slowly developing under the radar. I hope it doesn't make me an asshole, although I half think it does.
The first time I really noticed it was during a trip to Chicago to see Hoops. Waiting for my (now beloved) Megabus from Chicago to St. Louis, when I a trechcoat-clad gentleman rambled up to me selling copies of the FREE satire magazine, the Onion. Now, I buy socks, lighters, photos and loads of other junk from homeless/fell-on-hard-times people. But, my reaction to this guy, after a second's glance at the Onion copies he was hawking, was so instant and second nature that it shocked me. Even this guy, a tougher character than I, looked taken aback by my immediate and jaded hand wave without a nanosecond of eye contact.
I have to say, I didn't feel bad at that second, but while running back and forth from Union Station and the actual bus, I realized that I had been pretty mean. This was placed in high relief when the next guy approached quickly forked out a buck to acquire a copy of the free mag. Is he naive or have I simply internalized my wall to a horryfying extent?
Now, I am still nice to people I meet and feel like I have time for any person that has a genuine heart. So, on that note, I feel fine. However, this trend does make me slightly edgy, as it seems to indicate that my dismissiveness has reached new hights, which brings me to today.
Sitting on the Seoul subway, which I rarely ride since I live 2 minutes from work, I saw a middle-aged white man get on the train (which is not too hard to spot here). For the next five minutes, he fumbled around with a variety of knickknacks: first, an apparently new set of keys and a bunch of coins; he later moved on to papers, dropping several pieces of paper while doing so. He looked utterly echausted, based on how he put up his bag on the rack, and I felt a little sorry for him, for what reason I don't know.
Then, just under a minute from my destination, he came over to me, thrust a pamphlet my direction and told me, in Korean, to please take a look at the literature. Sure that it was another Morman or other religious wacko, I glanced at him sideways and said "no". He assured me that it wasn't religious, but again-another snap judgement, free from any detectable reasoning process- I told him no.
At this point, it got sticky, as there was a whole lot of Koreans watching the two foreigners going through a relatively unpleasant dance--he being more assertive than most Koreans would stomach, and me being more hostile in return than most Koreans would want to be. Whatever his cause was, I didn't look long enough to see. I just immediately brushed him of. And, at this point, he pushed the paper/pamphlet in my direction, assuming I would take it (had he been trained to believe the generally true rule of thumb that people will instinctively take something handed to them?). Instead, I continued to brush off the request, but inadvertently knocked the paper down, while simultaneously saying I didn't want to see it.
"Why?" he asked, in a slightly damaged voice.
"I'm getting off now," I responded with a coldness and detachment worthy of HAL in his better days. I didn't really look at anyone after that, but I could feel the tension in the body language of everyone on the train (and what a sight for them! Foreigners in conflict! Even better than regular foreigners!).
Leaving the train, I felt no remorse, but after a scolding by the wife, I wondered if I had been a little harsh. Half of me thinks that there is nothing a random person on the subway is going to give me that I will want (something that has proven to be true 99.9 percent of the time). The other half wonders if guy will think about this as much as I am.