I do not normally eat fish or other seafood unless it has been battered and deep-fried. (I *love* fried shrimp.) I enjoy sushi rolls from time to time, but it helps that the fishiness is offset by rice. Of course, when one travels around the world, one must become accustomed to eating whatever presents itself... and, as my mother says: never turn down free food.
Yesterday evening was our office's New Year's party, which was held at a very nice seafood restaurant in East Daegu. Samson - Gwen's husband and my boss - had told me there would be things to eat other than fish... but apparently what he meant by that was 'other sea creatures.' Luckily for me, it was, for the most part, quite delicious.
Appetizers
This stuff - translated for me as 'fatty sea worm' - was still wriggling. I did not attempt to eat it!
You're supposed to suck the innards out of these. I tried one. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't really worth repeating either, in my opinion.
It doesn't usually snow in Daegu. It gets cold, sure. Sometimes there are flurries. Sometimes the snow even sticks for a few minutes... but actual snowfall? Nah. Not in Daegu.
Well, that's how things normally work here, anyway. But this December is apparently unusual. Snow has been falling - and sticking. Ambitious Koreans head out and shovel sidewalks (I mean, it's Daegu; there won't be more snowfall, right?) only to have more snow drift on in. It's nothing like the current situation in the northeastern US (or the usual in Russia or Kyrgyzstan), but it's definitely unusual for Daegu. The sun is out today, and the snow is slowly melting... but more snow is already in the forecast. Here are some photos, to give you an idea:
This was the view out my front window when I awoke yesterday.
Yeon-shil, the secretary at the school where I teach, invited me, my cousin George, and our coworker Jeremy to attend her sister's wedding, which was held yesterday at the unimaginatively named Hotel Airport (located - not surprisingly - at the Daegu Airport. I don't know Yeon-shil very well, and I'd never so much as met her sister, so I felt a little weird about going, but as she seemed so excited to have us attend, I felt I couldn't let her down. This wasn't the first Korean wedding that I've attended (I went to one back in 2006), so I pretty much knew what to expect.
George and Yeon-shil
The first part of the wedding ceremony is very similar to a traditional Western wedding, with the groom in a tux and the bride in a floofy white dress, although the parents and several relatives of the bride and groom wore traditional hanbok.
Following the ceremony, the wedding photographer assembled the friends and family of the wedding party for formal photographs... and decided that including the three random foreigners (who knew neither bride nor groom, remember) was an absolute must. So yes, George, Jeremy, and I feature in several of this new couple's wedding shots. While the professional photographer was shooting away, some random fellow I'd never met nor seen before picked up my camera and immortalized this bizarre event for me as well.
After the photography finished, nearly all of the guests bustled off to the dining hall to partake in a huge buffet, while the close friends and family stayed behind to participate in a second wedding ceremony, the traditional Korean ceremony known as paebaek. I'd already decided the day couldn't get any more bizarre when we were asked to come and watch the private paebaek ceremony. This was something that I hadn't ever seen up close before, and I was quite pleased to be welcomed (and encouraged to photograph) - even though I couldn't help thinking it was rather strange to be included!
The complete set of photographs from the wedding can be seen here.
· And from me (because you came to my blog, so surely you want to hear what *I* have to say), I've revisited a couple of tales from my past: one wonderful - a visit to the collapsing remains of Russian nobility; one horrific - a large portion of why, for me, 2009 was a living hell.
Just to let everyone know, I will no longer be using jane@janekeeler.com as one of my email addresses. If you wish to email me, please use jane.keeler@yahoo.com. Thanks :-)
I really, really love my neighborhood here in Korea (which is also where I lived when I was here in 2006-2007). It's near the eastern edge of the city, meaning that the crazy-jam-packed-with-people madness that goes on in downtown Daegu never reaches out here. It's a laid back kind of neighborhood, very friendly, and incredibly safe. South Korea touts its modernity at every opportunity, and many neighborhoods in Korea are nothing but modern highrises as far as the eye can see. My neighborhood is different. True, we have our fair share of newly constructed modern highrises, as well as the ridiculously oversized and opulent Lotte Plaza, but we also have the smaller, more traditional homes and alleyways of the original neighborhood. We also have market day, a day when food, clothing, and household goods are sold on the street in the age old manner of a street market.
Market day in Banyawol happens roughly every five days. It is held on days ending in 6 and 1 (with the exception of the 31st). I've been waiting for a market day to fall on a weekend during which the weather was sunny and I was feeling healthy. Today, December 11th, was the first time all three factors coincided. I'm not good at taking pictures of people, so most of my pictures are of dead fish and of the decaying area of Old Banyawol in which the market is held. My complete set of photos can be seen here. My favorites are below.
Koreans eat a lot of fish, and the marketplace was filled with vendors selling fish of all shapes and sizes, living, fresh, frozen, and dried. I don't like to eat fish, which perhaps is why the fish in the markets fascinate me so much.
I didn't get many people shots at the market, but this was definitely my favorite.
Korean mailbox and home gate
An abandoned property
No, it's not a Nazi swastika, it's a buddhist manji, and it's showing the location of one of the many small temples located in Banyawol.
In addition to my 2011 calendar featuring photographs of South Korea, Desolation Travel has just put up *two* 2011 calendars - one is specific to Kyrgyzstan, while the other has images of desolation from all over the former Soviet Union, taken by the Desolation Travel team. Each calendar sells for $19.99. Check 'em out and buy one - or better yet, buy all three! Simply click on the image(s) below to preview and purchase!
· Derek promptly went to Transdniester, and shared his story of bribery and extortion
· And lastly, in a fit of pique over the cancellation of my planned trip to the DMZ this weekend (cancelled, of course, due to the shelling of Yeonpyeong-do), I posted about North Koreans in Russia, and added my story and photographs from my trip to the DMZ in 2004.
If you'd like the direct links to our sites, here you go:
And if, for some inexplicable reason, desolation isn't your thing, check out Charlie being petted and purring! (The purr becomes audible around the 15-20 second mark.)
Above are the photographs featured in my 2011 calendar, which you can purchase from lulu.com for $19.99. CLICK HERE or on the images above to purchase! :-)
That's right ladies and gentlemen, my kitty is a girl - and you know what that means: yep, I have finally been able to pet her! She has finally decided that - as long as it's the wee hours of the morning and I'm still in bed - she wants nothing more than attention. She wakes me up, purring and kneading, and demanding to be petted. She also has a bit of the Brie in her, but Brie (who lives with my Aunt Mary) taught me well :-) Of course, as soon as I get out of bed Charlie goes back to acting like I'm some kind of scary monster, but still! A purring, snuggly cat is a long way from the terrified little feral I snagged, biting, kicking, and screaming off the street back in September!
Douglas Adams knew what he was talking about when he told everybody not to panic and that the Earth was mostly harmless. I've received numerous emails and facebook messages from people warning me to be careful and asking if I'm planning to come home... Um, no. And frankly, I don't think this is going to escalate into much of anything.
For starters, I live in Daegu, which you might notice is rather a long ass way from Yeonpyeong-do, where the shelling took place, as well as from the border with the north. Unless all hell breaks loose and North Korea decides to nuke the south's four largest cities, I'm pretty safe.
Secondly, all hell ain't gonna break loose. Kim Jong-eun, Kim Jong-il's young and inexperienced heir is up there throwing some weight around and generating some propoganda footage he can use to bolster his image.
Thirdly, if the South goes holding war games in disputed waters (click here to see a graphic showing where North Korea thinks the maritime border lies, as opposed to where the South thinks it's located), they shouldn't be all that surprised when the North uses this as an excuse to fire southward.
The following comes from a statement issued from North Korea's military supreme command: The South Korean enemy, despite our repeated warnings, committed reckless military provocations of firing artillery shells into our maritime territory near Yeonpyeong island beginning 1pm [yesterday]. Taken from here. Kinda proves my third point, huh?
Lastly, I don't know enough about North Korea to tell you if they really want a war of not. What I can tell you is that the South definitely does NOT want war, the government's post-Cheonan rhetoric notwithstanding.
My prediction? The South will talk tough. They'll cut off humanitarian aid to the North. They'll threaten. And they'll take no military action. The North will use this as a propoganda goldmine to show how Kim Jong-eun battled the evil capitalist forces of the South. And here in the South, life will go on, unchanged. (And well, if I'm wrong about all this, at least it will give me blog fodder until the internet stops working.)
This is something I’ve been ruminating on for a while now, and it seems fitting to post it what with North Korea strutting its stuff and firing across the border today. (In case you haven’t heard about this, please click here, here, or here. Thus far, the average resident of Daegu doesn’t seem too concerned. Also, if the south is going to conduct war games on an island that close to its border with the north, what do they expect? See map.)
Anyway, I brought this whole apocalypse question up on facebook last month when I posted the following status update: Jane Keeler wonders: What would you have in your apocalypse kit? I’m thinking tweezers. I’m not entirely sure where this thought came from, but I was plucking my eyebrows (surely you didn’t think those elf-arches were natural?) when it occurred to me that The Apocalypse is no excuse for a unibrow. I suppose one would then have to add a small mirror into the kit, otherwise the tweezers would be rather useless as far as the battle against the unibrow is concerned. Anyway, the following commentary ensued:
So, here’s the combined list: tweezers, mirror, hatchet, bottle of vodka, brownie mix, romance novel, laptop, camera, internet, dark chocolate, a cat, duct tape, twine, a good knife, a gun, beef jerky, sunblock, How to survive the end of the world as we know it by James Wesley Rawles, a sword, a dog, and rope. Hmmmm. That’s going to be somewhat cumbersome to pack, not to mention I’d have to include something for the cat and dog to eat, unless we’re all munching down on the beef jerky come chow time.
As my friend Ben pointed out, I should’ve set some parameters; it all boils down to how you envision The Apocalypse, and if by ‘kit’ you mean something portable or something more along the lines of a well-stocked bomb shelter. Do you, like Brenda, picture The Apocalypse as some kind of natural catastrophe? Or do you see it as the result of a nuclear (or even conventional) war? Zombies? Plague? EMP? (<-- There’s a fascinating, albeit poorly written, book on this topic called One Second Later, which is worth reading if you can tolerate the wooden characters and frequent use of would of, could of, and should of. Makes one wonder how a book can score a foreward by Newt Gingrich but not a decent editor.) What about alien invasion? And, of course, let’s not forget the Four Horsemen and ye olde Biblical apocalypse.
I have to admit that I was picturing my Apocalypse as something along the lines of a war zone, or perhaps an area in the aftermath of a war, and I was picturing my kit being something I could pick up and carry with me, which would help me to do some triage on the group list above.
Tweezers and mirror – in. I repeat: The Apocalypse is no excuse for a unibrow. Hatchet – in. Bottle of vodka – in, if I’m in the FSU, where shots could be used as currency. Out anywhere else. Replace with water bottle. Brownie mix – not going to be able to fit an oven in my backpack, so the brownies are out. Sorry Brenda. Romance novel – Out. I think I’d substitute The Silmarillion. It’s a long and entertaining read, and if it’s one of the few texts to survive The Apocalypse, my descendents might come to believe it to be a historical text. How awesome would that be? Laptop and Internet – Out. I suspect the internet would go out on its own, what with The Apocalypse occurring and all. My laptop, while I like it and find it useful, is not worth saving. I would, however, put my external drive in a ziplock bag and add it to my pack, in case one day I ran across a functioning computer. Camera – In... until the batteries die. I love my camera, but once the batteries give out (and I’m assuming an inability to recharge) it will just be a large chunk of heavy, dead weight. I would of course save the memory cards. You never know. Dark Chocolate – Sadly, out. It melts. I don’t want melted chocolate all over the rest of my kit. Not saying I won't have any on hand to calm me down at the beginning to The Apocalypse, however. Cat – if I have a cat with me at the time, yes. If not, no… until I find one. In which case I should probably add a cat-carrier to my pack. Duct tape, twine, a good knife, a gun, beef jerky, and sunblock – all yes. How to survive the end of the world as we know it by James Wesley Rawles – Maybe. I haven’t read it. Perhaps if I read it and could remember everything pertinent, I wouldn’t need to pack it. Sword – out. Sorry, Jacob. Now don’t get me wrong, I do love swords, and I’m still pissed over the Ghetto Sword Theft of 2008, but it would be rather cumbersome, and given how terrible I performed in my fencing class at Sewanee, why would I bother? Besides, I’m already packing a gun. Dog – only if I find one along the way that doesn’t want to eat my cat and that is willing to protect me. Rope – In! Sam Gamgee and his Gaffer would be proud.
I am not an economist, nor do I normally try my hand at playing one on this blog, but given the general financial state of affairs in the world at the moment, I feel the need to comment on the way things are going here in South Korea. See, right now the economy in South Korea is pretty good - it's been better, but it's definitely been much worse at other times in the modern history of this half of the peninsula.
Koreans love to shop. They love their fancy clothes and expensive gadgets. Smart phones? Hell, half my students (elementary and middle schoolers) have smart phones. They laugh at my several-year-old regular cell phone. ("Jane-teacher, why no touch screen??") And in a culture where appearances are so important... well, if you're not earning enough to keep up with the Kims, then you should definitely consider borrowing.
Nearly every commercial break has at least one (if not several) advertisements for quick cash loans - snazzy commercials with a sexy cast and a catchy tune that make borrowing money look hip and cool. (The exception to the 'hip and cool' loan company appears to be Rush and Cash, which seems to be targeting the 50+ crowd with their radish toting ajumma, and animated Korean radish.) I can sing along with the jingles to Hi Loan, Won Cashing, Welcome Loan, and Sanwa Money, just to name a few. You know how so many people (in the US at least) fell into the trap of re-financing their home for the sole purpose of getting extra spending money before the financial collapse? Here there are numerous re-fi commecials - several which have animations showing one's house/apartment (it is common to buy apartments here) serving as an ATM!
Here's an example of one of the Won Cashing ads (a spoof of the Korean pop group Wonder Girls):
The constant bombardment of ads such as the above makes taking out a loan - or loans - seem like such a fun and easy thing to do... so why not, right? Except that we know what sort of hole this kind of credit-based, mad spending, consumer-oriented economic model got the US into. This does not bode well for South Korea's economic future.
Already there are horror stories of loan sharks (private lenders; not the glitzy loan companies appearing on TV) forcing women who have fallen into arrears into prostitution (see here and here), and one wonders how long the fast-cash boom can be sustained...
Yesterday I went to Busan to meet up with Steve and Rob for the purpose of wandering around and taking lots of photos. Unfortunately, the weather was dreary and overcast, and totally without the sort of lighting that makes for good photography. Nonetheless, we made the best of it. We headed for Igidae Park, a cliffside park overlooking the water, located about a twenty minute walk from the Namcheon subway station, where we took a ridiculous amount of photographs. Some of my pictures are below. The entire set can be seen by clicking here.
After leaving Igidae Park, we walked along the shoreline to Gwangan Beach, where we ate a rather ridiculous amount of delicious Korean food (above), which left us feeling rather less like exploring Busan and more like curling up and taking a nap. We settled instead for a coffee shop, although when the coffee did nothing to perk me up, I figured it was time to return to Daegu. To see the complete set of photos from the day, CLICK HERE.
