I Smell Fear

First off, I want to say thanks. As of early this week, this site has over a thousand hits on it. Not knowing much about this sort of thing, it seems impressive to me- so either one of you is obsessively checking the site in hopes of... well, I don't know.... the meaning of life, perhaps (you can stop looking, you'll never find it here)- or many of you have fallen into a ritualistic weekly reading of my rants. Either way, it's cool. Secondly, today marks the end of an era that I personally feel needs to be acknowledge. My phobia of big purchases is being dealt with head on and I am en route to buy myself a laptop. Try as I might to convince myself to cheap out on it, I just couldn't. So here we go... someone hold my hand... I'm scared!!

Speaking of fear, I smell fear on the campaign trail. Shortly after my announcement last week about my intentions to run in the presidential election, the local candidate started being very friendly to me. True, the Sun King (as he calls himself) has always been friendly. He dresses in the traditional Korean hanbok and takes to the streets directing traffic or greeting people outside the subway in the morning, but somehow his demeanor seems to have changed. He is afraid, I can tell. He knows that I hold an advantage. While he parades about the neighbourhood with his campaign do-gooder activities, begging for attention, people pass him by. His business cards litter the streets of Kkachisan and on Friday nights, the Sun King can be found drunk in a local pub. The shop he rented as campaign headquarters is difficult to find, hidden beneath piles and piles of the traditional Bonne Chance bouquets. I've determined there is either a secret entrance- perhaps a trap door that leads into the back store- or else those inside arrived before the flowers did, and will remain until after the election, or the flowers die- whichever comes first. (These same bouquets can be found littering St Catherine Street (east of Guy) year round, with the usual opening and closing of the hundreds of Chinese noodle places.) If you can dig your way through half of the flowers, you'll come face to face with Santa. Here we are, April- and the Sun King has not yet retired Santa to the closets like the rest of us. In January, Santa wore a hanbok. But then the Sun King needed it back to patrol the streets with his do-gooder campaign non-sense. So Santa gladly gave up his hanbok, and now he wears the uniform of the Korean soccer team. One can only assume that this is in anticipation of the World Cup... although who knows, the Sun King and I are clearly not on the same page. If you are lucky enough to catch Santa's eye, he immediately begins dancing and singing "We Wish You a Merry Christmas". If you're blessed with Superman vision, and your eyes can cut through the flowers behind Santa, you'll see that on the back wall is an enormous floor to ceiling poster of... who else? The Sun King. As I left my house the other night, on my way to return yet another bad movie to the video store, I happened to run into the Sun King and his wife (the Sun Queen?). Perhaps it's my imagination, but I'm sure his eyes became ever-so tiny slits as he bowed and said hello. But that wasn't enough, the evil look he shot me didn't put his mind at ease. He asked where I was going. And I told him, quite simply, I was walking. To which he responded that perhaps I should walk behind him. And I laughed, but inside my own tempers were rising. Walk behind you? Now this is exactly why Korea needs to vote for me. I have never, nor will ever, take a few steps back to follow behind 'the man'. At least he seems to recognize the appeal that a blond women has to the Korean public. Was this an offer to join forces with him? To run together a la Canadian Alliance & Reform? I smell fear... his fear... mmm... Sun King fear..

In other news, I've been cast in a play title Never Swim Alone by Canadian, Daniel MacIvor. The process of working on a play with a young director has come as quite a shock to my actor's sensitivities, after having worked with Ms Kate Bligh on my last show. For those of you who don't know Kate, she's British, and being such has some strong opinions about the way things should be done on stage. The stage is a sacred space. It is Kate who was responsible for the earlier than expected removal of my piercings. It was Kate that instilled in me the professionalism that I have in my acting. I make it sound as though I've achieved this professionalism through hard work, but more to the point, I had no choice. Her super-organizational abilities and all-seeing eye allows her to have a throughout understanding of the piece. So working with someone whose end of rehearsal notes end at "Turn more to the audience" and "You missed this line", is really strange. It is giving me the opportunity however, to uncover things for myself, and I don't have to listen to someone telling me where I need to work. I think most actors with a brain in their head are hyper-aware of where they need to work. It's that damn brain, after all, that stands between us and brilliant work. The brain that keeps talking to you, even when you want it to stop, cause you know if it stopped, you'd nail it. I'm probably starting to sound crazy now. That's okay- here's a little known fact about me (or perhaps widely known, I don't know)- I am crazy. Don't say it too loud though, crazy is a swear here in Korea.

Having said that I have a memory only slightly better than a goldfish, it seems pretty impressive that I remember any of my schooling. But it seems that I do. Besides interrogating M Sabraw as to why he wouldn't cut his hair, I also remember a certain unit about Japan. Now what makes a significant enough impression on a twelve year old Canadian girl with a poor memory, that at the age of twenty five she recalls her first introduction to Asian culture? A few things. The shock of discovering that Japanese children (and consequently, Koreans as well) spend nearly every waking moment in school. I remember saying that I would never want to go there because there was too much school. Yet here I am, a cog in the wheel that is keeping these poor kids imprisoned in office buildings away from the park. What else do I recall of these lessons? The Sumo wrestlers, obviously. Athletes that large rarely go unnoticed. And the spring festivals. I remember hearing about the Lotus Lantern Festivals and thinking how overwhelming it must be to have such an atmosphere of celebration. How beautiful to have lanterns strung throughout the city, and a lantern in every hand. And it was. The festival was in celebration of Buddha's birthday on May 5th. I spent the day in Insadon- the Buddhist cultural area... somewhat, I suppose like Montreal's Old Port. An area that holds onto the past. But unlike the Old Port, the area is not completely overrun with tourists. The day time events weren't anything particularly spectacular. There were information booths pandering panphlets for different types of Buddhism. There was free vegan food available on the street. Make your own lanterns and lotus flowers. Lots of dancers and drums. Buddhist monks swarmed the street, some as young as three years old. To keep in constant communication, many carried cell phones. To keep the memories? Cameras, of course. As I headed to the subway, I was slightly disappointed. A festival with an international reputation and this was the best it could do? I felt ripped off, I'm sure a feeling similar to how a tourist to Calgary secretly feels after the Stampede (sorry, Calgary- I never got the big Stampede thing). As I was about to step into the subway, I noticed the parade was starting. So I stopped to watch, for what I thought would be a few minutes. It started like any other parade, but then the shear amount of lanterns, both in the crowd and in the parade overwhelmed me. Any imaginable size, shape and colour. Many that to me, were totally unimaginable. The parade lasted about three hours, and half way through my section of the crowd was coaxed into the parade. Part of the tradition being that the crowd joins the parade and all the lanterns wind their way through the streets until they reach the temple, symbolizing Buddha's journey to the temple. The sound of Korean traditional drums thundered in my ears, and the streets were lit by the glow of the lanterns. Men and women in traditional Korean costumes danced excitedly in the street, pulling members of the crowd in to join them. Fireworks shot from the dragons and phoenix floats. As the temple came into view, thousands of lanterns formed a tent ceiling outside the temple. And the lanterns were all lit. Each one had a prayer attached to it. This was the gathering place. As each person finished their journey to the temple, this is where they met. At first, it was rather empty- but slowly it filled up and the dancers and drums found their space. I was pulled into the performance space again and again to dance with the drummers, as were many other foreigners. It seemed we were something of a target. An elderly Korean man passed me incence and pointed me to what I assume was an area for prayer. Another took my lantern from me and passed me his. I assume because mine was cheap cardboard and his was a real lantern. One of the Korean dancers, dressed in a beautiful flowing red dress pulled me back into the space and insisted I stay. In true Korean fashion, she thanked me for coming- perhaps not completely seeing that this experience was so foreign to me and I was thrilled to be there. The two minutes I intended to stay turned into four hours, and I dragged myself home after an incredibly long, stimulating day. Buddha's birthday, obviously- is the Buddhist Christmas. And after such an uplifting cultural experience- shared with strangers that I will never see again, it makes me question where Christianity went oh-so-wrong. Catholism is littered with rituals, but none of them (I found) elevate you. None of them engage you with a celebration that is bigger than you. There is no release- no ecstatic party, no drums. There are Christmas trees that have lost their meaning and a fat old man that brings gifts to good children. But only the good ones. A candle is lit each week for four weeks prior to Christmas. One is pink, three are purple. Maybe the other way around, it's been so long I can hardly remember. The Santa Claus parade, in all honesty- is usually pretty lame. Every family has their own Christmas traditions, but in a country so big and families so divided- how much do we really just yearn for a real party, without the pressure of commercialism? The only Canadian ritual I can think of are Montreal's tam-tams. A Sunday ritual in Montreal based around the spot where Jacques Cartier first planted the French flag. There is no relationship between the tams and Jacques, at least not that I know of, but on this spot there stands a huge statue that marks the center of the tams. Drummers and dancers gather, with the Dungeons and Dragons gamers off in the sand pits, and the acrobats, sunbathers and frisbee throwers scattered about the mountain. The sound of the drums is intoxicating, and it is perhaps, the one thing that we have that is trully ritualistic. We've lost so much of ritual, in the name of civilization and order. But we crave it. We need it. But as our schedules become more and more packed with meaningless, trivial duties, we neglect to engage ourselves in life. We're too busy vegging in front of the TV or stressing about our chequebooks. We forget that sometimes we need to escape. Theater, dance, music- the performing arts emerged from ritual - from engagement with the very things that we all share. And having lost ritual, we've lost art as well. We wonder why modern plays can't hold a candle to the works of Shakespeare and Marlowe. I think it's because we have forgotten the very reason that the rituals of performing were so important to begin with. We all have, the audience, the performers, the writers. None of us remember why we're doing it to begin with. Round the world, Asians are thought of as hard workers. Their six day work weeks and year round schooling is baffling to North Americans and Europeans. It's baffling to me and I'm here living it. But Koreans have clearly shown me that they are able to hold on to the past in a modern setting. They are able to set their work weeks aside for a party in the streets of Seoul. They are able to let loose and really celebrate what they believe, without stiffling ritual that is more about social conditioning than true ritual. The interest that was sparked in Asian culture long ago was fully ignited as I continue to contemplate all that I've seen...

Stuck in a State of Everlasting Culture Shock

They say you learn something new every day. I'm not sure if that's true or not, but I believe my memory is sufficiently poor that I could have already discovered the answers to many of the questions I have, but promptly forgot them. Perhaps the meaning of my life is simply to jog my memory so that suddenly everything will become clear. It could very well be, since I often have that unsettling sense of deja vue... like when I watch a movie for what I think is the first time, but it turns out it was my old roomate's favorite movie so I probably saw it a hundred times.

In any case, last Friday one of my older students taught me about yet another oddity in Korean culture. She asked me if I saw the traffic stoppage at 2pm that day. She said at two o'clock, all the cars on the road had pulled over to the side. "Umm... terrorists..." She explained. I was shocked. I was pretty sure that even with the language barrier, I would have heard about something that big. But then she told me she couldn't explain it in English. So I asked one of the Korean teachers, and she said, "Oh yes, practice war." Practice war? What do you mean? The North and South plan a day of friendly fire every year? Unfortunately she seemed to think that her explanation was sufficient because she went no further into detail. Later I learned that there were air raid sirens sounding all over the city - an annual practice drill apparently, that everyone here seems to think is perfectly normal. Personally I was a little freaked out by the reminder that my home is a short forty minute drive from the world's most defended border. But I suppose if anyone is safe, it's those of us who work directly beside the police station in Seoul's richest community...

I was out with my friend Songhee last week-end, drinking beer as one tends to do on a Saturday night. And we were talking about cultural differences, as a Canadian does when you meet someone who strives to stand out in a stiffling culture. Songhee was, once again, inquiring about the marrying age in Canada. And again, I tried to explain that we don't really have a marrying age. I could get married tomorrow, or at 65 and no one would be shocked. Better still, no one would particularly care. I could decide never to marry and still it wouldn't be scandalous. Songhee wanted to know why, after three and a half years with Fred, we were not married. And so, I launched into a complicated explanation of how marriage is taken extremely seriously in Canada, due in part to the high divorce rate in our parent's generation. Canadians want to make sure that we have life experience before settling down, trying to maximize our chances for happiness as adults. I wanted to travel, Fred didn't. So I left, and he stayed. As a Canadian it wasn't terribly complicated. I felt to give her a fair picture of the situation though, I needed to explain the concept of common law marriage. I told Songhee that even without a marriage certificate, if we wanted to say we were married, we could, since we had lived together for so long (shhh- please don't say this too loud, if my head ever realizes this completely, the commitment-phobia might just kick in). Songhee seemed to understand, but starred at me funny. (I would like to take a moment to apologize to any family members who may not have put two and two together. Any (crazy) Catholics may want to close the page and tune in next week...) Finally, she asked what would happen if I got pregnant. And I starred at her, equally confused. I finally replied, "Well then, I guess I'd be pregnant." She continued to stare at me. Finally I stated what for me was obvious. I told her that Canadian women consider three options in this case- abortion, adoption or keeping the baby, regardless of the father's involvement. And then the reason for her confusion became clear. She asked, if the mother decided to keep the baby, but the father would not marry her- would the child be able to attend public school? I'm sure my face went blank. And my reaction gave away my answer. In unison, we asked the other if we were serious. Yes, it turns out we were both serious. The birth certificate of every child born in Korea tells whether or not the parents are married. If the unmarried box is checked, it's private school for your kid and hopefully you can afford it. And so it seems that the unmarried Korean woman who is unfortunate enough to become pregnant, really has no option but giving the child up for adoption. A woman needs her guardian's (father or husband) permission for an abortion. If your guardian won't consent, no abortion. If the woman chooses to keep it, the child cannot be educated, unless she has money. It may be better that the child not be born at all than raised in an 18th century environment where the parent's marital status becomes an excuse to treat him badly. Considering that women who smoke are spat on in public, labelled 'bad girls', and see their school grades and dating options fall quickly away, I somehow doubt that too many Korean men are up for dating a single mother. Damned if you do, and damned if you don't, I suppose. Makes me wonder about the availability of birth control pills. Do you need a man's permission for that as well? I told Songhee that my maternal grandparents were separated and in the 1950s, my grandmother needed a man's signature to take her children to the hospital. But that was 1950. The revelation that such injustices weren't permitted in Canada seems to have awakened her desire to find another country to call home...

In any case, it got me thinking. I am all for cultural differences and beliefs, I think it's important. But even over the last six months I have noticed some pretty significant changes in Korean society. It's an exciting time to be here. More and more young Koreans are travelling abroad, and coming back with tales of freedoms never before considered here. One of my friends claims to have seen five women, separately, smoking in public last week alone. Given that my count in six months is only at three, five in a week is pretty impressive. I have noticed many more Koreans with facial piercings. Up until a month ago, my count was at two. Now it's around fifteen. Things are changing, you can feel it. And with change comes the need for new leaders, new government. So here's the story...

We were on a bad- no, wait- horrendous field trip Thursday, to the National Museum of Korea (site of the 3000 year old monkey ordeal, some four months ago). My boss, being the sort of person who prefers chaos to organization and being of the insane variety (one who does the same thing over and over and expects different results), dragged me, three other teachers and twenty children (aged three to five) to the museum. And, as always, he failed to call ahead to book. Apparently my boss believes that in a city of 12 million people, it should be no trouble to do whatever you want, whenever you want. Like visit the city's largest free museum. I bet no other cheap school owners had that idea. Anyway, we arrived, only to discover that the museum is packed full and we are given permission to enter only in the children's museum. The children's museum about two rooms, and, fitting with Korean logic, contains many things not to be touched. Now remember kids- no running in the gym- we wouldn't want you having a childhood or anything. Hands off in the children's museum- things might be at eye level, but I assure you, it's only so you can see it, not touch it. And so, my boss lets the children run around like madmen, while I, determined not to be responsible for losing one so-called child, insist that that they hold hands and stay with me. But as we've learned before in travelling to museums, there is nothing more interesting than a blond, blue-eyed girl. So I got cornered. A Korean woman came up to me and started asking questions about the school and the program. She had been watching me with the kids and found it incredible that they could speak English so well from such a young age. We spoke for a minute, then I excused myself to be pulled away by the kids. But she followed. Cornered me with her husband and daughters, and started taking pictures. Mary was holding my hand and trying to drag me away from the lady responsible for her boredom. Jennifer and Sally took this opportunity to run off, leaving me fighting with Mary who is trying to pull me in the other direction. Jacob (my boss's son), true to form, is playing with an ink pad in the corner. He is eyeing a 1000$ Louis Vitton purse, as though all his bad behavior and mischief has led him to this very moment. The pinnacle of his career as an impossibly obnoxious child. My boss appears, VIDEO CAMERA in hand. To my shock and horror, the camera is pointing directly at me. He makes no effort to help me with either the kids or this incredibly inquisitive woman. I would have thought that a business man would see this woman as a potential client, but instead of talking to her, or helping me (god forbid), he filmed the whole ordeal so he can proudly send the tape home with the kids saying 'look at our trip to the museum'. Just when I thought it couldn't get any more chaotic, another Korean child appears and corners me from the left. He speaks perfect English, because he was raised in Guatemala and attended an American school. Our conversation was cut short as my boss declared (after getting all the footage he needed for a 'look how popular my blond teacher is' video) that it was time to go. As we made our way for the door, schools passing us left and right- each one stopping to say hello to the funny looking foreigners- it hit me.

I thought all of you (because of your loyalty in keeping up to date with my weekly rants) should be the first to know. I have changed my plans about this year in Korea ever so slightly. After careful reflection and observation of the Korean culture, its tendencies- both logical and nonsensical, I have decided that they need to have a window, small as it may be - to the Western world. My mind has been running through the possibilities since I arrived. How do I keep myself from returning to the horrors of waitressing when the plane drops me off in Montreal? I think I've found the answer. Over the last six months, I have discovered just how important it is to see other countries. To experience another way of life. And I have met many Koreans, some whom have had this opportunity, and others who have not. But as I celebrate my six month anniversary in this country, I'm baffled that the culture continues to astound me. The sort of attention that follows me here is of the sort that actors, singers, politicians fight to get. But to me it just happens. I honestly feel that were I to walk down the street next to the President of Korea, we might be evenly matched for stares and hellos. Might be. There is still a good chance that I would kick his ass. And so I decided, with the election a little over a month away- why not put it to the test? As long as I can put my picture on the ballot sheet, I've got a pretty good shot. In conclusion, you can probably expect that I will stay in Korea at least until the end of my first term. I look forward to taking up residency in the Presidential palace, and sending my private jet for all of you back home. But I might be home in six months if word gets out that the only Korean I know is annio haseyomuliyo (I don't know), bonjaki (sparkly), upsoyo (I don't have) and bap (rice). Oh yes, and ulmayo (how much?)- but really, wouldn't such a limited vocabulary improve relations with the North? ("Annio haseyo, Mr Kim... bap upsoyo.. bonjaki makchu? ahh... neeeeeee...makchu (beer)?") How much more Korean could the President possibly need to know? So remember, on May 31st - election day- a vote for Stephanie is a vote for public school for the bastards, marriage whenever you damn well please, a lightening up on the country's infamous "I'll trade you a joint for life in Korean prison" policy, and the legalization of tattoos. Vote blond! (hello),