Do you know World Cup?

You may not realize that the World Cup tournament is currently going on in South Africa. It's like the Olympics, but without the American media. Or like the rest of the world's Super Bowl. (do I have to pay royalties to write that?) Korea's in it, and...gosh, it's hard to even mention sports without immediately sinking into a morass of cliches. World Cup fever is sweeping the nation. It means so much to this tiny country. You just can't help but get caught up in it!

Actually, that last sentence was quite literally true last night. I went with a couple of friends to City Hall Plaza, one of many sites where the game was being screened. You could tell when you were getting close because vendors of light-up devil horns started to blend together, and the line at KFC could kill your appetite if the chicken didn't. I was sorely tempted to buy a "We're 12th Player" t-shirt, but if I wore it to a Bills game, I'd just look retarded. Convenience stores had iced beer at the front door in a very efficient form of crowd control, and squid and pre-cut fruit were in abundance.

We showed up just in time for kickoff, so were relegated to the back of the crowd...fine, because the claustrophobia was intense. There were no chairs, but everyone spontaneously decided to sit down, so we all plonked down, Indian-style or criss-cross-applesauce (depending on when you grew up), right there in the street. Made me nostalgic for elementary-school assemblies. The great thing about elementary school was that you could sit there on the gym floor and watch the proceedings unaccosted, without anyone resting their leg against your back (come on people, it's 89 degrees; if you wanted to cuddle, why didn't you say so when I was hypothermic on New Year's Eve?), whacking you in the head with rigid handbags (no matter how many times you shoved the thing away), or dong-chimming you with their hooker heels (I was fortunate to be in the last row of people sitting, with the usual pushing & stiff-arming going on at my back). One couple kept letting their little flag hang in my sightline so it perfectly obscured the screen; at least I wasn't the guy 2 rows ahead who sat impassively as it covered his face time and time again. A sudden wet spot on my head turned out to be merely a passing water bottle fresh out of a cooler. I was more concerned with where the loogies were going. And God forbid someone should feel sick...the plaza was acres of devil horns with no space in between; anyone who needed to make a quick getaway simply couldn't. I lasted through the entire first half, not minding my sleeping leg so much, but in increasing agony over my jackknifed back. Finally, Korea scored as the first half died; everyone stood up to cheer, then forgot that they were ever sitting.

Just like at the baseball game I never blogged about, the Koreans expressed their enthusiasm by banging inflatable plastic tubes together, and spontaneously bursting into songs...all of which have familiar tunes, and, for that matter, familiar lyrics, since I've heard the word "Korea" before. Bet you didn't know that "Dae han min guk gloria" were the words to Beethoven's 9th.

Ultimately, they lost (to Argentina, who one of my kids told me is going to win the Cup), but we had long since started wandering the city, stopping to check in at every screen along the sidewalk, musing at the knot of people around a tiny tv in the subway station. It was a fabulous night to be outside, and I'm glad to be spending the World Cup where people care (I have a knack for this; I was in England for the festivities in '98, and even caught a good deal of the action in '06 by nannying for a soccer-crazed 11-year-old).

I skipped out on the first game, where Korea beat Greece, because it was cold and raining, but I could hear the elated screaming and the celebratory vomiting from my apartment. There's one more guaranteed game, but it's in the wee hours, so that'll be it for me unless Korea advances (which they could). Crap, it just occurred to me I'll probably still hear the screaming and vomiting for the wee hours game. Lifelong memories, these.

Why Johnny Can't Blog

I've been gone for over a year now. I think I can readily say that it's been the most difficult year of my life. I've been looking back at some of my posts from Colorado, and I'm surprised at how chipper they seem. Things had already gotten trying by this time last June, but I was excited about Korea, hopeful about how the summer might still play out, and curious about everything. Now I'm just tired. I've been needled frequently about posting more often, and I've truly meant to. There's a roster of things to talk about in my calendar, and 'blog' is on every to-do list I've made for months. I want to do it, want to keep a record and share all these observations I'm still making. But most of the time, I just don't have the heart to write.

This is what defeat feels like. Last week, as I ran dialogues with every kid I teach, was the final (or not...there always seems to be more shit, no matter how much you've waded through already) proof that what I'm doing here is futile, and my approach to it pitifully ineffectual. Very, very few of the kids understand anything I say. Even fewer care. Most of my co-teachers are desperately overworked and down to their last nerve, and I'm just one more mosquito in their ear. As I've known with quiet certainty for 11 years now, I'm not a classroom teacher. "If you're neither learning nor contributing, use your two feet and move on." But I can't yet. Not for 9 weeks. (10 if they screw with my vacation, which is always a distinct possibility in Korea)

So there's nothing else for it but to show up every day and make a game attempt, although I'm losing my spirit for that, too. Some days are not so bad, some are. Most classes consist of 2-3 kids who are listening and reacting, 4 or 5 who are mocking and cutting up, 6 or 7 who are sleeping, and 15 or so who are chatting with their friends. It's not rewarding work.

Funny thing is, I still want to work with kids. Just not in a classroom. This is really not my scene. And not in a place where everything happens TO me. I'm looking forward to being an agent in my own life again.

So in the swirl of weariness, frustration, humiliation, and resentment, I don't have many words. I'd envisioned writing letters and postcards, talking about more than 'What I Did Last Weekend', keeping a second blog that would be worthy of touting to schools, answering emails that I get... I'd envisioned feeling really enthusiastic & alive, adventurous and fulfilled. Gifts don't always come in the box we expected. One of my mantras during the last year has been, "Even if you hate it, it'll be one of the most important experiences of your life." And I don't HATE it. Not usually. But it has been a critically important experience, and I'm not at all sorry I've done any of it. I wish I was a better teacher, I wish it was over just a little bit sooner, but none of that is going to burn forever. I've taken the measure of myself, and it's not as flattering as I would have fancied. I feel that I'm at the crest of a mountain, and something new and pretty amazing is about to open up in front of me. If I can just hold myself together until it does...

"Come and play with us, Danny"

I'm not at school today because it's Election Day, and for that I am intensely grateful. I'm less grateful for the sensory onslaught that is Korean campaigning, although, to beat this theme to a pulp, I'm grateful for the chance to see it, and also that it doesn't last anywhere near as long as it does in the US.

I believe I heard that there's only an Election Day every 4 years (though the presidential term is 5 and they're not voting on him--that must be a different thing), so I'm lucky to be here in an 'on' year. From what I can tell, the election is for every office other than president...city, district, local...provincial? (not being able to read more than the names on the signs, I'm a bit underinformed)

Whether the start date is by decree, I don't know, but there was a big bang and suddenly campaigning was everywhere, comprised (whether in Gyeongju, Cheongju, or Seoul) of 3 main components:

1. Posters and banners. The banners are strung up between posts at every intersection, and the posters line every wall, one bordering the next in a tight collage that echoes the people themselves. A patchwork picturing candidates in various "action" poses...brandishing a pen, making an 'open arms' gesture, beckoning the viewer...reminiscent of the cloying head shots Newsweek adopted for its columnists a few years back. My EEP students last week were doing creative writing, about what they would do if they were invisible, and one boy (who I really have always liked) finished with, "and I use a scissors and cut election announcement paper. Because they have so many space. Also they look like dirty things."

2. Loudspeakers on trucks. Usually the domain of fruit vendors and religious proselytizers, these have all been co-opted by the candidates, the volume cranked to 11, and set to roam the streets blasting songs with tunes like 'Mary had a little lamb' and 'If you're happy and you know it', with new lyrics presumably detailing the person's fitness for office. These are catchy enough that I've accidentally learned a few of the candidates' names. I must have spent a bit of karma because none of them have parked outside my window, a miserable fate that elicits my profound sympathy for anyone it was visited upon. (the aforementioned student also planned to take advantage of his invisibility to "use a needle and prick wheel of election campaign cars. Because they are so noisy." Good kid.)

3. Dancing ajummas. An ajumma, for those of you who haven't heard me use the term, is a lady somewhere between middle age and dotage. They're iconic in Korea, known for attitudes worthy of a DeNiro movie, clothes with lively patterns, and a vampirish aversion to sun. And for wages that could never possibly be enough, they've been donning sashes and white gloves and dancing for hours on street corners. If it rains, they throw clear plastic ponchos over the getup and keep at it. Strangely, my neighborhood hasn't gone in much for the dancing, preferring instead an eerie chanting (inspiring the title of this post). Several packs of them stand at the subway station entrance droning couplets at 5-second intervals (rhyming in Korean is easy because every sentence ends with "ib ni da" or some variation). There's one candidate who has braces and employs not ajummas, but young people who hold his picture over their faces and talk on cell phones behind it. Going to the subway is creepy enough, but the lot that station themselves across the street from my apartment could drive me to distraction. I look forward to abandoning the ritual of getting up at 6 to close the window.