Who's dumb?

There's a very pervasive trend amongst Westerners to shit talk at various levels the quirks of Korean culture. Some of the observations seem warranted (ex. very liberal interpretation of driving rules), and some of them are debatable. Some guys from the West seem to get off on putting down the culture and locals here. So I try to take a step back from judging things which seem to indicate a fault in the people and/or society here, at least until I can observe enough to make a limited conclusion.
There is a perfect example to this end. I was trying to have my laptop fixed after it fell to shit on me one night a couple of months ago. I was surprised to have a KO teacher advise me to go to Kangnam (eastern part of Seoul south of the river), a 30-40 minute trip, instead of just taking the bus across the river to Yongsan (15-20 mins). I could have charged that to KO's being ignorant about their city. In fact, many times folks have little idea of areas outside of their travels here.
However, it would have been real ignorant to assume (as many I speak with do) that this lack of geography is a KO trait. Yesterday a co-teacher (real nice guy) from the west advised me to make the same trip Kangnam instead of going to Jongno for my KO lessons. They are pretty much equal in time wasted (he may know something I don't, but I would rather take one bus than 3 trains). So is he just not good with directions? Here's another case of a Westerner with different (worse) directional skills than I. This guy has clearly been here a short time (he still doesn't have a cell), but has not figured out the general location of one of the most famous areas of Seoul. Two things that every newcomer has are high-speed internet access, and a subway map. Can I assume therefore that Westerners are shit at geography?
Lesson: don't judge these KOs, West ye be judged.
ps The pic is not loading properly, if you want to see his post, click on the pic.

Trip Through NorthWest Korea pt. 1

Prelude... We told Okwhan we wanted to have a fun trip, and that his rendezvous with a tv producer in ChangJoo in the south for Thursday was unreasonable. That meant riding down for two days straight, having an interview, and returning back to Seoul, non-stop. He said we should all relax and chill, and things would work themselves out. Well they did.
The blogger software is difficult to change the order of pictures, so I'm going to have to work around a messed up order.
Pic 1. On day 1 of the trip I took a moped and was to meet Mike and Okhwan en route. I was to drive ahead of them and take pics of them riding. Remember, the whole point of this trip was to get promo footage for Okhwan in order to raise awareness about him and get some sponsors for his next trip. This pic is of beautiful greenery on the road between maybe PyunTek and Chunan.
Pic 2 & 3. This is a really bad part of Korea as compared to Canada. The bathroom facilities are often, if not usually, very sub-par for the developed country lavatory circuit. This is only one example of a VERY common situation (I actually, really saw this at a place in Seoul -not a hick, country place!- tonight!). If you look at the sink and the urinal, you will note that there is no running water in the sink - no connection actually. Also, the only usable water comes from a tube connected to the piss pot, and the tube's spout is lying in the piss water, dirty shoe sole zone. Nice.
[Skip to] Pic 10. We met Okhwan at the agreed upon place at roughly 8am Tuesday (Wednesday?) morning. We were pissed at having to go so early, but at least we would get on the road nice and early. Remember, we're under time constraints as we have to bike as far as we can today. So we leave right away in order to maximize our travel right? Wrong! Okie walks through a tiny, dilapidated market, with token white folk in tow, to get to a tiny SongPyun shop. There we waste an hour and a half of travel time so we can get some (yummy) breakfast and (instant) coffee. I had already eaten, as had Mike. Pic 10 is Okhwan leading us, and Pic 9. is Mike and Okhwan. Note the Seoul/PyeongYang 2016 shirt Okie has.
Pic 8. This huge church is on route to Ansan city hall. It's in the middle of the biggest vacant lot I've ever seen (maybe). Lots of churches in Korea.
Pic 7. This is something sold in Lotteria, the McDonalds-esque fast food joint owned by the Lotte family. They also make food goods, buildings, malls etc. This is a hamburger with two patty-esque pieces of rice patty. 7/10 for taste but 3/10 for bun holdtogetherability.
Pic 6. The town that Mike and I finally met at is called KohngJoo. We were searching for eachother for more than an hour, and the main points of reference in this fun town are the bridges. This is the view from one of the many bridges, and you can see it's a pretty nice view, except for the dirty-ass stream. If they clean it up, it could be a major attraction for walking, something like ChungGayChun in Seoul.
Pic 5. This is some sort of refining plant in the countryside between KohngJoo and Ahsahn. The logo is that of the Kookmin Bank, which may show that most major companies are in fact institutions which can be crazy diversified.
Pic 4. I saw pillars like these three times on the road from KohngJoo to Ahsahn. It's like a huge bridge to nowhere. Maybe there's a invisible highway with invisible space-cars running overhead.
So, long story short, no Okhwan. He was playing strange games all day the first day, and actually tried to cut out on me in KohngJoo (maybe). So, we let him keep on his way to GwangJoo, and Mike and I turned around and went kind of in a circle heading back to Seoul.
Part 2 coming soon!

Kidsarekrazy

Kids do the darndest things. This week was Market Day week, a day for the students at Oedae Hagwon to get together and learn about the most important institution in western culture: buying shit. Throughout the term children were given stamps in their 'Oedae Hagwon Passports' (I couldn't make this stuff up) in either the Reward section, or the Penalty section. All the good stamps were worth 10 cents, and the penalties -10 cents. Some kids had near $10, so you can tell that the penalties don't amount to jack squat.
These are 10 of the most affecting:
1. He's Indiana Carl... the roughest, toughest english teacher around. He's actually a cool guy, but has no idea about his hat. He's in deNial (get it?).
2. This is a new student of mine. He won some sort of award at school, so I copped this pic with him so I can say I teach champions, for references etc... BONUS GAME: Find the snake-monster posing as a student.
3. Look at the facial poses on these guys. A deeply impacting portrait of two of Korea's future leaders. Intense.
BONUS QUESTION: Which one rips the other a new asshole in ten years?
4. Some real cool kids I now teach. Maybe the cutest ones, the boy and girl in blue on the right, are actually cousins.
BONUS GAME: Pick the kid who has since dropped out of the class.
5. Another really cute kid. Nothing funny here.
6. This is Chinon Counta Grabcrotchi. The counters at the school were actually designed to his exact body specs for maximum whiny-pants usage.
BONUS QUESTION: Which secretary recently released two of my students from punishment, allowing them to leave the office without my OK?
7. Victorious gloating after spending half an hour solving two-piece kid's puzzle.
BONUS GAME: Guess who was reprimanded for singing 'I am the Champion'.
8. A bouquet of popcorn and another cute kid.
9. and 10. Ok, this is kinda cool. Read this before looking at them. Look at the eyes of both kids in pic #9. Then, look at their eyes in pic #10. Repeat... Cool! I didn't plan this at all, it just happened. I want to put this up on my wall and trip people out.
Okay, that's it.
Peace,
BA.
PS. I have the pics from the trip, I'll post them soon, probably tomorrow...