this program only works if you let people leave

In a move that I would say is antithetical to the goals behind the organization, Fulbright is withdrawing their grants to Palestinians in Gaza. Click here.

i'm trying; please stop staring

I’m reading in a coffee shop next to two high school boys. The taller one leans over and says in English, “Can my friend take a picture with you?” “Um, sure,” I say, and his friend, giggling, scoots over while his friend uses his cell phone to snap a picture.

A few minutes later I’m outside waiting for the bus. An old woman, perched with knees splayed on the bench, turns and stares at me. A middle-aged woman walks by, sees me, and pauses. She starts walking again, but then abruptly switches directions. She does this again and I realize she is pacing in front of me and staring. I look up from my book and half-smile, hoping she will see I notice and leave. Instead, she leans in close to me.”DO YOU SPEAK KOREAN?” she says loudly in Korean. “Um, no, not really,” I say in Korean. A string of fast and loud Korean of which I understand about three words follows.

Later, I step onto the bus. “Jungang Rotary?” I ask the driver, hoping he’ll take me to the stop closest to my apartment. He nods and I open my wallet for the fare. I look up and three old woman sitting near the front stare blankly at me. They have gone silent. I feel their eyes on me and sit down quickly on the closest seat, near the front. They start talking again. “Jungang Rotary? She’s going to Jungang Rotary?” I hear them in Korean repeating what and how I said it. I put my wallet in my bag and when I look up I see the old woman in the seat in front of me has poked her permed head around the seat barrier and is three inches from me, gawking. She turns back around when I look up and I stare out the window.

Suddenly I feel a sharp slap on my forearm. I jump and there is the permed head again, speaking loudly in Korean. “DO YOU SPEAK KOREAN?” I shake my head and rub the arm she just hit. “YOU DON’T KNOW KOREAN? KOREAN, YOU DON’T KNOW IT?” “No, I don’t speak Korean,” I say in Korean. “YOU DON’T SPEAK KOREAN?” “No, but I wish I did so I could tell you to turn around,” I say quietly in my head. “She’s from America. She doesn’t speak Korean.” The woman has finally turned around and is now discussing me at a lower but still audible volume with her friends.

A few hours later I walk into the Center for Adult Education, where I have been taking a Korean class. In the foyer there is a group of five women. They get quieter and their heads turn, following my movement, as I walk towards the water fountain. I take a paper cup and one woman says "pretty" to me, first in English and then in Korean. “Oh, thanks” I say in Korean and accidentally overfill my paper cup, splashing water on my jeans and the floor. “Oh, you speak Korean!” she says in Korean. “No, I...I don’t speak Korean” I say in Korean, wiping my hands on my jeans and head into class.

scenes from biking

Some friends and I biked around Jeju Island a few weekends ago.

things i miss and things i will miss

western life:

Cereal with lowfat milk, the newspaper spread out on the kitchen table, quilts, the piano in our basement, my brothers and parents, pasta with cream sauce. The water pressure from the shower. Large bath towels. Toilets that flush paper. Pedestrians having the right-of-way. Jeans that fit my American-sized butt. Blending in. Concerts.

Dryers. Television, independent movies, popcorn, crisp apples with peels, banana bread, broccoli with lemon and butter and salt, newsmagazines, bookstores, personal space, warm lemon bars, picking raspberries, our front porch, wearing flip flops. College friends. Not having my weight/hair/skirt color/skin condition discussed in front of me.

Books. Photo albums. Sheet music and pianos. Big couches in coffee shops. Pine trees and wide green fields and the gray pretty cold of the Oregon coast. My super-big extended family. Too-big hooded sweatshirts. Microwaves. Ovens that work. Cookies with vanilla and oatmeal and generous quantities of chocolate chips. Neighbors I know. Cold corona with lime. Lawns. French fries.

eastern life:

Kimchi jiiggae, Korean bathhouses, funny English signs, the “Hi Liiiiz” my host-sisters say each morning, seeing the ocean outside the car window when we’re driving through town, the spring canola and cherry blossoms. Getting free things for looking foreign. Cheap batting cages. The English teachers at my school.

Juicy and plentiful Korean tangerines and oranges and hallabong, my host dad’s laugh, the little boy in my apartment building who gives me hugs, the super peppy “Hello! Hello Teacher!” from my students. Melon-flavored ice cream bars, pomegranate-flavored candy, mangosteen-flavored gum. Fancy cellphones. Cheap taxis.

Full-fat yogurt, the staff at my gym, free samples at bakeries, Korean fried chicken and beer, seeing my Korean slowly, slowly occasionally improve. Cheap hotels with heated floors, taking windy 5.16 bus to Jeju City, rice with vegetables and oysters and thin crisp bits of seaweed, handmade noodles with crab and shrimp and shellfish, crunchy squid as a snack. Good friends from my program to vent to/ share lesson plans with/ proofread applications/ help translate/ travel and bike and share the year with.

LAAAYMOAN

My office is on the second floor of our school, nestled between two first-grade classrooms and a full floor above the teacher's lounge and principals office. This means that generally students are the only visitors, giggly high voices and black bobs and hair bows who flip through magazines and ask me for candy.

In my second week of teaching, though, my work was interrupted by the sound of a flung-open door hitting the wall and the appearance of a stocky, tan, wrinkly-faced man in a worn polo shirt and black gold jacket in the doorway. I actually jumped, surprised to see anyone other than my students, and then corrected myself and managed a mangled hello and head-bob bow from my chair. He took little notice of me and stormed over to the sink at the back of my office. He looked down at the tea and powered drink packets sitting on the table, took one packet, and looked my way.

"LAAAYMOAN" he declared loudly.

And then he was gone, taking big steps and slamming the door behind him.

I sat there for a moment and replayed what had just happened. What had he said? Laaaymoan. Laaaymoan. It didn't sound Korean and he said it really loudly like I should understand it. It must be......English! Laaaymon. Leeeemon. Lemon. Lemon, as in Lemonade. As in, the Crystal Light To-Go Pink Lemonade packets the former teacher left next to the sink.

I soon learned that the wrinkly man was actually our school's janitor and copy-machine operator. Language barriers mean that I know little about him, other than that at one school dinner I was at he drank a lot of soju and started doing pull-ups on the rafters of the rather nice chicken restaurant, and that he really loves Crystal Light Pink Lemonade, which you cannot buy in Korea.

He came in several times after that, until one day he held up an empty cardboard box and I was forced to admit that yes, "laaaymoan oppseyo." He looked distressed and then smiled with an idea. "OHMA OHMA" he said loudly, pretending that his hand was a phone and leaning towards me for emphasis. "LAAAAYMOAN CHUSEYO."

I nodded and told him I understood, that I would call my mother in America and ask her to bring more Crystal Light Pink Lemonade packets. To remind me, every time I need to make copies or I ran into him in the hall, he said "LAAAYMOAN," sometimes several times in a row and never quietly. This lasted for six months, until my mom visited last week and gave me the packets I had asked her to bring. In one of my proudest moments, I entered the copy room last week, presented him with the box, and stated two full sentences in Korean:

"OHMA CHONGWHA HASSOYO. SEOGWIPO AY WASSOYO." ("I telephoned my American mother. She came to Seogwipo")

delegates from the u.s.

My mom and aunt visited Jeju last week for 5 days. In addition to lugging two containers of Cheetos, a board game, trashy magazines, and baked goods to bring to me, they also deserve kudos for being so open while in Korea. They forgave me for my poor navigation skills and let me feed them everything from duck to blood sausage to eel to Korea's favorite dessert-- ice flakes, ice cream, fruit, syrup, and generous quantities of red beans. They visited my school, drank tea with my principal, managed to swallow my school's spicy soup and make their way through its fried fish with metal chopsticks. They watched me teach a lesson on greetings and put up with my sometimes too energetic students students running up to them and declaring, "Who are you?" "AHH SMALL FACE" (a big compliment in Korea) and "Why your little brother no here?" They were up for a trip to Korea's bare-all bathhouses and later a special dinner with my principal, vice-principal, my school's administrative staff, the English teachers, and my host mom, which was mainly in Korean and in classic fashion involved a lot of kneeling on the floor, being told to eat a lot, and trying to politely turn down too much alcohol.

It was nice to have a little empathy for the things that are hard for me here-- kneeling for long meals, getting cash in a country whose highest denomination is about $10, pedestrians never having the right-of-way, the lack of street maps, and the general struggles that come with never entirely being sure what people are saying. And it was great to show off what I love about living where I do-- my 630 students in matching uniforms and bolo ties, my friends in Seogwipo, the best favorite bakery and coffee shop and kalbi restaurant, the nearby waterfalls, the variety and affordability of citrus fruits, the heaps of amazing and different food, and the warmth and generosity of the people here.

we make it work

Awhile back I made cookies in my apartment. This was a little difficult as Korea isn’t big on baking. I did find mini chocolate chips in the grocery store, but I didn’t locate vanilla extract or oatmeal. Instead of egg beaters, I mixed the batter with a whisk and a rice paddle. I was the first person to use the oven in our apartment, ever. It is a gas oven and has three black, completely unmarked knobs on the left-hand side. I turned on the gas and through process of elimination (one turned on a light, one made a clicking noise—maybe a timer?) figured out which one was the temperature. I turned the dial half-way, crossed my fingers it was indeed a temperature dial, and on baking sheets built for a small convention oven I scooped out the dough and baked four cookies at a time. I cooled them on a rack we usually use for barbecuing prawns and squid.

In the same “make-do” manner, we held an Easter party at a church last weekend. No white eggs in Korea? No dye? No problem—markers on brown eggs make kids just as happy.

On St. Patrick's Day, I asked my host sister Kumju if she knew that today was a holiday. "Yes!" she said excitedly. "Today Jesus died on the cross."

At least she got the month right.