Singaporean Passage, Part 1

Despite spending a total of seven hours in the air on Christmas Day, I still eventually came falling back to Earth like one of gravity's bitches. But the day almost didn't happen.

It was around 10 after 6 in the morning when I awoke, and my panicked senses flooded me with the realization of the time. My alarm was bleating like a possessed sheep, and the vibrating portion of that alarm (I have this because of my near deaf-ness), which I had placed conveniently right next to my weary head, was flaying on the floor, beating like a heart. Alana and Erin later informed me that they had heard my alarm quite clearly from the hall.

Incidentally, they were the ones who wrested me from my dreamless sleep, by concurrently pounding on my apartment door, and by pressing the god-awfully loud doorbell.

I was awake and cursing. "Oh, shit, shit, shit, shit." Together, Erin, Jason, Elena, Alana and I were supposed to leave for the airport at 6 a.m. sharp. We would catch a cab to the nearest bus stop which the airport shuttles serviced. "Fuck, goddamn it." To the two ladies outside: "Hold on! Dressing!" I didn't even have my hearing aids on!

Once dressed -- at least enough to show myself -- I opened the door, still swearing.

"Awake?" came the gentle prodding from Alana. I chuckled.

"Do you have everything packed?" was Elena's inquiry.

I sighed, stuffing the remaining belongings into my backpack. "Yeah, all packed. I did it last night."

"Okay, well. We're going to run to Paris Baguette for some coffee."

"Alright. I'll meet you there in 10 minutes. I just have to brush my teeth and double-check everything."

"Brush your teeth? Okay," and they started to leave. "10 minutes?"

"Yes. I'll run."

I did just that, only to receive a text shortly afterwards informing me to meet Erin at her apartment, where she, too, had only just woken up.

"Ready?" I asked when I got there. Erin shot me a sideways stare, laced with unspoken sarcasm. "No?"

In 5 minutes, we were out into the cold air, with the night still perfectly dark and bleak around the edges of our vision. It was a brisk -2 (in Celsius), and we were all heading for eternally-warm climates. We dressed in long sleeves, jeans, a jacket, and beanies and hats; but in our bags the clothes were shorts and t-shirts: the dust was still settling in the apartment after their removal from the corners of the closets.

Elena and Alana took a cab together, while Erin, Jason and I took a separate one a few minutes later. After we caught the shuttle a few minutes later, Erin and Jason sprawled asleep instantly. I lay awake, unable to sleep despite having had only an hour of it.

I had planned my trip late, up till the minutes before going to sleep. If I managed to pull off this trip without losing my mind, I would be impressed with myself.

Sauerkraut and arsenic sauce

There is relief in the air (polluted though it is here in Korea). Yes, relief. The Christmas festival at Boston Campus is over. My kids were full of vim and vigor as they took their turn on the stage.

To bring you up-to-date: Every year, Boston Campus hosts a Christmas festival. This festival is of terrible importance, both to the school and to our kids' parents. Stress is a disease, more common than a cold (which is pretty damn common when working with children), during this stretch of a month leading up to the actually concert date. We practice every day, sometimes several times a day: Songs, scripts, dances!

My class, which is the oldest and smartest of the kindergarten classes, was doing the most difficult production of the bunch: The Grinch Who Stole Christmas. It was a long script, interspersed with a couple song-and-dance numbers. When initially told about this event, I was worried that we wouldn't be able to pull it off. When we started the whole shebang finally, things started to get better. The kids learned the script fast, within a couple weeks, leaving only the songs -- and those dances that I had to choreograph -- to memorize.

It took work, and determination, and when the day came full, we put on our suits (not me, obviously) and trekked onto the stage to perform. Beyond the heavy and hot lights of the ellipsoidals glaring down upon the kids, the parents stared anxiously, beaming with pride whenever their child recited his or her line perfectly.

Overall, the production went smoothly. Thomas, bless his lingering baby fat, froze once and completely forgot his line. But Erin ventured up to him and reminded him. After that, it was near perfection. The kids did have a little trouble with the songs, which were complex (yes, if you were 5, you too would have difficulty memorizing a line like the following: "Your soul is an appalling dump heap overflowing with the most disgraceful assortment of deplorable rubbish imaginable"), and having to dance at the same time didn't always make it easier. But they pulled it off well, and at the end were met with polite applause (thunderous applause from their own parents, of course). I hopped onto the stage then and, together with my kids, took a bow before leading them off at stage left.

All the hoopla was followed with a cordial ceremony afterwards, wherein the children got changed backstage while the foreign teachers like myself were introduced to everyone. We even received bouquets -- yes, bouquets! -- from some of the parents. It was quite a nice moment. There was chatting afterwards with the more fluent parents, many flashbulbs, and a fond faretheewell. The day had ended early, with a nice layover until the post-kindergarten classes began at 2:30.

I donned my jacket and headed out into the brisk cold. I got a bite to eat before proceeding to walk home -- with a bouquet of flowers in my left hand, of course. (I pondered whether I should've just walked up to a beautiful Korean woman and said, "These are for you, love" and then walked away.) When I got home, I sat listlessly and exhaustedly in my chair. I took a nap then. And an hour later I woke up and went back to work.

Roses and beams and candy-appled everythings

Tonight is December 20th. It was a brisk Saturday, which I predictably spent indoors, cleaning the walls and floors, decidedly unsocial. The time has passed slowly. But I'm not complaining, for Christmas approaches again, bringing its cheer once again to all of us. The roses now exist only in greenhouses, supported by the sunbeams that morph inward to the flowers' light-hungry cell structures. I find this way of the world's workings a great and wonderful thing.

I am listening at the moment to a song called "Prove It," by a band called Television. The song is more than just a bit dadaist, but the chorus has this tidbit worth the quotation:

"Prove it, just the facts
The confidential
This case, this case, this case
That I've been workin' on so long"

The song is about chasing some thought so far that you get lost along the path it leads you.

I haven't much to tell, but I feel like I have a lot to say, to the point of deluge. I have spent much time lately wondering why this is, but I don't think I have come to any worthy answers. I hope this trait is atavistic, and that I will pick up my pen soon and never put it down again.

The truth is I do not tell much of anything. I fancy myself some great enigma, and perhaps I am. I have always been honest, true, but I have become uncomfortable with the facts. It's not their reality that I distrust; it is their barrenness, their lack of contextual and relative grip. I turn instead to emotional honesty, and thus circumvent both truth and falsehood on a path that was built for the candy-apple-colored marching bands as well as the dark, chambered dread of a glucose-draining gothic sensibility. I communicate in images, and teeter that walk of insane hyper-surfeit cumbrance. Even now I am doing it!

When I was young, I was a talker. In fact, my youth was one of surprising garrulity: Words flew out of my mouth like atoms through a particle accelerator. My parents must've thought me an outlier in any statistical measure of speech patterns.

One day, when I was 7, standing in the half-kitchen of my home in Orlando, something happened which I think changed that, however slowly. (Okay, the specious quality of this self-analysis is certain; perhaps I am projecting in imagining the significance of this moment.) Dressed in a red sweatshirt, which my mom had made, I was looking out the window into the refractive embrace of the late afternoon. The sun outside had never been brighter, and at that very moment, it was sinking through the net of the basketball hoop outside on our patio. I was speaking with all the usual rapidity, about something or other, oblivious to the annoyed exasperation around me.

Finally, gently, my mom said to me, "Joel, you're talking too much." The command implicit in this was met with enthuastic relief by my sister. I defended myself with some weak argument, contending that I had a lot to say. My mom replied that we all do, but that we don't always need to say it out loud. With blankness etched on my face, I asked what that meant. I was politely informed that it meant to confine my words to my brain, and let them tumble in there like the clothes in the dryer.

With a look of eureka on my face, I comprehended her, and them, all of my family. And nothing's been the same since then, or ever.

Greeting whatever comes next

The night is begun, with the temperatures already approaching an ungodly low. It is barely 6 p.m.; the sun has only just been pushed past the horizon. And yet it is already below 20. For you metric-practicing readers, that is a stark -6; and for the dubiously-extant scientist who might read this, that is a moderate 267 Kelvin.

I came tonight to tell you of some sudden thought that struck me, a thought about the dichotomous natures of human motive. I wish to tell you my thoughts, but as always I don't think it's worth relating. So rather I think I'll keep you up to date, and inform you then of what I think.

A new semester has begun at Boston Campus (I have here linked the school's website, on whose main page you can see me). Mountains of stress accompanied the week, manifest in the multitude of lesson plans and dictating once again to the oft-mutinous kids the importance of their attention.

On top of all this, I have begun to have dreams, of the nocturnal kind, with vague and frequently confusing imagery. Truthfully, sleep has left me, and in its void only a stoniness lays beside me. The solitude of sleep is in its reprieve from the noise I hear daily, that sound I can't escape, like a cryptic conscience with a bullhorn. Deprived of this, I distort strangely.

The only time I ever drink coffee is if I need the caffeine. Yet this week I drank coffee daily.

Such tiredness can make one cranky. I am not given to such outburstings, and instead tend to become even more quiet. As a result, I become more unhappy. This is okay. As must happen, unhappiness leads to reflection, and ultimately, hopefully, to action. I discovered in my time that my thoughts, whose liquidity I have always joyed over, have become illiquid. My mind, my reason, have somehow become solid, and intractable.

If this seems boring, I apologize. But this was fantastic to me, an awakening. I had forgotten myself, in (mis-)adventurous whimsy. Left behind among the rubble and ruin of whatever troubles I concerned myself with understanding, my mind sat undisturbed and vacant. Why? Why did I forget the instrument whose melodies had always sounded so sweet to my ears?

And this brings me to my point of understanding the dichotomy of human motive. I have long seen myself as sincere, as honest. The motive for all human action flows out of two desires: love and pleasure (or to escape their inverses). Whatever may have been my ideas about coming here, and whatever they may still be, I have acted largely on the side of pleasure. I don't mean pleasure in the Biblical sense, which might conjure up images of strange, awkward sin; I am far too simple for such ideas. It has been a period where I have unwittingly attempted to restructure my character. Now I find it is vile.

Except for my sincerity. Here my honesty has been the subject of shock, and even of ridicule. Even as this weird fact frustrates me (I understand the ridicule of ignorance, but ridiculing sincerity is insensible to me), I am thankful for it, for apart from it, I might be left to whatever impulses I could indulge here -- whatever impulses I don't want to follow.

What melody could lead me from my bed?

Once again, and as often, I have retreated fretfully into myself, to adjourn the proceedings of my life, and let all hang open, facing inward, to fall on itself. The past few weeks have found me not unhappy, but introspective, and desirous of a calm, quiet place. Maybe this is who I am, I wonder, that I should pull out from beyond whatever circles include me, forever following what fleshy and flowery things appeal to me.

On Thursday, the teachers, staff, and I all culled together a Thanksgiving, spearheaded by Alana's mom's appearance. She flew from the States to visit Alana, and to spend the holiday with her. What had been planned as a small and light celebration turned into a festival, including the whole cadre of my school's staff. It was an airy night, the conversations floated amicably by in increasing pitch, and I spent the time with a plate in front of me, chowing down the potatoes and turkey (slathered in gravy, of course, like any self-respecting southerner would eat them). It was calm and blissful.

The night ended early for me, unfortunately with an exit immediately preceded by ill-chosen, though not ill-intended, words with Loren, and a questionable comment about the resemblance of leftover turkey to that old image of the famous Zuiyō Maru's decomposing basking shark. This was a moment where I was reminded that one of the downsides of your thoughts being mostly a series of pictures is that you sometimes choose analogies full of unpleasant imagery.

I went shopping afterwards. Friday was the end of my first full semester here, and for all my classes we had finished our textbooks. Interestingly, despite what was meant to be a relaxing day of snacks and games -- as opposed to book-learning -- I was stressed. The reason I had to go shopping so late at night was so I could purchase the snacks for these various classes. If you're wondering, I had to provide for approximately 20 students, so I bought these things: 5 things of drink, a couple dozen cookies, a bag of potato chips, nacho chips and cheese sauce, and a box of truffles for my youngest class.

When I got home from shopping, I went nearly straight to bed and slept soundly through the night, only to be disturbed by my alarm early. The day went as expected, full of stress and vigorous attempts to complete all that was doable under the oppressive thumb of linear time. I managed, for the most part, a success.

And when all was over, I murmured a farewell to the office, and I walked out. I took my time on a soothing walk through the wet cold, with my fingers stuffed in my coat, my music playing in a serenity around my head, and my thoughts in a distant rut, channeled through the familiar cosm of symbols and glorified abstracts. I sat and wrote in my journal, and remained stuck. The rush is over, I thought; life, new, is familiar again. The sounds climbed into an awkward, bombastic frenzy: horns in my head; and some silver saxophone in an atonal roar. I walked home, and registered myself once more as an individual in this world. And then I was content.

Just another night to mourn to

It started with a party. The night was fresh and cool, idyllic but for bad dispositions and dread. The night would end, though, with incessant laughter. In between were 11 hours.

The party was for a website which Erin and Jason had founded. It had only gone online in the few hours preceding the actual launch party. Well in advance, my comrades and I had been invited, being generally friends. Tonight we would see fruition, if it dared show at a party.

The streets were crowded, and the cars honked everywhere. Street vendors were selling shirts and shoes; and some sold sweaters and socks; and some sold scarves and suits. Everywhere there were people: rich, poor, old, young, in love, alone. And we were five – myself and four others, on a way to a party in Apujeong, crammed into a cab, with four of us in the backseat, one up front, and a guitar in the trunk.

At a quarter after 7, we stopped and paid, and we made our way blindly through streets with names we didn’t comprehend. We sought landmarks and banks. We had no directions; our phone calls brought us no closer to our destination. Unable to find our way, we simply walked in a general direction along the main road, expecting to see two friends of ours who had said they would meet us there.

Jeff and Ally met us at a gas station, across from a bank. We followed them slowly, myself in the rear with Loren, whose shoes were too small and were bugging the shit out of her. In her pain she began to take slower and slower steps. Ally fell back and joined us.

Up ahead with Jeff were Andrew, Alana, and Elena. Andrew looked excited, but I doubted this was how he wished to spend the evening. Alana, who is forever up to anything, was ecstatic, jumping lightly with excitement. Her jacket made her a white bulb in the night. Elena was wolfing down cigarettes, clinging to herself in her blue dress and stockings, her long legs briskly walking. Her excitement mirrored Alana’s.

I was less excited; nervous being the more apt word. Sick but feeling fresh, I had waited with flagging excitement for the party. I never expected it to be anything more than a light thing, though it seemed odd to plan such a light thing so far in advance, and with such secrecy.

The party was down a side street. The place was somewhat crowded already.

We placed our names on the list, grabbed our free beer tickets, and headed to a seat. We then ate and fraternized, and watched as the crowd swelled. Soon there were over a hundred, and eventually there were over two hundred. The music was loud but ever in the background, as chatter replaced the simmer of the melodies coming out of the speakers.

A man was selling souvenirs – necklaces and purses, things to raise money for a charity that was attempting to promote the use of birth control in Africa. He spoke before us all in front of a microphone, and under the lights told us how the Catholic Church frowns on the use of contraceptives such as condoms in Africa, and how as a result of unprotected sex AIDS and unwanted pregnancies are common and problematic. He was an older man, in his late 30s. Most everyone else was in their mid20s. He was bent, a dip in his posture, and he had beads around his neck, and a black v-neck shirt. He made a lot of money that night.

No word yet on what are the fortunes of the women in Africa.

There was some dancing, and lots of drinking. There were cheese balls and tomatoes, pretzels and bottles of water. I had one of those latter things. There was wine, too: at a table full of people sampling a bottle of red wine dark as the sea, I posed for a picture and smiled pleasantly like it was natural.

I grabbed a bowl and piled in some tortilla chips. I applied some cheese sauce and had nachos, moving to a different table, bringing my jacket with me. The mike was opened up to performers. The first man did covers and sang like a songbird. A young woman, shy and artless, came up and sang a few sad tunes. And the crowd dipped into melancholy.

Then a man stepped up to the microphone, full of confidence and with an intense face, and he shredded his guitar for us. Sitting down, I had to stand up and take in the performance visually. The crowd applauded when it was over. Through their buzzed stares, they saw, as I did, how good he was. The music went on for an hour or more, in spite of the fraternizing guests, who paid little attention. Loren, now barefoot and comfortable, sang a few songs, too, with her sweet voice like a full breath released.

At 9:30, or shortly thereafter, a band showed up. They sang three songs. They were a novelty act that sang about the peculiarities of Korea. Everyone sang along quite elatedly, myself included. Their concluding number, set to the music of Queen’s “We Will Rock You,” was a lament at the fact that it is impossible to find Taco Bell here.

The party's focus shifted outside as it became more crowded. There was a grill, and hot dogs for everyone. And a man was selling cigars, though not for the benefit of any charity. I liked him better than the other guy. People smoked. Andrew pretended to be a carnival barker. On the urging of my friends (“The beer is free, just have one”), I got a glass and sipped it idly. Later, I slipped into the bathroom and threw most of its contents out. Apart from a Jello shot later, and a sip of something much later in the night, I would remain alcohol free the entire night, which quite pleased me.

There were caricaturists, and fortune tellers. The fortune tellers left unexpectedly early. I had my caricature drawn. The lady asked me to stare at her pointedly, and without ceasing. I did: I smiled and stared into her eyes. She held my stare. When it was over, I thanked her.

Then I showed myself off to the others. Ally laughed! Jeff thought I looked like Elvis Presley.

By now it was 11, and with all the noise, conversation became untenable. I sank into my chair and reached for my jacket. I pulled out a notebook and wrote for the next hour, while the drinks continued to pour, and the prizes started to be awarded. I never win prizes. I grabbed a handful of snacks and guzzled them down with more water. They were saltine crackers, topped with a thin slice of sharp cheddar, a slice of ham, and a lovely cherry tomato, cut in half, facing down. They were scrumptious, and I chucked them down my throat like tic tacs. My pen dried up, and I was forced to stop writing.

Among the many prizes awarded were bottles of Soju, a popular rice whiskey here. Other prizes included t-shirts and concert tickets. The grand prize was a pair of tickets to the idyllic Jeju Island, which is a tropical (supposed) paradise off the coast of South Korea.

Many people won prizes. Elena was one of the lucky recipients of the Soju bottle. She turned it over to me for safekeeping, for she knew I would not drink it.

After midnight, the party thinned. The ones who remained protested its ending. They decided that we should all go to another place, for dancing – and drinking. I followed them. We made our way away, down through the alleys of Apujeong, to a dancing club called Monkey Beach. But it was too crowded.

As we sat outside the club, doing nothing, all of us wondering where next we should go, I found a bucket, like the kind you make sand castles with at the beach. Feeling silly, I started trying to stand on it and maintain my balance. Jeff counted the seconds, and at last I managed a ten-second stand before losing my balance and crashing to the ground. Everyone gasped, but I laughed uproariously. They soon laughed with me. Despite being completely sober, I was acting more drunk than any of them. And I was quite giddy.

The time dragged on. Spotting a barricade down a side path in the alley, I dragged the bucket over with my foot. I planned to kick the bucket over the barricade. But I failed; I shanked it right, and on that course it collided angrily with Andrew’s right leg.

Andrew was not happy. “Goddamn, what the fuck? Goddammit, what the fuck are you doing? You're goddamn sober, you're acting like a fucking moron."

“I'm so sorry, dude,” I said, even as I laughed. I tried to stop, but as I tried, I just laughed harder.

And Andrew, annoyed and tired, decided to take a cab home. He left with a few others. By now it was past 2. The rest of us, we trekked endlessly, never finding a good place to go, finally ending up nowhere as a large crowd in need of several taxis. Our disorganization showed, as four of us were left behind with no idea where the others had gone. Those four were: Matt, Sydney, Junga, and me.

Fortunately, Elena had retrieved her bottle of Soju from me a few minutes earlier, or else she’d have been pissed. Alana was drunk. Loren was in the cab with her, and together they managed to tell the cab driver to pull over so she could vomit. She and Loren ended up calling it an early night around 3.

Now the crowd was down to about 15 people, though some of us were still in Apujeong. Matt decided his night was through: he called a cab and went home. Junga did the same. Sydney and I took a cab to Seoyheon (pronounced soy-yawn), which is where we found out the others had gone. We arrived in 20 minutes, after the cabbie took us there in record time, driving upwards of 120 km/h. We texted and phoned and found out the others were at Posse, a Western bar. We made for that place, but when we arrived it was empty. We scanned around, but no one was there. We headed out, frustrated, and we considered a voyage to the Krispy Kreme across the plaza. But before a couple minutes passed we received a call and met up with Erin and Jason. They had gotten a bite to eat and thus were also separated from the rest of the party, which, by this time, was at a place called Under Construction. After 20 minutes of not finding this place, we received another call that they were at Dublin, an Irish pub. So we went away to that place, and to our delight found everyone there.

Or, rather, what was left of everyone. The crowd was now less than 10. Elena, full-on drunk, was sitting at the bar, nursing something or other. Jared was also there, but he appeared relatively sober. Jackie and Kayleigh were sitting at a table. Jared's jacket was draped over the next chair. Sydney sat down next to Jackie and Kayleigh, and I sat down with these three. Jason and Erin sat down at the next table. They spent the remainder of the night chatting with people I didn’t know. Erin ordered some drinks, and Jackie ordered some Chili Cheese Chips, which is a delicious, however unhealthy, confection. I stared at Jackie with interest. She looked as out of place as I did, or at least felt. The four of us chatted for two hours, until just before 5 o'clock.

And we ate the Chili Cheese Chips. And they marveled that I'd never tried whiskey. And we talked about jobs. And then the night apparently drew closer to a close. I bid farewell to Jackie, who lived far away. A few minutes later, I climbed into a cab with Kayleigh and Elena. Elena sat up front, drunk, while Kayleigh and I sat in the back, well within our wits. We rode for about half an hour, till almost 5:30, when we pulled up at a place near our apartments. Here Elena and I said farewell to Kayleigh.

Much to our surprise, Erin and Jason had also arrived in a cab, just a few seconds before us. We walked with them. Elena, in her high steels, stumbled. I offered to try to carry her back to her apartment. We all laughed, because we didn't think that was possible – and even I doubted it.

We did end up trying, though. But she didn't fully commit, and so it didn't happen. She assured me she could stay upright, and we left it at that. It was only a short walk. Erin and Jason, during mine and Elena's attempt to get her into my arms, had gone a different way. We didn’t know where they were. We walked, carefully. But then Elena started shouting, with as full a voice as she could: “Erin and Jason!” She shouted this again and again. And I laughed, and I laughed harder, till I had more trouble walking than she did.

“Erin and Jason!"

Up ahead, around the corner, they appeared, glancing at us in bewilderment – me, laughing my ass off, and Elena, drunk off her ass – both of us making a lot of noise for 5:30 in the morning. We walked the remainder of the way with them.

Elena went to her apartment first. Erin and Jason walked with me to mine. I thanked them for inviting me to the party, and I said that I enjoyed it immensely. They thanked me for coming, and then they went home, too.

When I got into my apartment, I sat down at my computer chair and checked my e-mail, as I always do. And then I slept, not to wake for the next six hours.

Annex

You are precious to me
in your world-weary innocence
and tremulous memory
To your youth I have
composed an elegy, and deep
in the vein of my dreams
I see you stretched awkwardly
upon brown sheets, your feet bare and cold
the scars on your legs yellow as they fade against your skin

You wear a ragged and simple nightgown
striped but bled together
from the wash and reuse
You sleep, and your breath is faintly visible
And in your fascination
you touch yourself to remind yourself
that yes, you are still alive, still able to feel

Am I the one who has made you cold? I want
you to wake up in me, and flood me
evacuate all that is unwanted and
forever burst the bombs of sweetness within

Nobody raise your voices

Yesterday was Halloween Day. I celebrated. Here's how (and why):

At 8:00 in the morning, I awoke to that shrill call of my alarm and, consciousness full, turned on the hot water heater. It takes a few minutes to heat up, so in the meantime, I got on the computer, checked the news (because this must be done, right?), frowned over the fact that I'd gotten no e-mails of import, and then wondered what I should do to pass the remaining few minutes.

With the hot water finally full, I took a shower. I remembered, much to my chagrin, that I had not completed next month's lesson plan -- I had completely forgotten to type it, in fact. I hurried out of the shower, got dressed for the day, and proceeded to complete my costume.

Here is the final product:


If you're not sure what the hell all that makeup and shit was supposed to make me look like, it was Kung Fu Panda. Kids were using me as a punching bag all day.

Here are the rest of the teachers:


In order of appearance, from left to right: Mary (as herself), Elena (as a pirate), Loren (as Rapunzel), Andrew (as sheriff of Brokeback County), Alana and Erin (as Eve and Wall-E from Wall-E), and me.

I stayed in character for the afternoon, too. Everyone got a kick out of it (in addition to their aforementioned punches), and it was fun. It was a hectic, wild, crazy, out-of-control, practically-spontaneous, by all accounts a no-way-in-hell-it-should-have-worked kind of a day. I don't mean to glamorize, or to promote sycophancy in your responses: work was extremely frustrating, and I was itching most of the day; and I had yet another sore throat, probably not to be helped by being touched by skeptical kids all day to see if I was real.

Here is my kindergarten class:


They are, if you desire their names (from left to right): Andy (as a wizard), Luke (as Spider-Man), Thomas (as a gangster from Chicago in the 1920s -- no, really), Joanne (who is unashamedly my favorite student, as a witch), Emily (as a princess/fairy), Jack (as Spongebob Squarepants), Steve (as a pirate), Michael (I think he was a Korean superhero, but I'm not sure), Ryan (who figured his Tae Kwan Do outfit was good enough), and Kelly (as a fairy).

This was the first time I'd celebrated Halloween. And the occasional playacting as a child aside, my first time dressing up for anything. It was fun, but nothing spectacular.

Welcome to my life.

All of which brings me to why, and to reflect on the day. My final class and I had a snack party during our class, since they weren't part of the earlier festivities. It was a laid-back class, with drinks and bits of candy distributed to them. They made it all fun and worth it in the end, in their quiet studious attitudes and gentle laughter at my getup.

After getting home, removing the muck that had sunk into my pores, and then removing the remains of my costume, I settled in for the night, feeling less than healthy, and more exhausted than I've felt in a while. I forwent my usual Friday night trip to the Subway in Suji (one of the highlights of my week, wherein I spend a calm, blissful hour to and fro whilst enjoying the shivering cold and some spontaneous tunes on my iPod). I went to bed early, thinking how glad I was that it was the weekend, and wished for a tasteful (hopefully for its fruitfulness) weekend.

And today, as on October 30, I think Halloween is just another day. But no one will ever be able to say I didn't try.

Roadmaps for the Soul

In reviewing my trove (not necessarily all treasure) of writings, I found this one, which is not nearly one of my favorites. It's called "Roadmaps for the Soul." I wrote it over a period of more than a year, regularly excising some part and splicing in a new thing I'd written as scrap. Finally, I felt somewhat satisfied, with this mangled, hopefully-caustic, and sadly pessimistic poem, whose inspiration came from listening to the rough edges of 60s rock and roll and the tall tales of anarchy in late 70s punk.

I'm on the front porch
Brandishing a blowtorch
So don't come near me
If you don't want to get scorched

I said, watch out, you
Be careful what you do
You can try hard
But get marred
And more likely get scarred
If you carry a gun
You’ll get put in a police car
So be on the lookout
And don’t do cookouts
Oh, they’ll get you even if you just pull a book out
‘Cause that’s what being a crook’s about

Then up the pavement
I see door-to-door salesmen
If only my dog
Went after them like the mailman

I said, don’t give in
Keep on living
You got cursed
But you come through the worst
So don’t die of thirst
And before you get revenge
There’s more you got to do first
Jump through the loopholes
When you get your soup cold
And as always, make everything you do bold
‘Cause opinions change almost every new poll

I need to get the president
Out of the basement
Maybe he can talk to them
And get them to make sense

I said, truth don’t change
People just get strange
You got new clothes
And a new nose
Even a set of brand-new toes
But your mind’s still ablaze
What you didn’t get was a fire hose
So bluff with scorn
At all the newborns
Say all the wasted words that prove to warn
That if you want to make it, you got to toot your own horn

Oh, what are they selling?
Well, they ain’t telling
I calmly say I’m not buying
But still they keep on yelling

The etheriform wins the bet

Where am I? Who am I? I feel so acutely this evening, the blood that runs in my veins. Tonight is the kind of night I rush to feel something worth holding in my arms. I am tender and selfish.

The sky is full of squalor, silvery-white clouds passing by in columns and vague shapes my memory tries to recall; the pale sky stars are, I know, merely the long-traveled beams of far-away explosions, novas and supernovas in hot gas vapor blizzards. Elsewhere I look up and see only the same dark I see when I sleep, only there here seems some color, some life-blood to inspire a splendorous awe. What that God must have made this! And for whom? Am I to see all this? It's too great for me.

And in the rage, the tide turns inward on itself

I don't know how to write about myself. You should probably ignore the pretty symbols and metaphors I use and just concentrate on the underlying confusion that haunts every post, in obscure passages and as a sentiment expressed throughout.

When I left Florida in mid-August, amid a flurry of byes and ill-expressed well-wishes, I had a few things in mind, some goals to accomplish. Korea was, is, and will forever have been a necessary step, far-removed though I am now from the familiarity of all that was, well, familiar. But I don't want to recount here the purposes of coming to Korea. I could spend hours on that topic, and only begin to exhaust its insatiable reservoirs of discontented feelings. In any case, those thoughts are better said in a poem:

A trough in the outboard waters
seekers drifting without their daughters
cars collide in the aftermath
careening through and around the path
like songbirds sweetly, swiftly moving
glanced upon by sun reproving
outwards all our sights are bent
inwards to our discontent

That poem, like so much of my writing, is unfinished. And indeed, that is the theme of my life at this moment: that I am not finished. I won't say unfinished, for perhaps my manuscript has already been written; but it is not completed to my satisfaction, and in my voyage to Korea, and in the subsequent days here, I am renewing the alterations, I am changing the substance of my character into something unrecognizable.

This week was miserable. My students were frustrating to no end, and it grieved me to punish some of them so severely. I had little humor to indulge, even to my prized Minnie, who, despite her frequent errors, tries harder to than anyone else in the class, a fact for which I am indebted to her. The glare in my eyes was harsh and unceasing all week, exacerbated by a renewed struggle with a sore throat (damn kids, with their pathology-spreading fingers).

All this, and I no longer can tell myself in a mirror. This is frightening to me, to be so far gone that introspection seems futile. I am not unhappy, but the origin of what I do feel remains a mystery. And when I know, I feel that will crash the levees finally.

Soft thoughts

The light outside has waned to an inestimable smallness, and I would readily go blindly into the darkness. Risk dominates my life and thoughts. The world only turns in fragments and farces; somehow it forgets its past and continues, blood-drenched.

More so than ever, there is nothing worth the relation. Everything here is as normal, and small, and full of gaudy guys and girls. I am deciding upon which plane I shall exist, in my mind or my body, unguarded or fully reveling. My vision is decidedly gray and unchanging, and all seems welcome and free. My writing is always concerned with the truth hiding under the nature of things, yet I am not unambiguous myself. If the world is a wondrous prostitute, so it is. And if I have endeavored to endure my years as a sundog, so be it.

But my worldview grows daily in its purview, and in ways not always deemed to be better. I am so unapologetic and flatteringly grave that I should shut up and not convey any more than I have. In fact, this is how my journal entries read: if you leafed its pages and dog-eared its contents, you would be most disappointed at the lack of clarity. But I understand every word.

Why do I evade? This is the question on my mind. Why do I seek to be un-understood? I don't want you to know me too well, but -- dammit, I want you to try. I want myself to be worth the effort. And I twist and boil myself beneath a fading facade that deigns to be alive and allowed to do what it pleases. Thoughts of God and women fruitfully chase me, and I flee after them. I scatter myself like ashes, but the substance of my fire is untouched.

And it ends with the comforting notion that perhaps it's okay, even as it is; that while seeing the world from the sun is rather dark, I do like its point of view.

Coils

Where you live
and where you pray
is where you will die

and where you go
is where you try
and where you grow
is where you smell and hold with me, upon your wavering wines

Or is it just you're such a lovely place to wait outside
and soon the living's so dangerous that you won't give it a try
then I watch my belly
float through the halls about which there are frays
and the river runs through a paradise and lends its cheer once again

When you grow
start up a size
and when you go
I want a slice to remember me apart from this world I belong
now come with me, watch our cover resolve

One day I will turn the corner and won't be ready for it

There was a time when the free flow of my thoughts looked rather graceful and flitting, but it feels bureaucratic now. In every corner I find little to relay, but nonetheless I am happy to be here. If I can, I want to make this blog mirror, in words, the sound I hear in my head. It is glorious, like monks chanting, as an organ runs like liquid and an accordion lopes in and out of the mix. I hear incantations, and fervor spills out like gold into a cast.

The background of this blog is from a painting by Jean-Michel Basquiat, an American artist who died in 1988. I am a big fan of his drawings and have been since I first discovered them a couple years ago. His art has influenced my thinking, and I would credit his art for creating in me the desire to view the tumult as somehow beauteous.

Plans seem far away again. I am in Korea, where I will remain for at least another ten months. My life at the moment is like that of a man who, having placed his hand to his forehead, cocks back his neck to catch an ephemeral glimpse at the yellow sun. For risk or reward, I am looking, and I see a light distorting strangely. Yet like all things, it will evanesce one day, and turn wan as the moon.

I have to say, though, that I like it here, that it excites me and surprises me still. When I wake up tomorrow morning, I will head off to see a sweet cabal of children who are like the finger cymbals in the symphony of my life. They will scream and chant and laugh themselves into being, and through them I will vicariously attempt to prove, if only to myself, that maturity can be just as weird as growing up.