Adventures in Asia and around

Nagi Gompa

2010-02-01T18:08:00.001+09:00

Nagi Gompa
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

This is a real place. You can go there. It's a bumpy ride, but you can go there.

Where oh where

2010-01-27T13:21:00.003+09:00

After a year doing my best to drill the infamous "5 W's" into the heads of attention deficit children (due only to attention determined parents) I am finding myself in the midst of an eternal questioning of where.
I am now sympathetic, especially, to a slightly thick headed chubby kid called Tom, whose main educational deficit was not a lack of smarts but a lack of cool which led him to things like talking smack in Korean and throwing things at teacher in an attempt to fight his own naturally sponge like mind. In any case, despite my constant remindings in both English and Korean, Tom always confused "where" with "why" or "who". I am now seeing that it's all one in the same, really, though you don't much want to ask "Who are you going?", especially to a stranger.
"Where?" seems to be the most popular question posed here in Nepal.
Where are you going? ~friendly banter--much like saying hello.
Where are you from? ~meant to guide you into a conversation during which you will be invited for tea, into a shop, or for a variety of other things. My standard answer has become "On top of California."
Where are you staying? ~meant either to create friendly conversation between two foreigners to pass the time and compare hotel rates and hot showers, or, to set up a date later in order to meet for some act more discreet than sidewalk chat.
Where have you been in Nepal? ~meant, it seems, to test out your Nepalese street cred and/or to see how much you might pay for a yak wool shawl, given prices in various places vary with popularity of the place and the item.

So I have learned the word "where" very well in Nepali.

But it has struck me many times over breakfast, or waking from dreaming at 2am that *where* is really of no consequence and it is much more *who* that is important.
I am not returning to a Portland where *where* matters. It is a beautiful city, of course, but it is the who that makes me excited to return.
I am not visiting a *where* in Korea but remnants of the *who* I knew when I lived there.
I will not visit the places where the extraordinary people I have met over the last year live, but the who that lives there.

The two are linked though, and in some way the places where you have been make you who you are, and can say something pretty powerful about you.

For example, the other day I went to a particular cafe to eat some chocolate monstrosity which I later regretted, recommended by an Argentinian man who works for the parahawking company in Pokhara. The only reason I was interested in the dessert at all was because of the way he talked about it and the slight accent mixed with a day's excitement about flying with vultures made the chocolate sound especially interesting. On the way, I met a Nepali man who runs a jewelery shop. In 5 minutes I learned where he was from (Kashmir), where his girlfriend was from (Colorado), where he had traveled (Australia, England, Canada, California) and where he will live when he and his girlfriend get married one, maybe two years from now which is less important than the where they will be. But for now, he has to be in Nepal for the family and the family business. Once he finished listing off places he had been, we had little to talk about and were able to move on, but it was incredibly important for him to tell us at the time. And so, I think of him as perhaps slightly hungry for conversation but also much the same as myself, or how I will be when I get back to Portland.
Home for the who moreso than the where or what that is there.

Thursday, Friday

2010-01-16T16:18:00.004+09:00

Thursday ends, my last day in the clinic. I treated upteen people with post stroke paralysis, a million patients with knee pain. My room is clean, everything I remember to put in it's place is in it's place. I say goodbye to the clinic and cry my eyes out.

A microbus to Laghen-Kel, another to Radna Park, I get lost walking to find Thamel. I end up on freak street, which may as well be Thamel with the tourist shops and western friendly restaurants. I ask several people how to find Thamel, where Sonia is waiting for me at the Wonderland Hotel. I finally find it, we go for Korean food made by Nepali women. It mostly tastes Korean anyhow, which at this point tastes like home to me. It's comforting. We go to the shisha bar and I order a gimlet and a melon shisha. Smoking, anything really, is somehow appropriate in Thamel. The night is long and delicious and life altering. If I didn't remember it so vividly I would swear it hadn't happened, it's that sort of night.

6:00am comes too quickly and I find my way to the bus park to board the tourist bus to Chitwan. I made the mistake of drinking an entire bottle of water when I first boarded the bus, trying to shake off too much to drink and too little to sleep. An hour later my bladder feels like it's the size of a football. The bus is winding its way around dangerous mountain roads, doing it's best to not hit the other 9,000 tourist buses and the other million or so colorfully painted trucks. The men have an easy time of it, they step off the bus as it's going slowly and pee, gloriously over the cliff. I however am wearing pants, and do not have one of those amazing contraptions that allows women to pee standing up. I'm not sure how those work, but it sure would have been handy. We're now 3 hours into the bus ride and I wish I could sleep, but trying to sleep makes having to pee worse. Finally, it's all too much and I get off the bus as it creeps through traffic and run into a surprised family's house to use their toilet. They are gracious about the whole thing and I wonder if any tourists have come to use their bathroom before. I run back to the bus which has creeped another 20 meters or so through the traffic. I get to sleep.

A few men and a jeep pick me up to take me to my prearranged hotel, "Jungle Sunset Camp". All the hotels are named "Jungle" something or other and I'm glad I found the right people, and had kept the brochure given to me when I booked it. Babo, takes me through the programme. "Some people, mebbe they see no animals on jungle walk. Some people, they see many animals. It is not a jew, you know eh?" No, it is not a zoo. The ESL teacher in me cringes, but I am no one to judge. I am completely inept at the Nepali accent, even now and while I practice in my mind the ubiquitous "lla", which seems to mean everything from yes to ok to have a seat to finished to I'm really enjoying making out with you--I can't seem to get it right enough to start saying it myself as much as I would like to.
Another guide, an older man with even tempered speech and kind yellowed eyes tells me stories about the Tharu people, native to the area. We go for a walk, watch the sunset and drink cup of milk tea number 907. He tells me about his life and the many times he's been attacked by rhinos, what to do if it happens. I was given more pasta than anyone could eat in one sitting and I'm in bed by 8.

This morning, I woke up early for breakfast and a walk through the jungle. Apparently bright colors can startle the animals and initiate an attack. Though I am fairly tiger-colored, I tie my hair in a bandana for the first time in my life. I have two guides and we ride in a canoe type boat, pushed with bamboo poles to the edge of the jungle where we will start the walk back. About 20 minutes in the guide hears something and we see rhino ears about 10 meters ahead. My heart is beating wildly in my chest and I am internally chanting things like "I mean you no harm". In retrospect, maybe it wasn't so dangerous but it seemed so at the time. A little bit later I find a peacock feather and carry it with me. The two guides have large sticks in case of a sloth bear attack, I figure I should carry something as well--just in case and all. Walking along the trail, a peacock is startled and flies out from behind a bush, scaring the bejezzus out of all 3 of us. One of the guides takes off running, the other prepares to make large noises with his stick. I freeze and begin to think about what the hell I'm doing in the jungle anyway. I do my best to channel calm and peace for the rest of the 3 hour walk. Occasionally the guide in front says things like "I am getting rhino smell" or "I am getting monkey smell". I can't smell either, but wish I could. Sometimes he points out tiger tracks or claw marks. I think I am glad they are nocturnal. We saw two kinds of monkeys--rhesus and something else--cute!, and a huge male peacock in flight not 20 yards away. It made me realize all the kind of fake stuff we do, being 'cultured' and all to have a sense of very safe excitement--roller coasters and disney land and jet skiing, maybe they are all just replacement for things like walking through the jungle.

Back at the hotel I had something ridiculously faux american served to me for lunch and took a nap before my scheduled elephant ride this afternoon. It is a little strange to be doing all of these prearranged touristy things. I took a walk in the village and played with some kids and their puppies. It started with two puppies and as I pet them these kids kept bringing more and more puppies over, trying to pile them on top of each other. The puppies were squirming and fighting and we were all giggling. When I stood to leave they either wanted to give me a puppy or were asking for money, I couldn't tell which.

Riding an elephant is more thigh work than you would think. They walk kind of slowly and sort of lumber along in a way that has you gripping for stability with more muscle than you thought you had. It made me glad for doing all that running earlier in the year. I saw 5 rhinos up close, bison, and loads of spotted deer. The rhinos sort of looked like huge armadillos, and had the funniest buts I've ever seen. I have a million pictures to upload when the internet is faster than a boulder moving through a flat plain. The elephants seemed to be happy enough, but I wonder what they are like in the wild. The drivers hit them lightly in the rivet between either side of their skull, and kick them behind their ears with bare feet to make them walk. It doesn't seem particularly cruel, but I wonder if it is worth being taken care of to be a working elephant. I guess I will ask tomorrow at the elephant breeding center where I will get to see BABY elephants.
...more to come, I'm sure.

Monday {01.11.10}

2010-01-13T20:29:00.003+09:00

I wake up fitfull, groggy, covered in chilly sweat from a vivid dream about a woman I am enamoured with. I think it over as dawn comes over the mountains. The room is faintly pink. There were tarantulas, and arguments, trucks and hoardes of people. Half dream, half nightmare. I wait as long as possible to get up, the morning is cold even under two goose down blankets lent from the witty British lady who runs the clinic. I walk upstairs to the kitchen, where the other doctor is re-heating the chickpeas the cook made us for breakfast the night before. I pour some hot water, ready to sit for a few minutes and wake up with instant coffee, powdered milk.
Two monks climb up the stairs, one tall and one small. The little one is holding his shirt up over his belly where there is a swollen wound. Tears and snot are running down his tiny face. He is maybe 5, 6 years old. "Can you help?"
I wake up faster this way than coffee could have done it and sit the boy on the bench in the kitchen. His belly is bleeding from a golf ball size swelling just under his ribs. The monks tend to get boils, really big gross boils filled with more pus and blood than you would think holy. It could be that. Then again, it could be an intestinal hernia. Never having seen a hernia before--in the flesh anyway--I ask any questions I can think of to differentiate. Neither of them speak enough english to answer. We go downstairs to the pharmacy/aid room. Joel, the dharma man in residence happens to come by and helps me ask questions. It is likely not a hernia, thank Buddha or Vishnu or whomever you like, as I have no desire to push anyone's intestines back in their stomach. The little monk squirms and crys as I try to clean his belly, dress it as best I can. I fully realize why little kids generally hate going to the doctor and I wish I had a lollipop or a toy or a something to give him.
I rush back upstairs, still in my PJs to start breakfast. Two spoonfuls of chickpeas in, my ride to the satellite clinic where I will be working that day arrives. I'm still in pajamas, hungry, reeling. We send him to have tea and I set a 15 minute time limit for myself to have breakfast, wash my face, change my clothes, pack a bag of medical supplies and get out the door. Small miracles.
Krishna is waiting for me downstairs, I apologise and we leave to get on his bike and ride to Godawri. He is a beautiful man, as any man named Krishna should be. I have been admiring him for weeks now. He has perfect teeth and almond shaped eyes and skin the color of toasted honey. Riding on the motorcycle to the clinic is pretty much the best way for a Monday to start. Half of me wants to be a Nepali girl in his village, help him look after his cow and rabbits and goats that he's told me about and half of me wants to simply be as handsome as he is. I think about this as we ride through the valley.
There is frost on the grass, this may be the coldest morning yet. I learn and forget the Nepali word for frost. All of me is cold save the insides of my thighs where the touch the bike and my driver. Motorcycles are inherently sexy. We ride sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly as the level of pavedness allows. The sky is completely clear, not a single cloud. The mist hangs in the dips of the valleys and the mountains are illuminated by the sun. Goats are chewing grass, ducks and dogs and chickens run around wildly. We pass two groups of donkeys carrying cloth or tools to till the earth. They are fuzzy and cute and seem to like being donkeys. We pass terraces of fields growing mustard and wheat. Fields of uncooked bricks glow.
Krishna likes to take me for tea at a place called "New Market". He likes to joke that new market is in an old place. The man at the tea-tent is happy to see me again. They generally like foreigners here, probably for the money but maybe because we look strange. His wife makes us 'special tea! special!" Krishna and I talk about places in Nepal. Maybe he will come to Pokhara as well when I am there, maybe he will take me boating on the lake. Back on the bike for another 5 minutes or so takes us to the converted school room that is now our clinic. The walls are a strange shade of green that makes everyone's tongues look purple. The patients, throngs of them it seems, are waiting to be treated. I do my best. Some are appreciative, some are getting better, some are whiney, some are needy, some tell me how to do my job. Mostly they are wonderful, but it is exhausting. One patient tells me where to put the needles, exactly. I do as a teacher had once told and 'follow patient predilection', only to have her complain once they were in, lesson learned. One patient wants me to buy her a magnetic belt to help her back pain. Many want miracles, and I only have tiny swords to chase tiny demons.
Sometime mid morning I realize that I have started my period, and am compeltely unprepared. I ask Sonia, our tiny Tibetan interpreter if she has anything that can help. She hands me a 'panty liner' that is about as big as she is, large enough for a mouse to menstruate on and a DIY OB tampon the size of my thumb, compressed. Considering the bathroom consists of a hole in the ground with no access to running, or still, water, I opt for the panty liner. I hope for the best at lunch, maybe they've put in a Walgreens next to the woman with her sewing machine in the street.
Lunch is instant noodles and chocolate and pepsi, care of Sonia and the market down the street. I find a pharmacy and buy what essentially feels like a pair of absorbant cotton pants, which is better than the alternative.
I give 25 treatments, drink more cups of milk tea than any sane person should do.
Krishna picks me up to take me home. It is nearly 5pm and the sky is slowly getting darker. He asks me why I didn't call over the last week, he had wanted to 'take me around'. How many answers do I have to this question? I sadly tell him it's my last time at Godawri, that maybe I'll be back in a year. I promise him an email. The snow capped mountains are blazing pink. This is the most beautiful place I've ever seen.
At home, the other doctor, the cook and the woman who cleans are in the kitchen speaking different langauges and making pumpkin and roti (chapati/bread) for dinner. Everyone is giggling and we drink coffee and eat "Lay's Tomato Tango!" chips. The cook tells me I've lost weight (Thanks, Giardia!) and I can't quite tell through the giggling if she takes this as an insult to her cooking, but given her nature I doubt it.
Dinner is ready but I can't bring myself to eat, as pumpkin is one of the many things I had been sick with in the weeks previous to the miracle known as anti-giardia anti-biotics. I lay my head on the table and am terrible company, moaning about being sad to leave.
It is time for the monks' clinic again and I head downstairs. The little monk I saw in the morning comes in again. His stomach looks the same and I decide to bleed it and cup it to help the swelling and pus and pain. Again, he cries and squirms and I feel like a monster.
The littlest ones are treated, and I am standing with 3 older monks-one interpreter and two others. One lifts his robe to reveal some scratches he got when he fell a few minutes earlier. I gasp in mock horror and clean his small wounds. He leaves. Radna, the interpreter says the 3rd monk has 'some problem'. He lifts his robe to show wads of cotton stuck to 4-5 patches of dried pus and blood. I have to tear off the cotton and clean his ridiculously infected leg. He's waited several days to come and see me and I half jokingly scold him. Sarah and I tag team the wounds. She is good with getting out the pus and I am good at cleaning it up once it's out. It may be the worst infection I've ever seen, it takes about an hour to clean and bandage. We are running out of bandaging materials and we only have the scratchy stuff left. We contimplate antibiotics. I decide to give him the strongest anti-bacterial, anti-viral herbs we have, lots of vitamin C, and wait till morning.
There is hot water enough for a shower, and I wash off the day only to find myself having to hunt for the hair dryer which had mysteriously been left behind the clinic front desk.
I crawl into bed generally feeling as if I'd been dropped off in the woods with a brick and a pack of juicy fruit and told to make a phone to call for a ride home.
Tuesday is slightly less dramatic.

Things that could totally happen

2010-01-05T19:27:00.003+09:00

There are several alternate realities that I feel as if I could now live given my most recent experiences in Nepal. Here are 2 of them.

1. Accept my invitation to join Nepali coverband "The Subtones". Play no instruments, attempt to sing jazz. Scandalize the Nepali community with off the shoulder dresses and general western-ness. Become famous for songs like "Ain't Nobody's Business" a la Billie Holiday. Eventually break up the band by having an affair with someone I shouldn't have, call them "mero mayalu" in front of the wrong person. Attempt to go solo, fail, return home.

2. Instead of returning home--now or after coverband fame--take refuge in Tibetan Buddhism, find a Rimpoche to call my teacher. Learn a lot about nothingness, shave my head, become a nun. Live at a nunnery in the middle of nowhere, go on pilgramage at several sites throughout Nepal and India. Eventually fall in love with another nun. Run away to Thailand.

3. Go home to PDX with my current ticket. Continue with 5 year plan of starting practice, buying house, raising a kitten, maybe get some chickens, rent out house, travel again.

The evil eye

2009-12-26T15:37:00.002+09:00

This last week before Chrismas in the clinic, both the other doctor, Sarah and I fell ridiculously ill one day. We were both having stomach trouble, trying to treat a million patients and generally hold it together. At lunch, the food sounded revolting though it's the same thing every day--Dal Baat, rice and lentils, so I layed up on the roof in the sun and fell asleep. The interpreters were all worried about us, and tried to think up reasons for being sick. Pradjil thought it was the chicken we had for dinner the night before, because apparently the butchers sometimes sell you 3 or 4 day old chickens (no refridgerators). Satya Mohan thought it might be that the walk we went on with him the afternoon before had been too long, though it was only maybe an hour and a half. Ramita called her mother, who said that while we were roaming the village someone had definately cast the evil eye on us, and we should be dewitched. She sprinkled some water on a bench, sat me down, and traced each side of me 3 times with different handfuls of uncooked rice. She then plucked a hair from my head, did the same to Sarah and threw it all off the roof.
I rolled around in pain for a while longer, but everything went away maybe faster than it should have and I'm now pretty convinced that the dewitching worked, but I don't think I'll have village chicken for a while.

Things to do to make a small monk laugh

2009-12-08T11:56:00.002+09:00

1. While rubbing neem oil for head fungus, massage it in as if he were coming to a salon.
2. Sing songs from Mary Poppins and The Sound of Music, dance along.
3. Waltz with another doctor to imaginary music.
4. Shadow puppets
5. Stand behind your collegue, put your arms through theirs and pretend to be their hands.
6. juggle
7. giggle back

Sacred refuse

2009-12-07T20:14:00.002+09:00

Our little clinic is located next to a monastary, or Gompa, which is 5 minutes away from a tantric Hindu temple. The people in the village make their way, every morning starting about 6:30 to give and receive blessings to both. Women walk with plates of flowers--poinsettias and marigolds, incense, candles, dye powder and salt to take part in the blessings. The incense and candles get burnt, but the powder, flowers and salt are thrown and placed to color different parts of the temple.
What is even better though is that this is done not only at the gompa and temple, but all around the village so that seemingly random places are colored red and orange with dye and flowers, a rock here, a water spigot there.
The whole place is covered in the rubbish of blessing and thanks.

A slow day

2009-12-06T20:25:00.002+09:00

I had 7 patients today, instead of the usual 14-19 which was a relief, as youthfully exuberant as I am practicing what I love every day.
The reason why is because the maoists decided they were unhappy, and led a citywide strike which shut down all transportation. Apparently some policemen killed 6 people, and so they see it as their civil duty to set fire to motorcycles and generally cause a disturbance that stops people from doing what they'd normally do. Apparently the strike is scheduled to continue until Tuesday. Wednesday, however, the 'untouchable' cast has decided to schedule a protest to make a point about being treated as untouchable, and so it seems the traffic may remain slow throughout midweek.
This is the news I have in my village. It took one of the interpreters an hour and a half to walk here after she had to abandon her scooter.
In other news, I live next door to a building of heavily armed mafia.
All in spitting distance are those guys with the guns, a gompa training quite a few young monks (whom I love to treat for their various ailments--mostly ringworm/fungus) and the clinic. It is a powerful little compound.

Drive by Tilaka

2009-11-29T23:18:00.003+09:00

Durbar square, 1st time in Kathmandu looking up at the carving of some ancient 14th century, 15th century Newari building. The history and life is real, more so than anywhere else I have been. Piles of garbage burning in the street as a family of cows lives next to an ancient temple previously guarded by fierce tribes in the middle of the middle of the city.
A holy man dashes by, throwing marigold petals on my head and blessing me with a red third eye. It has happened thousands of times before to thousands of travelers, but the mood of the day is still set. I have been made a gift. He was gone as fast as he came.
The 100 rupees hence requested could have been spent in worse ways.

4 buckets--2 to wash, one to carry, one to sit

2009-11-26T23:54:00.002+09:00

If you have never washed your clothes in a bucket and then hung them by moonlight on the roof looking out over the village, then perhaps you have never lived.
I hadn't.

In some ways, I feel I've waited my whole life to do that.
Washing machines make me lazy, allowing me to throw my clothes on the floor whether or not they are particularly dirty, knowing that I can throw them in the wash in my wasteful and western way.
In other ways, it feels awkward hanging my big city panties emblazoned with their materialistic designs--hearts, stars, stripes, hand-painted skull and cross bones--on the roof next to the monastary where they are banging drums and playing prayer games.
Perhaps the pink string bikinis will embarrass the young monks.
I vow to collect them as early in the morning as possible to hopefully avoid affecting their early morning prayers.
I somehow feel that vows of compassion and devout Buddhism don't cover pink panty curiosity.
But what do I know, I've only been here for a few days.

Nepal, Day 2 morning one

2009-11-26T23:50:00.002+09:00

Morning sounds.
No clock to know the time
wouldn't want to any way
early.
dogs barking, taking over the town. they decide they have collectively slept enough.
first-waking noises. then, fighting over some small scrap of something perhaps
eventually all falls silent.
the pack is somehow sated enough to give way to chatting birds
and the occasional howl.
then, two monks chatting on their way to prayers
passing by the window
car horns
sunrise turns the cacophony to music.

My favorite trick

2009-11-03T14:19:00.003+09:00

I'm not sick, but this is the 3rd or so time this year I have lost my voice. It tends to happen from time to time but has happened more this year, probably due to dry air, more pollution and having to use a big voice everyday with the little ones. When it happened last fall, I taught the kids the expression 'I have a frog in my throat', and they remembered it for this time and said things like "teacher? frog in?" and of course I said yes.
They like to ask me how, and I've made up all kinds of things but my favorite has been for this past week. It has been exceptionally cold and windy, so I told them that frogs, since they can jump high, sometimes jump *too* high and get caught in the wind. I was standing outside singing (like I do), and a frog fell from the wind into my mouth and I've been unable to cough it out. Kids are gullible, so as long as I nod my head enough they tend to believe me, but my favorite part is giving them tangible evidence. I have always had pretty big tonsils, the kind that make nurses go "oh wow!" during routine checkups and they are palpable from the outside of my throat. So, I have the kids put their hands (one at a time please) over my tonsils and if I swallow, it feels kind of like a frog breathing or jumping or something. They all look at me with wonder after they feel it and often they'll go get their friends from out of the room to feel too.
It makes my day, and I'll giggle for years about it. I hope they tell their parents.

I'd better write about China before I go to Thailand

2009-09-23T21:51:00.012+09:00

So I went to China for my 28th birthday. It was the best trip yet, and I love China more than ever. While it is dirty--you can't find a clean bathroom to save your life--it is charming and full of surprises.

On the 29th I flew into Qingdao and we (Timber and I) made our way from the Qingdao airport on a slightly rickety but relatively normal public bus. Stopping off at the hostel to drop our few things, we made our way down to the beach where I saw more thongs, g strings and naked children than I probably, hopefully, will ever see again. I guess Chinese men aren't as shy about their skin showing as Koreans are. While it seemed like everyone was pretty into being at the beach, swimming and making sand sculptures, many many extraordinary precautions were made to not get sun tanned.
The next day we took a train to Tai Shan, one of the most famous mountains in China. The train ride wasn't too bad--lots of rice fields and countryside, 5 hours of chatting and music.
The hike up Tai Shan was longer than it could have been, and shorter than it should have been. Once in Tai'an, the city at the base of the mountain, we evaded hundreds of taxi drivers who wanted to give us a "special rate" to get to the top of the mountain. We found the bus instead, and made our way to the stairs that would torture my legs for the next 2-3 hours. Halfway up the mountain, we found the oasis known as the cable car and took that the rest of the way up.
Once nearly to the top, there were more stairs but also a more relaxed pace since we knew we'd make it in time for our hotel reservation, having caught the very last cable car. There are lots of pretty temples and views from the top.

After staying the night in a schmancy hotel, we woke up at 4am for the sunrise and cheered along with hundreds of Chinese (we didn't see a single foreigner the whole time we were there) when the sun poked its head out from under the clouds. This sunrise is supposed to signify the beginning of the world, and it may have been.

After going down the other side of the mountain, we found a bus to get us back to town. While waiting for the mountain to town shuttle bus thingy to leave the mountain, we made friends with a super helpful mountain man who liked to scare me with cicadas. Once we were already inside the bus, he thought it was really funny to catch one and thrust it through the window at me, scaring me out of my seat. I think he wanted to crush it between some paper and gift it to me, but I insisted he let it go instead.

Now onto the absolute highlight of the trip. While waiting in line to buy a train ticket back to Qingdao, we met a guy who wanted to sell us two extra tickets he had for the next train out of town. In a snap decision, not knowing the train schedule, we bought them from him and boarded in the half hour, only to discover what should have been a 3-5 hour train ride was a 7-8 hour train ride. We'd had no lunch, breakfast several hours ago and only a bit of water, which turned out to be a good thing since the train bathrooms were squatter holes that emptied onto the tracks--and forbidden to be used while the train was stopped. After about two hours sitting separately, Timber came to tell me how long, exactly, our ride would be. She came to stay and hang out a while, and we ended up making friends with about 50 other passengers in the car.

We taught them to play a Korean game--3.6.9--with Chinese numbers and soon had even the train conductor wondering what was going on. It was the perfect opportunity to use our Lonely Planet phrasebook, since we had oodles of time to trains-late.
It turned out that most of the people in our car were on their way to an Amway convention, and couldn't understand why we didn't personally know the guys in their 80s brochure about the company. There was nothing about pyramid schemes in the phrasebook.

After getting back to Qingdao, we went to our next hostel where we stayed right on the beach. We had some amazing Schezuan noodles, saw some pretty temples, parks and music, and some good times at the beach before heading back to Daegu, and back to work.

Kimchi and Quietze/Eggplant out China! Hope to see you again real soon.

2009-07-24T23:51:00.003+09:00

So, what I really need to write about is my trip to Boryeong for Mud Fest, and the wild time that is cosmetic mud, torrential rain and comedic umbrellas. But for now this post is a palatable excuse. I've been working on organizing a fundraiser at a club here in Daegu, S. Korea, for my volunteer trip to Nepal this coming November. (See poster image above, thanks to a good friend here).

Some personal notes:

I'm exceedingly excited. I've never had a fundraiser before, and never done anything important enough to warrant one. It feels amazing, nerve wracking and all together too adult for my tastes. But, I guess I will be 28 in a few short days, so it's about time I at least feel adult, whist I go about doing adult things and making adult decisions.

In conjunction with the fundraiser is a photography show, something else that I never thought I would do. As it so happens, I take some pictures, and as it so happens, it seems that some of them are show worthy enough to perhaps raise some money for the project. Now, it's not like it's a *real* show, like I had to submit my photos, or even have the space for more than an evening, but I will be honored to have people purchase my photos for themselves or their families, and even more honored that it is for such a worthy cause. I am proud of the photos I've taken, and impressed with the way they are looking all matted in their little photo pockets.
Who knows? Perhaps this is the beginning of what may become being a more serious photographer? (...maybe you should buy prints now before I am world famous...wink wink).

So, this is why I haven't written about Mud fest, or anything else for that matter. After August 8th is finished however, I make a solemn web blog vow to share the hilarity that was the festival, one poorly remembered event at a time.

If you're not in Daegu and you'd like to see my photos, visit: http://www.internationalphoto.weebly.com

Pride spectacular, Jeju Island adventures and exciting plans for the future!

2009-06-25T19:10:00.009+09:00

So much has been done and happened since I last made kimchi (see last post) that it seems funny to write it all on one screen, so I'll chronologically compartmentalize.

Pride, Seoul!
I have been to a fair number of prides in Portland, OR, but none have felt as eventful or necessary as this one. It was a small event compared to any pride in the states, kept mostly secret from the public despite being held in one of the biggest cities in the world. Because coming out is dangerous for many people, the event staff handed out "no photo" stickers as well as press passes giving permission to take any photos at all. So, while I have a grip of excellent pride pictures, I cannot put them up anywhere on the web, save perhaps this one:

because there are no people in it. There were many booths giving out all kinds of information, just like your regular stateside pride, as well as a stage with a few "main events" just like home. But what was remarkable was the air of actual *pride* many of the Koreans exuded and the exuberance of the multitudes of foreigners. While there was a lot of information that I couldn't read, I gathered that there is a fairly organized if small undercurrent of GLBTQ activism alive in South Korea. This makes me really really happy, as there are no laws protecting anyone from anything happening to them because they are gay here. Even for foreigners, even for me. So, I too wore a sticker 'just in case', cause the last thing I need is some Korean parent claiming I'm corrupting their toddler with my 'choices', unless I want to be sent home early (which I've considered). The highlight of the day time was perhaps the parade, which is less of a spectator event like at home, and more a solidarity march. It was fab. At night a bunch of friends and I went to a "women's club" in Seoul, and had the time of our lives. Why a 'women's club', you ask, and not an all everyone queer fest? Because the gay bars are segregated into "women", "men" and "trans", which makes it hard to hang out with some of your friends. lame. This is sadly not for some sort of fist in the air decades behind the times feminist agenda, but for the protection of those who may go. double lame. I have hope that sometime Korea will catch up to the west, and the west will catch up to say--ancient Greece or something, but for now, I love what I got.

Jeju Island!
Because I am spoiled with travel in Korea, the following weekend 3 of us went to Jeju Island to see what the "Hawaii of Korea" was all about. It turns out that it's all about unpredictable weather, excellently variable modes of transportation and awesome beach swimming. We arrived Saturday to find out that we *did* indeed need our international driver's licences to rent scooters, but after many phone calls from the nicest hotel manager ever, we managed to rent three 50cc scooters for 20,000 won a day. This may be the best money I've ever spent. I'd never been on a scooter before, and my cursory lesson didn't do much to teach me how to ride, but I managed OK, even riding into a thunderstorm at 10pm, lost as lost can be on the highway. Over the course of 24 hours, I fell in love with scooting on scooters, and vow to get one sometime that I can call my own.
If this isn't the picture of happiness on my face, I'm not sure what is.

The helmet w/goggles was especially great, though the goggles only hampered any effort at effective steering. I kept them off.

Saturday we took the scooters for a couple hour drive up the west coast of the island and discovered a great raw fish resterant, teeming with locals and other mainlanders on vaca. It was good, but I could have done without the live shellfish pulsating at me. (I have since re-vowed to become vegetarian). It was after this meal that we ended up scooting home on the highway, into a thunderstorm. This might have been the stupidest thing I've ever done, not having much experience driving a car, nevermind a scooter, nevermind in a foreign country, nevermind in the rain and thunder. But having survived it, I may one day be able to bungee jump, paraglide, or many of the other things that scare me senseless.
I slept like the dead (ha ha) Saturday night and woke up Sunday to lazily getting around to scooting over to some waterfalls and witnessing some old mermaids free diving. These ladies are amazing, and the last of their kind. They free dive, that is, do not use any scuba gear but can hold their breath up to two minutes and descend up to 20 feet to gather fish, shellfish and seaweed near the beach. All of the women are grandma-aged, and their daughters have not followed in their footsteps, mostly working in the cities and such. What is even more spectacular, is that they work as a collective and share all the profits from their catch, including what they make at their makeshift restaurants on the rocks, where they will cut you up some of whatever it is they've got, and happily serve it with some raw garlic and soju. When we went, much of what they had is what they call "sea squirt", which looks about as appetizing as it sounds. I have so much respect for these women and what they do--they're real life mermaids!

After this, we had to return the scooters and catch a bus/hitch hike to the famous lava tubes. While they were about to close and we could only go 250 meters into the some 7,000 meter long tubes, I got a good feeling for what it must have taken for Mrs. Earth to create something so spectacular. The tubes were underground, pitch black and rocky like nothing else I've ever seen. It was kind of like being inside a damp loaf of bread burned black, but way colder and much more inspirational. I wish I had a picture.
Afterwards, we took the bus again to Sanguang beach, with black sands purported to relieve arthritis, athlete's foot, and a variety of other ailments. I was barely there 5 minutes before I put on my swimsuit and jumped into the warm-ish water. My friends could hardly get me out, and I felt like I was 6 years old when they started with "Ali---aren't you hungry? Shouldn't you stop swimming now?" I did finally get out that evening to go eat, but was promptly back in again around midnight and then again around 5am. What can I say, maybe I belong with the old mermaid ladies.
I really hope I can get back to Jeju before I leave Korea, as there is *so* much more to see, if I can keep out of the water long enough.

Now, onto:

~~~The Future~~~

I am exited to announce, over this venue and many others, that I will be travelling to Nepal in November and December of this year to donate my time and money giving medical aid through acupuncture. This is a dream come true for me, and I feel very very blessed to be able to participate. I think acupuncture is amazing, and though I don't know much about Nepal or the specific community in need, I know they could use some help and I am happy to get in there and do it. It is so important to give what you can to the world, especially as westerners because no matter what our life's lot may be---we usually have more than our share compared to so many others. I balk at this injustice, and while I've come to terms with the whole "life's not fair" thing, I think I can do something to make it better, if not fair-er. We'll see.
So, to this end, I have fulfilled another one of my life's goals, which is to have my own website and share my love of the visual. While I may be an amateur photographer, it makes me endlessly happy to be able to share my photos and perhaps raise some funds to donate towards the trip to Nepal as well, since volunteering isn't free for the wallet, however free-ing it may be for the spirit.
I encourage you to take a look at:
http://www.internationalphoto.weebly.com

Let me know what you think, and get some photography to pretty up your wall space, or cross someone off your gift list.

And this brings me to today, which is again miraculously Thursday and two days away to a visit to the beach in Pohang. Maybe there'll be more swimming!

Baby's first kimchi

2009-05-31T22:36:00.002+09:00

This weekend was an amazing weekend of food. On Saturday, Timber and I visited the home and kitchen of one of our Korean friends here, who taught us how to make proper Bi Bim Bap (rice and veggies with red pepper sauce). Sounds fairly easy, yes? But it took around two and a half hours just to prepare each of the 7 vegetables involved in the dish, as well as a side dish of ji jim, a type of green onion pancake. I have a profound new respect for perhaps Korea's most popular dish, which is maybe second only to bulgogi. On Sunday, I made my first kimchi, pictured above. I've found that for foreigners, kimchi is either a love hate relationship and for Koreans it is a life or death situation. I've never known such passion for any dish. I, however, got my kimchi recipie from a cookbook and made a traditonal type of daikon radish kimchi that has become my favorite here. It is easy to make, apparently chock full of vitamins and reportedly may save me from nasty things like SARS, cancer, swine flu and perhaps even death. It won't be completely ready till morning after it ferments overnight, but I can't wait to test it out on a Korean co-worker tomorrow at lunch.

Perhaps my favorite thing about this kind of kimchi is that daikon radish is called "mu" in Korean, and there is a popular commerical on TV here that chants "mu mu mu". It makes me giggle every time I think of it and is yet another way kimchi makes me happy.

Tonight, we went to dinner at Bella Cucina, an excellent Italian restaurant with a couple of lovely friends and had one of the most delicious and properly plated dinners ever.

At the moment, Timber is making "massaged pork" for lunch tomorrow, another kind of Korean food she learned to make from our Korean mom friend here.

I am one spoiled lady.

Tokyo trip: 5-2-09 to 5-5-09

2009-05-08T23:31:00.009+09:00

Day one:

6am to 10am--Flying first class! Story and Pictures
10am to 1pm--Getting to Tokyo from Narita and checking in. Tokyo's metro system is INSANE! There are several train systems working within the city, which is really just a bunch of individual prefectures. It was so frustrating that there were a few times I wanted to cry, and I've been used to the NYC subway before. yipes. It was also very expensive. Timber and I probably spent about US equivalent $15/day just on subway fare.
1pm to 6pm--After checking into our hostel, we took a walk down to the river, took the water bus into central Tokyo and made our way through the Hama-rikyu gardens. Gorgeous!
Story and Pictures
6pm-9pm--Shibuya crossing, one of the busiest intersections in the world. Story and Pictures

Day two:

I slept really great inside the crazy capsule bed in the doom room at the hostel. Timber didn't sleep as well, being a little claustrophobic, but I was happy to close the sliding door to my bunk enclosure and hunker down. I was surprised at how comfy the mattress on the floor was. Booking the room, I was honestly a little scared of Japanese bedding, but I'm sold.
After rousing a sleepy Timber with coffee and juice from the convenience store, we made our way to the Meiji-jingu gardens, which were full of lovely surprises. Story and Pictures

After the gardens, we walked to nearby Harajuku, a huge shopping area full of great fashion and lots of really interesting characters, including the cozplay kids and the Elvis gangs. Story and Pictures

Day three:

We set the alarm for somewhere around 5am to try to get to the Tsukiji fish market by 6, but overslept and only got up around 8:30. It turned out to be early enough to see some of the action of the world's biggest fish market and have the best sushi meal of my life.
Story and Pictures
After the fish market, we headed back to Asakusa to drop off Timber's treasure and go to Senso-ji temple. We had been to a couple of gardens and a Shinto shrine, but not a temple proper, so we figured we probably should. Story and Pictures

Day four:
We packed up and made our way across town (yet again) to go to the Ghibli museum. It was too lovely for words. Story and a few pictures. (cameras aren't allowed inside the museum)

After the museum, it was back to the airport and Korea. I loved Tokyo, and if and when I go back, I was LOADS of money to spend--and not just on Pachinko.

Glamorous: Tokyo Day one

2009-05-02T22:31:00.003+09:00

So as not to forget...

After staying the night at a classy love motel in Busan (condoms and calling cards included), T and I made our way to the Busan Gimhae airport via taxi at 6am to check in for our 8am flight. While sleepy and very much not excited to be awake, I was thrilled to pieces when we were bumped to business class in order to "sit together". I still contend that it was my highly fashionable and sexy pleather jacket that got us the glamour, but no matter why, it was awesome! Two other girls we are acquainted with were also bumped and sat across the aisle. Sporatic garbled attempts at Fergie were made throughout the flight.

T had Sake, our friends had wine, and I tried some non alcoholic Japan airline specialty Yuzu, or Yuku, or something like that. It was delish. They served us actually really good food, and I had all the legroom I could shake a knee at. It was fabulous.

We arrived in Tokyo at around 10, made it through the swine flu infared detectors without a hitch, and thru customs etc by 11. Then it was a battle with Tokyo's mass transit system(s), which may be one of the most confusing in the world. I swear, I thought Seoul had it bad, but Tokyo is considerably worse. There are at least 3 if not 4 different systems working on different fare schedules throughout the city. Some share transfer stations, some do not. Sometimes, if you need to transfer from one line to another on the same system, you need to pay another fare, sometimes not. I took pictures, it was that confusing. Once, I almost cried. Really--New york, San Francisco, Busan, Seoul, Shanghai: cupcakes, not even regular size cake, in comparison. Tokyo: I would like to compare it to cake, but it is more like a snack that looks like it will be sweet and delicious, but a rude awakening when you bite into it and find out that it's dried squid flavored.
So, in any case, after figuring out where and how we were getting to Tokyo from Narita airport, we took a train trip into the city and checked into our hostel in Asakusa. We then took about an hour's walk to the pickup station for Tokyo's river bus "cruise", which we took to Hama-rikyu Gardens, sort of by accident. We were just trying to take the river bus, see some of Tokyo by water and get to another part of town, but a ticket to the Garden was included in the price so we strolled around there for a while. It was probably, aside from the garden for the blind in San Francisco, the coolest garden I've ever seen. Immaculately manicured and immense, it included a salt water pond, a red and white peony garden (herbs used in Chinese Medicine), a duck hunting field (kind of weird, but I guess royalty has to do something with themselves), a tea house and what seemed like miles and miles of paths.
From there, we headed to Shibuya Station, the busiest intersection in the world. We walked through the intersection twice, and had coffee on the 2nd floor of the Starbucks and watched the mobile people museum walk by. I have loads of pictures, but that will have to wait until I get home. I have to say that I have never seen that many people in one place before. It was absolutely stunning to imagine how many people must cross through every day.
We did some window shopping and watched people play Pachinko in awe, ate some dinner and headed back to the hostel around 9. While being part of the huge mass of people in that neighborhood was exciting, it was also one of the most draining things I have ever done, and I was more than ready to go back to the hostel after a couple of hours. I'm determined to play Pachinko before I leave however, and while I didn't buy anything this shopping trip, I'm sure I will soon. It was really hard not to blow all my cash on some of the coolest fashion I have ever seen, but I'm sure sooner or later I'll give in and buy some really spendy socks, at least.

Some party: Lotus Lantern Festival, Seoul, 2009.

2009-04-27T22:53:00.002+09:00

The Lotus Lantern festival is held every year to celebrate Buddha's birthday, 2553 years ago. There are events all over Seoul, the main being in the Insadong neighborhood. There is a huge street festival with hundreds of booths offering everything from make your own mask, lantern and clay pot to face painting to acupuncture and tea ceremonies. We got free books, t shirts, wood prints and tons of photos. It was definitely the best birthday party I've ever been to. At night there was a 2 hour parade of a ba-jillion lanterns, most made of paper. There were the most amazing floats I've ever seen, also mostly made of paper and some anamatronic and breathing smoke and fire. There was incredible dancing and music. A sincerely incredible parade.
Photos can be seen here. (please click).
Videos can be seen here. (please click).

I can't say much that the pictures won't express. Really, take a look.

Oh, right, medicine.

2009-04-26T08:56:00.002+09:00

I forgot to add in my list of awesome things I did last week: acupuncture! I went to see this Dr. by my house who I've been to a few times before. He's extra nice and has excellent English. He's been treating Timber, and I decided to go and get some treatment too. I asked him some questions during the treatment process and he was more than happy to talk all about his points. He mainly does Dr. Tung's points (from Taiwan), and some hand acupuncture. I learned cool stuff about where to bleed for muscle and bone recovery for the entire body on the hand, and the basic map of the body. My plan is to go back for one more treatment, ask some more questions and then ask if he would be willing to let me hang out in the office with him sometimes. This is exactly what I've been wanting, and I might be ready to finally make it happen. See? Best week ever.

The week plus in review.

2009-04-25T22:21:00.002+09:00

Ok, so I'm a slacking blogger. Or a blogging slacker, something like that. At the moment I am making cupcakes. Just to make cupcakes, really, but also to take on the train ride to Seoul tomorrow for Buddha's birthday lantern festival. I successfully completed a two week spring cleanse and feel fabulous for it. Yay cleanse! Now bring on the cupcakes...

So last weekend was fruits and veggies only, appropriate for the earth day celebration being held downtown. A friend was performing with his band (in a bus stop---classic), so we made sure to get there for the show. It was fairly small, especially in comparison to the earth days I've been to in Portland. There was some good performance however, especially from the Daegu step dance academy. There were also stations were you could pot a plant and make some kind of pot holder. Even basket weaving! A lot of it was for kids, as are many things in Korea. For a while I thought it was just because I'm teaching children all day and that's my perception of things here, but I really do think it's super family oriented.

On Tuesday we went to the Korean sauna/bath house, known as a Jim Ji Bang (or something close to that) and soaked and sweated out toxins like nobody's business. I've been wanting to write about the bathhouse experience for some time, but can't quite find the words to really describe it. I will try. For one, bath houses are absolutely everywhere, and they are always full of Koreans doing their bathtime rituals. So, the sheer number of them and consistency with which they're used is incredible. Some are nicer than others, and luckily for me, the one by the house is pretty nice. They all have shower areas where women (I can't speak for the men) will soap and scrub for what seems to be hours on end. Everyone has these rough little scrubby mitts which are meant to be used as basically a full body pumice stone to get every iota of dead skin off your body. After you scrub all the parts you can reach, you have a friend scrub all the parts you can't as hard as possible. If you're too tired or scrub yourself, or without a friend or the nerve to ask a stranger to scrub your unreachable parts for you, a lady in black lacy underwear will be happy to help you out for somewhere around 10,000 won (about $10). I should mention that you can also get this done at Olympus Day Spa in Tacoma and Lynwood, Washington, where it's a little more spa-like and a little less utlitarian. This is actually where I had my first two Korean bathouse experiences, but I have to say that while the set ups are simiar, the practical use is completely different. So after you scrub yourself shiney, you can sit in the hot tubs of varying temperatures and ingredients. One or two are always some sort of herbal soup, often green tea or mugwort. There is a cold pool to dunk in when you get too hot, and also steam-sauna rooms to sit in and watch T.V., or scrub yourself down with some salt (as if the scrubby mit wasn't enough). On another floor there is a mixed mens and women's dry sauna space, with a variety of rooms all made of different materials. The one by my house has a charcoal and onyx room which is my favorite, as well as several jade and amethyst rooms, a salt stone room and a rose quartz room. You get little orange pajamas to wear, blankets and can hang out for as long as you like. Many people stay the night here when travelling or, perhaps, simply avoiding home. All of this will put you back a mere 6,000 won (about $6 USD). Incredible. Aside from the luxury of the easy access to hot tubs and saunas etc, I think what strikes me most is the culture of the bath house. Women are not at all modest, and don't seem to care who sees them doing what while naked. Babies are taken starting at around 2-3 years old, and scrubbed down like anyone else. I've seen really elderly women as well, scrubbing, soaking, sweating in the saunas, wrinkles and all. Out of everything I love about Korea, I think I will miss this the most of all. So, yey for Tuesday and yey for the JimJiBang.

Thursday was a rather long day, on account of the preschool field trip to the part for a picnic and a look at some butterflies. It's hard to herd the kids around, but fun to see them outside of class, having a good time, playing games, being kids. At one point I had caught a little flying bug of some sort off another teacher's jacket and was showing it to one of my new preschool kids, Ben, who at first thought it was cool, and then decided to smoosh it. I made a sad face and pretended to cry, but I don't think it will really prevent him from squishing bugs in the future. boys.

On Friday, Timber and I got our tickets for the Studio Ghibli museum in Tokyo for next Tuesday. I'm excited to go to Tokyo, but especially excited for the museum and really, really can't wait to pet the cat bus. We also found out that our summer vacation will be from July 29th to August 2nd, which means I don't have to work on my birthday! score! So, we've decided to go to China. We're going to go to Qingdao, Tai'an and climb mount Tai (Tai Shan), one of the 5 sacred mountains in China. I climbed Huang Shan in September, and can't believe I'm going to be able to add climbing another giant internationally famous mountain to my list of things I have done.

Today I went to yet another completely non-helpful Korean class, had a delicious lunch of BiBimBap with friends, re-visisted foreigner agony consulting (Now "Himilayan Market") to buy some chick peas and ended up enjoying a free sampling of their new restaurant menu, and saw "Monster Vs Alien" at the movies. I can't say I'd reccomend seeing it in the theater, but it was a good way to spend the rainy afternoon.

So, yep, tomorrow is the Lantern festival where I will hopefully buy a handmade lantern, probably see some cool stuff and come home super late on the KTX to get some sleep before the week starts itself over again on Monday.

Hummus, SK style

2009-04-16T23:02:00.002+09:00

What you need:

1 huge bag dried chickpeas from the Himalayan market aka "Foreigner agony consulting" (no joke)
1 bottle of toasted sesame seeds, sesame of a breed only grown in South Korea.
(A lot of) garlic, pre-peeled from Lotte (I love how they wash and prep all your veggies here for you)
(Some) Olive oil imported from Italy (Hey, I guess it's no farther than importing it from Italy to the US)
Several handfuls of Korean chili flakes than never seems to make anything hot.
Some teaspoons of cumin lovingly sent from the states. (also available at Foreigner agony consulting)
Salt, pepper.

Soak the chickpeas forever. The following century, boil them with some salt, cumin and chili flakes. Boil for at least an hour, or until you really do have to get ready for work. As they are boiling, grind the sesame seeds in your rad Korean made blender contraption. Remove sesame seeds, replace with garlic cloves (enough to make sure your kids stay in their seats during class). Chop the garlic cloves, then add olive oil and ground sesame seeds. Set to the side.
When the chickpeas look like they might be done, blend them with your awesome Korean immersion blender along with the remaining liquid. Be amazed at the power the tiny thing puts out, and then remind yourself that Korea's "only exports are their technology and intelligence" (real quote). When they are well blended, add the sesame garlic mixture, blend some more. Add some more water (cool) to make it super creamy. Stand back in amazement as you realize that someone now has to eat the 17 pounds of hummus you just made. Give to friends and be really glad you love hummus: eat.

Yummy

Yay, it was the weekend again!

2009-04-13T00:24:00.004+09:00

So today, I saw Hedwig and the Angry Inch, the musical in Korea in Korean. It was incredible. Aside from not understanding most of what was said-- except the random Korean word I knew or English thrown in, I was really entertained. They did a really good job, and I think it's amazing what the show must be doing for the gender divide here. I know there is a pretty big subculture, but all in all the expectations are still pretty intense and a lot of pressure is put on young men and women to not only get excellent scores on tests, have excellent high paying jobs, be spectacularly thin and attractive, but also somewhere around 35, get married, raise a family and do it all on one income (the man's). So, I'm impressed. I got to have a small conversation with the stage manager after the show as we were buying the CD (music in Korean). He said that the original Hedwig show had come to Korea last year or the year before and must have inspired the lead actor to do the show. There were pictures of the two of them together and everything!

Enjoy the video!

On Saturday I went to the big bulk herbal market Daegu is famous for. It was pure heaven, but also reminded me that I need to study! I recognized most of them, but 7 months away from the herbal dispensary and their names are escaping me. I have my computer notes and the internet, but if anyone wants to send me this book: Chinese Medical Herbology and Pharmacology I would send you a lifetime supply of Korean socks, possibly the best postcard you'll ever receive and maybe even $90 or so. I emailed the Korean Board of Oriental medicine (or something like that), but had to do it in English so am unsure as to whether or not I'll get a reply. Unfortunately, the doctors know the Chinese names written in Chinese (not pinyin) but also give them their own Korean names which may or may not be similar to the Chinese names. So, even though I can read Korean, and ask for the herb in Chinese and also by Latin botanical name, that may or may not help me. Dang it, how fluent in how many languages do I have to be, exactly? I was looking for some Chai Hu (OCOM friends--Hi!), but I guess they have a different name for it. I even listed the ingredients of the most popular formula it's in, but no luck. Oh well, one day I'll find the name written in Chinese in some book and bring it in. But even Dr. Luo (my first herbs prof) couldn't blame me for not recognizing it in there. Hell, sticks look like sticks no matter where you snap them.

Tomorrow's Monday yet again, and the start of this year's dietary Spring Cleanse. It might make me a loopy teacher, but it'll be worth it.

20 days to Tokyo!!!

A stellar weekend

2009-04-06T00:00:00.005+09:00

Though Saturday started out with another frustrating Korean class, in which I *sort of* learned how to ask and answer "What time is it?", the weekend turned out rather excellent. After crying (literally) through class, there was some shopping therapy time downtown until it got too busy to move. So, we went home and got ready to go out that night. Timber, and friend of ours and I tried to find this club that was listed online that apparently closed down 3 years ago (hello, online travel guides, update please!). Instead, we ended up at the same bar we had been at the weekend before, a "ladies" bar, no boyz allowed, in this mysteriously quiet alley downtown. (quick! hide the gays!) We met some of the same people we had last weekend, and a Korean couple who we drank and talked with the whole night. I learned some interesting Korean words and customs, and a little bit about how difficult it can be to be a Korean lesbian. They were totally adorable, and between my three months of Korean and their fourteen years of English, communication went OK. I'm pretty sure they did most of the work. It was totally impetus to keep on going to Korean class no matter how frustrating. My liver had another lesson in the chemical breakdown of soju, and I was up bright and early Sunday morning at 9 and at brunch by noon. A bloody mary and a B-fast burrito later I was all fueled to go to Woobang tower/Duryu park where Daegu has it's most gorgeous cherry blossoms. The park was FULL of people who all had the same idea we had. I can't figure out if it's just a population to square footage issue or that we just plan to do the same thing as everyone else all the time, but in any case it was busy. The park was full of families, couples, and groups of elderly people sitting around on mats on the grass playing cards as well as go and some other games, eating snacks, drinking soju and enjoying the sunshine. Timber and I sat down for a while and this sweet girl came over and gave us both cookies and a flower to me. This sort of thing has happened a couple of times. Sometimes on the trains and such, if a family or couple has had snacks they have gifted some to Timber and I, and our coworkers, as well as our kids at school are always trying to feed us things. I'm not quite used to it, but it's really sweet. With the kids it can be a little strange, because often the hospitality comes in the form of a sticky kid handful of candy. (mmMMM, delicious, thank you. I'll just put that right here for after class...) But, I'll take individually wrapped cookies from strange girls in the park any day. Another highlight was the butterfly I got to crawl on my finger. It had been circling around and around me while I was laying on the grass and when I got up to leave it let me get super close to it and crawled on my hand for a second before flying away. I was amazed! I wonder if they are just used to all the people.
At the temple in the middle of the park there was a siamese monk-cat who greeted us and let us take her picture under some paintings while she napped and bathed. Forget the buddha statues, people were gathering around the cat like she was handing out free tickets to enlightenment. Everyone kept saying "meyongi, meyongi", "cat, cat" when I think they might have otherwise been there to pray.

As we were walking around we saw two groups of older people dancing and singing. The first had a drum, a singer and several accompanying dancers--all old men shaking their shoulders like they were b-boys back in the day. We tried to take a video but I don't think they liked that very much. The next group featured an old lady with bleach blond permed hair, crazy makeup and a shiny gold suit. I was invited to dance with her, and in retrospect maybe I should have. When will I ever get the chance again?

As we were leaving, we met this older guy with a golden retriever puppy Timber just had to pet. We asked him, and he bent down, lifted the dog's ear and told him to come greet and sniff us. They are totally BFF.

Now it's time for bed, and another week of school starts tomorrow. It's not so bad, but I definitely need the weekends to look forward to.

Seoul graffiti

2009-03-28T00:47:00.001+09:00

Seoul graffiti
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

We went to Seoul last weekend to see the Gustav Klimpt exhibit (http://www.flickr.com/photos/alisonjl/3379213866/) at the Seoul arts center, and explore Itaewon, the international district for the weekend. I honestly didn't think I would like it, as it had been described as a sea of generally drunken and derelict foreigners, but during the daytime anyway, it was pretty great. The only way I can really think of to describe it is as a big city (NY, SF) Chinatown, but in reverse.

Chinatown: You're walking along in little Italy or exploring past SF's pioneer square and all of a sudden, you can no longer read the signs. Is that a bakery? A dry cleaner? A pharmacy? Who knows.

Itaewon: You're walking along, such and such street (who knows what it's called---the streets don't have names anyway) hoping to find shoes in your size when bam, all of a sudden there's a Croc store followed by a Nike store followed by a Thai restaurant. Take a right past the Calvin Klein knock off underwear cart and find "Little West Africa", with stores selling plantains and more cassava based products than you ever thought tiny little South Korea would hold. Take a left and you're in India, another block down and it's Pakistan. Intersperse a little Mexican here and there and that was basically Itaewon. The population was delightfully diverse, and I think I heard more languages being spoken than I saw "traditional Korean gifts" being sold...amazing!

We ate Indian for dinner, chorizo and eggs for breakfast, and had thai for lunch before heading home. I think the new rule might be "no Korean food in Seoul", as much as I like it. We even did a little grocery shopping to bring home some black eyed peas, tapicoa and tumeric.

It made me think I could live in Seoul, since it was the first time I have felt sort of at home since I've been here. Coming from the US, I'm used to a kind of diversity that I haven't seen here at all. Foreigners stick out like sore thumbs. I can see why the Koreans stare because hell, I stare when I see a westerner walking by. But in Itaewon, as the muppets say "piples is piples", and it was fantastic to feel like that again.

First Cherry blossoms!!!

2009-03-14T15:34:00.001+09:00

First Cherry blossoms!!!
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

I cannot express how happy I was to see this tree blooming on my walk to school Thursday morning. Wintertime is long and cold here, and I have been overjoyed at 45 degree weather. I think the temperatures are actually similar to Portland, but it is so dry here that the occasional wind is absolutely frigid. I hear summer is crazy hot, so I'm not sure I'm looking forward to that, but I am thinking Spring should be nice. With the change in season, I got sick (yet again) and lost my voice. I was still teaching of course and actually convinced all the little ones that there was an actual frog in my throat. I forgot how gullible kids are and they all totally believe me. I told them that I had slept with my mouth open and a frog had jumped in during the night. Once they understood, they all wanted to see and touch my throat. Luckily, I have naturally gigantic tonsils that actually do feel a bit froggish from the outside, so once a few kids "touched the frog", they were all totally sold. They even started telling other teachers about it, which I think is great. I'm hoping my voice will be back to normal by Monday and I can tell them all that it hopped back out again. Rather than being a hilarious waste of time, I'm hoping some of them pick up the expression "There's a frog in my throat", but we'll see.
Last night we went to this thing called "crap art" at Club That. We paid 5,000 Won to get in and can make all the art you like. They opened up a bunch of the rooms and people were painting and drawing all over the walls and floors. I found a can of red spray paint and some charcoal and made a rather large and crappy rendition of the tattoo I hope to get in Japan in May. I hadn't drawn in a really long time and it was lots of fun. I might go get some supplies this weekend and start up again.

yay, Springtime!

Will little Noah tell me what I want?

2009-03-06T00:40:00.001+09:00

IMG_5652
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

So Korea is a weigh station for me. I wasn't ready to settle somewhere and make any decisions about the rest of my life, wanted to travel, and needed to make so money...so here I am. This was the last of my plans, and now I'm not sure what I'll be doing after this contracted year is up. I like it enough right now to consider another year, but miss home more than I thought I would. That's saying something since my circle of friends and family is so awesome. I've always had some sort of plan and am finding it hard to just be. Living in the moment entails considering my past and future, if I'm being honest with myself. I've realized that over the last few years I have lost touch with what I genuinely want....even vaguely. I've had dreams about my teeth falling out, about a beach that slips out from under me in an icy tidal wave and an assortment of other bizarre situations that make me think I'm trying to tell myself something. I just wish I could be clearer on what.

The cutest billy goats....errr...sheep.

2009-03-05T00:44:00.001+09:00

IMG_5743
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

I never thought I would love these little kids so much, but they have gotten to me. So much so, that after mulling over very depressing financial information regarding upcoming student loan payments, the only thing that could make me happy was to watch the preschool graduation videos. They're on Flickr, check them out! I can *almost* guarantee that you'll smile, but I'm biased.

Rare Alison Fish at the Busan Aquarium

2009-02-27T22:55:00.002+09:00

rare Alison fish at the Busan Aquarium
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

Busan was lovely. The beach was beautiful, full of kids running from waves and couples strolling. I bought a 2000 Won ($2) frisbee in a shop and we tried to play, but it was too windy. I gave it to some very startled kids who then proceeded to fight over it, but I like to think they ended up having a good time. It is a much larger city than Daegu, and while the extensive subway system was nice to see and use, I'm glad I picked the smaller town. Trekking from here to there was exhausting, and reminded me of the hours and hours I spent on the subway in high school, and how I felt about it: stressed and tired. I spent most of a gorgeous Saturday on the beach in Haeundae and then the evening wandering around one of the many "downtown" type shopping districts before retiring earlyish to a rather fancy and over heated "love motel". It was suprisingly nicer than any other motel I've ever stayed in, even though it was only 40,000 won. It rained all day Sunday, so we went to the aquarium (back at Haeundae) for the day. They had some pretty exhibits, and we got to ride a glass bottom boat over the shark tank. We also found an excellent bakery that makes REAL European style bread. yay! We bought some to eat and some to freeze, and I made a pretty good maranara, given the canned tomatoes.

Tomorrow is the weekend again, and preschool graduation. I'm kind of upset about having to work on a Saturday, but also really proud of the kids and how flipping cute they are. We've been working on their plays and songs for WEEKS now, and I'm excited to see how they do in front of an audience. Sunday should be gorgeous, and hopefully there will be hiking. I start a new schedule on Monday that truthfully, totally rocks and is really conducive for friends and family visiting (cough...visitme...cough). Hopefully I'll use my free time wisely and stop spending it hula hooping in my apartment watching CSI Miami.

It's a fishy Valentine's day.

2009-02-15T13:56:00.001+09:00

ankle biters!
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

Yesterday: perhaps the best Valentine's ever.
We started off with Korean class in the morning and learned how to say "What is that? Is it yours? Waaa! That's really cool!" and an assortment of vocabulary to go along with it. "Is that your cell phone/hat/dictionary/bag/glasses...?" As long as everybody I encounter sticks to the same dialogue when I ask them what things are, I should be good to go.

Afterwards, we went to this spa/cafe called "Dr. Fish" in English and Namul Geleun (roughly) in Korean, which doesn't really mean Dr. Fish the same way it does in English. I really wanted it to be called Ooesa Mulgogi (literally, Dr. Fish), but alas. You pay about $4 to enter the cafe and have self service unlimited tea, coffee, toast and jam and can sit around gorging yourself as long as you like on white bread until you are ready to dip your tootsies into a pool of warm water housing twenty to thirty tiny minnow like fish. They eat the dead skin, and only the dead skin off your feet and ankles until you can't stand the tickling any more or until your twenty minutes is up and you go back to your tea and toast. It was possibly the most hilarious thing I have ever done, and definitely the most ticklish. Having particularly sensitive feet in the first place, I kept moving my feet around and disturbing the feeding fest, so while my feet are noticeably softer, I'm not sure I got the full effects of the nibbling. I think we're going back next week with some friends, I can't wait. (Warning: If you visit me--and you should--I will take you here whether you like it or not. It is permanently on my top 5 list).

After the fishstravaganza, we decided to walk around for a while enjoying the gorgeous spring-like February weather, and see if we could find the black market. We had heard roughly where it was, and had been told we could find a surplus of Oatmeal here. There have been at least two days spent on the hunt for breakfasty goodness already, but the warm spring air made all the difference. We were on a street we had been on a dozen times before, when Timber decided to take a turn into a clothing shop with a few personal items displayed in the back. The clothing shop turned into a long narrow hallway of hundreds of clothing shops with maze like twists and turns leading into an underworld of middle aged Korean women shopping for quilted jackets, paisley pants and giant underwear. At the end of a long string of stores we saw a convenience store set up and made our way towards the plastic curtain separating the food from the clothing. Upon coming through the plastic, we met with a tiny 50 something Korean woman who greeted us in perfect English, asking us in a hushed tone "What are you looking for?" We said that we were looking for oatmeal, and she hurried away telling us to stay where we were. Aha! Black market Ahoy! She returned a few minutes later with a huge canister of instant Quaker oats (hey, I'll take what I can get) for 12,000 won (about $15). Leaving, we turned down a different way from the one we came and found ourselves on yet another street we had been on several times, selling dumplings, sausage, pancakes and shellfish galore, triumphant with our oats.

We walked back to the main part of downtown, happy but slightly exhausted and made our way to Kraze Burger where we had a fairly accurate representation of an American cheese burger (maybe better--more veggies) and steak cut fries. Then coffee, and onto the arcade.

Giggled at for our Dance Dance Revolution skills by a gaggle of middle schoolers, photos taken and embellished in the photobooth, basketball, Mario cart, and a variety of other games later, we emerged a few hours later to weave through the throngs of other warm weather lovers to weave our way home on foot and by cab to watch a movie and have some dinner.

Today, it was biscuits and gravy, relaxing, planning a trip for next weekend and dinner with friends.
Tomorrow is Monday again already, and I can say that I am not actually dreading it.

It's been a while.

2009-02-02T22:33:00.001+09:00

dried flowers, apsan
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

I haven't written anything in a while. It's not because nothings been going on, it just seems that there is just too much going on to pick what to write about.

This last weekend I went to a town (Bongseung I think) to be an extra in a movie about the Olympics. In Beijing last year, I guess there was a female heavyweight champion of note. They needed a bunch of foreigners to be in the audience, and promised us a bunch of stuff for the day. It wasn't the best Sunday I've ever had, but it certainly wasn't the worst. Mostly, we sat around in a freezing auditorium in t-shirts all day fake cheering. But afterwards we got to see the green tea fields and a "light festival". Pictures to come later.

The weekend before last, I had a four day break and spent it messing around Daegu. We had an Obama party which was way fun, went out dancing one night (also way fun) and went hiking one day. There's one day I can't seem to remember, probably on account of all the partying. Oh well. The picture above was from the hiking.
It was actually pretty spectacular. We went to Apsan (Mount Ap, since San is Korean for mountain, I guess). After taking the cable car up, we had lunch and took about a 2.5 to 3 hour hike across and down. There were temples and gyms all over the trails. There was even a giant springy horse and a couple of rope bridges! All in the middle of a mountain hiking trail. Why don't we do this in the states? Actually, I think one of the greatest things about Korea is outdoor playgrounds for adults ALL OVER the place. They have random stretching/exercising equipment and acupressure paths for your feet. They're always full of people, too. Not that hiking or jogging along the river isn't sufficient exercise, but why not weight lift while you're at it? Brilliant.

I had an appointment with a really excellent acupuncturist today. He did Tuina on my neck and back and gave me some acupuncture. I am going back to this guy for sure. This is only the second time I've had a treatment here (silly, I know), and both times they only put needles on one side of my body, I'll have to learn more about why.

So that's all the really exciting stuff that's happened recently. I'll try to write more in the coming days/weeks.

All Lee's Sons

2009-01-11T18:45:00.003+09:00

Setting up my bank account in Korea, they had some trouble with my name. Apparently, Al-li-son Lo-er-ch-er is far too long for a Korean name, so it was shortened to Al-li-son, which sounds, in Korean, something like All Lee's sons, a slightly gender bent yet international nod to 'family’ that makes me smile. Growing up, I'd always wanted just one name, not so much as a dis to the patriarchy as an aspiration for my own eventual fame. It has always been difficult for people to pronounce, and I am constantly asked where the name comes from (America?). I've even had arguments about its origins. A telemarketer once insisted that it was French, though I have visited family in Germany. At elementary school graduation, I was asked to write it phonetically for the announcer. Being all of 11 at the time, I barely knew what phonetically meant, and so wrote "Law", as in civil and "chair" as in table and. This is not how I pronounce it, but I figured it was closer than anything else I would get. My name was butchered yet again, however ceremoniously it may have been. It may have been then that I decided that I eventually would only be known by my first name.

Being in Korea is how I would imagine being famous to be. I am invisible until it is convenient to see me. The barrage of “Hello! Teacher!” from middle schoolers on the street is proof that to many locals I am valuable only for my English language skills. Otherwise, it would be just as well if I had never set foot in Korea. Born in a state that is considered the melting pot of all melting pots, begging the shores to send America their tired poor and hungry, this is a strange feeling. This is not a commentary on America’s immigration policy of past or present, but on the dazzlingly diverse population found in New York in specific and in the US generally. Even in Portland, Oregon where the population is for the most part pearly white, there is a ‘Black neighborhood’, however gentrified. Many people can claim some sort of American Indian heritage, however harrowed with stories of ancestral rape. No one is purely one thing or another. Whereas here, you are either Korean or not Korean.

This is the experience I came for. To be an outsider where I am living is forcing me to find my own cultural niche of foreigners as well as expand the boundaries of my usual repertoire. I will never look at cabbage, fish tanks or coffee machines the same way again. AllLeeson Theacher, my new identity is being created day by day. I am a teacher who insists that you can ride a bicycle to the USA as long as it is grammatically correct, who refuses to write “The man smelled the panties” on the board no matter how cute the preschooler is telling me to, and makes her students write comics for homework because it will make them think. Simultaneously I am becoming a traveler who will climb mountains at 15 degrees but complain all the way, stay out till 3am and not drink more than two cocktails and find quiet time between headphone-earmuffs walking in the midst of thousands of people. None of this is extraordinary except in the ways I see my predilections coming true, famous in my own eyes thru the eyes of small children who may or may not forget “strange hair teacher” when my year is up.

LORIBANG! and Acupuncture!

2008-12-31T21:15:00.002+09:00

Soju is evil, but not as evil as some alcohol I've tried. Last night was the first night of our winter vacation. We have five days off before we start teaching again. Yay! So, last night the president of Ding Ding Dang (but we will furthermore simply call him the president, because no one in their right mind wants to be called "the president of Ding Ding Dang" out of context) took a bunch of us out to BBQ and kareoke. It was pretty great, as the president likes to get everyone to drink as much as possible and pay for all of it. We drank several bottles of soju at our table, which left me feeling a little strange this morning. Afterwards, we all went to a loribang (which I am probably spelling wrong) and sang kareoke---hilarious. I think my favorite of the evening was singing 'Welcome to the Jungle" by Guns n' Roses with another English teacher, Jack, who works for the same company, at a different school. The president started the singing off with a heartfelt 'Hotel California', for which I joined him in dance though unable to sing the actual song. Lindsay and I sang a fabulous rendition of 'My Sharona' and I seem to remember everyone ending the evening on a terrible show of NKOTB 'Hangin Tough", to which no one knew the words. I was a little wary about renting a room with people you know to sing terribly to each other, but it was great. The president ordered some interesting snacks, including chips that were shaped like french fries but tasted like squid flavored cardboard, as well as an actual entire fried squid which somehow ended up all over the sofas but otherwise seemed to remain untouched....strange.

This morning, despite funny left over soju feelings, I ran my first ever acupuncture clinic out of the apartment. It was fantastic to be actually working again, though last night I was asked by a Korean "So...you're an acupuncturist? How does that work? I've never seen a white person who could do acupuncture." While slightly put off, I did not let it affect my performance. I'm hoping to continue practicing on whomever may need it while I'm here and will drink tonight to a continued morning 'clinic' in my very own apartment.

While it's just turning to New year's eve in the states, here we are all dressed up with everywhere to go, once our party gets here. I might try to avoid soju tonight and stick to something else, but we'll see, it is vacation after all.

Happy 2009!

Holidays in Korea

2008-12-27T23:22:00.003+09:00

xmas biscuits
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

Way back in November, Timber and I decided that since she doesn't really like the holidays, and I'm not really christian, we should probably celebrate some other holiday besides Christmas this year. We'd be away from all the Americanization of the holidays, all the shopping and carols and lights and anamatronic reindeer, but somehow we got sucked into it anyway. Working at an English School, we not only celebrated Christmas, but we skipped preschool for it. The kids went and made Christmas cakes one day (shaped like barbie and Louis Vuitton bags, apparently) and we did Christmas word jumble worksheets and sang "Jingle Bells" all week. By the time Christmas eve came around, it was truly maddening. All the same, we woke up on the 25th and had presents and ate too much and all around did Christmas, and I loved it. I guess I didn't realize how important it is to me, how the colonization of Christmas has made it a very non religious tradition in my family. (Not to dismiss the midnight mass I sometimes attend with my Mom.) I threw wrapping paper everywhere, the cat went nuts and I probably ate my weight in butter. We got the day off and spent it lounging around, downtown eating dinner and at another English teacher's house playing monopoly (I came in 2nd--go railroads!!!). Timber's biscuits and gravy were great, and I got the best earmuffs/headphones ever (see flickr page for pictures).
I think Timber liked her presents. (Ok, I just asked her and she said 'yes'). The cat, Fu Zi Miao loved her new toys and especially the wet food.
Though it was pretty good, I also missed my family and in realizing how important the tradition is, I also realized why it's so important. It's the only time of year I am pretty much guaranteed to be around at least most of them. My sister makes excellent cookies and my Dad usually has something up his sleeve. If I spend the Holidays with my Mom, we go to midnight service, and have the most elaborately ornamented tree of all time, as well as her birthday celebration, since it's on Christmas. I missed all of that this year, and though learning how to say "Merry Christmas" in Korean has the benefit of making me sound very worldly, I'd trade in saying "melle chhristemassee" for holidays at home anytime.

Daegu National Museum

2008-12-20T22:09:00.002+09:00

relief from iran
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

Made our way to the museum today to see what was to be seen. It was actually pretty great. They had an exhibit on "The Glory of Persia" about Iranian history pre-Alexander the Great invasion and slightly after. There were some beautiful architectural things and some really old jewelry and a video about the huge palace in Persepolis built forever ago pre romanization. We got to make stamp replicas in fimo which will be hung on the wall once they dry and pretend to be archeologists in the kids' playroom. It seemed like the sort of thing you would never see in the states, because we're all about celebrating those Greek and Roman guys, when really they got all their ideas from Asia and the Middle East via the silk road. After we were museumed-out we went shopping at E-Mart and got a million things we needed and a few we probably didn't (except the tortilla chips---needed those). We had an amazing dinner of mushrooms, broccoli and steamed mussels by our very own Chef Timber by the glow of the Christmas tree. I like Saturdays.

Fu Zi's first tree

2008-12-20T12:23:00.001+09:00

Fu Zi's first tree
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

Yesterday I trekked out into the surrounding mountains of Daegu and brought home a tiny tree. Ok, not really. I walked about two blocks to the left of our apartment and bought it for 15,000 KRW at a plant shop. The cat was so excited that she jumped onto the table and sniffed it like crazy. I'm excited to put presents under it next week and have Christmas day a day earlier, here to the east of the international dateline. We get the day off, thank goodness. Plans are: after a breakfast of biscuits and mushroom gravy (hopefully, if we find a toaster oven) and hot cocoa spiked with whatever we find at the "Family Mart", I will go back to bed and read until I decide to get dressed up all fancy to go downtown to the Holy Grill for turkey & champagne dinner with Timber and new friends. This is my first holiday away from family and it'd better be a good one. Fu Zi is getting special kitty wet food and some new toys since she keeps losing them under the sofa and beds and I can only find 1/3 of the toys she started with. But don't tell her. Timber is getting a bunch of awesome stuff that I can't write about because she might read this. And your presents will probably arrive sometime in February, because I'm halfway across the world.

Back in the spirit of things

2008-12-14T22:15:00.001+09:00

Gatawbi Buddha 4
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

This weekend was full of medicine. After being sick all week, I decided to have my first acupuncture appointment. Timber (she's been sick, too) and I went to a clinic not too far from our house where we saw an acupuncturist who spoke some English and more importantly, gave us really nice treatments. I had my first experience with Korean hand acupuncture, which was great. He put three needles in my right thumb and I felt my sinuses start to clear. We were sent away with instructions to have a good rest and not to watch T.V. So, we went downtown. After wandering around for a while we made our way back to the oriental medicine market where I found a shop that sold needles, moxa, cupping sets and loads of books on acupuncture in Korean (darn).

Today (Sunday) we took the bus an hour outside town to hike up millions of stairs in the freezing cold to see the medicine Buddha. I don't think that's what the doctor meant when he said "have a rest", but it's been three plus weeks since arriving in Korea, and dammit I wanted to see something.

The bus cost about a dollar, 45 minutes and my digestive integrity and we arrived at Gatawbi rock. After two plus hours of very steep hiking we met the Buddha and his very funny hat. It was a miserably cold walk up and a shaky legged walk down, but the hot cocoa from the vending machines at the top was delicious and the Buddha himself was fantastic. How many places in the world can you live where that guy (see above) lives a bus ride away? Rad.

Prayers at Gatawbi

2008-12-14T22:00:00.001+09:00

Prayers at Gatawbi
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

The best letter I have ever recieved

2008-12-11T18:22:00.002+09:00

This is plagerism, sort of, but I'll change the names. My student's composition homework was to write a letter to a friend.

Here is Bobby's letter (names have been changed to protect the children)

Dear (Teacher)

Hi! my name is Matt. how are you?

Today is vary cool.

I eat dinner after eat heDDdung

I read books prearrangement

present time My mom is watch T.V.

present time My brother is cries

What present time now. theacher? (this is my favorite line. how dramatic.)

I present time do my homework

good bye theacher. see you tomorrow.

I like theacher. I love you.

you are good theacher. Name: Bobby

Korean healthcare rocks

2008-12-09T22:13:00.002+09:00

I came down with the flu yesterday and have spent an unpleasant two days with a fever, chills, full body aches, a stuffy nose--the works. I don't have my alien registration card or health insurance yet, so I didn't think I could go to the doctor, though everyone was encouraging me to go. As luck would have it though, it is easy to borrow someone else's number and my coworker took me over to the doctor this afternoon. In twenty minutes I had an examination and a prescription for about $5.00. Within an hour and a half I was feeling worlds better. I have little packets of 5-6 pills to take three times a day for three days. I have no idea what she gave me and normally am not a fan of little packets of pills, but considering I have to be at work no-matter-what I'm happy for the quick fix. I've been told that the standard remedy for anything here is a shot in the butt of some sort of steroid, and consider myself lucky that I avoided that this time.
Hello meds, goodbye sickness.

My not so secret passion for the ridiculous and pop-y

2008-12-06T17:20:00.000+09:00

Does it count as cultural exploration? It's (mostly) in Korean after all. My vote is yes.

She is totally Mariah Carey:

This one made me do the roger rabbit in my living room. 10 points if you can tell me why. The really stellar argyle sweater is for someone in particular. You know who you are.

I wasn't able to embed this one, but props to the healthy thug lifestyle. Quarts of milk all the way, baby.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDDiHM_iALk

The end of week 2.5

2008-12-06T13:50:00.000+09:00

Yesterday was snowflakes, another round of ghostbusters, and Soju.

We woke up to snow falling in 20 degree weather, big thick snowflakes accumulating on telephone wires and quickly melting on the ground. I danced around the apartment like it was Christmas and tried to take some very unsuccessful pictures out the windows. I decided to get back to something familiar by typing up notes from my observations in China. It was good to remember the things I saw, and something about the medicine, but it mostly made me sad that I'm not doing anything with it right now. I got to school in a pretty depressed mood, but playing with the little preschool kids helped pretty quickly. Rounds of "Teacher, finished!!!" as they proudly displayed their spelling blocks arranged into words like "box", "cloud' and "rainbow" helped me get my smile on, and the glue that kept it there was an excited round of the "Ghostbuster's" theme song. I swear, I'm taking halloween all the way into new years. Screw "We wish you a Merry Christmas", I think I'm going to teach them "Thriller" next (I seriously might, it's on the school's Halloween mix CD). The rest of the day zipped by in grammar patterns and the stickyball game (sort of like darts for 8 year olds). After work we went out with two coworkers for pork bone soup (see below) at a nearby restaurant. It was a bitterly cold night and somehow eating meat off swine's spine seemed appropriate. We talked, again, about being vegetarian and how difficult that might be here since there is meat in just about everything you order. I've been trying to keep it to a minimum, but a complete ban would be difficult. Over dinner I tried Soju for the first time. I have been both encouraged to try it and warned against it, but the final verdict is that it's fun! We shared a small bottle between three of us, so about three shots each. I felt silly, but never drunk and just fine this morning. In excess, since it's basically rubbing alcohol, it would probably do a number on anyone, but three shots seems to be just fine. It's worlds better than Hight beer, anyway. We stopped at the bakery where we got the thanksgiving walnut pie on the way home and the lady gave us free cookies with our loaf of bread and little French pastries. It reminded me of when I would go grocery shopping with my Dad when I was little and the bakery department would give out free cookies to little kids, but better because I'm 27 and she's just doing it to be nice and not because it's store policy.

Today we had planned on leaving town. We were going to go to a Buddhist temple just outside the city, in the foothills of the mountains that make Daegu a valley, but it's currently 26 degrees and feels like 17, according to the weatherchannel.com. We might find something closer and warmer to do for the rest of today, and try for the mountains and the temple next weekend when it's supposed to be about 50.

Oh, and my favorite quote from one of my kids this week:
"Teacher, what's this?" (pointing above his own eye while looking at my mole)
"It's called a mole, Marcus." (and I write m-o-l-e on the board)
"Is it a period?"
"Like, period '.'?" (I draw a period on the board)
"Yeah!"
"Okay, yes Marcus, it's a period!"

I laughed for a good few minutes and if I'm ever asked again about my mole, I'll definitely say it's a period. I'd been thinking about getting it removed, especially since I'm somewhere I could get it done cheaply if not for free with my health insurance, but now I'm keeping it for sure.

How it's going

2008-12-02T22:47:00.000+09:00

Today was a little rough. It started out fine, did a bunch of nothing this morning and went in a little bit early for a weekly meeting with the other native English teachers. Classes went fine, yadda yadda yadda until Timber asked me if I was still glad I’d come. I am, I really am, but I miss home and my friends and family, and more than even that, I miss medicine. I didn’t think I’d be saying that so soon, but it’s true. I’m actually motivated to study, and glad I have so many notes on my computer to print out and review. I’ve even looked on amazon to see if I can have some books shipped to me once I have some money. I want Dr. Tan’s especially (I think the systems are really fun to play with) and have a whole list going on a variety of subjects. I figure if I can stop watching the “style” channel on Korean T.V., I might fit some learning in before I go into school at 1pm. On Saturday, Timber and I had to go to this seminar about how to teach English with all the other foreign teachers at all the DingDingDang schools around Daegu (there are about four). It was generally uninteresting. At one point, they had us all “drilling” phonics. About twenty English speaking adults, 21-29 years old, saying “A, a a apple, B, ba ba boy, C, ka ka cat…”. I looked over at Timber, rolled my eyes and wrote on her seminar handout “I’m (almost) a doctor.” She smiled and wrote on mine “I’m a head chef.” Then we continued “D da da dog, E e e elephant…” So that’s about where it is, we are teaching incredibly basic English to students who mostly don’t want to be there for the sake of their very proud parents who are competing with other very proud parents to try and get their kids the most (not best, mind you) education possible. Some of the kids go to school from 7 or 8am to 9 or 10pm, sometimes even midnight. They go to regular school, then several different academies: art academy, English academy, music academy and so on. I really do love language, and if I could share it with the kids who do want to learn, it would be a great job. Mostly though, it is 40 minutes of book after book. “Ok everyone, grammar books out!” “Are there any apples? Yes, there are some apples. No, there aren’t any apples. Grammar books away! Phonics books out!”

So after Timber asked if I was still glad I came, I got discouraged, sad and maybe even nostalgic though it wasn’t all that long ago, about needling people and actually helping them. Last year I used an hour of someone’s day to dramatically change their perspective even if it was just from being in extreme pain to being in moderately less pain. Now, I am using 40 minutes to have kids monkey “dialogue book” back to me. So, I went on a walk during one of my infrequent breaks. I realized a few things that I hope might help me in my time here. First, my intuition or whatever you want to call it, brought me here for a reason and I need to figure out what that reason is. I do want to learn the language, and something about the medicine, and simply live in another country, but I know there is a larger lesson for me somewhere in all this and I will be happy to find the a ha moment when I do. I’m looking for something, but I’m not sure what. I also realized that I can use this time to plan next year, and see if I can’t do something really spectacular with the money I should have saved in Korea and that fancy national license I got in the mail. While I was in school, I didn’t feel that I had adequate time to discover what I really want to do with this shiney new profession of mine. I’m relatively certain of its capacity to heal and where it can be taken but not entirely sure of where it is I personally want to go with it. I got a fancy new gadget, read the manual and am overwhelmed by its variety of functions. I was telling my sister before I left that living abroad and teaching English was my last plan in what used to seem like a long list of plans. Now, I genuinely have no idea what I want to do next. I used to think I was a planner, and now I think I’m not so much a planner as someone who likes to have a lot of plans lying about. That last three years of school just zipped by, and now here I am in Korea, drumming my fingers wondering what to do next. Not having something specific to look forward to makes grammar book pretty intolerable, and this is only week two. Something that OCOM definitely taught me was to seek opportunity, and perhaps instead of planning my next step I can learn how to do that in a larger way here. When we do acupuncture or prescribe herbs, we are looking for that space in the pattern that is slightly amiss and then toggling with it to redefine perfection—we seek these spaces as opportunities to heal. Maybe I can expand that microcosm to seek opportunities in my life now that will help me to figure out what’s next. Or, you know, I can just take suggestions.

Introducing....

2008-11-30T18:53:00.001+09:00

Fuzi Miao and I on the bed
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

Everyone, this is my new kitty, Fuzi Miao. dun dun dun dun!!!

We inherited her half by accident, and she is a super sweet kitty, though this portrait may have you believing she is mildly evil. There will be thousands more kitty pictures I am sure, this is just the first.

The people we replaced, Brian and Celia left her behind when they moved. They had given her to some other teachers at another Ding Ding Dang school who didn't really want her. She wasn't happy at their house and rarely came out from under the bed. They played a lot of loud music and weren't really cat people. When Celia and Brian asked us if we liked cats, I lit up like a Christmas tree and basically from then on, the cat was going to be mine. Last night, Timber and I went over to their house with our neighbor Danni to bring her home. She is super happy to be back in her old house and is currently cuddled up with me on the sofa while I type. We all get along very well. I hope I can bring her home with us, but we'll have to see what the next year brings.

She'd had several names over the last year, so we decided to give her a new name. I'd had one picked out since the China trip and bestowed it on her. Fuzi Miao means a couple of things. First, Fuzi is a Chinese herb, Aconite which is used to warm you up, basically. it can be toxic if used improperly or in doses that are too high. Miao is well, what cats say. Fuzimiao is the name of the big shopping market we went to a lot in Nanjing. So there you have it, her name means a lot of things that mean a lot to me and I think she likes it.

She's pretty young, though we will probably never know for sure how old she is. She plays a lot with the toys we got her and has a sweet little voice and a silly demeanor. She's getting used to us being affectionate people and likes to bump her head on our legs a lot to say hi. In the summer, I'm thinking we can probably take her up on the roof with us when we get our patio together. There's no way she can be an out door cat. For one, there's no real outdoors and for two, Koreans don't like cats much.

So that's the big news so far. Now that I have the internet at home, I hope to blog at least every other day, and I'm taking pictures like nobody's business so be sure to take a look at the flickr site.

I miss all my friends and family, especially now that it's officially the holidays. I'll be excited to send everyone presents home through, the street vendors are great, and will be sending my mailing address out soon, hopefully tonight, if you want to send me christmas cards or what have you here.

Fuzi Miao!

2008-11-30T00:13:00.000+09:00

We got the kitty!!!!!

Fuzi Miao came home this evening and is instantly happy. We love her. Pictures to come (as soon as I find my camera cable.)

hurray! internet!

2008-11-28T10:32:00.000+09:00

This morning the internet guy came over to our house to "install" the internet that was already half working. He didn't ask for any money, which was good because I don't really have any money to give him, especially since I didn't break the internet in the first place. It took me a minute to get it to work on my computer, since he installed it on Timber's. After much cursing and throwing around of ethernet cables, it finally worked and I logged on to "KT MEGAPASS!!!".

I was all excited to load all my pictures, but now I can't find my camera cable. There aren't too many places it could be, my apartment isn't that big and if I could find it, I could show you how not that big it is. Hopefully this situation will be remedied this weekend, and if it's not, more cursing and throwing of things will probably be happening, which I also will not be able to post pictures of.

But, onto more pleasant things....

Last night we had "thanksgiving" with two other teachers from our school, a brit and a guy from Texas, and a Korean woman who I think assists my boss, but I'm not sure. We went to a restaurant called Moogtick or something equally entertaining, and had galby, which is the Korean barbeque that you may or may not be familiar with. So, you know, pork/turkey, kimchee/mashed potatoes, whatever. On the way home though, Timber and I stopped at a little french bakery by our house and found a walnut pie! We didn't know what kind of pie it was, and the lady at the counter insisted on finding an english translation for us other than "Pie, pie!" which she kept repeating until we emphatically shook our heads and repeated "Pie!". She searched my little phrasebook and then on the internet for about ten minutes until Timber said "OH! Walnut!" and we purchased our pie and went home. It's not pumpkin or pecan, but it was pie anyway, and pretty good for Korean street bakery pie at that. I took pictures, but it's honestly not that interesting. It looks like pie. It helped it feel more like thanksgiving though, and thats what counts.

I've decided that I like teaching for now, but am really glad that it is not my lifelong career choice (sorry, Mom). Overall, the kids are really great. Some of them have behavioral issues, and I've had to do my fair share of demerit giving and stern glancing, which I have to say I'm not very good at unless I'm in a poor mood to begin with. Mostly I just think they're funny when they act out, unless they're shouting which tends to give me a headache. Some of them really do want to learn English well for various reasons, and those are the most fun classes to teach. I learned last night that one of my students, Chongwoo wants to be an acupuncturist, which is pretty great. I'm not sure how to incorporate that into what I can teach him this year, but I'm sure I can come up with something.

I am slowly learning Korean words for things. I learned that yogio is for "stop, here" when you're in a taxi and that 'sawpa' means sofa, which is easy. Timber is talking about taking Korean classes one night a week and I might join her. We'll see how far I get with just immersion learning. I think for a week and a half I've done a good amount of learning, and as long as it continues at this pace I should be OK. I've made some connections in terms of finding an acupuncturist to observe, and offered acupuncture of some of my co-workers, who are generally impressed with the fact that I can poke them with needles. It feels like far more than a week has passed, especially with how sore my throat is from talking so much.

For the words I don't know, I've been pantomiming a lot which makes the Koreans laugh. I pantomimed "suction cup" to a lady on the street when we were trying to buy hooks from her and she gave me a hug and now waves to me every time I see her.

Well, now I don't know where the morning has gone and I need to get ready for work.
I will try to get some pictures up soon.

Blogging Hiatus

2008-11-26T19:17:00.000+09:00

Hi there....

Just a quick note to apologize about not blogging since arriving in Korea. I (we) am (are) all settled and learning how to be awesome teachers. I'm learning a lot about classroom management and that kids in Korea don't know how to whistle, but love Rudolph the red nosed reindeer. Weird. My skype works, so you can call me if you have the number (and if not email me and I'll give it to you), but the internet at the apartment won't work until friday (thursday for you in the States). I'm sure after then there will be non-stop blogging and photo updating. Until then, sit tight.

I'm here

2008-11-20T20:54:00.000+09:00

Today might have been the longest day of my life. We got into Daegu last night at 11:30pm, and were off to school this morning at 9:30am for an eleven hour day.
I'm going to bed in a minute, but before I forget:

The preschool kids' favorite song is the theme from "Ghostbusters". They absolutely went wild when we played it.

The 15 year old Alice wrote in her composition: " Second, I can read books everywhere. Think about it. Can you watch rad movies in a subway? Probably not. But you can certainly read books everywhere."

Now Alice is famous, and we are all entertained.

The sign above the toilet read "Please sit for stooling".

Also, there's a gym at the top of our school's building, and there is an excellent possibility that we will be inheriting a cat! YES!

It's time to go!

2008-11-18T15:56:00.000+09:00

This is my last night in the states before a year in Korea. Tomorrow at 9:05am, I take the Whidbey shuttle to Sea-Tac airport. Then to Tokyo (again), then to Busan with Timber, then to Daegu by bus. It's going to be quite a trip, but I'm looking forward to watching 3+ movies on my personal TV on the flight to Tokyo and rice for breakfast. I'm nervous, but mostly excited. It kind of feels like Christmas. It feels like I'm leaving so much here, and I am. At the same time I am looking forward to so much unknown. I hope I can share the new with the now, tomorrow with the yesterday. I hope I can live each moment to it's fullest, I hope I get enough sleep and enough leafy greens, I hope to learn how to be a better acupuncturist, I hope I learn a new language, hope to become a better writer, hope to discover new joys in etymology as I teach little bits the weird language I call home. I have so many dreams for this trip, but also so much grief in knowing that I can't take everyone and everything I love here with me. It's just a year, and it's going to fly by, I just hope I can fit it all in. I have had such a beautiful opportunity to say 'see you later' to all my dearest friends, nothing could have happened more perfectly in the month between China and Korea. But at the same time it makes it all the harder to go. I have never felt such love for so many people, and never felt so loved by so many people. Homecoming is going to be awesome, but now: into bed and onto the plane!

Tuvan throat singers quotes of the night

2008-11-16T14:58:00.000+09:00

"This song is about beautiful horses, and nice girls."
(really, what song isn't?)

and also

"When you hear the car horn, help us to make sheep sound."

Tuvan throat singing is not a new passion or hobby, but it sure was different.

What is it about clamshells

2008-11-16T05:47:00.001+09:00

yay for macro
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

There is this, lets call it a trend. I'll be generous and call it a trend, but I think that it might actually be an ingrained habit, or custom, or tradition even of modern day coastal peoples to turn clamshells, much like this one---perhaps even one day this very shell, into soap dishes. Most often this is for the guest bathroom, or the kitchen sink. Sometimes it is for every water spigot in the house. Sometimes, the glory of the clamshell goes beyond just holding soap, and will hold other things: buttons, paper clips, push pins, peppermints. My question is: what the? What on earth inspires SOAP DISH! when walking on the beach and coming upon these monstrosities of calcification now hollowed by clammy death? And how is this inspiration so seemingly the universal inspiration of every beach comber with a house down the street? Something in me gets it, understands this collective experience, but I think I'll have to dig deeper to find the root, because really, it's weird.

Beach on the strait of Juan de Fuca

2008-11-14T15:37:00.001+09:00

shining strait 2
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

Seaweed from the strait

2008-11-14T15:36:00.001+09:00

sexy seaweed 3
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

There is something disturbingly sensual about this seaweed. It was all over the beach, in huge bunches, washed up on the shore along with a ton of whole trees, driftwood and agates.

even the decaf is delicious

2008-11-13T17:11:00.001+09:00

even the decaf is delicious
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

Down the street from my sister's house is this coffee place, Mukilteo Coffee, where they roast their own blends and serve some of the best coffee around (so I'm told). I like coffee, sure, but don't know much about it and really couldn't give you a better suggestion than 'stumptown good, starbucks bad'. But, this is delicious, and the people are great, and it's pretty much a coffee shop in the middle of the woods and that can't really get much better.

Brunch Sendoff

2008-11-12T08:29:00.001+09:00

breakfast club 2
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

On November 10th, I left PDX for the next year (at least). An easy collection of some of my favorite people from the last decade of my life had brunch with me at the Cup and Saucer (cute dyke), and kept me from crying into my scramble by keeping me giggling for two hours. I don't know how I got so lucky to have such amazing people in my life, but I am sure I'll spend the next decade (at least) appreciating them.

Saying 'Obama' is like an entire song in my mouth, a holiday in my soul

2008-11-06T04:57:00.000+09:00

sweet....

"Francis Nyamnjoh, a Cameroonian novelist and social scientist, said he saw Mr. Obama less as a black man than “as a successful negotiator of identity margins.”

I love negotiating identity margins! What a beautiful way to sum up the challenges going on right now.

waaaatttteeeerrr

2008-11-04T06:23:00.001+09:00

waaaatttteeeerrr
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

I went to Bend this weekend and hung out with these girls (Kate and Maggie), and also Amy C and Crystal and Beth and had an awesome time. I love oregon, why am i leaving again?

squash! from Sauvie's

2008-10-26T03:08:00.001+09:00

squash! from Sauvie's
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

mmmMMMmmmm fall

October fall leaves, PDX

2008-10-24T05:30:00.001+09:00

October fall leaves, PDX
Originally uploaded by Alison J. L.

I am so happy and so blessed to be in Portland right now. China was great, Korea will be fantastic, but Portland right now is breathtaking.

peace out, China

2008-10-22T05:31:00.001+09:00

This is the last picture taken in China on my camera, after the last shopping excursion and the last group dinner. We got the awesome hats shown in the picture. Mine has a black vinyl brim and Christine and Justin's say "China loves me and #1 China" Love you, China! Love you China friends!

Back in time to Portland

2008-10-21T22:00:00.000+09:00

On the airplane back to Portland….

This trip has been so good for me. I feel so solid in my person, in my feelings and plans. I feel infinitely healthier and happier and more optimistic. I feel more secure about my relationships and their future, and feel all right about leaving the past in the past. I feel ready to reaffirm my friendships in Portland and build new ones elsewhere—abroad and in the states perhaps. I feel open to whatever will happen, and that is a fantastic feeling.

China was a challenge, for sure. If it wasn’t one thing, it was another. A mysteriously sprained and then kindly and miraculously healed ankle. Then “travel sickness”, then the flu, then more travel sickness, then gastritis, then deep and incessant phlegm that I am bringing home with me on the plane as I type.
I am changed by this country, I am changed by China. She has made her way into my body for sure, and also my spirit. I am unable to even outline all the ways in which I think I’ve been affected, it is infinite. I feel so deliciously blessed to have been there, to have graduated and then to have contextualized everything I have learned about Chinese medicine with clinical experience IN China. So much of it is so much more clear having seen where it comes from, and also extreme ways in which it can be used. Having talked about a patient with ‘yang type’ jaundice and then needling a patient who is the color of orange juice are completely different things. To have talked about using herbs and acupuncture for cancer and to have seen herbal IV drips for a pulmonary cancer patient and then needling her are worlds apart. My confidence in the medicine and myself have increased exponentially, as has my inspiration. I have thousands of ideas swimming in my head of not only what I might be able to accomplish in my practice, but also how I want to accomplish that. I now know that it IS possible to have a desk, a prescription pad and a pulse pillow and write fifty formulas in a morning—and have patients rave about what a great doctor you are---all using Shan Han Lun modifications. I know that with the right spirit, a smile and genuine concern, patients in the most dire circumstances will not only benefit from acupuncture, but consider you a friend and partner in their healing. I was so impressed by the doctors I met and worked with. Their true compassion, wisdom and joyousness shined through with each interaction. They work hard and long hours, but they love what they do and I can see why---it is so gratifying. The OCOM clinical experience was wonderful, but nothing like what I have seen and done in China and I can’t imagine starting a practice without that reference point.
I am so grateful. And I will read and re-read this post many times throughout the years as I pay off my student loans and grumble about the cost.

Yesterday, we were in Shanghai having our last day in China—which was perfect. I started out with a leisurely breakfast of fruit, tea and toast in the dining room. I think I lounged there for about 1.5 hours. Then I went off myself on an erhu search. An Erhu is a 2 stringed Chinese instrument that is played similarly to the cello, but is much much much smaller. After nearly being pick pocketed for my umbrella and sunglasses by this younger Chinese guy who looked incredibly strung out on something or other, I took the metro three stops to Huangpi road and Huaihui lu, one of the major shopping districts of Shanghai. I had 2 hours before I was supposed to meet some friends for lunch, and I was on a mission. I walked down the major street for quite a while and saw lots of fun stuff, yoga dancing and the fancy shopping mall and lots of amazing Chinese fashion. I decided I probably wasn’t going to find an erhu in times square, so I turned down a side street that looked relatively promising as far as cheaper items go. I found a sock shop where I got some great stuff, and after a great exchange with the shop lady (who told me my very limited Chinese was good!), I asked her where I could find an erhu. She pointed me exactly to it and even wrote down the name of the street in Chinese. I walked just three or so blocks and found a fancy instrument shop with everything from erhus to baby grands. I had limited myself to a rather small erhu budget, so I wasn’t sold on the spendy instruments and after a brief demonstration; I kept walking and told myself I would think about it. After winding around a few corners and seeing a few more things I decided that it would be silly to pass up the instrument over a couple hundred kuai, and made my way back to the street I had been on. Just when I thought I knew where I was, I saw an instrument shop on the other side of the street and crossed to check it out. I thought perhaps I was more turned around than I thought and that it was the same one I had been in. It was not though, and their erhus were a little bit cheaper! Hurray! So I shelled out and bought it and was thrilled with my purchase. I was right on schedule, so after hailing a cab I made my way to “Face” or “la visage” as I would rather say. I think my favorite thing about Face was that it is international and could probably be called the word for “face” in any language. We had a fantastic lunch that was about $40 US, so given that price in CHINA, you can imagine how delicious it was. We got the thing on the menu that said you “have to try this dish!” and I was so glad I did. It was leisurely and breezy and loungealicious as the four of us sat by the open window and chatted casually about medicine and travel and watched the children play on the lawn.
Then three of us went to the yuyuan gardens, which were definitely more structure than garden and perhaps more fish than people if that is possible considering the thousands of people that were there.
It was also the busiest shopping square/open market I have ever seen. I’m still too overwhelmed to even think about it.

Then cab back to the hotel to quickly shower before our last dinner all together for Beijing duck. The meal was all in all pretty good, but I don’t think that duck is my thing.

A few of us walked around the street the restaurant was on to do some last minute shopping and blow the rest of our kuai. I found the best hats ever and got matching ones for Timber and I for 3 kuai each---that’s like .50 cents! I’m wearing mine on the flight home and can’t wait to give her her’s. They’re black and have off black lettering in what I think might be Portuguese, but the best part is the opaque black vinyl rims. I was going to buy one, but when they rang it up and it was 3 kuai and not 9 like the sticker said I ran downstairs and got a second one. Between that and the iced tea I bought today in the airport I successfully spent most of my kuai.

Then home to re-pack, and an excited and light sleep. I was up with the morning call at 6am feeling like it was Christmas, and now here I am flying to Tokyo and then home. I have loved every minute of this trip but would not have wanted it a day longer or a day shorter.

Day one in Shanghai

2008-10-19T00:55:00.000+09:00

So I am in my hotel room and the power has gone out in the building. This would have been less of a big deal in Nanjing, because I would have known where the staircase is and simply gone down the 4 flights of stairs and outside to see what’s what. But, I’m in Shanghai and it’s a little scary. But, I won’t write about that to validate my fear because I have this strange feeling that situations like this is where Stephen King gets his inspiration and I would like nothing to do with that. I am just thankful that my computer still works and that I have a full battery that should last until I decide it’s time for bed. I don’t think I did justice to the acrobatic show in my last post, so I’ll start with that. It was the perfect end to a hectic feeling sort of day. After trying unsuccessfully to hail a cab for about 20 minutes, we decided to hop on the bus and bus/walk to the theater. It was a largish theater, I’d say Schnitz size.

Whew…ok, the lights are back on. That was fast, thankfully.

The theater was full of westerners, or laowai as they/I like to call us. It was kind of bizarre to see so many white people all in one place. I think going back to Portland is going to be a trip (haha). I’ll be excited to be in Asia again, I’ve gotten pretty used to it. So the first act was these guys jumping through impossibly small hoops. They kept building them higher and higher. Then these amazing women with these yo-yos they have here…the same kind as the one the guy is using in that video I have on my flicker. But, they were all in sync, and throwing them in the air and to each other, it was beautiful. Then some comedic knife throwing, and some jumping up in the air on a see-saw thingy. I think my favorite though, which I have a picture of, is the couple doing flying acrobatics on the pieces of fabric. They were lovely. The most impossible seeming were the women who balanced themselves on precariously stacked chairs about 10 high and then all proceeded to do handstands. I have a picture of that too. I kept saying “don’t do it don’t do it!” “get down get down!”, which is pretty unlike me for acrobatics. All in all it was great. I think cirque de soleil is better, but this didn’t have any of the cirque theatrics or music or costumes, so it is hard to compare.
I took a cab home afterwards with some other ladies and slept alllllll night, which was great as I’d had nothing to eat that day except a croissant I ate after the show and before bed. My stomach is a lot better today and I have feasted in comparison to the last few days.

Today I got up and ate breakfast (yay! Tea and toast!). Then a bunch of us set out on an adventure via metro to the Shanghai erotica museum. It was a display of relics from all through Chinese history, some amusing some lovely and some downright weird. They even had a nice little display about homosexuality and a little statement about how we shouldn't judge people. Go China! I have a bunch of pictures. If you’re not squeamish about things like large and very unsanitary ancient ahem “tools”, go ahead and look. If you’re my parents, well, you can look too, I am 27 after all. (Hi mom! Hi dad!)

Then we went through the Bund’s crazy underwater tunnel, which was this little pod-like ride through this insanely lit tunnel. There was a warning all about how you shouldn’t go through if you were an array of things like: drunk, mentally unstable, shirtless, obnoxious, pregnant, etc…”. Some of them did, and some of them did not make sense. We came out on the other side on the Bund, a collection of very out of place looking European buildings built when Shanghai was being colonized by Europe.

We finally made our way to an awesome vegetarian Buddhist restaurant where I ate more than I have in a while, GI problems or no. Even the white rice was good, and it was cheap for a meal like that! $35 RMB, which is like $5 USD.

Then an adventure with Beth to find the metro to get back to the hotel and shoshi (rest). We wandered for a while and found the Shanghai art museum which we saw the outside of. The Shanghai Bienniale is going on right now and today there was a line that wrapped around the building to get in. I might try to check it out tomorrow, but we’ll see about that line. We saw some great art on the outside of the building though, and eventually made our way back to the hotel. My long awaited shoshi didn’t happen however, as I had made it my mission at some point earlier in the day to see the symphony in Shanghai. I think it might have been when we passed the out of place looking statue of J.S. Bach. So I went down to the front desk and tried to navigate my way through language to some information about the symphony. All this was unsuccessful. Eventually I got my computer with internet back from Robynne who had used it during the day and we found a great performance that four of us went to this evening. It was called “Modern and Classic; The Oriental Angels”. It was a group of six women playing various Chinese instruments. It was beautiful! It was really nice to see because some of the Chinese music I’d seen to this point was pretty terrible. There was this one woman who was definitely “first zither” who had a solo where she played it like a possessed woman. It was great to see something played with that much passion, especially in China where all the women are supposed to be gentile, shy and lovely. The cab ride there was across the river to the Pudong district of Shanghai, all of which has been built within the last 20 years, before which it had been farmland. The cab ride itself was wonderful. Shanghai has some impressive and beautiful buildings with more lights than you would ever expect. Some of the buildings are striped with rainbow colored lights that flash and ripple and bounce off other surrounding buildings. Others have tetris-like lights stacking against their sides, some only have the top few floors lit so that it seems like it floats above the city. It really is beautiful, though it kind of inspires a “what the hell are we doing” sort of feeling.

So now I’m in Shanghai-home, with the room to myself and it is lovely. After posting this and futzing with my pictures on flickr, I might take a shower and head to bed before it’s breakfast time tomorrow and my last day in China—on this trip anyhow.

This is my favorite picture of the day. I love photos with Robynne!

Shanghai'd

2008-10-17T22:37:00.000+09:00

So I made it to Shanghai, train station schlepping and all. Whoever designs chinese train stations is off their rocker. Carrying luggage up and down stairs is not anybody's idea of easy transport. I'm not sure what they were thinking, but I made it anyhow.

After much schlepping....

and did I mention the schlepping?...

Ok, I'll outline it for you.

from the bus at the hotel in Nanjing to the train station in Shanghai, from the lobby of the train station up the stairs to the waiting area, from the waiting area down the stairs to the platform, from the platform to the train with very little luggage space, from the train to the platform in Shanghai, down the stairs to the lobby of the trainstation, out the doors we waited for someone from the hotel to guide us on our "five minute walk" to the hotel....
twenty minutes later, after gathering quite a crowd of chinese onlookers (some of us were playing with a hackey sac--me not included), someone showed up to lead us through deadly intersections and smelly back alleys on our fifteen minute long walk to the hotel.

All of this with some of the worst stomach pain I've ever had. Not so much fun.

But enough complaining, we made it and I promptly took a short nap and a bath (in the bathtub!!! eeeee!) before going to see the acrobats (by bus and foot).
The show was really really fun, lots of Ooos and ahhhs and I can't believe she's about to....'s.
I took some pictures which I'm too tired to upload now.

and then I took a taxi back to the hotel and am about to go to sleep.
Tomorrow is the erotica museum and maybe some shopping. I might even eat something! yay!

My name in chinese...

2008-10-16T07:21:00.000+09:00

a li

'little' oak

.

Today's forcast

2008-10-16T07:16:00.000+09:00

"Abundant sunshine"

--thanks weather.com.....

also:
Last day of clinic
Last day in Nanjing
Last massage at "Blind Tuina"
Last day riding emily
Last night at the Jinling mansion

4 days till portland

YES!

I have to start saying goodbyes to China, I love her, but traveling for five weeks in and around her is rough.

new name!

2008-10-14T19:07:00.000+09:00

Nothing thrilling to say about adventures, but, I just got my chinese name!

It's pronounced A li, but means "little oak", and I can even write it in chinese.

EEEEE! that makes me so happy.

Do what you want, it's China

2008-10-10T19:10:00.001+09:00

Two great examples of doing what you want, many great lessons can be learned from the Chinese:

1. Fairly mellow clinic shift this morning. Dysmenorrhea, stomachache, the like. Herbs herbs herbs. Just when I'm getting ready to tune out and wait for the time to pass before lunch, a woman walks into the clinic room with a bag making strange noises. Now, strange and loud noises are nothing new--cell phones, yelling, things crashing to the floor are all white noise at this point. Our doctors will answer their cells phones mid-appointment, no big deal. But this sounds like chirping, and it was. This lady brought her new baby chick to the doctor with her, inside her purse, wrapped in a plastic bag. Everyone looked up to inquire about the noise, and the lady smiles and shakes her head "yes" and opens her bag to reveal a little yellow chick running around maniacally inside her purse. Hey, do what you want, it's china. After several minutes of laughter and joking we asked our interpreter if this was just rote hospital procedure. She turned out to agree that "the nurse might be a bit angry about the chicken".
I should say so. There's a chicken, in the hospital. But no one showed the patient, or her chicken the door. It continued to disturb all of the 2nd floor with it's chirping while she patiently waited for her appointment in the hall.

2. On the bike ride home there is this particularly noisy section where they are doing some building construction and half the road is covered with steel plates. The cars driving over it make the street sound like NYC subway tracks--it's loud. Today they were doing some work on this piece of road. A guy was going at it with a mallet, making a racket. I've never seen this construction technique before, but alright, what do I know. Once he bent the metal to his desired shape he whips out his welder and starts-a-welding. Mind you, there are no traffic cones or blockades or anything, just a couple guys, a mallet and a welder. As he starts welding, a shiny new white car rounds the corner and nearly runs into the welder. The driver lays on the horn, hoping to get the crew to move so he can pass, but no sir. The crew doesn't care how fancy your car is or how loud the horn. The guy just climbed under the car and continued to weld away. Eventually the car backed up and swerved around the crew, probably pretty pissed. Who needs language for a battle of wills? Your car horn and welder will do. But whatever, just another day. Do what you want.

For Emily, wherever I may find her (no, really, where's my bike?...)

2008-10-09T19:30:00.001+09:00

A poem of mixed emotions

Oh, brazen biking through hectic city streets
My butt bouncing on your hard seat
Never have my ischial tuberosities been so sore
Oh Emily, riding with you is never a bore.

While my love is eight long weeks away
through sapphic streets my bike and I will play.

Though not as pleasant perhaps as that greek isle
or riding Black Beauty english style,
We weave and glide through traffic galore
the daily accidents only build our rapport.

Oh Emily,
with sturdy spokes and rusty chain
the tarnished bell that will never sing again
callouses from your handlebars building on my thumbs,
I'll be distraught when our last day is done.

From hospital to hotel
the streets of Nanjing never feel like hell
When gliding on your frame of steel,
for 200 kuai you were a deal!

Though one day soon I must leave you behind,
for human adventures both far and wide,
I shall never forget my love for you
and the adventures and pleasantries you took me to.

Tire tread fading along the hard pavement
our every day was well spent.

Though bumpy rides
Though thick and thin
Shocks would have only been
added weight to your thin frame,
Oh Emily, how I hope we (never?) meet again!

Surreal

2008-10-09T19:11:00.000+09:00

Yesterdays lecture turned out boring, but all for the best.

Afterward I ran into a doctor I met a few weeks ago, before Yellow Mountain. We chatted and she introduced me to a classmate of hers who I got into conversation with. We talked for a while and it eventually came out that she was going to start a job teaching English that night to 100 Chinese college students, and was feeling a bit lost as to what the hell to do with them, and rightfully so. So, I along with my friend from OCOM, Rik, volunteered our services and asked if we could come along to watch and help out if needed. She said that would be fine and to meet back in about an hour.

So the adventure began....

We ended up driving out, via hard-to-hail taxicab, an hour outside Nanjing to this huge university in the middle of nowhere. Literally--we're driving and driving and nothing and nothing and nothing and then BAM!--Huge buildings and university complex. I guess this is one way to make sure everyone studies.
Being that hailing the cab took about 30 minutes, we were a bit late. We got out of the cab and were immeadiatly shuttled off to a classroom by a gaggle of the professor's best students.

Walking into the classroom was like nothing else I have ever experienced, and maybe ever will.

The brightest lights, and row upon row upon row of students (100 of them) sitting attentively at their desks began clapping and cheering and taking photos when the three of us walked into the classroom. We were instant celebrities, and the smiles and enthusiasm continued for two short hours. We played some games, and went through basic words and sentences like: Can you help me find the bus station?
We went around with maps to have small conversations and ask the students to find the bus station. All conversations were peppered with "Teacher, can I take your photo?" "Teacher, we think you are so beautiful" "Teacher, where are you from"...on and on and on.

Some of them spoke very fluently, and other students couldn't understand a word of what I was saying. Though they were in college, they all seemed incredibly young and giggled madly when we taught them the word "bikini".
At the break, everyone came up and wanted their photo with me--I'm probably all over China's myspace and facebook, and at the end everyone wanted me to sign their lesson book, or photo ID, or something.

It was weird, really really weird, and incredibly rewarding, and while I don't think Korea will be quite the same I can't wait to start.

Oh! I forgot to blog about it..I got the job I wanted! Or, rather, we--Timber and I--got the jobs we wanted! We both start in Daegu, South Korea at Ding Ding Dang on November 17th. I mailed my contract off yesterday.
Now that it's all official, and especially after last night, I can't wait to start my time there. It should be lots of fun, a great adventure and good break/planning time for me before I move somewhere else in the U.S.

...and now to post a poem.

This week, in Nanjing

2008-10-08T07:33:00.000+09:00

Well, today is promised to be "considerably cloudy", as per the weather channel. Since when do they alliterate the weather? So I'm bringing a sweater to my third day in clinic. The first day was a little hectic, as we tried to figure out where we were supposed to be and where the blankityblankblank our interpreter was. Eventually everything worked out. The doctor as well as the interpreter are lovely. We've been seeing a lot of gynecology, some lung stuff, some depression stuff and its all herbs, all the time. Yay! I love it. The doctor is a really sweet person, very compassionate and caring and smart as hell. She is also a considerably competent teacher which makes it all the better.

After Monday though, I went home and went straight to bed for a 2 hour nap, then a brief break from sleeping and back to the pillows for 8 more hours. I think it was part the exhaustion of the first day, but also the food in China and the sugar in particular. No more sweet things! Yesterday though, I got some great shopping done at the 3 hour lunch break and then came home and went to the Opera. It was a cultural experience for sure, and I took some photos. I felt a little rude, but then all the Chinese people were doing it and thats my rule, follow whatever the herds of Chinese do. The best parts were the adventure getting there, since it doesn't seem that even if a building has an address, anyone will know where that address is. We took a cab and asked and asked and asked and eventually were pointed in the right direction. The performance took place in what looked like an old government building or temple. We were late, but no one seemed to mind. After two short stories, one painfully long, the performance was over and we went outside to figure out our next move. As soon as we got out there we saw a crowd of people watching their own street opera performance. Ladies with fans and hanky covered mikes singing and dancing and a big street band. The audience was singing along to all the songs they knew and clapping. Fun! They were really into us being there too, and kept on trying to get us to sing. None of us knew the words.

So today is wednesday, lecture day. We'll see how it is, it is supposed to be on clinical application of the extraordinary vessels, but really could be on anything.

a good day in China has no plan

2008-10-05T20:48:00.000+09:00

I started out this morning trying to find the ticketmaster place, but no such luck. The addresses skipped from 54 to 112, so there is something about the chinese address system that I am missing.
I went to starbucks to de-compress from the search and read for a while. While in the vortex, I decided to just take a bike ride down to the Ming palace remains that I had seen on the map and had been by on the bus the other day. It turned out to be a perfect adventure. I went into the gardens where the majority of the remains are. Most of it is bases for the pillars that are no longer there, one small building and a few old statues. It was really peaceful and I felt like I was in the middle of a lot of good history. There are beautiful carvings in the bases that you can hardly see because they have been so weathered Across the street is more of what used to be the palace, but what is now a garden. There were lots of older men flying kites, and I asked one if I could fly with him. He did the best he could to get me a kite up and going, but the wind wasn't good for a crap kite flyer like me, so after a few tries he took the kite back. I think we both had a good time though nevertheless. I walked around in the park a bit more, among families playing badmitton and this guy playing with the coolest yo-yo I have ever seen. I took a video of it that I've uploaded, but it's sideways--sorry!

After the park, I took a short ride down to the Nanjing Museum complex, where the contemporary and historical art museums are both located. I basically spent the day there looking at some weird contemporary art, and some gorgeous ancient art. The contemporary stuff was a lot of commentary on how China is being changed my western modernism. A favorite was the papercutting from McDonalds and Burger King fast food bags. I think what most struck me about the historical art museum was how old things were. They had jade from tombs from 2500 BCE, from just outside their own city. The U.S. doesn't have that much history, and I don't think I've seen anything that old in Europe either. This really is a culture and a people that has been around for a long time, and while so many things have changed, so many have stayed the same. Writing it like that makes it sound kind of silly, but really---it's really really old. really. Jade carvings and clay pots that were from thousands of years ago looked in many ways like they could have been made just yesterday down the street. The carvings and craft were so much more intricate and advanced than I realized they could be for that era. I bought jade pieces last week that look like they could be in the museum alongside what I saw today. So, really, the same people (in a broad sense) have been doing the same crafts for thousands of years. Are you impressed? I'm impressed.

So then home, and yummy noodles from down the street and now blog and bed. Tomorrow I start my second round of clinic shifts at a new hospital doing herbs.

Oh--I forgot to mention, after all the looking for the ticketmaster place that would hopefully get me tickets and lead me to the dance performance I want to see, I found the theater by accident. It was closed, but it's really easy to get to. I figure I'll go back one night when the performance is supposed to be happening and see what's what. The world is funny that way, huh?

So, night! I have to get my smart-rest.

I saw my life on the big screen

2008-10-04T22:48:00.000+09:00

This morning I woke up late, and headed to the best massage I have ever had with 2 friends, just down the road. 60 minutes of incredibly skilled Tuina changed my whole physical and mental structure. We then went to a delicious hot pot restaurant, just down the road from our hotel and the Tuina place. Yum! We had fresh lotus root, fresh bamboo shoot, lamb, thinly sliced beef, wood ear mushrooms, noodels, wintermelon, cilantro--probably more things than I can remember. In case you're not familiar with hotpot, it works like this. You and some friends get one giant pot of soup broth on a burner in the middle of your table. You order a bunch of fresh ingredients and add slowly by slowly the things you want in your soup. Wait till it cooks, and eat! It was some of the best food I've had here in China, and hope to go back soon. It's really great wintertime rainy food, and I bet it'd be easy enough to build a hotpot burner into a kitchen countertop. Hmmmmmm...

Then I went and did a little shopping for a special teacup, and headed home to plan for the rest of the day. I was going to go to the Confucius temple, but was feeling whiny and grumpy, and not so much like being in the rain that visited Nanjing today. So, I did some research and found a dance troup in Nanjing that I would love to see. Apparently they perform every night at the "Apollo Theater" (wow, really?). But, try as I might, I couldn't find an address or even a street name for the theater. I did find some vague directions to the ticketmaster office, and decided to give that a try. I figured, if I couldn't find tickets to the show, I'd go to the movie theater in the giant mall nearby, and if I couldn't go to the movie's I knew where there was a Starbucks, so if all else failed I brought my book so I could sit and vortex to America.

I got on the bus to XinJieKou station, where the mall and the ticketmaster place was supposed to be. I wasn't sure how I'd find the office, but I gave it a shot.
This is the address I had: Room e3, L7, #90, Huatai Securities Building, Zhongshan East road.

Ok. Now, which is the street address? #90? and what were the chances that there would be a big sign that said in English "Huatai Securities Building".
If there was one, I missed it. I ended up in the Nanjing International building, on various floors filled with medical offices, rooms under construction and english language schools. No ticketmaster.
Considering that "Zhongshan East rd" actually heads south, I don't think I'm too down on myself for giving up for the day.

After I wandered around looking for about an hour, I decided to give up the dance performance for the evening and give the movies a shot.
I made it to the 7th floor of the mall, and came to find that none of the movie titles at the "International Theater" were listen in pinyin, nevermind English. sigh. I wandered around for a while looking at movie posters and playing with various interactive machines, hoping for a sign that looked moderately recognizable to guide me to the right movie selection. I was just about to give up and go to starbucks, when I decided I might as well give buying a ticket to a random movie a shot. As it turned out, the ticket lady spoke a little English--yay!---and was able to help me get to a movie.
sidenote: It really stinks not being able to speak the language, really really really.

I ended up seeing a movie that started in 20 minutes, with subtitles in english! It was the perfect end to the day. I saw "Painted Skin" or "Wa Pei". It was a really random movie, based on a Chinese classic story. A little kung-fu, a little mystery, a little romance, a little horror, a little comedy, a little buffy the vampire slayer, a little fantasy, and a little weird, and I don't think it was just the poor translation of the subtitles. Apparently it's one of the author's series of stories that are about fox spirits. Ok.
I was just happy to be in a theater being entertained and out of the rain for a few hours. I might go back and pick another movie just based on start time, it's not something I'd do in the states and is kind of fun.

Ironically on the way home, I saw a bus-stop sign for Huatai Securities---I might go back tomorrow and wander around some more if it's not raining. There's some good silly clothes shops in the area, and at least I'd be by the starbucks once the throngs of people bumping into me got tiresome.

I'm doing my best to watch the debates over the internet and they keep skipping, so I might study some Korean instead. I'm determined to learn a bit more Korean before I move there than I knew Chinese before coming here.

Some pictures to entice you...

2008-10-04T00:00:00.000+09:00

My meta-vacation. Or, I might be a Doctor, but I play an actress on T.V.

2008-10-03T21:41:00.000+09:00

My trip in China is sort of like a vacation, despite the clinic time, but within that the whole country goes on vacation, so I did too. The first part of it was spent at Yellow Mountain, which you can read about in the previous posts, but now I am in the middle of 5 days off I had after that, before I go back to clinic on Monday (new Dr, different hospital). The day after HuangShan, I did nothing---I spent the day in my room editing photos, reading, listening to music, talking on Skype, napping and cooking food in my rice cooker. It was wonderful. That day was Erica's birthday, so a lot of us went out that night for dinner at a Buddhist vegetarian restaurant just down the street from "home". It was delicious, and not full of meat and MSG. Yay! I went there again tonight, actually. Dinner was good, and then we went to the Jazz bar again and had a couple drinks and met some other travelers. Most of them were teachers--English, Social Studies, etc, and were actually having their own get together. We actually even met a guy from Portland! I'd heard that this place we tried to go to earlier in the trip, as well as earlier in the evening, actually had good entertainment after 9:30. Ok, I'll be honest, I actually heard they had pole dancing transvestites---so--- a bunch of us decided to check that out, but can you blame us? China? Transvestites? Pole Dancing? We had to see. While there was a disapointing lack of transvestites, there was a little bit of cabaret like pole dancing, and some of the strangest variety show acts I have ever seen. They also gave us little plastic clappers shaped like hands, which were probably the highlight of my evening. It started with some high pitched singing and Chinese flag waving, as well as a hardy joke on us Americans. It was pointed out to me later that we probably deserved it, because we essentially barged in on their celebration during their national holiday week. So much for ignorance. There was some comedy in Chinese that I didn't understand, some really strange fake-violin playing which I took pictures of, some cabaret & pole dancing, and a good magician dressed like Charlie chaplain who did a lot of tricks like balancing things on his nose that you wouldn't think could be balanced there, and smoking a cigarette out of his eye. When they started the comedy in Chinese again, we went next door to the foreigner bar and stopped crashing their party. I didn't last long amoungst all the Brits and New Zealanders, and came home.

The next day I found the post office which was an adventure in itself, and then took a bike ride to the Nanjing Brocade Institute. It took a while to find, in part because I can't speak Chinese, but also because it's behind the Nanjing Massacre memorial, which thousands of people were lined up to see. I may go back there, but I know I'd find it hard to feel that kind of sad around so many tourists. The museum is pretty incredible though. The Nanjing brocade style (cloud, I think) is one of three styles of brocade in China. They had a pretty big collection of replicas of very old silks (like Ming Dynasty), and some fragments, as well as some more "modern" stuff from 1600 and on. I got my own personal tour guide from the guy who speaks English, who also happened to be an acupuncture student. I learned all kinds of things about brocade, the craft and the symbology, and got to see a demonstration in their loom room--which there are pictures of. I wish I could post pictures of the silks, but they are light sensitive and no photos are allowed. I think my favorite thing about art like this is all the symbolism. I learned about various kinds of plants and what they mean, like Reishi mushroom for longevity and peaches for health, chrysanthemum for moral character and lions for high military rank. I also learned that there are some types of brocade that can only be made by hand, and that only one cubic centimeter can be made per day. After seeing the people making it, I believe it. The tour guide showed me the shop, and I almost bought some things, but they were expensive (for China) and I couldn't decide on what to get, so I'll have to go back. After some street snacks and dinner, I went for a massage next door and then to bed. I have to say, while the massage next door isn't the most skilled, it's nice to have your feet rubbed and then tuck in. I hope Korea has pre-bedtime foot rubs for $7.00 too.

Today I went on the longest and funnest "date" of all time with Christine. We started out at Jimmy's, the same foreigner bar we were at the other night, to have pizza and burritos for lunch before Purple Mountain. We ended up staying for a few hours, making friends with a guy from Boston, Simon, and watching the VP debate and ripping on Palin. She's an OK speaker, but the nasal whine coupled with the poor logic and circular talk would put anyone over the edge if they had to listen to it for 4 years. This one New Zealander guy came into the bar while we were watching, and it only took the mere suggestion of him having to listen to her tell him to take the trash out for 4 years to convice him to go for Biden. Not that his vote counts, but he was all for the "hot younger chick" in the beginning.

We eventually made our way to Purple Mountain, where we saw Underwater World. It's like Seaworld but Chinese, and kind of tragic where the mammals are concerned. Afterwards we rode the cable car up to the top, got lost around the scenic area and eventually ran into some statues and pagodas. I took some pictures, so take a look!

We tend to make Chinese friends wherever we go who can speak about as much English as we can Chinese, but who really like to take our picture without asking. We just started telling them we were famous movie stars in the US. I'm not sure anyone believed us, but I'm also not sure they understood what we were saying. If anyone asks, I'm Nicole Kidman.

We had an adventure getting off the mountain, and rewarded ourselves with veggie buddhist dinner. Now its back at the hotel, and off to shower and bed for massage in the morning. It's hard being so famous in China!

Yellow Mountain

2008-10-03T21:34:00.000+09:00

These small gods are crass and noisy
inconsiderate of anything but their own time and space
which is how they declare their power among the magnificence.

They have already conquered this mountain, once sacred
through cables and stairways, hotels and marble
plastic bottles of sweet tea and bottles of beer.

There's no need to give thanks to something you own.

They do not seem humbled by their blessings as they
spit and yell
following the news on the radio
and listening to pop on their cell phones.

But however omnipotent they feel
they cannot help but give their blessings
through their sweat, or spit, or breath.
Eventually humbled by fatigue,
every one has to sit and rest and
quietly give up to the beauty around them.

Huang Shan etc

2008-10-02T10:03:00.000+09:00

The night before last I returned from H uang Shan (Yellow Mountain), back to Nanjing. The trip was something else, and the mountain was spectacular. I took over 700 pictures, and am still in the process of editing them. The pictures will probably do more justice than my writing about it would, but I can try. This should be the link to the photo set of the pictures of the mountain. The initial ascent was probably close to 5,000-6,000 steps up, and over the course of the weekend we estimated that we probably took over 10,000 steps. For all you PNW hikers, I do not mean footsteps, I mean stairs. The mountain has staircases built into it's sides, making the climb not only easier, but possible in some places. It was the first time, I think, that I've been on a mountain that had not ever been a volcano, which was an interesting realization the second morning at the top. Both mornings I got up early to see the sunrise, which was lovely as we were above the clouds, but honestly nothing more incredible than I have seen over the bay in Port Washington. What was remarkable though were the thousands of other people up for the sunrise, clamoring for the best spot to see the show, and the laughing and cheering that ensued as the sun showed it's bright face through the clouds. I guess if you live in Shanghai or Seoul, you wouldn't get to see that much. The scenery was all around gorgeous, and seeing the mountains lit up and colored by the sun this way was certainly special. It was nice, too, to get out of the city and breathe some fresh air. As much as I am a city person, Nanjing can be a little intense. While I climbed up the mountain, and hiked around the days I was there, I decided to take the cable car down and save my knees which were a little achy. Since we had to carry up all our stuff for the weekend, my back was thanking me too by the end of the day. The cable car was it's own adventure, and while well regulated, I don't know that it would ever feel safe riding a box attached to a thick string so many feet in the air over forested granite. Luckily I was in a car with three other people, and my little freakout didn't last too long.

As for the hike itself, I'm finding it really difficult to describe. It was hard, and steep, and sweaty. The mantra is that when you hike, you hike, and when you look at the beauty, look at the beauty--otherwise you might fall off the mountain. This is very true in some places for sure. There were hundreds of porters we saw walking up and down the stairs, carrying loads of various things on their backs--from steel plates to huge bundles of plastic to canisters of propane. We stayed in two hotels at the top for the 2 nights we were there, and the enormity of the buildings, with the fancy marble (or faux marble) floors and counters was humbling when I realized how all the materials had to get up the mountain. We asked our guide, Hu, if they really carried everything up and he kept insisting that they did, piece by piece. Knowing this, and the insane amount of work that must have gone into carving and building all the steps was really humbling--in addition to being among rocks larger than I have ever seen. Despite all this, somehow the other tourists, mostly Chinese, were still really crass, spitting and yelling and playing their radios and talking on their cell phones. I'm surprised more people don't get hurt on that mountain considering all the distraction. There's a small poem in the works about it, because this might have been the most remarkable human related part of the hike.
Ok, since pictures are worth 1000 words, I'm going to do some more work on editing my photos so I can get them up. More later about the rest of the trip, and my adventures today.

Language, culture and anonymity, a jumble of ideas and feelings

2008-09-25T22:21:00.000+09:00

I had my first feelings of "oh, i'm going to miss this when I leave" about China. It is difficult to be here, and taxing, and frustrating, and a sort of silent erosion of energy as my head tries to take in so much, but there is something really wonderful about it too. Because I (we) look so different, there is something kind of anonymous about being here. On the one hand, everyone stares with either curiousity or disgust, or on the other completely ignores us as they do everything else. It is very much a big city culture in the way that no one looks to the side or behind them when traveling, only concerned with moving forward, in both actual and metaphorical ways. Not being able to fully understand the language also helps with this, because then I can only be concerned with what I'm doing and where I'm going out of an ignorance that I'm not used to. But, on the other hand, and China is full of these Fiddler on the Roof-a la-Tevye moments, there is a lot that can be and is communicated completely without language, as long as I keep an open mind and open eyes. It helps too that I'm learning more and more every day, even just about the tones in which people communicate different things. I find that if I look at and pay close attention to what someone is trying to tell me, I can mostly understand their meaning though their actual words hold no symbology for me. Surprisingly too, the small education I have in Chinese language (Mandarin) through OCOM has served me well, as I can communicate (in a serious american accent no matter how hard I try) things like colors and sometimes foods, and since coming I have learned my numbers, and several ways to say things like "yes, no, that is correct, good, hello, goodbye, please take me to..., pain, soreness and no pain", all handy things when you are needling people in a foreign language. But in trying to understand what is being said and what is happening around me, my brain is in complete overdrive and it's hard to relax without sleeping, if that makes sense. Once I stop, I completely stop, but even my dreams are vivid. Hearing well-spoken english is probably one of the most comforting things that will happen during my day, as much as I hate to admit it. Right now for example, I have the only english TV channel on even though they've been discussing the launch of the 3rd Chinese space mission (the first one where they will leave the ship and walk on the moon--I assume it's the moon) for about 2 hours now and I kind of hate the glow of the television.
But even so, there is a certain amount of settling in that is happening that makes me excited about my next trip to S. Korea. There, I am excited to learn the language for real and become accustomed to people, places and things, all those nouns that can make you feel as if you are at home.

Tomorrow is our last day at the clinic and with the Dr. we have been at for 2 weeks (it's been 2 weeks already!?!). Then it is on to HuangShan (Yellow Mountain) for 3 nights and 4 days, and then 5 days off during which I'll stay in Nanjing and explore some more of the city.

Last night a couple friends and I took a small trip to the Confucious temple and the Fuzimiao market, where haggling is more fun than the shopping. I got a beautiful "successful acupuncturist" jacket, as Christine calls it, and a wall scroll of Kuan Yin. We didn't go into the temple because it was a little late, but I plan on going back to go inside the temple as well as take a boat ride on the Qinhua river.

Alright, thanks for reading my ramble if you got this far. I'm excited to go home and understand more of what's going on around me, and see all you lovely people.

Playing hookey and the Yangtze river

2008-09-23T21:54:00.000+09:00

I have been feeling pretty exhausted, and after feeling like my throat was starting to swell last night I decided to take a day off and sleep in. It was delicious, and though I'm sad to have missed a precious day of clinic in China, feel a lot better about going the rest of the week. So, about 1pm, after a leisurely morning I decided to do something with myself. After hunting down both an English and Chinese map of Nanjing, I made my way via bus numbers 18 and 117 to the Yangtze river bridge park. Despite being incredibly windy and humid at the same time, it was a lovely day, and the river was peaceful and settling for my spirit, despite the thousands of cars, mopeds, bikes, trains and people crossing it. I would say it's something akin to the Brooklyn bridge in size, but perhaps more important. Apparently, due to the width of the Yangtze as well as the turbulence of the water and the enormous amount of silt the river carries, the bridge was declared unbuildable by many engineers at the time. But build it they did, and now the bridge connects Shanghai to Beijing, as well as the two sides of Nanjing. It really was pretty awe inspiring. There were beautiful parks surrounding it, where families and groups of older men gathered to spend some time, play cards and music and hang out with their cute and funny looking chinese dogs. While getting there was an indirect bus route adventure, my transit skills came out in full force and I made it there and back with no problem. I think I felt better about the trip because I was alone, and didn't have to take other people's tired feet or anxiety about the bus into account. I figured, if I got lost, I got lost, and I know how to tell a cab driver to take me back to the hotel. I went through some new parts of town that I'm excited to explore, and found a new temple and garden that I plan to visit after I get back from Yellow Mountain next tuesday or wednesday. After getting home, I used my rice cooker to cook rice for the first time, and had a small dinner that made my belly feel good instead of slightly bloated and ill. yay! Tomorrow it's back to clinic in the a.m. and a lecture in the afternoon, and some shopping in the evening for acupuncture related things as well as some fun stuff at the fuzimiao market by the Confucious temple.

Well, once again my photo uploader isn't working for this blog, so make sure to check out the flickr page (link to the right) for photos. I've organized everything into sets under a collection, so it's a little easier to navigate.

Oh! Ok, here are the two pictures I managed to upload for you, I think the one on the left might be my favorite of today.

Observation

2008-09-23T10:06:00.000+09:00

Laundry lines across from the hospital
a sick man in good condition
with lungs, raw, struggling to revive
is blessed by a full clean pink skirt
dancing in the sooty wind.

Sunday at purple mountain

2008-09-22T18:46:00.000+09:00

Sunday shot my plans for a relaxing weekend out the window, but I had a wonderful time nonetheless. Tonight, I've promised myself an early bedtime, but promises are only as good as the conviction with which they're made, and so....

Sunday morning I decided to buy a new bike. I got directions to la rue du bicyclette and Diane B. and I took a bus-walk adventure over to the bike shops. I ended up buying another bike for somewhere around 200RMB, like $30, and then a slightly better lock for another $5 or so. Would you like to meet her? Ok...here you go....
This is Emily, she has promised not to stray too far from home.

She seems pretty sturdy so far, but it's only been a day. I think she might be fixed on a lower gear than Happy Bike, but it could just be me.

Diane got another bike too, which we dubbed the Silver Surfer, since it's a total beater silver cruiser with a turquoise seat. I don't think I have a picture of S.S. for you.

Then, four of us went to Purple mountain. We saw the Dr. Sun Yat-Sen mausoleum, and some of the Linggu scenic area. The park is huge, and I intend to go back during the national holiday week we have coming up soon. There's a botanical/Chinese herb garden, and a celestial observatory, and "underwater world" and all kinds of stuff. I bought the year long pass, and intend to use it like mad. Make sure to check out the pictures on flickr, it's pretty amazing. I'll try to organize my flickr page soon, I know it's kind of a madhouse right now. After a tiring day trekking around the mountain, we went to dinner at this wonderful Korean restaurant, and then shopping around Hunan Lu, where I bought some pretty awesome mistranslated T shirts including a Giraffe saying "Meaning? The What's" and "Nacho girlfriend", which I guess isn't exactly poorly translated, just funny. Then a bus adventure home, and K.O. until 6am this morning. Clinic was good today, nothing incredible but good, learned a bunch about herbs and what have you. Now we have a birthday dinner for Lindsay, and then I swearswearswear, I'm going straight to bed!

Ok, I'm going to organize my photos some now, so I don't drive everyone crazy.

Saturday adventures with the RMB

2008-09-20T02:40:00.002+09:00

Today was my first day off that felt like a day off in China. I woke up late, did some grocery shopping and took it easy--but still managed to have some pretty hilarious adventures.

The payment system in China is a little weird, I have no idea how I've bought anything since I've been here. First of all, everywhere except large establishments wants you to haggle for things. I had my first haggling experience today at a calligraphy shop. The guy wanted 30 RMB for something, and I "haggled" him down to 25, which he totally laughed at. I probably should have told him I'd pay him like 10 for it, and see what he said. Since 5 kuai is somewhere around 10 cents, I saved myself some big bucks there. I just wanted to see if I could do it I guess, and I did, so I'll practice. Earlier in the day I went to Auchan, which is like Chinese wal-mart (yes timber, I went to wal-mart), and bought a rice cooker (78 RMB) and a cutting board (9RMB) and the like. I had to buy the rice cooker upstairs, then go through this huge maze to get downstairs to buy everything else (10RMB), where the girl tried to make me pay for the rice cooker again. At the grocery this morning, I tried to buy some dragonfruit, papaya and bananas, and I think I had to pay for those upstairs too because the girl wouldn't ring them up downstairs, but theres no cashier upstairs, so I'm not certain what she wanted. I'm going to have to go back tomorrow a.m. to try to get the dragonfruit though, they're so beautiful! I've had them dried a whole bunch, but never fresh and I'm excited to try it with the instant oatmeal (5RMB) I bought.

This afternoon Robynne and I went out to the foreign language bookstore. I wanted to buy a copy of Journey to the West, and while I was looking at the classic chinese lit section, this man walks over and starts talking to me in really good english about all the places he's been and things he's done, and the U.S. and lord knows what else. I was excited to have someone Chinese to speak to, so we were chatting and all of a sudden he was asking if I could sponsor him to come to the U.S. When I said no, he asked me if my father would, then my father's superior or inferior, and then my mother. Just when I was about to retort with a "no, YOUR mom", I bade him goodbye by grabbing my friend and hiding around a post downstairs from the part of the shop we had been. I then proceeded to make a scene at the cashier at the bookstore by attempting to buy only Vol 1 of Journey to the West when it only came in a six volume set. But, in order to tell me this phone calls were made and a group of Chinese students gathered behind us while we waited for someone who spoke English.
Eventually we made it out of the bookstore, and after getting sufficiently lost trying to find our way across the street through the pedestrian access underneath the intersection, stood in the middle of the bicycle lane to try to hail a cab. After five or so minutes and 15 full cabs went by, this guy peddling a rickshaw waved at us from across the street. After we pantomimed agreement to a ride, he risked life and limb to cross the street to come get us. The poor guy and his squeaky bike dragged us for a miserable and guilt ridden 10-15 minutes back to the hotel, upon which he demanded 60 RMB for the ride. Now, 60 RMB is about $10 USD. I've never even made this much money per hour, but we were feeling so guilty and stupid and tired that we just paid him the money and went home. I used my rice cooker to make us a deliciously bland soup of vermicelli noodles and some sort of chinese vegetable and tofu and am about to tuck myself in for the night with a book and maybe even a cup of tea.
nightnight!

ps

2008-09-20T02:40:00.001+09:00

check out the flicker page for photos---the uploading to blogger stinks. The link is to the right of the page.

China no strike lightning double

2008-09-20T02:40:00.000+09:00

Ok, so my last post was a little doom and gloom, but there have now been at least two good days in China--maybe three now. Monday and Tuesday were a bit rough, but it got better from there. Wednesday we had our first lecture and welcome banquet, which I think I wrote about. Then thursday we were in the outpatient clinic again with Dr. Xu, and I got to needle and cup a whole bunch. I was totally complimented by the Dr., patients and chinese interns about my technique, which is a really big honor. Then, I got more advice and help about it from the Dr., which was more complimentary than the compliments if that makes any sense. We went to dinner in this crazy huge mall---it's like pionner square fancy but Lloyd center size or bigger. After dinner we found a gelato place, which I think made my stomach hurt more than anything else I've eaten here. The only sad news I have about Thursday is that Happy Bike got stolen!!! A group of us had gone to dinner, and I had locked my bike together with two others and when we got out of the mall, all three had gotten stolen! I was pissed for a minute, but then I realized I spent like $20 on it, and they probably stole it because they saw us lock them and knew I was some weird looking white person--which honestly makes me more OK with it than blind theft. So, today we took a cab to and from clinic which was a really nice break for my bike butt. I will probably go bike and D lock shopping again tomorrow or sunday, but we'll see. I'd really like to figure out the bus system.

Today, friday, was AWESOME!!! This morning we did inpatient rounds, and heard a lecture about herbal injection treatment for cancer with ku shen and tu fu ling. Afterwards, we got to go out with Dr. Xu and another Dr, I think his name is Dr. Wang. They took us to this really close dumpling/noodle place which was delicious and simple and cheap. It was a really nice break from crazy spicy eggplant and peking duck and fried lotus etc etc etc. We got to talk to Dr. Xu a lot, and develop a pretty good rapport. She is going to Germany in a month or so for three months to set up a TCM wing for a hospital there. She speaks a little bit of german, but is nervous about the travel and will miss her family. We talked about all kinds of things from her job to family to structures of the medicine in the US and in China to how to find the bathroom if you don't know the difference between the men's and women's to herbal medicine theory. Then, this afternoon I got to go to the herbal dispensary where they showed us every single herb and their crazy awesome machine that decocts and packages the bulk herbs for the patients. Once I set up my clinic, I totally have to get one of those!

Tonight a bunch of us went out, back to the Jazz club where 4 of us went Tuesday night, and then to this crazy strip of nightclubs called "1912". The clubs are totally weird. There's no dance space, just all huge booths. Some guy gave me a shot of iced tea, and another guy was handing out sparklers. If you think white people have no rhythm, you should totally go to a nightclub in China---whoa. Some of the songs were in chinese, but some of them were weird disco remixed of songs like "stand by me". The second club we went to had bigger booths and each table got their own personal waiter who would hang out and dance with you and order stuff for you if you needed anything. He insisted on taking a bunch of pictures with us, and I totally love him---adorable!!!

But, dancing around a table in a big booth gets kind of ridiculous after a while, and we left after about an hour. So now I am freshly showered and winding down before my marathon night of sleep. It's supposed to rain like crazy here tomorrow, so our trip we planned to purple mountain (the Mt. Tabor of Nanjing) is going to be postponed until Sunday most likely. It's good, because honestly I have some laundry and reading and note transcribing to do. I hope to make it to the night market to get some crazy stuff if it's not raining too hard. Yay! Bring on the weekend!!!

Nanjing, day 3 (only?!)

2008-09-17T21:27:00.000+09:00

So, after a complete meltdown last night, and a wonderful massage afterward, I realized that I am going through some pretty intense culture shock. Nothing is simple, everything seems like an ordeal and I always feel lost. I'm not sure how to explain how incredibly different it is here. People are wonderful and friendly, but at the same time unconcerned with you or your personal space. I'm not sure there is a cultural context for personal space. There are a lot of idiosyncrasies. For instance, riding in the bike traffic feels completely safe, but at the same time is a harrowing experience. I'll post a picture of it from this morning's commute for you...

<--so it's like that, for 45 minutes if we don't get lost, longer if we do. The flow of traffic is amazing. It is like a flock of birds or a school of fish--definitely an exercise in qi movement.
So, there is about 3-4 hours of bike riding per day so far, between the commute and getting around after clinic. I think it's good for me, but my legs are sore and getting more muscular by the second. When I was at the massage place the other night, the lady was doing some work on my legs, which was extremely ticklish but good for me. At one point she stopped and measured the circumference of my thigh and compared it with her own, mine was like a full thumb to forefinger larger than hers. We both had a good laugh. I think when she turned me over to work on my back, she did the same thing with my butt, but I couldn't tell for sure.

We had our first wednesday afternoon lecture, on acupuncture for emergency medicine. It was structured exactly like our TCM pathology classes back home, which was pretty funny. We learned about Coma, hiccups, and gallbladder attacks. I was pretty excited to learn about the coma stuff. I really hope that one day hospitals will allow acupuncture in emergency situations like this. There are too many people in comas from accidents or illnesses that could be helped by this simple procedure. And, how can it hurt?

In clinic, before the lecture, we did rounds in the inpatient hospital with our Dr., Dr Xu, who is incredibly nice. For you OCOMers, she is a lot like Hong Jin, plus a little bit of Zhenbo Li thrown in. She speaks english which is really very helpful. Her technique is beautiful, and I am excited to possibly start needling with her soon. So far we have seen a lot of sjogren's disease (sicca--an autoimmune disease that dries out the mucous membranes of the body, especially in the face), menopause, a few severe cancer cases, and a lot of shoulder pain. They do a lot of point injection therapy here, where they use an herb, mostly a lot of Huang Qi and inject it into acupuncture points. They use B12 as well, and then also a lot of herbs via IV. One man we saw with severe progressive liver cancer was on an IV of I believe toad skin venom. I asked for a list of the anti cancer herbs they use, and while I haven't been able to get them fully translated and find info about them yet, it seems like they're pretty toxic substances.

Ok, thats all the update I can do for now, I have to go to breakfast and start day 4. I'll try to get more pictures up soon, in all the overwhemledness, I honestly haven't been taking too many.

Some things I learned in Nanjing on day 3, and a poem

2008-09-17T00:58:00.001+09:00

1. Never ask for directions with a map, or perhaps even without a map. Getting the directions takes longer than getting lost and then re-finding your way there.
2. Don't try to eat lunch somewhere without a phrase book, or at least a point and order menu.
3. Steamed buns are my friend, grease laden bok choy is not.
4. Bike bells blend with scooter horns which blend with other bike bells. If you really need someone to move, yell.
5. If you repeat what someone is saying to you, they assume you understand. Be careful what you might be saying yes to.
6. I love the massage house next door to the hotel.
7. Wear sneakers even if they look stupid with your outfit.
8. Chinese bubble tea is better than American bubble tea.
9. Smiling at people who stare makes them smile back and then stop staring.

Shanghai to Nanjing

I am in China and I am awake.
Gardens next to piles of rubbish
and buildings fourty, fifty, sixty
stories high.
like love stories, all cities are the same.
My eyes, heart, mouth hurt and are open, a-gape
with love.
She is my portland and I am her
Shanghai, Tokyo, Busan, Beijing, New York
We are the same woman, the same myth,
fantasies woven around each other like
laundry lines wrapped around buildings,
clothing drying and collecting bits of city in the fog.
My eyes are wet with the monsoon of this morning and
my feet covered with the stuff of city puddles
dried between my toes.
I am alive again and it hurts,
hurts like pacific riverbed covered by city structures
only in the last twenty years
like families separated on a holiday by work, time, and government.
like the glorious powerlessness of the ocean knocking you
down and down and down on the earth,
and then you look up.

Pics from the last post

2008-09-16T06:36:00.000+09:00

Giant frosty melon, or cucumber, or something inside the veggie market

I'm pretty sure this one was giant cucumber

a shot of one of the stands in the market

Meat market, they're all alive and seem kind of unconcerned. Aside from looking uncomfortable and being really smelly, the animals seemed pretty much fine.

Everyone standing outside the ironic restaurant

Everyone inside

Dinner, Demolished!!

working in the fields makes me so happy!!

I'm not sure what these guys are doing, but they're happy doing it.

Nanjing, day 2

2008-09-15T23:56:00.001+09:00

So, before I get started I think that until I solve the photo problem I am having, I am going to separate my photos from the text I write. I have also posted a link to my flickr page to the right where you can find all the photos I have taken, instead of just the select few to illustrate what I'm talking about in the blog. Ok, so text first and pictures later, so you know what you're looking at.

Today was an unexpected day of rest and orientation, as we arrived at the beginning of the full moon festival, a two day holiday here in China. We didn't put pomelo rinds on our heads, or carry brightly colored lanterns, but I did eat my fair share of moon cake over the last two days. So, you might be thinking of those little debbie things, but they are like nothing I have had in the states. It's sort of akin to a fig newton, but instead of a fig middle there is a sweet bean paste in the middle (or lamb, or chicken, or lord knows what--I had bean), and it's inside a little cake/dumpling/rugala type pastry. So, after breakfast a few of us wandered over to the bank where we exchanged money. This should have been a fairly simple transaction, but it took about 2.5 hours for the 7 of us to exchange our various forms of currency. It may or may not have taken less time were it not pension day. The bank looked like the DMV with about 10 older Chinese men sitting waiting for their number to be called. We ended up going to another bank just down the street where we witnessed an arrest. I was unfortunately still inside the bank, but I heard the man was being accused of stealing a turtle. I ended up signing my travelers checks on the wrong line (of course), and the bank teller came to find me at the hotel at the end of the day. I'm not sure if I should go back there to exchange the rest of them or not, but considering how long the transaction took, I might just use my atm card for cash from now on.
After the bank-stravaganza, then an awesome lunch on "noodle street", was a trip to the herb shop where in a hilarious display of shirades, my friends and I tried to explain what we wanted pills for. Along with our broken chinese pronunciation of the chinese formulas we knew, everyone left with the things we needed. Though the first ingredient in mine is translated to "a little bit of red", I have the utmost confidence that I will be feeling tip-top in a matter of days.
Then it was onto the outdoor/indoor market, where they sold lots of veggies and fruits, as well as other sundries and live fowl. I assume that they kill it for you in the market, but between the fish floating belly-up in the tanks at the stall next door, and the exquisite grief I was feeling for these poor animals, I didn't stick around to check it out.

My friend Diane and I haggled for some shoes and teacups, and then back to the hotel to meet for dinner. We went to this restaurant not far from the hotel by 'happy bike'. I don't know what it was called, but it was ironically themed to make fun of socialism, with pictures of happy workers on the wall and wait staff in uniform. The food was good, and again shared family style with a big lazy susan in the middle of the table and the waiters bringing dish after dish. We had steamed pumpkin, long beans, tofu with egg and chili, mung bean noodles, shrimp, and so much more.

A few of us decided to go out to "Nail jazz bar" where we got some drinks and a hookah and listened to what maybe wasn't jazz, but was certainly familiar renditions of "Girl from Ipanema" and "Strangers in the night". Then the lazy bike ride home, and here I am, waiting for the melatonin to kick in and get me to bed.

Tomorrow is our first day in clinic, and I have an acupuncture shift with Dr. Xu (pronounced choo, I think) who may speak English. After we prove ourselves able to find common acupuncture points and maybe a little bit of technique, we should get to needle. When we first got here, going back to clinic was the last thing on my mind, but now I'm glad to have that little bit of structure to keep me from wandering the streets haggling and eating noodles all day.

Ok, here goes the pictures...enjoy!!

China, day 1

2008-09-14T23:46:00.000+09:00

Whew! What a crazy adventure of a trip! After 2 days of traveling, I am finally here in my little hotel room in Nanjing, China--my little home for the next 5 weeks. I will give you the rundown of the travel adventure:
Day 1: leave Portland airport at about 2pm, arrive in Tokyo/Narita approximately 10 hours, 2 and a half movies, one short lived nap and a scrabble game later. The Tokyo airport was amazing. There was an oxygen bar and a massage place, as well as a shower you could pay $5 USD to use for 30 minutes. One of the women I'm traveling with opted for the shower, several for the oxygen bar, a few for bowls of noodles. I went for the shopping and origami museum:

Origami village Origami cranes Origami dinosaurs! (my favorite)

Then, after the 2 hour layover and 2.5 hour flight from Tokyo to Shanghai, we collected our luggage and made our slow and unsteady way in a bus that smelled like smoke and smog to our hotel in Shanghai, about an hour or so from the airport. By this time it's around midnight China time, and about 6am Portland time. Needless to say, we were all exhausted and a little bit slaphappy. Here are some pictures of the Shanghai hotel.

The hotel building front, and two views from our room on the 20th floor.

In the morning was an incredible breakfast with the best congee I have ever had (like a rice porrige), humbao, dumplings, fried rice, sweet potato, boiled eggs and bok choy. YUM! Sorry, I didn't get to take any food pictures, I was too busy eating. Next was the reloading of the bus with all of us and our things, and a bus ride two blocks down until they realized that the bus was having a "problem" and they needed some time to fix it. So, we all got off and wandered about town. First we tried to go to a teashop right across the street, but it wasn't open until noon and it was about 10:30. So, we continued on to the Puhuang river, which we could only sort of see, but it was a nice walk none the less.

The bus that wouldn't, the teashop that wasn't, the bridge and river that were almost.

Some of the grit and some of the beauty of Shanghai. We got caught in the monsoon and bought colorful umbrellas for 8 quai (about $1).

By the time we had walked back to the bus, all was well and working and we got on for our trip to Nanjing, which took about 4 hours and some of my intestional integrity. We stopped for the bathroom and lunch at a truckstop where we tried to eat a cafeteria style. Lunch that was so salty and laced with MSG that most of us politely ate the rice and bites of the vegetable (whatever it was) and moved on. (No food pics here either, be thankful)

We arrived safely in Nanjing, and checked into our hotel. After a small reprieve from the travel and people shuttling, we met to walk to "bike street" and buy bikes for all 24 of us for the next 5 weeks. This took about 2 hours. My little fixie bike ended up costing me $215 quai, about $35USD and says "happy bike" on the side. I am totally in love with it and already scheming about how to get it back to Portland. Riding is an incredible experience, as there are about a million cyclists, mopeds, pedestrians, buses and taxis all competing for the same piece of road among poorly regulated traffic. There is a lot of honking and bell ringing. Here is happy bike
and some pictures of us this evening.

bike trying and buying---Happy Bike!!! Happy me! Happy Christine!

We locked all 23 bikes together outside the restaurant tonight, here we are all waiting to get seated for dinner.

So, that's it for now! Check back for more later--I'm going to try for at least once every evening, or every other. love!

Mt Hood vacation with the family and the sweetheart

2008-09-11T02:16:00.000+09:00

I'm back in PDX for a few days before I leave for Nanjing, China on friday the 12th. Considering this is something I have been planning for approximately six years to do, it feels really incredibly weird to be actually doing it. I was organizing and packing last night, and in addition to overpacking, somehow, for a five week trip in one suitcase, there is also this sense of freedom from everything that has kept me tied to this place for the last ten years. What a way to mark a decade. But now, we have
some pictures of my post Whidbey,
pre back to PDX adventures in and
around the Mt. Hood
national forest....

Post grad trip, leg 1

2008-09-07T13:49:00.000+09:00

8-29-08: Graduation! Yay! Finally!
8-30-08~9-6-08: Up to Seattle, and Whidbey Island, where my sister now lives with my nephew, Orzo. See?

<-- This is Whidbey Island...pretty! Actually, it is one of many many beaches on Whidbey, only a couple of which I got to see this trip. There will be more to come however when I visit again in November, before heading off to Korea. It is so strange, all I have with me now is one suitcase, my gigantic timbuk-2 and a small duffel bag. Everything else is either in storage at U-Haul, or waiting in my sister's attic to get trekked across the world to Korea with me. So while on the island, biking and hiking and sleeping and reading and cooking, I did a fair amount of thinking about things that I have put on hold for the last few years. Mostly, stuff I never dealt because it wasn't as important as this-and-such-assignment. But now it seems to lurk in the background of my mind in a creepy "I'm going to get you" sort of way. I don't think it's all bad, but hopefully it will get me writing again. I also did a fair amount of thinking about possessions. All the "stuff" we have decided we need to get through the day, and are kind of upset without. For me, I've realized that this is the rather vain, but also sentimental choice of jewelery. I have a lot of various sorts of things, now all left on Whidbey, that I usually wear based on some sort of mood or dream or event that is happening that day. Everything I have collected has some meaning. If it doesn't, I generally don't wear it. Now for travel I have it paired down to a pair of earrings my sweetie gave me and a necklace full of baubles from my mother. It feels kind of naked not having a choice. I know decorations like this are completely unnecessary, but it had become a ritual that I'll have to replace. Anyhow, onto more important things. So once in Seattle/Whidbey, my sister and I dropped my Dad off at the airport on the 31st and went to Bumbershoot. This is my third year in a row going, and I am a bit more than burnt out on festival type festivities.

Highlights were: Saul W illiams, whom I adore. My soul is always fed when I read, or listen to or get to see him. I am inspired in all sorts of ways and my mind goes in thousands of directions at once. I bought his new CD, but have yet had the chance to listen to it. If you don't know who he is, I personally recommend checking out his poetry/spoken word.
The PNW ballet was also lovely. They did a 9 song Frank Sinatra tribute with dresses by Oscar de le Renta, and two other pieces.

After the festival was the aforementioned Whidbey Island, where there are

pirates who live in houses
on the shore

and cute terriers that swim in the ocean

and now, on 9-6-08, 5 days before I leave for China, I am in Welches, OR, looking foward to
some more family time with my Mom and Jim and some hiking time with my lady.

Here is my Mom and Jim at the Space needle today, and a silly picture of me and Seattle from the needle for your viewing enter- tainment.

Well, Hurrah for my first real blog post. Stay tuned for real adventures in places that look much more far off than our beloved PNW.

New plans, and your plans

2008-07-23T03:38:00.000+09:00

So, as it turns out, the best made plans of mice and WOmen.....
I am returning to the US after my trip to china, on or about October 19th and am planning a trip to britenbush hot springs for a night or so with some of my best friends. I'm hoping it will be relaxing, and the perfect opportunity to catch up and connect before I leave for a year. After I get back from China as well, I'll be finding out where in South Korea I go. I was hoping for Busan, but it sounds like that may not be feasible as working within the public school system, which is safer and easier as far as contracts and money go, they need you where they need you. Hopefully I will be leaving at the end of October or early November. Otherwise I will be asking to sleep on your sofa :)

I also wanted to put on here, and this is the main reason for this post that flights to Seoul, SK are currently at about $1,000 give or take $100-200. It looks like the longer you intend to stay, the cheaper the flight options are. Please begin to save your pennies now. How often do you know someone living in asia? Come visit! You are more than welcome already, and I don't even know where to take you yet. I will have some vacation time, contact me if you want to adventure with me during those times. If I have a vacation schedule when I begin working, I will put it on here.

...Sometimes I can't believe this is really happening. It is all a little surreal, and I think I might be a little crazy for doing it, but what the hey, you're only here once.

First post, pre-everything

2008-06-27T13:37:00.000+09:00

I'll be graduating soon, and leaving the country September 12th, 2008.

Itinerary:
China (Nanjing): Sep 12th-Oct 19th
Ferry ride/retreat/adventures: Oct 19th-Nov 1st
Busan, South Korea: Nov 1st, 2008-Nov 1st, 2009.

Yey!