Happy Birthday to MEEEEEE!!!

Today, for those of you who are sad and lonely enough to still be paying attention, is a special day. Okay, yes, it's the day I finally update after nearly seven months of Fuck Off, but that's not what I'm talking about. Before I get to that, however, I guess there are a couple of things I should say, or rather, not say.

Specifically, what you're not getting is an apology, or for that matter, an explanation. Where have I been for the last god-knows-how-long? Well, Korea, duh. Sure, okay, and why the hell haven't I posted word one in that time? Or checked my email? Or, like, any fucking thing? Honestly, would anything I say really help? Not that I'm not sorry, and not that I don't have a Hefty bag of excuses (both things I'm excellent at), it's just ... look, you don't deserve it. You might think you do, but you don't. Not in a bad way, I just mean you don't deserve an earful (eyeful, whatever) of bullshit. Where have I been? Korea. Why haven't I written? Cause I'm the world's worst correspondent. And frankly, most of you know that.

Okay, I guess I could put that better, but I really needed to get that off my chest. This blog has been a millstone of guilt for, yes, the past seven months (I have blog notes on my cell phone from a concert I went to on New Year's Eve which have become a fantastic little symbol of laziness and reproach), and I needed to exorcise a portion of that. So, to those of you all set to fire off a "Where the hell do you get off?!?" comment, know this isn't aimed at anyone -- or at least not anyone on your side of the computer. Assuming there is anyone on that side of the computer anymore.

However, you guys (those of you left) do deserve something. Rather than try to explain everything that's been going on for the past semiannum, I'll get you up to speed on my future plans, in particular, my plans for heading back to the States.

Yes. Heading back to the States. Not for good, of course. Christ no. You'll be happy (or surprised) to know that Korea still KICKS ASS. Every day I'm here convinces me more that moving here was the single best thing I have ever done in my entire life. But you may be surprised (or happy) to know that I miss the hell out of all of you (And public trash cans. Sweet Jesus, you people don't know how good you have it.), even if I don't tell you, like, ever. So I'm coming back to visit.

Goes like this: I've been planning the next step in the Grand Korea Adventure, which is to settle into a job at an area university -- something that I am assured is possible, even for me. Ideally, I'd finish my contract here this month, take July and August off to go Stateside, negotiate a filler contract of six more months at Segye -- i.e., September to February -- and start at the beginning of the school year in March. Ideally. As it happens, I've extended my stay through the summer (it's the busy vacation season, because Koreans are krazy enough to enjoy spending their vacations studying English), and am now slated to come back in September and October. I'd be flying back to L. A. and spending a couple weeks there seeing Dad and all, getting my head around not saying "Gamsa hamnida" to everyone I see, then take a few weeks to travel and visit the rest of you guys (by rail, I'm hoping, because it'll be easier to get a pass for a few weeks and hop on and off trains, and also because after fourteen hours on a plane, any more flying will probably send me murderously round the bloody bend), and two more weeks back in L. A. getting good and sick of the U. S. before I head back out here. Then four more months at Segye, and then the sweet life teaching college kids to steal our jobs.

Maybe. The handful of you I have talked to in the last few months know about this little alteration, but things have very recently taken a turn for the decidedly frantic. Due to the muddy economy here -- and a few other things I'm not going to go into just yet -- I've discovered that, despite the fact that I am a surprisingly well-liked teacher (I know, I'm as shocked as you are), I'm not actually guaranteed a job here in November, especially not for such a shortened contract. Consequently, I'm ratcheting up the job hunt now, and looking for something in September. Not a huge fan, I must say, but that's when the second semester starts, and I'm anxious not to get stuck teaching kids for another year. Or, worst case scenario, getting nailed without a job here at all and having to spend the next six months (or longer) Stateside burning through what little cash I've managed to accumulate. All's not lost, though. Should I happen to land a college gig, I expect to be getting some considerable vacation time, which could be coming as early as January and/or February. So there's that.

I am, to put it lightly, a bit on the maddened side these days. Don't worry, I think I can put something together. And I will, the universe and my unreliable compulsions to write willing, let you know how things go with that.

The other thing I suppose you ought to have is some slightly more trustworthy contact information from me. I have a Gmail account for work, which I check far, far more often than my spam-clogged Yahoo addresses, and the address there is niko "dot" fru etc. Forgive the roundabout delivery, but, while Gmail is pretty together with dealing with spam, I'm still unreasonably paranoid about it, and I don't need herbal dick-lengthening bots trolling my blog looking for someone to shill to. (To that end, incidentally, DON'T, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, FORWARD ANYTHING TO ME. Seriously. Anything. Not to my work account, anyway. Lolcatz, spurious virus warnings, and bestiality videos can live quite comfortably at my old Yahoo digs. And if you can't get your heads around that and don't talk to me because you can't be bothered to type anything your own sweet selves, well, you're no worse than I am.)

Also, for those of you with mics and/or viddys, I'm on Skype these days. And, believe it or not, if you can negotiate the time difference and catch me at home, I do answer. My ID's niko.fruechting -- make sure you spell it right.

By the way, have you figured out what day it is? Yeah, it's my anniversary. As of today, I've been in Korea a year. Fucking sweet.

I think I just trot in my pants. Twice!

My latest Korean discovery is trot (or "teuroteu"), which is according to the (brief) Wikipedia article on it, is "the oldest form of Korean pop music." Its name derives from "foxtrot," which it more or less resembles in its beat. It's vaguely analogous to swing, and particularly the "hot swing" of a few years ago (like Squirrel Nut Zippers and that clan).

My Fifth-Graders From Hell (who first made me aware of it) all hate it, because it's fogy music, despite all their favorite K-pop groups competing in a big "trot-off" a few months ago. I thinks it's the shit. But I would.

Park Sang-Chul is apparently huge trot stuff. You can tell because he's got more dancing girls than James Brown.




And this is Super Junior Happy, who may or may not be representative of the "new trot" resurgence, but are definitely fucking awesome. Nicole, this is your official postcard from Korea.

Never a dull moment at the Sehgyeh Wehgukwoh Hagweon, Special Thanksgiving Edition

First off, no flak about the "posting every week sweartagod" thing, alright? It was the end of the month again, with all of the work horrors of grades and tests and evaluations and the like, AND I posted twice last weekend, so that like, covers this week, okay?

Never mind. No one hollered, so like, thanks for that. In fact, speaking of thanks, I got a nice little note from Dad wishing me Happy Thanksgiving, if in a slightly snarky tone. To answer your question, Dad, no, I didn't have dried fish for Thanksgiving. I had turkey. Real turkey. With cranberry sauce. And stuffing and gravy and garlic mashed potatoes and green bean casserole and ham. An honest-to-god, real American Thanksgiving spread, courtesy of Andy and the Seamen's Service Union of Busan. It was probably the weirdest thing that's happened to me in the last five months.

Honestly, I don't know if I can explain it. We (Andy, me, Robin and Ian) walked in and were greeted by Linda, who's sixty, plump, blue-rinsed, and from Oklahoma, as is her husband Earl. As was, I believe, everyone in the dining room, which itself seemed to be sixty and from Oklahoma. It had wood panelling and yellowy curtains and smelled like a grandma. Thanksgiving dinner (well, lunch, really, since we were working that day, after all, and lunch was the only time we could get there) was laid out in a buffet on three tables, from slices of turkey in a warmer all the way to slices of canned cranberry sauce on a plate. Everyone spoke English -- hell, everyone spoke American, real down-homey "Yew want CoolWhip on yer pie, hon?" Murr'can. There was both salt and pepper. It was wicked eerie. It was like we'd walked through a door in Busan and somehow ended up at a Rotarian's dinner in Topeka.

It was just so weirdly normal. I guess after five months of Planet Korea, I was a little unprepared for such typical Americana. I've been avoiding Western food for the most part, partly because I'm, ya know, in Korea and want to eat what the locals eat; partly because I didn't want to rely on the stuff I already knew; and partly because Korean "Western food" is about as American as the Panda Panda Super Buffet is Chinese. I mean, I'm finally getting used to gimchi and rice with every meal, and suddenly I'm greeted with a pumpkin-and-dried-corn centerpiece and my mind's scrambling to figure out which end is up. I think it much akin to living weightless on a space station for six months, finally getting the hang of not barfing every time you wake up, and someone suddenly switches on the gravity for an hour and gives you a meal that you don't squeeze out of a tube.

A few days ago, it hit me again. When I hit stateside, I figured out what I'm going to miss most immediately. Gimbap. I don't think I've actually explained gimbap, so allow me to enlighten you poor deprived. Gimbap is, at its most basic, Korean sushi rolls. (Though it would be more accurate to say that sushi is Japanese gimbap. Koreans, I'm led to understand, actually invented the idea of rolling up rice with bits of vegetable and stuff into rolls of that papery seaweed. The Japanese just stole it, like they do everything. The Japanese, apparently, are like the Romans of the Far East.) But gimbap is far more than raw fish and rice. They roll up everything -- carrots and onions and greens and ham and crab and egg and tuna salad and cheese and pickled radish and odeng (fish cake) and whatever else they have lying around -- and slice it and sell it for cheap. It's perfectly portable and easy bare-hands food, like sandwiches. And considering that it's a daily staple of mine, I predict I will last precisely two days in the US before I start climbing the walls. The bitch of the matter is that, to my knowledge, no Korean restaurant in the US that I've visited makes them.

*sigh* I suppose this is what they mean by "reverse culture shock." All the things that make you go "What the hell am I doing back here?" when you go home.

*sigh again* And I suppose that was kinda the point in coming out here, wasn't it?

Happy Thanksgiving, kids. I need to go find some dried fish.

More dirty, dirty politics

I've been meaning to put this up for a while. It's a nifty little 45-minute flick called Money as Debt, which I find fascinating, primarily because I have always been bit baffled by the very concept of money and a whole whole lot baffled by the idea of credit, and now I know why!

Maybe it's all batshit liberal mindrot, but if it is, it's the really good stuff that gets even Ron Paul loonies excited.

Credit where credit is due: I found this (weeks ago) on Ashlee's blog (good on you, darlin'!). I highly recommend visiting; she is both a better writer and a far more frequent updater than I am.

Never a dull moment at the Sehgyeh Wehgukwoh Hagweon, Part 3

Jeez. You guys. You'd think someone whose already spotty update record takes a six-week hit might actually lose readership. You'd think a blogger who spends most of what he does write whining about how tired he is might, I dunno, alienate a few folks. You'd think that y'all had better things to do, what with the collapse of Western Civilization and all. But no.

Which goes to prove what I've said all along: all of you sweet and loving people are plainly out of your tiny minds.

Seriously, though, I'm touched. It's not difficult to lose contact, to wait for the next go-round and pick up where things leave off; god knows I've done it plenty of times. And I'm still convinced that these posts are a bit like some vacation slideshow, where you sit and watch and go "Yeah, I get it, you really were in Korea" (only less interesting, because it's not like I actually talk about Korea all that much). So it's a thrill (a kind of weird thrill) to know that you guys really do read this stuff and really do wait for more stuff to read.

Particular shout-outs to Dad, Jesse, Lauren, Rob (thanks for that; I hate Internet people just a little bit more now), and Ronnie who posted comments the day I posted. Extra-special super hugs to Claire, who somehow actually tracked me down on my work email that like, no one has to make sure I was still alive. Excellent job, kiddo. Best. Guilt trip. Ever.

And so, just so you know all that fresh, hot guilt isn't going to waste, I'm making a promise here and now to update every week. I'm not promising it'll be good, or even long, but I do promise to get something up here once every seven days, give or take, at least to prove I'm still breathing.

So, that. I guess now I should get on with the updatin'. There definitely has been news.

Things started mostly in September with Haseyo getting sacked. Now, I can't say I didn't see it coming, but it did go down in a fairly squirrelly fashion I'm not particularly comfortable with. Here's the deal: Haseyo is -- how do I put this politely -- a shameless letch. Seriously. Love the man, and he was a stout fella to me those first couple of months, but he's a bit, uh, single-minded, and -- more to the point -- not shy about it. This is not exactly an asset in a country so socially conservative that holding hands on a first date is considered trampy. Not surprisingly, he had a bit of a reputation, and of course, that's no good. I think, considering, that Andy was building a case against him since July or before. He actually pigeonholed me about it about three weeks in, asking me about his "one-night stands;" and later, when he was driving me to the hospital after my accident, he wanted to know if the student who had helped translate for me earlier was one of Haseyo's girlfriends. And, of course, not a word to Haseyo. The whole thing was, frankly, kinda creepy. Finally in September, the day before Chuseok, Director Kim got him in his office and fired him, ostensibly for falling class attendance.

I should say here, unequivocally, that Haseyo never schtupped a student. Of this I am sure. If he had, he'd have told me. Really, he'd have told me all about it.

I guess he's landed on his feet though. He got to stay out the month and look for new work. Andy (in one of his more "what the fuck?" moments) even wrote him a recommendation letter. And so now Haseyo's in Seoul teaching kindergarten, making more than the rest of us, with his own cubicle and computer.

And Hooker Hill in walking distance.

What bugs me is that this is probably the first you've heard about this.

Well, fuck me. I just can't run out of reasons why I'm so very, very glad I'm not in the United States right now.

Brigade homeland tours start Oct. 1 - Armytimes.com Article

Brigade homeland tours start Oct. 1 - Militarytimes.com Forums

Not a joke, kids. Check the URLs. And then freak out and leave. Or consider taking advantage of your second amendment rights.

Christ, I hate being right.

Political Interlewd

Huh. Well. So some of my additional news (which I didn't get to over the weekend; sorry) was that I voted. Absentee and online, which probably means that whatever I marked, I voted for McCain and Palin. Well, as I've been saying a lot these days, gosh, I'm glad I'm out of the country. What follows is what began as a reply to an email I got yesterday with a couple of poliblog links. Good old-fashioned paranoid liberal mind-rot, which, in this day and age, means terrifyingly likely liberal mind-rot. I recommend reading the blog posts, because they're interesting and insightful political commentary, and ignoring most of my commentary, because it's not. Except for the bit about Obama and FISA. Call me nutty, but I actually think that's important.

--- On Sat, 10/4/08, D____ wrote:
From: D_____
Subject:
To: "T_____" , "C_____" , "Niko" , "J_____"
Date: Saturday, October 4, 2008, 5:27 AM

I am sending the links to these articles only to you four, unless I get
a bite from G_____ or U_____.  I should have the confidence of my
convictions, namely the guts, to send it to them anyway, but I don't. 
This is information you probably already have but, in case you don't, I
send these to read.  The stakes are very high this November.  We really
need to take back our country.  To me, that Congress passed the
"bail-out bill" is a very, very, very bad sign.


---D_____


http://themovingtarget.wordpress.com/2008/10/03/news-from-the-vp-
debate-the-mccain-palin-coup/



http://www.huffingtonpost.com/naomi-wolf/the-battle-plan-ii-
sarah_b_128393.html

As to whether to send these on to G_____ or U_____, I hesitate to say, except to consider this: the ideologies referred to in the articles, and the ideologies of the Bush/Cheney/Rovian cabal of the last eight (or fifteen, depending on when you want to start counting) are emphatically not traditional Republican concepts. Traditional Republicans are fiscal conservatives (remember the "tax-and-spend Democrats" of the eighties?), not $630 billion war-mongers or $810 billion bailout advocates. More importantly, traditional Republicans are mostly interested in limiting centralized (i.e., Federal) government, and advocate deconcentrating power by turning it over to the individual states. They certainly aren't interested in heaping it all in one wing of the White House. Republicans, all things considered, are relatively sane folks.

These psychos aren't Republicans (as G_____ pointed out to me a couple years ago, during what was, admittedly, our one and only conversation about politics); they're Neo-Cons. And Neo-Cons are, as far as I can tell, more or less indiscriminate power-mongers. What I find deeply upsetting about them is that they appropriate Republican language in order to further their own radical goals. "No tax-and-spend" became "No new taxes," which turned into tax cuts and deregulation (for businesses and the wealthy). And, since Republicans have always tended to have more faith in laissez-faire capitalism, there's your rationale. Even Sarah Palin kept going on and on about how government has to "get outta the way" of individuals (and individual businesses), which, amazingly, is why she's for expanding vice-presidential executive power.

And, of course, what fuels all of this and gives it legitimacy is fear, both realized and imagined. Both sides tell us America isn't safe, as though safety were all that mattered. (Here is where I digress and point out that one thing that I do not like about Obama is that he voted for the FISA bill this year. You know, that bill that grants immunity to all the telecom companies like AT&T who assisted the government in its illegal wiretapping? Yeah, Obama okayed that one. And apparently Joe Biden and I are the only ones who think that wasn't cool. Chill out, kids, I still voted for him.) I often like to suggest that security and liberty are a zero-sum game -- the more you have of one, the less you have of the other. Hey, the safest neighborhoods in America are Mafia 'hoods.

Another thing I like to suggest (with a certain gleeful self-righteousness these days) is that everyone go traveling. Of the vast myriad of things Americans are scared stupid of, one of the most prevalent, insidious, and long-lasting is "dem damn furriners," particularly the brown varieties. A little worldliness gives a little perspective and dispels a lot of one's extraneous, if systemic, racism.

I'm preaching to the choir, of course. And I imagine that I'm continuing to when I say that, despite my misgivings about Obama (he's really not that radical, he really is that inexperienced, and there's that damn FISA vote), and despite the apparent shallowness of saying so, I voted for him, and not in small part because he's black.

This is an interesting assessment of Palin succinctly articulating the lingering, not-quite-conscious fears people have about Obama. Hint: it ain't the "inexperience."

"Our opponent ... is someone who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect, imperfect enough, that he's palling around with terrorists who would target their own country," Palin told a group of donors in Englewood, Colo....

In her character attack, Palin questions Obama's association with William Ayers, a member of the Vietnam-era Weather Underground....

Palin's words avoid repulsing voters with overt racism. But is there another subtext for creating the false image of a black presidential nominee "palling around" with terrorists while assuring a predominantly white audience that he doesn't see their America?

In a post-Sept. 11 America, terrorists are envisioned as dark-skinned radical Muslims, not the homegrown anarchists of Ayers' day 40 years ago. With Obama a relative unknown when he began his campaign, the Internet hummed with false e-mails about ties to radical Islam of a foreign-born candidate.

Whether intended or not by the McCain campaign, portraying Obama as "not like us" is another potential appeal to racism. It suggests that the Hawaiian-born Christian is, at heart, un-American.

So there you are. Obama, I strongly suspect, is not the messiah the lefties hope for. But I don't think he'll completely suck, either. And I'm pretty sure he isn't the smiley-faced spearhead of American fascism that Sarah Palin is. The thing is, as long as he doesn't completely bollix the job (and hey, even if he does, right?), we have at least four years to get used to a presidential face that isn't fish-belly white. We might be a little less terrified of "not like us." Next go-round, we might be willing to consider another one or two, or maybe a woman, or maybe even -- gasp -- a homosexual. Call me batty, but I think a little more flavor in the stew is a good thing.

Who am I kidding? 59 million Americans, remember? See you in the re-education camps, kids.