Sunday, October 28, 2007

Quick Update

Hey guys:

Its been a while. This blog-site is blocked at my school, so I have to swing by the local PC Cafe to finish it up when I have time.

I have been real busy: this week I have to give oral English proficiency tests all this week and through next Wednesday.

This weekend I just got back from a church-weekend retreat to Ganghwa Island. It was a good time of "getting away," spend time with God, reflect, and ask Him what I need to clean up and continue to work on.

The biggest event going on here in Incheon are the SK Wyverns: the local baseball team here in Incheon. They are currently in the Korean Series, the equivalent to America's World Series, facing Seoul's Doosan Bears. Our local team, whom my friend James and I have been supporting since we got here in Incheon earlier this year, holds a 3-2 series lead, and have a game tomorrow night at their home stadium called Munhak Baseball Stadium. After losing the first two games at home (which we both miserably watched), the Wyverns gained steam and roared to win three consecutive games at Jamshil Station (home of the bears), and now take a 3-2 advantage back to Munhak.

If they win, we will not only win the championship of Korean baseball, but they will punch a ticket to the Konami Cup, aka the Asian Series, where the Wyverns will gain the right to face the champions of the Japanese, Chinese, and Taiwanese baseball leagues. This is the first ever kind of championship series that I have ever been to, and I'm excited to hopefully see our team win a championship, and be there to experience it...

Check out my MySpace page for pictures of the series.

Other than that, life is the same, just teaching, hanging out with friends, touring Seoul, learning Korean, and spending time with family.

How's your life lately?

Friday, October 12, 2007

The Hair Purge

So, I'm back in town, back to school. School was great this week: no major fisticuffs with the kids, good discipline, good lesson planning, and great execution. Nothing major happened, and that's what I liked.

But recently at school, there's a funny little phenomena going: their haircuts are getting shorter. As I mentioned before, the high school has an unusual rule where the boys' haircuts has to be shorter than the ears, more like military-style cuts designed to keep the boys in line.

Its one of the most unpopular rules that is enforced at the school, all due to the principal. The principal is a wanted man for this.

What is more unusual is that other high schools are relaxing this rule, with many other boys' schools producing students with shaggy and long-haired cuts similar to the many boy bands in South Korea. Whereas our student body looks like a bunch of "fuzzy kiwi fruit heads," as one 2nd level student told me in humor the other day. Even my girl cousin's high school back in the day, she was forced to wear her hair near her ears, which made all the girls look like cute little boys...sad indeed. But today, even the girls' high schools are sporting hair that is long, frizzy, and stylistic for their needs.

So, our students are being "hunted" down by authorities to conform to the haircut law: if they do not get a haircut, then they are deducted points and punished even further until they go under the knife, errr, razor/clippers. The hair purge of the Yeonsu Regime begins.

But it brought back an interesting thought and question about this whole hair purge: why? I think its mostly conformity. As one of the top high schools in Incheon, the principal wants to make sure they conform to a high level and look neat for that purpose.

However, I disagree with this policy. I think that your hair is one major aspect that makes your individuality. I remember when I had short hair, you can't do much to it and you have to let it sit there until it grows back. So just like Samson from the Bible, these boys feel they are being robbed the last of their individuality, and their power! And they're kids too!

Its bad enough to have 40 to 1 class ratios, where no one speaks out and does "individual learning," but the whole deal with this haircut policy is questionable. I feel bad for the kids, and the kids joke with me by saying, "Nice hair, Mr. Soni." I couldn't imagine, unless in the military or for oath reasons, where someone told me to cut my hair. I cut my hair when its necessary, not because someone tells me to do it. I think the whole spiel is that they want kids to get be integrated into one system and one set of rules, and having long hair would increase the number of non-serious students. But to have a kid conform to a haircut rule...its just shaky ground to bring an old rule in a new modern era of education.

Its sorta like when someone says, "do this because its fashionable." So when trendsetters or other people who say this is cool "because everyone else does it," does not mean its always healthy. Movies, clothing-styles, expressions, secularism, whatever the crowd implicitly says that you need to feel good...its hardly good for you. People who follow pop culture to the t and conform because everyone does it...they get a hair cut.

On a cool note today, an unknown senior student randomly plopped into my classroom to ask me how to conduct an interview with a foreign professor. Nice boy had the guts to meet me. He asked me what is the most polite way to greet a professor from the West. I gave him my spiel on Western culture and the usual greetings in the "nopimal," or "high form" of speech of English, and off he went. Good luck to the kid...his future is on the line...November 15th. A day that is a day of infamy for all seniors of South Korea. Two words: national exam.

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

Live in Busan

I'm in the city of Busan, South Korea, as we speak. Busan is the second largest city of South Korea, and its located on the southeastern tip of the peninsula, facing its most loved rival: Japan. I've been here one day, but there's a somewhat different feel to this place compared to the cities of Seoul and Incheon.

For one thing, Busan is another major port city, like Incheon, but this place is more displaced in terms of location compared to the nation's capital. So there culture seems a little different. My Korean skills still suck diddily-uck (quoting Flanders from The Simpsons), but there's a noticeable twang to the way they speak their Korean compared to the folks back in Incheon and Seoul. Basically, its like going from Washington DC to Atlanta.

But to me, Busan is like Baltimore, a decent comparision. An important hub of East Asia, loads of cargo ready for trade and shipping comes here and goes throughout the rest of Asia, i.e. to Japan and/or Southeast Asia. Seafood is obviously the staple here, something I realized when I ate breakfast at a Korean restaurant. My soup consisted of these UFO seacreatures, I can't even remember how to describe them, but they were tough to eat. Nonetheless, the food was energizing.

So far, I rocked Busan's most famous beach, called Haeundae, went to one of the biggest bathhouses in Asia (never felt more refreshed), and visited the notorious Jagalchi Fish Market (where anything that swims becomes food, even whale meat). This is definitely different city from the capital, but similar to Incheon in some ways.

So I am doing a solo trip here in Busan, and solo trips are a fresh way to get your mind off things and try things on your own. So far, so good. The 1 and a half years of studying Korean is starting to pay dividends now as I begin to travel around this nation, like this morning I had a small conversation with a local who helped me with directions.

Meanwhile in other news around this nation, North and South Korea are having a major summit in Pyongyang, North Korea. Big news, it is being followed by every major network here in Korea, and in some other world major news networks, but most people are skeptical about the progress being made there.

Will the South concede more concessions? Will the North start to roll back some of its forms of terror and start to reform to the real world? Its all up for grabs, but for now, God's in control. Just keep in mind that North Korea is a poor nation that needs all the help it gets, and I'm talking the citizens, not KJI himself.

After touring more of the city, I'll update this solo travel later.

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2010: The Year of the Soni Tiger