Off to the little boat

I head off at 5pm Korea time this Saturday. I have to board the boat at 11am, though I hope I don't have to stay aboard the whole time. 12 days is long enough so evey little hour of freedom is welcome. Since I am not sure exactly when I will get into Long Beach I cannot buy a train ticket. Hopefully it will be warly enough for me to catch a taxi then a bus to the station but who knows at this point.

I have a ton of things to post but was too distracted by all the flashes of picture snapping Japanese in the Krispy Kreme, one of the few places I have found that I can connect my laptop to the internet and not be required to enter an id number (which all Koreans must use so their internet stalking and rumor spreading can be monitored). So please do not give up on me while I don't post for the next 2 weeks. Currently I am on the computer that is in my hotel room. Not sure why someone needs a computer in a love motel, but here it is.

I have picked up some of the reccomended books. Started one and it seems a bit depressing, and another one is about a boy trapped on an iceberg with a tiger or something. Good books for helping me deal with cabin fever on a ship!

Hopefuly the world won't change too much while I am away.

For Mum

This post is for my mom who complained (on merely pointed out) that she would like something more personal than me just directing her to my blog whenever she has questions about what I have been up to. So please do not read this unless you gave birth to me.


Hi Mom!

I am currently in Busan and will be here until the 21st (or so, you never can tell when the ship will head out, Busan dock workers like to emulate WWII Australian dock workers. You never know when they will bitch and moan and then strike leaving the war effort (or the Me getting to the USA effort) in jeopardy.

Korea is good and I am eating a lot of good food and meeting interesting people. I did have a good ol' fashioned battle with an old Korean woman who thought her getting on the train was more important then my (or everyone else trying to) getting off. I finally had to forcibly move her out of the way while I silently chanted "USA! USA! USA!"

I have been wondering around town with an attractive female friend (yes, only a friend) and she has not been too happy about getting comments about how lucky she is to be with such a handsome man.

I went to see my old school where I was greeted with shouts of "Beckham!", "so handsome!" and "big head!" A Korean actually said I have a big head. These people must not own mirrors.


Love you Mom! If you have anymore questions please post them in my commemnts section!!


YLB



ps. To all of you others that are still reading, you are a nosey people.

I need your help!!!

I am the proud owner of a Sony ereader. I love it but am in need of some good books to read while on the boat. PLEASE post some recommendations in the "comments" section. Anything will be fine.

Thanks!!!

Busan

I am currently in Busan (Pusan). Spend most of my time studying Japanese which I then try to use with the Koreans. I don't think they appreciate it too much though. Eating lots of great food, meeting great people and drinking crappy beer.

I am happy.

So long and thanks for all the sushi

I leave Japan today with a slightly heavy heart. I had a good time here and I plan on coming back after summer. This week was spend with the new (and I think better) teacher observing my every move. I was given a lot of nice little parting gifts, and one wonderful woman even gave me something to give to my mom! There were a few tears shed as it dawned on a couple of the girls that I was actually leaving. They were 2 of my favorites, so I was near tears as well.

I will fly out of Tokyo (actually Narita, about an hour east of Tokyo) to Pusan, South Korea to see friends. I was originally going to go there and look for a possible job, but as the nation's currency is worth 40% of what it was when I was there 2 years ago, I don't think it is going to happen.



On or about March 21st I will hop aboard the Hanjin Praha for a 12 day journey to Long Beach and hopefully from there get on a train to Cleveland via Chicago. It will take awhile to do all of this, and no, it isn't cheaper than flying. I plan on studying Japanese...not sure why I waited until I left the country to finally study it, but there you have it!

I posted some more pictures on my flickr site, so head over to the PICTURES section on the right if you have any interest.

Ginza

I went to Ginza for a goodbye meal with a friend. We mostly ate crab salad and oyster salad that cost way too much money. Also had some spoons filled with 雲丹 (sea urchin) and 魚卵 (fish eggs).

After that she went to work (9pm on a Saturday, she is an office worker) and I wandered around the most expensive area in Tokyo.

Girls' Day

The 3rd of March is Girls' Day. Not sure what that means other than putting some dolls on certain steps. But Google Japan made a special logo for the day (but it isn't as cool as March 2nd's in the USA!)

My beer

My beer of choice has made it to CNN. Rich Malt is by no means a good tasting beer, but it is what one should drink after a couple of quality beers numb the tongue.

usa-hana (pronounced "oosa-ha-na")

"i could know it is poop because rabbit saying some korean. it is kind of sound when people doing poop, 'kkung-ah'."

What I was told by a good friend in reference to the picture below.

Rant of a sort

CNN.com has features about families that have had hard times due to the economic downturn. Every one of the articles I have read (about 4 of them) have featured young families (in their 30s) that had at least one spouse earning more than $100,000 (and sometimes both earned that much). Then one or both lose their job and the articles tell how they try to cope paying, for example, their 3 year old daughter's $900 a month tuition for preschool. Or talk about how they had to put their antique and art collection in storage and move to a farm in Oregon where they can buy a cow and milk it so they don't have to buy milk at the store.

Can CNN find some real people that have real problems to profile please?

Toys

Throughout my year here I have bought a few interesting toys. Here they are.

I couldn't keep her skirt down no matter how hard I tried.