Dragons and Cheap Beer

Pissing off the Great Wall of China

Ni hao....Heavy winds on Friday cancelled my boat ride to China that night. I spent a night in Dong Incheon and took the boat on Saturday morning instead. It was long and a bit boring, not much to see out in the middle of the Yellow Sea. I arrived in Tianjin early Sunday morning and took a 1 hour cab ride to the train station. It was strange being in China, I couldn't say anything to anybody...Tianjin was a concrete jungle, giant thermal power plants, curving highways, so old and in disrepair that there were deep grooves trailing across the lanes and broken pieces of concrete scattered everywhere.

The train from Tianjin to Beijing wound through the countryside, tiny ramshackle huts of brick and tin everywhere and garbage blowing through the trees and across the alleyways. I met a guy from Canada, Marty, and rode the train with him. We arrived in Beijing around 5 on Sunday evening and made our way by subway to the heart of the city.

Walking out of the subway station and right out on to Tianamen Square was strange. The giant concrete buildings and pillars of the communist, Russian style architecture right beside ancient Chinese gates and the Forbidden City Palace, a giant painting of Chairman Mao staring out ominously over the square. We were mobbed by men selling watches and kites, trying to get us to go to their hotels, a little girl grabbed my hand begging for money and wouldn't let go. I had to pry her fingers loose and run about a block.

We bought some 2 yuan (30 cent) giant Yanjing beers at a convenience store, some "pizza" (and I use the term loosely) off a cart and planted our asses on Dazhalan street watching the people go by. Eventually we found the hostel nestled far down an alley way...

The next day we went and saw the Forbidden City and I checked out a few parks around Tianamen Square. Yesterday, I hiked the Great Wall from Jinshan Ling to Simatai. A very old section of the wall, crumbling....we hiked for four hours in the bitter cold but it was beautiful and amazing, eating Egg-fried rice in the 15th watchtower between the small villages and looking out along the wall as it disappeared into the distance and fog.
Yesterday morning, I went to the MAOsoleum and saw the preserved body of Chairman Mao. Later in the day, headed to the Summer Palace and walked through some of the Hutong Alleys of outer beijing. I also went to the Beijing Opera last night, really good with traditional Chinese stories, costumes and music...

So I'm off to Hong Kong tonight on a 24hr train, then Thailand on Monday...

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goodbye korea

here's my last post from korea...yesterday was my last day at work.
the kidergartens did a little presentation and sang for me. each one came up and gave me a hug and said "sarang haeyo" while we had our picture taken. i got all kinds of gifts, the usual, dress socks, candy, chocolates, drawings and cards, even a t-shirt with a huge iron on transfer picture of my kindergarten class and me together...
there was pizza and chicken and cake, candles, balloons, flashing lights....

last night was also my last night with christa. we had gone out for boyangtang (dog stew) on sunday night and saw rodney in the restaurant. the dog tasted like roast beef, but there were little curled strips of dog skin in it, and you could see the little plucked hair follicles...nasty!
anyways, we decided to go out for sannakji last night, which is a live baby octopus cut up into little bits and served fresh on your plate, still squirming. it didn't taste that good, and was really weird feeling it suction on to the inside of my mouth or teeth. we spent the night together at liverpool and said goodbye this morning. it was a sad day, i'll her miss her so much...

next time i write, i'll be in china, the boat leaves friday night from incheon on a 24-hour hellride across the yellow sea....

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changing my template again....still got some stuff to work out...
let me know what you think...

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Just So You Know

The Second Layer's host just sent me an email saying they're projecting that I'll exceed my monthly traffic quota for November. I'm allotted 1 gig and it looks like I'll be using about 1.215 gigs. I'm not going to upgrade. The only reason it's so high is because I added about 30 megs of photos in the last three weeks, and the constant uploading and downloading that I have to do because I'm working from a PC room used up a lot of my quota...

They said they'll pause hosting service if I exceed my quota....it shouldn't happen until late in November, maybe the 25th or 26th if at all...Everything should be back and up running on December 1st when my traffic quota is reset....don't fret!

In fact, I'm not expecting it to go over....I've still got a good four hundred megs of traffic left for the next thirteen days, but have been averaging 50 megs of traffic a day....

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can i see your bum, please?

i thought i should write a bit about my experience with doctors here in korea. i've been sick more often in this country than i have in probably the last ten years of my life. i lay most of the blame on the fact that i spend 8 hours a day with dirty, snotty nosed children who don't wash their hands in the bathroom and constantly pick their nose or have bubbles of green snot all over their face.

the medical clinic that i visit here in gyodong is fairly decent, it looks like your typical clinic back home in canada. i do find it odd that they check my blood pressure every time i come in, something i've never had done back home ever. this is done in the waiting room in front of all the other patients. there's also some sort of ventilator out there and i often come in and find children, sitting on their mothers laps, breathing with this device while waiting to go in and see the doctor.

i always have to describe my ailment in detail to the receptionist/nurse, who then sends it via the computer to the doctor's office. when it's my time, he calls me in over the loudspeaker. i usually have to go in for "tonsillitis" which has been a chronic problem for me here. he takes a picture of my throat and then prescribes me some medication. usually, only two days worth of an antibiotic. now, my degree is in microbiology and immunology and i'm fairly well versed in the proper use of antibiotics and their effects of bacteria. i know that a two-day course is just asking for trouble and in fact gives the infective bacteria a fighting chance, weeding out the weak ones. apparently, this is a tactic used in Korea by doctors to ensure a second visit. they make most of their money off of signing prescriptions and most often send you to a pharmacy owned or run by a friend or spouse. needless to say, i always end up back in the office four days later with the same problem.

my medication comes in sealed wax paper pouches, each containing a multitude of pills in addition to the antibiotic course, every colour of the rainbow, some cut in half, and usually about 5 to a pouch. i have no idea what else he's including in there, but i'm urged to take it all.

i also end up having to get a shot in my ass every time too. he never tells me what this is for and i can't really figure it out. it costs an extra 5000 won, so i figure he's pocketing it. i've tried to ask him, but his english isn't that good. i usually say "wae chusa?" (why injection?) he then smiles and laughs "huh, huh, huh..." there's not much else i can do and end up with my pants down in the next room bent over in front of the receptionist as she sticks a huge needle in my ass.

the needle is then tossed into a cardboard bin without a lid in the corner of the room. blood and medicine stains on the wall around it and blood and gauze in the bin make it entirely hygienic.

another time, i was getting a hepA booster shot. the nurse, who seemed a bit unexperienced and nervous was shaking as she stuck the needle in. i looked away and suddenly felt something squirt out of my arm. i don't know whether it was blood or the vaccine itself. she immediately started wiping my arm and then rubbing in small circles over the injection site. then she told me "not to shower for one day." i assume that the vaccine had squirted out and she was hoping that it would absorb in through my skin...i dont know?

it's also funny how the doctor finds the need to call my boss after every visit and detail my ailments for her. i've gone in for some things that i would prefer that she didn't know about and actually had to ask him to keep some information private. he seemed a bit offended and confused, not understanding why i wouldn't want her to know. when i'm done in his office, he announces over the loudspeaker what he's diagnosed me with and the prescription he's giving me so the receptionist can type it up. i would think that this coudl lead to some embarassing situations as well, as the office usually has a number a patients just sitting around in the waiting room, now everybody knows what's wrong with me.

sometimes, he feels the need to tell me about other foreigners living in my neighborhood. he describes everything they've come in for and how they were treated. so i now know a little bit too much information about some of my friends and coworkers.

anyways, if you're coming here to Korea, you're best bet is to not get sick. although, it's reasonably cheap, the doctor's are a little corrupt and don't understand things like privacy. you're also expected to never question the doctor or going looking for a second opinion as this would be questioning his competency.

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goodbye korea

well, i was right. george w. bush elected for a second term...ahh the feeling!
i wonder which would be easier, using my power of correctly predicting US presidents for good or for evil?

sorry, if you check my blog regularly and have been disappointed with the lack of posts over the last...say...ten months. i do my best, inspiration hits me when i'm riding a bus, or right when i turn out the light before bed...the computer's all the way in the pc room...so most of my moments of genius are forgotten by the time i'm here and i stare at the blogger "post" screen drawing blanks...

i do have to say how happy i am to be finishing my work here. it's been rough, especially because i've never been meant to deal with kids and never want to again. my director came up with this new "genius" way of calculating my hours at work, by the minute and though i work the same amount, 8 hours a day, monday through friday, she's cut 17 hours of overtime pay off my cheque every month. after a a huge meeting this morning, the other foreign teacher and i were able to convince her to pay us everything owed and "trash" her new system...

in addition, the won to canadian dollar exchange rate has been steadily climbing, i've lost over $1000 in the last month...from 880 won/dollar in early october to 948 now....ridiculous...
just hoping something will pull it back down to more reasonable levels within the next few days...

next few days, because i've only got 8 working days left...i'll be finished work on the 23rd and have managed to convince my boss to let me stay in my apartment until the 26th when i'll head to seoul and catch a 24 hour ferry across the yellow sea to tianjin, china.
i can't wait...

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Halloween 2004 photos are now up!

Ahh, yes, that's me as an ajummah!

http://www.thesecondlayer.com/gallery/southkorea/halloween04/galleryhallo04.html

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