I was wondering why there are mops on most of the city buses I get on. Usually, it’s posted against the side of the bus in between two chairs and people try to stay away from those seats.
It’s 11:00 at night and I just hopped on the bus to go home from a friends. I was attempting to walk, but it was too cold and would have taken 45 minutes to do so. Hardly anyone is on the bus with me. There aren’t too many lights on the main roads, but when you do encounter one you can wait anywhere between 2 and 5 minutes. We get to the infamous 5-way stop. In the interim while I’m waiting, the bus driver becomes one of the most efficient men I have ever seen. First, he takes the change meter off and jiggles it around (to what end, I have not clue. He just looks busy). Next, he grabs the mop and begins wiping down the floor of the bus. I had to lift my feet as he cleaned under my seat. There was no polite warning, just a look and a nudge. I got the hint and admired his work ethic.
I’m guessing that was normal and even if it wasn't, the bus driver didn't waste a second of his time. Now, let’s try to get that done on the New York subways! I wouldn’t mind picking me feet up for that.
When something's strange in your neighborhood, Who ya gonna call? Ghost Busters! When your toilet's overflowing in your apartment, Who ya gonna call? The Super!
I went downstairs to his office and said, "hwa jang sil, mul! 화장실, 물!" Then I motioned with my arms. I was trying to recreate the atomic bomb explosion. He looks at me, points, and says, "you." He points to himself and says, "me, no." Saddened, I tried again. Maybe he didn't understand when I said, "Toilet, water, boom!" Again, he said, "anio 아니요."
With my heart breaking in two and a confused look on my face I left. I called my friend Eun-ha to tell her what happened and minutes later my super came buzzing at my door. He rushed in to look at the bathroom and motioned for me to get a bucket and scoop the water out and throw it down the drain in the shower. Luckily, my boyfriend, Nebi, was there too. He put on some pink rubber gloves and went to work.
While he was busy doing that, the super took my hand and led me out of my apartment. Obviously, I was meant to follow him. In an Alice and Wonderland swirl, I followed him as he was running around corners and racing to the supermarket near the apartment building. We went in and he asked the woman at the register something. The next minute he is waving a bottle of some magic liquid in my face that I took to be the equivalent of 'Draino'.
"Yogi yogi. Sam bun." "Here to here then wait 30 minutes."
I got it. I have to pour a certain amount in and wait 30 minutes. The super left and I did what I was told. Then after two minutes I hear a knock at my door. He had come to inspect my work and then tell me one more thing. (Note: All English had stopped after "me, no" at the very beginning of this whole ordeal.)
He steps into my bathroom again and point to the toilet and then to the garbage can. Next, he starts speaking Korean and makes a motion like he is wiping his butt. I start to laugh and then realize he is telling me that I need to throw all tissues in the garbage, not the toilet. He starts again. For some reason he wipes his butt in circular motions, but maybe he was doing it just to make a point for me. Either way it was hilarious.
Nebi and I went out to get a plunger and as soon as we got back and tried it, the toilet water went down. Our toilet was back to normal. If we had only done that to begin with we would have saved a lot of time. On the flip side, I would never have seen my super pretend to wipe his butt in my bathroom...
I finally got invited to go to the oncheon (hot springs) by my co-teacher, Little Kim (that's what I call her sometimes to distinguish her from Big Kim). She picked me up and on the way to the hot spring, surprise, I am meeting her sister and nephew. They are now collected and we are on our way. 30 minutes later we are in Dan Seong driving past terraced rice fields and pulling into the parking lot of Yedam Charcoal Kiln Land (http://www.iyedam.co.kr/).
Unlike many experiences I've had thus far, I did know what to expect. We opened the entrance door, took off our shoes and put them into a locked cubby. We took our keys to the register and had them exchanged for a new set of keys that would unlock a different cubby to put your clothes into in the locker room. Since Little Kim's nephew was 7, he was allowed to come into the women's locker room. After quickly undressing, the Kim clan and myself headed into the steamy bath room.
First, we washed off before going into the baths. Happily, I scrubbed myself clean and washed my hair. Lowering myself slowly into the hot bath, I felt really Korean. It was nice to see Little Kim and her sister conversing, while her nephew was running around turning various shower heads on and jumping into the cold bath. I decided to follow his suit and head toward the cold bath. Man, was it cold! I kept wondering why some people looked like lobsters in the bath rooms. After climbing out of the frigid water, I realized I looked like a cooked lobster too.
More scrubbing. Scrub, scrub, scrub. The rule for myself is to scrub every part of my body until I look the color of a slapped baby's ass; nice and pink. I told Little Kim, when I first bought the yellow scrubbing mitts, I thought they were used to clean the dishes, not my body. She had a really good laugh at my mistake. Then she asked if she could rub my back... HUH? "Samantha, can I rub your back?" "Umm, yea sure." "Samantha, let me use your mitt." "Oh yea! Of course. That would be really weird if you used your mitt."
She didn't get my sarcasm and started rubbing. Rub, rub, rub, OW, rub, rub. It felt good at the beginning, but my goal of looking the color 0f a slapped baby's ass was achieved.
"Samantha, you have young skin. I have old skin."
All I could do was nod. I wanted to return the favor for Little Kim, but her sister took on the scrubbing with a force that I couldn't fight her. We left the bath room and changed into clothes to go to the sauna. What a cool freaking sauna! After going outside and up some stairs, we arrived at a room full of clay domes. These were the saunas. Even cooler was the fact that there was charcoal burning inside one huge chamber. People surrounded the opening.
"Samantha, come with me. We must sit in front of the charcoal and look at it. It is good for your eyes." "What? Good for my eyes?" "Yes, let's go." She grabs my arm and leads me to the fires of MORDOR (and you must say this in a menacing voice and roll the last R). MORDORRRR.
Looking into the huge fire pit was great. I was seeing the same visible, moving heat that you see floating above the black pavement on a really hot summer's day except it was 10 times more intense. Heat wave folding into heat wave, creating such a spectacular visual that I couldn't help but stare. I was like a moth to the flame.
More grabbing and rushing. This time I was being taken to a small clay dome. After removing our slippers and pushing back a black, heavy curtain we entered into the clay dome lair. The air was still and there were people sleeping and sitting, playing with their DS, and answering their phone. I got the chance to press my back against the wall. What a warm sensation. The sweating began no less than 3 minutes in, but it was a good sweat.
Inside was pitch black. Faces melted into the darkness. Only a whisper could separate darkness from person. "O ma, o di so?" It was Little Kim's nephew entering the darkness bringing with him a tiny slice of light and a cool breeze. "Yogiyo." They connected with a mysterious helping hand emerging from a direction that was lost when the curtain came to a close. I couldn't stand the heat, so I left. Little Kim followed.
We bought some fish shaped ice cream and ate it taking in the view of the mountains in the distant. Her sister comes running over, says something, and we follow. She had cooked 4 sweet potatoes in a fire pit in the middle of the room. We squatted around the pit. It was us three dressed in pinkish-red robes, squatting just so our butts didn't graze the floor, eating cooked sweet potatoes out of a small fire pit in the middle of the room. What?! It was madness. Madness until the tender half of the sweet potato grazed my tongue. Then it turned into deliciousness and infatuation. Oh, sweet potato! How you would never be consumed in such a way in the States. Your skin wouldn't crisp from burning charcoal only to be eaten in such a primitive fashion; broken in half with bare hands that loved every second of the pain because the end was so sweet.
Come on, you guys don't muse about food that way? Something so delicious beyond words has never put you in a trance like it does to me?
We arrived at 2pm and we were just getting into the car to go to dinner at 5:38pm. What a wonderful day.
Words that had no meaning washed over my ears. I just handed her the money, 20.000 won, and nodded a lot. While I lay on a gurney covered with decorative linoleum staring at the ceiling, I wondered what I had gotten myself into. For fear of making awkward eye contact, I settled upon studying her body. Her skin was smooth and practically hairless. The un-matching black lacey brassiere and full-cut red panties with roses didn't quick fit the bill. At the same time, I kind of liked it. A warm towel was thrown over my body. Ahhhh. Next, a bucket of hot water. My body jolted upward from the unexpected weight that poured down. "Relax Sam," I told myself silently. The towel was lifted and another towel caressed my face. Wondering if another bucket of hot water was to be spilled over my face, I closed my eyes tightly. Nothing happened...
Instead, the woman massaged my jaw and cheeks. It was a game of towel on and towel off. She would massage, then put the towel back on. Massage and put the towel on again. I felt no touch for a few minutes when I decided to turn my head to the left to see what was going onI saw a cucumber and a slicer. An odd combination in a steam room. The cucumber got progressively smaller and was then applied to my face. Ohhh it was cold. If you added a bit of salt I bet it would have been really tasty too. I wanted to open my mouth to see if I could get any leftovers, but decided against it at the last minute.
She wanted to make small talk, but all I could say was mi guk saram ieyo, "I'm American." My lady in red walked away again. When she came back she looked as if she were going to pull a cake out of an oven. She had yellow mitts on both hands. Apparently, I was not a baked good, but rather, a burnt pan that needed to be scrubbed clean.
It was firm scrub down. It wasn't to the point where I felt chaffed like when you wear jeans with no underwear and walk around a lot. It was pleasant by all accounts. In the exact moment, I didn't really know what to think. She left no area untouched. It wasn't until she got to my arms that I saw all the tiny brown dirt balls on my skin. How gross, yet how fascinating?! Out of nowhere, SPLASH. More hot water gliding over my body. This time I was happy to know that it was washing away all my newly made little brown friends. It's funny how attached you can get to inanimate things.
The last frontal scrub was upon me and so was my bakery ladies' rolls; her stomach was soft so I didn't mind, but feeling another woman's tummy rolls on your forehead is a crazy feeling. First my face was cold from the cucumber being smashed into it, then her rolls warmed it up.
More foreign words were uttered from her mouth. When I could finally see I decided to study her face. I figured if she wasn't weirded out by putting her stomach on my face, I shouldn't be shy about looking at hers- her face, not her stomach. Pretty wrinkles had found their resting place around her eyes. Her hair was permed and short. Her cheekbones were high. She was wearing earrings. My guess was that she thought they complimented her under-outer garments, which they did. She was around 60.
She was strong and ended the scrub with a light massage for lack of a better word. It was more like dousing me in oil and then hitting random parts of my body. I must say, I felt great and it was 20,000 won well spent. For the next time I am going to learn some key phrases so we can have a better conversation in the nude. ^_^
No, this isn't some crazy reggae dance where you have to shake your butt or jump around (although maybe I will create a dance one day...). The art of soju is a lovely Korean custom in which one person pours a shot for another. The person pouring should never pour his own glass. If he/she has to shove the bottle of soju into someone else's hand for them to pour, so be it. Normally, someone recognizes that the pourer's cup is empty and will make sure that he/she gets his/her fill.
Out of respect, the bottle is held with two hands. The person holding the shot glass either has both hands on it or will look super stylish with one hand holding the shot glass and the other touching some part of the upper arm forming a triangle. It's a very nice thing to see. At first, I thought you had to drink the entire shot. After all, that is what I have always done. But I witnessed my counterparts taking small sips. Even if you don't want to drink at all you still must hold out your shot glass. The person will fill it with a small amount of alcohol and you can just touch the liquid to your lips and pour it out into another regular sized glass.
The scene here took place at dinner after a trip with all 32 teachers, 4 assistants, and the principal and vice principal. It's not taboo either to drink a small amount of soju during lunch even with your higher-ups present! It doesn't happen every time, but on occasion the situation calls for a celebratory drink.
I hope peanut butter and jelly stirs up the feeling of nostalgia and childhood memories passed. I was watching someone make one of these most delectable sandwiches when I realized I had done it all wrong. With one slice of bread I used to spread all of the peanut butter from end to end and then the jelly. On white bread it sucked because it was so flimsy and the peanut butter would always rip up some of the middle of the bread. Then, I witnessed a revolutionary act; only spread the peanut butter on one side of the slice and the jelly on the other. When you fold it together...BAM! A perfect sandwich.
Around 13-18 people rented what is called a Pension on the island of Namhae. It's a small house (one floor) with a few bedrooms, a dining area, boys and girls bathrooms, and a kitchen. Everyone slept on the floor because that is what you do in Korea. The floors are heated, so it's quite nice when the temperature is right. You are provided with a thin blanket and a pillow to sleep on. Since there were so many people we had to share the floor covers and not everyone got a blanket to sleep with.
The second night the floor was blazing! I slept on my yoga mat and decided to share my blanket with the girl lying next to me. We did an over/under share. She used one half to cover the floor and I used the other half to cover my body. In essence, I felt like I was the peanut butter sandwich that I ate. I couldn't quite put my finger on if I were the peanut butter or if I were the jelly. I settled on being the peanut butter simply because I like it more. But it wasn't until the middle of the night that I imaged myself as a peanut butter and jelly sandwich being toasted! The floor was burning me it was so hot. I was sweating, but needed to keep my body covered. I still have images of monsters attacking my body if it is exposed in the night air (Don't ask just accept it).
As I lay there sweating, I tried rolling around a bit until finally I had to brave the dark world that engulfed me. I quietly got up and put the blanket over my yoga mat. With a slight tremor and another quick scan of the room, I decided that there were no monsters. Even if there were I took solace in the fact that they would probably eat the other people first. It's the mindset when you swim in the ocean; if you go in alone, a shark will definitely eat you. If you go in with other people, the shark will definitely eat them first. ^_^ I sacrificed my sleeping counterparts in order to escape the toasting. I felt I was justified and luckily, I awoke to find that neither my body nor those around me were eaten. I smiled serenely at the fact that I was a peanut butter sandwich for a night. Happy New Year to that.
