Oh pork, oh bacon, how could you do this to me? You were so tasty, And you looked great on the coals, But you wouldn’t stay down with the kimchi. There it is folks, I’m pretty certain that I have an allergy to really fatty pork and bacon. After visiting a Korean barbeque joint earlier in the week, I have spent the past four days mostly in bed, debating if my stomach ache was severe enough to warrant a doctor’s visit (see: no health insurance until I officially start working). Not much fun as you can imagine. After a whole heap of bland food, stomach meds from the pharmacy, and drinking my weight in water, I finally feel like I’m on the mend. Between long naps and binge watching the final season of How I Met Your Mother? (SPOILER ALERT: Team Robin. I wasn’t mad. Sloppy writing, but I ain’t mad) I did have a few hours of time when I was not curled up in pain to be productive. I used this time to get in touch with my inner domestic goddess. It was weird. I’ve never really had the desire to “nest” but after two days of staring at an apartment that was teetering on the brink of uninhabitable I was forced to break out the pearl necklace, heels, and cleaning gloves. Meaning, I didn’t bother changing out of my pajamas and I sprayed bleach on everything. Can I just marvel for a second at how ridiculously good it feels to accomplish a small bit of housework when your world is reduced to the space you live in? Take, for example, this big pink winter blanket we inherited from a fellow ESL teacher. It was coated with dust and smelled like something died in it but I was determined to make it clean again, those kind of blankets here are expensive people and we’re working on a small budget right now. Please see below the text exchange I had with the far more domestically-inclined Danny: I think cleaning is directly tied to the endorphin centers in Danny’s brain. He grabs a Clorox wipe: yesss Dust gone in one swipe: oh my God so good!!! There are more wipes and more dust!??: IT’S ALL TOO MUCH!!! Here he is cleaning dishes: So happy. Also ‘habibi’ means ‘baby’ in Arabic. Don’t judge, you know you call your person weird stuff too.
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Did you ever play The Sims when you were a kid? You know how when your sim made a new friend a little green bar would fill up above their head? Well right now, as we eagerly try to dig in temporary roots here in Ansan, any time I have a social interaction I can’t help but imagine that glowing green bar hovering above my head. A few days ago, Danny and I were definitely starting to feel like those little green friendship bars were dropping into the red. I think that homesickness is really just an awareness of the absence of anything familiar. Full disclosure, I called my Mom crying about a stupid DIY sock snowman video I saw on Facebook that reminded me of her. “M-mommm,” I ugly cried over FaceTime, “We can’t make snowman crafts together this winter!” It’s those weird little things that creep up on you and release the tear duct flood gates. And as much as I thank baby Jesus for things like Skype and Face Time, sometimes seeing pixelated, familiar faces makes it all the more isolating when you realize that you literally know no one in this brand new place. After sobbing into Danny’s armpit for an hour after talking to my mom, I decided that I needed to get out of our dorm room...er, I mean, apartment. Fast forward to the next day. On my way to find some palaces I’m riding the metro into Seoul and double checking my guidebook (for the third time) to see if I was on the right line (I was), when the two older Korean ladies on either side of me ask, one in English and the other in Korean, “Where are you going?” Along with the frantic tourist vibe I must have also been exuding the “I need friends!” smell. I struck up a conversation with the adorable grandmother to my right, who looked like she couldn’t be older than 40 - bless her perfect Asian skin - and by the end of the ride we had become friends on Kakao Talk. BIG. DEAL. Kakao Talk Friends = Friends for life! My friendship bar was creeping back into the green. After feeling inspired by the sightseeing and friend-making, I was on a role. That same evening Danny and I decided to check out a magical thing known as a meetup group. I can’t believe I never checked out meetups in DC, there is literally every interest you can imagine hosted by cool people who share that same interest!
Our meet up was awesome. We met a Korean guy who went to school in South Africa who has a very confusing, albeit charming, accent; a sassy Chinese girl who is dating an American and has absolutely no interest in Korean men, much to their disappointment; a Guatemalan who said screw it to a regular job and life back home, came here, and is baffled as to why the Asian women do not respond to his latin swagger; and generally just a lot of really cool and eclectic people. In a moment of weakness, we grabbed McDonalds on our way to the group’s second location for the evening and over our quarter pounders that tasted like America, Danny mused: “It’s nice to know that there are great people just around the corner, no matter where you are!” |
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