When the doorbell rang he was watching a repeat of MASH. At the door was a DHL driver and he carried a small parcel which Edgar signed for. The sender was J.C. Chase Hobby Shops. It was the plane.
He’d been anticipating this moment and precisely how he would feel since he placed his order. For eleven days he’d played through in his head how good the moment that would launch his grand new hobby would be. In fact, he’d imagined a scenario almost exactly like this.
After the driver had left and he stood there with the package in his hand, Edgar had a feeling that he found similar to déjà vu, though decidedly melancholy. He decided it was similar to the way outdated 70’s pastels on a modern façade can make one feel vaguely depressed and out of place.
Edgar realized he’d had this feeling before in his life, including when he upgraded to high-definition television, shot a sub-80 round in golf, and rearranged the tools on his workbench. It’s how he felt lying in bed next to his wife after he made love to her while thinking about pretty young girls.

Edgar set the package down on the coffee table and resumed watching television. He couldn’t focus on the program anymore. His attention kept wandering to the box. He desperately wanted to open it up and have a look, maybe even begin building.
“Better to start in on it tomorrow,” he thought. “Just carry on as normal for the rest of the day.”
But even as he thought this another idea was there. He pictured himself working feverishly through the night on the model, staying up perhaps a day or two until it was completed. But the moment he thought this he pushed it out of his mind. It was out of the question. He would start to work on it tomorrow. He’d rearranged his whole schedule to work on the model from eight to ten every morning, right before his daily exercise routine.

After MASH was finished he proceeded on with the next phase of his day, which was walking in the park with his miniature schnauzer Pete. Edgar hooked him up to the leash, laced his waterproof hiking boots, put on his overcoat, and went outside.
During the walk Edgar was uncharacteristically thoughtful. He was so caught up in his thoughts that he walked a full hour longer than usual. This was partly because he sat and watched a group of children playing. One toddler would make a roaring sound and put up his hands in a marching-zombie pose and start off after the other two, who would shriek and run off. The pursuer would give chase for a bit then fall back, as if no longer interested until the other two got closer, at which point it would all begin again. Edgar liked sitting and watching them play. Every so often he looked down at his watch and realized he really ought to be going, but couldn’t tear himself away.

When he got home his wife was near frantic.
“Where have you been!” she demanded.
“I just felt like taking my time is all,” said Edgar.
“But you’re never late!” she shrieked.
Out of the blue, he found his wife to be extremely unattractive. She was wearing a red and white apron with years of spills down the front, her hair pulled back in a pony-tail.
“Maybe it’s the way that one stray hair is dangling down between her eyes-its framing her face in a strange way-or the little globs of white stuff in the corners of her mouth,” he thought.
He couldn’t figure it out, but he found her utterly revolting. All he could focus on was her mouth with those hunks of crud in the corners. He was standing there, stupidly staring at her, as she carried on.
“Well, is that all you have to say? At least a call would have been nice.”
He suddenly saw her not as his wife, but as this odd little red-haired woman in an apron who happened to be his wife, as if he suffered from amnesia and had no historical context in which to place her. He stood there fixed, observing her as this totally new, foreign object.
“This woman is my wife,” he thought. “My God, she’s just a silly little woman!”
“Jesus Edgar! Are you alright?”
“Yes, I’m fine honey,” he said. “I’m sorry. I just lost track of time.”

But at dinner Edgar wasn’t sure if he was fine. The surreal exchange with his wife had carried over and he found himself thinking things like, “My God, this woman has prepared for me a pork roast, carrots and rice pilaf.”
He couldn’t quite believe this stout little homemaker would do such a thing for him, or indeed that these things could just be procured, seemingly out of nowhere, laid out on imported china, eaten with shiny silver forks off an oak table. He was equally amazed that such things could exist and that he could somehow be entitled to them.
Edgar and his wife usually didn’t talk much at dinner which allowed him to stay suspended in the feeling. It was up and down throughout the meal and fizzled out for good at right around the time he sat down for the post-prandial newscast. Suddenly he was back in the world of the familiar, one where he knew exactly how the TV and the chair and the things which adorned the room had come to be there. When the 6:30 news was over he switched to the History Channel and watched a show about how cigars are made. From eight to nine it was CSI and from nine to ten a repeat of Law & Order. At ten o’clock he fixed himself a bowl of ice cream and ate it at the dining room table while thumbing through Newsweek, then it was up to brush and floss, read in bed until precisely eleven, and lights out.
As he was about to switch off the reading lamp he looked over his wife, hoping she would turn into that unfamiliar character from earlier, but to no avail. She was wholly her familiar self, sleeping as she always did on her side, propped up by two pillows. Edgar noticed the flecks of white in the corners of her mouth were still there. He resisted the urge to wipe them off and settled under the covers on his side, facing away from her, leaving a chasm down the middle of the bed more than big enough for Pete who let out one of those long dog-sighs and joined his masters in slumber.

Edgar awoke and through sleepy, squinted eyes managed to read the clock radio’s time. 2:18. He listened to the rhythmic, half-snoring sounds of his wife and the short, even breaths of Pete. He laid there slightly panicked, as one might after a nightmare, only he had no recollection of one. He rolled back over on his side and attempted to fall asleep, but was unable to.
At 2:27 Edgar felt that if he had to lie and listen to restful noises a second longer he would go mad. He got out of bed, put on his robe and slippers, and made his way down the hall and into the kitchen.
Edgar thought the house held an eerie silence. He liked that familiar items were dark and lumpy, almost unrecognizable. The only light was the faint green of the microwave clock. He felt his way to a chair at the kitchen table and sat down. Going back to bed seemed out of the question, but he had no idea what to do with himself. Part of him wanted to just remain sitting in the near-dark and silence. It was as if they were a great equalizer, making everything he saw with his daytime eyes totally subjective.
Edgar thought, “What is real? This same room which by daylight is so familiar, or this ‘new’ darkened version?”
This was followed by: “Is my wife the pleasant woman who caters to my needs or the ridiculous little lady shouting at me in the hallway?”
After thinking this he felt uneasy. A scene started to play in his head. Edgar had no idea where it came from and he wanted it to stop but it also excited him tremendously. This is what he imagined:
He goes to the safe in his bedroom and takes out the revolver. Next, he goes down to his study in the basement, puts the gun to his head and pulls the trigger. Now, he’s dead but he can see everything. He can see the blood dripping down the wall. He can see the fallen gun. He can even see the model plane box on his desk and there’s blood on that too. In the morning his wife comes down to look for him and when she opens up the door and sees the blood and the gun and Edgar’s limp body she begins to scream.
After he’s done thinking this Edgar begins to laugh. He’s not sure why, but it what he’s pictured is perhaps the funniest thing he’s ever thought of. As a result, all by himself at 2:35 on a Thursday morning at his kitchen table, Edgar buried his face in his arm and laughed harder than he could ever remember doing.

At 6:30 Edgar’s wife awoke and noticed he wasn’t in bed. She was startled but too sleepy to think much of it. She slipped on her robe and shuffled out to the kitchen where she could smell coffee. This surprised her even more, as she was always the one to start it.
“What the hell’s gotten into that man,” she mumbled, heading downstairs to look for him. The door to his study was open a crack, and she could detect a strong smell in the air. She rapped lightly on the door then pushed it open. Edgar sat at his desk, focusing intently on a small, gray piece of plastic he held in his hand. She saw the lid of a box with the picture of a plane. Next to it sat a revolver.
“Edgar, what the hell are you doing with that thing out?” she said.
“It’s a model plane, an F-16 Tomcat to be exact.”
“No, no, that!” she said in a high-pitched voice, pointing at the gun.
Ignoring her he said, “Oh, is the coffee done…and by the way, I’ve been meaning to tell you, there’s some white stuff in the corners of your mouth.”

(New Readers: Start at Volume I)

By about 10:30 the bar begins to fill up.  As patrons file in and gather with their friends I’m reminded of how cliquey the expatriate community is in Korea.  Upon my arrival here I expected all foreigners would share instant rapport because of our common experience.  Rather, I found many of them went out of their way to avoid looking at me when we passed on the street.  Even on a Friday night with the liquor flowing freely, not many stray from their small group of friends.  There are two reasons for this.  The first is that most people who take the plunge into Korea gain a certain pride from their bold endeavor.  Their egos are further boosted by the fact that many are treated like local celebrities in their neighborhood.  Even though much of the attention from Koreans is akin to the ogling of a deformed midget at a county fair, it is abundant nonetheless.  There is a slightly uneasy truce at expat gathering places such as YES Bar because we serve as proof to each other that we’re not as unique as we’d like to think.  Here, we’re just another foreigner who ended up in Korea.
The second reason for coteries is that the friendships one makes here tend to be very strong.  Korea can at times feel very unwelcoming to a foreigner.  Seoul in particular tends to feel like one sprawling, polluted megalopolis of towering concrete structures, snarled traffic and scant nature, from which the only escape is a boxy, cramped, smoky establishment filled with locals you can’t meaningfully connect with.  Fellow expats are a buttress against the loneliness Korea can inspire.  They become symbols of a more familiar and humane world.  Without them, life here would be unbearably forlorn.
Your friends are also a support group.  It’s typical for one’s feelings about Korea to swing wildly up and down.  You might wake up Monday with fresh eyes and walk around with a newfound curiosity in the minutiae of this little country.  By Tuesday, nothing short of you standing atop a pile of Korean corpses, pointing an automatic weapon skyward with a barbaric scream, will bring relief.  On days like this your friends here are a lifeline.  Nobody at home knows the despair of an anti-Korea kick.  Only a fellow soldier on the battlefield can relate.  They lay next to you in the foxhole and say, “Don’t worry we’ll get out of this alive!”  When it seems there is no coming back from the dark side, they can pull you towards the light.  For this we love them profoundly and are forever grateful.
Meeting up with a friend from Korea after you’ve left there is like a reunion between two war veterans.  Even if it’s been years and your lives have gone in completely different directions, you’ll always have Korea.  We talk about our time there with a verisimilitude that isn’t possible with people who never went over.  Only with each other can we authentically recall the madness.  Reunited on the other side, we know how sweet and precious freedom is.

It’s now past eleven and YES is reaching capacity.  People fight for a spot at the bar and pack into the remaining booth space.  I slide in and make room for James, a Canadian with a sleazy-looking goatee and a t-shirt that’s too small for him.  I don’t particularly care for the guy.
He leans in and says in a half-whisper, “I’ve got something you boys might be interested in.”
He’s the closest thing there is to a pusher-man in Seoul.  He knows some Nigerians in the city who can get him weed.
“I don’t want any more of your over-priced, shitty dope.” I say.
“Ahh, I’ll do you one better tonight.” he says.
“What’ve you got, blow?  I don’t even want to know what that costs.  I’ll just con the doctor out of adderol.” says Seth.
James has a smug little grin.  “Boys, boys, boys, your lack of faith disappoints me.  Trust me when I say this is an exclusive.”
“Alright alright out with it.  What’ve you got?” says Seth
“What I’ve got is LSD.” He draws the three letters out dramatically.
Seth and I look at each other.  James sits back, his smug grin widening.
“No way you’ve got acid.” I say.
“Oh, it wasn’t easy to get, but I’ve got it.”
“Forget it, I don’t want any.  This country makes it feel like I’m tripping as it is.  You go out onto the streets with a head full of that stuff…you’re done for.” I say.
“How much?” says Seth.
“15 apiece…3 for 40.
“Let’s see it.”
James takes little squares of paper out of his wallet.
Seth hands him 50,000 won and says, “Gimme 4.”
James pretends to weigh it in his mind and then obliges.  He stands up.
“You sure nothing for you?” he asks me.
“I’m very sure.” I say.
“Well then, boys, I’ve got business to attend to.  Cheers.”
He says something to the girls at the next table then plunks down and begins his same pseudo-hustler act.
“Come on man, do it with me.” says Seth.
“No way.  Not a chance.”
He shrugs and digs a hit out of its wrapper.
“Bombs away.” he says and presses the square to his tongue.
I see James hand something to the girls.  In about an hour this place is going to be a hive of twisted foreigners.  Things could get ugly.
“Oh my god!  Hi!  I haven’t seen you in so long, honey!”
Heather, a tall slender blonde, plops down next to Seth.  She would be sexy if not for the desperate availability she exudes.  At one point or another she’s thrown herself at pretty much every guy in the place.  It appears tonight is Seth’s turn.  I use their conversation as an excuse to get up and move around.  I walk up to the bar and order a beer.  British Dave is sitting at the far right end with his customary bottle of wine.  I squeeze in next to him.  He’s bald and very serious.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen the man smile.  He sits at this spot every Friday night with his overpriced merlot like some brooding aristocrat.  Without any salutation he launches into one of his somber observations.
“Alcohol is a shit drug when you think about it.  I mean, what does it do for you, really?”
“Well, for starters, it brings us all together in this fine establishment.” I say.
“Precisely.” he says.  “It’s a crutch.”
“Do explain.”
“Why can’t people get together and enjoy each others’ company without being totally inebriated?  Most of us are anxious creatures with low self esteem.  We need alcohol to loosen up and be ourselves.”
“What’s your crutch?” I say.  “Your undying faith in mankind?”
“Pessimism is certainly a crutch of mine.” he says.  “Believing that nothing will turn out well releases me from the mental angst of not trying to do good.”
“So you’re defining a crutch in the same way Marx described religion as an opiate.” I say.
“Yes, only on a nuanced, personal level.  Religion is certainly a crutch for many, but atheism could just as well be.  Any belief or practice can become a crutch.  Us weak sentients all need something to lean on.”
“It’s commentary like that that keeps me coming back.” I say.  “I’m a glutton for your stoicism.  But listen, if you want a better drug, James has some acid.”
“Are you mad?  Take that stuff in this country?  I’ve got a crutch right here, thank you.” he says, patting his bottle.  “I don’t need a bloody wheelchair.”
“I’m with you there.” I say.  “Listen, I have to rock a piss.  I’ll talk to you later.”
As usual, the stall is filled with vomit and there’s a long line for the urinal.  I duck outside into an alley to take care of business. It’s nice to have relief from the stifling interior of YES so I decide to have a couple of beers outside of a convenience store.  I watch each person who passes and wonder what they would say their crutch is.  An hour and three empty cans later I get a text message from Seth asking where I am and I head back upstairs.  Stepping through the glass door, I walk right into the belly of the beast.    The music has been cranked to about 100 decibels and googly-eyed foreigners dance with a fluidity that is only possible on drugs.  Several of them cling to pitchers of beer that slosh and spill with the rhythm of their bodies.   Mrs. K looks on from behind the bar with concern.  Though she has witnessed many booze-soaked nights through the years, nothing could have prepared her for an LSD bash.
I scan around for Seth.  I spy him at the back of the bar staring straight ahead.  I navigate through the maze of people toward him.  One girl crawls across a table cackling and knocking over empty bottles and glasses.  People huddle together in booths, their eyes shifting furtively, speaking in drug-induced vernacular.  I see James and he gives me the thumbs up, as if he’s taking all of the credit for the scene.
I can tell by Seth’s face he’s in trouble.  His journal lies open in front of him with cryptic marks scrawled in it.
“How are you feeling buddy?” I say.
“My cricket stump…my bloody cricket stump…” he says, trailing off.
Heather dances up and puts an arm around him.
“Hey…you gonna come dance with me or what?  If you want to get with this, you have to dance.” she says, gyrating suggestively towards the impromptu dance floor.
“The pussy…I know I need to get the pussy but…”
The thought of sex while under the influence of psychedelics is horrifying.  I’ve got to get him out of here.
I look over at the bar and see Dave is still sitting in his spot.
“I’m not fucked up enough to appreciate this and my buddy needs to get out.  You want to come?” I say.
“Yes.” he says.  “Where shall we go?”
“My place is close by.  Let’s grab some drinks and head there.”
We agree to meet outside of a shop near my apartment.  I go back to Seth and try to coax him into leaving.  He remains glued to his spot, his eyes darting around like a cornered animal.  I order him to listen to Johnny Cash on my iPod.  The soothing baritone calms him and he follows me out.  I drop him off at his place with an ample supply of beer and Disney films.  The booze and G-rated plot lines should safeguard him against any overwhelming terror.
From there I go to meet Dave outside of Family Mart.  We stock up on beer and soju and proceed to my apartment.  Inside, I put on some tunes and begin to roll a couple of cigarettes from a pouch of Drum tobacco.  Dave mixes up some soju cocktails in the kitchen.
“What a scene at the bar, huh?” I say.  “I’m really glad I decided not to go that route.  I probably would have ended up like poor Seth.”Dave offers a slow, “Mmmmm” in reply.
I hear him approaching from behind and turn around, expecting my drink.  Instead, what I find is Dave’s pants around his ankles.  His partially engorged cock is mere inches from my face.  It is large.  It is uncircumcised.
For a few seconds I’m too stunned to react.  After the initial shock wears off I calmly tell him to pull up his pants.  We remain where we are in awkward silence.  I break it by asking,
“What the hell was that about?”
“I was hoping we could…you know…well, that we were going to fuck each other tonight.” he says.
“Why?” I ask.  “What possible hint of that was there?”
“Just I thought…it seemed to be leading that way.”
It seems that propositioning men for random gay sex is another crutch of his.
Something about having a near-stranger’s penis in my face causes me to question the direction of my life.  I consider the strange existence I lead here in this ugly, barren city… surrounded by capricious foreigners…misunderstood by the natives…trying to teach my native language to people who botch it so badly I’ve come to question my own ability to tell good English from bad.  The truth is, I don’t really want to be in Korea anymore.  It is such a unique, particular niche of humanity that it’s nearly impossible for a non-native to fully assimilate.   On good days Korea is quirky, vibrant and strangely fascinating …you feel like a tenderfoot Luke Skywalker in the Mos Eisely Cantina.  But on bad days Korea is a misanthropic film noir set fifty years in the future where human drones eke out a shadow of happiness through digital entertainment and alcoholism.
I came here wanting adventure; something fresh and unfamiliar.  My first six months here have certainly provided that.  It’s been like an extended viewing of Cirque du Soleil: uncommonly entertaining; hallucinogenic, even.  There have been incredibly fun, unforgettable moments.  I’ve become more tolerant and understanding of other cultures and made great friends from around the world.
Despite these upsides, at this point Korea is mostly something I just tolerate.  The entire country could be razed to the ground and as long as I got my final paycheck I wouldn’t really care.  And yet, I’ve already considered extending my contract.   Many foreigners agree that living here is a bit soulless and teaching English is unfulfilling, but a good portion of them stay on for a second or third year…some beyond that.   It’s the Korea trap.  The schedule is great and the pay and benefits good enough that it makes it difficult to realistically consider teaching in a different country, or to return home and enter the rat race again.
But every teacher knows that ultimately, Korea is a dead end gig.  Upward mobility in this business comes in the form of incremental pay raise and moving from field slave to house slave status.  You will always be regarded as a foreigner and therefore, a second class citizen.
While some may go on to make a career out of teaching English, nobody wants to end up doing it here for the rest of their lives.  Anyone who says they do is mentally ill and should not only be disregarded, but sterilized as well.  A teacher that stays on more than a few years in Korea has the sad air of a boxer past their prime who slogs through the doldrums of an amateur circuit.
Yet as certain as I am that there is no future for me here, I also know that I’m not quite ready to leave.  Korea supports me through these years of itinerant restlessness.  It props me up during this quarter-life, ruminative odyssey.  A crutch…a trap…as far as I’m concerned Korea is both of these things.  I accept it because the alternative is starting over again in another country or going home and settling into a more permanent career.  The former holds no promise of being a place I like any more than Korea, while the latter is something I’m just not ready to be ensnared by yet.  For now, I’m fine to limp along in Korea, which sucks, but at least is dispensed in 12 month intervals of suckiness that I’ll someday walk away from without an ounce of regret.  Someday, I will live in a place I’m truly connected to and make a living doing something I really care about.  Someday, I will be off the one year installment plan and locked into something serious; something real.

Someday…a crutch if ever there was one.   For all I know I’ll be sitting in YES Bar ten years from now, eyeing a fresh female recruit over a mug of piss Korean beer.  I’ll make my move and she’ll sense my desperation…that I’m a creepy older guy who’s been here for too long.  On the defeated walk home I will get a text message from Jean, who is still my boss and still speaks horrendous English.  Unable to take another day of this life, I’ll throw myself off of an overpass.  The next morning thousands of Koreans will read the headline, and while they may be a bit disappointed that the foreign suicide victim isn’t black, overall they’ll feel a bit better knowing that there’s one less drug-using carrier of homosexuality in their country.

The smell on the 63-1 bus is a distinctly Korean blend of booze, garlic breath, fresh ginger and grooming products. I get a text message from Seth asking where I am. As I type my reply the old woman sitting next to me looks on out of the corner of her eye with a mixture of curiosity and suspicion. To her, it must be strange enough to witness the advent of hand- held electronics. That a foreigner is using one next to her on the bus in a post Hermit Kingdom Korea must indeed hearken the dawn of a 21st century Bizarro world. Still, at least she chose to sit next to me. Many Koreans will opt to stand for the entire route rather than share a seat with a foreigner who is almost certainly an STD riddled criminal.

A bell tones and an automated woman’s voice announces my stop. I muscle my way down the packed aisle and towards the doors. As I swipe my transit card on an electronic reader the same female drone says, “Kamsahamnida,” which means “thank you” in Korean. I grip the hand rail tightly not so much to steady myself on the moving vehicle, but to hold my ground against other passengers. A man bashes into me as he reaches to scan his card. An old lady cuts in front of me, her elbow landing dangerously close to my groin. The pressing bodies leave me in a compromising position, my face mere centimeters from a fat boil on somebody’s neck and what I hope is the edge of a parcel pinned against my anus.
The doors open and the clump of bodies spills out onto the street. Again I am pushed, elbowed and generally treated like I don’t exist. I keep my head down and absorb the blows for a few blocks until I’m able to dart down a side street and escape the jostling madness of the main avenue.
When I first arrived in Korea I was astounded by the lack of courtesy I received in public places. The way people shoved and cut made even notoriously rude New Yorkers seem downright chivalrous. For a while I held to the belief that I was treated like this because I’m foreign, but after a couple of months it became obvious that Koreans treat each other in a similar manner. This led to further hypotheses such as the passionate but un-empirical “Koreans are rude savages” and the more plausible “Densely populated urban areas lead to a reduced standard of personal space.”
Nowadays I’ve given up trying to explain the phenomenon. It has, like many other things, just become part of my daily life in Korea. As I cross a pedestrian bridge and come upon a circus of neon lights that marks the bars, shops and restaurants in this part of town, I’m reminded of my arrival here, when the busy streets were incomprehensible. Now, watching drunk men hold hands on the front steps of a business is normal. Young guys with Rod Stewart-esque feathered mullets and tight fitting clothes are commonplace. Cauliflower decoratively planted in pots doesn’t earn a second look, nor do tanks outside of a restaurant full of live eels, squid and writhing fish that look like penises. The occasional whiff of raw sewage is mundane.
It no longer shocks me to walk down a street such as this one where side by side, vendors sell vegetables and bootleg DVDs, a monk asks for donations and a pushy housewife tries to convert you to Christianity, where one story homes with pagoda roofs lie in the shadow of a fifty-story glass high-rise. It’s safe to say that after living here for nearly six months, the sensory-overload bazaar of juxtapositions that is Korea fails to get my attention.
Well, almost.
An elderly woman squats on the sidewalk unpacking vegetables from boxes and laying them out for sale on a blanket. A young boy, presumably her grandson, says something to her. She points towards some low-lying bushes. He steps behind them, pulls down his pants and craps. The woman wipes him clean with a napkin and goes right back to sorting her goods.
Scenes such as this are a firm reminder that while Korea has come to feel like home, it still has the ability to leave me thinking “Where am I?”

I ignore Seth’s second and third text messages and proceed towards our meeting point. I cross a pedestrian bridge that spans a busy road and step into a public square with some benches and small trees. Seth’s unmistakably loud voice is audible even amidst the bustle of Seoul on a Friday night. I make my way towards it and see him sitting on a bench, surrounded by Korean men in suits. They cheer him on as he tips back a can of beer, chugs the contents and throws it down with a resounding belch.
“Good, good!” some of them say.
This explains his excessive texting. While Koreans err on the side of xenophobia and can be notoriously stand-offish towards foreigners, those with a few rounds in them demonstrate there is also an intense desire to get to know us, to put a human touch to the foreign language and culture that has inundated their homeland. Once you get on a Korean’s good side there is seemingly no limit to their generosity and eagerness to give you an authentic Korean experience. While this is a welcome respite from the many grouchy, mistrustful glares we foreigners receive, it can be too much at times. Seth is surrounded. For some reason, Korean men are almost unnaturally attracted to his flowing, curly mane, stubble-lined face and boisterousness. He seems to be some kind of forbidden fruit for them.
I hang back a bit, watching the scene for my own amusement. One of the Koreans offers to call a taxi and take Seth downtown. Such a proposition is always tempting although ultimately ill-fated. Everything will be paid for, right down to a late-night round at one of the claw-grab machines that dot nearly every street corner, but will hardly seem worth it when waking up deliriously hung-over on the floor of a love motel surrounded by liquor bottles and snoozing men still wearing their suits. Koreans drink with what can only be described as reckless abandon. I’ve seen grown men fall flat on their faces, vomit, and crawl across busy intersections after a night out. When they get down to business (which generally happens 3-5 times a week) it makes the excesses of a frat party look like a Boy Scout fundraiser.
A man grabs Seth by the arm and tries to pull him towards the street. At this point I step in and rescue him from his over-eager assailants. The sight of a second foreigner leaves the group momentarily speechless.
“Quickly, let’s go.” I say.
He leaps up and follows after me into the maze of buildings, saying over his shoulder, “Sorry, thank you,” to his would-be friends.
“Jesus dude, what took you so long?” he says.
“You ungrateful bastard.” I say. “You were one beer away from giving in. You’re lucky I came when I did.”
He doesn’t argue.

We walk another five minutes in silence until we’re outside of the building that houses YES Bar. It is the local foreigner hangout…an island of westernness among a sea of Korean. On a Friday or Saturday night this is where the expats gather to drink, converse, shoot pool and try their best to feel as if they are not impossibly far from home.
We climb up the stairs and out of the neon-lit bazaar. We push through the entrance side of the double glass doors into the dimly lit, smoky confines of YES. Mrs. K, the owner and bartender, gives us a broad smile. She’s a kind, decent woman and I can’t help but feel a bit bad that she’s fallen into the trap of catering to debaucherous foreigners.
“Hello, boys. What’ll you have?”
“A couple of beers, Mrs. K.” I say.
She pours out two pints and slips them to us at the corner of the bar with a wink.
Seth and I stake out a booth near a window and settle in with our beers. 9:30 is still a subdued hour at YES Bar but in a little while it will be standing room only, packed wall to wall with foreigners downing pitchers of flat, flavorless Korean beer. YES on a Friday night has the vibe of a saloon in purgatory where it’s difficult to say whether the person sitting across from you is a mad saint or a maniacal fiend. Every time I come here I end up talking to somebody who is unfit not only to teach children, but to hold a post higher than town drunk. Indeed, it seems that many who come to Korea do so because they never quite fit in at home. It takes a certain type to willingly pack up their life and ship it halfway around the world… the type that doesn’t have much to lose…and those without much to lose can be very dangerous.
Combined with Korea’s lax standards for prospective English teachers, it all adds up to an influx of shady characters. They are a dirty little secret of the English teaching business in Korea. While the government has taken preventive measures such as requiring a background check and a drug test, this does little more than deter outright criminals. There is still a significant proportion of teachers that are just cracked eggs. They may not have a rap sheet or dirty piss, they may have a university degree and be native English speakers, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t alcoholics who live with their parents or part-time chicken farm security guards who whack off to vampire porn. True, anywhere you go there are likely to be folks harboring freakish tendencies, but there’s something about the cathartic anonymity of this small Asian peninsula that attracts such people in bulk. Far from home, free from the burdens of reputation and habitualness, people can be whoever they want. For some, this means a whole new crowd to frighten. For others, it is a chance to start over.
Take Seth, for example, who got the hell out of Dodge because of heroin addiction. He thought he’d never be able to kick the habit if he remained surrounded by a network of pushers and users. Moving 6000 miles away took him out of that trap. By contrast, binge-drinking and legal stimulant abuse is living the clean life.
I look around the bar and see more of these damaged denizens. There’s my other co-worker, Joe, a black, gay man from Mississippi. It goes without saying he didn’t feel comfortable coming out in the former Confederacy. Now in Seoul, he’s not only out of the closet, but apparently on a mission to suck every cock in the city. There’s Steve, the paranoid Kiwi who once smashed a man in the face with a mug of beer and bit off a piece of his ear because he thought he was talking about him. (He wasn’t) Randy, a near-midget Carolinian of Armenian descent, regularly gets so drunk he shouts obscene comments, pisses himself and falls off the bar stool (not necessarily in that order). Laura from South Africa is a pathological liar who makes outrageous claims such as, “Nelson Mandela is a personal friend of mine.” (No he isn’t…shut the fuck up.) Then there’s Rick, a seven-foot Aussie who talks almost exclusively about how his life is in danger because of the bizarre conspiracy he’s uncovered in the Australian government involving dike cops, rigged slot machines and prostitution rings (I usually stop listening around the time he claims he’s the only man in the world to be formally accused of thoughtcrime).
Of course, it’s unfair to generalize about all of the foreigners here. I’ve met people who are quite normal and probably aren’t seeking an escape across the Pacific. For every nut job there’s somebody who came to pay back student loans or save for grad school. Others, such as myself, have ambitions of world travel and adventure. A few are devoted educators who genuinely love teaching. Many just want to try something different.
However, I’ve had enough run-ins with unstable foreigners here to make me wary of even the most unassuming person. If one isn’t vigilant they can end up in the company of some desperate freak who will drag you into their sordid personal universe. The musk of these wounded animals is thick in here. Strange vibrations abound…there is a hint of danger…yes… one must tread carefully in this place…

Read: Part IV: The End of The Beginning

Every day my first period students play a game where they hide and try to scare me when I enter the classroom. Today I figure I’ll ignore them and see if they stay hidden the entire class. Unfortunately, the attention-span of a first grader lasts scarcely more than a minute. One student sneaks up behind me and attempts to deliver a “dong-shim.” This is done by aligning the thumbs and forefingers into a gun-shape and interlocking the remaining digits. Next, the hands are thrust upwards towards an unsuspecting victims’ anus.
I receive a direct hit, which doesn’t sit well with Brian Teacher. I retaliate, forgetting to take into consideration my superior firepower. Now, little Johnny is crying on the floor, grasping his bottom.
“No, no, don’t cry, it’s OK,” I tell him
“Look, you do to Brian Teacher.”
I present my buttocks and encourage him to give me a good shot. Jean walks by and sees me offering my rectum to the fallen student. She comes in.
“Oh my god, why?”
“Just a little accident,” I say. “Everything is fine.”
After that it’s a flurry of Korean between Jean and the students, from which I can’t make out much more than “dong-shim.” Jean calls me out into the hallway.
“Brian, young students very active. Please no game and encourage to study on and on for best.”
“Yes, of course.”
Back in the classroom the tears have stopped and given way to a flurry of dong-shiming.
“OK guys, please sit down. Homework check. Books out.” I say.
The girls obediently take out their texts while the boys continue to target each others’ butt holes.
“No stickers…” I threaten them.
Dealing with a Korean child is essentially no different than managing an animal. Control depends upon a system of commands, rewards and punishments. In this case the operant conditioning revolves around a board entitled, “Best student” on which stickers are placed for good behavior, or at least for generally not acting like barbarians. The four girls have are about dead-even with 20 stickers apiece. The four boys have eight between them. Watching little boys in action leaves no doubt that men are the more beast-like of the genders. This doesn’t change over the years; males only learn to disguise their atavism better.
At last all books are out and I go down the aisles and mark who has and hasn’t done homework.
About a third of the girls in the school are named Julie, Sally, Jane, or Jenny. Among boys, Harry, John, Steve and Billy lead the pack. The majority of the rest go by a smattering of American celebrity names. Occasionally, a student has a name like Taluka or Glody that sounds like it belongs to an African distance runner. Then, there are titles such as Ninja or Butterfly. I’m never sure if these are monikers bestowed on them by previous teachers or the product of a parent with inadequate English. And, even those kids who end up with a normal name aren’t safe from the wildcard: the secretaries who can’t speak or read English but must enter the students’ information into the computer. With the flick of a finger Clara becomes Glara; Stan, Stab. The only thing more ridiculous is that the students insist on being called by their botched names.
“Wrestler. Hey Wrestler. Homework?” I say.
He stares at me blankly with a finger up his nose.
“Homework. Homework book.” I point to his classmates’.
“Ahhhhh,” he says and pulls a mangled notebook out of his bag. The other boys pet my forearms, which are still a novelty in a nation of nearly-hairless men.
Today’s class is good because homework check has taken up a third of the time.
“OK guys, books out. Reading books.” I say, holding up mine as a model. Again, the girls respond almost immediately while it takes a good five minutes for the boys to take out their books and open to the appropriate page.
“OK, first, Brian teacher say. Then, you say. A-a-apple, B-b-balloon, C-c-cake, D-d-dog, E-e-elephant…”
F-f-fuck me. There is no way to make a phonics book for 1st grade, non-native English speakers interesting. The only part worse than the content is trying to stretch it for thirty minutes, five times a week.
“Y-y-yoyo…Z-z-zebra. One more time…”
On any given day I have the girls’ attention for between five and ten minutes and the boys’ two or three before they rediscover their noses or their classmates. I’ve come to accept this. This age group isn’t expected to learn much. Rather, my role is to get them used to foreigners. I am a starter white guy. All I need to do is maintain a semblance of order. Open books give the appearance that we are studying actively on and on to make the happy learning time.

The bell sends me in retreat back to the teachers’ room. The older elementary students begin to arrive and the lobby is clogged with kids, parents, teachers and staff. Since living here I’ve adopted the Korean approach to moving through a crowd. I lower my shoulder and barrel through, knocking slighter built students to the side.
Back in the teachers’ lounge the sound of young girls’ overly-dramatic shrieks are still audible. Several students pop their heads in curiously. It seems as if they have trouble believing we foreigners exist at all outside of the classroom. They watch us like zoo animals as we shoot down small cups of coffee and cram in mouthfuls of food.
“Brian Teacher.”
I look towards the door. One of my students is gesturing for me to come over. I wave her towards me.
She holds out her hand and offers a pile of crushed, uncooked ramen noodles.
“Wow, thanks Julie. Mmmm looks good.”
She passes them to me and some stick to her sweaty palm. After that she slowly walks back out towards the door, watching to see if I eat them. I stand up and pretend to go file some papers and as I do I drop the mangled noodles into Betty Anne’s handbag. I turn back to Julie and pretend to be chewing.
“Mmmm… yummy Julie. Thank you.”
Satisfied, she rejoins her classmates in the lobby.
Jean closes the door and calls for the teachers’ attention.
“OK teachers. I have small information to tell. Please finish student evaluation on Friday. Next week I am calling parents and speak them. Please writing one good thing and one bad thing for students.”
I’ve found if that if this requirement is met, it’s possible to write anything else, as long as one disguises their English. For example, I write:
Mary, Class B4
If whingeing and smelling like fermented produce were indicators of scholarly aptitude, then Mary would be at the top of her class. As they are not, I foresee a life marked by mediocrity. A good reader. Needs to improve listening.
Most of the teachers don’t even acknowledge Jean. The only one really paying attention is Dave. Betty Anne looks around cautiously before slipping some raisins into her mouth. Joe is browsing the internet for new clothes. Seth is eating a convenience store sandwich. This is a dangerous proposition in any country, and especially one where you can’t read the ingredients. He takes it down in about 5 bites and lets loose a gurgling burp which makes the Christian shudder.
I continue writing.
Steve, Class B2
Steve’s knack for the English language is no better than that of an invertebrate. I’m forced to consider the direction of my life each time I’m in his presence. In my opinion, he will continue to be a drain on all those around him well into middle-age. He is a good writer but needs to work on his behavior.

Speech contest is almost ready to begin. The twice-yearly spectacle involves students’ recitations of a given topic in front of their peers and teachers. For the non-participants, it is pretty much a day off from classes. The same goes for teachers, only we have the burden of scoring the speeches, which generally range from shitty to god awful. The event is on par with an office workshop or training day: it’s boring, but you generally don’t have to do much and it’s slightly better than actually working.
In the lobby the secretaries try to settle down eighty rambunctious students. The contest participants nervously make final preparations in classroom one. Jean hands out a scoring sheet to the teachers and provides some last minute instructions.
“As you know, we have speech contest now. Students are very hard for speech contest so show them your eagerness. Also, as you know, some parents at speech contest so please do best to be generous and paramount for parents.”
After the briefing she moves to the lobby and begins to speak into a portable PA system. After saying a few words in Korean she announces, “OK, now, teachers will please come.”
We take our seats on a lineup of chairs against the wall, making an informal judge’s panel. Jean claps twice and the students are supposed to respond in unison to show they are paying attention. The excitement is too much for some of them and they can’t sit still.
“Everybody, please shit! Shit down! Shit! Now crap! Like this! Crap hands!” says Jean.
After a minute or so all of the students at last shit and crap and the speech contest is ready to begin.
Before it does, though, Jean addresses a group of about twenty parents at the back of the room. The truth is this performance is all for them. English in Korea is two things: a business and a status symbol. Koreans understand that the language is an integral part of globalization, and that not being able to speak it leaves them at a serious disadvantage. What’s happened, though, is that their near-obsession with learning English has turned into a massive and massively profitable industry where schools sell not so much English, but the appearance of learning English.
For the parents, the consumers, the important thing is being able to afford to send their kid to a private academy. They want to see foreign teachers and English textbooks and drop in once a semester to lean against the wall, beaming with hubris, as English words come out of their child’s mouth. The problem is that they don’t understand how horrifically bad that English actually is. This bastardization of the Anglo tongue is the result of schools trying to keep parents happy, and the parents are happy if they are told during the once a semester telephone conferences that everything is fine, their child is learning, he is brilliant and happy and yes, maybe his spelling needs improvement and his pronunciation could use some work, but overall he’s doing well. Keep paying the tuition; its money well spent. The management doesn’t care if the kids learn English as long as they can memorize the material long enough to pass an exam. They just want the textbooks finished, so a shiny new one can be sent home and shown off as the illusion of progress.
The staff and teachers win because they make a nice fat paycheck out of this farce. The parents win because they have the satisfaction of knowing their child is learning the ever-important English. The only losers are the students who are merely pawns in an industry that is epitomized by this orchestration called speech contest, where Koreans, foreigners and English intersect in a vague, fabricated idea of a better and happy forever prosperous joyful life. But make no mistake about it: never, ever, not even for a moment, is any of this about learning English.

The topic of this semester’s speech contest is “My Family”.
First up to present is Billy from class A4. Like most 12 year old Korean boys he has black hair, a bowl cut, glasses and a kimchi stain down the front of his shirt. His poster board is adorned with photos of him and his family on vacation. The ‘i’ in ‘Family’ has been awkwardly added in after the fact over the top of the m and the l. After a nervous look around he begins.
“My family. My family is me, brother, mother, father sister. Father job microprocessor and is kind. Mother…mother…
Jean tries to get some encouragement from the crowd. “Crap…come on…crap for Billy!”
“Mother….mother cook home. Sister pretty. My study math go USA. Thank you my speech.”
Hmm, Billy…not your best work…though graded on a curve this will probably be in the top 2/3. 7.5 out of 10.
“OK good job Billy. Next student is Harry 2.”
Most students named Harry are a little on the meaty side, and this one is no exception. Like his classmate he too sports a look common among his age group: gray hairs. While learning English may not be real in Korea, the pressure to learn it is. Koreans believe education is the cornerstone of success, resulting in fierce competition in both public schools and private institutions like this one. And English is only part of it. Most students attend at least one or two additional academies to perfect skills such as math, science and Korean. In an atmosphere where not being the best is often regarded as failure, it’s easy to see why students gray at the age of twelve and indeed, why South Korea has one of the highest suicide rates in the world.
Harry clears his throat, works out a facial tic and begins his speech.
“My family is me, father and mother. Father has Samsung job. He is smart. Mother is clean the house. She is kind. My is student. I like chicken. Thank you for listen my speech.”
Solid delivery. This will be hard to beat. 9.5 out of 10.
I decide to take advantage of the time and grade a few journals, which are the students’ weekly writing assignments. Excerpts from this batch include:
Jenny, Class B4
“My Weekend”
This weekend I made an omelet and ate my family.
Daisy, Class C6
“Test”
In my weekend I creamed for an exam. I know creaming is not the best way to prepare for an exam.
Jessica, Class D2
“My Hero”
My hero is Oprah Winfrey because she overcame being ugly negro.
Stan, Class C6
“Math”
I like math because I use math to find the rectum.
“Very good,” says Jean. “Thank you. Next student Sally.”
As I pick up a new stack of diaries Seth grabs my arm.
“Dude.”
“What?”
“Dude…look.”
He points to Sally. I see nothing out of the ordinary. Straight black hair. Glasses. Pink outfit…and there it is. In silver lettering on Sally’s shirt are the words, “I Fuck on the First Date.”
The teachers look at each other. It is a silent meeting to decide whether to do something or not. Nobody makes a move.
I measure the parents’ reactions. There is no sign of recognition that the girl at the front of the room is endorsing promiscuity. None of the students appear to notice either. Jean doesn’t have a clue. She pats the girl on the shoulder and tells her to begin. Sally delivers her monologue and at the end everybody craps and the next speaker is brought on.
It is a speech contest day miracle. Sally’s pretty pink shirt is an indictment of the entire English-language business in Korea. Wearing those six embossed words, she lays bare the entire sham.
Seth pulls me close to him and says,
“Dude, this is the greatest day of our teaching careers.”

Click here to read Part III: Happy Hour in Hades

I’ve been told that ‘somebody’ will meet me at the airport. After being herded through immigration, baggage collection and customs I emerge in a lobby where scores of people are waiting to meet passengers. I’ve never seen this many Asians in one place, except maybe when free furniture was left on the curb near my apartment in Boston.

I hope that whoever is waiting at least has a picture or some other way of identifying me. Several people hold up signs with passengers’ names on them. My entire life I’ve wanted to have a chauffeur awaiting my arrival with a sign that reads: “Brian Eckert.” I always imagined it to denote some level of importance.

I’m not sure what a sign reading ‘Briv Ecklbert” denotes. The flight number matches mine, while the name is less certain. I approach the man with the sign and nod. Without any confirmation that I am in fact Mr. Ecklbert he snatches my suitcase and grunts for me to follow him. He leads me outside and across a parking lot to a van. Once we’re settled inside I ask him how far it is to our destination. He doesn’t answer, as he’s busy entering coordinates onto a GPS mounted on the van’s dash. The machine robotically speaks a language I can make no sense of. As we start moving I again ask about where we’re going.

“No Englishey,” he says brusquely and turns on the radio.

The English teaching business is unique not least of all because one of its core requirements, being a native English-speaker, has nothing to do with individual merit. Being born in America and inheriting her mother tongue can no more be credited to me than my eye color or height. When first considering a job teaching English I found it hard to believe I could work in hundreds of countries by virtue of a natal fluke.

However, it was refreshing to discover that being American made me automatically qualified to do something overseas besides don a uniform and join the ranks of an occupying force. And although teaching English is itself a relic of colonialism, it can also be quite lucrative.

I came to South Korea in 2006 after returning home dead broke from a backpacking trip in South America. I needed a job but I also wanted to continue traveling. Teaching English overseas seemed to be the perfect gig. My first choice was Japan, I country I’d always longed to see. I applied to a bunch of schools there but was rejected by some and told by others that placement could take up to six months. Needing more immediate means to earn money and continue my peripatetic ways, I decided to look elsewhere.

Korea was a place I knew almost nothing about, but also one where I could make thirty five grand a year for a 30 hour work week, not to mention free airfare, accommodation and health insurance. It had the added benefit of requiring very little from prospective employees except for the aforementioned nationality, a college degree and the nerve to fly 13,000 miles and plunge headlong into a career that your studies didn’t even remotely prepare you for. (I would find out later that being fat, misshapen/deformed, disabled, ugly, black(or even quite brown) or bearded are generally grounds for rejection.)

Within a few days of sending out emails to a recruiter I had a telephone interview with a Korean woman named Jean. After explaining to me that her school was not only “convenient” but also “funny and joyful,” she asked how soon I could start. While I’d done my best to prepare for the interview, I hadn’t once imagined a job offer in the first thirty seconds. I asked for a day to think about it and then sat down to make my decision. I was unsettled by the sheer vagueness of the move to Korea and Jean’s inability to speak coherent English, but in the end I was moved most by the potential for adventure. A week later, I was on a flight.

The van makes its way through Seoul rush hour traffic. Even as I gaze out the window at the Hyundais, Kias and Daewoos driven by people with Asian faces, it hasn’t quite hit me that I’m in Korea.

We must be getting close because the driver is on the phone trying to get directions; at least I think that’s what’s happening. At home I never appreciated the simple luxury of understanding what the people around me are saying. For all I know I’ve been kidnapped and am en route to North Korean officials who will hold me as a bargaining chip in their international nuclear talks. In case that’s true I try to get my bearings but everywhere we’ve been looks exactly the same: a collection of high rises and shops that are stacked on top of each other in a way that’s at the same time orderly and chaotic. Outside of Vegas I’ve never seen so many neon lights. I feel I might have a seizure from all the flashing colors.

The van stops on a street corner and the driver gets out. I stay put, waiting to see what happens next. He opens the door and grunts. I get out and survey the scene as my bags are piled at my feet. A man on a motor scooter barrels down the sidewalk inches from me without batting an eye. There are students in navy and black school uniforms walking in troops everywhere. Men wearing shiny metallic suits strut down the street together with the look of those emboldened by alcohol. Young women in obscenely short skirts giggle and walk arm in arm. Elderly people line the sidewalks selling produce, fish and street food.

“I’m in Korea,” I keep thinking, but the idea still doesn’t ring true. The scene is utterly surreal.

“Ahhh, you Brian. Welcome Korea,” says a voice in a protracted, nasally whine that sounds vaguely familiar. I turn to see a short Korean woman in glasses.

“You more handsome than photo. I can see you best teacher.” she says.

“I’m sorry, who are you?” I ask.

“I am school manager Jean. We phone speaking.”

The twenty five hour journey from Boston provided more than enough time for me to doubt my choice to come to Korea, and the closer I got the more dubious it seemed. Now, standing on a frenetic street corner in Seoul, struggling to get my bearings among the onslaught of foreign sights, sounds and smells, I must concede I have no idea what I’ve gotten myself into.

“Please, your come inside me.” says Jean.

No idea at all.

I collect my bags and follow the diminutive stranger into the building. During the elevator ride she locks a toothy, awkward grin on me. I don’t know if I should respond in some way, but I at least can be sure I’m not in the hands of the enemy. She doesn’t seem to have the brain power required for international conspiracy.

We stop at the third floor and I step into the lobby. Two Korean women wave at me from behind a desk.

“We here,” says Jean.

I put my bags down and wander through the halls, peeping into the classrooms. I’ve nearly forgotten that teaching is the reason I’m here.

I ask Jean how many days I’ll train before taking over a classroom of my own.

“Actually, your begin tomorrow,” she says.

“Really? But I have no experience. I’ve been on a plane for almost a day. I’m not at all ready to start.”

“But is OK because you very handsome. You can do good job.”

I look at her, flabbergasted, until circus-like music sounds from unseen speakers. The classrooms empty and the lobby is suddenly filled with Korean children. They whisper to each other and point at me. Jean brings a pair of girls over and tells them,

“Here new teacher Brian.”

They stare at me, clearly uncomfortable.

“Hi,” I say. “How are you?”

Blank stares.

“What are your names?”

Jean says something to them in Korean.

“Sally,” says the student on the left.

“Sally,” says the student on the right.

“You’re both named Sally?”

More staring.

The other foreigners eye me on their way back from class.

“Come on,” says Jean. “Let’s meet teachers.”

The teachers’ room is long and narrow with desks arranged on each side facing the wall. Jean’s desk is at the back of the room looking out toward the door.

“Everybody please listen to me.”

Only one teacher looks up; the others vaguely glance our way.

“OK so this new teacher Brian of USA. Please help make the welcome feeling.”

I nod and introduce myself to the guy nearest me. His name is Dave, from Indiana. He’s clean cut, excruciatingly polite and there’s a bible lying on his desk with highlighted passages. Jesus freak…we’ll likely maintain a professional but distant relationship.

Next to him is Joe, from Mississippi. He is impeccably dressed in a charcoal suit with a shiny pink tie and is checking out a webpage entitled, “Ten Surefire Ways to a Sleek, Sexy Midsection.” Fag…which means he probably at least likes to party.

To my left is Betty Anne from Florida. She has greasy, mousy-blonde hair, a bad complexion, a nervous demeanor and too-huge boobs. Just plain frightening…I will go out of my way to avoid interacting with her.

To her right is Seth from Orange County. He wears a gaudy gold watch, a baggy polo shirt and has a mop of curly hair spilling from his chest and head. Ex-wigger Italian or Jew…from the outset the pick of the litter.

After the brief introductions the teachers make a b-line for the elevator and I’m left alone with Jean.

“So, you pleased at conditions?” she says.

“Ah, sure,” I say. “So, I’m really starting tomorrow?”

“Yes. Don’t worry. Students are beautiful and joyful.”

“Well, I’m sure they are but…um, where am I sleeping tonight?”

We park in front of a tall building downtown and take the elevator up to the fourth floor. Jean speaks to the woman at the desk and gets a room key. When I open the door I’m greeted by a square, windowless space. It’s as charming as a bank lobby. I set my bags down and walk in.

“Your is fine?” asks Jean.

“Yeah, no problem.” I say

“Please your ready tomorrow by 10 a.m. I take you school.” she says, then leaves.

Alone in this box there are no signs of the alien world outside. If I squint I can still convince myself I’m at home.

I change my shirt and decide to have a look around. As I step out into the hallway I notice a commotion a few doors down. Several men in suits are gathered around something on the floor. I pretend to be going that way to get a closer look.

From ten paces away I can smell the booze on them. When I get closer I see one man on the floor, too drunk to stand. A few steps beyond him two men in formalwear are squatting against the wall, holding hands and talking about something very seriously.

“Hey, hey, you you!” one of them says to me. “Where’s your from?”

“USA.”

“Ahhhh, America good. I like you. You handsome boy.”

He takes me by the hand.

The man on the floor is swaying and burping stuff up.

“Thanks. Your friend…he’s OK?”

“Yes, he drunken many. Now sleeping time. Hey, you drinking? You come me?”

He begins petting my head tenderly.

“No, thank you. I’m very tired.”

“Please, you are coming me. Is Korea do. You know Korea soju?”

“No, I’ve never tried it. OK, OK, one drink.”

At 3:30 a.m. I stumble out of the room and almost trip over the passed out Korean man. In the past several hours he’s managed to strip down to his underwear and vomit up something extremely orange.

On the way back to my room I notice a half-open door. I step through it and onto a balcony. There is a makeshift clothesline strung across it with towels and other linens hanging. The mid-November air is chilly, but still somewhat pleasant. I look out over Seoul. It reminds me of a pinball machine with its flashing lights and strange music. 3:30 a.m. is officially the hour when nothing happens, but here, the nocturnal procession carries on. The streets are filled with people.

I take a deep breath and exhale slowly. The rice liquor has left me feeling warm and content.

“I’m in Korea,” I say aloud. “I live in Seoul. I live in Asia.”

An abstract notion of world travel has finally fused with reality. I’ve made it.

There’s a noise behind me. I turn around and see the Korean man in his underwear stumbling out onto the balcony. He slumps down to his knees and expels more orange liquid. It clings to the slotted metal for a moment before dribbling onto the street below. Some of it lands on the female half of a smartly-dressed couple walking hand in hand. Her boyfriend looks up and sees me, then shouts in perfect English,

“You! Hey! I’m gonna kill you motherfucker!”

Click here to read Volume II: A Speech Contest Day Miracle