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One of the things that kinda tripped my balls when I first got here was the shower. As you can see, my bathroom is rather small - like a residence don's bathroom, perhaps, or a bathroom that a very devout monk might rock on occasion. The bathroom is so compact because the entire fucking room is a shower stall. See that showerhead on the wall there, beside the mirror? Yep, I hose myself down with that bad boy every day, in front of the sink, and the water pools on the tiled floor and eventually drains (very slowly). I don't know why, but the whole process makes me feel like ridiculous livestock: a glibly showering horse standing on its hind legs.

The rest of the apartment is pretty sweet, albeit a single room. I have a nice big window that peers out onto the highrises and mountains beyond, and a 1/2 sized fridge packed with unintelligible food items. I think one of them is chicken wings, but you never know. Last night, me and Chad and Jen fried up some dumplings and they had purple paste inside, not the sweet meatstuffs we had been eagerly craving.

We had been convinced of the dumplings' quality because the packaging was adorned with an enticing little mascot cartoon. He jauntily held a tray of dumplings in one bulbous hand and joyfully shouted the dumplings' many praises in Korean symbols while wearing a big, shit-eating grin.

The kicker was that the mascot guy was, himself, a dumpling and his hands and feet were also dumplings. So here he is, offering up himself and a big steaming plate of his family for our gluttony. That's some serious advertising, essentially saying: "Yes, that's right - us dumplings are so damn tasty that here I am, a dumpling myself, recommending that you eat my legs and all of my aunties and uncles for supper. You must consume us all!"

But he was a liar. The dumplings were purple and bean-y and gah inside, hardly the delicious feast we were promised. I hope that me and Chad and Jen choked down his family and all his limbs first so he had to watch. And there's one dumpling left, sitting on my kitchen counter, and that's him. I hope that mofo is happy. I'm probably going to throw him out the window later.

Check out this huge honkin' box of pears. My boss got them for me and the rest of the teachers for Chusok, which is the Korean harvest moon holiday and sorta like Thanksgiving. These pears are enormous and their large girth make them rather impossible to eat. I've been giving them away as gifts as fast as I can, but the other teachers who live on my apartment floor have been doing the same. The funny thing is that this big box of pears is worth a shitload of money over here - I saw a 3-pack of these suckers at the grocery store going for about 10 000 won (10 bucks).

Sometimes I wish I liked pears more.

Posted by Chris at 05:54 AM >> Commentations (8)