Checking off the list

First off who in the hell is hamsterjockey 24? And am I to believe there are 23 more people out there with the name hamsterjockey? These are questions crying out for answers, please help in anyway you can. Hamsterjockey just doesn't sound right, reminds me too much of Richard Gere.



Alright we are 3 days into school and believe it or not I've been there for 2 of them. I've gotta think this is one of the sweetest teaching jobs there is, so much so there really isn't anything to talk about. The students are cool, my principal loves me (we cut out yesterday and went to Seoul), the school is cleaner than a hospital and I'm getting paid way more than I should. One funny thing I learned today that may be worth sharing is just one of those little cultural differences you find. All are maintenance and cleaning people are Korean and we have a small battalion of rather short Korean ladies that constantly go around the school cleaning up every little thing (those of you working for Racine Unified and there ultra-hygienic every other day cleaning schedule would really appreciate this little feature). More and more I'm coming to realize how hard Korean people work, as someone from the oddly labeled Generation X and it's tendency toward slackerness, it's really quite astounding. I first got a hint of this work ethic while still in the state. My friend Matt and I who got hooked on sushi and mai tai's (this is for another day altogether but why is it that during 99% of my I never have the urge to have a drink, but during the 1% of the time I'm around Matt Geisler having a drink seems like the most natural thing in the world; very strange). Well to get back to the point, when Matt and I would go to the sushi place in Racine, Shogun, we would always see the same girl, whose named we later learned to be Kim. It was as if she never left the place. After a while we became friendly enough for conversation and asked her about it and I for one got the impression it wasn't a big deal to her, it was completely normal. By the way the people that run the "Japanese" restaurant are Korean (and increasing Mexican which really sucks because the quality of the rolling has been going way down hill which sucks because you're starting to get these lob sided rolls with stuff falling out all over the place; and believe me it's not like the price is going down any). Now that I'm actually in Korea I see this work ethic was not some sort of Korean-person-in-Racine anomaly. So when are we getting to the cultural difference you may be wondering? Well right now. The Korean cleaning ladies think nothing of walking into the male bathroom and going about their cleaning business. You and some male students will be using the bathroom for the purposes it was designed for and you will find yourself dodging mops and little Korean women bent over the garbage cans. You quickly discover it's no big deal and appreciate their efforts, it's just the oddness of those first few times and the American-induced uncomfortableness that goes along with it. I couldn't imagine how it would be at an American middle or even high school where the male students are so uncomfortable and homophobic that they literally make love to the urinals; some of them practically have both feet inside of them. That was a long story about very little and to sum things up, school has started and there really isn't anything of interest to talk about so I'm going to move on and talk about something else.



Everybody has there own unique list of things they need to discover and check off when they move somewhere new. For some it may be where the nearest Magic card playing hobby shop is located (Rios; I can't believe I have one of those friends), for others it may be where the nearest Hooters is (Scott Fay, more on him later, but as Joey can attest, there is a really uncomfortable story here), still others may wonder where the nearest bar for guys who want to get drunk quick is at (obviously this is Geisler, by the way Matt what is the name of that bar? It's not Martini's) finally one might wonder where the really hot drama teacher who I can make out with is at (Nikki Michaels; I'm not sure if she's reading this but I always did love that story).

One of the things I'm always really interested in is where are the good restaurants located. The first week here I felt like a complete idiot because I was so busy running around trying to find things on base I would usually end up eating at the base's Chili's restaurant; I kept seriously thinking to myself "you came all the way to Korea and you're eating at Chili's?). Well luckily that page has mostly been turned, although I do like my baby back ribs on occasion. One of my favorite types of restaurants is the Thai restaurant and luckily I have found one quite close to the base, well withing walking distance which is a pretty key feature at the moment. I ventured out to my new favorite restaurant tonight after taking my driver's test (It's a pretty sweet system they have here. They give you the test, collect it back, grade it, and then sometimes hand it back to you and say "Sir would you like to review the first section of your test", which is really nice because after "reviewing" it I discovered I needed to make a few changes and wah-lahh, I passed). Over the weekend I had the green chili curry and it was some of the best I've had, so tonight I decided to go for a noodle dish. It wasn't quite as good but one of the things I truly appreciate about the place is that when you ask for something spicy, they make it spicy; so unlike most of the restaurant in the greater Racine area. Spicy food has a way of completely resetting you physically and mentally. If done correctly the hurt and pain completely clears the mind; it's really quite an experience.

I consider spicy food the fansidar of the culinary experiences. For those of you amongst the uninitiated, fansidar was this secret pill the Peace Corps gives you; sort of a drug of last resort. Whenever you came down with the tropical ailment of mysterious origin and where laying on your bed in the steaming heat completely unsure and slightly delusional, you would simply dig into the medical kit, find the fansidar, and know everything was going to be OK. Joey and I liked to equate it to the reset button on your VCR. You hit the button and Poohfff, you instantly get blinking red lights; not a completely functional state, but not a state of imminent collapse either.

I have to interrupt now and tell you my favorite spicy food story. You get to meet a new character in the story of my past, this one named Scott Fay; another Peace Corps friend. Joey (if you've forgotten, my closest P.C. friend) and I have decided Scott is luckiest guy we know, the guy with the best life around. I don't think we're really jealous or anything, there's no way either of us could ever life the Scott Fay lifestyle, in fact we're both really happy for him. Even though he's from New Jersey or somewhere lame like that, Scott is very California, and more specifically very Berkeley. He has the best disposition of anyone I know, he is always happy, smiling, and laughing. The best way I can think of to sum up the whole situation is Scott Fay is the type of guy who uses the word nebulous in casual conversation. Scott goes to Berkeley and they send him all over the world to collect little snails or something like that. Scott thinks to himself "Gee, I'd really like to go back to New Guinea" and then comes up with some crazy plan to go there and collect snails and Berkeley sends him; it's really the greatest deal I've ever heard of. Now back to the story. I believe we were at our end of service conference in Port Moresby. A lot had changed in the 2 years we had been over there, we started out with 50 some people and ended up with about half that. In some ways that made us special, except none of us really felt special, I mean come on, we were in New Guinea not one of the glamorous Peace Corps destinations. We were all convinced all the overachieving, Peace Corps superstars were sent to places like Thailand or Kenya. New Guinea? we were more on the level with places like Moldova.

So, we go to this Chinese restaurant and order food. I believe Scott goes last and orders a bowl of soup and asks for it to be spicy. The waiter diligently writes down the order, Scott then repeats that he wants his dish hot, followed quickly by the obligatory Scott Fay smile and laugh. The waiter turns to Scott and says "Oh you want it hot? I'll make it HOT". Every one at the table was a bit taken aback, this was just normal Scott Fay, and really quite endearing, but we knew it didn't go over well. The food came and the rest of us instantly forgot about the clash of cultures and became completely distracted with eating. It wasn't long before Scott mentions his soup is pretty hot. Nothing of alarm to the rest of us, doesn't someone always say "Ewww my food is hot" when group dining at an Asian restaurant? Persistence does have a way of making a point and after hearing it enough and experiencing Scott's face as he removed his glasses and stretched his face in response to the soup, the point was made; well it's better said the point was acknowledged. Soon the soup was offered to the rest of us. It really is tough to describe. The pain didn't go away, it really didn't go away. It felt like having small worms covered in broken glass crawling around inside your head. That was one of the last meals we had together in PNG and it's one you don't forget; a bunch of Americans in New Guinea eating Chinese food. It just shows you life is better unplanned.

Oh, Scott and his wife (another PC PNG group 29'er) recently had a baby (boy I think) so let's all be happy about that. Better yet if anyone from St. Cat's is reading this, the next time you're all together on Wednesday and they ask for intentions, someone needs to say "Scott Fay and his wife just had a baby and I'd like us to wish it a wonderful life". When this is done please tell me all about it.

And now a word from Joey Rios:

On the topic of MTV Asia and Mr. Fay:One of the biggest things I remember about discovering MTV Asia actually involves our good friend Scott Fay. For some reason while watching a video by some Chinese/Hong Kong pop star (singing in English with an accent), Scott wanted to make it clear that this singer was from California and currently attended UC Berkeley. I have no idea why he believed this to be true, nor why he couldn't understand our skepticism at the claim. If he could have somehow let us know how the hell he would have known such a thing, I think we may have given him the benefit of the doubt. I am pretty sure, in retrospect, that he was joking about knowing who that singer was. But he joked in a bizarre Scott Fay-ish sort of way that wasn't funny and was just odd. And like you said earlier, Scott is always smiling, so you can't get a read on the guy. And, by the way, Chili IS fine!

Joey