Progress Report 20.1
Annyongh hasseyo, chumpychops.
How's things? It's been a while, hasn't it? I can't really say that a great deal has happened in the time since the last report, but I have been to the DMZ and to a theme park and to the toilet around 140 times (of which about 22 were 'sit-down visits'). I've also bought myself a shiny new laptop, and I'm using it to write this right here right now. This means that one item on my 'Things to Do in Korea' list can be ticked off, a measly five months and three weeks into the enterprise. How's that for firey, liquid-lightening dynamism?
And you'll also no doubt notice that the timing of this achievement falls one week short of my six month anniversary. Next Wednesday, I shall have been in the Republic of Korea for six whole British imperial months. That's half a year, or 26 weeks, or 182 days or 13 fortnights or about the time it takes to get a sandwich in the Korean version of Subway. And with this vaguely meaningless milestone looming, it seems appropriate to offer some manner of reflection on the journey thus far. So let's...
It's been remarked upon by several recipients of these reports that though I'm thorough and perspicacious in some respects, they feel that they aren't getting a proper feeling of the bigger picture. In particular, they want to know whether or not I'm actually enjoying it out here. I think that when they proffer this tendril, they're expecting a straightforward answer in response. Well, excuse me, but last time I checked, I didn't have a two breasts and a uterus - if they think they can just roll out a welcome mat for my 'inner feelings' and expect them to come in for an Earl Grey and a leaf through 'Chat', then they've got the wrong end of the tampon. Such matters aren't available to feminine level communication. I can't pull a response out from the deeper depths and have it sit at the kitchen table as a one-word answer. Males don't do that shit. And if we try, whatever we manhandle into the daylight just comes out as "s'alright". If you're happy with that, then so be it: Am I enjoying it here? Yeah, s'alright. However, if you want something that weighs a few carats, then you have to be a bit more patient. I'll come back to it, okay?
Now, this morning I went to the gym. Nothing unusual there - I'm trying to get big so that I can punch people in the head and they notice. The management of the gym aid me and other members in our quest to expend energy pleasurably by providing (at no extra cost) a startlingly loud K-Pop accompaniment. This isn't your standard K-Pop, mind you, but a souped-up, high energy K-Pop sub-genre. The principle difference between it and normal K-Pop is around 150 beats per minute. Basically, you take K-Pop (which is reconstituted, mechanically-recovered Kentucky McMusic at the best of times), double the tempo, take out any melody, add some happy-hardcore-style dissonance, and then get a semi-anglophonic moron to shout along to it. It's so devoid of artistic value that even the most feral of teenage gluesniffers would dismiss it as a bloody racket. I think the well-meant intention of the gym's upper echelons is that some lively, homegrown choons will make the clientele of off-the-boil housewives lift their knees higher on the treadmills, but the realised effect - on me, at least - is one of weary despair. The stonecold awfulness of the music is further exacerbated by their only being around six tracks available, which are played in strict rotation, all day, every day. When you're as ninja-disciplined in your exercise regime as I am, the cumulitive mental effect of repeated exposure to such musical pollution is harrowing. For instance, I'm now starting to suspect that the Fast Food Rockers weren't entirely without merit.
This morning, though, I was at the gym and I found myself in the midst of a K-Pop apocalypse.
In addition the chaos of the standard playlist being belted out at volume, the aerobics class at the far end of the room also got in on the action with their own mix. There were two sources of hideous anti-music bellowing out simultaneously, generating such a cacophonious mesh that squealing feedback would have come as a soothing relief. I stopped pedalling my exercise bike (which was on the toughest 'uphill' setting, by the way) and gazed around in wonder. Hell was pouring in through my ears and sticking shards into my brain but I was evidently the only one who noticed. No-one else seemed to mind the sound-riot that had broken out. No-one seemed to mind! The other workers-out all went placidly amidst the noise and aural violence and carried on their exercise without so much as a tut or a pair of rolled eyes. This suggests to me that they have either the inner calm of the Dalai Lama or the receptivity of a dog chew.
If this had been taking place in a British gym, then I don't think I need to tell you that the manager would have found himself dealing with a workplace danger not covered on the GCSE sports science syllabus. But here, he can saunter amongst the apparatus as his gym reverberates with violent discord without the slightest fear of protest from his paying customers. He sees nothing wrong with the musical warfare playing out and neither do they. There is just one pale whitey in the middle of the room who looks like he's having a moment. What's his problem, eh? Silly whitey. Ooh, the cross-trainer looks like it could do with a wipe down...
The preceding example serves to explain why, if the Noise Abatement Society were ever considering preaching their message in Korea, they could yell it through a bullhorn into the face of every man, woman and child and still they wouldn't win a single convert. (Not least because of their shameless hypocrisy!) The fact is that Koreans, as a people, don't hear noise. And more than this, Koreans, as a people, don't feel irritation.
Want more proof? Okay: on Sunday morning, the Jewess and I were sleeping peacefully, when we were metaphorically kicked awake by a mooing from the corridor. I live, if you remember, on the thirteenth floor of an apartment block, and coming from tile-lined hallway was a sound not unlike a cow lowing in an echo chamber (such are the tiles' acoustic effect). As the noise gained in volume, it became clear that it was not a head of cattle but a human. He was repeating two syllables, deep and low. It sounded like 'oil cloth', but long and drawn-out, like 'ooooiiilll clootttthhh'. This incantation was accompanied by the slow slapping clop of his stagger as he dragged himself from one end of the building to the other and back again. I looked at the clock - it was nine thirty AM. On a Sunday frigging morning. I was speechless.
You might expect that my primary concern would be establishing this man's reason for mooing. He might have been warning of a very slowly spreading fire, or maybe selling diazepam door-to-door. However, I already knew his mission - he was taking in dry cleaning. I knew this because he'd pulled the same stunt the Saturday prior, but that time an hour earlier. Consequently, I'd made enquiries with my students and they'd told me his game.
'How does he dare?' I'd asked them.
'Dare what?' they'd replied.
'Wake an entire apartment block up at 8.30am on a Saturday?' I explained.
'People don't mind,' they responded. 'It's a handy service.'
'But it's 8.30! On a SATURDAY!' I added by way of a clarification. I got shrugs in return.
I went on to tell them how, should he ever go on holiday to London and decide to give his patter a twirl in a British tower block, he might possibly get one floor up before the Korean embassy would need to start making arrangements for DHL to ship whatever was left of his body back home. My students couldn't understand why this might be. 'He has to make a living,' they'd protested. No amount of reasoned, home-is-his-castle rationalisation could get them to budge an inch from their charitable, tolerant attitude.
And this is, in the final analysis, what the Korean missing irritability gene amounts to: Saint-like tolerance, unshakeable patience and a cast iron unflusterability when met with the deeds of their fellow man.
And goodness me, do they need it, for there's a f*ckload of people crammed onto this peninsular...
Korea is the in the top twenty of the world's most densely populated nations, and Seoul itself is the seventh biggest city in the world. When the surrounding metropolitan areas are factored in, it shoots up to second place, and with a population estimated at 22,770,000, nearly half the population of the country is squeezed into one small corner of it. This necessarily means that a lot of people are going to be living very close together. Indeed, it makes London look like a barren prairie. When you're in such close proximity to your countrymen, if you're not accepting of their antics, then you're not going to last very long. Koreans are tolerant and patient because they've got no choice.
This is why they let salesmen yell in their faces as they browse in the supermarket, and let department stores set up stalls that congest the exits and escalators. This is why they can make so much noise when they're eating, and why they can bawl at each other in the pub without getting taken outside. The ethos is 'agitate and let agitate'. It is an approach that stems weak status of the individual in the Korean system of thought. Individualism is something we take for granted in the West, but here, its rise is seen by some as encroaching and dangerous neo-colonialism. Since the nation found itself newly self-determining (after a fashion) in 1945, the message from the top has been for everyone to pull together and get the economy shipshape. At first, this was achieved through more traditional and robustly authoritarian means, but as things got more comfortable financially, the leaders loosened their grips on the reins and let capitalism work its magic. The people began to discover and embrace new-fangled post-industrial concepts such as personal freedom and leisure time (though for some, this is still measured in minutes). They found that they had an economy and infra-structure that could compete with any in the world. Their hard work was starting to pay off. Those growing old found that they were living in a very different country to the Third World rural backwater they got back from the Japanese at the end of World War II. Korea's transformation has been utterly dramatic. This, however, is a matter for another report.
For now, I shall return to the earlier question: Am I enjoying it out here?
In a word, mm-hmm. After nearly six months, I'm starting to go beyond the day-to-day and deeper into the Korean psyche (if that doesn't make me sound like a twat). It's a journey that keeps on surprising, and a journey that keeps me learning - about people, about me, about shit. And what's not to love about a journey like that? I hope that this expanded scope shall be reflected in the tone of future reports.
Don't worry though - I'm not about to come down with a case of I'm-Korean-itis. It's a common problem amongst some of the weaker minded Westerners here - they're not quite happy with the personality that they've formed thus far in their lives (and neither, no doubt, was the country they came from), so they decide to get all more-Korean-than-thou instead. They learn 'emselves the language and follow all the customs and won't touch Western food. It's pathetic and it's a shame but I suppose they're learning too, and deserve some patience and respect too. Or, on the other hand, maybe they're complete f*cking losers who might just get a whole report dedicated to their defamation some time in the future if anyone of them should ever look down their sorry noses at me again. Who knows? Only time shall tell.
Anyway, that just about does her for now. Stay well and keep it real, yeah? Oh, did I mention that it's getting absolutely friggin' freezing here? Well it is. Alright?
Annyonghi kasseyo for now,
S
PS Just to bring you up to date, following on from Michelle's soaking of a whole roll of toilet paper, she has attempted to make amends by bringing two rolls with her on subsequent visits. Whilst I appreciated the gesture, the rolls were not complete, meaning that her attempt at contrite generosity has turned into my administrative nightmare, as I have no idea how many individual leaves remain on each roll. I'm now completely unclear about how much toilet paper I have and whether or not it will last until next month, never mind to the end of the year. However, as soon as I have a free weekend, I'm going to arrange a full audit and I should hopefully be able to offer you a clearer picture of how we stand thereafter. Thanks for your patience on this matter.
How's things? It's been a while, hasn't it? I can't really say that a great deal has happened in the time since the last report, but I have been to the DMZ and to a theme park and to the toilet around 140 times (of which about 22 were 'sit-down visits'). I've also bought myself a shiny new laptop, and I'm using it to write this right here right now. This means that one item on my 'Things to Do in Korea' list can be ticked off, a measly five months and three weeks into the enterprise. How's that for firey, liquid-lightening dynamism?
And you'll also no doubt notice that the timing of this achievement falls one week short of my six month anniversary. Next Wednesday, I shall have been in the Republic of Korea for six whole British imperial months. That's half a year, or 26 weeks, or 182 days or 13 fortnights or about the time it takes to get a sandwich in the Korean version of Subway. And with this vaguely meaningless milestone looming, it seems appropriate to offer some manner of reflection on the journey thus far. So let's...
It's been remarked upon by several recipients of these reports that though I'm thorough and perspicacious in some respects, they feel that they aren't getting a proper feeling of the bigger picture. In particular, they want to know whether or not I'm actually enjoying it out here. I think that when they proffer this tendril, they're expecting a straightforward answer in response. Well, excuse me, but last time I checked, I didn't have a two breasts and a uterus - if they think they can just roll out a welcome mat for my 'inner feelings' and expect them to come in for an Earl Grey and a leaf through 'Chat', then they've got the wrong end of the tampon. Such matters aren't available to feminine level communication. I can't pull a response out from the deeper depths and have it sit at the kitchen table as a one-word answer. Males don't do that shit. And if we try, whatever we manhandle into the daylight just comes out as "s'alright". If you're happy with that, then so be it: Am I enjoying it here? Yeah, s'alright. However, if you want something that weighs a few carats, then you have to be a bit more patient. I'll come back to it, okay?
Now, this morning I went to the gym. Nothing unusual there - I'm trying to get big so that I can punch people in the head and they notice. The management of the gym aid me and other members in our quest to expend energy pleasurably by providing (at no extra cost) a startlingly loud K-Pop accompaniment. This isn't your standard K-Pop, mind you, but a souped-up, high energy K-Pop sub-genre. The principle difference between it and normal K-Pop is around 150 beats per minute. Basically, you take K-Pop (which is reconstituted, mechanically-recovered Kentucky McMusic at the best of times), double the tempo, take out any melody, add some happy-hardcore-style dissonance, and then get a semi-anglophonic moron to shout along to it. It's so devoid of artistic value that even the most feral of teenage gluesniffers would dismiss it as a bloody racket. I think the well-meant intention of the gym's upper echelons is that some lively, homegrown choons will make the clientele of off-the-boil housewives lift their knees higher on the treadmills, but the realised effect - on me, at least - is one of weary despair. The stonecold awfulness of the music is further exacerbated by their only being around six tracks available, which are played in strict rotation, all day, every day. When you're as ninja-disciplined in your exercise regime as I am, the cumulitive mental effect of repeated exposure to such musical pollution is harrowing. For instance, I'm now starting to suspect that the Fast Food Rockers weren't entirely without merit.
This morning, though, I was at the gym and I found myself in the midst of a K-Pop apocalypse.
In addition the chaos of the standard playlist being belted out at volume, the aerobics class at the far end of the room also got in on the action with their own mix. There were two sources of hideous anti-music bellowing out simultaneously, generating such a cacophonious mesh that squealing feedback would have come as a soothing relief. I stopped pedalling my exercise bike (which was on the toughest 'uphill' setting, by the way) and gazed around in wonder. Hell was pouring in through my ears and sticking shards into my brain but I was evidently the only one who noticed. No-one else seemed to mind the sound-riot that had broken out. No-one seemed to mind! The other workers-out all went placidly amidst the noise and aural violence and carried on their exercise without so much as a tut or a pair of rolled eyes. This suggests to me that they have either the inner calm of the Dalai Lama or the receptivity of a dog chew.
If this had been taking place in a British gym, then I don't think I need to tell you that the manager would have found himself dealing with a workplace danger not covered on the GCSE sports science syllabus. But here, he can saunter amongst the apparatus as his gym reverberates with violent discord without the slightest fear of protest from his paying customers. He sees nothing wrong with the musical warfare playing out and neither do they. There is just one pale whitey in the middle of the room who looks like he's having a moment. What's his problem, eh? Silly whitey. Ooh, the cross-trainer looks like it could do with a wipe down...
The preceding example serves to explain why, if the Noise Abatement Society were ever considering preaching their message in Korea, they could yell it through a bullhorn into the face of every man, woman and child and still they wouldn't win a single convert. (Not least because of their shameless hypocrisy!) The fact is that Koreans, as a people, don't hear noise. And more than this, Koreans, as a people, don't feel irritation.
Want more proof? Okay: on Sunday morning, the Jewess and I were sleeping peacefully, when we were metaphorically kicked awake by a mooing from the corridor. I live, if you remember, on the thirteenth floor of an apartment block, and coming from tile-lined hallway was a sound not unlike a cow lowing in an echo chamber (such are the tiles' acoustic effect). As the noise gained in volume, it became clear that it was not a head of cattle but a human. He was repeating two syllables, deep and low. It sounded like 'oil cloth', but long and drawn-out, like 'ooooiiilll clootttthhh'. This incantation was accompanied by the slow slapping clop of his stagger as he dragged himself from one end of the building to the other and back again. I looked at the clock - it was nine thirty AM. On a Sunday frigging morning. I was speechless.
You might expect that my primary concern would be establishing this man's reason for mooing. He might have been warning of a very slowly spreading fire, or maybe selling diazepam door-to-door. However, I already knew his mission - he was taking in dry cleaning. I knew this because he'd pulled the same stunt the Saturday prior, but that time an hour earlier. Consequently, I'd made enquiries with my students and they'd told me his game.
'How does he dare?' I'd asked them.
'Dare what?' they'd replied.
'Wake an entire apartment block up at 8.30am on a Saturday?' I explained.
'People don't mind,' they responded. 'It's a handy service.'
'But it's 8.30! On a SATURDAY!' I added by way of a clarification. I got shrugs in return.
I went on to tell them how, should he ever go on holiday to London and decide to give his patter a twirl in a British tower block, he might possibly get one floor up before the Korean embassy would need to start making arrangements for DHL to ship whatever was left of his body back home. My students couldn't understand why this might be. 'He has to make a living,' they'd protested. No amount of reasoned, home-is-his-castle rationalisation could get them to budge an inch from their charitable, tolerant attitude.
And this is, in the final analysis, what the Korean missing irritability gene amounts to: Saint-like tolerance, unshakeable patience and a cast iron unflusterability when met with the deeds of their fellow man.
And goodness me, do they need it, for there's a f*ckload of people crammed onto this peninsular...
Korea is the in the top twenty of the world's most densely populated nations, and Seoul itself is the seventh biggest city in the world. When the surrounding metropolitan areas are factored in, it shoots up to second place, and with a population estimated at 22,770,000, nearly half the population of the country is squeezed into one small corner of it. This necessarily means that a lot of people are going to be living very close together. Indeed, it makes London look like a barren prairie. When you're in such close proximity to your countrymen, if you're not accepting of their antics, then you're not going to last very long. Koreans are tolerant and patient because they've got no choice.
This is why they let salesmen yell in their faces as they browse in the supermarket, and let department stores set up stalls that congest the exits and escalators. This is why they can make so much noise when they're eating, and why they can bawl at each other in the pub without getting taken outside. The ethos is 'agitate and let agitate'. It is an approach that stems weak status of the individual in the Korean system of thought. Individualism is something we take for granted in the West, but here, its rise is seen by some as encroaching and dangerous neo-colonialism. Since the nation found itself newly self-determining (after a fashion) in 1945, the message from the top has been for everyone to pull together and get the economy shipshape. At first, this was achieved through more traditional and robustly authoritarian means, but as things got more comfortable financially, the leaders loosened their grips on the reins and let capitalism work its magic. The people began to discover and embrace new-fangled post-industrial concepts such as personal freedom and leisure time (though for some, this is still measured in minutes). They found that they had an economy and infra-structure that could compete with any in the world. Their hard work was starting to pay off. Those growing old found that they were living in a very different country to the Third World rural backwater they got back from the Japanese at the end of World War II. Korea's transformation has been utterly dramatic. This, however, is a matter for another report.
For now, I shall return to the earlier question: Am I enjoying it out here?
In a word, mm-hmm. After nearly six months, I'm starting to go beyond the day-to-day and deeper into the Korean psyche (if that doesn't make me sound like a twat). It's a journey that keeps on surprising, and a journey that keeps me learning - about people, about me, about shit. And what's not to love about a journey like that? I hope that this expanded scope shall be reflected in the tone of future reports.
Don't worry though - I'm not about to come down with a case of I'm-Korean-itis. It's a common problem amongst some of the weaker minded Westerners here - they're not quite happy with the personality that they've formed thus far in their lives (and neither, no doubt, was the country they came from), so they decide to get all more-Korean-than-thou instead. They learn 'emselves the language and follow all the customs and won't touch Western food. It's pathetic and it's a shame but I suppose they're learning too, and deserve some patience and respect too. Or, on the other hand, maybe they're complete f*cking losers who might just get a whole report dedicated to their defamation some time in the future if anyone of them should ever look down their sorry noses at me again. Who knows? Only time shall tell.
Anyway, that just about does her for now. Stay well and keep it real, yeah? Oh, did I mention that it's getting absolutely friggin' freezing here? Well it is. Alright?
Annyonghi kasseyo for now,
S
PS Just to bring you up to date, following on from Michelle's soaking of a whole roll of toilet paper, she has attempted to make amends by bringing two rolls with her on subsequent visits. Whilst I appreciated the gesture, the rolls were not complete, meaning that her attempt at contrite generosity has turned into my administrative nightmare, as I have no idea how many individual leaves remain on each roll. I'm now completely unclear about how much toilet paper I have and whether or not it will last until next month, never mind to the end of the year. However, as soon as I have a free weekend, I'm going to arrange a full audit and I should hopefully be able to offer you a clearer picture of how we stand thereafter. Thanks for your patience on this matter.
posted by Stephen Beckett at 3:38 PM
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