Monday, November 14, 2005

Bono would be really happy here.

With all the little fires burning, he would sure have no problem reaching out to touch the flame.
One things he might have trouble with , though, is finding anything. You see, in Korea, the streets have no names.
I was invited to a student's yesterday to help him celebrate the end of his exams at his night-school (which, in Korea, most attend from about age 10 on). Anyways, I set out last night to find it, and got totally lost. I tried two streets that might have been the one he was talking about before I found the right one. And then, where he said his building was, there were two.

I forgot to mention: not only are the streets unnamed, but the buildings are also unnumbered.

So now I am faced with the prospect of knocking on the wrong door and having to explain to a confused Korean why I am knocking on their door on a Sunday night. An equivalent situation, to help you with the imagining, would be if your "Road to Avonlea" viewing were interrupted. Going to the door, you find a smartly dressed Korean twenty-something holding a phrasebook. Flipping between pages that have the corners folded down (he obviously prepared on the way), he awkwardly says:

"I... student... (flip flip flip) middle school... (flip flip flip) looking am"

He then would smile meekly, as you slowly closed the door...

So, I wasn't too eager for that. I knocked on the door, waited. Then I saw the doorbell, so I gave that a try. Luckily, no answer.
I took that as a sign that I should quit while I was ahead. I feel really bad for not making it to the kid's party, but to be honest, I'm not even sure that I was at the right building, or even that I was there on the right day.
At least I had the phrase book handy, so when I got the pizza (our Sunday night tradition), I could properly ask for no corn.

"Oak-soo-soo Koom-ji!"

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