My Collection of "Short Stories"

October 3. 2010

While I’m waiting at the Beijing Airport for my transfer to Singapore I thought I’d fill you in on some anecdotes.

This airport is eerily quiet, but is filled with people. My flight is delayed so I hoped to get online to tell my friends in Singapore. It turns out you have to get a password after having your passport scanned. Talk about Big Brother watching you! The kiosks wouldn’t give me or some others a password. The kiosk would register my name and passport number, but couldn’t manage more. At first I thought American passports were being denied because I saw other Americans not get one either, but then I saw a Chinese man not get one. My whole conspiracy theory deflated! So I hauled myself and my stuff 10 minutes to the business center where I wrote out my passport number, phone number and signature. And voila I was online!

Typing in my email was slower than usual. The letters couldn’t keep up with my typing. Another conspiracy theory is brewing...

I took an hour long bus to the airport and this time got my bag without trouble. When the driver from Seoul dropped me of in Gyeongju I pointed to the baggage area and I thought he understood. I got off the bus and opened the hatch just as he started to drive away! Luckily, he saw me otherwise I would have had quite a time trying to retrieve it from who knows where. Today was easy though – although the drivers never help with the bags here.

My airport experience in Busan brought some stirring emotions. First, when I’ve seen Duty Free perfume I’ve been spritzing my usual on me since I left my bottle behind. It’s been a few weeks and I guess because the scent isn’t part of my daily routine anymore the smell recalled the past. The memories were sad ones of things lost. It’s incredible how a scent can bring such memories and emotions to the forefront of your mind. After my spritz I went to the 7-Elevan (yes, in the airport) to spend my last 4,600w. I strategically searched the store to maximize my “buying power” and settled on a sandwich, chocolate coffee (I’m not a coffee drinker, but anything with chocolate is fine by me), and two candy bars. Unfortunately, I got to the counter and was 5w short (so a couple pennies). I was about to sacrifice a candy bar when the cashier took what I had and gave me my bag - A nice last interchange in Korea.

Then I took a seat at the gate and called the company who had been hired by the shrew to find a “teacher.” I wanted him to know that she had asked me not to tell him she hired me because she didn’t want to have to pay the fee that she said came out of my paycheck (he never mentioned this). I also wanted to let him know generally how things unraveled. He seemed disturbed and has asked that I write him an email about it and that he would have to talk with her. He also has the right to be upset with me since I did agree to lie to him. As I hung up the phone I realized there was a man now sitting a couple of seats from me. He asked me to define a couple of English words in his article for him. He started asking about my travels, work, etc. He very quickly wanted my SKYPE address and Facebook. I said I didn’t really use either (a little white lie, but I didn’t know the guy). I gave him a very outdated email address. I asked what he did and my breath stopped short (hopefully unnoticeably). He is an officer in the airport. All I could think was he overheard my conversation and would detain me about my work. So I was nervous and vague for the remainder of our conversation and finally he left. I’ve made it out of Korea so I think I’m in the clear. :)

I asked for a window seat for the flight to Beijing since they will be my only views of China. I get on the place and have a window seat, but the ONLY window seat without a window! :) Fortunately, the plane wasn’t very full so I switched rows. I didn’t see any tourist sites from the sky, but lots of farming and buildings that were replicated one after the other. There were streams of tall apartment (?) buildings clumped together as well as shorter structures. In the farming areas you would see a big square of housing and building surrounded by the farms. Then a distance away you would see more squares of buildings. It all looked very organized.

One amusing thing I noticed about the gold Buddha’s in the temples around Gyeongju were their mustaches. They were drawn with a couple of curly lines on either side of the upper lip. They reminded me of the mustaches of Parisians in cartoons so to me it didn’t look solemn or spiritual. Why did they even have mustaches? I had to suppress my giggles. How I wish I could have taken pictures of them to share!

As you can tell by my candy bar purchases above, I have a sweet tooth. So I feel a need to comment on the sweets in SK. Koreans seemed to like western style desserts and pastries with some modifications. They also had their versions of American candy bars and I’ve mentioned the love of donuts. I have done my own little taste test and found that their sweets are not as sugary as ours. For some of you that might be a good thing, but I do have a wicked sweet tooth. The Korean brand of donuts is less sweet than the Krispy Kreme ones as is their version of Crunch. I think the Snickers bar here is even a little less sweet than at home. I haven’ tried the Whatchamacalit I bought today so we’ll have to see about that one. I’ll have to continue my dessert test as I go to new destinations. Tough job! :)

My final story happened back when I was in Seoul and I can’t believe I forgot to write about it. One morning I was on the subway heading to the International Clinic to get my last vaccines (much cheaper in SK than the US) and I look at the person next to me sleeping. I’ve seen several Koreans who remind me of particular students I’ve had, but this sleeping person really looked like a student I had a couple of years ago. I tried to dismiss it thinking I was inventing similarities and what are the odds, but then I looked at the bag on his lap – it was from the high school where I taught! It was him! And I saw things hadn’t changed because I remember in my class he was always trying to sleep too. LOL! My stop arrived just as I saw the bag so he never realized I was next to him. I don’t know that I would have woken him anyway since he didn’t do so well in my class. I also can’t remember his name. After teaching probably over a thousand students I lose track of their names, but I usually can remember the gist of how they did and what they were like. I can’t believe the coincidence of time and place, but if I were to run into a former student overseas it makes sense that it would be Korea.

Interesting... I cannot get onto my blog here... another conspiracy?

I suppose I’ll get back to my book. I’m on my 5^th one since the trip began and it’s another sad one. I think I need something light next. Any recommendations?