Here I Go Again

Jun

   I am taking a small break from packing yet again. I feel like I have just been packing and unpacking for the past 5 years at this point. I have, however, only been in Korea for less than a month. It feels like a lot longer.

   It took me a little while to adjust to this move it is true. While I am not fully adjusted, I must admit that I am not nearly as down as I was in the beginning of this adventure.

Jae and Jane

   I didn't make many friends while in this orientation. That is to be expected though. As I have said, I am a bit of a recluse, and that is okay with me. I did meet some pretty cool people, and got close to some who did not reciprocate. I did meet some pretty nice students while here named Jun and Jae.

   Jun I met the first or second night we arrived in Busan. I had skipped dinner for some reason and was looking for something to eat. I went down to the convenience store here on campus and bought some ramen. As I am just sitting to eat my ramen, Jun is sitting eating ramen too and we just started talking. He turned out to be a pretty cool guy and really friendly.

   Through Jun I then met Jae who turned out to be just as friendly. I think it is a Korean thing to be honest. In any case these two together made for some pretty funny conversations and soon they even introduced me to people from my own program that I had never even spoken to before. It is kind of funny how that works out isn't it? Meet one person and you meet a bunch more.


   This little group was kind enough to invite me out on a couple of their drinking excursions and I must say it was a lot of fun.

Terribly lit photo I know...

Surprise birthday celebration

   Here I go again. I hate to leave Busan but I must. Tomorrow I will be swept on further down the river. I will miss Busan immensely. I liked what I saw of Busan a bit more than what I saw of Seoul. Perhaps later that will change, but for now Busan is my favorite big city.

   I will hate to leave the few friends I made. Hopefully the distance will only be a minor inconvenience. We shall see. 

   I don't have much more to say. Orientation was fun and long. Some of the people I met were really cool, some I wish I had gotten to know better, and some I spent more time on than I should have. Tomorrow is a new day though, and a new day is a new adventure. Where will I be? Certainly not where I was. 

Teaching My Past Self

   In a few weeks time I will be a teacher... Me. An actual teacher. I will be teaching 3rd-6th graders English in South Korea. More specifically, in Yecheon Dongbu, Gyeongbuk province. I have never taught before. Not formally anyway.

   If you had asked me 2 months ago, "Do you think you could be a teacher?" My answer would have been a confident, "Of course!" Now my answer has become, "Uh... yep." I am confident in my abilities, but there are a few things weighing on my mind.

   First off is the responsibility. I have never been fully responsible for a child or their education before. That's not something to be taken lightly, at least I don't take it lightly anyways. I know I can do it, but I know that at some point I will fail in some way. I am, after all, only human. But will I be able to correct those failures, and how much will those failures or successes impact the children that trust their impressionable minds to my care.

   Which brings me to perhaps the biggest thing that has been on my mind with this topic. That is, how I was when I was in school.

   Does anyone remember "Gifted and Talented?" (GT) Does that even exist anymore? For those who don't know GT was this program that took in kids around 3rd or 4th grade who seemed to have a gift for learning. "Smart kids" I suppose. You had to take a test on various subjects like reading and so on. I was selected to take the test and one of the sections was creativity. Oddly enough I failed that part of the test. When I was smaller this actually had a huge impact on me. I questioned why I didn't have creativity. I figured I was just an unimaginative person and I stopped being interested in any kind of art projects. Now, however, I know where my creativity lies and it has never been any different, even at that age. But I had to figure it out myself through various art forms and it took me a long time to get over the stigma of that test telling me I was not creative enough. I cannot imagine a day without art for me now. If I had never questioned that test and experimented, I don't know what my life would be like today. A life without art is a life without expression. This single test could have decided the rest of my life. No, in fact it has, I strive every day to be more creative.

   Although I was a little older than my potential students, a lot of stuff was changing in my life around 5th grade to middle school and no I don't mean just the usual "changing into a man" stuff. I had a lot on my plate and on top of that, it wasn't until 5th grade that I had ever had a male teacher.

   So what? Big deal, your first male teacher.

   I was raised by my mother and had weekend visitations twice a month with my father. My father left my mother before I was born. She inevitably married when I was about a year old but he too was non-existent more often than not and not a great person when he was around. So the only two males in my life that were of a higher status than me had hurt my mother, and by association, hurt me. I hold no grudges against my father. Whatever he was when he was younger, he is a good man now. Though around 5th grade is the time I needed my father the most, and the time when I felt I had my father the least. I don't know whose fault it was, if it was anyone's at all, but that is how I felt.

   I now understand that I have a real aversion to male superiors. Even to this day I cannot stand the fact that a male is over me. I know how to deal with it, but I hate it. At work, I prefer to have female managers and bosses. When I have a male boss, I simply never go to him more than I have to and that is how I avoid staying out of trouble.

   So then in 5th grade I get thrown into a classroom where I must take and obey orders from a male. I didn't know why I fought so hard against him, but I do now. It was amazing, like night and day I went from GT kid to being in the principal's office every day. I had the weight of a lot of personal stuff on my shoulders, and they go and throw me into a situation which was only an accident waiting to happen. 5th grade was the start of all of my school issues. Until college, I had not done homework since the 5th grade, I broke school property, I yelled at my male teacher, got in plenty of fights, I even set stuff on fire which ultimately got me sent to a school for troubled kids. I fully blame administration for how that period of my schooling turned out. Any self respecting administrator should have seen what was happening right away. My mother was not the uncooperative, tuned out type either. In fact I feel like she was in the principal's office more than I was. They knew my situation. It doesn't take a genius to think, "Okay, this kid hasn't had stable male figures in his life, and hasn't ever had a male teacher until now and he is acting out now where he never has acted in the past. Maybe he needs a female teacher."

   I feel bad now for all I put my 5th grade teacher, Mr. Herrera, through. He didn't deserve half of it. He was around the age I am now and I think this was his first teaching opportunity. It wasn't his fault at all, but neither was it mine. In the end we did become really close on a real personal level. He didn't give up on trying to win me over and by the end of the year he succeeded in becoming one of my favorite teachers. It was, however, a little too late because I would go on to get kicked out of school a few years later as I mentioned previously.

   (I wish I could meet him now and tell him where I have turned up and where I am headed. I don't think he remembers me but if he does I know he'd be shocked.)

   Later, during high school, I merely got lucky. I met a girl who really knew how to keep me in check. I thought about most of my actions a little more mostly because I didn't want to fail her. For that, I thank her, I can only imagine the hardships she saved me from. Not everyone gets lucky like that and High School is really a huge determining factor in someone's life. I have no doubts in my mind that I am ultimately sitting here now writing this in Korea because of the help and support she showed me. Perhaps she did so indirectly, but she helped me get where I am and where I will be in the future.

   My point in all of this is that I know what conclusions teachers and administrators drew about me. They looked at my poor grades, my switched off personality, my introversion, and came to the conclusion that I was just another difficult kid. Little did they know that I was learning, I was studying, I was listening to every word they said. I just couldn't show it. I remember countless times a teacher asking if I was even paying attention and I'd have to reply, "No," because I was reading ahead of what they were teaching.

   So then, will my experiences as a kid in school prepare me for what I am about to face? Will I be able to see the potential in the children who won't speak? Or will I fail them as so many failed me before? It breaks my heart to no end to think that this is even a possibility. I know what it is like to be failed, to be let down by so many that had the opportunity to lift me up to another level. Of course the majority of the effort must come from within the individual, but a teachers job is to see the potential and squeeze it out drop by drop if they need to.

Can I do that?

Can I teach my 5th grade self?

Oryukdo Island

   I know I haven't updated my blog in a few days, but the amount of crazy that has been attached to that time is indescribable. I am, however, now in Busan and staying in the dorms of Busan University of Foreign Studies. This campus is really nice but getting from one building to another is a workout in itself. The campus itself lies in something like a valley and has steep grades all throughout. There are even some Rocky Balboa stairs that I have found to be good exercise after the sun goes down.

   Last Saturday the TaLK program (I really need to dedicate a post specifically to explaining the TaLK program soon.) took us on a little excursion to a tourist spot in Busan called Oryukdo Island. It is actually a chain of 6 islands, but depending on the day you can only see 5. This area is fun to explore and has a really nice view of the ocean and islands from various vantage points.
The whole area itself is a bit small and can be explored probably in about an hour if you're really just in a hurry. But if you want a nice workout with some beautiful nature at every turn then this is a good place. Actually, I have come to the realization that living in Korea means walking up hills everywhere you go so a workout is not far from your front door.

   That being said, Korea has really encouraged me to lose weight again. After my motorcycle accident I could barely walk, let alone run or exercise. After I healed though, I simply lost the will and all the progress I had been making prior kind of went out the window. Being in Korea has shown me how much of a mistake I made. It is embarrassing to be sweating as soon as you take a step out of your door. Its not fun seeing girls turn their heads for the guy beside you and seeing right through you. I... have come to a sudden and unexpected realization about something. I don't feel like I could ever see that realization become any more than a dream or wish with the way I look and feel now.

   Korea can do that to you. It is not a bad thing. Call it motivation if you will, but when you see so many fit and good looking people, even those twice your age, you start to look at yourself differently. It is good then, that we have places like Oryukdo to reflect... and burn some calories.

The Weather

Screw this weather. The End.

   Yesterday my little group and I went on an adventure into Seoul. We saw quite a few things including a palace performance. Unfortunately, however, I cannot say I have much to show you on the matter. I will surely be going back to these places in the near future because I absolutely could not focus on sight seeing.

   "Could not focus" is an understatement. I was completely shocked by the amount of absolute suck that is South Korean weather. I have never in my life experienced heat like this. I was born and raised in a very dry climate. With that comes sweltering heat its true. But this heat was on a different scale. The reason for that was the humidity. Embarrassing and uncomfortable does not begin to explain the way I felt sweating profusely while walking around. I looked like I had never walked more than 10 feet in my life. It wasn't the actual activity though. I could have stood in one spot the whole day and been sweating just the same amount.

   Anyways all my complaining aside, I really liked what I saw. I need to go back for sure, but I think that will have to wait for a cooler season. I will show a couple of photos I tried to take but they aren't great at all. My mind was more like, "Please stop sweating," than, "What is my shutter speed?" So forgive me.

First Day Blues

   I'm just going to be honest here. But first thing is first, I am in Korea.

   Currently I am staying in Incheon. Incheon is a city a little bit outside of Seoul, the capitol of South Korea. This is the first city you will enter since the national airport is in Incheon.

   About that flight... it is terrible. I love to fly as I have mentioned before, but any flight over about 2 hours is terribly uncomfortable. My advice, adjust to the new time zone early if you have the chance by trying to stay up during the night and sleeping during the day. It sucks while trying to adjust, but it is going to suck no matter where you try to accomplish it. Next choose a flight that is in the morning (your time which happens to be the other time zone's night time) and you will be so tired during the flight that you will knock out no matter what the level of comfort is.  At least I know I do. Oh, and invest in a neck pillow!

   Anyways I am here safely and I guess that is all the matters. I can't, however, say I am completely happy. I remember going to Japan and how happy I was by being there. Simply stepping off the airplane felt like a huge achievement. I was ready, I was excited and eager to explore. Here in Korea... at least this first day, I don't feel exactly the same way. Please don't misunderstand me, I am grateful to have this opportunity and I am not infinitely melancholy or anything close. But I do have a little bit of the blues. I felt no real drive to record any vlogs for the first day, and even my photography suffered because of these blues. My heart was just elsewhere today.

   Perhaps it was just a harder flight than I thought, but I think it is more than that. I couldn't possibly explain why I feel this way in one single blog post. Partly because you would have to read a very lengthy post, and partly because I really don't know why myself. However, I can pin point two reasons for sure.

   First off, I wanted to get out of my comfort zone and book my flight a few days early with two other people. These two are great, I have no issues with them in any way. But I think this was a mistake all the same. I am just simply not the kind of person to travel with friends. I can't explain it. It is not as if they are dragging me down, or ruining my experience in any way. In fact for any other person these two would probably enhance the experience, they are just really fun people.

   Now more than ever though, I have come to the conclusion that I am a very reclusive person. I do not want to be, but I am very uncomfortable with people. I never thought it was this bad, but the way I feel right now only serves to confirm what I am and to what degree it afflicts me. I do not like that I am this way. I like people, I like their stories, and yet I can't feel comfortable around them for too long. I don't know when this became a thing, perhaps I have always been like this, but I wish I wasn't.

   I am afraid of what this may mean for my future relationships. Before I never had a problem spending lots of time with a girlfriend or someone I was dating. But that was a very long time ago. I have wondered why I have been single for so many years, and I feel like I may know now. If that isn't the case, then this has developed in that long period of time, and I wonder how a future relationship would carry out. I guess it isn't important right now, there are no girls knocking down my hotel room door or anything, but it has been on my mind. By the way, one thing that really set this off is that I found out I will be having a roommate for three weeks during orientation. That really upset me.

   Secondly, for my blues, I feel like I have really made my family sad because of leaving for so long. I mean, that's normal right? Anyone would be at least a little sad that their loved one will be half way across the world for an extended period of time. But I don't like the feeling of doing this to my family. I have always felt an inexplicably high sense of responsibility for them, and doing this makes me feel like I am not fulfilling those responsibilities and making their lives a little more difficult at the same time.

   I am home sick already... to say the least. I want to be with my family more now than I ever have before. I felt a little bit like this before I left to Japan, but not to this degree at all. Maybe its because of the length, maybe not. Its weird too, because I really don't have the mindset of particularly needing anyone around me. I am a survivor and, as I stated above, a recluse. I get by alone very well no matter what the situation. But it is not because I need my family to do for me, rather I want to do for them. Here I am almost helpless. I know they will get by with or without me. They are not completely hopeless cases who can't do without me, but as I have said before, that's not at all the point.

   I hope this subsides. I don't know what to do about my reclusive tendencies, but I do hope that I am just having normal home sickness. I really think I am, I think it just hit me hard this time. Here is to hoping for better moods!


   Thanks for reading guys, I appreciate it. I know this one was kind of a heavy one. I will be recording more vlog videos about my travels soon. I know many people liked those so please be on the lookout for those and share my blog with anyone who might be interested.

Anticipation

Fun fact: 16 days until I leave for Korea.

   I guess I just wanted to share my plans with everyone. In 16 days I will be boarding a plane to South Korea. Actually to San Francisco but then to Korea if you want to be precise. I am excited, but I hate this part of the travel experience.

   For one, the wait. Anticipation is a killer for me, I hate it. When it is a long wait, I don't really mind. I just kind of stop thinking about it for a while because I know there is no reason to get myself worked up for something that won't happen for months. But when it gets to the last few weeks, things start to change. You simply cannot push it out of your mind. Even if you try, the excitement and wonder seems to bubble to the surface instantly. Not only that but at this point you have so many last minute things you need to do, stuff you need to buy, people you need to speak to, and so on. So putting your coming travels out of your mind completely is detrimental unless you want to forget something important. But the second reason I hate this part is because of the flight. I don't mind flying, I like it, but after a few hours being stuck in a pressurized tube with however many other people gets well... annoying.

   Usually I like to travel alone. I really don't like having the burden of someone else to look after or potentially ruin what I set out to do for the day. But it isn't just that. I am the kind that needs to drink stuff in alone. As I have said before when I went to Japan, I love to just sit on the sidewalk and watch crowds go by. In that moment I am completely quiet, but my mind is a cacophony of internal narrative and careful thought processes. I am trying to view the scene and people I am seeing as best I can in a clear and unimpeded way. Perhaps I am making no sense, or perhaps I am making complete sense I don't know. I do know there are people out there that I could travel with who would understand this and be able to support my foibles selflessly. But this person would be a very specific person and not just anyone I am afraid.

   So then, why did I book a plane ticket to Seoul 3 days early with 2 other people I hardly know? As I've said previously in this blog, one of the best things you can do for yourself is to put yourself out of your comfort zone every once in a while. You never know what will come of it. Perhaps it will be a dismal experience but in the end if you didn't ride the wave, you will never know where it would take you. To me that is too much of a risk. So I am travelling with 2 others who were accepted to the same program I was and are from San Antonio. I don't know what this experience will be like. I think these people are pretty cool people, but beyond that, who knows? I certainly don't and to me, that's enough.

Painful Film

   Oh how I yearn to shoot film every day. I love my D610 so much that I'd be pretty sad if I ever had to move up to a more "professional" body any time in the future. But film just captures something more than can be explained. I don't know what the difference really is but something about film has character that digital images just do not. That's not to say digital does not look good, it looks great, but there is a subtle difference between the two I can't quite put my finger on.

   Recently I wanted to break out my Pentax camera. I love this camera. It's completely manual, no light meter, small, relatively light, just all around a basic but fun camera to use. I thought well sure, but instead of going with my regular Kodak, why not try a new film stock. Now, I've tried Kodak black and white and color, and I've also tried Fuji Film color. I like Kodak and I usually reach for it when I am in the mood to shoot film. Plus with the easy C-41 processing black and white I usually just get that for cheap and throw it in my camera.

   This time however, I picked up some rolls of Ilford mainly because Matt Day switched to it and I like his work, so I figured it couldn't be too bad. But I didn't know what to expect from it really. What he gets from the film and what I get are two different things entirely. I shot both rolls of 400 and I haven't yet found a proper place to use the roll of 3200 I bought. (I'll explain why in a minute.) I was pretty impressed with the look of the 400. It is quite grainy especially compared side by side with the Kodak 400 I usually get. In hind sight, I guess the grain is just different between the two. In any case grain is not bad. It's part of what makes film special, and I loved the look of the Ilford grain.

Kodak BW400CN

Ilford Delta 400

   I am not disappointed with the film in the least. In fact from now on whenever I get the itch to shoot film again, I will definitely grab a few more rolls of Ilford. It just performs really well. 

   What I will NEVER do again is send my film off to a lab. I thought, since I don't have the chemicals or equipment readily available, I'd just send it off to a lab to be processed. My thinking was, yeah I may pay a little extra and it will take them a bit longer than it would take me, but so what? It's the convenience. I was wrong. It was just downright painful.

   It took them 3 weeks to develop the film (where it would have taken me....30 minutes?) and I ended up paying over $60 for high res scans and slow processing! For $60 I could have just bought all the chemicals and developed all the rolls I have laying around that I shot a long time ago! This was completely ridiculous I thought. It's no wonder film is fading away. It pains me to say that but no one wants to do this any longer. We know that with film you must be patient. But $60 and a 3 week wait? Yeah... I don't think so. From now on I will just develop my own film and take them to a lab for scans.

   Anyways I am happy with the results of the Ilford 400 film stock so far. I haven't used the roll of 3200 yet, and I am dying to get my hands on their Ilford 50. I really like that Ilford is keeping traditional B&W film going. It's a bold move, and one that many photographers appreciate I am sure. I know I appreciate it. Hopefully this will be another film stock that finds its way into my bag too often. I won't really know until I shoot a bit more with it, but so far I like it! Tell me what you think.