Rubber Stamp Imitators of Life and All that Lives

Dear Folks,

I feel unusually grand this morning, no doubt an ample tribute to the manifold elixirs (blueberry- and honey- flavored vinegar in water) of yesterday evening's teaching stints I endured. 

I sense a need to select an appropriate font size.  Currently I am working with "four," but not knowing just how it will be presented in the viewmaster par excellence, I must confess that I cannot proceed with absolute confidence.  Hence, I quaver as I type.

I am enamored of the preacher character in a sitcom I have lately come into the habit of viewing, "Deadwood."  He is perhaps the sole noble figure in this sordid comedy.  And he remembers his Bible verses quite well, which makes me wonder about the quality of recent seminary education. 

I study at a seminary, but they do not make me memorize Bible passages.  If seminary study is not about committing the Bible to heart, what is it, then?  It just goes to show that education is not what it used to be. 

I'm not talking mere grade inflation, either, be apprised.  Yes, grade inflation is a thing of opprobrium and ignominy indeed.  But this is a horse of another color altogether.  I warrant you you may see the young sloughing off the oppressive weight of university gravity and affixing their educational aspirations to more nimble and astute competitors in the private realm of education not affected by the traditional channels of accreditation and whatnot, rubber stamps to the powers that be. 

Love, Padooker

Smile and Get Fat

Ouch.  My wife had some problem uploading her files to the Blackboard of her university's course management system.  She missed a deadline not because she failed to prepare everything on time, but solely because our computer has some problem when you click on the cut and paste option, a problem I do not yet understand.  I don't cut and paste much, or, I do, but have never experienced any problem, and cannot understand exactly what she means.  

She refused to tell the professor of her mistake because she said it would not have happened had she not cut it so close to the deadline; she would have had time to check it thoroughly and would have caught the error. 

I told her we don't generally operate that way in the West, or that is my understanding.  She still refused to alert the professor to the problem.   She will lose 20 percent from her grade because she turned in the paper after the deadline.  She caught it two hours later, when she logged onto her site to double check and make sure everything was OK.  

She utterly refuses to allow me to get involved in anything related to her work with her degree.  I would like to have written a letter to her professor to explain, but she would not let me.  So, here we are.  Our fortunes are combined, yet I am excluded. 

Furthermore, she practices a double standard.  When I studied in my computer science program last spring semester, she read everything about my course, and knew the syllabus and grade requirements better than I did.  I am the primary childcare provider in our family, and did the programming course "off the cuff," just winging it from one assignment to the next, never having enough time to read the textbook to my heart's content, a most frustrating experience. 

Wifey wanted me to do that course, as a kind of back-up job security plan.  I told her that if I could finish that and do well with it, I would know that I would not mind being a computer programmer.  Well, that panned out to be very true.  I could not have imagined how much I would love programming, particularly algorithm formulation.   There are still a few little commands that I forget, but I made much progress in one semester. 

So, now we know that if need be, if my wife fails to get a job (something she strongly fears, being a non-native speaker of English aiming to teach ESL in the U.S.) and should I fail to earn enough money preaching and in the other ideas I have for private business services, then she would like to farm me out as a computer programmer, par excellence. 

She says that her course of study does not permit the involvement of anyone else, other than the student.  But I don't see why I could not write a letter to the professor and try to explain the problem with our computer, and also her mix-up with uploading.  She got mixed up somehow, flustered, in trying to upload essays for three different one-hour courses at the same time, for the same deadline.   She used to just take one course at a time, and now she's taking three.  She says that that is all her fault, though, implying she has no right to explain her situation and hope for any leniency on the grade.  I told my Mom, a teacher in high school, and she thought surely the professor would see it differently if she could talk directly with my wife. 

One thing about my wife is that she doesn't lie.  That is odd, really.  I mean, she does not even exaggerate.  Of course, I suppose that is a lot easier when you are so anti-social, as my wife...  If you don't say much, then you have far less opportunity to stretch the truth, no?  And that is something my friends have noticed, that when my wife speaks, it is something you would never question. 

I have learned, though, that she is right most of the time.  Maybe too, in this case, she is right; it really is entirely her fault.  It is her computer (or ours), and she knows the disadvantage she has with it, also knows her difficulty with computers.  Too, she spends an inordinate amount of time on her English writing, poring over each sentence with a fine toothed comb.  Too, she's got a grand husband for that, as I sleep with the children while she stays up all night to work, seven nights a week.  She couldn't have a better situation for study.  And, I earn all the money we need.  I do all the shopping, hang the laundry to dry, and wash dishes (though she does that more than I in between semesters). 

The sole chore she does exclusively is one I have zero interest in, and that is going to the bank to handle our money.  I don't like waiting in lines, and I do not know how to manage a money machine.  That, and I am not interested in learning. 

I have never learned how to work a hand phone, and I cannot program a VCR, either.  My children are far better than I on working the TV remote control.  I can do just the minimal functions, like fast forward (DVD actually), reverse, and play.  Oh, also, I can click on the subtitle button, that, and jump forwards by a whole scene.  That's enough for me.  But, my children are all over that stuff.  It's like second nature to them. 

Well, I spouted off.  I believe that is all this entry was for.  I have a fine wife.  Only, she is an odd person in some ways.  I would like to have her blessing to do private work in America.  That is the only kind of work I am interested in. Too, it is what I have done here for thirteen years straight, with grand effect, great pleasure and sublime satisfaction.  But, she believes America will be different, less kind to me as a businessman.  I believe that all businesses are essentially alike, that you merely follow the Golden Rule, providing the same quality of service you would want if you were in the client's shoes.  That's it.  Not for her. 

But, I don't believe God wants me to ever be a wage slave again unless I have no other choice.  I used to deliver pizzas while I was in grad school, and that was fun, and I made good money, but I knew I was not delivering a great service ... just making people smile and get fat.  I don't want to remember myself that way, would you?

Love, Padooker

An Education in Racism

Dear Folks,

The past few days have witnessed a shift in our TV watching.  Actually, we don't have "TV," per se, but we have what you might call a "TV."  We just don't have any television reception, and that is fine by us, our design in fact.  Plus, I would guess it is all Korean language broadcasting, which we don't need.   My wife is South Korean and places no value on having our children learn the Korean language, which is the dominant reason we don't send them to public schools here.

There are other reasons, for example, the rampant bullying and racism.  Even though my children are fifty percent Oriental, they don't really look it.  They look all white.  That's fine with me; I'm not a racist.  Nor was my father.  He bought a bunch of cheap land in a rural black neighborhood at 300 bucks an acre forty years ago, back when racism in rural North Carolina altered supply and demand such that you could pick up really cheap land that way, if you had no truck with living with Blacks.  We got a twenty-two acre farm for a song. 

Also, I played so much basketball that my dream was to become an NBA player.  Somehow that did not entirely materialize, and I'm now teaching "the English" here in "the South Korea."  But I did learn to speak the Black dialect of rural western North Carolina fluently, having played ball with my neighbors on our court at my home almost every day from age 7 or 8 until I left high school.  And my mutual love with my neighbors made it impossible for me to think of them as "other." 

In fact, Utne Reader, to which I used to subscribe before I got financial obligations of a wife and five children to support, once noted that perhaps the ultimate litmus test of whether you were a racist was to ask yourself the question of whether you would not mind being Black.  A tolerance for "Salt and Pepper" marriage, they insisted, was less compelling, at least to them, and I see their point.  I found that easy to answer, as I knew and loved my close Black friends, so it was easy to answer in the negative, in my mind, to note that I would not mind a bit being Black.  I knew of personality changes I would make with any one of my friends, if I were to suddenly and hypothetically swap places with him, but skin change is just not on the agenda. 

Over the next thirty years, two factors multiplied the value of that land one hundred fold, to 30,000 per acre:  A) Our Black brethren grew in social status and improved their homes, and B) other Whites became far less racist and were not opposed to living in that area.  Kudos for my father. 

In fact, racism is one of the three book-stoppers within my personal censuring filter that make me put down a book, topics which when supported in any affirmative way, no matter how valuable or appealing other topics from the same author may seem to be on the surface, make me just put the book, or article down, and count myself lucky I got only that far in wasting my time with what is "smut" to me. 

So I generally like it when my children can learn about different groups of people.  We have a host of DVD's from the early 50's and 60's, before public TV, too, became more smutty in many people's eyes.  Just the past few days, I noticed that we had two programs which introduced Indians to my children:  "Little House on the Prairie" and "Kung-fu."  I sat there with my daughter just an hour ago and watched one episode in season one from Little House where a Sioux Indian was on the show.  

I dislike it when, as in this show, the writers (and producers) decide to view and depict the Indians through a relatively "thick" Christian filter, imposing strong features of Christianity, such as the Golden Rule, as in the show we watched today, when there is just not such strong evidence that their religion was dominated by love of one's enemy, or at least not to the extent we generally understand it to be within Christian thought and writings. 

I try to explain to my children that some features which we take for granted, freedom of speech and the respectful treatment of women, children, minorities and the underclass in society, are just not as well supported by reliable eye witnesses to precursor cultures here, as our movie producers tend to make them for sale to the dictates of the "yearning modern public."  And that's understandable; if modern people feel guilty for their nation's (at times horrible) mistreatment of Indians, and they now enjoy the advantage of living in relative safety (having won the displacement war), then it is easy to see how they would clamour for pablum which caters to the popular image of the noble savage. 

One thing I do believe is that if American Indians were more loving towards their enemies and women, then their cultures would have been stronger and more viable.  And I do believe that they are not stupid, but that modern day descendents of American Indians are in the best position to pick and choose, glean the best moral influences from the religions of their ancestors (from all races and cultural influences) and then inculcate those into their lives. 

I believe the source of America is from some Italian, right?  Wasn't his name "Amerigo," or something to that affect, and yet it does not bother me that people here in South Korea refer to me as an "American," even though I am a citizen of merely one of many nations sitting on the two American continents.  I like to tolerate the free speech and expression rights of all who address me in any form of communication, so long as it is tendered with a tone of respect and consideration.  To me that is the only way we can live together as a variety of groups, by incorporating tolerance for diversity in expression.  From what I have read the thought police have been on the resurgence in the U.S. while I was gone, with people imposing their firebrand images of politically correct speech on others.  This is not just pathetic, to see our culture going that way, limiting freedom, but sad. 

I hope it is not so bad as it seems from the newspaper reports, with common people proving to have a whole heap of a lot more sense than writers who proliferate on the web.  We'll see when I get there next year.  It has been better than a decade since I've set foot on U.S. soil. 

Education in racism for my children: 

I believe it important to prepare my children for potential racism in the U.S.  Heretofore they have always been on the receiving end of discrimination and oppression.  I want them to become sensitive to the plights of other minorities in the U.S.   My parents say that there is a sizeable population of Hmong people and Laotian people in our rural area now, and they attend the elementary school we thought we would use for our children, for the first year of our return to the U.S., though now that is not so certain, as we may move directly into seminary housing, so much enamored have I become of the seminary education I am getting.

Still, I like the fact that my children are exposed to a variety of cultures on old TV sitcoms and dramas before we make our exodus.  We have The Cosby Show, I Love Lucy, Gomer Pyle, and TAGS, among a host of others, totalling more than 4000 dollars worth now, though I stopped counting at 4000.  And my wife has insisted I stop buying, at least for a while.  "If Mamma ain't happy ain't nobody happy."  Gotta remember that adage, no? 

Currently Greatest Hits By Guns N' Roses Knockin' On Heaven's Door, Dude see related

The Chicken Table & Ice Cream for Breakfast

Oh me.  I am just too old, or too something.  I believe my Dad was right when he used to say I had too many irons in the fire.  Let's get a cup a jo for the early a.m.

Piddling Introduction:

I feel like a horse that has been rode hard and put up wet.  But, it's a new day, and I've piddled on the computer for an hour or so.  Actually, I shouldn't say that.  That is my work.  I make nearly all of my money by patting my belly and rubbing my head, as it were, just being entertaining.  I gather news articles of high interest from the internet and use them in class for study content.  So, this morning was spent on business stuff, and I enjoy it.

Master Belly Patter Par Excellence:

Working on the private market, I must be entertaining to retain students.  My private teaching is still the primary source of our income, though now I teach a bit at a university, have for the past two years, but South Korean universities just don't have the cash to pay more than a bit (Pittance sounds bad, and is not entirely true.).   But it is true that they hold a strong monopoly and don't give even half a market rate for your time, actually, less than a third, maybe closer to a fourth, to be exact, when you count in all the extra time (Oh, Geez, no, not even a fourth, or a fifth, when you add in all the time for grading... I didn't think of that.). 

I don't count the commute because I love it, a 30-minute bike ride along side a river, off the road, on a nice rubber path through a riverside park for 90 percent of the way.  That's lovely.  Plus, Wifey wants me to keep doing just that much, teaching two classes, because she thinks it looks good, something official, to the U.S. Embassy, which despite her having five children, all red-blooded Americans, offers no guarantee that she will be permitted to enter the kingdom (with one of those coveted US visas) next year when we make our grand exodus form South Korea (Land of the Morning Calm) to the U.S. of A., "land of the brave, home of the free," and whatnot. 

Land of the Morning Calm:

You know, not to disparage the U.S. one bit (I love my country.), but I like the casual moniker of South Korea a tad better, "Land of the Morning Calm."   Isn't that nice?   I couldn't come up with a better tag myself.  You think tranquility ... mist rising from a still pond in the early aye em, and ... need I say? ... Coffee....     Mmmm...

I don't think of friends in the morning, not in my ideal image of a morning best spent.  Rather, I think of tranquility and solitary thoughts, maybe by a pond.  Water is a good morning friend, still water, though not skanky and stagnant.  Just still for the morning.  That's enough.

And friends.  Friends and coffee mix well in my mind in the early afternoon.  I always liked that time when I lived in Boone, North Carolina, as my daily running (training for 800 meters) duty was done, I had come home, stretched, bathed, had breakfast, and the afternoon was beginning.  I didn't like a crowd, and the business people did lunch at my favorite coffee shop, "Cup a Jo's," ... wonder if it's still there...

Coffee Lovers Delectable:

But I would meet with two good friends (two coffee lovers, and lovers, but not what you might call "socially acceptable lovers," as they were both female, and too, juggling buddies, of mine, club passers, also literary buddies, as we all wrote a lot and read a lot, and they did what you might call "the courageous thing" by majoring in English; whereas, yours truly backed out of a masters in English three times and finally did a business masters ... always afraid he couldn't make enough money to support a big family ... and now look!  Whudduyknow!  He makes his dough teaching "the English."  Live and Learn ... coulda done a master's in English and been fine all along...  still, I got in four or five master's level English courses in the process, while I was pursuing an MBA), and we would drink coffee and take in the afternoon calm. 

College students came in after 6, in bigger numbers, and dominated the night scene.  Between 2 and 5 seemed the perfect time for us, and we remarked on that often, "Hey, you wanna catch the afternoon calm?"  I'll see you there in a few minutes.  My two friends came in a pair, and I always thought of them as such, and now they are broken apart, living separately.  I'm sad their friendship did not last. 

I see no compelling need for people to be lovers, not when they can be friends, but I always believe friendships should last, call me hopelessly romantic and naive.  To me, sex is good for one sure thing, reproduction.  My group, the Southern Baptists are far more liberal when it comes to sexuality, in that we acknowledge the possibility of the "unitive function" for sex, which "justifies sexual relations even apart from the procreative function." (A Theology for the Church by Daniel Akin, p.389)

The Baptist position stands in stark contrast to the Catholics.  According to the same page in my trusty theology primer, "Official Catholic teaching has been for years that in every act of sexual intercourse, the possibility of conception must be present for it to be a valid part of a couple's life.  Thus contraception is seen as 'intrinsically evil.' " 

Two Camps:

It seems that most people fall into two camps on this issue, whether:  A) it is OK to practice some for of inherently sterile simulacrum of sex (say, just for funsies, "sport-coupling," if you will), or whether B) sexual expression (anything evoking the mental aspect) should always be authentic in the fullest sense of the word, fully reflecting of every definition of sex you might proffer to the cause -- which specifically, here, would need to include the biological aspect wherein we see a glad and happy "meeting of gametes."  

Actually, and I hate to complicate the issue, I do not fall neatly into either category, as I sit on a fence with respect to this issue, though I can say that I lean heavily towards the Catholic position, despite being Baptist.  One handy aspect of being what you might call Baptist is that we reserve the right to pick and choose on many aspects of belief. 

While I can hold the Catholic position on this issue and be warmly, fully accepted as a Southern Baptist, I could never go vice versa, espouse the opposite as an bona fide believing Catholic, without belying my statement of faith in adherence to the Catholic church.  They clamp down a lot harder, the Catholics, and in this one issue, I am glad they do, as I believe it gives greater levity and freedom to my life in keeping very close to their understanding, which would not be so nearly available to me had they not promulgated it so clearly. 

Our Bible Readings of Last Night:

Below is part of last night's Bible passage I read with the two of my children who stayed awake during our Hobbit reading.  They enjoy the King James, and demand I move to it to get all information, even though our knock-off version (which we always use to whet our appetites) gets us started, in the groove, so to speak.  But in this case, they wanted to know exactly what happened to Absalom, the gory details, the nitty gritty, never to be satisfied with some prettified rendition made bland for children who would be sheltered and pampered.  

5: And the king commanded Joab and Abishai and Ittai, saying, Deal gently for my sake with the young man, even with Absalom. And all the people heard when the king gave all the captains charge concerning Absalom.  6: So the people went out into the field against Israel: and the battle was in the wood of Ephraim;  7: Where the people of Israel were slain before the servants of David, and there was there a great slaughter that day of twenty thousand men.   8: For the battle was there scattered over the face of all the country: and the wood devoured more people that day than the sword devoured.   9: And Absalom met the servants of David. And Absalom rode upon a mule, and the mule went under the thick boughs of a great oak, and his head caught hold of the oak, and he was taken up between the heaven and the earth; and the mule that was under him went away.   10: And a certain man saw it, and told Joab, and said, Behold, I saw Absalom hanged in an oak.   11: And Joab said unto the man that told him, And, behold, thou sawest him, and why didst thou not smite him there to the ground? and I
would have given thee ten shekels of silver, and a girdle.   12: And the man said unto Joab, Though I should receive a thousand shekels of silver in mine hand, yet would I not put forth mine hand against the king's son: for in our hearing the king charged thee and Abishai and Ittai, saying, Beware that none touch the young man Absalom.   13: Otherwise I should have wrought falsehood against mine own
life: for there is no matter hid from the king, and thou thyself wouldest have set thyself against me.   14: Then said Joab, I may not tarry thus with thee. And he took three darts in his hand, and thrust them through the heart of Absalom, while he was yet alive in the midst of the oak.   15: And ten young men that bare Joab's armour compassed about and smote Absalom, and slew him. 

David:

 That outta learn'im, durn'im.   Enee Waiee ... My wife is very fond of David, of all the secondary characters in the Bible. She says David is easy to identify with, given that he made so many mistakes, and yet she admires that he consistently admitted his mistakes and repented. 

I think that is true, that we make mistakes somewhat regularly, not that they are inherently good, but it is best when we can admit them.  And yes, she has a point, David is certainly a fine model for admitting mistakes.  I hope I don't make mistakes as grievous as some of his bigger blunders, and I can see how I could be viewed as in some degree culpable for much murder and mayhem, if, say, I were to casually (or gleefully) vote for, or lend support to some popular policies, such as the European and U.S. agricultural subsidies, which economists tell us prevent Africans from working their way out of poverty, as the subsidies keep prices on the crops artificially low, pricing poor farmers out of the market.  

Economist also agree that statistically in regard to reducing the deaths due to diseases with a known cause and simple, cheap treatment, nothing comes close to mitigating these manifold,  tragic, senseless deaths like the sort of economic growth that transformed all developed nations into what they are today, from their indigent roots.  It is difficult to know this (from the dismal science), and continue to support farm subsidizes, at least at the gargantuan levels where they remain, virtually unchallenged in the mind of the masses, where democracy rules, as it were.

Wistful Look:

I walked part ways to my fourth child's kindergarten, along with his big sister and him, I saw them across the big road before turning back (with my baby in tow, in my arms, out for a bit of fresh sunshine this morning) to head for home, and this web log.  My fourth child looked back at me several times. I waved. He waved back.  He looked happy and yet wistful. 

He always would rather stay with me.  He goes at 11 or 11:30, when they start at 9:00.  We sleep late, and miss out on the first couple of hours of his kindergarten experience, something I regret.  He comes home smiling, though, so he has a good time.  I need to get them to bed earlier, and I did fairly well this past semester, when the study demands of a computer science course made it impossible for me to mess around in the evenings, but to get them to sleep by 9:30 or 10:00 sharp.  I studied in the mornings, 6:00 to 10:00 or whenever they got up, taking a break to take the kindergarten lad.  He woke up early and went enthusiastically, largely because I always took him, everyone else being still asleep, that, and he rode on my shoulders the whole way, something he loves. 

Retrospective:

As far as I could see him, across the road, heading hand-in-hand with his older sister up the alley way towards his school, he kept looking back. 

Looking back is not always a bad thing, is it?   Good question.  It surely cooked Lot's wife, no?  But I think there may be some situations where it is not only acceptable, but beautiful, even in its inherent evocation of nostalgia and melancholy.

Thinking back on Absalom, once he was stuck there, hanging in the tree, it seems there wasn't a whole lot he could do to defend himself, that, or in one believable fell swoop, make credible apologies and amends to his fellow Israelites.  In human trust, it just doesn't work that way. 

Under the Boot:

Still, I like to see people treat apostates kindly, once they have thoroughly conquered them and have them under the boot, like with Saddam Hussein.  I saw no reason to hang him by the neck until dead.  But, I do believe it was right to allow the Iraqi people to decide that, even though we caught him in his hole.   

Happiness All Around:

Doesn't happiness and love make the world go round a little better?  I think so.  I wish we had some bread about now in our household; that would make me a little happier.  I just cooked a big bowl of eggs for my burgeoning brood, and they weren't too interested.  Odd.  I ate a bit, and left the steaming bowl on the kitchen table, or as we say, "the chicken table." 

Husbanding Service:

I also pitched in and busted out the dirty dishes yesterday between classes, a humongous pile if I do say so myself, to make my wife happy.  She's been super busy and hence unable to do so much domestic work here lately.  But I like to think of her as a "very good cow," provided your image of a good cow includes some being reliable, calm, persistent, loyal, trustworthy, clean, and fertile.  So, I sacrifice my desires and hours to serve her in every way I can.  And this formula, while never understood by my female neighbors (where I'm famous for being seen outside all hours of the day, doing all the shopping and assuming all duties in response to care for the children, ferrying back and forth to school, kindergarten, doctor, and daycare ... while my wife is a mystery, never seen, not in 13 years, rumored to be some weird, reclusive, nocturnal incarnation of the banshee-esque sort in these superstitious parts) has served our family very very well.  I recommend it highly young men. 

South Korean Fertility:

My wife's fertility is one thing she does well, and appreciates, as a gift from God, and basks in the evident glory that is hers in this baby deprived corner of the globe.  Here in South Korea, while we have one of the lowest birth rates in the world, the overwhelming majority of us wish it were higher and laud the women who do have more than average.  Every day I get "thumbs up" from strangers, along with abundant, gushing compliments for my large family, when I go out shopping. 

That, and, the government lavishes cash upon families such as ours.  Kindergarten and daycare are virtually free for us.  (I had to pay 40 bucks at the first of the year for a materials fee.)  Ta Da!  But that is merely a reflection of the general feeling of the populace.  Many young women are infertile here.  Too, many men are overworked, and hence virtually infertile, just too tired to get up the gumption to fertilize their fain, young available wives.  (It is somewhat rare that a man marries an older woman in this society.  In fact, I know of one such situation.) 

One Small Group:

It is one small, but significant, group which jeopardizes our demographic future, or populace as an extant entity (according to Seoul University demographers).  Ten years ago, 14 percent of women aged 30 were not married and had never been married.  Today, that figure is 30 percent.  Huge change in the atmosphere.  Of course, many young women complain that they don't like their memory of their mothers up late worrying about their fathers drinking and carousing about at all hours, doing nothing about the house in the way of domestic chores or child care. 

Too, they were not stupid ... by middle school, they knew just how much more money the family spent on their son's education, vis-a-vis how much less was allocated for them and their sisters.  And sisters, plural is the operative word.  If a family has four children, your run-away-rocking-horse-winner of a bet is that it is comprised of three older sisters and one cherished younger brother, the apple of their parent's (and especially grandparents') collective eye. 

Lastly, they dislike their memories of their brothers being pampered, never asked to participate in chores about the house, while they had to do chores.   And so it is not so difficult to understand how the young women are now thusly struck, impregnated, with a negative image of the married life, at least so far as it includes husbands raised in the South Korean culture in which they, too, were raised. 

Women here earn 62% of what men earn for equivalent experience and credentials.  America is now above 90 percent, and kind of stuck, leveled off.  But, 90's better than 60.  Money is money, and includes some degree of respect in compensation, no? 

Rape and prostitution are high here, but we won't go into that.  That's another whole can of worms, one which greatly bothers many of my fellow expats, those who keep up with those statistics. 

One More For the Road:

While many of you may well have followed Ephesians Five "to a T" when marrying your wife, where she recognizes her duty to "submit to you," as head of the family, "in all things," I implore you to not neglect the follow-up verse which tells the man to love his wife as Christ loved the church, giving himself up for her."  That's a high standard, dudes, and one, I think, that is commonly ignored, if only for convenience, and the freedom to stick around with one's buddies at the local pub after work for the proverbial "just one more beer, Sam." 

Gaping Maws:

I'll see if I can't round up some vittles to feed my yapping brood, fill the gaping maws of my clamoring clutch, something nutritious to keep'em happy while I type away to my heart's content.  Sorry, I've been busy lately and neither updated nor read and posted much these past few months, but I took a class in computer science, to get a start on a short certificate program which would enable me to work in computer science, just get my foot in the door, so to speak, and it greatly eased my wife's concerns that I will never make much money preaching, or in any of my "harebrained," private business ideas. 

Let's see ... there should be some ice cream left. Two days ago I bought a whole bunch, two packs of ten at 3,800 won per pack, of little stick skewered jobs.  Yes! (back from the freezer), I got me a cherry pop, 1.4 grams of fat (cheers!), 21 grams of carbohydrates (good for energy), and 1 gram of protein (don't want to get protein poisoning). 

Good Stuff  & Ice Cream to Break the Fast:

So, it looks like our ice cream bars about as healthy as you can get, or expect.  We're not doing too badly on this count, I would think, which may explain why our children are bustling with health, the very picture of that robust, salutary glow which goes under the banner of hale, salubrious, ruddy, beaming vigor.  After all, you are what you eat, no? 

Yes, I suppose, if you like to think you are what you might call a "determinist" ... and no, perhaps, if you like to imagine God can make treasure out of junk.  And if He can't do that, what good is He?  After all, what's creation for if it ain't good?

Love, Padooker

Drop The Ball & The Alpo Male

My Little General seems to be very well-adjusted and happy, happy, happy.  He plays by himself well.  We hold him a lot ... which admittedly, cramps my computer typing style.  To buy or not to buy.  There is a 2.4 giga-hertz Apple computer for sale here.  You guys should buy one seeing as how they are so cheap in dollars.  The exchange rate has nearly doubled here of late, from 1050 won-to-the-dollar as the average for the past five years, 2003-2008 inclusive, up to the current 1640 or so.  If I were American and needed anything (electronic doo-hickeys, clothing, shoes, etc.) I would beat it to the money changers and go on an internet shopping spree in South Korea.  Your credit cards do the money exchange for you, you know. Apple Computer doesn't raise prices just because of the exchange rate, but prefers to maintain price consistency on American imports.  

Ugg..   I am tired.  My voice is worn out.  I started at the university again yesterday.  March is the beginning of their school year.  All other professors I've ever met, whether South Korean or foreign follow the informal, but virtually iron-clad, tradition of meeting with the students for just fifteen or twenty minutes to outline the syllabus, ask if there are any questions, to which no student responds, and then let everyone head home, professor included. 

I have never been able to do that, even after walking in the classroom with some degree of that intention.  It is what the students want.  But deep down I know I have been paid for a contract which has me actually teaching the first class, and I always go the whole two hours, particularly knowing that ESL has some of its greatest benefits in the more informal situations, when they are just chatting, thinking they are not studying.  The first day has the lowest pressure, with low expectations and a sense of zero obligation.  It's ideal for teaching ESL, and I love it. 

But, the upshot is that my voice is shot.  I taught two groups yesterday, for four hours, minus the ten-minute break.  I will miss it, though, when I go back to the U.S., where I will preach every Sunday and find some other work to do during the week.  I suppose I should start a business, or businesses, in which my burgeoning brood could find profitable work in their teens and early twenties, while they are focusing on their education.  To that, let's hope they focus on their education all their live-long days.  That's the only way to integrate education into one's life, no?  At least that's the way my parents did it, and I don't intend to do otherwise.  I'd hate for my children to not get the basic message and drop the proverbial tradition-clad ball.

We started the morning with snow curling down from the sky above.  I have my two older children home with me today, doing some homeschooling.  Courage coalesced within them during the eight-week school break this winter.  They began doing some English writing work here at home a couple of weeks ago and had somewhat of a revolution in their approach to studies, fain to learn eager to please.  They take it seriously now, with very neat writing.  It all started when my wife threw in the towel, giving up on teaching our children here at home.  My children, whatever their individual stripes, share one common trait:  they won't do anything without thinking about the value of it, and don't like to be coerced to do something which they think virtually worthless.  That includes nearly all of the South Korean public school curriculum, as well as my wife's methods of teaching. 

I forked out some dough, though, in buying four books about insects.  We had lots of field guides and brief introductions to many different species (Do you realize there are literally hundreds of insect species out there?  And they all look alike.).   Eni Waee ... the field guides give only enough to whet your appetite.  We had no books that went into sufficient depth to satisfy My Flagship.  No more.  I will give a list. 

Oops  He had a rhinocerous beetle to die earlier than expected.   Books say that they die after mating.  However, he has had most of his continue living even after mating.  This one seems to have coughed up some sperm and is ready to give up the ghost, but his mating activity was a while back, two or three weeks ago, right after he got it.  His others lived a normal lifespan, which is several months.  Books claim that they fall down dead after mating.  Could it be that in his maiden mating attempt, he was being prudent, conserving his essence and just went for a dry run, so to speak, not the real McCoy, kind of checking out the female to see if he felt she would make a good mother?  My Flagship says she did not lay eggs, and the other females he has had took about three or four days to lay eggs.  She dug holes in the wood, though.  He says that is what females do.  My wife doesn't dig any holes, other than financial in the sense that she presents strong opposition to me doing much in the way of investing and growing a business, what I am trained to do in my MBA.  

I came here planning to start a small hagwon, and see how well I could grow it, starting out as the sole teacher and just letting it go from there.  But my wife couldn't stand the thought of me incurring the business risk of running a business here in South Korea.  She says she feels more comfortable about me doing it in the U.S.  And she may have a point.  Corruption is relatively high here; that's a known fact.  It may be that competitors would have done me in.  I certainly never would have paid a bribe for anything.  Walmart, too, reportedly had to turn tail and beat a hasty retreat from this lovely Land of the Morning Calm, thanks to its staunch policy of giving no bribes. 

But I felt that I would stay well below the radar and just have a well-run school for teaching English in the evenings, and give great service, Tony the Tiger "Greeeaaat!"  But that never happened.  Rather, I continued working heavy loads, upwards of 60 hours a week, when I could have used some help, hiring two more foreigners, and focused on improving teaching methods and relations to mothers.  Even with my own students, I did manage to have some special events for them all, on Liberation Day each year for a few years in a row, when we got together, ate some chicken in a park, and had a field day with athletic and fun events, and with me also teaching juggling.  But those days are over, with me getting saddled with more children, and my wife unable to do much in the childcare department, or anything else now. 

How many children can you find in the photo on the right? Oops!  There's one more!

Wifey "Nim-Ggae-seo-neun"(sign of respect in Korean) is so afraid of us making money that she felt she needed to get certified to teach in the U.S., and started a master's degree in English.  Now, it turns out that her university program does not give certification, merely a terminal degree in ESL.  She is doing a distance learning program, which is considerably better than your typical online programs.  With distance learning, you listen to the same lectures, and you follow the same assignments in step with the students who attend the classes physically.  In fact, her diploma will make no distinction between her status as a distance learner and that of a student who attends classes in person. 

I look at her textbooks and see her working passionately, staying up all night many nights in a row for projects and think that she is having a great experience.  I only wish she enjoyed it as much as I think she should, or maybe does ... if she indeed thrives on it and does not realize her debt to it as a stimulus to her growing young mind.  

Studying is inherently good for her, and it does not matter to me if she never gets a job.  I wish she shared my feelings on that and would just relax, work hard, and not worry about getting a job. 

Mentally, she's on her way up, while I am on my way down it would seem, if I am a typical red-blooded American Alpo Male.  I believe most minds begin shrinking more rapidly at about age 40. 

Well, this post is waxing dry.  I'll see if I can rustle up some photos to touch it up here and there, and then bid you adieu.  Maybe I'll add a bit more to this post within the next few days.  Much has changed here, and I've been busier than a bee.  I hope to be able to show you my game, provided I get it copyrighted in the U.S. soon, within a few weeks.  I'll send it off today or tomorrow if all goes well, and my fourth child lets me work on it this evening.

This one, My Flagship, is always stopping to look at bugs. 

Love, Padooker 

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