January 5, 2009

  • This Here Year

    Dear Folks,

    Classy Christmas 2008 Nathaniels[1]

    Here we are on Christmas 2008

    We've got to get us a good camera.  I am planning to buy a Nikon D40, used, for just under 500 dollars.  But we will have to wait awhile.  I spent nearly 800 dollars on Christmas, focusing on DVD's of American Sitcoms from the 1960's and 70's, plus The Simpsons seasons 6-10.   My family enjoys watching The Simpsons.  I need to watch with them, though, in order to explain the idioms and colloquial expressions.  Otherwise, the children and my wife just gloss over them, not knowing what they mean. 

    Scooby Doo is worse, though, to explain to someone who never grew up in American culture.  My Dandelion likes Scooby Doo, and I sit with her from time to time and explain what I can, pausing the DVD to get in a better explanation. 

    4 January 2009 022 4 January 2009 018

    Above, My Flagship and I went for a bike ride this afternoon.  It took us 75 minutes, and I got tuckered out.  I had already gone 80 minutes at a faster clip to Dae Jeong Elementary School to teach today at an English camp.  The teaching was fun, but we had to sit through an opening ceremony which was boring.  It took an hour or so.

    My Flagship kept getting out ahead of me on the trail.  I couldn't keep up with him on the way back.  He likes to go fast, and I decidedly do not.  Those dirt trails beside the river jostle my bones.  Too, I believe my bike developed a new rattle, not a good sign. 

    I am listening to a Hootie and the Blowfish album which a friend of mine gave me for Christmas.  It's not bad.  That's all I can say for it right now. 

    4 January 2009 Clever Lad 003

    Above you see My Clever Lad all sad that we ate up the whole tin of cookies that a student gave us for Christmas. It took my family, and my students, too, a week to eat them all.  But we did it, by golly.  We ate'em all, ate'em all up, we did.

    4 January 2009 001 Nathaniels[1]

    Above:  Mom and Our Newest Family Member, now Five Months Old, "My Little General."   He's turning out to be a pretty good little dude, it seems.  He's definitely "a keeper," on any scale.  But then, I'm his father, so I might be a tad biased. 

    I bought some bean soup the other day, with My Shining Knight in tow.  Together we decided that it would round out a nice meal.  We got home and the team enjoyed it.  However, when I remarked to my wife that we got two plastic things of soup for eleven dollars, sort of proud of my shopping prowess, she said that was expensive.  Go figure.  Is bean soup (one with a bit of tuna, the other with snippets of veggies) expensive at 5 dollars and 6 dollars?  I believe you get maybe one kilogram in each case, for a grand total of two kilograms.  I won't swear to it, but that's about what it seemed to be, either that, or about two pounds per soup.  Presumably it was about enough for one adult to eat for each pan.  The kids divided it up and ate well. 

    With the milk and egg prices edging up over the past two years, I gradually stopped buying certain foods.  The latest casualty was the little cartons of chocolate and strawberry milk.  My kids used to gobble them down, but they just cost too much now, and we can drink regular milk, and be fine for it, no worse for the wear.  That's what we do now, been on this kick for several months. 

    The thing is, I just try to feed them nutritious meals without going in hock.  So far, we've managed that, even while working our way out of hock on the house, which I guess you could call "House Hock."   That took about six years, if I remember correctly, something my wife says I just can't do anymore.  So, all the better for me; I will soon be able to reread the same novel over and over, and never know the ending until I get there. 

    The preacher talked yesterday about how a seed has to be placed in the ground and die (at least to its current form) in order to bring forth fruit in abundance.  What he meant was that I have to give up my life for my children and others.  Sounds pretty good to me, so he was preaching to the choir as far as that is concerned.  I like serving others, especially those closest to me, in my family and business. 

    I'll have to start a new business in the U.S.  And we're reading our selves for the big exodus, maybe as early as this here year. 

    Love, Padooker

Comments (2)

  • ..such a beautiful family and yes, if the container of soup would only feed one adult then it's a bit pricey but if it managed to feed all of your kids then it really isn't, lol, did that make sense?

    I can't help thinking that you all have a far better life where you are than you ever will in the US or at least in the present climate there.

  • The two containers together cost 11 dollars, and did satisfy most of my children.  However, as we don't eat meals, per se, I am not sure everybody dug in, and those who did were probably not too hungry.  We graze most of the day, rather than divide our consumption up into neat, timely portions you might recognize as a meal. 

    To me, meals have three traits most would agree with:  a variety of food, a certain minimum quantity, and are served on a fairly consistent time table.

    As for the better life in South Korea, yes, there are certain aspects here which have been better for us.  Medical care, shopping places, and schools are very close, within walking distance.  I can make up to 86,000 dollars a year and enjoy the U.S. foreign income exemption from taxes.  I commute 5 seconds to my job (from the living room), and as many as 10 seconds if I'm in the back bedroom.  On snowy days, I don't put on a jacket to go to work. Most of my work is private teaching, at which I excel.  I have recently begun teaching in other ways, to get the work out of the house.  My wife has been having a harder time managing our kids while I'm teaching. 

    The biggest draw of the U.S. is the education system.  Bullying here is rampant, and there are no teaching assistants to monitor the large classes while teachers take their ten minute smoking and teacher room coffee breaks between each class session.  Too, the mothers of my students and my wife all agree that the quality of education offered here in the public schools is so much lower than they expect in the U.S. that it can't be compared on the same scale. 

    We get a 200 dollar subsidy for daycare, which pays for the 2 and 1/2 hour per day service we get now.  When we jump up to 6 to 8 hours per day, then we will have to pay 100 per month in addition to the 200 the government pays (for the 3rd or higher child in each family) to stimulate greater baby production.  Our birth rate reflects cultural suicide, a low level of hope, and living for the moment, as we are the lowest among OECD members, at below 1.0 babies per woman.

      And who can blame women for not wanting to marry?  This society only pays women 61 percent of what men get for equivalent qualifications and experience.  Too, of all the major public companies, there are zero women at one of the top six (of 9 total) management levels.  Sucks, doughnut?   What is amounts to is an unconscious rejection of this heavily patriarchal society by women, when just 10 years ago 13 % of women aged 30 had never married, and today that percentage is 40.   Huge change, huh?  Now, THAT'S a statement, no?

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