I Have Become Emilio Estevez

That’s right, it finally happened. Just like his character in the popular Saint Paul-based film The Mighty Ducks, I led a ragtag group of kids up against highly trained, more experienced teams. And thanks to my inspiring leadership, we were victorious.

Okay, actually the kids and my co-teacher Seonmi did most of the work. But I’m still quite proud of our middle school’s English drama team. We were the youngest group by far in west Daejeon’s drama final, with four first graders in our cast of nine. Up against teams made entirely of third graders with more English and acting experience, they came out swinging and earned first place overall!

But never has the difference between coaching young actors in the USA versus here in Korea been more stark. This show was for competition, and the judges expect big voices and big motions. They want to be able to understand what the students are saying through their gestures as much as through the words. A big dose of silliness never hurts, either. The result is a whole lot of adorableness with heaping helping of ridiculous sound effects and music cues. Just so you’re aware of what you’re getting into if you choose to click on the video below.

The script is posted below the video. I’d recommend two windows to follow along if you have trouble with the sound quality or the pronunciation (although I think their pronunciation was pretty darn good).

THE REAL HANSEL AND GRETEL

(The play starts in Mother’s house. HANSEL and GRETEL are playing computer games. Firing guns and other game noises can be heard. The FAIRY GODMOTHER is standing stage right.)

FAIRY GODMOTHER

Hello, everyone! Now, I bet you think you already know the story of Hansel and Gretel. You know, the two children who run away into the woods and meet a wicked witch who wants to eat them? Well, you see, that story’s not really how it all went.

Today, I am going to tell you the true story of Hansel and Gretel. And, like any good story, it begins with, “Once upon a time…”

(The Fairy Godmother steps out of the way as MOTHER enters from stage left.)

HANSEL

That’s stupid! I killed you first!

GRETEL

No way, I killed you first!

HANSEL

Nuh uhhh!

MOTHER

Hansel! Gretel! It’s time for your chores!

GRETEL

Chores? But it’s Saturday!

MOTHER

And you have to help around the house! It’ll only take an hour.

HANSEL

A whole hour? No way.

MOTHER

And don’t forget, you need to finish your homework before you go to bed so we can visit Grandma tomorrow.

GRETEL

Homework? But it’s Saturdaaay!

MOTHER

So put the games down and get to work.

(Hansel and Gretel ignore Mother.)

GRETEL

Oh, I got you again!

HANSEL

You’re the worst!

GRETEL

No, you’re the worst!

(Mother mimes pulling out the plug for the TV.)

HANSEL & GRETEL

Moooooooooom!

MOTHER

Get to work, kids!

(Mother exits. Fairy Godmother stops the action with her magic wand.)

FAIRY GODMOTHER

Hansel and Gretel were less than happy with Mother for this. Of course they were! What kind of parent asks their child nicely to do work on a perfectly good Saturday? So they came up with a plan for revenge!

(Fairy Godmother starts the action again.)

GRETEL

I have an idea.

HANSEL

Me too!

GRETEL

Let’s say it at the same time!

HANSEL & GRETEL

One, two, three! We should run away! Hey! That’s just what I was thinking!

HANSEL

Where should we go?

GRETEL

How about the forest?

HANSEL

The scary haunted forest with the wolves and witches?

GRETEL

Yeah, they’ll never think to look for us there! We can play all Saturday long!

HANSEL

Good thinking, sis!

(Fairy Godmother freezes the action again.)

FAIRY GODMOTHER

Boy, Hansel and Gretel sure are smart, aren’t they? They packed up a lunch of sandwiches and pop and made for the forest. The scary one with all the wolves and witches…

(Scene change. We are in a forest now, with a large bush to hide behind. Hansel is eating his sandwich, and Gretel carries a picnic basket.)

GRETEL

Hansel, save that for later! You’ll be hungry if you don’t!

HANSEL

But I’m hungry now.

GRETEL

We left five minutes ago!

(A scary growling noise is heard from behind the bush.)

HANSEL

What was that?

GRETEL

It sounded like…

(THE BIG BAD WOLF leaps out from behind a bush. He is small, and looks very nice.)

HANSEL & GRETEL

A WOLF!!!

(They run screaming.)

BIG BAD WOLF

Hey, wait! Wait!

(Hansel stops running and looks back at the Wolf.)

GRETEL

It’s a trick! The Big Bad Wolf will eat us up!

BIG BAD WOLF

What? No I won’t! I just smelled your sandwich.

HANSEL

Get away from us you beast!

BIG BAD WOLF

No, really! I’m super-hungry. Is that peanut butter and jelly?

(Big Bad Wolf reaches for the sandwich.)

HANSEL

Hey! Hands off!

GRETEL

Come on, Hansel! Wolves are dangerous. We shouldn’t stick around.

BIG BAD WOLF

I’m not dangerous. Who told you that?

GRETEL

Everyone knows that. Wolves eat people all the time. Haven’t you ever heard of Little Red Riding Hood?

BIG BAD WOLF

That whole story was a lie! I did dress like an old lady, but it was Halloween and I did not eat anybody!

HANSEL

What about the Three Little Pigs?

BIG BAD WOLF

I know those pigs. They’re nothing but bullies.

GRETEL

Huh?

BIG BAD WOLF

They’re the ones that ran around telling everyone I was big and bad. They were making fun of me because I’m small. And I don’t even eat pork! I’m a vegetarian!

HANSEL

That’s not very nice of them.

BIG BAD WOLF

It wasn’t very nice of you to run away from me.

HANSEL

Sorry. Here, you want the rest of my sandwich?

BIG BAD WOLF

Yeah, thanks!

(Hansel gives the Wolf his sandwich, who eats it while making growling Wolf noises.)

GRETEL

Hansel! What if you get hungry later?

HANSEL
We can share your sandwich.

GRETEL

I’m not sharing. Come on, Hansel, let’s get out of here.

BIG BAD WOLF

Hey, if you see those three little pigs, could you tell them you saw me? And that I’m a pretty nice guy?

GRETEL

Sure, whatever.

(Fairy Godmother freezes the action again.)

FAIRY GODMOTHER

So Hansel and Gretel narrowly escaped from being supper for the Big Bad Wolf.

BIG BAD WOLF

(Still eating the sandwich.)

That’s not very nice, you know!

FAIRY GODMOTHER

Quiet, you! I’m telling the story. Hansel and Gretel continued their adventure in the forest, and soon came across some very interesting houses…

(Hansel and Gretel exit. The 3 LITTLE PIGS enter with their houses, and Hansel and Gretel enter after them.)

HANSEL

Hey, we should see if there’s anyone inside. I’m hungry.

GRETEL

I told you, you shouldn’t have shared your sandwich with the wolf.

(Hansel goes to the first little house and knocks.)

LITTLE PIG 1

Who is it?

HANSEL

It’s Hansel! I was wondering if you had any food.

LITTLE PIG 1

I do have food.

HANSEL

Could I have a bite?

LITTLE PIG 1

Not by the hair of my chinny-chin-chin!

(LITTLE PIG 1 reaches out of her house and high-fives LITTLE PIG 2 in her house next door. Hansel goes to the next house.)

HANSEL

Hello?

LITTLE PIG 2

What do you want?

HANSEL

I’m just a little hungry. Can I come in?

LITTLE PIG 2

Not by the hair of my chinny-chin-chin!

(All three pigs laugh and high-five each other.)

GRETEL

You know, you guys aren’t very nice.

HANSEL

Yeah, the wolf was right about you!

LITTLE PIG 1

The wolf?

LITTLE PIG 2

The big wolf?

LITTLE PIG 3

The big bad wolf?

(The pigs laugh again.)

HANSEL

I guess so. But he’s not very big, and he was really nice!

LITTLE PIG 2

It’s no way for a wolf to behave!

LITTLE PIG 3

He’s more afraid of us than we are of him!

(The pigs laugh again.)

GRETEL

Maybe it’s because of how mean you are.

HANSEL

Yeah, if you were nicer maybe you’d have more friends.

LITTLE PIG 2

And how many friends do you children have?

LITTLE PIG 1

Not many, I bet!

GRETEL

That’s not true. We have friends. Like… um… Hansel?

HANSEL

Errrr…

LITTLE PIG 2

Not so great yourselves are you?

HANSEL

Maybe not. We were pretty mean to Mom before, Gretel.

GRETEL

Yeah, maybe.

LITTLE PIG 2

Well, isn’t this touching?

LITTLE PIG 3

Heartwarming!

LITTLE PIG 1

Adorable!

(The pigs all laugh again.)

HANSEL

Laugh if you want, but what happens when a real Big Bad Wolf comes?

GRETEL

Maybe then you’ll wish you’d been nicer, so you’d have friends to help you.

LITTLE PIG 2

Hmm…

LITTLE PIG 1

I think they might be right.

LITTLE PIG 3

Maybe we should apologize to the Wolf.

LITTLE PIG 2

Maybe so.

(The Fairy Godmother steps forward as the Pigs move their houses offstage.)

FAIRY GODMOTHER

Thanks to the adorable children, Hansel and Gretel, the Three Little Pigs were soon the best of friends with the Big Bad Wolf. Meanwhile, Hansel and Gretel tried to find their way home to their mother, but soon found that they were lost, deep in the forest…

GRETEL

If you hadn’t eaten your whole sandwich we could have left pieces of it to help us get home!

HANSEL

It’s not my fault! It was your idea to come into the forest.

(Hansel grabs his stomach.)

I’m so hungry.

FAIRY GODMOTHER

Just then, they came upon a very strange sight. It was another house, but this one was made of candy! And cookies! And sweets!

(The WICKED WITCH’S house comes onstage, carried by the witch.)

HANSEL

Gretel, do you see that? Or am I going crazy?

GRETEL

It’s a house made of candy!

(Hansel runs to the house and starts pulling pieces of it off and eating them.)

GRETEL

Hansel, wait! Maybe we shouldn’t eat the house. What if someone lives there?

HANSEL

Candy is for eating, Gretel. If they didn’t want me to eat their house, they wouldn’t have made it out of candy.

GRETEL

Good point.

(Gretel joins her brother and they both start eating the candy off the house.)

FAIRY GODMOTHER

The hungry children were so grateful for the food that they didn’t even notice the mean, wicked, ugly old witch come out of her house!

(The WICKED WITCH comes out from behind the house and watches the children.)

WICKED WITCH

Hello there, little children.

(Hansel and Gretel turn around, see the witch, and wave. Their mouths are too full to speak.)

WICKED WITCH

What are you doing way out here in the forest?

(Hansel and Gretel shrug.)

WICKED WITCH

You must be so hungry!

(Hansel and Gretel nod.)

WICKED WITCH

And tired!

(Hansel and Gretel nod.)

WICKED WITCH

Come inside! You can rest and I will cook something for you.

(Hansel and Gretel high five. The witch goes into the house.)

GRETEL

Should we go? It might be dangerous.

HANSEL

She has a candy house in the middle of the woods! What could possibly be dangerous about that?

GRETEL

Again, good point.

(Hansel and Gretel follow the Wicked Witch.)

FAIRY GODMOTHER

Meanwhile, the Three Little Pigs and the Big Bad, mean, scary old wolf had apologized to each other and made friends.

(Music. The Pigs and the Big Bad Wolf all enter together, dancing around like the best of friends. Suddenly, the Wolf stops everything.)

BIG BAD WOLF

Stop!

LITTLE PIG 1

Why?

LITTLE PIG 2

What is it?

BIG BAD WOLF

Those two children! I can smell them! And they’re heading for… the Wicked Witch’s house!

(The Three Little Pigs all gasp.)

LITLE PIG 3

Not… the Wicked Witch!

BIG BAD WOLF

Yes… the Wicked Witch!

LITTLE PIG 2

Oh no!

BIG BAD WOLF

We have to help them!

LITTLE PIG 1

I’m afraid!

LITTLE PIG 2

Yeah, we’re just little pigs, and you’re a big, bad wolf! Maybe you should go help them!

BIG BAD WOLF

I can’t do it all by myself. I need your help.

(The Three Little Pigs all look at each other.)

LITTLE PIG 2

Fine. We’ll help. Which way do we go?

BIG BAD WOLF

Just follow your nose!

(The Wolf runs offstage, sniffing, and the Three Little Pigs follow. The Fairy Godmother steps forward.)

FAIRY GODMOTHER

Back at the Witch’s house, the adorable heroes have found themselves in hot water.

(A jail cell is brought on (the candy house, flipped backwards), and Hansel and Gretel are trapped inside.)

WICKED WITCH

You think you can just go around eating people’s houses?

GRETEL

Not usually.

HANSEL

Only if they’re made of candy.

WICKED WITCH

No! You can’t!

HANSEL

But I was hungry!

WICKED WITCH

Well, guess what? I’m hungry now. Do you know what’s for dinner?

HANSEL & GRETEL

Umm… candy?

WICKED WITCH

Wrong! Children!

(The Wicked Witch laughs.)

HANSEL

Uh oh.

GRETEL

We have to get out of here!

WICKED WITCH

There is no way out! I made that prison myself… with magic!

(The Big Bad Wolf and the Three Little Pigs enter.)

BIG BAD WOLF

Wicked Witch, Wicked Witch, can I come in?

WICKED WITCH

No! I’m getting ready to stew some children!

BIG BAD WOLF

Then I’ll huff, and I’ll puff, and I’ll bloooooooow your house in!

WICKED WITCH

Really? I thought you’d eat it.

HANSEL

It’s the Wolf!

GRETEL

He’s here to rescue us!

(The Big Bad Wolf tries to blow the house over. Of course, it doesn’t work.)

LITTLE PIG 2

Come on, Pigs! Let’s help him!

(The Big Bad Wolf keeps blowing, and the Pigs lift up the ‘house’ and tip it over.)

WICKED WITCH

Noooo! My evil magic candy house!

(The Little Pigs surround the Witch threateningly.)

LITTLE PIG 2

You’d better get out of here, Wicked Witch.

LITTLE PIG 1

Before we show you how big and bad Little Pigs can be.

WICKED WITCH

Okay, I’m leaving!

(The Wicked Witch runs away.)

GRETEL

Wow, thanks guys!

BIG BAD WOLF

It’s nothing. We couldn’t leave you here with that mean old Witch.

LITTLE PIG 2

Not after you helped us become friends.

LITTLE PIG 1 & 2

Yeah!

HANSEL

See, Pigs? I told you the Wolf was nice.

GRETEL

Come on Hansel, we should try to get home.

HANSEL

But we don’t even know which way to go!

BIG BAD WOLF

I can help you with that! I’ll just sniff my way there! Follow me!

(The Big Bad Wolf follows his nose offstage, and Hansel, Gretel, and the Little Pigs follow. The Fairy Godmother steps forward.)

FAIRY GODMOTHER

So the Big Bad Wolf led the children back to their mother. Goodness, I sure hope Mother changed her mind about all that homework and those awful chores, don’t you?

(Mother enters, looking this way and that.)

MOTHER

Hansel? Gretel? Where are you?

(Hansel and Gretel enter and run to their mother, giving her a big hug.)

HANSEL & GRETEL

Mom!

MOTHER

You’re home! Where have you been?

HANSEL

We went into the forest!

GRETEL

We met a friendly wolf!

HANSEL

And some pigs!

GRETEL

And a witch tried to eat us!

MOTHER

What were you doing in the forest?

GRETEL

We didn’t want to do our work on a Saturday.

HANSEL

But it’s fine now, Mom! We’ll do all our chores and homework!

GRETEL

We learned our lesson.

HANSEL

We have to help people and be nice so others will help us when we need it!

MOTHER

Well… okay! Good!

(Fairy Godmother steps forward.)

FAIRY GODMOTHER

The children learned a great lesson and the Big Bad Wolf and the Three Little Pigs became friends. This is the end of the true story of Hansel and Gretel. And of course, they all lived happily ever after. Except for the witch, because her house was ruined.

(There is much ridiculous singing and dancing to the same song we used in the last show, because we were too lazy to find a new one.)

THE END!

I’m Not Dead

Really, I’m not. I know I haven’t updated here since Christmas, but I have an excuse. Well, a lot of them. None are very good. I was back in America for three weeks, for one. I took a few other vacation days to travel around Korea. When I was writing in between all that I was trying to finish a script for the new season of English Drama Club. I went to Seoul for a Saint Patrick’s Day festival. I climbed a couple mountains. But mostly? Mostly I’ve been lazy.
Okay, so I go to work and all of that, but the days of, “Holy crap I’m in Korea and must use every second to live life to the fullest and experience everything I can while I’m here!!!” are, well, gone. The starry-eyed optimism of a newcomer has been replaced with the glazed-over expression of a jaded veteran. Who brought his Xbox back from America.
When I first arrived a little over a year ago I was bubbling over with excitement. I may have even vomited a little pure excitement here and there. People who’d been here far longer than a few days gave me warnings, like, “Some older people hate foreigners,” “Your school will sometimes be very frustrating to deal with,” and, “For the love of God make sure you center yourself before pooping in the squat pots.” I, of course, ignored their warnings, thinking that my new home could do no wrong.
And now I’m the one giving the unsolicited advice when I run into new folks around town. Granted, if I have any advice to give to them, it’d be these three things: don’t take crap from your school, be persistent, and no matter what it looks or smells like you should probably eat it at least once because it might be delicious. But part of growing accustomed to a new place and new culture is growing accustomed to the things that bother you about it. And nothing puts those things in sharper relief quite like a little time back in the homeland.
When I arrived back at Incheon International Airport from my time in the good old Midwest, one of my biggest pet peeves about life in Korea was on full display immediately. Line etiquette. By which I don’t just mean standing in line, I more mean lines that form where none should. Specifically escalators. I was spoiled on escalators from my time in London, where it is considered extraordinarily rude to not keep to the right in case someone’s in a hurry. In Korea, the modus operandi is to ensure that no one can ever, ever pass you no matter how much they want to.

Are you in a group of two or more? Stand next to each other, please. Only one of you? Stand right in the middle, maybe taking a wide stance to ensure thin folks have no shot at moving up, either. If someone asks you to move, it is improper to move on the first ask unless you’re feeling charitable. Why is this? Honestly, I have no idea. My working theory is that people in this country work so hard that if a machine offers to do the moving for them, even for a little while, they are going to damn well accept the welcome respite.

Another important rule is to rush to get on the escalator before anyone else for maximum standing-around efficiency.

So what would be my very best advice to a new native-speaking English teacher in Korea? Simple. Take the stairs, you lazy so-and-so. By the time you get up to the top you’ll have saved yourself plenty of standing-around-with-people’s-butts-in-your-face time, and maybe you’ll even feel like you got a little exercise. The best part? Those stairs are all yours. Nobody ever uses them.

Those people at the top are just cardboard cutouts posing for the picture. 

But hey, that’s really my biggest complaint. I hate using escalators here. I can deal with it  because I can avoid them. In America, it was impossible to avoid the things that annoyed me to no end, specifically neckbeards and hipsters (and they often go together).

That’s all I have to say for today, dear readers. I hope that my next post will come along much, much faster than this one did. I must now return to the arms of my one true love, for she is a harsh and demanding mistress. ‘Til next time!

Oh, how I long for your embrace. And to think, I nearly cheated on you with donuts!

English Major Away: Festive Edition (Also Banana Hammocks)

Well, I did it. I made it through my first official Christmas away from home. So, (you ask, wide-eyed and awed) what was it like? How is Christmas celebrated in Korea? Well don’t fret, dear reader, because I am here to tell you that it seems to be a mix between Christmas in America and Valentine’s Day. That’s right, you get all that insufferable holiday cheer shoved down your throat in the form of mistletoe and holly, Christmas trees, and creepy robot Santas as well as the constant Valentine’s Day reminder that you are alone and ugly and no one will ever love you! Hooray!

Pictured: Christmas in Korea

Okay, so I’m being a little melodramatic. But Christmas is, in Korea, less a day to be spent with family under the tree and more a day to spend with a girl/boyfriend, shopping and going to movies and eating at nice restaurants. Also, there’s presents and Christmas carols. But take this: on Christmas Eve, when most Americans who celebrate the holiday would be at home eating a home-cooked meal and watching It’s a Wonderful Life (or whatever it is people do these days), the restaurants all over Daejeon were positively packed. I went for dinner with a large group of friends, and waited for nearly three hours in the lobby of our chosen restaurant. Once inside, we saw that most tables were taken up by couples gazing lovingly at each other over their Christmas Eve steaks.

Once I’d powered through Christmas on a diet of (literally) meat and potatoes, I had a school trip to look forward to. No, not a school trip with students, but one with only the staff of my school. We went on an overnight excursion to the island of Jeju, just past the southern tip of the Korean peninsula. It’s a subtropical island that seems to have a completely schizophrenic climate. Up north, it was incredibly windy and cold. Towards the center of the island, it was chilly with thick layers of snow coating the ground. And down south was mild with no snow and plenty of sunshine. This is an island that takes maybe an hour to travel from north to south.

Above: Monday.

Below: Tuesday, 15 miles away.

 

Anyways, Jeju-do (do, as in doe [a  deer, a female deer], means island in Korean) was perhaps the most exhausting bout of furious traveling crammed into an incredibly short time I’ve ever witnessed. After landing at around 9:30AM on Monday, we proceeded to a Chinese acrobat circus, hiking a stretch of coastline, going on a cruise around some volcanic islands, and orange picking. Yes, you can pick oranges in the snow on Jeju-do.

Anyways, that night our unsuspecting group was bussed over to a ‘nightclub’ after dinner. When you think of a nightclub, you might think about a sweaty basement with pounding bass beats and flashing strobe lights. Or maybe a slightly classier establishment with windows and other such high-end accoutrements. Apparently a nightclub in Jeju-do is a huge, bare facsimile of a Las Vegas lounge-act joint. A singer who ‘used to be famous’, according to my co-worker, and a band serenaded us as we entered. Later, the entire goddamned roof opened up for no reason like someone punching a sliced pie from below, only instead of being delicious and hilarious, it just let cold air blow in for awhile while they sprayed soapy foam on us from above.

Now imagine that it opens, only instead of being filled with custardy goodness, there’s nothing but a vast and frozen sky blowing its nose at you.

But wait! There’s more! The next act onstage was a lone man. Off in the corner was a DJ, who started playing some thumpin’ dance beats. Then, the guy started taking his Vegas-y leisure suit off. Until he was wearing only a glow-in-the-dark banana hammock.

Um, not quite.

That’s right, our intrepid tour guide saw fit to take the mostly middle-aged staff of a middle school to a male strip club for a little after-dinner treat. I was probably the least-horrified one there, but only because I couldn’t stop laughing. Especially when the lights went purple, and the stripper’s body somehow glowed purple while his man-thong glowed green like he was some kind of wildly gyrating reverse Hulk.

The next day we woke up early, went hiking once again, took a ride on a toy train to a Dutch windmill (really, should anything I say surprise you at this point?), visited a traditional Jeju-do folk village, and went horseback riding for maybe ten minutes. All in all, we did an absolutely ridiculous number of things in only two days and a little over twenty-four hours. I felt like I was at a buffet of free samples made of Jeju activities.

Thought I was joking about the toy train, didn’t you?

Nine times out of ten, if someone asks you to feel the bear, you don’t go near that shit. For the record, it was kind of greasy.

Anyways, it’s New Year’s Eve here in Korea, and I have been enlisted to taste-test the food at my Korean friend’s new restaurant before I get down to the execution of the Korean New Years’ ritual: forgetting everything that happened in the previous 365 days via the consumption of alcohol. Wish me luck. For the record, my New Year’s resolution is the same as it has been for the past several New Years now, which is to simply not die. Happy New Year, dear readers!

A Few Really Good Things and One Really Bad One

If you’ve been paying any attention at all to the news, you’ve probably heard about the recent events just off the coast of the Korean Peninsula. Just a few months after tensions between North and South Korea ratcheted up another notch with the sinking of the Cheonan, an hour-long exchange of artillery fire took place on Yeonpyeong Island, about 350 kilometers northwest of Daejeon. Being through both of these incidents, the thing that strikes me most is how little my Korean co-workers actually talk about it. Yesterday, the day after the exchange of fire hit international news airwaves, no one at my school even mentioned it. Life went on as usual.

To my friends and family, don’t worry. The US Embassy (and the embassies of my friends from other countries) has not raised the alert, not warned us that we should be packed and ready to go in an instant if anything gets worse. While the Cheonan and Yeonpyeong incidents are significantly worse than any between the Koreas in several years, they still come as a reality of living in a country that is technically at war with its only bordering neighbor. The fact that the regime within that neighbor is feeling increasingly insecure, and now threatened by only its second hereditary shift in power (a very risky proposition when the internal stability of the country relies upon a personality cult so powerful that many of its citizens look upon their leader as a sort of God-king) will only serve to make them more likely to lash out. But South Korea is a stable country with loyal and powerful allies. I feel safe living here, and I don’t feel any less safe now than I did last week.

On to brighter, sunnier things! First off, I would like to congratulate my students in the JinJam Middle School English Drama Club for first of all winning their preliminary round in Daejeon in September, and going on to place 2nd in the nation earlier this month! We beat out teams from Seoul, where the national view is that English ability is higher, and we laid waste to high school teams, as well! We’re like the Mighty Ducks of acting! Only in Korea!

 Starring me as Emilio Estevez.

In addition to helping the drama club grab some glory, I was asked to teach Korean English teachers during a training session about using drama techniques in the classroom. Given that theatre was one of my areas of study in college, I jumped at the chance. Plus, I truly believe that using drama to teach a second language is a very effective technique. It builds pronunciation, vocabulary, listening skills, and fluency all at once, and it’s a ton of fun. And now I’m officially a trainer for the Korean public school system!

I also mentioned in my last post that one of my stories, a flash fiction (under 1000 words) piece called ‘Judas Wrote a Blank Check’, would be posted up on a website called The Flash Fiction Offensive. Well, you can read that story right now! Leave a comment if you want to curry my very valuable good favor, but beware that some people who have read it have found its content to be objectionable.

That’s all I really wanted to say this time out. Sorry for the lack of pictures, cartoons, and off-color jokes. I hope you’ll forgive me. Have a happy Thanksgiving! ‘Til next time!

The Most Embarrassing Airport Security Experience Ever and Other Stupid Adventures

WARNING: THIS POST CONTAINS CRUDE JOKES (even more so than usual).

Okay, I’m sorry. I admit it, I’ve been slacking. I went to Japan, a major international film festival, and what I can only describe as a Rock ‘n Roll Flame Daredevil Explosion Festival in Daejeon and I still haven’t updated this site. But it’s only because I’ve been so busy and haven’t had time. That and I’ve been hard at work pursuing my more fictional writing. So anyways, this post will be a quick and dirty update on some of the absurd experiences I’ve had recently.

We’ll start with Japan. My number one motivation for going was to visit fellow Mac English major/EFL extraordinaire Wes in his little city of Uedo. After traveling for a very, very long time I finally arrived, looked around for Wes, and only succeeded in finding him when he shouted, “Jake! You look like a idiot!” To be fair, he was right. My few days in Uedo featured darts and beer, and some raw horse meat. I’m not entirely sure why horse gets such a bad rap as a food in the West. It was pretty tasty.

Anyways, from Uedo I went to Tokyo, where I had a rather strange mission for myself. I had to out-weird the package I received from my friends in Saint Paul, which included pre-colored coloring book pages, two varieties of cat food, random candy, and what I think was a ball of cat hair. That meant going to Akihabara, the video game/girls-in-maid-costumes-cafe/sex shop center of Tokyo. Basically, if you want to see all that weird stuff you’ve heard about people seeing in Japan, this is where you go. So I went there, and found no less than three different varieties of liquor-scented ‘erotic oil’, which I intended to pack up in a box and send to my friends because let’s face it, that’s pretty funny.

What was considerably less funny was when the bottles of liquor-scented sex oil turned out to be a little too big for the strict ‘liquid on an airplane’ limits and my bag was searched. A week’s worth of dirty laundry was unearthed, and the security guard was rather confused by the bottles of brightly-colored oil in my bag and had to run them by about three of his colleagues. While snickering. I tried to keep a sheepish grin on my face so that they knew that I did not, in fact, have an oddly specific addiction to this stuff.

 You know you want it.

In the end, they made me check my bag. So it could’ve been worse. I could’ve been arrested for attempted lubricant terrorism or something.

So anyways, Japan was indeed a blast. Tokyo is the cleanest city I have ever been to, almost to the level of being creepy. There is no garbage anywhere (and no trash cans, either, which seems something of a paradox to me). The food is delicious, public transportation efficient, and landmarks appropriately beautiful.

Quick! What does this Tokyo landmark remind you of?

October brought the Busan film festival, which is a huge event. For me, it mostly involved standing in line for tickets, finding out that the movies we really wanted to see were sold out, and settling on a couple of documentaries. One was an interesting look at growing up in the Soviet Union as it crumbled, the other was a three-hour propaganda film for kabuki theatre in Tokyo. And we saw a Korean movie star! I don’t know who it was, but I know it was a movie star because he was surrounded by people with cameras and autograph materials.

Finally this brings me to the Daejeon Balloon and Rock Festival. Which also included guys flying around in weird parachute/giant fan contraptions, towering jets of flame, fireworks, and epic fantasy quest music in the background, leading to the single most absurd moment of sensory overload of my life.

Center: towering jet of flame. Background: fireworks. Top right: Guys in weird parachute/fan contraptions. Not pictured: Epic fantasy quest music.

Whew. I guess that’s all. I’ve been busy. As evidence of such, I want to give you a link. A flash fiction (a story under 1000 words, for the uninitiated) piece of mine will be going up on this website in about two weeks. Be warned, some people who’ve read it have been… shall we say, displeased with its themes and certain events therein. But I’m proud of it, and it’ll be my first fiction published outside of a school I was attending!

www.theflashfictionoffensive.blogspot.com

At last, I leave with some photos of the magnificently unsettling (and deserted) Daejeon EXPO Park. For your amusement. ‘Til next time, dear readers!

 

Winning IS Everything, After All

My English Drama Club was in its second competition on Saturday. If you’ll recall, we finished our first competition in second place. This time out we laid waste to our adversaries and secured first place and a trip to Seoul to compete nationally. So that’s pretty cool.

As a theatre and English major you might think I would be predisposed to getting Korean students to act in English. But these competitions seem to have surprisingly little to do with actual acting. One thing directors in normal theatre are not supposed to do is give line readings to their actors; tell them how to say a line. With this play, though, that’s pretty much all we did. The movements and gestures are all carefully choreographed and rehearsed ad nauseum (the whole thing is less than ten minutes long, but we managed to have a few three hour rehearsals nonetheless). Sound effects, music clips, and dancing are a must according to the students, which is how they wound up sneaking High School Musical into this thing when I missed rehearsal one day. But I’m not sure how much the students here want to act (and some of them have the potential to be really good) and how much they really just want to win. Or learn to speak English better. Whatever the motivation, they did a fantastic job and put on a good show, despite our budget and performance space both being drastically reduced in size in comparison to our first effort, so I’m posting the video below for you to see. Under the video I’ll paste the script, so if you feel the need to follow along to better understand the words you can go right ahead.

My next post will come after my Japan trip, so ‘til then, dear readers!

SUPERHEROES

(The play takes place in an average school. PETER is alone in a classroom, reading a comic book. The NARRATOR walks among the other characters, sometimes interacting.)

NARRATOR
Behold, Peter, a seemingly normal young man. But hidden underneath his average appearance, there is hero waiting to be born!

(BEN walks by and pushes Peter out of his chair.)

BEN
Nerd!

PETER
Ow! Jerk…

NARRATOR
The hero has been waiting for a long time, but I think he’s almost ready now.

(Ben turns around and goes back to Peter.)

BEN
What did you say?

PETER
Nothing.

BEN
That’s right!

(Ben hits Peter for emphasis and walks away again.)

NARRATOR
Okay, any second now…

(Peter gets up and sits back in his chair. He picks up his comic book again.)

PETER
What a bully!

NARRATOR
Seriously, I know it’s coming.

PETER
I wish I could be more like… Action Man!

(Superhero music, the Narrator puts a cape on Peter.)

NARRATOR
There it is!

PETER
(He sighs.)
But I’m not really a superhero. I’m just a normal kid.

NARRATOR
Oh, come on! I know what you need… a sidekick!

(EMMA enters the classroom, carrying her books for class.)

EMMA
Are you okay, Peter?

PETER
Yeah Emma, I’m fine. It’s just Ben being mean again.

EMMA
He’s such a jerk. There must be a way to teach him a lesson!

PETER
You’re right! If we work together, I’m sure we can think of something.

EMMA
Um, are you wearing a cape?

(The Narrator swoops in and puts a cape on Emma, too.)

PETER
I guess so. But so are you.

NARRATOR
Behold, the greatest superhero team of all time!

(Superhero music.)

EMMA
Where’s that music coming from?

NARRATOR
But wait! Another approaches!

(Music. BRUCE enters the classroom.)

PETER
Oh great, it‘s that jock, Bruce.

BRUCE
Hi, guys. What’s with the capes?

EMMA
We’re not sure. I think we’re superheroes.

BRUCE
Peter, you look upset. What’s wrong?

PETER
It’s Ben. He’s always so mean to me.

BRUCE
Yeah, Ben can be mean sometimes.

EMMA
We’re going to teach him a lesson.

BRUCE
How?

PETER
We don’t know yet. But I have a good imagination.

EMMA
And I’ve got the smarts.

BRUCE
Well maybe I can help, too. Ben does need to learn that it’s not okay to pick on people.

PETER
What can you do?

BRUCE
Well… I’m strong. Like, really strong.

NARRATOR
(Puts a cape on Bruce.)
And so, our dynamic duo became a trio! A League of Heroes set against the school bully!
(Superhero music.)

PETER
Where do these capes keep coming from?

NARRATOR
Meanwhile, the villain meets with his henchmen in their hideout… er, I mean, the hallway.

(Peter, Emma, and Bruce all freeze while Ben enters with his friends OTTO and JEAN.)

OTTO
Hey Ben, I think we’re going to be late for class…

BEN
Who cares?

JEAN
Um, me?

BEN
Shut up, Jean.

OTTO
Why can’t we just go to class?

BEN
Because, Otto, we’re going to catch whoever’s late to class, and shake ‘em down for their lunch money!

JEAN
Ohh, now I see.

OTTO
Good plan, Ben!

BEN
I know. I’m a genius.

NARRATOR
An evil genius. The arch-nemesis of our superheroes: Bully Man!
(Music, pause.)
It’s okay to boo him, if you want.

BEN
Now come on, you morons, follow me!

(Ben, Otto, and Jean all exit. )

NARRATOR
Back in the classroom, The League of Heroes confers.

EMMA
So what do you think we should do?

BRUCE
Well, I could use my awesome muscles to punch Ben in the face. He’d never see it coming!

PETER
Real heroes never have to use violence, Muscle Man.

BRUCE
But Batman uses it all the time!

PETER
Are you Batman?

BRUCE
No.

PETER
Didn’t think so.

EMMA
Okay Peter, if we can’t hurt Ben back, how can we teach him a lesson?

PETER
You’re the smart one, you tell me.

EMMA
But this was all your idea. You’re the one with the imagination.

NARRATOR
(sighs.)
Guys, guys, don’t you think you should be working together?

(Peter, Emma, and Bruce all jump, surprised.)

BRUCE
Where did you come from?

NARRATOR
Never mind that. Just stop arguing and start thinking!

PETER
Hey, this mysterious woman is right! We should all be working together.

NARRATOR
(sighs again.)
Thank you.
(He snaps his fingers.)
Disappear!

EMMA
Hey, where’d she go?

BRUCE
I have no idea what’s going on.

PETER
Focus, guys! How can we work together to teach Ben a lesson?

EMMA
Well, Ben likes to beat up on people smaller than him, right?

PETER
Does he ever.

EMMA
Then maybe we can use Bruce as a bodyguard!

PETER
Wow, great idea!

BRUCE
I like it. He’ll never get past these guns!
(Bruce flexes his biceps.)

NARRATOR
And so, our heroes were on their way to stopping their nemesis! But we still have one last hero before the final showdown…

(Sue enters, already wearing her superhero outfit, carrying her guitar.)
The Musician! Using the gift of song to save the world!

SUE
Hey, guys.

PETER, EMMA, & BRUCE
Hi, Sue!

SUE
What’re you doing?

PETER
Oh, we’re superheroes.

SUE
All of you?

EMMA
Yeah, we’re a League of Superheroes, actually. You want to join?

SUE
No, thanks. I usually fly solo.

EMMA
Oh. I see.

SUE
No offense to you guys.

BRUCE
None taken.

PETER
Yeah, it’s totally okay.

SUE
Okay, then.
(Pause.)
You mind if I practice in here until class starts?

PETER, EMMA, BRUCE
Of course!

SUE
Thanks!

(Sue goes over to the corner and begins to practice her guitar.)

NARRATOR
Well, that didn’t go like I‘d hoped. Maybe it’ll work out in the end. Anyways, back to the hallway, where the villainous Ben and his henchmen are putting their plan into action!

(Peter, Emma, Bruce, and Sue all freeze. Ben, Otto, and Jean enter.)

OTTO
And then, the other nerd, he said -

BEN
Shh! Someone’s coming. Otto you stand there. Jean, behind me.

(Otto goes to where Ben points, stage left, and Jean counter crosses stage right. All three pretend to be going about their normal business. Hank enters, carrying an armload of books.)

JEAN
Hey there.

BEN
Shut up, Jean. Hey there, loser.

HANK
Me?

BEN
You see any other losers around here?

HANK
Um, no?

OTTO
That’s right, loser.

BEN
Shut up, Otto.

OTTO
Sorry.

(Ben approaches Hank.)

BEN
What have we here, geek?

HANK
Just… my homework.

BEN
Oh, it’s just your homework, huh? Then I guess you don’t mind if I do… this!

(Otto and Jean, one on each side of Hank, slam his books and papers to the floor.)

HANK
Hey!

(Otto and Jean each grab one of Hank’s arms.)

HANK
Let go!

JEAN
Quit squirming, you little runt!

BEN
You got any lunch money? Any food? Hand it over, geek!

HANK
I don’t have anything, I swear!

OTTO
Then we’ll just have to take… all of your homework!

(Bruce, Emma, and Peter enter.)

PETER
Unhand that nerd, villain!
(Superhero music.)

BEN
Oh? And who’s going to make me?

EMMA
We are! The League of Superheroes!

BEN
Ooo, I’m shaking in my shoes. Go get ‘em, friends!

(Otto and Jean leap forward, but Bruce steps out and flexes his biceps at them.)

BRUCE
Muscle power!

(Jean and Bruce stop and stumble back.)

OTTO
Whoa!

JEAN
I’m not going to mess with him!

(They both turn and run away.)

BEN
Wait, come back!
(They don’t.)
Fine. You guys are losers, too!
(He turns back to face Bruce, Peter, and Emma. Meanwhile, Hank hides in the background, watching.)
I can take all three of you on at once, by myself!

PETER
Ben, wait!

BEN
Wait for what?

PETER
Why do you want to beat us up?

BEN
Because… you’re nerds? You’re weird? You’re smaller than me?

BRUCE
I’m not smaller than you.

EMMA
But Ben, how many friends do you have?

BEN
I’ve got Otto and Jean.

PETER
But are they your friends, or are they just afraid of you?

BEN
What’s the difference?

NARRATOR
Oh, my.

PETER
Your friends want to hang out with you, and help you, and have fun with you. Do they do that?

BEN
Well… I guess they mostly just punch what I tell them to punch.

EMMA
Those aren’t friends, Ben. They’re henchmen.

BEN
Are you… are you saying that nobody likes me?
(Ben sounds as if he is about to cry.)

BRUCE
Well, it’s just that when you go around being mean to people…

PETER
…that’s the effect you have.

EMMA
Nobody wants to hang out with a bully.

BEN
But… but everybody already thinks I’m a bully. How can I convince people to be friends with me?

PETER
You could start by apologizing to Hank over there.

(Hank steps forward and Ben goes up to meet him. Hank looks scared, but Ben picks up his book and hands it to him.)

BEN
Sorry about that. I won’t be mean to you anymore.

HANK
Really?

BEN
Really.

HANK
Wow! Thanks, League of Superheroes!

(Music.)

PETER, EMMA, & BRUCE
You’re welcome!

EMMA
See, Ben, it’s getting better already!

BEN
Will you guys help me? To make friends and stuff?

PETER
Of course! If we all work together, there’s nothing we can’t do!

(Sue enters with her guitar.)

SUE
Hey, guys. How’s the superhero thing going?

BRUCE
Awesome! I think we just added a new member!

BEN
Really?

EMMA
Of course!

NARRATOR
And so, the League of Superheroes adds its fourth member!
(Narrator puts a cape on Ben, superhero music plays.)
And everybody learned a valuable lesson: That if we all work together, we can change anything!

SUE
Hey guys, I’ve been working on a new song! Want to hear it?

PETER
Of course!

SUE
Okay, here goes!

(Song and dance.)

THE END.

Into the 4th Dimension

I can’t believe I haven’t talked about this yet. I live in Daejeon, which really wants to be Korea’s science and technology capital. In fact, in the city’s motto, “It’s Daejeon”, the “It’s” is a cleverly-disguised acronym for “Information, Technology, and Science”. I met a guy on Friday night who does research into nuclear waste disposal.

“I use a glass box and protecting gloves,” he said.

“Like Homer Simpson?”

“Exactly like Home Simpson.”

This is not an uncommon conversation for me. Most Korean men I meet (who aren’t students) in Daejeon seem to work in Techno Valley, a district in the northern part of the city where I can only assume scientists are hard at work on several variations of Doomsday Machines.

Korea will soon unveil its “XXL Hadron Collider”.

Nothing is quite so humbling as asking someone what they do for a living and having it go like this:

“I do research for nanotechnology.”

“Like, microscopic robots?”

“Yes. What did you study?”

“Um… English and Theatre.”

It’s not just the super-science that South Korea is into, though. The country is also home to two of the largest electronics brands in the world in Samsung and LG. In America you’d probably think of flat-screen TV’s and maybe cell phones when you read those brands, but in Korea they make everything. And I do mean everything. If you live in a high-rise apartment in Korea, chances are that it’s either a Samsung or LG apartment building (or maybe a Hyundai). And they export their architectural skills, too. Samsung is responsible for the Burj Dubai, AKA the New Tower of Babel, which forced our angry God into causing two hundred extra languages to spontaneously appear.

Gorzanese 101 will be available at your local community college for the Fall semester.

All this is to say that when any new technology becomes available to the masses here, chances are it will be exploited as hard anyone can exploit anything. Case in point, the whole 3D craze in movies right now. Yes, they have massive 3D screens on which they show all the latest movies, but Korea does America one D better: they have 4D. I’m not kidding. I thought at first that watching a 4D movie would allow me to travel in time.

 

This misconception was exacerbated when Doc Brown was there to personally sell me my ticket.

What 4D does is essentially turn your movie-going experience into an extended theme park ride. My friend Brian and I made the wise decision to shell out the few extra Won to see Piranha 3D in 4D. While watching most movies like this would probably just be annoying, watching a movie about killer fish eating naked girls while your seat gently sways with the motion of the onscreen boat, or something punches you in the ass when the fish bite the girl floating in the inflatable tube, is pretty stellar. The theatre blasted air in my face, sprayed water at me, and, during a party scene, put a laser light show on the ceiling. The first one of these theatres popped up in Seoul a few weeks after Avatar was released. Now, there are tons of them. Things like that change very rapidly in Korea.

Case in point: Korean Monopoly. I played this on my very first night in Daejeon with Sookhee and her two sons. It’s just like regular Monopoly, except that you don’t have to own all the properties of one color to build on them. You also don’t have to build four houses before you build a hotel, and you can build as many hotels as you can squeeze onto the square. In other words, buy a scrap of land, and build as much as you can as quickly as you can. That’s how it goes here. Most times you just look out the window of the bus and think, “Hey, those giant apartment buildings weren’t here last time I was here.” Sometimes, though, they take a jackhammer to the side of your apartment building at 8AM on a Sunday.

That’s all for this update, folks. Next time I’ll have the results of this Saturday’s English drama competition! Til then, dear readers.