The Half Korean Says..

Murakami Quotation of the Day

“So that’s how we live our lives. No matter how deep and fatal the loss, no matter how important the thing that’s stolen from us—that’s snatched right out of our hands—even if we are left completely changed, with only the outer layer of skin from before, we continue to play out our lives this way, in silence. We draw ever nearer to the end of our allotted span of time, bidding it farewell as it trails off behind. Repeating, often adroitly, the endless deeds of the everyday. Leaving behind a feeling of immeasurable emptiness.” 
― Haruki Murakami, Sputnik Sweetheart

The System

“We are all human beings, individuals transcending nationality and race and religion, and we are all fragile eggs faced with a solid wall called The System. To all appearances, we have no hope of winning. The wall is too high, too strong–and too cold. If we have any hope of victory at all, it will have to come from our believing in the utter uniqueness and irreplaceability of our own and others’ souls and from our believing in the warmth we gain by joining souls together. Take a moment to think about this. Each of us possesses a tangible, living soul. The System has no such thing. We must not allow the System to exploit us. We must not allow the System to take on a life of its own. The System did not make us: we made the System.” -  Haruki Murakami

Super 80’s

Out of every film coming out this summer, I’m looking forward to Super 8 the most.

There are a number of reasons for this, but it boils down to a few factors:

1. JJ Abrams directs, and he’s earned my trust after LOST and Star Trek

2. Though it takes place in 1979, the film’s aesthetic is almost certainly that of early-to-mid 80’s films produced and/or directed by Steven Speilberg (and I mean old, fun Speilberg, not post-Schindler’s, preachy/boring Kingdom of the Crystal Skull Speilberg). Not surprisingly, the film is exec produced by Speilberg.

Most early reviews city two films as being the mood and tone that Super 8 captures: The Goonies and Stand By Me.

Consider me sold.

I’m literally a child of the 80’s, having been born in 1981 (which makes me 30 as of this Friday, June 10th - the same day Super 8 opens). A lot of what occurred during the first decade of my life inexorably shaped me as a person. The films, the music, the culture of the 80’s are things that I still revel in to this day. I love everything about the 80’s, save Ronald Reagan. 

I suppose it’s not really that surprising that as people from my generation hit adulthood, more and more the entertainment landscape seems to be playing on our nostalgia. The fact that there is a big-budget Transformers film franchise is one indicator, as is the fact that people my age were so bummed that Macho Man Randy Savage died late last month.

But when it really comes down to it, there are people (like me) who love the 80’s, and there are those that hate the 80’s.

I remember before I moved away from Orange County last summer, my friends threw me a going away party. The party was 80’s themed, much to my delight. However, I got a very derisive and condescending comment from a couple of people that I thought were my friends: “80’s parties were cool…in the 90’s.”

Never mind the fact that we weren’t even old enough to go to 80’s clubs and parties in the 90’s, this kind of pissed me off. I like the 80’s. I still listen to tons of 80’s music, especially The Cure, old (good) U2, New Order, etc. I still love my childhood favorite films like Ghostbusters, Conan the Barbarian (which is getting an awful looking remake), The Goonies (I can probably recite the bulk of this movie still), and whatever else besides Conan Arnold starred in back in the day. I love the 80’s without irony, which is something that I suppose is lost on those two friends that made snide comments.

Which brings me back to why I’m so excited for Super 8. From all accounts, it is an irony-free take on 80’s kids + adventures films. I’m sure that my 80’s hating friends will watch it and wonder what the big deal is about. But I’m ready and willing to gaze into the maw of nostalgia and come away in love with Super 8.

Of course, now that my expectations are through the roof, the film might let me down. But I can’t blame them, no matter what happens, for trying to deliver that old-school Amblin Films feel. Too many films have lost that sense of fun and adventure (outside of animation, actually) that those old school 80’s films offered, and I’m ready for it all over again.

Thirty.

So next week I turn 30.

I’m sure most people my age share the same mixed feelings about hitting this milestone that I do. As a teenager, the age of 30 seemed one that was distant, unknowable. Even as I hit my twenties, I only held a vague concept of what it is that a 30 year old does on a day to day basis. I think, as a 15-20 year old, I had a lot of anxieties about hitting this age. What would I be like as an “adult”? How old would I look? Would I still have the same dork hobbies that I do now? Which friends would I still have?

The answer is both simpler and more complex than I envisioned, I think.

For instance, let’s start off with a simple one: hobbies. I thought, for sure, I would no longer be playing video games. It’s not that I ever wanted to stop playing video games, but I thought there was some threshold I would cross where I would stop playing them and never look back. The fact that I own an DS, a PS3, XBOX360, Wii, and am planning on owning consoles probably forever has shattered my fears for good, I think. That I married a woman tolerant of my video game playing is a good thing.

I am, however, getting tired of going to the movies. I still love cinema, especially foreign cinema, but the big summer movies are become more and more distasteful to me, and going to a theater on opening night now holds zero appeal to me. Somewhere during the last few years, the though of waiting in line to enter a packed theater where drunken Broheims would be screaming and ruining the movie for me lost its flavor. I don’t think there’s any going back to that one. Though I understand why cinema owners and filmmakers reject the idea of on-demand day-of releases for movies, at this point, when a movie opens, I welcome the notion of having 5-6 friends over and paying 30 bucks for it. There are just too many crappy things to deal with at a theater now. Most of the people in the theater (friends included, actually) check their cell phones constantly, and the light/ringers are distracting as hell.

I’ve always enjoyed reading, but reading for pleasure is something that I’ve done more and more as the years have gone on. This one will only increase, I think.

I did think I’d be married by 30, but I didn’t think I’d spend less than a year of my twenties being married. Not that I was in a rush, but somehow I think I expected, when I was 15, that I’d be married by 25 (25 seemed like it was so freakin’ old).

I certainly never expected to be living in Northern California, but I’m glad I took the chance and moved - or lived somewhere else besides SoCal (especially Orange County).

As far as friends go, it’s interesting to me to consider who still is a close friend, and who I’ve grown distant from. Some friends changed, making it unbearable for me to be around them anymore. But that also could apply to me (and probably does). I think my tolerance for certain things just kind of vanished, and some people pushed my buttons a little too hard. One of the common things my family shares is an uncanny ability to hold grudges for an inordinate amount of time…and my anger and hurt at some people run too deep for me to just forgive and forget anymore. There are, of course, people I really wished I was better friends with. Sometimes I’ll see a group of people I knew in college post pictures of how they’re hanging out, and I’ll get a twinge of regret mixed with nostalgia. But there’s nothing you can really do about any of those things at this point. I used to tell my students that I only kept a few friends from high school - that my clique dispersed. I think that they thought that meant I had huge fallings out, but really, people just scattered to the four winds (myself included now). I love running into old high school friends now, but that wasn’t always the case. Aiko is the opposite - her main circle of friends is almost exactly the same as it was when she was 15. I am both jealous of and perplexed at this, but that just demonstrates how the world turns out sometimes.

At any rate, I have no problem turning 30. 40, though…who knows how I’m going to feel then.

A Happy Turn of Events

So, if you’re my friend (in real life or on facebook), you’ve probably by now heard that I finally was hired for a teaching job for next school year.

This comes after over a year of interviews, demo lessons, and sometimes just plain nothing in my job search. I interviewed for four positions, demoed for two, and, finally, was hired by Marin Country Day School in Corte Madera.

Though I was initially hoping for a high school job, I was never opposed to a Junior High position, and I’m actually really happy I’ve landed at MCDS. From the minute I walked on to their campus for my first interview with them, it felt like home.

A few things to note about MCDS:

- It’s on a huge property, overlooking part of the Bay. 

- The property is large enough that wild deer walk around the hills, grazing on grass.

- There’s a charming creek that runs through the side of the campus. On my campus tour, I was told that a lot of students sit by the creek and read on nice days.

- The school hires outside artists to come and paint murals, make sculptures, and just generally decorate the whole school.

- The current visiting artist is a guy who builds “spirit nests” - which are actually massive tree houses. They’re big enough to conduct a class in.

- Maximum class size: 13 students.

- Tuition for freakin’ kindergarten: 21k. It gets crazier from there.

- Organic kitchen produces fresh food from in-house cook. Vegetables are grown via on-campus composting/gardening program. The food is fantastic, and, as a teacher, free to me for breakfast and lunch.

These are just a few of the reasons why I didn’t think too hard about signing with MCDS. I was still in the running for a High School job east of Oakland, but when they told me that they had more applicants than expected, and that they wouldn’t give me an answer until May - I decided to not take my chances in a shaky hiring environment and go for the school that actually seemed to want me. MCDS has a great reputation, the students I’ve met there are awesome, it’s unbelievably beautiful. I can’t ask for more than that.

And honestly, once I signed the contract, I breathed one of the biggest, heaviest and longest sighs of relief I’ve ever taken in and exhaled. To say that being unemployed sucks is an understatement. 

Great Achievements in Unemployment; Or, How I Spent My “Winter Vacation”

So now that I am firmly entrenched in “in between jobs” mode, I’ve had a lot of time on my hands. Though I do not feel that bad about being laid off of a job I truly hated, even if I do finally get a teaching job, it won’t start until August. That’s a lot of free time! (Sidenote: it looks like I do have interest from a few schools, so maybe I won’t be a bum/house husband forever).

Anyways, it’s amazing what you can do with a shitload of free time. In years past, when I had summer/winter breaks (one of the perks of being a teacher - to offset crappy pay!), I’d usually just play video games and eat. But now, I do those things…AND MORE. Here follows my great achievements in unemployment:

1. This is probably the one that makes Aiko the happiest - I managed to shed 10 pounds. This is a direct result of having a puppy that doesn’t run out of energy until around 8pm at night…12 hours after he wakes up. To solve this dilemma, I started walking him at the lake near our house. At first, we only went a couple miles, and I hated having to actually move, so I’d get tired kinda quick. Porkchop, however, did not get tired. So, after a couple weeks, we went further, closer to 3 or 4 miles. Then, a funny thing happened - I started to like walking with him. The lake (and accompanying hiking trails) became actually fun to trek around. So now we’re up to 6 miles, and I’m probably going to go longer soon. 

2. Learning to cook more dishes. Aiko’s vegetarianism has led to a lot of kitchen experiments, but it’s been fun trying to come up with recipes that are a) meatless and b) still filling. I think I’ve settled on a few dishes that I know I can pull off for sure - potato leek soup, Szechuan eggplant, my friend Kristine’s veggie lasagna (which yields tons of leftovers), my mom’s baked beans recipe, lots of various stir fries, cous cous with sauteed veggies, various pasta sauces (from scratch!), etc. 

3. 3 stars on every Angry Birds level. Including Angry Birds Seasons and all the golden eggs. I’m now moving on to Cut the Rope.

4. Games completed: Dead Space 2 (very good), Donkey Kong Country Returns (super fun), Fable 3 (letdown of the year). Waiting now for Yakuza 4, beating the last two Call of Duty games in the meantime (yes, I’m behind)

5. Unsurprisingly, I’ve watched a shit load of movies in the past three months. Netflix instant has definitely been a cure for boredom! Off of streaming, I’ve watched:

• Mary and Max - awesome claymation film from Australia
• Enter the Void - holy shit. Easily the biggest mindfuck of a movie I’ve ever seen.
• Dogtooth - fucked up Greek movie about a fucked up Greek family.
• Kings of Pastry -decent doc about a pastry competition in France
• Train - shitty horror film notable only for setting the record for most fake blood in a film - broken later by Piranha 3-D
• The Blob - 80’s remake of the 50’s classic, holds up pretty well
• Friday the 13th 1 and 2 - the 80’s ones. They do not hold up well.
• Un Chien Andalou - watched this again for the first time since college. Shock value has long worn off.
• Art & Copy - great documentary about the advertising world
• $9.99 - easily the most boring film I’ve seen in the last few years. All three of us watching it fell asleep.
• Dear Zachary - the most devastating and amazing documentary on Streaming.
• Seven Days - French thriller about a dude torturing the guy who killed his daughter. Not that great.
• Beer Wars - another interesting doc. Netflix instant has a ton of documentaries, apparently.
• Seventh Moon - piece of shit horror film.
• UHF - another 80’s classic. Doesn’t hold up, but nostalgia ftw.
• Jar City - fascinating Icelandic murder mystery film. Unsurprisingly being remade in the US.
• The Betrayal - another doc, this one about how bad the US fucked over Laos during the Vietnam War. Focuses on one immigrant family.
• Spring Fever - banned in China, but not as exciting as that would lead you to believe.
• My Summer of Love - mmm, Emily Blunt.
• Wild China - BBC doc series on China’s ecosystem. Pretty amazing stuff, actually.
• Lila Says - French film about an Arabic teen falling in love. Pretty good.
• An Education - This was nominated for Best Film a last year, I think. Not bad, but Saarsgard’s accent is totally unbelievable in it.
• Merantau - Ong-bak, set in Indonesia. 
• Kimjongilia - great doc on North Korea
• The Drummer - really good Hong Kong/Taiwanese film about a guy learning taiko drumming, with a little crime action thrown in.
• White on Rice - terrible, terrible Asian-American film about a stupid 40 something Japanese dude.
• The Maid - awesome Chilean film about…a maid.
• Woman is the Future of Man - I like Hong San-Soo’s films, but this was not one of his better ones.
• Frozen - if you’ve seen Open Water…this is the same movie. But on a ski lift. With wolves waiting for the skiiers.
• Barking Dogs Never Bite - debut film from the director of the Host. Pretty good.
• Bottle Shock - fun little movie about Napa wine.
• The Secret of Kells - one of the most stunning 2-d animated films, ever.
• Vengeance - slightly stupid French/Hong Kong action film. Kinda fun, though.
• Soul Kitchen - fun French film about a dude trying to run a restaurant and keep his girlfriend.
• Exit Through the Gift Shop - fucking robbed at the Oscars. Killer film. Billed a doc, but I’d be shocked if it was real.
• Paranormal Activity - finally saw it, since the friends I was supposed to watch it with in the theaters ditched me at the time. Not bad on the small screen.

And these were just the ones I saw on streaming. On disc, I’ve watched Machete (super fun, now one of Aiko’s all time favorite movies), Let Me In (the most unnecessary remake since Psycho), Kamui (shitty Japanese blockbuster about ninjas), Love and Pop (shitty Japanese film about call girls), Saw…7? (meh), Buried (really intense), Devil (don’t judge me. It wasn’t bad), Splice (not bad, not great), The Kids Are Alright (most overrated film of last year), The Horde (French zombie movie. Nothing new), Map of the Sounds of Tokyo (beautiful looking, poorly acted), The Karate Kid (better than expected…but still not that great), Exam (interesting until the end), Get Him to the Greek (huge let down).

6. I’ve read a few books, but not as many as I’ve liked. My goal is to finish between 30-40 books this year, but I’m only on my 6th. I’ve read World War Z by Max Brooks (awesome), The Monster of Florence by Doug Preston (meh), I Love Yous Are For White People by Lac Su (wanted it to be better than it was), and Villain by Yoichi Suchida (boring). Currently reading John Dies at the End by “David Wong” (author pseudonym). Not sure how I feel about it yet.

7. Approaching 500 Yelp reviews. Should be there by the end of the week. UPDATE: Review 500 complete.

Please Don’t Eat My Dog

So as anyone who is my friend on Facebook has probably noticed, I occasionally run into this strange Asian woman at the lake near my place.

The lake, Lake Chabot, is a dog-friendly rec park. Since Aiko and I adopted Porkchop, and especially since I got laid off, I’ve made it a point to walk the dog every day at the lake. There are several reasons for this, but the main one is that he has way too much fucking energy (he’s a puppy) and unless I take him AT LEAST three miles a day, he’s almost unmanageable at home.

So that’s how I found myself confronting the Asian woman at the lake. Unfortunately for me, she’s there three times a week - Monday, Wednesday and Friday. How do I know this? Because she told me. She talks to me EVERY single time she sees me. I usually can’t understand what she’s saying to me (racist) because her accent is so thick. I’m pretty sure I’ve figured out what type of Asian she is, but in the interest of ethnic sensitivity, I won’t say what my guess is. Needless to say, though, she is of one of the Asian cultures that eats dogs. That doesn’t narrow it down that much, I know. But she’s also not the obvious one (Korean). So…yeah.

At any rate, the first time I saw her, she was walking with a white dude who was about her age (early 40s). They were probably about 300-400 feet ahead of me, coming in the opposite direction I was heading. At this moment, she noticed Porkchop. 

“OH MY GOD CUTE DOG HE LOOK SO GOOD I WANT TO EAT!”

The white dude she was with proceeded to speed up.

“HEY DOESN’T HE LOOK DELICIOUS! OH MY GOD YOUR DOG IS DELICIOUS!”

I was kind of confused at this point. Did she confuse “delicious” with “cute” in her fobby brain? Or was it something more sinister?

Her white dude pet/husband/whatever sprinted right past me, but she stopped to look at Porkchop more closely. Porkchop, being 8 months old and semi-retarded due to his youth, happily wagged his tail at the attention he was getting. I clenched the leash tighter though.

“WHAT KIND OF DOG?”

(And yes, I’m typing in all caps because she yelled every sentence at me even though I was right next to her).

I told her that we think he’s half pit half basset hound.

“DELICIOUS!”

I nodded and tried to keep walking.

“HE LOOK SO GOOD! YOU  KNOW, WE ASIAN!”

I could only stare, slack jawed, at this insinuation. At first, I thought she could tell I was Korean, and by extension was a total dog eater. But then I remembered that even Korean people can’t tell I’m Korean, and decided she just wanted to bond with me over eating my dog.

“WE ASIAN EAT DOG!”

I smiled again and hustled away. The white dude was long gone, probably to figure out how to ship his wife back to Asia and see if he could get a refund on her.

A few days later, I saw the lady again, without the white dude in tow.

This time, she asked me what I did for a living. I told her that I was/am a teacher, but, that I had recently been laid off my the company I was working for.

“NO GOOD! BUT YOU CAN SELL DOG TO RANCH MARKET!”

At first, I didn’t understand what she was saying. But then, she repeated herself.

“YOU CAN BRING TO 99 RANCH! THEY PAY YOU!”

I actually don’t doubt this is true, but still. This lady wanted me to sell Porkchop to 99 Ranch.

I again just smiled and ran away.

This has happened a few times. I’ve decided to just walk Porkchop earlier in the day, or maybe on the other side of the lake (even though it’s not as hilly and doesn’t tire him out as much). Luckily for my health, Porkchop and I go about 6 or 7 miles a day now. But I still live in fear that one day the lady will show up with a wok and spices and chase us around the entirety of the lake.

Aiko would probably be happy I was running.