Nixon tapes, quoted in the New York Times article, December 10, 2010: “The emigration of Jews from the Soviet Union is not an objective of American foreign policy,” Mr. Kissinger said. “And if they put Jews into gas chambers in the Soviet Union, it is not an American concern. Maybe a humanitarian concern.” “I know,” Nixon responded. “We can’t blow up the world because of it.”
Month: December 2010
Caveat: 20) 교만 함으로 인해 악연이 된 인연들에게 참회하며 절합니다
“I bow in repentance of the ties that become like an evil destiny due to arrogance.”
This is #20 out of a series of 108 daily Buddhist affirmations that I am attempting to translate with my hands tied behind my back (well not really that, but I’m deliberately not seeking out translations on the internet, using only dictionary and grammar).
…
18. 성냄으로 인해 악연이 된 인연들에게 참회하며 절합니다.
“I bow in repentance of the ties that become like an evil destiny due to anger.”
19. 모진 말로 인해 악연이 된 인연들에게 참회하며 절합니다.
“I bow in repentance of the ties that become like an evil destiny due to harsh words.”
20. 교만 함으로 인해 악연이 된 인연들에게 참회하며 절합니다.
I would read this twentieth affirmation as: “I bow in repentance of the ties that become like an evil destiny due to arrogance.”
Arrogance. My issue with arrogance is complicated. I don’t really feel that it is one of my major problems – but I know that almost anyone who knows me would say that they suspect it is.
Which is to say, I think many of those around me perceive me as arrogant. I’m intellectually prideful, yes. I can’t deny that. And I talk “down” to people because of my vocabulary, and my refusal to conceal my weird, academic interests in normal conversation. And for people who don’t understand what being a nerd really is like, I’m sure that that comes off as arrogant. The point is – I really do talk that way. I really do think that way. I really do have those interests – I’m not showing off or using it to push people away. I’d much rather talk about linguistic theory or geopolitics than sports or food. I’m sorry. Is that arrogant, for me to want to talk about my interests?
Hmm, there’s another aspect. Which is that I am judgmental. I mean… I come off that way. But that’s not really meant, either. Again – I’m merely expressing what’s interesting to me, and, in the area of “judgment”… well, I have strong values – strong ideas about what’s right or wrong, what’s appropriate. It can be difficult to set aside (or more accurately, to avoid expressing) those values when in conversation with people who don’t seem to share them. But I try.
Really, if I re-read the above, it just comes off as more arrogance. Why does assertively stating ones feelings come off as arrogance? Is the key simply to “shut up”? Is it only possible to be humble with one’s mouth shut? Maybe. This is more plausible than I’d like to admit.
On the other hand, just because I’m intellectually prideful doesn’t mean that I don’t struggle with self-confidence in other areas. Lately, I’ve been very anti-social. Avoiding people. Feeling unmotivated. On retreat.
Inadequate as a teacher, unskilled in language acquisition, lazy as an artist.
Can’t.
Won’t.
Caveat: Structural Corruption
[broken link! FIXME] I'm not going to try to summarize the whole article here – I suggest everyone read it, however. James Fallows discusses the issue of "structural corruption" in US government. The concept is often raised in the discussion of foreign countries, from China to Afghanistan, but it needs to be pointed out much more often, as Fallows does, that the US has it too. And it has it very, very badly.
One very annoying element of US exceptionalism shared by both the left and right, very broadly, is the weird, unrealistic belief that the US has no corruption, or in any event that it has much less than "other countries." This really annoys me. I think the only difference between US corruption, and that of other countries more noted for corruption, such as Mexico or even South Korea, is that US corruption is so exclusively "structural" that it's easily "depersonalized" and pushed from one's mind.
I like Fallows' reminder that it's a really big deal, nevertheless. I find the concept of "structural corruption" to be a powerful one, intellectually. Please read his article.
Caveat: The Governator’s Legacy
“The less you’re concerned about getting credit, the more work you can get done,” – Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Unilke many, I've never been of the opinion that the governator was insubstantial. He's a smart dude, and a highly unconventional politician. And I think his disavowals of overweening ambition, while disingenuous, are somehow at the same time sincere – if that makes sense. He's ambitious – but it's out of a genuine belief that he could "make a difference" from a political standpoint, as opposed to it being strictly a project of self-aggrandizement.
Nevertheless, I feel that Marc Ambinder's autopsy on the governatorship, now that the man from Muscle Beach is departing office after 7 years, is a bit on fluffy side, journalistically. Perhaps this can be forgiven – journalists who meet or interview the governator always seem to be incapable or resisting the man's undeniable, almost magical, charisma.
The things – the accomplishments – that Ambinder wants to give Schwarzenegger credit for are things that I think would have happened regardless of who was governor. Possibly, they'd have happened even if Gray Davis had remained governor. They are things that have been "on the mind" of California's body politic. The most long-lasting "changes" Schwarzenegger has overseen: the alteration in elections processes that will (hopefully) end partisan primaries and gerrymandering; the checking of the power of the unions; the long-term investment in alternative energy projects or public transportation infrastructure (and actually, I'm sceptical this last will really pan out – it's too easy for money to get removed or rerouted from projects of this sort). Each of these, while advocated actively by the governator, could just as easily have come to pass regardless of who was sitting in the Sac.
I'm far from optimistic about my birth-state's future as a well-functioning polity. But I think the governator reflected (and still reflects, as he moves on) a zeitgeist that includes a fundamental collective self-awareness vis-a-vis its worst dysfunctions. I will always be interested in – even fascinated by – California politics. But, personally, I'm an adoptive midwesterner and, subsequently, mostly committed to my expat lifestyle, at this point.
California is an embarrassing place to have been born. Does that make me one of those "self-hating" liberals? Maybe, except that I still characterize myself as a libertarian, or even as an anarchist, more than as a traditional liberal. I believe in the importance and value of government, but I think it works best when the body politic remains highly sceptical of it. I actually think Schwarzenegger would agree wtih me on that.
Caveat: Nuked While Sleeping
I haven't had a "nuclear war" dream since about 1984. I had a few vivid ones, back then. This dream I just awoke from was both vivid and weirdly cinematic, although also seemingly satirical, toward the end.
I was on a bus, going toward Hongnong along the expressway. It wasn't the commuting bus, it was a charter bus – I had been on some work-related excursion with my fellow teachers. It was dark, and the flash of the explosion was obvious. It was like the sun was rising, to the west, out of the Yellow Sea. I had no doubt, immediately, about what I was witnessing, although a lot of the other teachers on the bus, whether through ignorance or denial, had no idea – until cell phones started ringing, and text messages exchanged, and internets surfed via smart phones.
Then the reaction was disbelief, awe, shock. Yet we continued to drive the rest of the way to Hongnong. It seemed logical, partly – the town is nestled behind the mountain, protected from the nuclear plant which had been the obvious target of the blast. And then the chaos, as the real sun dawned, Korean Army units moving in, people evacuating.
The focus of the dream seemed to lie in the Kafkaesque confusion of what to do, where to go, who to meet with. I was told that I had to go to my apartment (in the dream, my apartment was in Hongnong, not Yeonggwang) and that I was allowed to get one suitcase. When I got there, I couldn't decide how to pack, and was thinking that it would have been so much easier to just tell me I could take only what I had on me.
Ambulances and then Army trucks were zooming around, delivering serverly wounded from behind the mountain. There was some hotel on the top of the mountain that isn't there in real life, and it'd been right in front of the blast wave from the explosion. The building had crumbled and fallen down the hillside. Oh, ghastly.
Mr Choi came into my apartment, and he was trying to read my books that I was debating packing. And meanwhile, I was overhearing conversations, learning about where the bomb came from. The bomb had come from Argentina. Not even North Korea.
Argentina nuked South Korea? Well, no. It turned out that it was a disgruntled former English teacher. Hah. That's where the dream suddenly seemed satirical. But the backstory was complex. He was from a very wealthy family, and he'd spent his family fortune to acquire a bomb in Argentina using Russian and Argentine materials over a period of years, which he then delivered to Gamami (on the west side of the hill in Hongnong, next to the power plant) in a shipping container, where it successfully detonated. His name was Edwards – a name that will live in infamy, according to some stentorian announcement on CNN. Someone in my dream said to me, sardonically, "maybe not a good time to be an English teacher in Korea, now."
And then I woke up.
Caveat: 19) 모진 말로 인해 악연이 된 인연들에게 참회하며 절합니다
“I bow in repentance of the ties that become like an evil destiny due to harsh words.”
This is #19 out of a series of 108 daily Buddhist affirmations that I am attempting to translate with my hands tied behind my back (well not really that, but I’m deliberately not seeking out translations on the internet, using only dictionary and grammar).
…
17. 전생 , 금생 , 내생의 업보를 소멸하기 위해 지극한 마음으로 참회하며 절합니다.
“I bow in repentance with a sincere heart, taking care to destroy the karma of my past, current and future lives.”
18. 성냄으로 인해 악연이 된 인연들에게 참회하며 절합니다.
“I bow in repentance of the ties that become like an evil destiny due to anger.”
19. 모진 말로 인해 악연이 된 인연들에게 참회하며 절합니다.
I would read this ninteenth affirmation as: “I bow in repentance of the ties that become like an evil destiny due to harsh words.”
This was easy, for a change – because it’s identical to its predecessor except for the substition of “모진 말” (harsh words) for “성냄” (anger).
It’s actually quite difficult never to use harsh words.
Caveat: Unfriended
Most of what happens in facebook, in my opinion, is simply a re-imagining of various aspects of how humans have always organized their social lives. Perhaps it makes things a little more "transparent," but it's hardly as revolutionary as people make claims for. However, I've recently experienced something that I'm having trouble reconciling with "real world" parallels: I've been unfriended.
It doesn't mean much if someone who is strictly an "internet friend" unfriends you. It's just an ending of the relationship, such as it was, on the same terms as it started. But most of my facebook friends are "real world" friends. Maybe not people I've seen much, in the last decade or two, but still people I can say that at some point in my past (recent or remote), I had a real, interactive, face-to-face friendship with – however brief. What does it mean when such a person unfriends me?
It's a little bit odd, because I don't always notice right away – it's not like facebook gives you a little message that says "So-and-so doesn't like you anymore." The three cases where I'm aware of having been unfriended, I became aware because people I thought were already my "friends" have suddenly started appearing in my "recommended friends" listing. I will say to myself: hmm, that's confusing. But sure enough, if I go look, they're not my friend anymore.
What's the etiquette, here? Maybe a short return message, "It was good while it lasted. Have a nice life." Maybe they were annoyed with my blog posts, or my rants, or my metanegativity. But I have facebook friends whose posts I find annoying – I just block their posts from my "news feed" – it seems more polite than unfriending. Unfriending sends a definite message.
Here's the metaphor I've developed. Blocking the news feed of a facebook friend is like throwing away unanswered letters, in pre-internet parlance. Or ignoring phone messages. We all do this – whether short-term or indefinitely – with people we feel we've grown apart from or struggle to communicate with. But unfriending is a bit like taking a picture of yourself throwing away an unanswered letter, or ignoring a phone message, and then publishing that picture in a newspaper, which the person who was trying to communicate may or may not notice. Subtle.
It might be an interesting exercise to maintain a published list of unfriends, just for entertainment purposes. But, although entertaining, that would be to dwell on the negative, which is something I keep reminding myself is better to avoid.
Is this meant to be a rant? Not really. I can see that maintaining facebook "friendships" with people you no longer feel a connection with, for whatever reason, as leading to a sort of "cluttered" feeling. Better to sweep out the cupboards, periodically. Maybe there should be some kind of etiquette for unfriending – a sort of dialogue: "So-and-so would like to end the friendship. OK?" If you say OK, then you acknowledge, and no hard feelings. That's more how real friendship works, and then fails – there's some back and forth, as it comes to a close.
Caveat: The African’s Snowball
Two sixth-grade boys ran past me in the courtyard. "Teacher! Teacher! African! Snowball!" they panted out, excitedly. But they didn't slow down. They quickly disappeared into the back wing, toward the stairwell leading to the sixth-grade classrooms.
This was hard for me to understand. I was puzzled.
Until, a few moments later, Hwa-myeong raced into view from the alleyway between the storage building and the entrance to the boy's bathroom. Ah. Hwa-myeong – our school's only "ethnically diverse" Korean. He's Afro-Korean, or something Middle-Eastern, in his background. He's a nice kid – a little bit hyper, but well-adjusted and quite popular. But his nickname, of course, seems to be "African" (the English word, "a-peu-ri-kan" in the Koreanized rendering). He had a large snowball. He was on the hunt. I got him to pause long enough so I could take his picture, as he posed, proudly displaying his weaponized snow.
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Here are some other pictures of our first snow.
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The weather was Minnesota-y, today. Meaning not the cold, per se, but the strangeness. It was quite changeable. Morning it was bitterly cold and snowing. By noon, the snow had melted and it was blustery. At 3 pm, the sky was like the bottom of a copper kettle, and there was thunder and lightning. There was a brief downpour of cold, cold rain. When I was walking home from the bus terminal at 6 pm, the sky was cloudless and violet-pink-blue-gold, from the dregs of the disappearing sun, and there was a sliver of crescent moon hanging peacefully.
My favorite first-grader, Ha-neul, presented me with a portrait she'd created of me, today. I was very pleased.
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Caveat: First Snow!
It was very beautiful. The highway, with its row of bare trees, between Beopseong and Hongnong, especially, looked like a Van Gogh rendering of pastoral winter.
Caveat: 18) 성냄으로 인해 악연이 된 인연들에게 참회하며 절합니다
“I bow in repentance of the ties that become like an evil destiny due to anger.”
This is #18 out of a series of 108 daily Buddhist affirmations that I am attempting to translate with my hands tied behind my back (well not really that, but I’m deliberately not seeking out translations on the internet, using only dictionary and grammar).
…
16. 내가 저지른 모든 죄를 망각한 채 살아 온 어리석음을 참회하며 절합니다.
“I bow in repentance of any foolishness lived, forgetting any sins committed.”
17. 전생 , 금생 , 내생의 업보를 소멸하기 위해 지극한 마음으로 참회하며 절합니다.
“I bow in repentance with a sincere heart, taking care to destroy the karma of my past, current and future lives.”
18. 성냄으로 인해 악연이 된 인연들에게 참회하며 절합니다.
I would read this eighteenth affirmation as: “I bow in repentance of the ties that become like an evil destiny due to anger.”
Anger. Anger-with-self? That’s my vice. Destiny? Do I believe that?
Walking familiar paths.
Caveat: Gift Kimchi
My coteacher Ms Ryu gave me some homemade kimchi (by her mom, not by her, I think). I took it home – I got a ride home with Mr Lee, the "vice-vice" principal. The sun set. I made some kimchibokkeumbap (kimchi fried rice). I'm tired – the day was eventless, because all my classes were cancelled, because of a giant test that was taking place. Such is life working in a Korean school. I tried to plan out some lessons for the future. I studied Korean for about 2 hours. Really. It might snow tomorrow.
Caveat: And on. And on.
I had a really terrible weekend. Not anything specific, except a really extreme level of discouragement and consequential apathy. I didn't study Korean, as I normally do. I didn't write much, as I normally do. I didn't go hiking or exploring – I had the excuse that I still don't feel very healthy, but that's really just a way to justify being antisocial. And I was definitely that.
I've written before about feeling that I'm not making progress on the things important to me. And I suppose I should try to better outline what those "important things" are.
1) I came to Korea because I want to learn Korean. It's not going well. I've been here three years. I can barely make myself understood in single sentences. I understand less than 20% of what I hear.
2) I'm working as a teacher. I like working as a teacher. But I want to be an excellent teacher. I don't think I am. I'm barely adequate, mostly. I don't know what steps to take to improve: do I need to be more organized? More spontaneous? Funnier? Less funny? How do I connect with my students?
3) I wish I were a true artist. I write all these little fragments, outlines, "first pages of novels." I occasionally do a single drawing, or pen some half-hearted poem. I have a musical instrument I tell myself I should learn how to play. I don't work on it. I'm intimidated by my inability.
4) I need to meditate more. Better. More…
These important things are all incremental projects. They don't require miracles of talent or self-discovery. Yet I'm not making progress. I'm on a treadmill.
Caveat: Story Puzzles
Last week, on my Wednesday and Friday afterschool advanced (allegedly sixth grade but really a mix of 3-4-5-6) class, I was trying to do an exercise with story-telling. I had these handouts that I'd gotten a while back, where there are these wordless comic-book-style story panels presented, and then a series of "hints" (like initial letters of words, rebus pictures, etc.). The students look at the pictures and try to fill in the story based on the hints. It's pretty difficult, actually – even I was having trouble a few times thinking of how the authors of the exercises meant for the words to go.
But my idea was to then have the kids make their own. I demonstrated one, on the whiteboard (an ad hoc story about miniature aliens landing at Hongnong, being cooked and eaten, and making the guy sick):
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Then I had them make their own, as homework. Most "forgot" the homework – pretty typical for the afterschool class – but one student did an amazing job. She made a story about snow and cats making "cloud bread" (which I theorize is a literal translation of the Korean term for something like eclairs). It was excellently done. Here is here set of picture panels:
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Here is her page of "hints" (remarkably few mistakes that impair the ability to fill it out):
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Finally, unrelatedly, a truly humorous little sketch on the corner of a paper from a first grader. The Korean is "peck peck" (as in "kiss kiss"). Cute:
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Caveat: 17) 전생 , 금생 , 내생의 업보를 소멸하기 위해 지극한 마음으로 참회하며 절합니다
“I bow in repentance with a sincere heart, taking care to destroy the karma of my past, current and future lives.”
This is #17 out of a series of 108 daily Buddhist affirmations that I am attempting to translate with my hands tied behind my back (well not really that, but I’m deliberately not seeking out translations on the internet, using only dictionary and grammar).
..
15. 내 이웃과 주위에있는 모든 인연들의 감사함을 잊고 살아 온 죄를 참회하며 절합니다.
“I bow in repentance of any misdeeds lived, forgetting my gratitude for all my ties to my neighborhood and surroundings.”
16. 내가 저지른 모든 죄를 망각한 채 살아 온 어리석음을 참회하며 절합니다.
“I bow in repentance of any foolishness lived, forgetting any sins committed.”
17. 전생 , 금생 , 내생의 업보를 소멸하기 위해 지극한 마음으로 참회하며 절합니다.
I would read this seventeenth affirmation as: “I bow in repentance with a sincere heart, taking care to destroy the karma of my past, current and future lives.”
I don’t believe in karma, nor in past or future lives. These are the sorts of transcendental beliefs that don’t fit with my hyper-rationalist worldview. So this is an aspect of Buddhism that I find it difficult to relate to, although I tend to view karma as a metaphor for the fact that things we do in this life define who we are throughout the remainder of our life, and impact the lives of others, often in very indirect ways.
Caveat: tweegret 2.0
tweegret. N. the feeling that one gets that one might be missing out, by not participating in what seems to be a largely vacuous fad called Twitter.
I felt my second twinge of tweegret, this morning, upon learning that the [US] National Christmas Tree has its own twitter account, this year (#trackthetree). Thank you, Stephen Colbert, for elucidating this matter so cogently.
Caveat: Cows With Guns
Wow this is funny. Very much worth watching all the way through.
Caveat: Ritualized Humiliation
Yesterday at the close of work, I was feeling rather depressed.
One thing that happened, was that after I finished my afterschool classes, which end at 4 PM on Wednesdays, I went over to the gym to try to put in a social appearance at the staff intramural volleyball event (which includes a lot of traditional things to eat, too, and soju and makkolli and beer and things like that). I'm just rying to fit in, I guess. Anyway, the volleyball game seemed to be in suspension, due to the fact that one of the teachers is recently engaged to be married. She'd brought her fiance to introduce him to the school staff. And after forcing him to drink some alcohol (common enough in Korean social events), they tied him up, put him on a table, took off his shoes, and began hitting him on the feet. Hard. I'd heard of this before – vaguely – it's some kind of pre-wedding ritual that is common. Maybe like the way a bachelor party is a ritual that is common before Western weddings. But, this being Korea, it's got a very strong component of humiliation, and seems to be a lot about establishing social chains of dominance… that kind of thing. I felt more alien than I normally do. I felt like I could never truly understand Korea. I was very puzzled, and dismayed by what seemed the cruelty of it. I felt I couldn't relate to these people who I worked with every day.
And then I got mocked in my efforts to speak Korean – by a group of students (not students who I have in any class – I'm not even certain they attend my school). I just felt self-conscious and hopeless, in that moment.
I wrote yesterday that I'm not making progress on the things that are important to me. Someone asked, what are these things that are important to me? Maybe it would be a good thing to try to map these out.
Caveat: 16) 내가 저지른 모든 죄를 망각한 채 살아 온 어리석음을 참회하며 절합니다.
“I bow in repentance of any foolishness lived, forgetting any sins committed.”
This is #16 out of a series of 108 daily Buddhist affirmations that I am attempting to translate with my hands tied behind my back (well not really that, but I’m deliberately not seeking out translations on the internet, using only dictionary and grammar).
…
14. 이 세상이 곳에 머물 수있게 해 준 모든 인연들의 귀중함을 잊고 살아 온 죄를 참회하며 절합니다.
“I bow in repentance of any misdeeds lived, forgetting the preciousness of all my ties to the things that allow me to stay here in this world.”
15. 내 이웃과 주위에있는 모든 인연들의 감사함을 잊고 살아 온 죄를 참회하며 절합니다.
“I bow in repentance of any misdeeds lived, forgetting my gratitude for all my ties to my neighborhood and surroundings.”
16. 내가 저지른 모든 죄를 망각한 채 살아 온 어리석음을 참회하며 절합니다.
I would read this sixteenth affirmation as: “I bow in repentance of any foolishness lived, forgetting any sins committed.”
I’ve certainly lived a lot of foolishness.
At the moment, I’m feeling discouraged. Sometimes, I feel discouraged. My teaching feels stale and uninteresting. My interactions with others feels fraught with my own negativity. I don’t feel like I’m making progress in the things important to me.