Month: November 2009

I know there are some ways that I am quite strange.  One thing that happens, when I’m traveling alone, is that I will go off on long walks for no good reason, or as an alternative to some much more convenient means of transportation.  So this morning, I walked from my hotel on the Las Vegas Strip to the airport, even though a taxi would have probably been less than 8 dollars.
Las Vegas doesn’t really interest me much.  It’s not that I don’t like kitch — I love it.  And it’s pure americana, in some respects.  But it’s very hard for me to find stuff to DO in Las Vegas:  I don’t gamble, I despise dining out alone, and going to shows or movies alone can be kind of depressing too.  I guess all of this could be summarized by stating that Las Vegas might be a fun town, WITH someone, but it’s stunningly dull for someone who’s alone.
I went on a long walk along the strip last night, looking at lights and signs and people-watching.  And I slept a lot, in my pyramid-shaped hotel that I got for an incredibly low rate (because they expect you to spend your money gambling and watching the shows, of course).  And I got up this morning and strapped on my luggages and walked to the airport.

Here is a last look at Zion, taken yesterday upon departure:

It was a few days early, but I was feeling very thankful last night. I had dinner with Jeffrey, his parents Randy and Barb and their daughters (his half-sisters). What’s my relation to them? It’s complicated: Jeffrey is my stepson, by my marriage to Michelle. So Randy was Michelle’s first husband, before she and I got married, and Barb is his second wife. And although we’re as different as people can be, we have a certain family-like relationship, that came about in the wake of Michelle’s death.
I feel very thankful that after Michelle died, Randy and Barb stepped up so completely to provide a healthy and relatively stress-free home for Jeffrey, as that was a very hard time for him. Of course, when Michelle and I were together, she had very little positive to say about Randy and Barb, and their relationship as “exes,” with arguments over things like visitation for Jeffrey, etc., were fraught. This is typical of such relationships, of course. The fact that when Michelle died, everyone involved (barring, perhaps, Michelle’s parents) were able to set aside those earlier acrimonies and do what was “right” for Jeffrey has always struck me as a minor miracle of human interaction. And as such, I’m very thankful.
We met for dinner at an Italian restaurant in Maple Grove that the girls (Jeffrey’s sisters, Ashley and Tiffany) like. I best recall them as around 3 or 4 years old, but now they’re 10 and 11. After dinner, we made a little parade driving in the rain and fog back up to Albertville, where they live currently, and spent some time just hanging out. The girls, especially Tiffany, asked me, spontaneously, to write their names in Korean. This was the first time I’d interacted with American kids who seemed genuinely interested in Korean culture, and as an unrepentant language geek, I was pleased to try to sound out their names and write them in the Korean alphabet, Hangeul.
The girls were fascinated, and soon had me writing the names of everyone in the room, then their friends and teachers, on scraps of paper. Tiffany’s face lit up as she suddenly realized the phonetic principles behind the Hangeul writing system, and with no timidity, she began trying to “guess” how to write various names she could think of. I was stunned and amazed – you always hear Koreans (and rarely, Westerners) talking about the simplicity of the Korean writing system, but watching a midwestern 10 year old grasp all its essential principles in under 30 minutes in a casual exchange was amazing.
Finally, I taught them a few simple phrase, such as 고맙습니다 (go-map-seum-ni-da = thank you), and Tiffany did a perfect-looking Korean-style bow and uttered it repeatedly. The whole experience felt like a charming reversal of my normal role and job in Korea, but it was additionally pleasing because Americans normally are so uninterested in foreign languages and cultures, yet here was this unassuming midwestern kid, with whom I have a “relative-type” connection (how else to explain it?) showing true interest and excitement for Korean.
Well, anyway, that was my Tuesday evening out on the prairie in the northwestern suburbs of Minneapolis.
Here’s a picture of the clan – Randy, Barb, Jeffrey, Ashley, Tiffany:

Here’s a picture of Tiffany, and you can see quite clearly she’s writing her teacher’s name, Miller, sounded out in Korean letters (밀러):

When I take long road trips, I often return to my youthful fantasies of becoming a truck driver. I used to imagine “finishing my PhD” and then, rather than going off into academia, instead going out and becoming a truck driver. I liked to imagine hanging the little degree in its frame like professors and professionals do in their offices, but hanging it up in the little sleeper cabin attached to my big rig. Really! I thought like this, sometimes, right through college. As much as I’ve always enjoyed road-tripping, truck driving always seemed like something that would make a good career for me.
Well, I never finished the PhD. And I never became a truck driver, unless you want to count some months as a primary tow truck driver for my support battalion on Korea in 1991, and some cross-Korea convoys we participated in during weeks-long field exercises, from Geumchon north of Seoul over to Wonju and down to Daegu. Yes, I was one of those US GI trucks cruising on the Korean backroads dodging “kimchi wagons,” way back when.
But driving across the country as I have been, I return sometimes to those truck driver fantasies. That’s a job that, if all else fell apart, I could manage, I’m certain.
Drive, drive, drive.

Montana is a very long state, to drive through. I think I-90 is about 700 miles.
It’s especially long under wintery highway conditions. Toward the end of my day, in the early evening dark, I was going 25-35 mph through blowing snow over very icy interstate eastward from Bozeman.
I saw overturned trucks, jackknifed trailers, cars in ditches. So I stayed slow. And as much as I generally find driving about as close to a meditative state as I can attain, driving through that can be kind of stressful. I’m tired.
Here are two pictures from earlier in the day.
A freeway rest area:

A stop at a “ranch exit” (i.e. there’s no town at the freeway exit) around sunset:

Juli and Keith’s neighbors have a bunch of animals, including a llama, a very friendly horse, some cows and chickens. I went on a walk earlier today and visited them. Here’re llama and horse, saying hello.

After doing so much, traveling, keeping so busy… I kind of came to a stop, today. Resting at Juli & Keith’s house here on the Oregon hillside, kind of having a lazy day. I did however make a small, important step. I sent off the email confirming my intention to return to Korea today. So that kind of represents a commitment.
Here’s a picture from Patrick’s Point, a few miles north of Arcata, taken in late afternoon on Tuesday:

Arcata is a small town.  I took about 5 long walks through and around the town during my 3 day visit there.  Yesterday afternoon, I walked down to where my middle school was, in SunnyBrae.  Then I walked up Shirley Blvd (a very steep winding hill) to Fickle Hill Road and back down to the house.  I went into Redwood Park (which is the name of Arcata’s city park, about 2 blocks up the hill from the house where I grew up).  Here is a picture from a path inside the park:

I took a long walk in the rain around Arcata. I walked over to the high school, where I attended. It looked almost the same. Hmm… it’s a beautiful town, but I think it was a good thing for me that I moved away.
Here is Humboldt State University’s “University Annex” building. But in 1965, it was the Trinity Hospital, and this is the building I was born in.

This is Arcata High School, which I attended 1979~83. It basically looks exactly the same as when I was there: California-classic-high-school-as-prison architecture, with its outdoor hallways and grim, utilitarian exterior.

This is the view up 11th street from its foot near Janes Road, looking up. At the top of the hill, that’s Redwood Park, and my house is a few blocks below the top of the hill.

In the 1930’s and early 40’s, the northern counties of California and southwestern counties of Oregon launched a secession effort aimed at creating a new state, which was to be called the state of Jefferson.  It was one of the most successful “new state carved from existing states” movements of the 20th century, but got derailed by WWII.
Even now, however, the region as some distinctive features.  The high incidence (relative to most of the west) of rural poverty means that it has often be attached with the sobriquet “Kentucky-by-the-sea”, for example — at least that was something I heard sometimes, growing up.
Anyway, I was born and grew up in Humboldt County, which is, historically, part of this never-to-be State of Jefferson.   And I was in Roseburg, near its putative northern border.
I stayed the night with my aunt Janet and uncle Bob, who live outside of Eugene.  I saw a lot of relatives at my aunt Freda’s memorial service, some of whom I literally hadn’t seen since I was a child.
Today, I drove back down across the Oregon border and back into Humboldt, to spend a few days in my hometown, in my home “house.” The house isn’t owned by my mother anymore, but a very close friend of ours, Peggy, bought it, so I can “visit” and stay in the house. Although it’s been remodeled and changed a lot over the years, it still has the feel of home. Peggy was one of my babysitters when I was an infant, and she was also, later, my 6th grade teacher. She’s like a godmother to me, in many ways. She has been very important in my life.
I went on a hike in the morning with my aunt Janet, my dad and their cousin Larry.  Here is the view from Janet and Bob’s driveway in Pleasant Hill, Oregon, looking at some very relaxed-looking neighbor cows.

Below is a picture of Larry, Janet and my dad, stopping to talk about something near the top of the hill.

Is it possible to love a highway?
I certainly harbor a special feeling toward US Route 101. I was born 3 blocks from it, and grew up 4 blocks from it, and have lived more than half my life (discontinuously) within a few miles of it.
When I left San Luis Obispo on Friday night, I knew I’d have to drive all night to get to Roseburg, Oregon, on time, so I figured I might as well go up 101 (which takes a few extra hours due to its not being freeway the whole way, as compared to Interstate 5) most of the way, just for sentimental reasons.
It was strange, especially from downtown San Francisco on northward through Marin, Sonoma and Mendocino into Humboldt counties, because although I was driving in the middle of the night, I’ve been up and down that highway so many times I was able to visualize the scenery along the way effortlessly. Kinesthetic memory on the curves is almost eerie, too.
Anyway, I got to Arcata and stopped at the beach for a few hours. I watched it get light (the sun was behind thick clouds) and then went on to Oregon.

The name of the island where Ketchikan is located is Revillagigedo. There are actually a lot of Spanish names attached to geographic features in Southeast Alaska – something to do with Spanish explorers making the navigation maps later used by Russian and English and American colonists.
It’s a cool name, though the locals mutilate the correct Spanish pronunciation – but who am I to criticize the mutilation of correct pronunciation?
Here are some pictures I took in Ketchikan, over the weekend.
Driving down to the south coast of the island:

The end of the road, at about mile 15. This is about as far from downtown Ketchikan as you can get, using a car:

A great view of downtown Ketchikan from the north end of town (where the “mall” is) (note the disconcerting presence of strange bluish coloration in sky due to absence of normal cloud cover):

Looking straight out from the seawall at my hotel:

Similar view, after the clouds shifted, revealing an unfamiliar but naturally-occurring thermonuclear phenomenon suspended 95 million miles in space above the planet:

Wow, nice. It lasted almost an hour. Then it rained again:

Tug boats, congregating:

Along the main drag, Tongass Ave:

The way in and out – the Alaska Marina Highway ferry Columbia docked:

The strange case where the northbound traffic uses a tunnel, and the southbound traffic goes around the hill – but they’re not even a block apart:

A Ketchikan streetscape

The pale pink skyscraper of downtown Ketchikan, AK:

The town’s famous “Creek Street”:

A fishing boat, heading out southward: