2002-09-26 - 6:56 p.m.

About Wednesday, September 25

[written after midnight]

Hiked around Kangnam area for 4 1/2 hours looking for Marche' Department Store. No dice! The best English teaching books are there, Jim said: Good methods books. I finally gave in to my complaining feet and went very early to Hannam for the meditation meeting. I ran through my subway pass and got a new one at Hangangjin Station so's I could get home later.

I took off my shoes and sat on a bench with my feet elevated, just flexing my toes and ankles for a while. Then moved to a soft couch and studied a Hangul-script book abour Vikings,- much hacking and slashing in it! Practiced sounding out words.

After the meeting, Jim P's buddy John gave me a ride to Anam in his car. This is the first time I've gone all the way from Hannam to Anam above ground! We passed a drive-in movie theater over by Dangguk University; got a chance to take a good look, too. Driving was very slow until we got past Dangguk. Some college event was letting out and a long stream of cars was merging with the traffic.

The waning harvest moon was bright and prominent until we got into the commercial district down by Dongdaemun. You'd be surprised how much it looks like Somerville, Massachusetts, even to the intersections under an overpass! Lots of old brick commercial buildings mingled in with the newer steel-and-glass "slabs."

It's pretty close to 8 kilometres or 5 miles from Hannam to Anam, and it took us the better part of an hour. The commercial district is very active at night; that's when the wholesale business gets done. That's partly because the customers in Europe and the New World are awake and contactable then. Wholesale markets all over the world run odd hours, from what I can find out. If anyone has theories or raw data on that, I'd like to know.

John really is a smooth and knowledgable driver. Jim P says he is thinking about taking the taxi-driver's exam. At first, I thought Jim was kidding; he was chuckling and rolling his eyes. However, John agreed, and I realized that Jim was doing some minimizing. I'm not sure why folks do this here, but it's pretty common to downplay any aspiration. Jim would most likely say that it comes from being raised in a Confucian society; that's his explanation for many cultural differences. The government has been guided by Confucian precepts since the Chinese came a'conquering about 1,500 years ago.

I invited them in for coffee, mentioning they were my first guests. Jim insisted on buying about a man-won of treats as a house-warming present. We sat and talked till after midnight.

Jim is very encouraging and says not to worry, no one will bother me about private tutoring. He says Coreans are quite practical about survival versus legalisms. {This cultural trait is very ancient,- it predates the "Confucian" influence.} I think rural Americans are a lot like Coreans that way; if we need food, we'll harvest a deer out of season. Urban citizens would be horrified at such a notion.

Jim P is also of the opinion that Coreans are much more like rural people, since so many of them are recent city-dwellers. Nearly everybody's father or grandfather was a farmer in "the family village." At the recent Chusok festival, nearly half the residents of Seoul decamped for their family villages.

Happy Trails!

~ Sil in Corea

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