Category Archives: memoria

Seoul and Sinbad the Sailor

I went to Seoul last weekend. I listened to a movie on my iPhone while riding an empty train to the capital. Much can be learned about a movie through its audio track. I fell asleep and woke up near Seoul. The corridor was packed with older people. Most were geared up for a hike-up-and-booze-at-the-top sort of deal.

I visited one of the royal palaces.

Techniques to deter evil spirits:

1) Dragon Faces

2) CCTV

I wanted to find The Papertainer Museum at the Olympic Park. The Papertainer is a museum made of shipping containers which I thought would be neat-o to visit.

I didn’t find it which is odd since it’s pretty big. Instead I enjoyed the sight of some inline skaters with sweet moves under the Olympic Peace Gate.

Late that night I saw the last snowflakes of the Korean winter fall on Hongik University. Felt like Winona Ryder in Edward Scissorhands.

The next morning I read Sinbad the Sailor on the train back to Busan. His voyages are mostly accounts of terrible troubles encountered. His stories are filled with people getting eaten by giant snakes, cannibals, mythical birds, etc., etc. Sinbad always regrets his decision to travel when these tribulations catch up to him.

Sinbad in the Valley of Diamonds

He survives, finds a treasure, and returns to Baghdad richer than before. Soon he finds an excuse to travel again.

While Sinbad’s adventures are magical and fantastic, they made me remember that risk is always present in a good adventure. Adventures have dangers both physical and emotional because we step into the unknown. This is what attracted us to the adventure in the first place. The fights between best friends, the breakups, intestinal parasites, etc., etc. are also part of an adventure… though jumping off the Swiss alps wearing flying squirrel suits may be the more fun and thrilling part of the adventure. When we travel, things won’t always work out the way we planned them. I accepted this common perception when I came to Korea but didn’t fully internalized it.

So don’t be too surprised when you find yourself alone, scared and uncertain, and, perhaps, surrounded by giant snakes. These things may all be part of your adventure package. You may be cursing your luck while walking on a valley of diamonds.

Wednesday March 21

Sentimentality.

“What is REAL?” asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. “Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?”

“Real isn’t how you are made,” said the Skin Horse. “It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.”

“Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit.

“Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. “When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.”

“Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,” he asked, “or bit by bit?”

“It doesn’t happen all at once,” said the Skin Horse. “You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”

Excerpt from The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams.

I love when part of this quote is narrated in Mike Mills’ film Beginners.

Little Korean Treasure Hunters

The envelope’s wax seal is ripped apart and the kids start shaking.

The kids got all clammy and nervous. They were excited in a very strange, unpredictable way which was unsettling. The bell rang and they fled down the hallway of the school screaming about mysterious codes and blood stains. I went pale and chased them. Before I could get them to shut up, the Korean director of the school where I work approached me and very seriously told me “The children are very shocked, they say blood on a treasure map. Very very shocked.”

“It’s not blood. It’s red wax. It’s just a story I invented… for teaching”.

She smiled gracefully but I couldn’t tell if I would eventually get in trouble.

It was a sunny afternoon many many many many many weeks ago when I didn’t know how to kill 5 minutes of Kinder class. I was fairly new to teaching and the children could smell my fear like a pack of roaming dingos. Kids know how to exploit the little awkward silences when an unprepared teacher falters.

I told my students I was from Colorado and that there were treasures in Colorado. Which is true. Sort of. When I notice I had secured most of their attention, I started improvising a story “Many many many many many many many years ago…” and pieced together details from a collection of old treasure tales I had heard and read. The classroom had been wild at first but as I continued the story, it grew quiet.

Map Elements: page with the “Dead Tree Treasure” story, the code key, burned pictures of some of the locations near the treasure, a missing piece of the map.

Narratives are sometimes linked to survival. The old Persian king stayed the execution of the storyteller every night in One Thousand and One Nights because he wanted to hear the end of each story. I didn’t have experience telling oral stories and felt I was learning something special and important that day in the classroom.

“…And my uncle… no, my father has the treasure map. He lives in Chile. I’ll ask him to send the map and then I’ll make photocopies for everybody.”

When I finished the story, the Dear Leader of the class, six year-old Elizabeth, stood up and made a pronouncement: “and then, when we are older, we and you go to Colorado and find the treasure with you!” She had the presence of a little Korean Margaret Thatcher. The whole class seconded the motion by banging on their desks and letting out war cries “KO-RE-A! KO-RE-A! KO-RE-A!” I tried to quiet them down but I was laughing too hard.

From then on, every day, kids would come up to me and ask me “Where’s the map?!”. The map’s journey developed a story of its own. I told them it was coming and used an assortment of excuses… “My dad went to get the map at his grandmother’s abandoned, burnt out house where she had kept it buried in a box under the lemon tree… My dad mailed it but sent it by “sea mail” rather than “air mail” so it will take longer to arrive… because it was cheaper, that’s why, he’s cheap like that… Oh no! there was a typhoon and the mail ship sank off the coast of the Northern Mariana Islands… …the Taiwanese Coast Guard has found the missing cargo on a beach in Keelung and it’s being sent to Korea… it should be arriving at Inchon international airport any day now…”

The wait for the map had an important dramatic effect that I stretched for a while.

Little Miss Thatcher with the map

The map finally arrived. I was a little unsure about how the kids were going to respond to it. I thought they would immediately tell it was an hoax. Then I thought the opposite… I would get fired for scaring the kids because it would be too real. I imagined a sensitive parent complaining to the school that their child was being taught by “crazy teacher.” To make sure the kids wouldn’t run away and travel to Colorado by themselves Goonies-style, I stipulate that the treasure could not be recovered until the first full moon of the sixth month of 2027.

The kids used the map as a prop on their graduation play. I wrote the script based on a story about treasure hunters who seek riches but end up finding friendship.

I love the idea of treasure and I think most kids do, too. As a kid, I looked for treasure everywhere. I had a conviction that in the Andes existed treasure caches waiting for me inside caves filled with giant multi-colored quartz crystals. In my house, I combed the yard for anything that would lead me to the riches I knew the old owner had hid behind the adobe walls.

Perhaps the map I brought for the kids leads to no treasure. I don’t know if there’s a dead tree with an “X” mark on its trunk in Colorado. That doesn’t really matter. We search for treasure because we love adventure and a good story to tell our grandchildren. And one day, that story may save us from the sword of a king or the wrath of unruly children.

Three characters from the play: from right Dreaming Cloud The Storyteller, The Queen of Snow, and Luna Coyote. Missing: Cowboy John, Paco the treasure hunter, Old Miner Bill, and The King of the Wind.

read my mind

I look up and see them.

Window workers in Centum City

I think the same thing other people think about people hanging from buildings.

I’ve been listening to one song over and over. “Read my Mind” by The Killers. I don’t like the music video and the song is not something I would normally enjoy. The video is weird in a lazy way. But there are some manjar-covered parts within the song that feel nice and sweet to me… like Brandon Flowers, the vocalist, unexpectedly changing his voice to sing “Oh Well”… or his appearance… his western mustache and tie. When I watch the video I see myself in the future. I’m in the future listening to this song and reminiscing about the past (now, the present)… my nights here in Korea. And in that past, I’m wearing a western mustache and tie, and I’m on a hipster bike cruising down Korean alleyways after a light rain. The wet streets shine under neon signs.

So even if the video and song feel lame, the combination has an emotional effect on me… and about 13,000,000 other viewers. That effect is total star-quality.

For your consideration