It's 1:03 a.m. in the so-called 'Land of the Morning Calm' (or the Hermit Kingdom if you'd prefer) and it's been a little more than a month and week since I packed up my bags and aborted myself from the dusty world that is Vegas. What's changed in a month? Apparently while the Vegas economy continues to spiral down the literal toilet faster and faster than anyone can predict, the only toilet I'm stuck worrying about is whether or not mine is going to flush. I eat dinners for $1.50 that would cost $12 in the U.S. I swill dozens of glasses of shit beer and still only pay $10 for it. While having its own problems, thanks to the crashing U.S. consumer electronics market, Korea is strong and, with only a 4-5 percent unemployment rate, is still kicking the crap out of most internation economic markets.
What brought me to Korea, while sort of interesting, is nearly completely irrelevant. Once you get off of the bus and step into the night-time chaos that is Daegu, not even remembering if you've lost your iPod or a kidney, all the things that lead up to your departure become useless. Survival instinct, in all of its primal consistency, kicks in. Simply put: You freak the fuck out. But the days go by, you meet friends, and you come to realize that we're all here, for better or worse, to get away from our homes. Whether it be because you're an out-of-work journalist, a 20-something fresh out of college, or a 50-something who's only choice between life and death was removing himself from the so-called "Western World," we're all running the gamut between reality and fantasy, that hard part is knowing which part of the two Korea really is. Korea is wonderful. The kids are awesome, the people are friendly (mostly) and everything can be an adventure, provided you have a lot of patience. Patience for the fact that while modern in nearly every way possible, you still have to hang out clothes outside to dry them and most building don't have fire sprinklers, much less smoke detectors, safety complient stairs or even toilets in public bathrroms. Yet you can get YouTube on your cell phone for free and old people play with their Korean iPhone equivalents more frequently than some of their 30-something sons and daughters. In short, in my first month in Korea, I've found that the world, as easy it is to label as shitty, is a beautiful place and if you're willing to give it a try, there's still adventure to be had. Just be willing to deal with a lot of bullshit, and be ready to lose your iPod on the bus.
-A
