Zzzz

I slept incredibly badly last night. I went over to Liz and Lizzie's, theoretically for quiz writing, though I missed most of that. Instead I got fed some lovely snacks and the king of the snacks was the bacon-wrapped dates with almonds stuck in them. Yum. Martha and I watched Smart People after that - I liked it a lot, though in a rather low key way. Then after both of us couldn't sleep, we put on Into the Wild at 7 a.m. this morning... This is gonna be a long day.

Cloudy Characters

"When they write poems or sing songs in the West, they speak for all humanity. They're human beings - but we're just Muslims. When we write something, it's just ethnic poetry."

I've read two books recently where I spent a great deal of time very confused by the characters. I just didn't get why they acted as they did and both of the books seemed to be written in a very realistic style. Snow, by Orhan Pamuk, is said to be a novel that is supposed to open a window into the mind of Islamists and yet I have seldom encountered a book where I less understood the minds of the characters.

"If you write a book set in Kars and put me in it, I'd like to tell your readers not to believe anything you say about me, anything you say about any of us. No one could understand us from so far away... Oh yes, they do believe it... If only to see themselves as wise and superior and humanistic, they need to think of us as sweet and funny, and convince themselves that they sympathise with us as we are and even love us. If you would put in what I've just said, at least your readers will keep a little room for doubt in their minds."

The Crazed by Ha Jin - I'd didn't much like it. It drew me in for sure, but I really didn't understand the motives/emotions/conclusions of the main character in this one either. A university student cares for his ill professor, who is also meant to be his future father-in-law and comes to question his path in academics, except that I never understood why, really.

"Tell me, what is a useful life?"

"Not to be a piece of meat on the chopping board for others to cute. No, let me put it this way: I want to take my fate in my own hands, and when I die, I want to end with the feeling of content and fulfillment. In other words, I don't want to feel that my life should have been used otherwise."

"You're silly if not megalomaniac. Even Hamlet, a prince, cannot control his own fate. Who ever can?"

Wednesday Demonstration with the Halmoni for International Human Rights Day

For International Human Rights Day, I participated in one of the weekly Wednesday Demonstrations in front of the Japanese Embassy. I first learned about the issue of sexual slavery by the Japanese military when I visited Sharing House. Sharing House consists of both a museum and a house where some of the halmoni live together. International volunteers run English tours. In addition to learning about what happened in the museum, if you are lucky you can listen to one of the halmoni narrating their own story. It was an incredibly moving experience. Halmoni means grandmother in Korean and is the preferred and respectful term used when referring to the survivors, who are in their 70s and 80s. As Kim Hak-sson said, "We must record these things that were forced upon us."



Seven Demands to the Japanese Government

1. Admit the drafting of Japanese military comfort women.
2. Apologise officially.
3. Reveal the truth about the crimes.
4. Erect memorial tablets for the victims.
5. Pay restitution to the victims or their families.
6. Teach the truth about this so you do not repeat the same crime.
7. Punish the war criminals.



Han Do-soon, one of the oldest survivors of Japanese Military Sexual Slavery, passed away Friday, Dec 5th, 2008, at a nursing home near her hometown in North Jeolla Province. Her death means there are now only 94 surviving former "comfort women" registered with the Korean government, as the elderly survivors are rapidly passing away. There is little time left for these courageous women to hear a long-sought apology in this lifetime.



My coworker Shawn and I arrived in front of the Japanese embassy just before noon, and the Halmoni arrived just after that for their customary protest. The organizers say that about 100 or so supporters were there at the peak of the protest, with Korean and international speakers supporting the Halmoni. We had people from: Japan, New Zealand, Indonesia, Canada, Thailand, US, Malaysia, France, Peru, Brasil, Korea...and perhaps more that I've forgotten to mention.



From the moment I arrived, I was told that the police (and there were about three buses of them at that point) were not happy that the protest was intended to be longer than usual ('til 4, as advertised) and informed us that the protest was illegal and that we would be arrested if we stayed past 1 pm. It was also brought up that it was illegal for all the foreigners to be present at a protest, as that goes against our visa regulations. Which is something that I learned ages ago - it's true for many countries and I discovered it back when I did a university exchange and they told us to be careful. However, foreigners have been heavily involved with the halmoni protests for years and that hasn't been a problem before. Finally, the police told us simply that we would be arrested if we stayed past 1 pm, and around 12:45 about SIX more police buses filled with riot police arrived and started to pen in the area. I had left to find a bathroom and a snack and I had to get the police to let me through their lines to find Shawn again. The guy was adamant that I stay out of the area until I explained that those were my friends and if they were getting arrested, I guess I'd have to, too. At that he just shrugged and let me by. When we didn't leave immediately at 1, the riot police lined up with shields, then started marching toward us to corral in those who hadn't already left. We stayed for a while, but ultimately fell back/were pushed back and headed over to Insa-dong where they set up the speaker and posters.



The rest of my pictures of the demonstration are here.

Human Rights

This May Be the Closest I've Come to Being Converted

The baby Jesus blogs.

There's a Very Interesting Story Behind...

... how I started off the day today by almost being arrested.

However, I'll have to tell it to you later. I'm still at work finishing off a test I have to write and then I'll be going straight to Indigo for dinner, followed by a quiz at Phillie's.

However, the full story is a good one and there are photos and videos!

Weekends - I've Had 'Em

But oddly, I've not posted about the last couple. It's like the mystery of a blogger who names her blog after her travelling habits and fails to ever post about her trips...

The weekend before last was Thanksgiving and was characterized by lots of food, Project Runway and games. Martha and I played some more backgammon - I'm getting fairly decent at it and it's fun. I can't believe it took me this long to learn to play. A bit of ghetto Yatze and then there were the two games of Dice, both of which I won - such an energy boost! Once you start rolling dice that often though, it feels super odd after you stop. The food was not just the turkey - we also went to Suji's for brunch - expensive but scrumptious. And naturally there was trivia.

This past weekend was trivia free though, as the quiz master apparently ended up in the hospital. We had seen him the night before at the book launch of Every Second Sunday, which my friend Liz had a piece in. The book launch was at Dear Chocolate and was fun - champagne, good food, and I won a gift certificate to What the Book. A dodge around the book ban - fabulous! After it was over, we walked very, very far in freezing cold weather - why the hell did I wear a skirt again? - and ended up in a little Korean bar with tons of old records where we not only got to listen to some great music, but also danced the Hava Nagila. As you do. Padraic, Martha and I hit up Gogo's briefly, before she turned in and Padraic and I danced until the wee hours in Soho. I haven't been out dancing in ages and it was a lot of fun. Sunday involved a book club "meeting" that took place in my bedroom - Padraic, Martha and I discussed Life of Pi, but only Melissa also made it to brunch and she hadn't finished the last 30 pages. We put the lid on book discussion and ended up sitting shooting the shit between 1 and 1 at Wolfhound - ahhhh, Sunday Funday, how I've missed you (though you used to come with considerably more beer.)

And now I wait for another weekend to come.

Random Thought of the Day

It suddenly just struck me, as I sat in my bed grumbling to myself about having to walk over to the couch to check a text on my phone, that it is going to be really, really weird one day when I stop living in studio apartments that you could fit into the bedroom I grew up in as a child (almost anyway.)

Just really, really weird.

NaBloPoMo Fluff

It happened last month, and so it happens again. I meant to blog about the last couple of weekends, but I've managed to exhaust myself while watching old Ugly Betty episodes (I didn't get back into it after the strike) and eating cheese melts. Yeah, I know, pathetic, but it has left me in a mood to listen to music and not write about stuff. It is not a lie when I say I do listen to pretty much everything and that doesn't make a good poem, apparently, unlike Feral Geographer's which made sense.

"Put your media player on shuffle, and write down the first line of the first twenty songs. Post the poem that results. The first line of the twenty-first is the title.”

Goodnight, to every little hour that you sleep tight

Gotta make a move to a town that's right for me.
Dear Prudence, won't you come out to play,
Memph' Bleek always smokin' that la-la-la.
Si la vez, dile que aun la quiero.
Waltzing round the room tonight,
he ran a marathon.
Yeah, I'm gonna make you wonder if you're my friend.
Anyday, now... it's gonna start - my real life.
Sometimes...
I'm black I'm black.
On the bossom of young Abigail was written the price of her tail.
So this is odd.
Finally I figured out,
We used to be number 10.
You got me going.
Red lights are flashing on the highway.
It was crime at the time but the laws, we changed 'em.
And so the the story begins,
Whenever you want me,
We made a dance and buss de scene.


Funky Town, Blondie; Dear Prudence (John Lennon Tribute), Alanis Morisette; Excuse Me Miss Again (Remix), Kanye West; Si La Vez, Rakim & Ken Y; If You Belonged to Me, Traveling Wilburys; Actions Without Love, Chantal Kreviazuk; So Called Friend, Texas; Sometimes, Erykah Badu; I'm Black / Ain't Got No, Hair Soundtrack; Abigail, The Corries; This Brilliant Dance, Dashboard Confessional; All for You, Sister Hazel; Fu-Gee-La, The Fugees; Crawl, Soul Asylum; Don't Come Easy, Patty Griffin; The Laws Have Changed, The New Pornographers; Country House, Blur; Ring Ding Ding, L.O.C; Farewell and Goodnight, Smashing Pumpkins

Friendship

I have been thinking a lot about friendship lately. About what it means to be a good friend and about the qualitites one must bring to a friendship in order to maintain it.

In my experience, the most important part of friendship may well lie in forgiveness. People will often fail to support you or do or say something that hurts you at some point in any relationship - in fact, the whole nature of being friends allows that more easily because you tell your friends things that give them the ability to hurt you in the first place. You tell them your worries and problems and show them the buttons that people can press to make you miserable. Sometimes they are going to use that knowledge against you. Forgiveness is hard, first off because it requires that you be able to remove yourself from your hurt and try to understand what is going on in the other person's life that has lead to the situation. And yet, I think it is the most vital ingredient in any relationship. I don't claim to always be good at it, at all.

I find some people incredibly easy to forgive. I'm not sure why that is, but there are people I would forgive almost anything, especially with a little time. I am also an emotional person - if I'm upset, I have learned to say and once it's discussed I am fast to forgive and move on. I find it hard to deal with people who don't do this - people for whom things fester, who don't tell you what upsets them and what can be done to fix it or people who hear your reasons for failing to be perfect and who can't move past it.

I have also found it particularly fascinating who ends up being supportive when times are tough. In my life, ut has often been people I hardly expect to suddenly be there and be incredibly helpful and wonderful who suddenly just are. It's remarkable. It's interesting the people who will take time out to send a message or call and see how you are doing when you are going through a rough patch and interesting to me just who I'll do that for too. It's often a bigger list than I think it is.

I am at heart a people pleaser. I want people to be happy. I suppose I also want them to like me. I will continue to try to reach out for quite a while, because I have always experienced that sometimes all it takes is one cheerful text on a really bad day to make me feel incredibly better. I try to always extend that to other people - you never know when you will blunder into a moment where someone just needs to talk. I appreciate being able to be that person for people, when I can. I am always going to take that 3 a.m. phone call (assuming my phone wakes me) because I've been there too and I know how much those things matter. I will try to move mountains to cheer up people when they tell me they are sad, though I often have no idea how to do what they need. I will try anyway, because I'm of the opinion that it is better to try and be wrong than not try at all.

I would never claim to be a good friend - in times of my own trouble, I will become incredibly self-absorbed and sensitive to slights. I am easily hurt, which is I think both a bad and good quality. But I am also easily pleased - I like nothing more than to be able to have a cup of coffee and a great chat. What I would claim is that I strive to be a good friend. I try as much as I can. If I see people trying back, there is little I won't be able to overlook and forgive. I believe that the intent is more important than the result 90% of the time.

So, to all my friends, thank you for forgiving me my faults. I am often too loud and debate-like in conversation. I am ditzy and tend to forget things. I can be incredibly self-absorbed at times. I am fairly high maintenance. I make more plans than I can keep, but do it because I really wish I could do everything with everyone. I can be incredibly oblivious to what others really need, though if people would only tell me, I will try in my own ham-handed way to do offer the support people are looking for. I fuck things up as often as I get them right, though I am always trying to do my best. And really all I ask of my friends is that they do the same.

I Like Musicals

See more Jack Black videos at Funny or Die

Had To Share

From my brother's email: "Good morning old girl. Not sure if it is morning or not, if it isn't, then I will need you to pretend. Also mom told me that is the female version of old chap. I think that could be taken as rude but, it seems that is how it is. That may be why it seems to have disappeared, although it maybe just a British thing."

All I Want For Christmas Is...

... a Russian Personal Moon Light Box.

True 'Dat

In these times you have to be an optimist to open your eyes when you awake in the morning. ~ Carl Sandburg

I'm super tired. In fact, I'm contemplating peacing out of what I've said I'll do this weekend and just lying around in bed, reading and napping. I feel like I should go and do what I said I'd do and I've even prepaid for something, though.

My introvert and extrovert selves are warring with each other, with exhaustion leaning very heavily to the introvert side. The freezing weathter outside also has the introvert side's back.

If I had ice cream or chocolate in the kitchen right now, I'm not sure I'd leave the house all weekend.

I guess I'll play it by ear, once my eyes are open tomorrow. I make a fairly bad optimist though.

"Beyond Disability: The Fe Fe Stories", documentary

Empowered Fe Fes

Seriously?!? Seriously!?!

I was just reading on someone's blog that you can't take photos in stores back home. I take photos of anything and anyone here and it's all cool. How odd to think I couldn't take photos of odd products in grocery stores at home.

That got me thinking about the biggest crime I've ever committed and they both are fairly hilarious. The first was participating in an act of property damage - the destruction itself was very much not hilarious and completely unintended. The hilarious part is what it all says about me - namely that as the only sober person in my final year of high school, I thought it was a sterling idea to remove a tractor tire wheel from school property (and don't even ask how it got there) by rolling it along, as it was too hard to carry. Which did indeed make sense until we hit a hill, lost control of the wheel and it very much broke a fence clear on the other side of a park.

Just picture a bunch of eighteen and nineteen year olds, most intoxicated, standing in the dark, saying that for sure the wheel would fall over when it hit the first curb... Or that second one... Oh, fuck! If it wasn't hilarious enough that it was a tractor tire wheel we were moving, the other rather amusing thing is that we went over to try and fix the fence, which is what nearly got us all caught. We also had along for this ride an Australian exchange student with only a small amount of vision in one of her eyes, and hence a problem running like hell in the dark away from the threat to call the cops.

The other crime I've committed was fully intended and also hilarious, but I had no idea it was a crime. A bunch of us, including a guy in an RMC uniform, decided to go around during an election and swap all the lawn signs around. We were all highly amused at the idea of Reform Party supporters looking out the window only to see that they were advertising the greatness of the NDP. And in the interests of full disclosure, I was indeed a bit tipsy for this one.

Looking back at this post, I realise I've just outed myself as an ex-hick and a rather old one - the Reform Party's been gone for a while now, yes?

Yes!

I am very pouty. I've run out of both sugar and milk, thus tomorrow morning will be coffee free.

However, my K1 class today was amazing. For reasons beyond my ken, I am teaching them to read. I'm their speaking teacher and they have another reading teacher. So naturally, I'm spending a month teaching them beginner readers. Makes perfect sense.

However, we've been reading away for a couple of weeks now. At first, it took ages just to get them to understand that they had to look at the words on the page. Slowly, it seemed to occur to them that maybe all these letters might just be important and today we jumped a big hurdle. They had come to recognise the word in, though more through memorizing it with the tapes they have to listen to along with the books at home. Today's story had the word inside and the momment I covered up the side with my finger, Jain suddenly got it. Once she was reading in and trying to sound out the rest, the boys followed suit.

They were blatantly a bit bemused by my incredible excitement at the developement but soon joined in the party atmosphere. We ended the class with some dancing along to their CD of English songs, which is always a crowd pleaser.

It was a good day.

Delicious!

Can there be anything more wonderful than eating oatmeal, drinking coffe, and reading a great book (The Life of Pi) in bed? That's how I spent yesterday morning and how I will spend this one (once I go to bed and sleep through whatever odd part of the day I will end up sleeping through.)

Yes Canada Can!

In a historic political move, the leaders of the Liberals, NDP and the Bloc Quebecois signed a formal agreement Monday to topple the Tories and co-operate as a coalition government for at least 18 months.

Drama

I'm not a big fan. Which is not to say I've always managed to avoid being embroiled it in, granted, and I seem to be smack in the middle of it once again. While I was certainly at fault for part of it, my part of it was very well-intentioned. Since then, it feels like there has been a ridiculous spiral of non-communication and possibly some jealousy. I have no idea what to do about it, since the individual in question seems to be incapable of accepting an apology and moving on. I would guess she is the kind to hold a grudge - in fact, all of this might well go back the entire two and a half years we've known each other - or at least part of it might, anyway. One big heart-to-heart and a couple of emails have not led to any further understanding as far as I can tell and the person in question keeps making passive-agressive digs that don't even make any sense to me.

I wonder if the problem is that we made good bar buddies but we make awful friends?

Either way, I peace out. I have far too many other things to do and think about. I did my best. Perhaps time will heal the rift and if it doesn't, I can't be bothered getting much worked up about it.