A Little Bit of Everything

1) A dialogue on the happenings of home:

Zach: Matt was asking me questions on how to handle a situation. It seems a girl has entered his life. If you know Matt, and you do, then you know how rare of an occurrence this is.

Me: Matty has a girlfriend?

Zach: A looker too. But he hasn't got her yet. The ball was falling where it needed to, even overcoming a few hiccups along the way. But then Matt got punched in the face.

Me: Matt got in a fight? I don't even recognize this guy anymore!

Zach: It wasn't really a fight. A Washburn football player, a real big Samoan, a mean SOB drilled Matt in the face. Matt said he didn't even see the punch coming, didn't even know a fight was brewing and doesn't know what caused it. The punch, damaging enough, wasn't the punishing blow. Knocked backwards by the hay maker, Matt flipped over the rail of a deck and twisted his ankle. Scratch that, sprained his ankle.

Me: Booze was involved I'm sure of it. Did Matt instigate this affair?

Zach: There's conflicting stories. Some people say Matt was breaking up a fight, which by the way, Matt's a bouncer at the Hawk. Did I tell you that?

Me: (nodding my head yes, with an expression on my face that says, "You've told me a minimum of five times in the last ten days, that Matt is a bouncer at the Hawk.")

Zach: Anyway, some say Matt was starting a fight. That's neither here nor there. Matt has a love interest, but he has a swollen face and a busted ankle. I mean, he was worked over. And this hottie, a Vietnamese chick, invited him to a formal dance. Matt was in no position to bust any moves or tear up any carpet suffering from both White Man's Syndrome and a bum ankle. So he said he sprained his ankle playing basketball.

Me: He should of said he got in a fight. As the saying goes, chicks dig rebels.

Zach: I told him girls like that. He told me, "Zach, not when you get your ass kicked. They like ass kickers!" Touche Matt, touche.

2) Parent-Teacher Conferences

I have parent-teacher conferences this week. There's only one parent that I've encountered so far that is fluent in English. That was the only parent-teacher conference that I had a significant part in. Parent-teacher conferences are so boring. I am just a mannequin. The conversations are entirely done in Korean, and I speak for a little under a minute, what I say is then translated into Korean. Each conference is about ten minutes long, I'd rather watch paint dry.

My co-teacher, Eva, does 97% of the talking. I just try and sit there with good posture. After about the seventh conference, roughly an hour of talking to parents, I started thinking of that story above. At first, I cracked a smile at Matt saying, "Not when you get your ass kicked Zach; They don't like that! They like ass kickers!" Then I started to chuckle silently. I'm sorry, Matt getting beat up by a large Samoan is funny. The more I began to think about the whole silly scenario the harder it was to contain by growing smile. Then I started to laugh...out loud. I couldn't help myself.

I'm sure the mother asked Eva, "Why is this crazy foreigner laughing?" Eva asked me what was funny, and I told her a non-funny story about the parent's child. The mother, thinking anything about her child was good, began to laugh out loud too. Maybe Eva translated the story so it was funny. But for whatever reason, the mom began to laugh. Eva then joined the party. So all three of us were laughing in this teacher's conference. This all started because of a twisted ankle and a big Samoan.

3) B-Ball

Last night, I went to play basketball at an indoor court. Indoor courts are as rare as a cold day in hell, here in Korea. Indoor courts that foreigners have access to are worth there weight
in gold. Jason, a good wholesome Canuck and a co-worker of mine, got a precious invite. Because these gyms are so rare, the organizer of the gym sends out very few invites. If this gym was open to every foreigner, it would be flooded with them. Luckily, he gave Jason the opportunity to invite one more person. Jason, who is somehow fooled into believing that I am a good guy, invited me to the glorious indoor court.

Having just spent the whole day bored off my you know what, I was looking forward to playing some basketball. This also happened to be the same day I got a good laugh at Matt's expense. Within fifteen minutes of playing, I promptly landed on another guy's foot and sprained my ankle. Karma.

4) Zach

Zach lives in my neighborhood. He's just a five minute walk from my house. This is great for obvious reasons. Last year he was about an hour away, so we only got together about once a week. I expect to see a lot of the big guy this year.

5) Pink

It's said, brave men wear pink. South Korean men must be the bravest in the world. Hey look, I love a good Salmon colored shirt, but these guys will wear any shade of pink, even Hot Pink. There's even a store called Pink, which sells both female and male clothing.