Fungus My Glory

Like much of Asia, Korea makes very liberal (ab)use of English in advertising, fashion, and just randomly scribed on things like dishtowels or photo albums. In fact, professional photo studios in Korea will take a very nice portrait, then print a bunch of English song lyrics across it. Usually they are something romantic. Sometimes they are just odd. One that stands out had Blue Oyster Cult's "Don't fear the Reaper" lyrics in flowery lettering down the side. There are websites that do a pretty good job of collecting misuse of English, but I just wanted to share a few recent finds (you might need to click to blow them up so you can read them): Note the starbucks-esque coffee cups. You can get these in Family-Mart (like 7-11). They come pre-loaded with instant coffee... Another nice example of odd English is an underwear shop I sometimes pass that is called "Yes". I always tell myself I'll bring my camera and always forget... At any rate, the sign above the door reads something to the effect of: Jeane, did you see my new panty and brassiere? Is this one yours? No, does this one look like mine? It is nice. Should we go to Yes? Yes, yes, yes, yes.... Yes!!!! All things digital and wireless are huge in Korea. The technology's pretty impressive, with the subway full of people watching digital TV shows on their cell phones. Marketing tries to pick up on the high-tech trend--almost any appliance you buy has a digital display and "fuzzy logic" written across it. Some things are harder to make high-tech/digital, like big apartment buildings. But if you can't make them virtual, then at least you can give them virtual names: Sweet dot Home (built by the "Pair of Dragons" conglomerate) Some building names have less obvious connotations: "We've" While others are more direct: My favorite recent find was this one, though. Maybe the guy dreams of being a famous mycologist?

A very merry... ummm... birthday to me

OK. Sorry for the dorky Alice in Wonderland reference. Ella likes Alice, a lot--she has a thing for the psychedelic. Anyway, my birthday was August 5th, and I got about the best present you could imagine, even better than the presents my dog-nephew, Ike, got for his adoption day. My birthday present was Jina Lerato Thompson, and here she is: Weighing in at a dainty 6lb, 11oz, and born exactly on her due date. This is the story of her first days in this world. Warning to the squeamish: there are pictures of nude, slimy babies (but nothing more graphic than that). Things are a little different in Korea. You don't get the luxurious birthing suites of American hospitals, since deliveries here don't bring in the kind of $$ that they do in the US. We did get a private birthing room, though, compliments of our insurance. Most people have shared birthing rooms. We also got Hyunjoo's best friend, the epidural, for which she was very grateful, albeit very, very itchy. Things after that went more-or-less as you'd expect in the US, with a few notable exceptions. They kept asking me to leave the room for every minor procedure or exam. Then came the perennial struggle I was accustomed to having with certain respiratory therapists in US delivery rooms. There's no need to give oxygen to a healthy vigorous baby who is still a little blue shortly after being born--babies aren't supposed to be that pink that soon. There's actually growing evidence that being hyper-oxygenated isn't just not necessary, but it can be harmful in newborns. At any rate, people love giving oxygen since it makes the babies get pink faster and they feel they've accomplished something... Korea was no exception I had to keep subtly pulling away the O2 mask whenever I could get a hand near her. Did she just mouth-pipette those gastric contents!?!?! That's definitely different. Jina: "Hey, lady, I've got an apgar of at least 8, even without the oxygen." Note the nice symmetric moro reflex :-) Then came the most frustrating part. Although we had requested mother and baby rooming-in together, things here are still kind of like they were in the US in the 1950s. As soon as the baby is born, you get one peek after she's been toweled off and bundled (and then they put the baby to the breast for about 2 seconds--part of new efforts to promote breast-feeding), then whisk her away to the nursery so mom can recover). Does she look like she needs to have her baby taken away? That's about 2 minutes after delivery. At any rate, I went to the nursery and argued for a while that for reasons of bonding, attachment, breastfeeding, reducing postpartum bleeding, etc it's important for mom and baby to be together immediately unless there's a medical reason to keep them apart. I got some sypathetic nods, but the final word was, "We don't do that, sorry." I hate to be the pushy patient. God knows I've experienced some who have pushed too far, but most are simply trying to do what they think is best for their children. I believe I was justified, but I probably pushed a little too long, spending time arguing in the nursery that I should have spent with my wife, supporting her... In the end, my sister-in-law, Ji-Young arrived, and helped push forward our transfer to postpartum so we could bring Jina in to be with her mom. All told, it was about 2 hours before we got moved into the postpartum room--better than the 4 hours they usually take, but still too slow. Ella was relieved to see her mom again. She had been understandably worried about what was going on. Hyunjoo soon got her first meal of seaweed soup--which she will be eating every meal for the next month! And Ella did her best to imitate mom's expression. Another 15 minutes later, Mom and baby were finally reunited. Then everyone had the chance to get better acquainted over the next couple of days. Ella was delighted to meet her baby sister. She constantly wanted to hold, touch, and kiss her... She also "read" her Dr Seuss's story of overcoming one's fears of the mysterious and unknown, such as "pale green pants with nobody inside them". After the reunions, things got a little deja-vu: Jina got attacked by her hand (left), in a scene that was eerily reminiscent of Ella's hand-attack of 28 months ago (right). Actually, I told her "If your hand's bigger than your face..." and she fell for it! My girls are so gullible... Finally, we had our first family portrait on the way out the door: The name: "Jina" is Korean (진아), since she was born in Korea. It's pronounced similar to "Gina". It's actually two words: "Jin", which mean essentially treasure (or chastity/virtue, or truth) and "A" which means grace/nobility. We're still deciding exactly which characters to use, so the final meaning is yet to be determined. For those who read Chinese, we're considering 珍雅 or 真雅maybe 贞雅--although the Korean pronunciation for the last one isn't the same. There are some other possibilites, too. Hong-Bin and Lily, we're going to need a name consultation. "Lerato" is Sesotho, since she spent most of her first 9 months in Lesotho. It means love, and is a common Sesotho name. Thompson, well, that means Son of Thomas. Actually, it should probably be Tobiason (or even Olson per Norwegian tradition) after my great grandfather Ole Tobiason, but that apparently didn't sound American enough, so it was dumped for Thompson. More than you wanted to know.

And now for Something Completely Different

Not much action lately. So I thought I'd share Ella's favorite.... ummmm... psychedelic amalgamation of animation and electronica. That was Lemon Jelly--Nice Weather for Ducks. Or, as Ella knows it "I wanna see duckies on your 'puter" She also like's "The Frog One"... although that one's a little more disturbing. I'll let you draw your own conclusions. Still waiting on the baby... due any day now. The doc kind of wanted to induce Hyunjoo today, but with 3 people at home with colds and Ella's Grandma with a cold sore we don't want the baby to come quite yet...

TV Tourism

Korea has never been the most popular tourist destination, especially with big draws like China and Japan right next door. But, in the past decade, "The Korean Wave" has been a powerful force in Asian pop culture, with the spread in Asia, and interestingly Latin America, of TV serial dramas that come out of Korea. They are mostly romantic soap opera mini-series, with rather cliched melodramatic acting, people falling in and out of love-triangles and tragedies, and full-frontal face-shot camera angles. Their popularity has led to the spread of Korean fashion trends, pop music, and an increasing interest in Korean culture, food, etc. all throughout Asia. And, as can always be expected when something foreign is popular, protectionist alarms have sounded, with governments and concerned citizens in Vietnam, Taiwan, and China, complaining about their culture (and their TV airwaves) being diluted by the Korean invasion. In terms of tourist dollars for Korea, the Korean Wave has definitely been washing back to the peninsula, bringing with it a huge number of foreign (particularly Chinese nouveau-riche) tourists wanting to visit the places where the shows were filmed. So, on the advice of my brother-in-law, and not wanting to miss the wave, we went to Nam-I Island, which sits in a river about 2 hours from Seoul by train. Nam-I Island is a rather quirky place. About 50 years ago, some guy decided to plant a bunch of trees there, so there are a number of pretty tree-lined paths going in all 4 cardinal directions, each flanked by a different type of tree. Since then, there have been all manner of oddities added to the island, from collections of village guardian "totem poles"... ...a small sculpture garden... ..antique-looking buildings selling tourist-kitsch... ...and perhaps most surprisingly, a permanent UNICEF photo exhibition in a fake castle that is trying to fill that delicate architectural niche between Disney and gothic. But, what defines Nam-I Island more than anything else today, is that it was the site of the filming of "Winter Sonata", a tale of complicated love triangles, half-siblings, architecture, and brain damage (at least that's what I got from the plot summary on Wikipedia. I must admit I haven't seen it personally.). On Nami-Island, you can see such Winter Sonata highlights as: The picnic table where the leading couple made snowmen and shared their first kiss on the first day of snow. and signposts allowing you to relive that scene in case you'd forgotten the romantic details. And, in case you were worried that the legacy of Winter Sonata will not endure through the ages, there is a bronze sculpture of the leading actors... Complete with a plaque reading: "This sculpture ensures that the memory of 'Winter Sonata' will remain on Nami Island Forever." As you can probably guess, I did a little bit of eye-rolling, but that's part-and-parcel of tourist sites in Asia. Subtlety doesn't draw tourists or make money--Did I mention that there is a small flock (?) of ostriches running around on the island? All that aside, it was actually a really nice trip. My personal highlights included spicy chicken grilled right at the table Sharing green tea ice cream with Ella And of course the little boat ride. I can never get enough of boats and trains...

Ella's imagination

Mostly just a few photos of Ella. I'm still busy studying for boards and... ummm... playing Go online. My father-in-law plays all the time, so it's an addictive way to bond, sort of. The weather is clearing up, so maybe I'll be able to get out more. Planning a trip for next week. Still trying to write my Lesotho retrospectives. It's hard... I'll keep on it. On to the photos: Do you think this is a sign of OCD? Ella likes making "tea" in MinSeo's ExerSaucer. The "teapot" is the red thing that looks like a silo, the "microwave" is the little round depression, and her hand is in the milk/sugar dispenser. A demonstration of the "grumpy face". She does this on cue when you ask for the grumpy face. And, practicing for nude toddler chopstick racing. Her grandmother spent all week comparison shopping for training chopsticks. Ella broke them after about 1o minutes. One of life's many small tragedies. p.s. she has a heat rash, which is why she's topless in all these photos.