within life and other stories

...but i have a huge crush on MC 몽. he's officially added to the celebrity crush list.

it's important for me to document the experiences of my day-to-day, that way the feelings that i encounter can be properly archived for future reference and reflected upon. i dwell in the past just as much as i think about the future - this has been discussed at length many times before. though recently i have found myself thinking about how much things have changed, especially in the past year. and as 2009 comes to a close, i find myself reflecting upon the last year because, perhaps more so than any other year previous, this year has been marked by so much change. monthly i had something new to worry about, and i'm only realizing this now.

i wanted to write something poignant, instead of the usual "oh, woe is me!"-affair, but i'm tired. and the above took me almost half an hour.

broken. i am so broken. i am wondering around underground shopping centres - a sea of difference and i am so fucking alone.

i came home, dejected and irritated, and i'm falling into a pattern of helplessness. i'm whining now - i'm in the most amazing place, but i can't help but feel so alienated. i want to come home.

just now i found myself getting angry at people i shouldn't be angry at. culture shock is awful.

how do i meet people in a country where i don't belong?

i am depressed and lonely. and it sucks. i don't know what to do. 

i believed in magic, and fairies, and imagination. wonderful things would happen on a daily basis because i believed they could happen. seems so long ago now, like a forgotten toy that would resurface in a toy chest every once in a while, only to disappear again just as quickly as it appeared. with the passing of time so too did the feelings of whimzy and wishes disappear to be replaced with ones of regret and damage. it's hard to hold onto your fantasy when reality is trying to supersede every fathom: every nook and crany. 

we're told to just grow up; to just shrug our shoulders at what's to come and to "get on with it." as hard as it may sound we trudge on, heads sometimes held low and pressing against our chests, or otherwise held high and proud so that they can be seen above all others. we continue on, hoping against all other hopes that we can find some sort of familiarity to hold on to. but then that hope disappears, because it cannot exist when you grow up: to grow up, is to lose all hope in what you hold dear. growing up changes what is important; no longer can a scratch be mended by a kiss; nor can we quell bad dreams with soothing words and a hug. we possess the knowledge that this was once the solution to all our problems, only now they are too big to be truly fixed by any means.

and so we pass along our judgement, and attempt to help along those who still believe in magic, and wishes, and have hope. we hold them tight, whisper to them about secret helpers in the night who come to take your scary thoughts away. and quietly we cry, and quietly we hold ourselves tightly, wishing for a hope and hoping for a wish, though it never comes. but we get on with it - it's what we're meant to do.

one of the most difficult, and infuriating, things about korean culture is that people are very difficult to read. there is no specific verbal acknowledgment of people, or their feelings towards one another, in any sort of social setting. and if there is, it's for a fleeting moment before the "korean-ness" takes over. for example, i am fully aware of my self-validation... i constantly need to be told i'm doing a good job. but guys, this is a western construct! we feel the need to tell one other how we feel about each other constantly as a way to reassure that person that they are a necessary and viable person in the social circle, or society at large. 

i'm not entire sure of the system that korea has in place, but it's becoming increasingly apparent that my friends at school won't necessarily tell me that we're friends, or enact on the principles that being friends usually entails. oftentimes, when i am home alone because i don't have any friends, i start to think "well, are we not hanging out because they'e busy? or because they don't want to work twice as hard to hang out with someone who only speaks english?" the loneliness has to be, by far, the hardest thing that i'm going through here. tomorrow is the monthly get together with the other teachers under 30 (this time to celebrate the end of some homeroom teachers' open classes and my co-teacher's birthday, which was yesterday. he told me about it today...). i was really angry that he hadn't told me, apparently because he was "embarrassed". it makes me look like a real jackass because here's a guy that has somewhat helped me adjust to life in korea. i say somewhat because, really, he's just bought me a few meals, taken me to the weddings of some teachers at school, bought be pizza and showed me how to buy hamburgers. well i guess he also dealt with the mess of the previous teacher's unpaid bills... but for the past two months he has been self-absorbed with his studying, for an exam that will likely result in him leaving the school next year if he gets a good result.

if i sound bitter... damn, i am. i'm so insanely bitter. i feel as though i'm being left behind in a world i don't belong in; like going camping and forgetting to bring a tent, a sleeping bag, food, everything. the number of conversations that just pass me by... ah, it's humbling. 

i realize it's been a little while since i last updated. the good news is that the next time i actually sit down to update, it will probably be filled with some good stories as i am starting to adapt to the culture here. 

it's a slow process.

i'm one of those people who needs a definite role to play: if i am aimless, without a direction or otherwise, i can become lost in the shuffle and find myself moving onto other things. therefore it becomes difficult for me to maintain proper relationships with people soon after making their acquaintance, because i want things to be perfect with them almost instantly. the friendships that i have currently have been farmed and nurtured over the years into what they are now, but there was almost definitely a point in the infancy of each relationship where i was at odds with myself for thinking the most ludicrous things. thoughts that should not be thunk during such a premature moment in a blossoming, and budding, co-operation. as a result, i have taken upon myself to slowly coax myself away from these desperate acts, because they are just that: acts of sheer desperation. i am so convinced of the opposite of what is actually happening that i will try to talk myself into thinking about the "what if? scenarios, just to get a rise out of my disposition. it becomes a cyclical thought process as i battle myself in a bid to outdo the previous thought, eventually turning my state into one of panic and unrest and destroying any hope of just letting the moment slide by as a normal person might. no, i am an over-thinker, and whenever a moment suddenly changes that wretched evil suddenly rears its ugly head again.

jealousy.

my jealous nature has been a subject here before, but once again i am crippled by it's unyielding force; an unwanted presence that is weighing in the back of my mind like a paperweight, and causing me to flutter in and out of stability. the spokes of my prosperity have been thrown out of sync, and for a short while it looked like things would click into place; if only that were true. i can, then, only reside in the faint hope that things will work their course and play out for the best, or i can use the time to my advantage and construct some semblance of a good time out of my predicament. it is, after all, only time.

i'm in daejeon now, and i have been two days. it's a really nice city - very clean and vibrant, i think i'm going to like it. my co-teacher, nick, is very nice. he's pretty young as well, which gives us a little more in common. i'm impressed with his english, which is just enough to make me feel comfortable. the day we all arrived in daejeon was also my birthday which gave me an excuse to forthrightly tell people that it was. nick took me to dinner with some other teachers from our school that night, and i finally got to try soju; it wasn't bad, but i can't see myself drinking it again. i'm slowly settling in; my apartment is too small, but there isn't much use in worrying about it because i can't do anything about it. at least i can't until february. it'll be fine i am sure. but there are still some more problems i have to overcome.

the problem with my loneliness is that it is coupled with a crippling fear of going outside because i am different. but i am aware of my thoughts, and am doing my best to overcome them. i went to the grocery store again today, and these two kids both said "hello" to me. not "anneyong", but "hello" - in english. so i smiled and waved back at them because i was too far away to say hello back. tomorrow i'm going to go on a super long walk again, and i'm going to get used to my surroundings. i have hot water now, so i can shower properly. it's not as bad as i thought it was going to be, since the head is directly above the sink, but i do have to lean right over the sink to wash my hair.

i have skyped with tara the past few days. he new roommate has a webcam, so we tested that out today. it's good to hear about everyone in toronto and what they are up to.

i know where i'll be teaching starting monday: euneosong elementary school in daejeon. the write up that my co-teacher wrote makes it sound really exciting:

euneosong elementary school was founded in 2007. So we have convenient and clean facilities. Most of students are from middle class in korea and they are very meek and good at study. we won the english drama festival last year. and there are lots of young teachers who want to be friends with you. maybe you can have a good time with them for a year. let's work hard, get together, play sports. welcome to euneosong!

i can't wait to see what it all looks like!

orientation ends tomorrow as we all ship off to our respective cities and provinces. it's sad to say good-bye to the regular meals and the constant chatter of english speaking people, but i'm looking forward to getting back into a permanent rhythm... i've known, in the back of my mind that this week was going to come to and end and so i have tried to act accordingly. i have packed up my carry on, which seems to be a lot fuller than it was when i arrived. not to worry! it'll all work out.

leaving this room feels different than when i left my room at 660. sure there are obvious differences, but what strikes me is that literal similarity of leaving a room is not present - i have a somewhat cold and callous nature towards this room perhaps. my feels may be indicative of the amount of time i have spend here, which is comparison is a lot less. as well, 9 ferrier was never really a "party house" - a place to get together with people on any number of nights throughout the week; 660 always had that drop-in/drop-out feel to it, which came along with the house vibe to begin with, and wasn't necessarily something we brought in when we got the place. that vibe is still there though, even when i visit. 

these past few days have been filled with good-byes to my group of astounding friends. not only am i in awe that i'm friends with these people, but i'm constantly amazed at their incredible individual talents, personalities, and general will about themselves. needless to say i don't pick any duds, when it comes to friends. wednesday night involved an impromptu send-off at the green room on bloor street, however it started with dan weir and i getting a $20 pizza deal at pizza pizza and immediately regretting it. there was just too much pizza! and on top of the pizza we had wings, dip and two cans of pop each! (a coke and root beer please!). after this we walked around the annex and yorkville with stops at the tim hortons at st. george, the hmv on bloor, the varsity theatre in the manulife centre and cumberland theatre on cumberland. none of these stops provided any sort of tangible activity worthwhile of our time, which is why we resorted to getting beer.

i've been to the green room a few times before, but not in a long time. i also haven't drunk beer in just as long as i had made a conscious decision last year to stop after watching mike g throw up over the side of the dock. however, when i did drink, i would almost exclusively only drink steamwhistle, because i loved the idea that it was only brewed down the street from where i was sitting, anywhere in the city, and it tastes pretty good. so dan ordered us up a pitcher, which we drank and enjoyed. then we were joined by cory. who helped us out and added to our group. then we waited for bryar to show up with his band of cronies, a band that turned out to included mike g, julia, dan g, melse, and wallis - all of whom i would be saying goodbye to that night because they were off to guelph the next day for the fashion tips show. devon and norah showed up a little later to party too.

now, i got quite drunk. i figured that i drank more beer last night than i had all year. i barely remember saying goodbye, which in all honestly is a good thing. i remember a giant group hug, and mike g kissing me, some weird german guy with no shoes, trying to sell us art in the street (he got mad at me when i was taking photos), almost being coerced into smoking a cigarette (i didn't) and peeing a lot. i'm glad the goodbye was a blur, otherwise i wouldn't have been able to hold it together. tonight, during the only night of the final oxford hotel weekend that i could attend, was pretty bad as i was sobering up as the night went on, and as people started to leave. it helped that the goodbyes were one at a time, and not at the same time because it softened the blow. it was funny, everyone i said "good-bye" to was because they were leaving the oxford house. it felt like a normal night in the back of my mind with everyone just going to bed. the worst part about it is that i forgot look back before getting in the cab with tara. she told me, as we drove away, not to think about it - "it's best not to look back," she said. i am dreading the airport.

tomorrow is my move to chatham; i am fairly confident that it will be awful as my packing has been subpar at best. luckily my dad and brother will be joining me to help out in the afternoon and then driving back with me in the uhaul. 

starting next week i will be tagging major posts with "korea", this is after all my blog and will be the place to go for korea updates. if you want hysterical non-stop updates of my life you can check out my twitter: www.twitter.com/jake_money - you should follow me, you won't regret it.

today marks the two year anniversary of the dudenshire fire, which was really nothing more than a smoking box of peat on the roof. a lot has changed since then, but a lot remains the same. i was over at dudenshire last night, for the first time in quite a while, enjoying the tail-end of a party after a horrific night at work. the party was fun, and it was nice to just sit outside on the roof for a little bit, listening to another party a block over as they sang "all the small things" by blink-182 as loud as they could. 

work has changed drastically this week due to the general manager being fired by the tyrannical owners for no apparent reason. my attitude towards that place has changed just at dramatically as a result and i have lost all respect for the upper-upper management; they have no respect for us so i don't see why we should give it to them. the events of this week have made me feel a lot better about leaving this week, but also a lot more guilty for leaving my co-workers behind with the situation to deal with. i know that they understand, but i can't help but feel guilty. the main change that i am not happy about is the apparent lack of a staff schedule, as before we would all be very clear on when we would be working (as any other normal job would operate). however now the word is that we won't know before hand, and the new management will call around to schedule us about an hour before our shift. this ultimately doesn't really affect me because this week is supposed to be my last week, but again the same guilt of leaving everyone behind is kicking in. i hope things can be get better soon.

i woke up really late today and i'm regretting it considerably right now - i wish i had just bitten the bullet and set an alarm for 1pm. i feel like the entire day has gone. but not to worry! i can just use the rest of the afternoon and evening to do whatever i like, but what that is i don't know yet.

i'm leaving for my annual pilgrimage to chatham in about eight hours. train is scheduled to leave at 12:10pm, at which point i will be carefully settled in a window-seat, preferably one facing west (so as to watch the lake), with my laptop perched in front of me on the foldout table. hopefully there will be nobody sat beside me, but if there is they can watch with growing jealousy the many tv-shows i will watch to entertain myself during the 3.5 hour journey.

this time around i am visiting chatham for two reasons: #1 for fun, and most importantly: #2 to see my friends and family once more before i leave for korea. i went back and forth between how much time i should spend at home, eventually opting for two full days and leaving the earliest i have ever left on the final day. in the past i have stayed for long weekends, two whole weeks, five days and any other number of days. i think that this trip may be my shortest one yet, which a part of me thinks is absolutely ludicrous - "it's going to be the last time for a long time! i will want to spend as much time as possible at home!" but in actuality, a part of me knows that the inevitable boredom will set in on wednesday afternoon, a point that would be unbearable to tolerate if i still had another full day to grapple through. i can handle about one and a half days of my parents before they become difficult to hang around, so this way i will be spending only the maximum prescribed amount of time. i'm also leaving a lot earlier on thursday and taking the 11am train back to toronto, putting my arrival time in the 2pm-region. normally i would leave chatham at this time and arrive in toronto a little bit after 6. however, after several trips of his departure time i have discovered that i do not possess the stomach for extended periods of anticipation. my stomach is subpar even on it's best days, and when coupled with the stress on an impending journey it's down right upsetting. i would oftentimes, when faced with the usual 2pm train time, find myself sat in the upstairs living room watching television and just waiting to leave. i wouldn't be able to eat for fear of throwing it up again almost immediately, even though i knew that after a few hours my stomach would be screaming for food. by taking a much earlier train i can ensure that i will feel very little of the affects of what i refer to as a "travel-day": a day of travel that is otherwise just a write-off. 

my flight to korea leaves on august 17th at 11pm. that is going to be disastrous! an entire day to sit around and think about a thirteen hour plane ride! i'm going to die.

as mentioned above, i will have a laptop to accompany me on my journey. this is very exciting for me, as it'll be the first time my macbook pro has ever truly travelled with me. i've had it at work a few times, but this'll be different. before, when i was away from my computer completely i often found myself collecting various things i've taken off the internet and either emailing their links to myself, or storing them on my portable harddrive. now i can just compute as normal - i will have my actual computer with me! i'm also really excited about watching shows on the train... music alone for a three-plus hour train ride has become rather tedious (i believe during the last train ride home after christmas i listened to as many neil young albums as i could, in chronological order). 

speaking of neil young, his first four albums ("neil young", "everybody knows this is nowhere", "after the gold rush", and "harvest") were all released this week in newly remastered versions as part of the archives - official release series. ... i bought them ... all. i don't even listen to cds! they're just going to sit on my shelf now and collect dust. on the plus side they have numbers on the side, which is something i cannot resist.

canker update! i had a giant canker sore at the back of my mouth, next to my jaw line, last week. it was very painful because the lesion kept messing with my actual jaw, tricking me into thinking i was in a lot more pain than i should have been. i battled that with a lot of orajel, probably a lot more than i should have used, and as a result it's healing oddly. there is still a bit of a bump around the edges of where the ulcer was, but i'm hoping that will clear up soon. as soon as that started to heal another canker started to form, this time on the very tip of my goddam tongue! this one really hurts, but it's a strange sensation. i applied salt directly to it today, a first for me, as usually i would just wash my cankers out with salt solution. i think it's starting to heal. but now i have ANOTHER one forming! this is at the very bottom on the inside of my lip - i don't think it will hurt nearly as much as the other two did, but i am still preemptively battling against it all the same.

i am seriously going to miss my co-workers at the bloor after i leave. they are some of the best people i have ever worked with.

"time's getting on."

- my dad, circa. 1998 

i really like it when i realize that there are some things i have that i cannot live without; it reminds me of the things i have accomplished, or the memories i have. there are photos i could not part with, or songs that are so particular to a period of my life that it would be difficult to imagine a life without them. thoughts of this nature often come to one when they are awake at 4am, ruffling through the thousands upon thousands of folders that one has on one's computer.

i have a lot i need to sort out and get done:
- buy one-way ticket to south korea for august 18th
- go to korean consulate and sort out e-2 visa
- order up korean won
- buy laptop case/sleeve
- buy khakis/"business casual" clothes
- buy new luggage
- go home
- continue re-watching lost
- hang out with friends/have fun
- slave away at the theatre for minimum wage/make money

i have some time off next week so i should be able to sort out the most important items on the list: plane ticket and visa. after that i think everything will just slide into place. 

it's my own fault that i'm awake so late right now. curse the man who invented surfing the internet in bed. i can check my email, facebook and twitter all while lying down! it's amazing. 

i'm listening to the joel plaskett emergency and thinking about going to bed. i probably should turn in soon because tomorrow is the big day: graduation. it's been a long road, which feels weirdly short; i mean grade 9 in grade 12 felt like it was a million years ago, but first year feels like it was last year. i have mutated into such a different person over the past four years and i'm thankful to every one of the people i love. 

it's going to be hard to say good-bye in two months when i head over to south korea for a year, to teach english. i'm excited about the opportunity, but daunted by the challenge. i just hope things will work out. 

i'm excited about graduation though, and really nervous. i can take comfort in the fact that i won't be the only one looking stupid in one of those graduation gowns: we'll all be wearing them. i just want it to be over, which i'm realizing might be a bad thing; i should relish the day.

screw it! this is going to be the best day, rain and all! i worked hard to get to this point, and i deserve all the glory. i'm excited about graduating.

i am definitely graduating this year, which is a relief to be sure. my sessional gpa for the past year pushed up my overall gpa, but sadly not enough to get any academic distinction (dean's list and the like), although i will be graduating with honours which i guess is better than nothing. the ceremony is in little under a week, on june 25th. i'm eagerly anticipating it, but mostly for my graduation gift and not so much the ceremony itself. i have started to liken my degree to a sort of "receipt", which has made me laugh. though technically i can do anything now!

which is exactly what i plan on doing. my documents for korea have arrived, and i have been offered a placement in the city of daejeon, which is on the western side of south korea. i have no idea of any specifics beyond that (so don't ask!), and i will be getting everything sorted out in the coming weeks. all in all it's very exciting! and it definitely beats toiling for minimum wage at a cinema run by a tyrannical italian family. though it means i will have to make the most of out the coming days of summer. let's plan some parties and days out! stat!

I have a bunch of playlists in my iTunes library, all chronical various songs from various parts of my life. there are lists for each season for every year since 2002. some songs I have not really listened to since the time when they were in heavy rotation, and thus a true remnant of that time. other songs leaked into other time periods and are blurred between specific times. some songs were popular at various times but can be assosciated with very specific times.

"the Hindu times" by oasis reminds me of driving down the 401, really late at night with my dad on the way back from toronto after flying home from England.

"cool" by gwen stefani reminds me of my first summer working at subway and biking to and from work.

"the eraser" by thom yorke reminds me of a few lunch breaks when I was working at YA and played that song on repeat.

I have a lot more.

I saw "up" tonight. it made me worried for the future, but reminded me to stay hopeful. I was teary-eyed within the first five minutes and bawling by the end. amazing movie.

I think I'm definitely graduating this year. I had a panic attack last night on twitter regarding a screenwriting course. but I'm fine. the terminology on the grad status page suggests that all my past courses, grades and credits are fine, the old thing that was missing were my grades from the current academic session. and this those were fine (awesome even) I have nothing to worry about.

I typed all of that on the livejournal app for my iPod touch. don't know why, I'm only two feet away from my computer.

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

it's been a tradition for the past four years for me to watch the finish line film screenings at york once the school term is said and done with. this time i was only able to attend one out of the two days for each of the third and fourth year screenings, and both days i went i thought were quite good. i'm always inspired after watching the hard work of my peers on screen, to write something of my own that would try to come close to the calibre of shorts that i witness year after year.

this year i have a hankering to instead reread j.d. salinger's "catcher in the rye", which i was introduced to last summer. i even learned today that salinger is still alive! and well! imagine being a recluse for the past fifty years? i can't even begin to fathom that sort of thing.

my intuition tells me that the weekend is just around the corner, but that for me means a few days of work. unfortunately my hours are down considerably for the first half of the month, but should go up again as the weeks go on. i should count myself lucky though, i'm hearing that a lot of people are having considerable difficulty in finding employment, which has me crossing my fingers tightly for my own future plans. for the time being, however, i will continue enjoying my new free time and hope that things will work out.

for the past twenty minutes or so, since finishing the season two finale of "mad men", i have been clicking around from website to website, looking at the same information over and over again. i am exhausted, sleepy, and irritated, and yet i don't go to sleep. why is this? i know that there won't be a v0-encoded version of the neil young archives online tonight, and even if there were i wouldn't get to listen to it until tomorrow. i won't watch the episode of "rescue me" that aired tonight either, because that requires a certain degree of alertness that i am completely unable to devote to my favourite television programme. instead i sleepily sway from website to website, hoping that there'll be some new post to read, or a new update delivered to my rss feed so i can validate my staying up to this hour.

i am an internet junkie. i will admit that i have a problem: this much is true. the problem is that society, and the internet itself, is become aware of this new trend and is therefore playing it up immensely. i find myself writing dozens of tweets a day about the most useless things; stuff that even i don't care about (and that's saying a lot), or refreshing google reading incessently just so i can get a new bit of news delivered instantly via my many rss subscriptions. it's disgusting. i'm a slave to this beast, this entity. the internet has me by the balls. always in public, i will take out my ipod and check for a wifi signal to hijack, so i can do all of the above on the go.

the only silver lining is that i recognize this problem in me, although i don't do anything to correct it. i live in perfect harmony with this addiction because i try to search for ways to fully distract me from it. long ago i realized the problems of sitting at the internet for days at a time; nothing changes - it's all the same. the only difference is that it all bleeds together, somehow becoming less important as the days blur into one swooshing entity that validates nothing and marrs my perception. i try to leave the house everyday because of it: the outdoors are amazing.

but i guess "the screen" is something we have to live with now. while it would be handy to conclude here with some sort of voyeuristic metaphor for "the screen", subsequently alluding to our internal goals and the like, i will choose not to. this change is one i accept wholeheartedly because as much as i despise what i have become, i am still in love with who i am. time will tell of the actual outcome.