LASEK: 9 Days Later

Last Tuesday, I went through with a decision to get laser eye surgery. Whilst I would have preferred to undergo the more modern LASIK, my thin corneas meant that I could only safely have LASEK surgery done. Since then, I have spent a high percentage of my life in bed, in pain, with blurry vision. With each passing day, my vision and eye condition gets better, and my despondency with the surgery decreases a little. Here’s a brief picture into what the first week after LASEK looks like.

The day of the surgery

For the weeks leading up to the surgery, I was fairly content with my decision. I had read up on the possible consequences of LASEK, and although the recovery time was fairly long compared to the other options, I felt like I would be able to endure a couple of days of discomfort in order to have decades of perfect vision. I walked into BGN Eye Centre in Seoul a confident, slightly nervous, and excited customer. A number of my friends had already had surgery there before, and I myself had been there for my initial assessment. The staff are wonderful, and they have a dedicated member of staff to assist English speakers in the predominantly Korean office.

After some issues paying for the surgery itself (my credit card’s limit was not high enough to accommodate the whole cost of LASEK), I was carefully taken to the surgery area. My eyes were checked again to confirm the adjustments that I would need, I was given anaesthetic for my eyes, and led to the machine.

It was an intimidating machine to say the least. A seemingly random collection of metal, gears, and lights with just enough space under it for a person to stick their head. I had no idea where I was meant to look, so I just looked straight ahead as my eyes were washed and prepared for the lasers. The actual surgery took a grand total of no more than 10 minutes. I stood up with blurry vision but no pain (the anaesthetics were still working their magic) and met my friends that I had asked to help me around Seoul after the surgery. We then went together to the pharmacy in the buiding, got my swarm of eye drops, and were soon on our merry way.

Day After the Surgery -Day 5 Post-Surgery

Sunlight sucked. Sunlight sucked a lot. Room lights sucked. Loud noises sucked.

I spent this period of time almost entirely on my back in my bed, with my eyes closed and sunglasses on. At night, I had to sleep with special goggles that prevented me from rubbing my eyes. In addition, LASEK requires you to wear thin contact lenses for five days in order to protect your lasered eyes from the world. These both resulted in even more eye discomfort than normal.

That is not an easy task – my eyes were in a great deal of discomfort already. This fell on a spectrum of ‘oh, it feels like I have a speck of dust in my eye that I just can’t rub out’ to, and I quote, ‘THIS SHIT ISN’T WORTH THE PAIN’. I did not have a good Chuseok holiday. Kristen was a superb nurse during this time – without her constant love, attention, preparing meals, and generally being there for me, I would probably have had a breakdown of some kind.

I couldn’t see anything due to blurriness, my eyes were in pain, and my body began to ache from lying in bed all day. The only relief came from applying cooled metal d20’s (which would normally be used to chill drinks) to my forehead and cover my face with a dark scarf. In those moments of comfort, I enjoyed being able to just lie in the darkness, listening to an audiobook with Kris by my side. Those moments were peaceful. They were also very few and far between.

Day 6 Post-Surgery – Removal of Protective Contacts

As each day went by, my vision got slightly better and the discomfort decreased. After six days, my eyes were ready to have the protective contacts removed. I returned to BGN, where they checked my eyes to see their progress (apparently everything was going well!) before taking out the confounded pieces of plastic coating my eyes in irritation. I was relieved to have them out, and the rest of the day passed with minimal disomfort.

Day 7 post-surgery – now

These have definitely been the easiest days since the surgery. The day after the removal of the contacts, there were moments of incredible pain again, but they were short-lived. Now, I just have to deal with the annoyance of street lamps, indoor lighting, and projectors making my eyes more irritated than the average user of an Internet forum.

But I think I can deal with that in order to spend the majority of the rest of my life without glasses and with good vision. I can wear sunglasses. I can look at my fiancee after I’ve taken my glasses off to go to sleep and actually see how beautiful she is. I can play Ultimate without worrying that my glasses are going to fall off and break, or get covered in sweat and obstruct my vision. And hey, I might even look prettier without glasses. I don’t know. But now that I’ve done the surgery, I have a lifetime to explore the benefits that a pretty awful few days allowed me to have.

Nothing Like a Hot Breakfast

I love food. This is evident by my above-average waistline and the amount of time I spend thinking about whether a snack is an option at any given point in time. As a result, one of the aspects of my recent trip to Seattle that I was eagerly anticipating was American food. There are many American food brands in both South Africa and South Korea, and I was looking forward to trying as many of them as I could. Whilst most of the food we tried was delectable, there was one meal that I was surprised by enjoying the most: breakfast.

My fiancée Kris and I sampled as much of Seattle’s culinary landscape as we could. We ate eye-poppingly beautiful sushi arrangements. We devoured more burgers than I could count (seriously, I tried but I lost count of the number of burgers we ate). Inside Key Arena, we had a daily ritual of eating the overpriced yet surprisingly tasty bowl of cheese nachos. We even gorged ourselves at a fine Brazilian meat buffet that boasted over seventeen different kinds of meat.

And yet, from all of our food exploration, the meal that we long for the most now is a simple hot, greasy, American breakfast. It was something we never truly missed in Korea up until we could have it every day in Seattle. And we did have it almost every day. After getting up and dressed, we would walk to Corner Cafe, less than a block away from our superb Airbnb home, and bathe in the fried, syrupy glory of breakfast.

A breakfast sandwich – because everything is better with extra carbs

I was willing to experiment with new things, trying everything from the corned beef hashbrown (a strangely scrumptious dish introduced to me by my brother during his weekend with us there), breaded chicken steak, and various saucy sandwiches. All of these made me smile in a different way each morning.

Kris’ favourite breakfast in all of its glory

Kris, on the other hand, stuck with a smaller number of regulars. Her favourite dish was a serving of two enormous chocolate chip pancakes, which she would top with butter, syrup, and fruit, for a sweet start to the day.

It may seem strange that breakfast food is what we remember most about American dining. But good, hot, greasy breakfast is something that is surprisingly difficult to get in Korea. Most of the time, we just have cereal before heading to work in the mornings. Most Koreans eat ramen or a rice dish for breakfast. It is rare to have bacon, eggs, and toast in the East. So, when we found it in Seattle, we ate it with relish every morning. We had an amazing time in Seattle. And pretty much every day was fueled by a wonderful, delicious, hot breakfast.

Both Sides of Skid Road: Touring Seattle

When a tourist thinks of seeing the great sights of the United States, Seattle is not a name that comes up very often. A typical potential traveler to the US will have places like Orlando, New York, Las Vegas, or San Francisco on their itinerary before Seattle will even be considered. Nevertheless, my fiancée and I visited Washington’s largest city and took in some of the sights, sounds, smells, and sensations. Here are some of the highlights of our time in Seattle, in no particular order.

Space Needle

The most iconic piece of Seattle’s skyline was well worth the visit. The views of the city were rather nice, but I honestly preferred the historical tales of the construction of the Space Needle to the spectacle. The walk up to the lift was home to several large boards giving timelines for the project, with historical reference points such as the moon landing thrown in for context.

This is the first of the attractions that we went to using the City Pass – a worthy investment for any traveler to Seattle. The City Pass is essentially a book of coupons for access to set attractions around the city for a lower price than it would be to purchase them individually. I have used a similar Pass in Paris before, and the Seattle one certainly saved us some money and hassle.

Pike Place Market

While the Space Needle might be the most visually striking part of Seattle, Pike Place gives the hardest assault on the senses. The chaos of an exceedingly busy farmer’s market filled with shops trying to sell everything from ceramic piggy banks to glasswork to fresh fish, bulging with customers foaming to buy as much as their wallet allows them (and maybe a bit more on top of it) was overwhelming for me at times. I found the market fascinating, with so many different stores, but I also had to seek the quiet corners on a couple of occasions to re-ground myself.

One of the more famous stores at Pike Place is the first-ever Starbucks. The line to enter is reputedly long, but we simply walked in. This ease of access compared to the stories that I’d read makes me worry that my fiancée, my brother (who joined us on the trip briefly) and I didn’t actually end up going to the first Starbucks, but simply one close to it. Let’s just hope we caught Starbucks on a quiet day.

Gum Wall

Next to Pike Place market lies another Seattle icon – the gum wall. It is exactly what its name suggests – a wall where people have placed their gum. Not a few people, though. Hundreds, perhaps even thousands of people. It is disconcertingly interesting to consider both the sheer amount of gum on the wall and the creativeness of some of the more elaborate contributions. There are names spelled in gum, symbols, and even the American flag in gum. It is even more compelling to consider that the wall is cleaned on a not-too-irregular basis for hygiene purposes.

Gas Works Park

A park is a park is a park, right? All you need is some green grass and open space and you’re set, surely? Not at Gas Works Park. The site of a disused gas works (shock! horror!), this park boasts great views of the downtown Seattle skyline across the river, acres of space (so you never feel like you have to crowd next to another group), and a nice balance of sun and shade. All in all, a great place to spend a lazy couple of hours in the sun reading, throwing a disc, or simply people-watching.

Fremont Troll

A short walk from Gas Works Park is the Fremont Troll, a large figure mostly comprised of cement. The troll sits underneath one of the major bridges in Fremont, holding a car in its grasp and staring blankly at all those who would behold it. I feel like the concept is creative, but it was let down a little in its execution. While it is certainly impressive, the troll is not remarkably striking or visually appealing. It is dull and grey, except for its eyes and the car in its clutches. Perhaps a mixed media creation would have popped better, but the troll gets a bit lost in the grey cement surrounding it. The only historical background available at the site is a small plaque. If you visit Gas Works Park or the surrounding areas, you should go visit the troll, but it is a short visit.

EMP Museum

The EMP Museum is unlike any other museum that I have ever been to. The curators of the museum are clearly trying to widen the audience that is interested in museums in general. While most museums are filled with items of historical value from a broad spectrum of topics, the EMP museum chooses instead to focus on smaller collections in topics of great pop culture interest, with kooky side exhibits thrown in. For example, the exhibitions that were showing whilst my fiancée and I visited Seattle focused on science fiction, fantasy, horror Movies, a history of Nirvana, Jimi Hendrix, indie video games, and wearable art. There was a section showing music videos on a film cinema-sized screen. There was an extra paid section exploring Star Trek (which we chose to skip because we’d never watched any).

EMP Museum is well-aimed at young adults looking to explore the history and present of what interests them. As my fiancée and I fit very firmly into that demographic, we were enraptured by EMP, spending most of a day there. I was most surprised by the horror section. My fiance and I both have extremely low tolerance for being scared. I am not interested in most horror films. And yet, exploring the way horror is constructed, watching short blurbs on key films in the genre, and learning about some of the masters of the craft was incredibly informative, as it is not an area that I have explored much due to fear.

An explanation of some of the common monsters used in modern horror films

EMP Museum is one of the top reasons to go to Seattle. If you’re in the city and you have a day, go. It is also part of the City Pass, so you can save some money there.

Chihuly Garden and Glass

Directly next to the Space Needle and EMP Museum lies the Chihuly Garden and Glass Museum. Chilhuly is a famed glassblower and artist from Seattle, known for pushing the limits of glass as a medium. The museum is relativey small and there is not much information to be found, but this is clearly an intended design, to avoid detracting from the pieces themselves. There are truly some beautiful pieces in the museum. However, as it is small, it takes less than an hour before you’ve admired everything, so don’t plan an entire afternoon around it.

The experience at Chihuly is short and beautiful. If you make the trip to visit either the Space Needle or EMP, be sure to check it out. It is a calming experience to walk through rooms filled with coloured, crafted glass. Another reason to ge the City Pass. The more I mention the City Pass, the more I feel compelled to say that I wasn’t paid by them to write this post.

Seattle Aquarium

OTTER!

 

The second-last mention of the City Pass in this post, the Seattle Aquarium is a cosy yet refreshing aquarium. Its layout is unusual, spread over multiple buildings on Seattle’s piers. It is home to hundreds of species of fish, a couple of octopi, birds, and, most importantly, otters. Cute, cuddly, fluffy otters, of both the river and sea variety. Kris, my fiancée, and I spent more time watching the otters than we spent at the rest of the aquarium combined. That includes the gift shop, where we spent dozens of minutes agonizingly choosing what otter-branded merchandise we would buy (we landed on a big fluffy otter plush and cups with otters on them). If you like otters, I mean, aquatic life, Seattle Aquarium is worth your time. It is also close to Pike Place Market, so you can combine the two and the next attraction for a good day out.

The otter’s name is Ollie.

 

Sprit of Seattle Ferry

The final milking of our City Pass came from a ferry ride around the coast of Seattle. While there were options to go on trips to see orcas, we went on a short, hour-long zip in the waters around Seattle. There was almost-constant narration from the crew, detailing the sights and dropping interesting historical tidbits about the city. Whilst we didn’t see any whales, we did get another angle on the city, some more information about it, and a couple of photos of seals. Not quite as cute as otters, but still quite cute in their own lazy way.

Bill Speidel’s Underground Tour

Seattle before the Great Fire

Our historical education of Seattle was further improved by Bill Speidel’s Underground Tour. In the 19th century, Seattle suffered a terrible fire which burned down a large portion of the city (luckily, no-one was killed). The city planners took the opportunity to rebuild the parts of the area close to the coast exactly one storey higher than they previously were, effectively raising large portions of the city by a floor.

This leaves these areas with underground tunnels, filled with history and dust. There are many tours through these tunnels, but the one that seemed the most well-reputed was Bill Speidel’s Underground Tour. We soon saw why. The tour guide was knowledgeable, funny, and effectively herded the mass of people behind him. Kris, my brother, and I all had a great time on the tour, and the stories he told added a touch of magic to the rest of our time in Seattle. Every time we looked down, we imagined what might be lying below us, left untouched from decades before.

Looking up at the street while people walk over you is an interesting experience

These are the more traditional sights of Seattle, that you’ll see on TripAdvisor and the like. However, we also visited some landmarks which are more obscure and suited to the unique tastes of Kris and I. Here they are:

Five Ultimate

Kris and I both love Ultimate. The game and community around it are major factors in our decision to stay in Korea for as long as we have. So, when we found out that Five Ultimate, one of the major Ultimate manufacturers have their headquarters in Seattle,  we had to pop in, say hi, and leave with a bunch of shiny Ultimate things. After struggling to find their offices (they aren’t allowed to have large signage on the outside of their building – we only successfully found them by going to their address and luckily spotting their WiFi), we were welcomed into the sprawling home of high-quality Ultimate merchandise. We were given a quick tour by Denny (who happened to also have played Ultimate in Korea for many years – small world) and then let loose to buy what we wanted, a privelege we may have abused a little. We kept on chatting with Denny, sharing tales of Korea and Ultimate and life. Whilst not necessary for most, Ultimate players visiting Seatte should try and pop in at Five Ultimate.

Banana for scale

Meeples Games

Photo credit to the West Seattle Blog

It is no secret to those who know us that Kris and I love board games. Naturally, we have to explore the board game options within any given city. Whilst there are a number of highly-rated board game stores in Seattle, Meeples Games was the most convenient for us. I walked in expecting a pokey store with a few shelves and a table to play, but was met with a bustling, expansive, multi-room haven for games. There were games of all shapes, sizes, difficulties, preferences, and tastes. There was even a Magic: the Gathering tournament going on whilst we visited. I found games that I had been searching for for months with no luck in Korea. I found games I didn’t know I wanted (but bought anyway). I found games I wanted, but couldn’t justify taking with because they would have taken up too much space of our bags (I’m looking at you, Marvel Legendary). The staff was friendly and wise in the ways of cardboard fun. The game spaces looked clean, and there were even couches within the store for you to sit and read the back of a box. I wish every board games store was like Meeples.

Mox Cafe

Photo credit to meetup.com

While we visited Meeples near the beginning of our time in Seattle, by the time we were almost ready to head home, our board game itch began to show itself again. So we decided to visit another Seattle board-gaming mecca – Mox Cafe. Whereas Meeples is primarily a store where you can also sit down and play a game or two, Mox Cafe is primarily a cafe where you can enjoy food and drink whilst sampling a new board game or pulling out an old favourite. Mox has a large sample of games that you can play at their tables. They are fully licensed, and have a good selection of drinks and food (although we didn’t eat there). Kris and I had a good few hours of fun playing Raptor (where Kris the mommy velociraptor was too cunning for me and my scientists) and Castle Panic (where we defended a castle against hordes of orcs, goblins, and trolls). Mox Cafe also has a library for sale that rivals Meeples. While it is a bit out of the way from Central Seattle, it was a great way for us to spend an evening.

From an exceptional museum, a feat of architecture, and a bustling market place to board game havens and a cement troll, Kris and I saw a great deal in our time in Seattle. In coming posts, I will explore The International (the event that brought us to Seattle in the first place), Seattle food, and, finally, our engagement story. There are many more tales to come from our time in Seattle, but if you ever decide to visit the city, keep these landmarks on your list of things to do and see while you are there!

 

Unpacking Seattle

After most holidays, people compare the experiences that they had during that short period with holidays they’ve had previously. Was that the best holiday I’ve truly ever had? Was it better than that rose-tinted trip I had to Disneyland when I was twelve? Did the sights, sounds, smells, and other sensations I exposed myself to give me a higher level of pleasure and happiness than the rest of my existence? After your average holiday is compared with the rest of your life, the stories are filed in their mental shelves, where they will be accessed repeatedly in the short time following your holiday, but then decreasingly over time. My recent holiday to Seattle is something else – it is one of those truly unique, marvelous experiences that will likely form the core of my being going forward.

“Why the melodrama and hyperbole? Surely it was just a holiday? Just file it and be done with it.” a metaphorical critic might say. Well, figment of my imagination, you forget what exactly happened in Seattle. I traveled around a great city. I witnessed one of the most exciting and awe-inspiring Esports events of all time. Oh, and I also got engaged.

My mental doubter seems to have let himself out. Great. Now I can stop talking to a pretend person and go back to speaking politely to the Internet.

My two weeks in Seattle truly changed my life in multiple ways. Each aspect of the holiday – the tourism around the city, The International (the aforementioned Esports event), and my engagement – left me with memories and emotions upon which I will build. Each aspect of the trip moved me in different ways. As such, it feels wrong to lump them together into one sprawling tourism-Esports-engagement mass of experience and internal reflection. So, in the next week, I will form clear, considered pieces about each of the three aspects of my trip to Seattle. I’ll talk about what happened, how I experienced it.

I hope that you’ll join me for a detailed, week-long exploration of the link between my experiences and myself – past, present, and future. It’s amazing how much a two-week span can affect a person. I look forward to sharing it with you all.

Seattle Trip Day 1: Purgatory

After months of trying to coerce English into the minds of children and adults, Kris and I left for our two-week holiday to Seattle today. During the day, we time-traveled, watched far too many movies, completed the entirety of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, and dreaded American immigration. All of this before we even landed in the US!

The different time zones that lay across our world are not something that we, as humans, often think about. Even in a family like mine where members are spread across three time zones and 14ish hours, we have just become used to only calling each other at specific times to make up for time differences. Yet today, when we left Seoul just before 4pm on Thursday afternoon, flew for about 10 hours (during which we watched 4 movies each), and landed in Canada at around 10am on Thursday morning, we felt rather like Phineas Fogg must have done. Time travelling was awesome!

What was significantly less awesome was the 8-hour layover that awaited us at Vancouver airport. After clearing US Customs (yes, in Canada, as bizarre as that sounds), we walked around the airport, checking out all of the shops. Once we had completed the shop rotation, we decided to buy Harry Potter and the Cursed Child and see how far we could get. As it is a play, we devoured it in its entirety within 3 hours. We tried to get Pokemon Go to work on the spotty WiFi at the airport. While we did catch some Pokemon, what we caught the most during our hunting was frustration at the lack of consistent Internet connection. Finally, Kris settled down for a well-earned nap while I re-read some of the graphic novel masterpiece that is Fabio Moon and Gabriel Ba’s Daytripper.

By the time I was two-thirds into the story, it was finally time to board. We left Canadian soil and, 40 minutes later, touched down in Seattle. We knew that one hurdle lay ahead of us: immigration. Would they turn us away? Would they let us be? Would they force us to recite minute details about our life for no reason? As we made our way through the terminal, all of these possibilities weighed down on us. We needn’t have worried. There was no immigration. We simply picked up our bags and left the airport, finally loosed onto the American soil that is to be our home for the next two weeks.

We are now both quite content to take it easy tomorrow. We plan to find a suitable camera for the trip, visit a local board game store, and browse the wares of an Ultimate shop. Our short time with my brother and our TI6 experience both begin on Saturday. Tomorrow, however, we will take in the sights, sounds, and retail experiences of Seattle. We may get fat, but at least our wallet will be lighter!

Stagnation and Preparation

Some days, I feel like I haven’t accomplished anything in my months in Wonju. I feel like taking a part-time job was a poor decision. I could be making more money! These past few weeks have most certainly been one of those times. Luckily, in the last week or so, things have started to take an upturn that might begin to justify the monetary sacrifices that have been made thus far.

For a while, I have been feeling utterly lackluster professionally. What little elementary school teaching I do has been unfulfilling. I have been writing less than I did even last year, when I held a full-time job. I haven’t been keeping to any sort of streaming schedule. I have been neglecting this blog. The only aspect of my professional endeavours that I have been proud of is my adult classes, which I have actively striven to make as engaging and relevant to the students as possible, with moderate success. So I have been looking forward to those classes most of all.

As far as my writing has been going, what little I was doing in that area was not giving me any sort of emotional or monetary payoff. I may have written an article or two for GosuGamers.net, but they weren’t articles that are going to get to the front pages of subreddits. The majority of the dripping tap of story pitches I sent to potential employers returned no sound once I had dropped them into the bucket that is the Internet. All that were honoured with responses were nothing more than polite declines. Until an acceptance came back.

Greater than that, an acceptance of an Esports-related pitch. My first actual paid Esports commission. Sure, it may not be much money, but it is the first time someone will actually be paying for my views and research in Esports. I was overjoyed at the news.

I would like to say that I have been toiling endlessly on the piece, researching and refining it until it shines brighter than the red faces of Brexit voters when results were announced. Sadly, that would be a lie. But, I have been preparing and crafting the piece every day since I was chosen for the job, and I do feel that I will hand in a piece that I will be proud to put my digital signature on and claim as my first dip into the world of professional Esports writing.

The other major preparation I have been doing is for travel. First, I will shortly be visiting my mother in Dubai, a reunion that I am excited for, because I haven’t seen my mother in a few months and it will be good to catch up. More significantly (sorry mom), Kris and I are headed to Seattle in the first weekend of August to attend The International (essentially the Dota 2 World Series). We are elated to be going, and neither of us can quite process the fact that the moment of departure is almost upon us.

So, while feelings of mediocrity will always feature in my internal monologue no matter how forcefully I try to eject them, they are currently being tempered by one minor success. Here’s hoping that I can chain a couple more onto it.

Listen to the People

At this point, it is highly likely that you have heard about the terrible occurrences in the United States in the past few weeks. From Alton Sterling to Philando Castile to the Dallas shootings, there has been a wave of publicly-visible violence coming from a country where guns have long been a point of contention.

With such dramatic, violent events, there has been outcry about each and every one of these occurrences. People have been speaking out about injustices in the system, the need for change, and racism, amongst other things.

I have only just watched the Alton Sterling and Philando Castle videos for the first time about 10 minutes before writing this post. I still cannot comprehend the callousness and reasoning behind the shootings. To be honest, whilst a large portion of people are crying out, all I want to do is keep quiet. Keep quiet and listen to those who are closer to these harrowing killings. To those who do not happen to be white males on the other side of the world from where these shootings took place.

And while I hadn’t watched the footage until now, I have been following some of the coverage of these events. From Trevor Noah’s poised, rational take on Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, to an Asian-American discussing the impact that these events have on him and the non-white community. There has even been an explanation of the problems of dismissing #BlackLivesMatter by saying #AllLivesMatter at this point in time. There has been a lot of measured, considered commentary on this.

Sadly, there has also been so much hate, coming in the usual channels of hatred. Comments on YouTube and tweets filled with vitriol and bile, laced with insensitivity and ignorance.

It’s hard to talk about events such as this, no matter what demographic you fall under. So before you say anything, just listen. You don’t need to get your Masters thesis in social dynamics before you have your say. Just watch the videos. Read the tweets. Educate yourself about what’s happening. Only then, when you have a good idea of what has happened and what has been said, should you comment.

Rest in peace, all who lost their lives in these tragedies. May your memories and stories help bring forth a better society.

 

 

The Bicycle Difference

Recently, Kris and I made the decision to invest in a pair of bicycles. I was highly skeptical of the idea at first. I never thought that having a bike was necessary, and I didn’t think that it would make that much of a difference in travel time and the accessibility of the whole of Wonju. I thought it didn’t make financial sense. I thought it would be unsafe. I am happy to say that I was utterly wrong on all of those fronts, and our bikes are two of the best purchases we’ve made in our brief time in Wonju.

I was no stranger to using a bike as a form of transport. I had done so at university, to save money on petrol and car maintenance. I remember biking to university being a stressful experience, always worried about whether I would get hit by a car, or miss my first class because of bad robot (traffic light for non-South Africans) timings. These slightly negative experiences seem to have put me against getting a bike in Korea, simply because I didn’t want to add mild unpleasantness to my pre-work time, as there would be mild unpleasantness in excess once I got there.

On top of this, a bike was most definitely not necessary in Dongtan, the town that Kris and I lived in last year. It was the perfect size and distance from major cities to not need a bike. Dongtan itself was small enough that you could walk almost everywhere within half an hour, so faster transportation was unnecessary. Dongtan was also, I reckoned, too far from the closest major city to plausibly bike there. As such, we never truly considered getting a bike in Dongtan.

Wonju, however, is a moderately bigger city. While it is possible to walk everywhere in a day, it is far less of a practical option. One of my contracts that I was due to start shortly after we bought our bikes required me to be at an office 7 kilometers away from my house by 07h45. Sure, I could get up early and jog there. But I would rather not. Even the school I work for most often is a 40-minute walk from my house. I spent the first three months of our time in Wonju catching up on the superb Freakonomics Radio podcast, with the distance floating by.

I also felt that a bike was an unnecessary expense. Spending the equivalent of R2000 (US$160ish) on a mode of transportation that I seemingly didn’t need was, in my mind, wasteful. It was only once we purchased the bikes and started using them regularly did I see how wrong this perception was.

Despite my misgivings, Kris convinced me that bikes would be useful in Wonju. So, I caved and we bought them. From the next day, my eyes were opened as to how foolish I had been in not buying a bike earlier. My travel time to work went from 40 minutes to 15. The office trip turned from a R190 (US$15) round-trip taxi into a 30-minute bike commute. Best of all, Wonju is designed with bikes in mind. There are wide bike lanes on almost every road, so there is no need to risk your life by cycling on the actual street. The most dangerous obstacles are children that stop suddenly to pick up leaves, and old ladies who somehow take up the entire sidewalk.

Overall, I am thoroughly enjoying riding through Wonju. It is a safe, quick, relatively cheap form of transport that is perfect for a city of Wonju’s size. We have explored more of the city on our bikes than we would have if we had continued to take taxis everywhere. The rides are good exercise for our lazy bodies. Finally, it is a way for Kris and I to spend more time together, laughing at the things we see on our rides. Let us just hope that we don’t get stranded by a flat tyre any time soon.

Candy is Sick

Candy, a dear part of my existence in Korea, is ill. She had a little too much to drink last week, and she hasn’t quite recovered to a functional level, even now. Her absence has affected my day-to-day goings-about in a noticeable way. But who, you may ask, is Candy? How much did she drink? And how could this permeate the way that I go about my day? Candy, dear readers, is my laptop.

Last week, I was foolish enough to be drinking some water to combat the increasingly omnipresent heat in our apartment whilst watching my daily dose of Kripparian. I do not for the life of me know how it happened, but a small amount of water spilled onto Candy’s keyboard. I was not worried. Last year, Kris spilled an entire cup of tea onto her (nameless) laptop, and it was fine within three days. I simply took out the battery, placed it in rice, turned Candy over, and left her to air and recover from her ordeal.

Image from tumblr

Two days later, I went to her room to check on her. Confident that enough time had passed, I put her battery back in and booted her up. Initial results were promising. The startup sequence began. As I was typing in my password to log in, the screen went black and Candy began to beep obnoxiously.  I groaned in frustration, but I was still relatively unfazed. I would just leave her for a couple more days, in an airier spot, and she would be right as rain.

A few more days later I tried again, with even less success. My optimism was met with a small whirr, black screen, and more confounded beeping. I began to fret. What if something was seriously wrong? Her illness has meant many inconveniences for me. Kris and I have to go to local PC bangs to play games together. I have lost touch with my Skype and Discord conversations, meaning I have written less than normal. I have to hog Kris’ laptop in the evenings to prepare my lessons, which I feel is unfair. They may not be major things, but Candy’s condition has made life harder than it needs to be.

Whilst we could probably afford to repair or replace Candy, I have grown attached to her over the years. She may start up slowly, run most games on low graphics settings, and have blown-out speakers from many years of watching movies and series, but I take this as part of her charm. She shares my hatred of Internet Explorer, often crashing the program in disgust whenever Korean banking systems force us to use it. She knows far more of my personal information than I do. She is home to one of my horcuxes of happiness – her background screen.

Who couldn’t be happy looking at those faces?

Even now, she sits upside down with her dad’s eyes constantly wandering over her, wondering whether she’ll be okay. I will have to take her in for a service soon. I don’t want to though, for many reasons. It will be expensive. It will be far – probably meaning a trip to Seoul. Most of all, I just can’t think of having another laptop right now. She was my first, and that will always be special. Get better soon, Candy.

Stifled Voices

For the most part, I try to keep this blog as a more upbeat record of my life. But sometimes, there are things that happen in my life and in the world in general that cannot be spun in a positive light. The story of the Brock Turner case sickened me and Kris to our cores. That the American justice system can be so broken as to allow someone who sexually assaulted a woman to get off with a more lenient sentence because it may severely impact his life is saddening.

Read a report of the case here. Get yourself up to speed. This case is probably, rightfully going to be the topic of heated conversations and outrage for a while.

Then, go and read the victim’s statement that she read in the court here. This helps give anyone with the capacity for empathy a harrowing glimpse into the world of someone who has been sexually assaulted. It is also a rallying cry for awareness, strength, and hope that Brock Turner and his ilk can truly learn and change.

Image from deaf-hope.org
As someone who has never and hopefully will never experience what the young lady in question did, my voice means little. But here is an open letter from a friend of mine who does know where she’s coming from, and it only serves to reinforce the messages of the victim’s statement.

The saddest thing of all is that this case is in no way an isolated one. Rapes and sexual assaults happen every day. Most go unnoticed, un-discussed. For a brief moment, the world takes a break from Trump and Rihanna and worshiping their idols to cry out against this injustice that happens every day. So don’t listen to my voice – I know nothing of their suffering. Listen to theirs. Truly try and comprehend the magnitude of their experiences. Despair for as long as is necessary. Then go out and try and change the situation in any way you know how. Even if, like me, you can only share the voices that need to be heard.

Header image from sportingnews.com