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September 6, 2005
A Sempai (Upperclassman) Moment
I was burning some incense I bought in Kyoto in my room yesterday, and it occurred to me to post how I got it. Last month, on my ultimately unsuccessful visa run to Japan (another long story I should tell someday) I was wandering around my old neighborhood in Uji and finally went into this antique shop that I'd never been in before because it always looked too expensive for me. I found out that it was, but that it also carried incense. Seemed like a good omiyage idea, so I had the guy show it to me. While we were making chatter, he asked me why I was in Uji (the area I was in is kinda off the tourist path) and I explained that I had studied at the Stanford University center in Kyoto. When he didn't know what Stanford was I mentioned that it was connected to Kyoto University and he lit up, saying he'd gone there too (I forget for what). And when I bought two little things of incense, he told me to wait and puttered around for a while, coming back with a plastic bag containing a little incense burner and seven or eight plugs of different kinds of incense, for free. It was enough to make me wish I'd spent more time at Kyodai. At least the next generation of KCJSers will get a center located on the Kyodai campus.
Korean language update: I understood a complete sentence from my ajuma when I came back from my (successful) visa trip to Nagoya, and answered in a comprehensible way!
The exchange in question:
어�애�어�?
�본애서친구를만났어�.
Corrections are welcome as I'm sure there are some mistakes in my written Korean. I just wish I had more time to study.
And Mom, I bought a bed. But I left my towel in Japan and am using a dishcloth. I will buy another towel tomorrow, though. Really.
I figured out how to get the hot water to work. The Chinese ajuma showed me the hot water panel in the kitchen, which luckily I recognized as similar to the one at my host family's house in Japan (otherwise I would have thought she was showing me the air conditioning or something). But even with it on, the water is not that warm and the hot water pressure is horrid, so I think I'm just going to keep doing the cold shower thing. It shocks me into waking up and it guarantees I shower quickly. Though I anticipate problems as the winter approaches.
Anyone who knows a good public bath in the Sinchon area, please let me know.
Breakfast is getting more palatable day by day. I am actually eager to eat the kim chee now that I've sampled the other stuff on hand, which includes some sort of grape leaf squishy thing and assorted things that I can just barely get down when the ajumma points at them insistently.
But it's still cool to be able to eat healthy in the morning. The boiled potatoes aren't so bad, plus I actually like the little fishies. And every once in a while (if I'm extra good, I imagine) Chinajumma makes me a fried egg. ^-^
Posted by b-applegate at September 6, 2005 6:38 AM
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