Teaching at Poly and a Flood

In the "I forgot to post this in the correct temporal order" file, here's some pictures from work.

In Korea, every major city has a river that runs through it, and those rivers flood fairly regularly. The areas around the rivers are built into parks and bike paths, which aren't as easily damaged by water and which can be more easily reconstructed. After a rainy week, it was fun to look out the window of the classrooms and watch the water rise. The pool across the river was particularly interesting, since we could see the brown torrent spill over into the pool's clear water and see the swirling progress of the sediment filled water.

I don't talk about the teaching enough on this blog because to me it was the backdrop to the awesome adventures I'd have on weekends and breaks. The work day was grueling, but rewarding. I taught ten or eleven classes every day, for a total of ten and half hours of work each weekday at minimum, plus planning for classes and doing grading, so often more like twelve hours. I was pretty fairly compensated for that work at Poly, and the excellent curriculum and brilliant students made the job meaningful. I remember being asked why I worked so hard, coming in early and staying late, and responding that doing the minimum amount of effort at that job required ten and half hours of work, and if I was only doing the minimum that meant I wasn't valuing it, so I was wasting ten and a half hours a day and would go home feeling drained, or at best relieved. On the other hand, if I decided that what I was doing was important and put in the extra effort then I was doing something valuable for twelve hours a day and went home feeling satisfied. I really miss teaching at that level, especially to my kindergarteners where I was teaching concepts outside of English, such as science, and to my most advanced students who I taught textual analysis as well as debate classes where they considered the pros and cons of issues as complex as whether or not South Korea should continue food aid to North Korea. 

Okay, enough introspection. Here are some kindergarten students being cute at birthday parties and art class:

Haeinsa Labyrinth

I forgot to write up one last trip I took in Korea: I returned to Haeinsa Temple, one of Korea's most important historical sites. It is most famous as the home of the The Tripitaka Koreana, a Buddhist cannon that Koreans claim to be the first book in the world to be printed with movable type. Since it is printed in Chinese characters, I can see why the technology didn't spread from there and only became popular once it was reinvented in a country that uses an alphabet. I discussed the Tripitaka Koreana more took lots of pictures on my first visit, back in 2009. 

This return trip was at the invitation of Kyungrae, the man who we met at Bongamsa Temple on Buddha's Birthday, and who became our unofficial guide as well as our generous ride. Barbara and I took him up on his offer to show us around Daegu and to go visit Haeinsa together. 

My first visit was by bus, so I unknowingly passed right by a pavilion that was famed as a monk philosopher's favorite meditation grounds. The river there really was quite peaceful.

I once again noticed the chimney made entirely of roof tiles. 

It seems that the labyrinth was set up year round and not just for the special event that I witnessed on my previous visit. 

I do always admire the ornate and effective joinery of Korean temples. 

Some of the imagery in the paintings on the outside of temple walls were fascinating, such as the tree growing from this giant fish:

Some was horrifically gruesome, such as the praying man wearing necklaces made of fingers. 

Kyungrae was able to provide a lot more background of Buddhist stories and iconography, but writing three years later I can't remember any of the specifics.

Metamorphosis

You may have noticed that in my Japan pictures I had a lot less hair than usual. 

Here's what I looked like the week before:

I spend a lot of time thinking about alternate possible cultures and beliefs as part of fantasy writing and game creation. One idea I had was a culture where people think their senses are sacred, and so shave lines into their hair along the lines of their sense organs, so as not to obscure those divine pathways. I was never going to have a better chance to see what that would actually look like, and the results were... 

pretty goofy looking.

This picture is like a glimpse into an alternate universe where someone with my genetics grew up deep in meth lab territory:

Curiosity sated, I went for the Ra's Al Ghul look:

Finally, I shaved my face and head to the skin for the first time. I'd been curious as to what it would be like for some time, but in the US or Europe I'd look like a neoNazi. In East Asia, at worst I'd be mistaken for a Buddhist monk. 

It's hard not to nick oneself when shaving where one can't see. Also, my head seems to be a bit lumpy. Oh well. It didn't hurt, and the sensation of shirts going across it as I put them on was interestingly strange. 

I lowered my voice an octave and told my students that my name was Mr. Jay. Some of my students were taken in completely, and others were creepily observant, noticing that I had the same watch or same laugh. Yes, I enjoy messing with my students. At heart I'm Calvin's dad.

The fuzz came back by the end of my week in Japan. I only had one more week in Korea before jetting off to the Bay Area for Ben and Elana's beautiful whimsical wedding. 

As long as I'm at it, here's the previous time I radically altered my appearance for fun, back in 2006:

Some of the stages of the process were hideous:

I fully expected to have to buzz my head after cutting my own hair for the first time, but it somehow turned out just fine. I've been cutting my own hair ever since. 

This was the first time I was clean-shaven or had short hair while I was at Reed. Even most of my own dorm mates didn't recognize me, and I was their House Adviser. What was even weirder was the people who did know who I was and I didn't know them. "Wow, Landon I almost didn't recognize you." Thanks person who didn't change your appearance and yet I have no idea who you are...

I think I annoyed some professors by not introducing myself in classes. I timed the haircut to fit with our discussion of identity over time in Metaphysics, and all of my professors were weirded out by the fact that this stranger clearly had done the reading and was familiar with earlier coursework. The best reaction I got was from a professor I intentionally messed with. I picked up a prospective student folder and sat in on his freshman Humanities 110 conference classes. He did an amazing double take when I walked into his three hour long senior level philosophy class the following evening. 

Professor: "You're... you're that prospie."

Me: "Yes."

Professor: "You're not really a prospie, are you?"

Me: "Nope."

Professor: "Are you auditing this class?"

Me: "No, Eddie, I'm in this class."

Professor: (after two minutes of befuddled staring) "HOLY SHIT, oh my god, holy shit!"

Japan Day 7, Part 6: The Stone Lanterns of Kasuga Taisha Shrine

I had a pleasant, though hot, walk across the Eastern side of Nara park.

In the Southeastern part stood a Shinto shrine. The area around it is filled with stone or cement lanterns, covered in moss and surrounded by large trees.

The hall of Kasuga Taisha was founded in the 700s replaced every twenty years in accordance with Shinto traditions, though the current building is about 100 years old. As I had come to expect with a Shinto shrine, it is very orange. 

It would be amazing to visit during one of the lantern festivals to see them all lit, but I enjoyed the lanterns even during the daylight. 

A fountain paid tribute to the deer residents. 

The bamboo base must be more modern than most of the lanterns, but I liked it nonetheless.

I then visited the Nara National Museum. My favorite part was the Buddha hall, filled with statues of Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, and guardian spirits carved from stone, wood, or clay.

I had a little time left before my bus to Osaka. I meant to spend my last 1370 Yen on a Japanese meal, but I ended up ordering ice cream with fruit instead. A cherry, orange slices, pineapple, and whipped cream sat above chocolate, vanilla, and berry ice cream (which I was pleasantly surprised to find to be actual ice cream instead of the soft serve that I'd come to expect in lactose intolerant East Asia), layered above peach, pineapple, mandarin orange slices mixed with cornflakes. I have no regrets.

I bumped into the poetry guy again in front of the pagoda on my way to the park. I was even less impressed this time as we went on about god and humility. Beyond the fact that he was obviously not humble himself, he had no response when I asked why being humble was at all valuable. 

In the park, I sat and wrote in my journal, which is good because otherwise there's no way I'd remember half of these details three years later. The deer kept me company as I wrote.

I was early to the airport bus and the airport. I wrote a little before boarding the plane. 

The airline was obviously operated by Koreans because the map of the route prominently labeled "Dokdo" island and "The East Sea". Japan would have labeled Dokdo their name for it since they (on flimsy pretext) claim the island themselves, and everyone in the world besides Korea calls the body of water separating the two countries "The Sea of Japan." The pilot spoke Korean, English, and Japanese with a distinct French accent. I returned for one final week in Korea before heading home.