Ex Libris Tuttle

• The Prometheus Project: Trapped by Douglas E. Richards - This is part one of a juvenile three-parter in which two quite bright chldren of quite bright parents find themselves trapped in a multi-dimensional spaceship buried deep underground in rural Pennsylvania. Part 1 is on Kindle, parts 2 and 3 much less so ...
• The Accidental Billionaires by Ben Mezrich - From the guy who wrote the book about the MIT blackjack teams comes the story of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, the basis for the recent movie, told entirely without his participation--or that of the Winklevoss twins. Interesting, well-told, but ultimately unsatisfying, as we really need to hear Zuckerberg's side.
• Memoirs of an English Governess by Anna Harriet Leonowens - This book speaks to the raptures of imagination that can bring us a well-told story. Not this one, alas, but the magical The King and I musical by Rodgers and Hammerstein that is "derived from" it. How they got their charming tale from this dreary tome is beyond me; though there is a bit of story (i.e., a sequence of events linked by narrative) in the beginning and again at the end, mostly this is an endless description of Thai funerary rituals, coronation procedures and belittling descriptions of ordinary life in the Siam of the 1860s. Unless you really like Thailand (or Broadway musicals), skip it.

• Wired and Amped by Douglas E. Richards - Thoroughly imaginative sci-fi thriller combining some of the best of both genres I have read in a long time. Brilliant genetic engineer Kate Miller has developed a treatment that temporarily rewires the brain to achieve almost god-like intellectual abilities; David Desh, ex-special forces operative, is hired to "bring her in" before she can sell off her secret to Islamic terrorists--or so he is led to believe. This series (for I hope there will be more) has a red herring in every chapter and enough double-crosses to keep your head spinning--and the pages turning. Highly recommended.
• Reading in the Dark by Seamus Deane - Vignettes of enormous descriptive power bring the reader into the mid-twentieth century world of Northern Ireland and "The Troubles" as seen through the eyes of an Irish Catholic boy. There is a secret in his family, one that slowly emerges through the short scenes, until revelation of the truth--violent and devastating--leads to his adulthood and independence. Deservedly shortlisted for the Booker Prize.
• Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See - The second Lisa See book I've read, frankly, Shanghai Girls was better. Still, there is much of interest here for one who loves Asia--mention of numerous traditions, not least the laotong relationship, which pairs up girls for a lifetime, and is stronger than their husband-wife bond; foot binding, a brutal custom that hobbled and even killed Chinese girls into the twentieth century; nu shu, the long-secret "women's writing" which Mao tried to ban during the Cultural Revolution (the suffering of women in Confucian China is a major theme of the novel); and a host of festivals, particularly in the countryside, such as the "Expel the Birds" Festival, held just before planting time, in which poison seed was laid down so that the good seed could be planted without having it stolen. In the midst of all this is the story of Lily and her laotong Snow Flower, told over the course of their lifetimes in nineteenth century Hunan province. I have to say the cultural insights are more engrossing than the plot. Despite that, it's a good book, and I'll read more Lisa See.

A Class at My New School

I haven't been thoughtful enough to take pictures of my new school or my new classroom, but I did take a few shots of some fifth graders this week. They were studying the past tense of a set of irregular verbs, and the review activity I did was to give them cards with which to create a story.

There were three categories of cards, and sentences were to be constructed in the format [noun]+[verb]+[object], where the verb was in infinitive and had to be converted into past tense.

They have small size white boards and markers (which I asked for at Youngil but never ended up getting), and worked in their usual groups of three or four. Like so:



Cuties! And the fifth grade seems (after two weeks) to be a particularly good group. Since I bought my new Nikon D5100 for Christmas, the old single body Canon has been kept at school so I can capture the odd moment without having to plan ahead. My young, enthusiastic co-teacher had the idea to display the resulting stories around the room and borrowed enough fresh boards for all four classes' work to be lined up. Here are two examples from the first session (Ted, Amy and Suji are characters in the text):



Without at all meaning to disparage my high school boys, some of these fifth graders did work as good as a mediocre group of them might do. Also, despite the horror stories, teaching has not been a constant battle for attention and appropriate classroom behavior--if left unsupervised, of course they get rowdy, but so far they are obedient, polite and manageable. Except for two of the sixth grade classes ... where the stopwatch may be introduced.

It hasn't all gone swimmingly, as I think the Vice-principal finds it unforgivable that I won't do their "English Festival" one Saturday a month. I am already committed to my public speaking class on many Saturdays, where I make a ton of money and get to interact with the best and brightest from all over the southern district of Seoul. We had the candidate interviews last Saturday, and about 40 of the 70 who finished the vetting process would do quite nicely. But we only keep 20.

From the director of the program, I heard that someone at my new school had called the main office (I suspect the VP) to ask if I could be taken off the public speaking class. When the main office called him, he told them to go jump in a lake. This really burns me. I'm sure you know that I am not all about money--I regularly turn down work because time matters more to me, but I made the exception for this class. And this VP lady tried to take away a package of approx. 3.2 million won, in exchange for 4 Saturday mornings at 25,000 W per hour. Definitely uncool.

Cool Seoul Time Lapse Video

Nifty find by old pal Janel, who posted this is the mode of "really been missing Korea lately".

Tuttle Update

Wow!

Long time no viddie, droogs! Since my last post, about 17 millennia ago, a lot has happened:
1) said my final farewells to Young-il H.S. (in Korean, no less)
2) spent 10 days in and around the Newnan/Atlanta, GA area
3) said farewell to more than one friend (August sucks in Korea for this and other reasons!)
4) moved to a new officetel in Yangcheon-gu
5) began teaching at a new school,Yangmyung Elementary
6) got wireless internet installed today in my new place
You can expect one or more posts on most of these topics in coming days and weeks. Still, a few quick notes are in order.

My new neighborhood, right at Sinjeong sta. on line 5, is quite developed--it's a ten minute walk from Mok-dong sta., and is situated in the low-rent area of one of Seoul's richest dong. That said, my old place was superior in some ways: first, this building does have a convenience store on premises, but you have to go outside to access it; second, the apartment is quite similar but smaller, and has no large storage space, such as for suitcases, the boxes of mementos I've collected, etc--on the plus side, the loft is actually usable, since you can stand up in it; thirdly, there is no Emart directly across the street, though a reasonably-sized grocery is located a block away; fourth, the nearest dry cleaner is a five minute walk, instead of just downstairs; fifth, most of the restaurants in the area are unfamiliar to me--one familiar name is Donenu, but I had to leave there tonight because they tried to tell me what I have to order; finally, the subway entrance is four times further than at my old place--40 paces instead of ten!

It was great seeing friends and family back home, and ten days was almost the right amount of time--maybe two days longer would have been better. I bought some new clothes, since it's hard to find stuff to fit me here, and I ate all the food you can't get in Korea. Some pictures later.

The new school seems nice, though the jury is of course still out on that: the VP is pressuring me to teach a monthly Saturday class in which I am less than not even slightly interested--I already teach a Saturday class, that pays much much more and gives me the opportunity to teach superior high school students.

The English classroom is really cool (pics later), and the co-teachers seem okay, and very nice. I co-taught three classes on Monday, and the comment I got from the two cos was, "Your teaching is amazing!" Yep, tell me something I don't know. But seriously, the bad news is that I go from two preps per week to five!
No classes today, since the promise of Typhoon Bolaven cancelled classes throughout Seoul. Teachers had to show up, though. Tomorrow is scheduled to be a teacher in-service from SMOE for all of us high school NSETs that are now at elementary schools.

Yeosu Expo 2012: Pavilions and Shows

The theme of Expo 2012 is "The Living Ocean and Coast", and the theme sees one of its best expressions in the Theme Pavilion:


The highlight of the pavilion is phase three of the show: I don't know its official title but to me it is "A Boy and His Dugong". It was interesting because it combined a large screen video (which is the most common feature of the pavilions) with live action. A small Korean child comes out onto the stage, and climbs aboard a dugong.


They then disappear off into the screen, or rather the deep ocean, for a fun ride exploring the great beauty of the deep--the corals, amazing fish and whales, and so on, until pollution comes along and messes everything up! The manatee falls ill.


But humanity realizes its wicked ways just in time, and a triumphant manatee, restored to health, swoops in over the audience's heads to greet the boy.


That last shot isn't very good because I was told at some point to stop taking pictures. So don't tell anyone you saw these!
Another key pavilion is the Marine Civilization and City Pavilion, which focused on mankind's past and future living relationship to the oceans. The highlight was a walk-through reconstruction of the Arab dhow that was discovered off Sumatra in 1998, believed sunk in the ninth century. It has a few of the actual artifacts on display, notably the three plates:







The other feature of the pavilion is a display of some exploratory craft, and a model of a future underground city. Bigger and more impressive than that one Tony Randall and family lived in in that movie, Hello Down There.





Hyundai has a very popular pavilion, in part for the song-and-dance robots, but also for the unusual video display. I recorded a couple of minutes of it, seen below:



The UAE had a very good video, which in my head is titled, "A Boy and His Turtle", rather like the dugong story except is has the added feature of being basically true. A young Emirati boy sneaks aboard his father's research vessel and tries to help save a massive sea turtle who has swallowed too many plastic bags--this is a genuine concern, as plastic bags ruin their digestive system and account for hundreds of thousands of marine animal deaths each year. The boy is inspired to advocate for the abolition of platic shopping bags, and as a result, UAE will ban all non-biodegradable bags by 2013.

Many other countries' pavilions express concerns about ocean pollution, but none was quite so tangible. Although Monaco did grace me with a "Certificate of Engagement" for taking an interactive quiz and promising not to throw a bunch of crap into the ocean:





The USA Pavilion begins with a welcome message, seen above, from Hillary Clinton, as Secretary of State, and President Obama, projected onto a screen of water. Nifty. However, the main show, brought to you by CitiCorp, has a theme of "This is my ocean," in which dozens of Americans in coastal or ocean scenes, look at the camera and say, "This is my ocean," with the message that we are all responsible for taking care of the ocean. But I can't help thinking that other nationalities are saying, "Wow, those Americans! So damned arrogant now they're claiming the whole ocean!"
Australia, though surrounded by ocean, mostly lauded its aboriginal and animal life (including those delicious roasted 'roo tails), and had this photo op:



Belgium had two things, a rotating display of famous Belgian things, such as chocolate, the Mannekin-pis, and the Atomium, legacy structure of Brussels World Fair 1958:



...and chocolate.



Many poor countries used their pavilion less to promote tourism than to actually make money here and now by running a curio shop. Below, Cambodia:



India was largely a bazaar, but they put in other elements as a seeming afterthought, including a photo op in front of a large image of the Taj Mahal; an English-language video touting India's graces--with the PC running it set up right beside it on a card table; a collection of Shiva and Ganesha statues piled haphazardly in one corner; and an Indian food concession that seemed always to be closed. They did also have a small 3D exhibit of tiny marine creatures:



In the middle of the fairgrounds--actually in the water--is a big circular thing, called The Big-O. Every night at about 8:45 they put on "The Big-O Show, immediately following the musical drama, Girl of the Sea. The seats in the main viewing stand were filled up by about six o'clock, so I watched from the hindside, by the Theme Pavilion. Here is a technician, preparing the Big-O:


The Girl of the Seas was probably quite brilliant to watch, though it was all in Korean. Here's what it looked like across the water:


After it ended, it was time for Expo 2012's piece de resistance, a water and light show, with the neat feature that the O is filled with water jets onto which the "movie" images are projected:


I recorded a couple minutes of it, though the good stuff doesn't happen until about half-way through:

Yeosu Expo 2012: Food and Fun

The thing people tend to remember about a World's Fair is the amazing pavilions they saw, but an Expo should also be a happening, a place with a vibrant atmosphere. The center hall of the International Pavilion has an interesting interactive feature, a digital display ceiling called the EDG (Expo Digital Gallery) on which an ever-changing visual river flowed:




There were roving bands of minstrels and masquerade artistes:






Jet-ski daredevils at the oceanfront:




And even the occasional levitation act:




And numerous times each day, running much of the length of the main road, is a parade called:











The banana was introduced to Americans at the Philadelphia "Columbian Exposition" in 1876; the waffle, curled into a cone-shape, served as an ice-cream receptacle for the first time at the St. Louis World's Fair of 1904; "Lovely eyes come shine and glitter, buy your girl a popcorn fritter," vendors cried at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo: fairs and food go together like pancakes and maple syrup--no, that was't invented at the Expo, but "Aunt Jemima" (actress Anna Robinson) was a very popular character at Chicago 1933.
No novelties like those here at Yeosu 2012, but plenty of good eats. Unlike my experience of Shanghai 2010, snack vendors are ubiquitous, selling drinks, hot dogs, chicken tenders, 꼬치, and beer. Turkish ice cream is popular. At the Australia Pavilion, I ordered the "Kangaroo Special", which was a sizable helping of stewed kangaroo tail meat, served with rice and a side of ... kimchi (W16,000). Awesome!


The Russian Pavilion has a well-publicized and bustling cafe, where I got a "meat pancake" and a honey-drenched blintz (W13,000). Delicious!


For desert, what else but waffles from the Belgium concession, with real Belgian chocolate for dipping (W9,000).

Yeosu Expo 2012: Sky Tower Overview

After a largely uneventful train ride from Yongsan station to Yeosu Expo station, conveniently across the street from Gate 3, I converted my internet ticket for my Expo pass, stowed my overnight bag in the last (whew!) available locker, and made my way to the "Sky Tower", a pair of converted cement silos that are the tallest edifice at Expo 2012, and also the location of the Observation Deck.

When I joined the line, this was the first thing that greeted me:


A wonderfully frozen cold pack, that was welcome indeed even after only a half-hour in the searing heat. This was the second:


The attendant said the wait was 1 hr 30 min., but it was actually 20 min. less than that. The Sky Tower is 73 m. tall, which is no kind of record, but it also contains a pipe organ, which now officially holds the Guinness Record for Loudest Pipe Organ. You can see the pipes in the middle pic, and the bottom pic is the booth where the organist sits:




From this bird's-eye view, you can see the whole site laid out: top, the massive building is the International Pavilion, with all the national pavilions (except Korea's) inside it; the second shot shows the water (the Expo theme is 'The Living Ocean and Coast'), with the Theme Pavilion and 'The Big-O' in the middle ground, and the fancy-schmancy on-site hotel at the back. The orange-roofed block behind the Big-O is the Aquarium; the bottom picture faces east and shows the Energy Park at far left, the sponsor organizations at mid left (such as the UN, the BIE--World's Fair organizing group--and Korail, etc), and the Korean mega-corps including the funky Hyundai pavilion, Samsung, SK, LG and GS/Caltex. To the right of GS would be Lotte, then Posco.




The Hyundai pavilion was a crowd favorite, though I'm not sure why--sure, the video had some cool features (and I may show it in an upcoming video I'm going to cobble together)--but the biggest attraction was the robots. And you didn't even have to go through the exhibit to see them. They were doing their song-and-dance routine in the plaza in front of the building, not the staging area for entry or exit. The wait for the pavilion was about 45 min., but the wait to get my picture taken was less than ten.



After entering the Sky Tower facility, but before going up to the observation deck in the glass elevator, there is an inside theater which shows a four minute or so video featuring a CGI dragon and scenic panoramas of the Korean countryside. When you leave the Sky tower, you go through an area which shows off a desalination system (converting salt water into the potable kind). As a bonus, you get to keep the cup!