Monday 10 May 2004

Catch Up

I've slackened off with my writing of late, I'm aware. I have good intentions but simply don't have the same opportunities to write as I used to. My class schedule is such that the short breaks I do get these days I use for mental recouperation and trying to retell my recent events over the internet is too demanding. But - I'm going to make a concerted effort to improve, and write at least something every couple of days.

So, my new and improved lifestyle continues, with continuing stutters. Since I've decided not to drink heavily on Saturdays, I've managed to still get drunk 2 out of 3 Saturdays. Both times were accidental and ultimately it was the work of White Russians (the drink, obviously) that ended my good clean-living efforts. I'm managing to get up at about 7.30am each morning though, and although last week's studies weren't as good as the prior two, it still went well. I'm enjoying my Korean class a lot, and can now string sentences together, even if my conversation is still limited to saying "This morning, at 8 o'clock, I studied Korean" or "Today afternoon I watch movie".

I wasn't at the orphanage this weekend, and won't be at it next weekend either, but after that I hope to make it weekly. In a few weeks there's a football aka soccer tournament arranged to raise money for it, which I think I'm supposed to be taking part in. This is a prospect that terrifies me. As I think I mentioned before, my only other proper footballing experience was when I was goalkeeper for my university department team, and I let in 60 goals in 8 games. Ever since then I've harboured traumas about taking to the pitch again. These stupid little orphans better appreciate the sacrifice I'm making for them.

Talking of football, I went to my second Daegu FC game on Saturday. They lost 3-2 in a well fought game to Chonbuk Rovers, or something like that.

This weekend, oh dear me, I'm going to Seoul with Matt for what we both hope and hope won't be a repeat of our last Seoul weekend together, my first weekend in Korea, and a weekend we still talk about often. We're meeting with our slick ex-gangster friends June and Chung, or whatever the hell their names are, and I'll impress then with my longer hair and improved Korean.

Me and Matt are dead set on the trans Siberian express next year. About April time we'll take 2 weeks in China, go to North Korea for a week, then slowly make our way to Moscow via Mongolia and, if possible, popping by some crazy sounding countries like Kazakhstan and the almost vowel-less Kyrgyzstan. I've already warned Matt (who hasn't been drinking in three weeks, for very amusing circumstances that I can't tell you about) that he'd better drink like hell while travelling with me, because I don't damn well travel for the cultural experience.

Ok, so there's all sort of other details I've missed, but I'm going to try and write more in future because I don't like having months of my life undetailed. Now, I've got about 19 hours of straight teaching ahead of me, so I'd better get ready.

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