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Week 35 (Oct 23rd to Oct 29th) |
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Tuesday Oct 25th, Tonight at funk band rehearsal, we had a traditional Korean drummer come out and jam with us. He had this big drum that he puts sideways on the floor or on the table, and the sound resembles a bass drum. He was having a tough time fitting in with the funk band, but the drumming itself was really cool. I'm making a pact with myself to learn more about Korean traditional instruments and music. |
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Friday Oct 28th,There's a new restaurant that has opened up on my street. This is nothing unusual, but when new places open up, they often have two dancing girls who wear sexy little outfits and dance all day to techno, no matter the weather. Every time I've passed them this week, I keep on thinking about Korean women get so many mixed messages about their sexuality. They're told to be conservative, don't mix with boys, blah, blah, blah, but then at the same time, they'rebombarded with images of dancing girls in freezing
cold weather, and I'm sure most of them are aware that many Korean husbands cheat on their wives with hookers (most of the wives are aware too, apparently). It's almost like they're getting the message that it's only okay to be seen as "sexual" if a man is demanding it
from you, or using you for it. It's not okay to be strong and womanly in your own right. I suppose these ideas are pretty prevalent back home too, but it just seems so much more pronounced when you see scantily-clad dancing girls freezing their butts off for the opening of some restaurant.
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Saturday Oct 29th,Halloween isn't a very big deal in Korea. In fact, I bet most Koreans only kind of know what Halloween is.
But it has always been a really great party night for us foreigners. We had all agreed to dress up, but it's kind of hard to find costume material in Korea, so in utter laziness, I pinched a pair of flashing devil horns from my school. I wasn't the only one who did a real half-ass costume. Most of us just had on some cat ears, or black clothes, or skimpy clothes (Halloween did provide me with a good occasion to wear my favourite little black dress). Evan by far had the best costume: his idea was to go as a flasher, and wear a really big trench coat over a wife beater and boxers, and paint a really skanky mustache on his face. Then when we passed people on the street, he would shock them by opening his coat, and showing off a leg of panty hose stuffed with cotton and attached to his pelvic area. It was a big hit. I thought that Koreans would be too scandalized to get a kick out of it, but they were loving it as much as all the foreigners were. Evan's antics won him the Funniest costume prize at Communes, which in turn got us a free pitcher of beer. I like it when people give me free drinks . . .
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