My First Oriental Painting

This was haaaaaarrrrd.
I call it, "stream to mordor." j/k.

"I Steal Things All The Time, It's Just Something I Do"-Creed

The Artist Kyungah Kim recently had a fascinating, or maybe sarcastic, exhibition. Well, it all "started when she realized the oozing hypocrisy behind the sophistication and the discrepancy between the original location of the artifacts and collections of the world-renowned big museums." Basically, it doesn't make sense for countries to display artifacts of other countries. And I don't think that sentence I quoted made sense either, but my good grammar senses are being dulled. So for the past ten years, she traveled the world, and stole stuff. She would steal a coffee mug from a Korean cafe, and replace it with one in France. Or she would take a salt shaker from one hotel in Hawaii, and replace it at another hotel in Hawaii, keeping the left over. She took pictures of the switches, displayed the stolen items, did some paintings, an instillation piece, and even a video. who does that? awesome.

Terrorized By The White Girl!!

My friend Marian was coming to meet me in my room. I ran to the bathroom, and I was about to walk out into the hallway when by chance, Marian had come walking by! It was perfect for a surprise attack! I was all geared to leap out and ambush, and actually started to, when suddenly Marian who was not Marian who was actually a very small Asian, started turning into the bathroom. The look of fear on her face! In mid-spring I turned my assault into a somewhat firm arm squeeze, ran past her, and collapsed onto the floor of my room laughing/giving myself a hernia. Every time I think about the look on her face... Just instilling some white fear, that's all.

Compliments?

"Your skin is very pink."
"You're getting cuter."
"You're working very hard today, are you all right?"
"You have a small head."
"Sorry, your eyes are so big."
"You're pretty today. What happened?"

Pu Han San- We Climbed A Mountain-word

We All Knew This Day Would Come

The bathroom that my floor shares has one available Western style toilet, and a squatter. I am one of the three whiteys on the floor, and interestingly enough, all the Asian kids usually go for the squatter, so there hasn't been too much of a problem there. However, I was just waiting for the day when the Western toilet would become...out of order so to say. Well, if finally happened. At any rate, it's better than the boys bathroom, Olivier tells me that they smoke in the jon and that when you shower, sometimes they hock lugies, and if you are unfortunate enough to be downstream, the lugies drain into your shower stall. At which point Olivier starts yelling.

Urine Paintings and Dead Cat Sculpture

My professor is planning on boiling urine in ginormous glass vats for 30 hours and then making a series of demon paintings on sheets. The glory is that the pee will glow in the dark. He also used dead cats for casting one of his sculpture projects. He is actually American, but he is from New York, so I guess that could explain things. In one of his classes a girl stapled a cup of week old coffee with a straw to the wall, and called it her homework, which he explained, is brilliant. One time he left the room and when he came back, some kid was lighting his assignment on fire. He teaches drawing classes, but there is actually no drawing, just watching cartoons, lectures on the history of Michael Jackson, and learning to break dance.

Frodo Lives

Oriental Painting i ridiculously hard, but I think it will be profitable when I do a series on Mordor, which I wasn't planning. Until now. When I did a billion paintings of rocks and streams and suddenly realized that my room had turned into a barren wasteland of black and white rocks and streams. Maybe they will start growing orcs.

Pop Goes Japan!

To get to the 6th Floor

You should go to the building next door and get on the elevator. Take it to the 8th floor. Walk down the hall until the 8th floor becomes the 6th floor. There you go.

White Children, Run For Your Lives!

I've been stopped on the street to be photographed, thrown into group and individual photographs with random strangers, interviewed for a documentary, and am now paranoid of people taking pictures of me with their cell phones. Oh man. It's sort of cool to feel famous, but at the same time, it's like, hey, why doesn't this happen to me in America?? As soon as I get back I'll be lame again! tragic. Oh well, at least I was complimented the other day on my small head.

Campus Wars

Hongik University's campus differs from USU in several ways.

1. I nearly get run over by speeding mopeds at various times of day when walking to class.
2. For every western style toilet, there's at least 1 to 2 squatters.
3. All the girls wear 2 to 4 inch heels despite the fact that the major walkways are unevenly laid stones of various sizes coupled with wooden boardwalks.
4. I take certain routes to class to avoid smells of the sewer...
5. Sometimes in the morning random music plays from mysterious speakers.
6. The t-shirts get me everytime though, the t-shirt of the week was definitely won by the boy who displayed the following in huge text, "Make Love, Not Babies" but I did like the t-shirt, "I need all the friends I can get" and also, "Marc can't be always right." It's true though, sometimes Marc is wrong.
7. When I run into people I know, our conversations usually turn into games of charades, and often end awkwardly.
8. What is clearly missing here are the longboarders, the quad, and the people who give free hugs on "Free Hugs Day." However, I do enjoy what I have dubbed, "the forrest of feng shua." It runs through the middle of campus. You can pop in and out of it on various paths and enjoy bamboo plants, trees, bushes, streams, ponds, birds...quite nice.