I note that, yes, more and more of my posts of late have been in the gord’s life/life in korea categories. I have a bunch of draft posts about crossdressing African child soldiers, and about Bob Hope, and other things, but I’ve had no time to develop much about this stuff.

Anyway, I will say a tiny bit about my short term plans: I will be working for two more weeks, and then during the third week I will be briefly going to Osaka to get my new work visa processing done. It’s a paid-for trip (necessary as it’s required by the government, so my new employer will reimburse me the flight cost), which is nice. So I shall spend the days bumbling about in Osaka. (My friend Young Ja just got back from Japan and said that even the Osaka airport is a great sightseeing experience, let alone the city and environs themselves…)

In the short term: I am gonna get a digital camera and I am thinking about picking up a minidisc player. A new model is out meaning that the older USB models are quite cheap, around $200. Pretty tempting, seeing as it allows live digital sampling, quick loading of MP3s, and the advantage of the most compact system around. Nice nice nice. But the main concern is the digital camera. I want something with good quality and some limited videocam capability, so it’s gonna cost me a chunk, maybe most of my overtime pay for teacher training… but then, that was my self-justification for the extra work, so it’s okay by me. It just means that in Japan I shall not buy much in the way of souvenirs… maybe a T-shirt and a couple of little things for friends.

Young Ja brought me a bottle of sake and a can of the best beer in Japan. She’s a gooooooooooood friend!!! As for me, I don’t know what to bring back, but I only have a couple of days there so I better figure it out quick.

In the longer term plans, I am betting on spending a month or two in India at the beginning of 2004, but I won’t say more until it’s more certain. We’ll see in a day or two, I guess…