Here’s the Amazon listing for Jazz and Death: Medical Profiles of Jazz Greats). I know, I know. I stumbled across the title when searching for books about piano voicings and just had to know more…
Month: November 2004
I’ve Joined Up!!!
Blinger’s started up a blog for foreigners learning or working on their Korean. It’s for posting about learning, for practicing writing in Korean, and so on. Unlike Kangmi’s blog, which is a kind of personal-self-study log, this is a kind of community effort with multiple posters signed up. I’m sure I shall be the worst poster, and perhaps (with my writing projects) the most infrequent, but I shall try do a regular post and get a few new words and points in each time. I am studying a lot nowadays, not as much as Blinger, but more than I was. …
What Formalized Feedback Is Good For…
Today my teaching was evaluated. It was pretty nerve-wracking, really, knowing that it was coming. I think I was maybe second or third, though I’d thought beforehand that I was first. I didn’t think much about the relative benefits (real or imagined) of being first, or not, but it was nonetheless nerve-wracking. Well, my supervisor qualified his evaluation pretty heavily beforehand, saying it was just one person’s opinion of one class session on one day—for he did it alone, and only during my 4:30pm class today. And sure, I got to choose which class he would evaluate—naturally, my best class, …
Kinds of Crazy
Wanted to write about this before I forget it. Lime’s been working at the Psychiatric department in the hospital, as part of her medical internship. So anyway, last night, we were walking downtown and some guy came past us, declaring that we must all accept Jesus. Well, as he walked past I misheard him, and anyway, during the ensuing discussion, Lime observed that religious fanatics are hated; among all the patients, everyone—including both the interns and the other mental patients—dislikes the religious fanatic patients. It was amusing.
New (To Me) Korea Blog
I think it was the Marmot (linked in the last post, I’m feeling too lazy to dig up the link again) who recommended this worthwhile blog, titled Scribblings of the Metropolitician. The link I’ve provided is actually to an article on a topic I’ve posted about a few times, and which is important to me: the way prostitution in Korean society reflects and shapes the role of women here. Worth a read. Me, I’m adding this guy to my RSS feed and hoping I’m someday lucky enough to have a beer with ‘im… Oh, and another cool link from Marmot …
Korea a Century Back: Historico-Photobloggery
Anyone curious about what Korea looked like a century ago might wish to look through this post by the Marmot before stopping in and checking out these photos. Marmot translates a lot, providing context. It’s fascinating and coming in handy for me, as I plod on trying to get this ghost story to smell, feel, and taste more like old, old Korea… in parts, anyway. Marmot’s posting it is a great, wonderful thing.
Chuck Mangione, Live
Where else but in South Korea can you see Chuck Mangione play to a pretty crowded house in a big performance venue (about the size of the usual orchestral symphony house in a smallish city)? Where else will people (not many, but even some) stand up and attempt to mount a standing ovation after Chuck plays the song “Feels So Good”? Only, only, only in South Korea. I’m so glad I talked Lime into coming. I wasn’t crazy about Chuck before, nor am I now, though I may try get my hands on some albums to give him another listen. But man, …
The Quiet American
For anyone who’s read Graham Greene before, what I’m going to say should come as no surprise at all, but what a writer! I’ve just finished my first trip into his world, via Jeonju University library’s copy of The Quiet American. I saw the movie last year at the Jeonju International Film Festival, I believe it was, and what a movie that was. I imagined that perhaps it had even outstripped the original book, when I saw it, for all the depth of character and the depth of political and cultural texture. But the book is even more powerful than …
Russell Hoban’s Mr Rinyo-Clacton’s Offer
I just finished the novel about two minutes ago. Not gonna go too deep into this except to say that this author Russell Hoban, who wrote this book I just finished, Mr Rinyo-Clacton’s Offer, is a far different man from the person who wrote the mind-blowing SF novel Riddley Walker. That’s not to speak ill of the fellow and his work, because both novels are absolutely excellent. It’s just that they are such very different works. Riddley Walker, which I haven’t read in a couple of years (and which, I believe it was Adam, kindly sent me from Texas, and …
Korean Culture, Old and New: Starcraft Pansori
One of the things I talked about last night with Sang Joon was Seoul. He was telling me about his experiences there, and I was asking about what the cultural scene is like, trying to see how valid my own views are. He said the area around Hong Ik University is really different from anywhere else, and described all kinds of things he’d experienced while living there for a few months. One of the most interesting things he described was one day seeing a pair of women in kisaeng outfits (the Korean form of the geisha, a kisaeng is), dancing …