Tag Archives: travel light

The First 2013 Post

Dig…

The big thing: My story “Shadows Under Hexmouth Street” got a nod from Lois Tilton, one of Locus Magazine’s short fiction reviewers, on her Best of the Year post. You can read her post here.

And, if you’re inclined, you can read the story about urban sorcerers in a decaying city here.

I’m always a bit squeamish about linking to good reviews, because I think in general you should ignore reviews and just keep on keeping on with what you want to do. Don’t let other people define who you are and all that, but… well… it wasn’t like I had a great year publishing-wise, so if I’m tooting my own horn, at least it’s a small horn.

Writing-wise, I wrote a shitastic novel, started two others, wrote five new stories, and sold one (so I’ll have something new coming out in 2013). I received 25 rejection letters and wrote something like 300K words this year.  It might be more — significantly so.  I don’t have an exact figure because two weeks back I spilled a cup of tea on my laptop, and since there are no Mac stores nearby in South Korea, I’ve been using an old netbook while at home, and the netbook doesn’t have the spreadsheet on it where I track all these things because I am on of those people who tracks data “for fun”, having worked at office jobs for too long and chewed too many paint chips as a child.

Not sure how many books I read this year, something like 50+. I track all that junk at Goodreads, along with keeping a list at home, but it’s on that other computer, you know the one that’s an inert metal slab at the moment.

One great thing about 2012 was finding folks to game with here in South Korea. The Vaults of Ur have been a hoot to run. I might branch out and run a more political game this year — but we’ll see, because I’ve got another novel project I’m keen to work on and that’s where I plan on keeping my attention for the next six months.

In 40 hours I board a plane to the USA. While I’m there I hope to have the inert metal slab returned to functioning computer status.

Yesterday I took part in a Polar Bear Plunge. It was great fun, and I recommend it. Seriously. Tomorrow I’ll likely run around like mad trying to do all the junk I put off doing before my trip.

I finished The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao last night. It’s an amazing book. You should read it.

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Mr. Good Morning

Here’s a story.

I used to pass this guy every morning on my way to work at this certain streetlight. He’d be on a bike and I’d be walking.

He was an older Korean guy wearing a baseball cap and aviator sunglasses, always casually dressed but super neat like if it were raining he’d be riding the bike one handed holding an umbrella with the other, and the open umbrella would be perfectly parallel to the road, not held sloped or slanted like you or I or any other slob would.

Anyway, he always said “Good Morning” to me, so that’s the name I gave him. He was like my alarm clock. If I didn’t see him on my way to work, I knew I’d be late.

But in the past few months there’s been all this construction near work and I’ve had to detour past the place where we usually met, so I hardly see him. I still do but it’s rare and no matter when I do, he always breezes by me on his bike saying “Good Morning.” This even happened once on a Saturday afternoon.

So I told Jin about the guy and she thought it was amusing. But then earlier this week we were coming out of the supermarket and there the guy was in his track suit and wearing a cravat (and baseball cap). It was nighttime, he said “Good Morning”, and we stopped and chatted with him. Turns out the guy’s a retired master ship’s surgeon from the Korean Navy who works as a school crossing guard, which is where he’s always going in the morning. He also thought I was from Uzbekistan. Jin was more than a little amused by that, and after we left she said, “You know that guy’s now going to take you out drinking.”

That might be interesting.

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I Can Tell When My Students Have Seen Star Wars

I can tell when my students have seen Star Wars because they’ll walk up to me and say, “I’m your father!” which inevitably escalates to, “No, I’m your grandfather.”

“No, I’m your grand-grand-grand-grand father.”

“No, I’m — I’m your ghost!”

At which point I look them in the eye and say, “No, I’m you.”

And their minds explode.

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Winding It Down

My vacation’s about over. I’m in Boston until Thursday when I’ll once more enter the air travel relay race and fly back to Korea. It’s been a great trip. I’ve had time to catch up with family and friends, and in between all the running around and socializing I got to be pretty damn lazy. No complaints there. Now to figure out how to fit that pile of books above into my suitcases.

All of which is to say things are still on hiatus here.

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Service Announcement

There’s likely to be a lack of posts while I’m visiting the USA.

My flight was more or less fine. The whole thing “door to door” took close to 30 hours. I think only 15 of those hours involved being on an airplane. The rest was spent in transit or sitting around. No highlights, except for the leg early on between Korea and Japan where the woman seated beside me burst into tears halfway through the flight. Yeah… fun times.

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At Least I’m Packed

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More From Disorienting Encounters

“There is no better way of obtaining useful information than by mixing with people. According to a wise saying of the ancients: “The eye never tires from seeing, nor the ear from hearing.”

Therefore, I decided with the help of God to blacken these pages with what I saw and heard during this voyage, be it clear or obscure. For I am but a woodgatherer of the night, the one who lags behind, a horse who is out of the race.”

- Disorienting Encounters: Travels of a Moroccan Scholar in France in 1845 – 1846. The Voyage of Muhammad As-Saffar

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One Week From Now…

I’ll be aboard an airplane cooped up in economy class making my way to Boston. To my surprise packing hasn’t started yet. When I think about packing it’s mostly trying to think of what books I want to read on the airplane. My clothes… eh…

Last week I taught some camps. It went well. Next week I will teach some more camps then Saturday will arrive and I’ll give my wife a kiss, board a bus, then a plane, then another plane, and another plane. At some point I’ll be in Osaka at another San Francisco. Then I’ll be in Boston.

Fun times.

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Meanwhile…

Kim Jong-Il has died. I made the joke on Facebook that the Atlas Obscura will have to update their list of Communist mummies soon. More seriously though… wow. I have no idea what this means or what will happen next.

This event has the potential to bury the previous two crises I’ve witnessed in the sand. Or not, because when it comes to North Korea I think we’re looking at a heavily armed and militarized inkblot. Who knows what’s happening inside it. I’m sure some people do — but the truth seems to get buried beneath our projections.

Right now South Korea’s on military alert. From past experiences the North has reacted to internal instability with external aggression. For this reason alone going on alert seems justified. But the war didn’t turn hot again in 1994 when Kim Il-Sung died, so it’s not like we haven’t been here before. Whether Kim Jong-Un, Jong-Il’s successor and son, lives out the rest of the month is another matter.

Crazy times ahead… well, crazier.

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Thanks. Thanks For Nothing.

Well, Thanksgiving came and went.

I’d been offline some of the day, so it wasn’t until about 2PM that I realized what day it was. I did call my folks, but the early morning Skype session scheduled for today didn’t work out (my bed’s fault). Ah well, at least my cousin was there to be the surrogate-child to my folks. Besides, it’s not like I won’t be back to see them in January.

It still amazes me that I live in another country. I know. I know. It’s not like it’s very hard for USians to live abroad, but, as my closest friend back home said right before I left, moving to a foreign country is not what people “like me” do. (I leave it to you all to unpack that “like me” in scare quotes back there.) She’s certainly one to talk, since she had moved to a foreign country (the States) herself. She’d be proud though. I’ve pulled a decent Flitcraft over here. So much so that as I read the holiday travel plans of other expats on Facebook, I realize how much living in Asia is wasted on me.

Shit, I haven’t even been to Busan.

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