Books and Stew

It's a chill, rainy November day in Seoul. I'm sitting on the floor leaning my back against the couch, reading a book I borrowed from the loose-cannon of a Canadian that goes by Ryan around here. With a stomach full of bean paste stew and kimchi, the cabbage fermented in red pepper you can't get away from in this country, I find myself thinking life can't get much better.

I also find myself thinking about how odd this whole scene is. Although quite a few, but by no means all, foreigners in Korea eventually warm up to the local food, I'm one of the few that would actually make it in their own apartment. Most of my friends stick to Western food when they're cooking. Which isn't to say I avoid Western food while I'm over here. I'll always have a soft spot for cheeseburgers, and I usually have a couple of hot dogs in the fridge and a half-empty jar of peanut butter lying around somewhere in my apartment. But I've always had a soft spot for hearty soups, and traditional Koreans will insist it isn't a meal without some kind of salty broth.

I'm enjoying the luxury of having an hour and a half break between classes, just enough time to walk home, heat up the stew from last night I left on the stove, and relax a bit. I haven't seen my native land in more than three years now, and I don't know when I will again, but few things make me feel at home like having a hot bowl of stew and a nice book in a warm home on a cold, rainy day. Sure, I have to go back to work soon, but who cares? All of the classes I have left are ones I like anyway.

And I guess this is what it comes to, two days after my 26th birthday. I haven't continuously lived at home in over 6 years, haven't seen my hometown, or home continent for that matter, in nearly three and a half years. When I left home I was a stupid kid who thought he knew everything and had a plan for how he was gonna live the rest of his life. I was gonna teach in Korea for a year, then go home and get my Ph.D. and spend the rest of my life teaching history. My entire department, including the professors I was working for, expected nothing less of me, especially after I tested high on a test that is supposed to screw every history major's chances of getting into a respectable grad school, unless, like all of the smart ones, you make sure to get accepted BEFORE you have to take the test.

As to where things went wrong or, as I prefer to think of it, changed, your guess is as good as mine. Perhaps the most important lesson I've learned in the last three and a half years, the one most relevant right now, is that after I teach a few more classes there will be a nice book and hearty stew waiting for me.