Saying Goodbye to Susong

Today is election day in Korea. So all the schools are closed, as are government buildings, banks, etc.

Yesterday was our last day of classes at Susong Elementary School and tomorrow I leave for Bankok.

So it figures that today, the one day I have to get everything done before my trip, the city is shut down. I’m home doing laundry and dwelling on how unprepared I am.

It was a bit hard for me saying goodbye at Susong, but a whole lot easier than I thought it would be. It is possible that many of the teachers and staff think we’ll be back for the English program next semester. But my boss has told us that won’t be happening. He’s had too many disagreements with the principal and wants to move on. The kids don’t really grasp the finality of goodbye. School is their constant. No end. No beginning.

I learned quite a lot about Korea and the culture, being in the public school as the lone foreigner; mostly by making mistakes.

There was the day that I walked into the staff lunchroom, grabbed my tray, my spoon and chopsticks when the secretary/servant came running at me screaming, literally with total panic on her face. She hadn’t yet served up a tray for the principal. The first bowl of rice always gets served to the principal and no one begins eating until he has sat down and taken his first bite.

I guess in another century, I could’ve been beheaded for that. But that day, there was a lot of shouting and arguing but I survived it, head in tact. I didn’t even have a clue what all the commotion was about. Ignorance is bliss.

Then there was the day that I walked into the lunchroom and said hello (annyong hasimnika) to the principal with my hands in my pockets. This is another major no-no. He was in a good mood and cut me some slack on this one. It was the other teachers who were most embarrassed for me. Again, I was blissfully unaware. The teachers tend to shuffle around bent over, in a hurry, acting skiddish and afraid in the teachers’ room. They bow a lot and they’re always apologizing. These are ways of being that you just can’t pick up as a foreigner. You either really feel that way or you don’t. They jokingly call it the “kingdom of Susong”.

This past month, my co-worker Sandy celebrated her 300th anniversary with her boyfriend. She sounds like an old hag. But Korean couples have their anniversary every 100 days, rather than marking a specific day every year.

That’s not only 3 or 4 anniversaries for a guy to remember every year, but it forces him to get a calendar and do the math. Throw in Christmas, Valentine’s, and birthdays – you’ve got yourself a full-time job.

We finished the school year with the performance of musicals. No surprise there. They were fun though. We had five groups with four productions – The Scary Dino, The Gingerbread Man, The Three Little Pigs, and the Blind Men and the Elephant. The stories have changed slightly since I was that age. The big bad wolf now farts to blow the little pig’s house down. I guess the original story is just not hip enough to stand the test of time.

I brought the guitar in on the last day, as usual, for the annual Christmas Carols Folk Sing Along. This was more fun in Vancouver – with older students. The lyrics to Christmas Carols are just too much for the kids. However, “Santa Claus is coming to Town” was a barn burner, as always.

On the biz side, this is yet another surprise holiday for me – still with no concept of where I am or where I am going. I get info on a “need to know” basis, and I guess I still don’t need to know about work stoppages. Luckily, I was able to scrounge a last minute flight out of Korea for xmas at a fairly decent price.

The downside of unplanned trips and last minute flight booking in this case is a two-hour stop-over in Taipei and then a 2am arrival in Bankok. That should put us in downtown Bankok at about 3:30am looking for the hotel. I’ve perfected the art of doing things the hard way. Need advice? Just ask.

Coincidentally, I've read that it is also election time in Thailand. So for the first three days after we arrive, there will be no alcohol sales anywhere in Bankok. Fingers crossed, this could just be a rumour.

December has been a month of generally feeling good about Korea. Suddenly getting out for Christmas has a lot to do with that. They have plenty of holidays to celebrate throughout the year but Christmas is just not Christmas here. – Not that it should be. – Not that it will be in Bankok either.

It’s been snowing on and off. And it’s cold. I have this natural feeling inside that Christmas is coming – but I know that here…it just doesn’t.

There are some bars and shopping malls that decorate. That’s business. Itaewon, the foreigner neighborhood, will probably be hopping – mostly with ESL teachers who have to work through the holidays for private schools that just never stop. I’ve been there, done that. There’ll be plenty of soldiers from the US Military base at Young San who’ll be making Christmas happen in some form as well.

A Korean teacher named Gina, who works at the school with me, has to prepare a Christmas tree and decorations for her church. She said that she spent the entire weekend in the library, doing research on it.

In Seoul, Christmas is a night out drinking in pubs and night clubs – like St. Patrick’s Day – just replace green with red and green. It’s very similar to a Japanese xmas – a romantic night for couples, or a piss-up with the gang. It works. The last thing they need here is a ritual of chopping down trees.

The Rocky Mountain Tavern in Itaewon, owned by Canadians, is serving Christmas dinner for $40 a plate and will have a full day of hockey games on the big screen. Those who are stuck here could do much worse than that.

Considering the frenetic shop-a-thon that is Christmas back home, I have no problem with how it goes down here.

I will miss the turkey at Christine’s and Carlos’ hot tamales. Sorry I won’t be there for the gift exchange this year and yes, I am still using my electric nose hair clipper.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to everyone back home. Sorry I can’t be there, but I’ll be back in March – which is fast approaching and just a few cold days away.

My first stop home will probably be the Yale Hotel for a proper blues show. I’ve grown pretty tired here of the techno remix rip-off version of everything.

I shouldn’t complain though. December was alright for music. Rocky Mountain Tavern hosted a “Battle of the Bands” – 12 bands in three nights. Some were better than others, of course. But there’s plenty of talent in town.

I also visited “Ole Stomper’s Rock Spot”, also owned by a Canadian, at the top of hooker’s hill in Itaewon, next to Polly’s Kettle. My friend’s band, “Dog Soup”, was playing. With two guitars, bass, drums, two saxophones and a trumpet in a room that seats about fifty, they shook the walls.

I auditioned for a band in town. It was a strange feeling, the first time I think I’ve ever auditioned for anything. First time i think i've used the word. In the new year, I guess I’ll find out where that leads.

So, I will try to check my mail. I hope you all enjoy the holidays, wherever you are, whatever you do, whoever you do it with.

Rock and Roll is Not Paying the Rent

For the third time, last Thursday I went down to play at the Open Mic Night at The Big Electric Cat in Itaewon, Seoul.

There was only one other player. So I had the stage for over an hour. Last week, same story, and I played for over two hours. No one else showed up to play. My first night there, I was the host. For some reason, the host had disappeared.

It was great for me to get some practice time in. But the Big Cat was famous in Seoul, especially for its Thursday night open mic. It was a bit sad to see the bar empty.

A new owner had recently taken over the bar and remodeled. But the only advertising she’d done to keep the open mic alive was a piece of paper taped on the door.

The pub is in a dark cellar room on a narrow back alley. No one saw the little piece of paper.

So it sounded like if wanted to keep this thing going, I’d have to do some leg work myself. But it was too late for that even. She tells me she’s clearing the instruments off of the stage and putting in a pool table. It’s going to be a girly bar – her words, not mine. She said – I have to pay the rent.

This story is not special. It’s typical. Rock and roll has been banished to the underground, as little Steven would say, where it probably belongs.

The live music scene in Seoul is concentrated mostly around a few areas of town. There’s Hong Dae, dae meaning university, which is the largest party district. There are a ton of night clubs. It’s a University environment. So you can find just about anything going on there.

Then there’s Itaewon. It’s a multicultural neighborhood near the Young San American Military Base. In Itaewon, you can get a Yankees baseball hat or a Mexican taco or a Sunday morning Caesar with your truck stop breakfast. On the weekends, there’s some live music going on. Two of the venues are owned by Canadians – Stompers and Rocky Mountain Tavern.

The scene seems to rely heavily on foreigners for talent, and customers. I spoke to a blues player from Virginia named Carlos. He plays slide with the guitar sat on his lap. He tells me that Seoul is an easy town to find gigs in. There are more bars than bands, unlike the situation at home. So if you put a decent band together, the phone starts ringing. No one is making more than a dime, but the gigs are there.

Next week I’m going to Hae Bang Chun, near Itaewon, where I’m told there are a few little pubs keeping it real.

The situation is similar but a little different in Japan. There seems to be more interest in rock in Japan. They get more of the big international tours stopping through. A band that skips Seoul entirely might play five shows in Japan. But at the grass roots level, rock and roll is suffering the times.

If a band in Japan wants to play a show on a Friday night, they first have to rent the bar/venue from the owner – shelling out hundreds up front. Then they have to do the promotions on their own and hope to sell enough tickets at the door to make their money back. All drink money stays at the bar. Bar owners take no risk at all.

My friend Shuichi in Hiroshima is a huge fan of American music. He is a small-time concert promoter. He goes to the south-by-southwest festivals in Austin, Texas, meets the bands he likes, mostly independent bands, and does his best to bring them to Japan for a tour.

The venues on his circuit are great. I’ve been to two of them. The bar in Hiroshima where his bands play is an awesome room. Very cool.

This is not his job. It’s his hobby. He has a desk job in a company. But live music is his passion. He makes it happen because he loves it. He picks the band up at the airport in his car. But he gets down and discouraged with the results.

He has a mailing list of friends and supporters who will buy up enough tickets to break even and make it happen. But that’s as good as it gets. He can’t afford mass advertising. People won’t pay to see a band they don’t know, someone who just isn’t famous.

I really wish this was Shuichi’s full time job.

Rock has always had a life in Japan on both big and small levels. Talking with the old guys in Mac Bar in Hiroshima was how I wasted a lot of time in Japan. Mac is a “music bar”. He has just about every CD you could imagine and if you request something he doesn’t have, he’ll go out the next day and find it. They also have a lot of recordings we’ve never heard – the classic Asian bootlegs.

Mac himself was a bit of a famous guitar player back in the 70’s Tokyo scene. He loves to talk about seeing Neil Young play in Fukuoka. And the Japan tour that Bob Dylan did with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers is still legend here.

Rock and roll is definitely about storytelling, and its fans are knowledgeable, especially in Japan – but it’s a shame that it’s not current. Is it really just a cult of old boys living in the past?

In Korea, it’s even less than that. It never happened. I was in Wa Bar last Sunday. It’s a bar that specializes in imported beer from all over the world. A bottle of moosehead is 8000won, about $8. Local beer is 3000won. The music they play is awful. But it’s just down the street from home – the only decent pub in sight.
These Korean guys asked me what kind of music I liked.
So I said – I like rock and roll.
They said – ohhh, Elvis Presley !!!
I said – well, not really, more recent, like the Beatles.
I’ve had this conversation too many times now. You say rock. They say Elvis.

The thing is, I think that rock and roll is missing a chance for a new life here RIGHT NOW in Asia, especially with China opening up for business. The culture is rich here of course, but popular music is something they borrow and emulate.

The Hip Hop scene and the Latin Music scene have both jumped on this horse and run away with it. They’re cashing in on Asia.

A friend of mine was in Shanghai last year. Telling me about the trip, her fondest memory was of this massive night club that featured two rooms – one was a hip hop dance party, and the other room was latin dance party. This is an exciting night out in Shanghai. Same goes for here. Similar clubs here in Apgujeong charge $30 at the door – for the slow line.

As China opens up and millions of Chinese have money in their pockets, they are learning to break dance and learning to salsa. It’s not just the club scene that’s cashing in. There are the dance schools, the experts, the dj’s and the fashion retailers.

Do people dislike rock and roll because it sucks? I think people tend to like what’s recommended. The top 40 formula. And no one with the bucks is pushing rock and roll.

If the essence of the club scene is the dance floor, the essence of rock is the live stage. If rock and roll is ever going to see the light of day again, it’ll have to be about the stage AND the dance floor, like in its glory days. It has to get Groovy again. The ROLL part. Not rock. Rock AND ROLL.

Meet You at the Byol Da Bang

Seoul to me is not really a big city but hundreds of small cities that are joined by a subway system. The subway stations – I counted almost 400 and my map is 5 years outdated – are linked in a way that I can be just about anywhere within an hour.

When you reach the surface of a station and hit the street, looking around, it could be a suburb of anywhere. There will always be a Starbucks and a Coffee Bean in spitting distance of the exit; and plenty of people spitting. So these are your typical meeting places.

The traditional Korean word for coffee house is “da bang”. The Korean word for “star” is “byol”. So they call Starbucks the Byol Da Bang. The Korean word for “bean” is “hong”. So the Coffee Bean is the Hong Da Bang.

What gives the station its truly Asian feel is the flashing neon advertising that goes way over the top, piled five stories high as far as the eye can see in every direction.

The stations are on huge blocks along 10+ lane boulevards. Ducking into one of these blocks, the roads narrow and become more pedestrian; that is, there are no sidewalks, so you walk in traffic. The first block within the block is where most of the restaurants are and the atmosphere feels more distinctly Korean. There are tents and tarp and carts selling street food and junk items.

Having met and had dinner, Koreans will then move on to the next stop – which could be a “po jang ma cha” – a pub with cheap beer and pub snacks, like chicken ass or barbecued pig skin, or a “no re bang” – a singing room, like karaoke. The same strip will have room clubs – private rooms with hostesses for big spenders, pool halls and massage parlors.

Then beyond this strip of restaurants and pubs and singing rooms, there will be a strip of “discrete” hourly hotels; discrete in the sense that there are black curtains covering the entrance and the car park. They have hot names, like hotel novios, or funny ones, like the tomato hotel. The names always seem to be English but they’re not for travelers.

Walking farther from the station, the neighborhood becomes more residential, rows of apartment blocks, churches and schools.

Korean society is a complex system of strict and rigid rules and traditions, like curfews, that govern love and life.

Yet their cities seem perfectly designed to combat the very rules they live by.