So far, my sojourn in England has been the closest I’ve had to a holiday in years. As I lolled on my bed reading with my hands down the front of my pants (a security thing?), I felt more relaxed than I had done for years (I don’t mean I was extra flaccid, I mean philosophically/spiritually/bodily). I pondered why this was and came to the following conclusions:
a) Most holidays are in part ‘adventures’ even though you may well only be traversing a well beaten path, it will be something new to you.
b) Due to (a) you will be unfamiliar with the language, food, and culture.
c) Although (b) elicits feelings of excitement and a sense of being a faux-intrepid explorer, it also adds layers of communication problems and potential confusion and misunderstanding.
d) For many – and it is a form of false consciousness – (c) is ‘all part of the adventure’ (though of course, the ‘adventure’ has the caveat that millions of people have now been to wherever it is you’re also now going as a tourist).
e) As things in (c) & (d) that are ‘all part of the adventure’ often include receiving incorrect food orders, being driven to the wrong destination in a taxi, being ripped off/cheated, and ending up in situations only your wallet can buy you out of, the conclusion that can be reached is that the notion of a ‘traveler’ (as oppose to the unfashionable ‘tourist’) living off their wits in difficult situations which are by in large wholly unenjoyable and stressful, must figure as one of the greatest marketing ploys of the late 20th Century. Rather like the notion that camping is any way ‘fun.’
Perhaps this has more to do with my maturing years and tiring of backpacking (which I never really did properly; simply owning a backpack and staying in 3* hotels would have me stricken off the backpackers register in an instant). My notion of holidays and travelling has drastically altered to the point where I now realise that I have very little actual interest in ‘tasting other cultures’ as I think it is a construct. I’m inclined to agree with Jake from Expat Hell:
‘When I travel, I mostly do exactly what I’d be doing if I were sitting at home in Korea, the only things that change are the setting and the characters; the plot remains the same.
Until I returned to England, I had been travelling exclusively around Asia (indeed this blog began whilst I was on holiday in Thailand), and though I had my share of fun along the way, I can in all honestly say I learnt precisely nothing about any of the cultures which I stared at for a few weeks. Normally, the order of events would be:
i) Spend hours planning holiday, look up hotels and things to do, timetables, reviews, etc.
ii) Book flights after hours of surfing different sites that all contain much the same information; this stage always has a set pattern of deciding at the beginning that I will always buy the cheapest, and ends up with me buying the more expensive and most direct flight.
iii) After literally days spent ‘researching’ wherever I’m going, throw hissy fit and eschew all planning, being the wild, eyed, traveler hero I am.
iv) Arrive at destination without a hotel booking and spend the first day searching for a hotel, not knowing where I am or what any of the hotels are like. Try desperately to remember names of hotels I was going to book, but fail. End up in what looks to be a safe mid-range, comfortable, characterless, overpriced hotel. In between, annoy already stressed out taxi drivers by not knowing where I want to go to. Enter mime school.
v) Spend next day in internet cafe looking for better accommodation. Find better accommodation is fully booked. End up booking in nearby hotel that all online reviewers say is ‘ok but not as good as Hotel X’ (the one I want to stay at). Move to hotel next to Hotel X, paying extra for room with balcony (I must have a balcony; I may need to throw myself off it someday).
vi) Go to the famous tourist site.
vii) Immediately become annoyed at all the camera wielding maniacs bustling everywhere.
viii) Leave famous tourist site in a bad mood and head for a cafe. As Starbucks is likely the only one with aircon, end up there. Read book for 4 hours.
ix) Leave Starbucks and begin to drink heavily. Pick up bottles of beer to drink in hotel next to Hotel X.
x) Chuck stuff back in hotel next to Hotel X. Shower. Drink bottles of beer on balcony in my pants. Now quite drunk, go out for cigarettes even though I gave up smoking years ago.
xi) End up in some bar talking to some freak.
xii) Now steaming drunk. End up going home with some woman who can communicate more than 10 words of English.
xiii) Repeat in different locations (beach, mountain, valley) in different areas of country currently holidaying in.
Though there are many elements of fun to all this, there is very little in the way of relaxation. There are pockets of chillage, for sure, but not extended periods; there is always planning, packing, moving, negotiating, confusion.
So, in coming back to England I have found somewhere I can fully relax. I can communicate with consummate ease with (most) of the locals; I’ve been going a little over the top with all manner of colloquialisms and idiomatic language, safe in the knowledge that I won’t have to unpack or explain any of my utterances. I can sit in a pub all day drinking bitter and reading, listening to some of the amusing stories of the barflies. When I order food I know what I’m doing and most likely what I will be getting.
Now, of course, this all seems perfectly obvious; what has changed is my appreciation of what I left behind. Living overseas is one of the great privileges available to people from a similar background to myself, and I am very grateful for that, but if my return has taught me anything it is that wherever it is that shaped you is something that cannot and should not be cast aside as inferior, or, as you often hear from expats, as being somewhere that is more stressful. Living overseas has plenty of stress, but we tend to cover it up because we are fundamentally distanced from reality of the place; it’s unreal, there’s a layer between us and reality that we try puncture with exposure to a culture that has no intention of ever embracing us. When you return to your own culture the layers instantly disappear and you’re left with you facing the you you tried to leave behind. And for me I found that that you wasn’t as bad as I thought it was.
I went swimming today at the local pool. On the whole, it was fine, cleaner than the pools in China, and, it goes without saying, more organised in terms of swimming lanes and etiquette.
The thing that intrigued me was the way in which changing rooms have been re-designed. In China and Korea, there’s a strict gender divide, which is the same as I was used to in England when I was growing up and using sporting facilities regularly. In this traditional design, the changing area is open with lockers lining the walls, communal showers (or baths in Korea) the norm. Now, in England, seemingly in response to the two twin English obsessions of fear of nudity and paedophiles, the changing room has been radically altered.
Gender separation is a thing of the past; now both sexes share the same changing area. A strange move you might think, as I did, until upon entering the facility, I noticed that there is now a series of small cubicles, with the occasional larger one for family groups. So what has been achieved is a greater compartmentalised visibility.
The immediately horrifying thing for me was that everyone kept their shoes on. I’ve really struggled with this since coming back; when I first arrived back home I felt a little bit sick when both my parents traipsed into the house wearing their shoes. It seemed inhuman, but not wishing to appear any more weird than they already think me, I followed suit. So in the changing room, what with it being damp weather, the floors had a dirty, watery, muddy tinge to them.
The other thing of note was how the changing room was packed out with big-boned mothers fussing over their children. In the past, unless the children were really young, they were left to get on with things themselves (as still happens in Korea and China).
Naturally, as a lone older looking male, I was immediately identified as a potential paedophile. Even if I was not, I suspect they suspected that I secretly haboured desires to kidnap and have sex with their children even if I myself was presently unaware of my longings. Why else would I be in a swimming pool changing room for God’s sake?
I battled past the looks of disgust and tightly clutched children and entered one of the micro-cubicles to get undressed. I’ve never been one to have much of an issue about nudity, and this has only lessened since being in Korea and being a bathhouse regular, so the whole thing seemed patently absurd. As I struggled to maneuver in my repressed cubicle, I noticed that there were bars on the top, so I was, in fact, in a cage. This presumably, is to prevent prowling, agile paedophiles from going about their grubby business in a vertical fashion.
I stowed my possessions in a locker, and tried to make myself as invisible as a semi-naked man who bears a figurative giant arrow with ‘PAEDOPHILE’ written on it could. The portly mothers glared at me as I rushed past desperately trying to make out that I hadn’t seen their children and even if I had I wasn’t interested, honest. But they knew, oh they knew alright. They had read it it the Daily Mail, all about my sort – lone men going to swimming pools – what possible reason could they have for going to a swimming pool? They make me fucking sick. They should be strung up by their balls – but those sick fucks would probably like that, wouldn’t they? Eh?
After an extremely enjoyable swim, I reluctantly reentered the danger zone. A heavily tattooed man glared at me as I entered the changing room, I suspect because he thought I was checking out his obese partner who was similarly tattooed and revolting. It was a situation where I felt like defending myself: ‘look mate, she’s dog rough, I can assure you I most certainly was not checking her out. In fact I wish my eyes had never been cursed with that ghastly aberration. Okay? You cool with that?’ I decided against this particular course of action and headed towards the sacred mothers of protection, who sensing my foul, child-sex crazed presence, had covered up their little princes and princesses before I could so much as dribble a lustful glance in their sainted direction.
Head now firmly bowed, I collected my towel and shower products from my locker. I felt thoroughly ashamed at my assumed intentions, but I needed to have a shower before I left. In my haste to escape the accusing eyes of the disgusted mothers, I had failed to notice where the showers were. I dared not ask anyone as they would probably think I was planning to grab a child and do something unspeakable with them in the showers, so I had to find them myself.
Like everything else in this bewildering changing room, the showers were housed individually in cubicles. It took me a little while to locate them as just couldn’t fathom out where they were as they looked the same as the changing cubicles. This extended walking around made me seem – as if further evidence were needed – that I was indeed a repugnant lone paedophile wolf on the prowl for some tasty child based action.
Having found them (the showers), I locked myself in securely. Next door, I heard the the tattooed moron and his frowzy hippo having a joint shower. I could hear their awful Leicester accents through the cubicle partition. I wished for deafness. But the anticipated pain came as expected: heavy petting – which as I recall was strictly prohibited upon entrance to swimming pools.
I moved quickly but I kept hearing sounds I didn’t want to hear. I finished up in record time and virtually sprinted from the shower cubicle, much to the shock of the protective mothers, who assumed I was attempted some sort of bird of prey maneuver upon their young, back to the minuscule anti-paedo cage cubicles. After getting changed in lightening speed, I exited the changing room quickly, shamefaced.
My Mum asked me the predictable question upon my return: ‘what have you missed?’ Knowing our relationship as we do, not even she expected me to say ‘you,’ but clearly an answer of sorts was not unreasonable to expect. I had to think about it, which, given my mother’s impatience (she’s one of those people who will ask you a question, and as you begin to answer interrupt you with another), resulted in her giving me the answer ‘nothing’ after I failed to respond in the permitted three seconds. I requested more time, which infuriated my mother who was now no longer interested in my thoughts to a question she herself had asked and answered for me.
Yes, there are friends I’ve missed, and yes, English bitter and pubs make me wistful, and I’ve definitely missed the food more than I thought I would, but the primary thing I’ve really, really missed is the general public’s acknowledgment of the importance of spatial awareness. I noticed it immediately upon getting on the plane from Hong Kong to Heathrow, a Quantas flight which was mainly full of British and Australians. As if by magic, nobody was staring at one another, people waited for others to take their seats instead of pushing past, and hung back a distance from other people instead of pressing up against them and breathing down their necks. It was a remarkable experience; a small enclosed area was treated to a sensible approach to the logistics of having lots of people within it, rather than the spectacle I have become accustomed to of an infantile free for all where everybody behaves as though the pre-selected seats will only be available for limited amount of time.
After the long flight, this spatial wonderland continued through the often frustrating and time-consuming process of immigration. For the first time in fours years, nobody was trying to knock my bag off my shoulder and engage in stranger frottage. There was a person sized space either side of me. I felt free.
I can already sense the collective sighs of the Serious Integrators reading this post. Yes, I’m moaning about queuing and the inability of people in China, and to a lesser degree, Korea, to accomplish this simple task; but as I was asked what I missed most about England – this is it – spatial awareness, an understanding and appreciation of the art of acknowledging the existence of people whom you don’t know. I’m also aware that there are cultural reasons for the chaos that occurs when you have to wait for anything in China and Korea. I know full well why strangers are not acknowledged and their existence is rendered meaningless because of these cultural traits. Contextually, it is perfectly logical. Nevertheless, upon my return to my home country, it was the thing I realised that I had missed the most.
As we traveled up the M1, I marveled at the sensible driving and adherence to lanes and traffic laws. It was a thing of beauty to me. No-one was beeping their horn, no-one was trying to cut anyone else up, there was a distance of often more than two whole car lengths between cars.
Taking a bus into town proved tricky. Initially, I got it wrong. The bus pulled in and two people began to get off; I bowled up to the bus and started getting on as they disembarked. ‘Wait!’ the driver growled at me as though I was a complete moron, ‘if people get off first, then there’s more space for you when you get on, you see,’ he explained. I paid my fare and got on shamefaced.
I’m going back to England for a bit. I must admit I’m looking forward t it, it’s been a long time. After nearly four years away, I’m sure it’s going to be a little strange. And cold; it’s a steady 19c where I am now.
Today is the last day of the semester. Finally. These extra four weeks tagged onto the end of the Autumn term have killed me.
So, here’s my report card for my time here:
THE UNIVERSITY: C+
Yeah, it’s a beautiful campus, but it’s in the arse end of nowhere. Anything of any consequence is a 45 minute packed bus ride away. The consequence is inconsequential. The administration is bewildering at best, incompetent at worst, and the contractual nature of the scheme (teachers on hourly rates) makes everything all the more impersonal and damaging to the students. However, everyone’s very nice about their incompetence, which helps.
STUDENTS: A
The students have been the saving grace of my time here. In general, I would say that they are of a higher ability level than those I taught in Korea; however, when we get to the advanced levels, Koreans tend to have better pronunciation.
ACCOMMODATION: F/A
Placing teachers on a working building site is completely unacceptable anywhere. Having said that, more generally, getting good – and I mean good accommodation- is relatively cheap (in most places); you can live very well here.
FOOD: B-
I’ve been completely underwhelmed by Chinese food. I miss Korean food like you wouldn’t believe. I now understand why Koreans take food away with them on holiday. Frankly, B- is generous, I’ve had better Chinese food in Korea and London. How weird is that? (Hong Kong is exempt from this judgement.)
PEOPLE: A
There’s no doubt that Chinese people are warm and friendly. There appears to be far less xenophobia than in Korea. However, if you worry about being stared at in Korea, don’t come to China: it’s stare city.
EXPATS: C-
Frankly, I’ve met some of the worst people in the world here. And I’ve spent significant time in Thailand. Having said that, It goes without saying that I’m exaggerating; I have met some good people and I’m in no position to throw stones.
CULTURE: C
I’m going to go out on a limb here: China’s pretty boring. On a day-to-day level it’s dull. Caveat – it’s probably got a lot to do with where I live.
HEALTH: D
It’s not quite India, but it’s close. There’s fake everything here, and that includes pharmaceutical drugs. Bear in mind that this is a country where restaurants use ‘drainage oil.’ I’ve had food poisoning three times since I’ve lived here (3 months); in three years in Korea I never had food poisoning.
Hospitals are dire. Filthy, crowded places with no privacy. I have a long-term medical condition and the drugs I was given from the hospital pharmacy were fake and I have suffered the consequences.
ZHUHAI: C
Zhuhai is not a place that holds the interest. It’s a border city at best, and that’s not much of a compliment. It’s not even a city really as the whole place is a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) created by Deng Xiaoping in 1978, and consists of three former fishing villages squeezed together. There’s no centre to the place as such; the best area is Gongbei, which is the border area with Macau. But even that is kind of bland.
CONCLUSION
This end of semester report suggests that the applicant could do better. Clearly, it is not necessarily the location, but perhaps the applicant’s unsuitability to the environment. What can be surmised through this report, and other ancillary evidence, is that the applicant misses his friends dearly and wishes he’d told them how much they mean to him. But he hopes they understand that he finds expressing such emotions difficult and and often uses other less obvious ways to tell them that he loves them and they mean they world to him.
Living overseas has eventually made me English. Before that I was British.
It has only been through increased exposure to Scots, Welsh, Northern Irish and Irish that I became English. Steadily, I’ve become even more English, which, as I make my imminent return to the Olde Country, I worry may be something of a confusing experience.
Due to a combination of historical and colonial factors, and a genuine fear of racist undertones, saying that you’re English has for some time been deemed a problematic way to describe your nationhood. Not so with the Scots, N.Irish or Welsh; but as I say, it is through my increased exposure overseas to people from these nations that I have eventually become comfortable in describing myself as English. Scots, Welsh, and to a lesser degree (depending upon other factors) Northern Irish, tend to eschew the ‘British’ tag for themselves, and will immediately identify me as English. This is not meant – usually – in any kind of disparaging way, but as a means of both an identification process for themselves, which happens organically when you live away from home for a significant amount of time, and also as a means of explanation to non-native speakers of English (and also other speakers of English) confronted with all these different accents and dialects.
This latter aspect I have found increasingly helpful to language learners. The long and boring battle between American and British English holds no interest to me; choose one to regulate your pronunciation and be done with it, then expose yourself to other forms of spoken English to increase your knowledge. It has to be said that it’s usually teachers from the UK – or ‘teachers’ in this case – who make silly points about the superiority of one form over another. Anyway. For more advanced language learners, a whole new world of interest opens up to them when they realise that there really isn’t such a thing as ‘British English.’ There’s a multiplicity of dialects, accents and languages from the UK; yet for most learners their only exposure is to Received Pronunciation, which about 2% of the population of UK actually use.
Teaching my students about these various dialects and accents had a dual purpose. One was to expose them to the tremendous variations in English there are in such a tiny area (the UK is about the same size as the province of China in which I currently reside, and has about half the population); the second was to encourage my students not be so overly concerned with accent and to focus upon pronunciation.
This has its origins in my surprise at just how many Chinese students would say to me how they were ‘embarrassed about their accent,’ and wanted me to teach them a ‘British accent.’ My surprise was initially because as I had come from Korea, where the fetishisation of the American accent holds no bounds, my ‘British accent’ was very much deemed second rate (God help Aussies, Kiwis and, bless ‘em, South Africans, teaching there). I have to admit I was a little flattered; ‘My accent? You want to … speak like me? Really? Oh, that’s so …’ Later, I realised that the same fetishisation of American accents that goes on in Korea is the same in China but for the ‘British accent.’
The off-shoot for me as a teacher – and a person – was further confirmation of my own Englishness. As I played the recordings of people from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, I realised something about mine and their distinct and unique cultural identities. I actually, for just about the first time in my life, felt a sort of pride in being English. Not in any superior or smug way, just in a way of an acceptance of my speech as an identifier of me and my cultural origin.
And so generally, as I mentioned above, there is this ‘organic’ process of a turbo boosted national identification that occurs for all people who live overseas. Just as I have become English, I presume others have become more American or more Australian and so on. This is because both within the small expat communities it acts as locator, and within the wider community in which you live it acts as an identifier. The latter can be both irksome and beneficial. In Korea, most foreigners are assumed to be American, which acts as a double edged sword for Americans themselves (loved and loathed at the same time), and for other nationalities as a minor irritation and sometimes a good thing. For example, for English people, the universal awe in which the Premier League is held has given an undue amount of instant respect and an immediate starting point for any conversation anywhere in the world.
So I never believe people when they say they’ve become ‘less [INSERT NATIONALITY HERE]‘ the longer they’ve lived overseas. In Asia particularly, you can learn the language, know all about the history and the culture, and have lots of friends from the country you now live in, but you’re always on the outside. For me, as someone who felt on the outside growing up in England, it suits me just fine, as, rather peculiarly, the distance from England has given me an opportunity to become what I never felt when I lived there.
Hysterical EFL adverts will often say: ‘TRAVEL THE WORLD!!!’ ‘EXPERIENCE A NEW CULTURE!!!’ ‘SAVE $$$!!! TEACHING KIDS OVERSEAS’
What they fail to mention is the variety of teachers or ‘teachers’ you will encounter upon your hysterical year(s) overseas. There are many categories and sub-categories, so I will merely highlight my personal favourites:
The Recalcitrant Drunk Teacher
The Recalcitrant Drunk (RDT) is obviously unhappy any time when drinking is prohibited. As the classroom is generally considered out of bounds, this puts the RDT in a foul mood, even though they may still be drunk from the night before. Common enemies are both real and imagined and are primarily focused upon the actions of the administration, secondarily upon other foreign teachers, and thirdly upon students. But that’s not all. The citizens of entire countries, usually the one the RDT is currently domiciled in, are also held accountable for their crimes against the RDT. The RDT rarely remains longer than a single year in one job, and will bounce from place to place spinning his tales of woe to anyone stupid enough to listen.
The Gangster Teacher
Quite possible my favourite category. The Gangster Teacher (GT) is normally white, middle class, and from a good family (though North Americans with Asian backgrounds also contribute heavily to this sector). The GT always speaks in inflected ebonics, will at all times practice the ‘pimp roll’, and dress in baggy hip-hop clothing. Referring to Asian women in a derogatory and racist manner is de-rigueur amongst the GT community, as is lying about your success rate with the aforementioned women. The GT will often state how his – and they are always male – aim is to teach ‘da language of da street, yo,’ to second language learners who struggle understanding more standard spoken English, and thus find language peppered with idioms, colloquialisms and slang completely unintelligible. The GT’s background is invariably described as ‘tough,’ because listening to hip-hop demands it to be so; it is unthinkable for the GT to describe his background as a ‘pretty normal middle class upbringing,’ though this is what it actually was.
The Serious Teacher
The Serious Teacher (ST) is strict with his/her students and disciplined in life. They criticise other teachers for drinking or ‘making other foreigners look bad.’ Speeches about being an ‘ambassador of your country’ are given on almost a daily basis. The ST will always spend hours learning the language of the country in which he/she lives, and will smugly whip out their phrases to local serving staff who often respond with looks of incomprehension and point at the pictures on the menu saying ‘you want this?’ The ST prepares lessons timed to the second of perfection, often incorporating seating plans (which while useful with elementary students, seem a tad patronising to university/adult learners). The ST is young and idealistic and will always attend every meeting, get-together and voluntary activity with gusto, ensuring that the majority of staff who employ the ‘make an appearance at the first one and then never go again strategy,’ look bad. The ST is despised by their students and loathed by their colleagues.
The Religious Crackpot Teacher
The Religious Crackpot Teacher (RCT) is a staple amongst foreign teachers in Korea. Being a country infused with evangelical fervour, the RCT is accepted with open arms. The RCT really teaches RE in English. A simple ‘directions’ lesson will utilise a map that includes several churches, Christian bookshops, buildings used for prayer group meetings, and of course heaven – if you go the correct way – and hell – should you go the way of Satan. The RCT always looks like he (it’s always a he) has something to hide, be that an interest in pre-pubescent boys, corpses, or a previous addiction to methamphetamine. The RCT’s presence fills a room like the icy hand of death.
The Hooray For Everything! Teacher
The Hooray For Everything! Teacher (HFET) is a happy, happy, happy blissful ray of positive yummy angel dust gooiness. The HFET sees only the good in the goodliness of good things. Every class she – and they are always women – teaches is ‘super fun happy time!!!’ and students learn at an early age the overuse of exclamation marks. Often adorned in Hello Kitty merchandise, the HFET rarely strays out of Kindergarten teaching, though they may teach elementary school kids at a summer camp, even though some of the older boys might be ‘quite horrid!’ The HFET loves everyone and everything except for horrid little boys. The HFET is always a woman and of the larger variety, and in her spare time enjoys being brutally buggered by Nigerian men.
The Failed Actor Teacher
The Failed Actor Teacher (FAT) just loves to bring drama into the classroom. There’s not a hope in hell the students will have a chance to act out a role-play while the FAT’s in the room. Pronunciation becomes an exercise in over-emphasis and thusly wholly inaccurate rendering by students who think that English is series of staccato vowel sounds, elongated pauses and exaggerated facial ticks. When listening exercises are presented to the FAT’s students, they have no idea what the speakers are saying as their failure to whoop and screech in the manner to which they have become accustomed is absent. As teaching is just another trial thrown at the FAT as they struggle vainly for the world to recognise their talents, FAT’s concentrate their efforts on forming local ex-pat drama groups which torture the expat community with their excreable nights of improv and hideously over-acted dramatical nightmares. The FAT is ever the victim and likes to wear scarves all year ’round, especially inside coffee shops.
The Edutainer Teacher
The Edutainer Teacher (ET) always plays guitar. Always. The ET is the zany cunt who puts on costumes, clowns around, plays guitar, and makes life so much harder for the rest of us who just want to teach, because students will invariably request a song because their previous teacher used to always play songs to them. The ET is a favourite of the local staff, who just love it when he/she gets up at staff events to belt out a ‘couple of songs,’ but ends up playing half a dozen because someone, somewhere clapped. A grimacing experience for the other foreign teachers, which requires copious amounts of alcohol to unlock the tightly clenched teeth afterwards.
The Just Here For The Hookers Teacher
The Just Here For The Hookers Teacher (JHFTHT) is commonplace most obviously in Thailand, but is also frequently spotted in China. The JHFTHT has absolutely no interest whatsoever in teaching. Whatever their sexual peccadilloes may be and whatever it takes to service them is what matters to the JHFTHT; what it takes to service these needs is money. As the JHFTHT is completely lacking in talent or skill of any kind, teaching EFL is an obvious route. The JHFTHT will bounce from school to school, much like his cousin the RDT, and has not the slightest interest in the culture outside of the brothel. The JHFTHT is easily identified as they are always fat, balding, middle aged white guys, with a scruffy appearance and poor personal hygiene.
The Serious Integrator Teacher
The Serious Integrator Teacher (SIT) is seemingly specific to Korea. The SIT supersedes the old school ‘apologist’ who merely defended all things Korean, as the SIT is an extremist who hates all other foreigners with a passion, and truly believes that when Koreans see him they don’t just see another whitey but a brother in arms. All other foreigners are termed as being ‘privileged’ and discredited for being white (despite the SIT always being white and ‘privileged’ and not all foreigners being white). The SIT had never had these thoughts before coming to Korea and acquiring a Korean girlfriend; but the SIT is a master of revisionism and will state that he (always a he) has ‘always’ felt this way about Korea, they ‘chose’ to come to Korea (not that they couldn’t find a job in their home country), and that they have always maintained an abiding hatred of the Japanese. The SIT is a passionate online commentator, though their actual life is very distant from the reality they portray virtually as they have many expat friends who are all white and frequently hang out in expat areas.
I have now had three serious relationships since living permanently in Asia. There was no laughter, no joy, no light hearted moments; just bleak uncertainty, dour introspection, that eventually led to an ignoble severing of all ties.
But not really.
My three ‘proper’ girlfriends, the ‘serious’ relationships (as you can see I am troubled by this term ‘serious relationship’), all shared a common theme of incessant photographic documentation. Wherever I have been, whatever I have been doing I have been photographed doing it.
Food is a particular favourite. I have yet to have an undocumented meal. There is detailed photographic evidence pertaining to my dietary habits over the last four years. I am never allowed to forget what I have eaten, nor am I ever permitted to begin a meal without first it and then me and then her and then both of us together eating it being photographed.
All meals are delicious. The photographic evidence says so.
***
My previous relationship ended for a variety of reasons. One of them was due to my transformation into a photographic refusnik. My ex was a photo-addict; I was terrorised by photography. In addition to the obligatory food photos, there were walking photos, on the computer photos, just got out of the shower photos, looking out of the window photos, watching TV photos, relaxing (or trying to) at the sauna photos, and even sleeping photos (who does this?). I found it very stressful. I felt like a subject under observation.
I don’t like having my photo taken. I’m not very photogenic and I have difficulty smiling; it’s hard to smile when you’re posing for something you hate doing.
One day, I rebelled. ‘Stop taking my fucking picture, will you?’
She recoiled in fear. I knew she hated swearing and loved photography, thus my verbal thrust was double-edged.
‘What?’
‘Last photo – ever – no more. I can’t stand it,’ I growled.
‘Come on! You know how much I love photos!’
‘But I don’t! I hate how the camera always has an input – often before I do. It gets to do everything before me. And frankly, your photos of me doing everything are creepy. It’s like having a stalker who I happen to live with.’
‘Ha ha! A stalker you happen to live with! I like that,’ she smiled. Stalking appears to have less of the fruitcake associations in Korea than in does in the West. It almost seems as if it’s viewed as a bit ‘cute.’
From that day forth I broke free from photographic subjugation. I would start eating my food as soon as it hit the table. I would vindictively swirl the pretty pattern made in the foam of my latte. I would refuse to stop and pose. If the camera was raised to do the self-shot I would turn my head away.
***
When my ex and I split up, she painstakingly deleted all the photos with her in, leaving all the ones of me. There were over 2000 photos of me.
***
On our recent trip to Macau, a familiar pattern emerged. We were unable to move, eat or absorb anything without it being photographed. Everyone else there was also manically taking pictures of everything. At the ruins of the Mater Dei Facade, I saw one man taking a photograph of a sign that said ‘No Food Allowed.’
Photography strips the joy out of life. It tries to capture experience to the extent that it is now the experience. The experience is going somewhere to take photos proving that you went somewhere and did something. The experience alone of something and somewhere is no longer enough.
I made a bad decision to leave Seoul based upon the end of a relationship and a dislike of the weather. I’ve found myself really missing the place and the friends I made there. You can keep the weather, though. The expats here leave an awful lot to be desired generally. I have made a few sort of friends, but I guess they’re more acquaintances. I don’t feel any sort of connection with them. I have got to know precisely zero Chinese people beyond colleagues, students, and my girlfriend. Chinese people seem friendly enough, though, if that doesn’t seem to be a complete contradiction in terms (it isn’t, I’m not that friendly).
I also really, really miss Korean food. I’ve been quite surprised about how utterly indifferent I am to Chinese food, especially considering that I live in Guangdong, the home of Cantonese food. I’ve yet to have anything amazing, and I find the dining culture rather rushed and boring. In Korea, wherever I went in the country, I tasted something new, interesting and very often amazing; I like the sitting there and getting drunk aspect to it all as well. In China it seems like the restaurant owners want you to leave almost as soon as you’ve sat down, and the drinking culture is limited to a host of routine and unimaginative bars. You can keep Korean beer, though.
Whereas I travelled quite a bit in Korea, I’ve got no interest in doing so in China. I think this has much to do with the relative difference between a small country with a great transport system, and a big country with a not so good one. Also, the travel experiences I have had in China have not been good (see rant below).
Chinese hospitals are awful. I have a long-term chronic health issue, so for me this is a big issue. In Korea, the hospitals were like 5* hotels and I got the best treatment I’ve ever had. As I take daily medication there is also the very serious issue that China is the home of fake medicine. This worries me beyond belief. Fortunately, Macau and Hong Kong are fairly easily accessible, although it’s not cheap to go there and access is not always so easy (see rant below).
The university I work for is so badly organised it’s hard to comprehend how they ever get anything done. The most convoluted option is always the option taken. There is zero consideration given to either the needs of the students or the teachers, everything is geared to the workings of the administration. The administration could not care less about the students or the teachers. I miss my old university, which was in retrospect, very well organised and efficiently run. Foreign teachers were actually given a voice, whereas here, there is none. This goes as far as pay and conditions; I am paid hourly – so sick or holidays = no pay. No office, no facilities; I come, do my lessons, leave. Some teachers might find this appealing, but if you are one of those teachers who actually cares, you’ll understand what this means in reality. It means you have no say, it means you have no proper means to prepare, it means you are on the outside, the hired help who comes and goes. The (unpaid) holiday time given is also far worse.
***
I went to Macau for New Year’s Eve. I really like the old town in Macau, but that’s not why most people go there. It’s all about casinos for most mainland Chinese (who make up the vast majority of visitors).
We got there late because T had to work until 8.30pm. It took us two hours to cross the border at Zhuhai. It was a frustrating experience, not particularly because of the queues, but because of the cretinous behaviour of the Chinese travellers in said queues. Yes, I know all about cultural difference, etc, etc, but it still doesn’t stop situations of complete idiocy from being situations of complete idiocy. At Zhuhai, you have to cross the Chinese border, and from there you have a short walk through no-man’s land to the Macau border. The Chinese side was irritating because it confirmed just how grating to the ear I find Cantonese. It’s unbearable. It’s like a constantly aggressive attack of angry whooping bird call turned up to 11. All Cantonese speakers seem to find it necessary to have insanely loud phone conversations; a guy behind was speaking so loudly that I could hear him above the full volume of Iceage I’d been using to block out the sound of a room of full of 500 people who all appeared to be simultaneously arguing with one another.
Whilst I was going slowly mad with aural intolerance, people would be attempting to barge into the lines, which had metal barriers on either sides. Eventually, I moved T in front of me and stood with my arms across from either side blocking the intruders’ passage. I ignored anyone who attempted to pass and eventually they gave up and stood behind me probably slagging me off. Good. This calmed down and eventually stopped the closer we got to immigration.
After the Chinese side, we needed to go through Macau immigration. This was a fucking nightmare. As we got into the crossing room (?) the authorities decided to open up two more lines. T and I happened to be close to one of the newly opened lines as we entered the room so we moved forward to wait for the gate to open. As we did, it seemed like the whole of China moved on mass to take our place. Middle aged men pushed T out of the way, and jostled with me as they moved their parties in front; people were literally running like village idiots towards the moon from one end of the room to where the new line was, so within seconds where there could have been an orderly queue there was a swell of people pressing up against one another, all screaming at relatives and friends to join them.
I very nearly lost it and had to restrain myself from slapping some 50 year old guy who literally knocked T off her feet.
The end result was, of course, that within seconds the line was the same length as all the other lines.
In the queue, with people pressing up against me, I felt more alone than I’ve ever felt. What am I doing here? I don’t belong here. These people are fucking idiots. Why can’t they just show a little maturity and common sense? This is how children behave.
Again, I realise that some will interpret this as me showing some form of cultural superiority, and some will say I’m being racist. Frankly, if questioning why people can’t behave in a manner that shows some sort of consideration for others is either of those, then fine, fill your boots.
***
I realise that I need a break from Asia. I’m beginning to feel frazzled and worn down from situations such as the above. It’s beginning to get to me for the first time in nearly four years, and I don’t want to lose it because I really do understand that it is cultural difference. I need to go back to Europe for a while. I actually do want to visit England, but it’s difficult for me as I have a complicated relationship with my family that makes it hard for me to return. The very thought of it makes me feel stressed.
***
I realise that it’s now time for big decisions; do I stay in China for another year and give it a go? Do I go back to Korea? Do I try somewhere new?
My current train of thought is that I will probably leave China at the end of this academic year. Whereas I loved Korea right from the off and was fascinated by it, I’ve felt complete indifference to China. Actually, that’s not quite true; I’ve felt utter revulsion towards some of the expats here, and a feeling of alienation I didn’t feel in the slightest in Korea. There are of course other options. Like many people who end up in Korea, Japan was my first choice, but Korea won out due to the financial incentive. Of course, my time in Korea turned out better than expected, but I still have a hankering for Japan. I really enjoyed my holidays there and it was the place I intended to live from when I decided to teach EFL overseas. It’s a distinct possibility in a number of probabilities.
It’s not often that an album of vocal harmonies rocks my musical world, and it’s even less often that I find such music completely captivating, but it’s happened here. A truly unique and spellbinding album that bears repeated listens and should probably incorporate words like ‘ethereal’, ‘timeless’, and ‘transcendent’ in its review, but I’ll refrain as that would be a bit wank.
9. The Fall – Ersatz GB
Not premier league Fall, but not half bad either. After last year’s brilliant Your Future, Our Clutter I had high hopes that another golden age of The Fall was upon us, but it was not to be. Still, a very good Fall album is better than most of the pitiful offerings served up in the rock world, and this has some great songs such as ‘Taking Off’; ‘Greenway’; ‘Happi Song’, and my favourite ‘I’ve Seen Them.’ Lyrically, Smith is back in good foaming at the mouth lunacy and inspired genius.
8. Iceage – New Brigade
Over the years I’ve found it increasingly easy to hate punk. This is largely due to the sheer narrow-mindedness/crypto-facism of people who refer to themselves as ‘punks’, and the by definition limited scope of the music. So it’s both refreshing and confusing when a band like Iceage come along that shatter all these negative preconceptions. Refreshing because unlike many ‘punks’, who seem to consist of 40-something bores who spend the majority of their time screaming about ‘hipsters’ and bellowing on and on relentlessly about left wing politics until the right begins to look very, very appealing, Iceage are a group of 18 year olds from Copenhagen whose lyrics are obscure (yet seemingly angry and alienated) and mercifully free of all the sermonising bollocks that you often get with ‘punk’. Confusing because this lyrical content is not locked into the ever so tedious anger-by-numbers-anti-something-or-other, and the music though raw, aggressive and energetic, is more sophisticated and intoxicating than the usual hopelessly directionless guitar mauling that you come to expect from any band terming itself punk. It seems very unfair, therefore, to label Iceage as punk; if they’re close to any sound then it’s contemporary take on post-punk, Joy Division/Wire, with some thrash thrown in and accompanied by some rhythmical drumming that keeps the contorted energy flowing.
7. Nicolas Jarr – Space Is Only Noise
In an interview with the Guardian, Nicolas Jarr said:
“I honestly feel we’re at the beginning of a renaissance in music. It’s an amazing time. Mount Kimbie, James Blake, a lot of underground LA hip-hop – it’s happening. We’re all kids making music without studios, producers or other musicians – without anyone giving us money or telling us what to do – because we want to make really honest work. That’s different. That’s never happened before.”
Rubbish, of course, as innumerable musical trends have begun with ‘kids making music without studios, producers or other musicians,’ most of which influenced Jarr’s work and that of the artists he mentions. ‘Space Is Only Noise’ has been hailed as a ‘singular take on electronic music’ which is only true if you don’t know anything about electronic music. It reminds me very much of a whole swathe of early-mid 90s electronica, most notably St Germain’s Boulevard, a jazzy-housey type thing, and truly something of a landmark album. Whilst Jarr’s album isn’t anything new or ground breaking like Boulevard, it is a very decent piece of work and not at all as po-faced and humourless as most electronic music tends to be (particularly the likes of SG).
6. Lykke Li – Wounded Rhythms
If only all pop music could be like this. Alternately euphoric and heartbreaking, Wounded Rhythms is sing-a-long in the car-tastic and moodily down a whisky in a dive bar despairing. As someone who often feels this range of emotions in the space of, say, 40 minutes, I feel this album is perfectly suited to me.
5. Radiohead – King of Limbs
Poor Thom Yorke rises from his bed of nails at 4am every morning. Removing his sackcloth and ashes, Poor Thom, his eyes dried like a salt-bed desert from the ever flowing tears he sheds for the folly of mankind, slips on his hairshirt and hairpants. Grimly moving through the rubble of his five storey town house (Poor Thom requested his interior designers give him ‘Grozny-Chic’, which required them to mortar bomb and machine gun the house until it was virtually destroyed), he makes his way to what is left of his kitchen. Living a life of few luxuries, Poor Thom has restricted himself to a self-termed ‘scavenger diet’ of ‘found food’, which he sees as a new art form. Furtively, the lead singer pulls out a week old loaf of stale bread that he’d stashed behind the remnants of the partition wall. He brings the loaf close to his face and examines it as though he has never encountered one before; eyes darting, checking for snipers and dedicated fans, Poor Thom savagely tears into the loaf. He stops mid-chew and looks to his one remaining cupboard. He knows that his downfall awaits him inside, but he cannot resist. Tentatively, he reaches inside and paws for his Pandora’s Box. After what seems like seconds, his hand grasps his fate. Unable to look at what his hand contains, Poor Thom begins to wail a mournful falsetto entitled ‘What My Hand Contains.’
What his hand contains is a jar of Robinson’s marmalade. Poor Thom stares with anger flecked eyes at the ‘gollywog’ emblem that adorns this particular brand of preserve. ‘Racist marmalade!’ he screams at the jar and hurls it against the wall; as goey dribbles of sugary orange remnant slip slowly to the floor, Poor Thom scoops some in his war weary palm and whispers ‘I won’t let this happen to my children …’
Meanwhile next door, guitarist and sound boffin Little Jonny Greenwood rises from his bed of mirrors. He catches a glance of himself reflected in his mirrored walls and sees the dark circles of his red eyes powering back into the chambers of his inner being. Little Jonny’s five storey town house is entirely decorated with mirrors. On every wall, every floor, every available space a mirrored surface reflects back an echo of never ending reflection. Little Jonny keeps out the light with mirrored shutters, and allows only antique candles from the 18th Century to illuminate the gloom. A never ending loop of Kraftwerk’s ‘Looking Glass’ echoes permanently from mirror concealed speakers around his lair:
The young man stepped into the hall of mirrors
Where he discovered a reflection of himself
Even the greatest stars discover themselves in the looking glass
Even the greatest stars discover themselves in the looking glass
Sometimes he saw his real face
And sometimes a stranger at his place
Even the greatest stars find their face in the looking glass
Even the greatest stars find their face in the looking glass
He fell in love with the image of himself
And suddenly the picture was distorted
Even the greatest stars dislike themselves in the looking glass
Even the greatest stars dislike themselves in the looking glass
He made up the person he wanted to be
And changed into a new personality
Even the greatest stars change themselves in the looking glass
Even the greatest stars change themselves in the looking glass
The artist is living in the mirror
With the echoes of himself
Little Jonny, naked, grubby, and emaciated from his diet of clear soup (from which he can see his reflection), furtively makes sure he is not being watched by his Master next door. Over the last few months, Little Jonny has become convinced that he is being watched – which he is, all the time, by himself – but also by his shell-shocked neighbour and schoolboy chum. Poor Thom has been haranguing Little Jonny to ‘find more weird sounds! We need more weird shit! The new Radiohead album will be released in five years time!’ Little Jonny, though, locked in an ever increasing inward battle with multiple mirrored images of himself, has found himself unable to produce the unique sounds demanded of him. In desperation and in fear of the wrath of Poor Thom, Little Jonny has taken desperate measures.
Little Jonny presses on one of the many mirrored walls, and it gives way to his scrawny touch to reveal a darkened chamber filled from top to bottom with TV monitors showing pictures from other darkened chambers. Little Jonny takes his seat in his chair or ‘command post’ as he calls it, and shouts ‘Attention!’ The still grainy images on the screens begin instantly to move, revealing the outline of human forms. What emerges is a bank of images displaying what appears to be children of different ethnic and racial backgrounds. Behind them are rows and rows of complex electronic equipment.
‘Pakistan – report!’ cries Little Jonny.
‘We are sorry sir, nothing to report,’ replies a sad, cherubic faced boy in rags.
‘What!!! No new sounds?’ screams Little Jonny, ‘what is the meaning of this?’
‘We are sorry, Sir. We are working around the clock, but still, no new sounds come … We try field recordings, warp them, chop them up, slow them down, but … nothing.’
‘Nothing? Nothing can come of nothing!’ screeches Little Jonny.
‘Eritrea – report! cries Little Jonny.
‘We tried, Sir, your idea … ‘ says a weary eyed Eritrean boy.
‘The last gasps of dying goat? And? And?’ squawks an animated Little Jonny.
‘It just died, Sir …’
‘But the sounds – the sounds! Had you heard it before?’ cries Little Jonny
‘Oh yes, Sir, but that is why it’s not a new sound …’ replies the Eritrean boy.
‘Silence! I will not tolerate your insolence! Send me the recording instantly – wait! Send it via a bird of prey, that will be more authentic.’
‘I cannot do that, Sir,’ replies the boy with a shiver.
‘In the name of Thom why?! I tell you to do something and you do it!’ screams a demented Little Jonny.
‘Birds of prey do not migrate, Sir. Perhaps a Swallow? But even then … might it not be better if I email it to you in a .flac file?’
‘I will not be corrected! I strike thee down! Guards – take him away!’ roars an irate Little Jonny.
Hooded figures emerge on the monitor dragging away the kicking and screaming child.
Little Jonny stands up, naked and proud, and addresses all the monitors showing the images of his global army of child sound slave labourers.
‘Here this and here it good: you have seen what just happens if you disobey my command. I want my weird new sounds and I want them soon. The new Radiohead album is due in five years’ time – we do not have any time to waste. Get them to me and you will be rewarded. Fail – and, well – they’re will be no failure on my watch.’ He defiantly flicks the switch and all the monitors go blank.
Little Jonny cautiously returns to his mirrored outer lair. He tip-toes across the hallway and uncovers the peephole he secretly made while Poor Thom was sleeping. He peers through to observe his Master applying another elastic band to his scrotal sac. Poor Thom, concerned that as he becomes older his distinctive falsetto might lose it’s intensity, has taken to applying consecutive elastic bands to his ballbag in the hope of fighting the tide; however, due to this practice, he discovered that his voice was actually becoming higher as he got older, which gave him another ‘art thought.’ He confided in Little Jonny that his new ambition was that by the time of the release of the next Radiohead album his voice would be so high that the first note he sang would instantly shatter all the glass wear in his fans’ homes. As most Radiohead fans have shaven heads and wear glasses, he duel hope was that their spectacle glass would also fragment upon encountering the piercing tone. The putative track ‘Shatter Your World’ is the one that is causing Little Jonny such headaches, as Poor Thom’s demands have been that his insanely high vocal pitch be accompanied by ‘noises never heard and sounds not yet invented.’
But this is not all. In a cryptic note that took Little Jonny 3 months to decipher (Poor Thom has invented a new written script based upon a combination of paleolithic cave paintings, hieroglypics, and infant children’s scrawls), Poor Thom revealed that the end game of his scrotal tightening procedure was to produce an album entirely in sonar. Poor Thom wrote, ‘not enough has been done to incorporate the needs of our non-human fans. What about the dogs, bats and dolphins that all dig our music? Get to it now, son, get me some sonar shit. My voice will be ready at that time.’ The note gave Little Jonny another nervous seizure, and he wondered whatever happened to the days when he just set down some standard rock guitar licks to some standard melodies …
And so with King of Limbs we finally get an album from Radiohead where they give up any kind of pretence of being any kind of conventional rock band. There’s no crowd pleasing ballads or guitar led rock tunes, there’s just this sound that sounds uniquely Radiohead. The album received mixed reviews, and it appears is not all that popular with the fan base, some of whom still seem to think an Ok Computer type album is just waiting to come out. As someone who didn’t care for the band much until Kid A, it seems to me that King of Limbs is something quite special, distinct, and proves that Radiohead are still moving forwards.
4. Tom Waits – Bad as Me
Tom Waits has been around forever. Just prior to the release of his debut album, Closing Time, Tom slithered down the tree and said to Adam, ‘I’m guessing you’re not a betting man,’ and turned to Eve, ‘but baby, you sure look like you’d enjoy a bite from a delicious juicy apple, why don’t you mosey on over here and sink your teeth into this, lil’ darlin’?’ The rest is history.
The history of Tom Waits is that you’d be hard pressed to find a bad album in his catalogue. In fact, you won’t find one. The range of quality is from unbelievably brilliant to absolutely fucking wonderful. Bad As Me is somewhere towards the latter end.
3. EMA – Past Life, Martyred Saints
This young lady is certainly very cross about a few things. And who can blame her? Life’s shit, so why not say so? Erika M. Anderson is a self-taught musician who produced a lot of this album at home, which explains why it sounds so fresh, so vital, and so honest. Scathing lyrics, ‘Fuck California – you made me boring,’ to brutal tenderness, ‘I wish that every time he touched me left a mark,’ show an energy, anger and willingness to expose what most keep hidden. Musically, it’s got banks of feedback, subtle acoustic guitars and pleasing harmonies; Erika’s voice is rich, expressive and beautiful.
As you may be able tell, I’m really quite fond of this album.
2. James Blake – James Blake
It took me quite a while to ‘get’ James Blake. The first few times I listened I thought he was a bit too keen on the vocoder and the music was a bit too sparse (even for me who likes space in music). Repeated listens revealed the genius within. It’s really something special to find something that sounds utterly unique – almost heart stopping – as so much sounds the same and everyone’s nodding towards somebody else. Not that there isn’t stuff here that isn’t influenced by other things of course, it’s just that what Blake has done with his sound is shape it to mould to the fragile beauty of his vocals and lyrics so that the sparseness is completely fitting.
A remarkable debut.
1. Ólafur Arnalds – Living Room Songs
It was always going to take something special to beat James Blake, and that something special is this short neo-classical album by Icelandic composer Olafur Arnaulds. Based around Arnauld’s exquisite piano playing, these seven tracks are melancholic, melodic and beautifully nuanced. I often like to read when I listen to music, but this is an album I find so affecting I end up just sitting there letting my mind drift upon the waves of the music. I completely adore this album and have been listening to it on a daily basis for many months now.
