someone else's apartment

Even though it has all my stuff in it, this apartment doesn't quite feel like home yet. I feel like I'm housesitting, like I'm visiting a friend who happens to never be home when I'm here. It's like someone else lives in this apartment, someone who likes all the same books I do and has a stack of Korean ramen in the pantry. Someone who wears the same size clothes as I do and has a picture my nephew finger-painted. I recognize this stuff, but it doesn't feel mine.

I guess maybe I'm too used to living out of a suitcase. I'm used to borrowed spaces and carefully chosen memories; I'm used to temporary, simple, sparse, uncomplicated.

But here, I have all my stuff. I have clothes I haven't worn in years that I didn't even remember I had. I have an entire fridge to fill with foods I like (even though it currently has only taco shells, colby jack cheese, and chocolate milk). I have pictures on the walls of everything I've ever done that's made me happy. I live here.

Everywhere I've lived in the past two years has felt more like an extended-stay hotel than a home, and I can't seem to wrap my mind around the permanence of this move. I can buy a huge picture of the Brooklyn Bridge if I want to because this living room is mine. I can put a single pan in each cupboard because I don't have enough things to fill an entire kitchen myself. I can get a driver's license with my address on it because this is the only address currently associated with my existence.

I'm still waiting for this all to feel real. Maybe when I start making friends I can invite over, or when something breaks and I have to figure out how to fix it myself. Maybe it'll be when I get a dog that's registered under my name or when I have to argue with the cable company over my bill. I just don't feel like this is my actual life. It feels too grown up, too stable.

I'm not saying I'm unhappy; just baffled. When did I get to be a month away from turning twenty-six? How did I end up with a job that enables me to afford an apartment like this all to myself? Who decided it was a good idea to sell Graeter's at the grocery store when there's no one to monitor my eating habits? I feel like just last week I was trying to understand how my shower worked in a foreign country, and now suddenly, I'm living in a parallel universe where I have a microwave and a lease with only my name on it. 

Sometimes I'm afraid I might wake up and still be heading to work in Cincinnati, my greatest accomplishment being that I memorized the Dewey Decimal System without being asked. If you had asked fifteen-year-old me what I'd be doing in ten years, never in a million years would she have guessed this. I wish I could go back and write her a little note, tell her to hold on tight because life is going to go places she'll never imagine. And one day, she'll be sitting in a little apartment in California, and the only thing she'll know for sure about her life is that it's awfully blessed.

newer sometimes really is better

I'm in New Orleans this week for a training conference courtesy of my new school. I haven't had much time to explore the city, but I have been able to get out and see a handful of touristy sites. The last time I was in Louisiana was spring break my sophomore year of college. Hurricane Katrina had hit a few months before, and I joined a few thousand other college kids who gave up their spring breaks to dig through moldy old houses and help put this city back together. Needless to say, the city has changed a lot in the last six years. And so have I.

My college roommates and I often say that if we could do college again, if we could share a house again, we'd so it so much better this time around. We'd be less selfish, maybe a little more patient, perhaps leave fewer dishes in the sink. The years that have passed since we moved out of that little house on the corner across from the elementary school have taught us far more than our just-out-of-high-school minds would have acknowledged possible. Simply put, we're better now than we were then.

I often think about this in regards to Korea. If I could get my hands on a Time-Turner and drop myself back on that airport bus that gave me my first glimpse of Seoul, I'd do it in a second. I'm not ashamed of anything I did in Korea, nor do I regret any of the choices I made. I just think I could do Korea better if I had another chance. I could have more grace with the kindergarteners who are struggling to learn an annoying new language. I could focus more of my conversations on what's going on in the lives of my friends instead of pining over a lost relationship that took up far too much of my energy. I could create more exciting activities to use in the orphanage rather than playing with the same flashcards every week. I could travel an hour by subway to see my friends just because I love them.

It's disappointing to think that in some ways I wasted my year in Korea. I didn't learn as much Korean as I should have, and I didn't spend as much time trying to understand the culture. Sometimes I wish I could write two-years-ago Nikki a letter and teach her a few polite Korean words before she even gets on the plane.

Fortunately, I'm not 100% a Debbie Downer. I also recognize that had I moved to Korea the day I graduated from college, I'd have crumpled like an autumn leaf under an elephant's shoe (elephants need to wear shoes for the sake of hyperbole. just go with it.) before I even made it to baggage claim. I'd never have been able to navigate Thailand as fearlessly as I did, and I'd probably have eaten McDonalds every day due to the sheer familiarity of it. When I moved to Korea, I was the best version of myself yet, and I experienced it the best way I knew how at the time.

I guess this is all rolling around inside my head because I'm starting my first "real" year of teaching in a few weeks, and I know I'm not going to be magnificent right out of the gate. I'm going to finish the year, look back, and think, "Man, I could have done a million things better if I had known then what I know now!" I'm going to make a lot of mistakes and I'm going to do a lot of things I'll have to forgive myself for. But as long as when I get to the end of the year, I'm better than the girl who is about to walk in the door in two weeks, I've done alright. It's only if I get to the end of a year and haven't changed even a tiny bit that I'm failing. Everything else is just a learning curve.

Author's note: If you've been around the blog for a while, you're probably wondering why I haven't posted in two months then come back with this weird blob of self-reflection. It's just been that kind of a summer, folks. But don't worry! I've found all kinds of spectacular story-making activities in California, not to mention my upcoming school year with a bunch of awkward middle schoolers. And who knows, maybe we'll get lucky and Cali will fall off into the ocean. That'd make one heck of a blog post, don't you think?

just a job

As I fill out hundreds of online job applications and tweak my resume to fit everything I can find, I'm struggling with what, to me, is a very important question.

Do I need to have a job with purpose, or will a meaningful life suffice?

I could go right back to Cincinnati and the temp agency that hired me before would take me back and find a desk for me to fill. I can join another company that doesn't so much need employees as trained typing-monkeys and use the money they give me to pay my bills while I live the dream. But the dream doesn't ever have me wondering who stole my stapler.

I've always been a huge proponent of "don't live to work - work to live!" Back when I was desperately low on cash and trying to find any possible way to pay my bills in Cinci, I would have taken nearly any job. As long as my job gave me enough money to pay my student loans, I reasoned, it didn't need to be the most fulfilling job in the world. I just wanted to make enough to go bowling when my friends did.

Now, however, I'm standing on the edge of that same cliff, wondering if automatically deposited checks are enough. My job in Korea wasn't my favorite; hagwons are all kinds of messed up and I'd much rather be teaching Macbeth than Old MacDonald. But I knew every day that what I was doing mattered, that my efforts caused noticeable changes in the lives of my students. On top of my 9-5, I was involved in so many things that made my life exciting and left me feeling full. That job gave me the freedom to eat out with my friends after church and travel to Thailand during the summer. It was pretty much a win-win.

So the issue that I'm faced with is whether I want to return to a job where I'll basically have to tune out during working hours. I want to teach again, but I want to teach in an inner city school with underserved kids who maybe wouldn't have the opportunity to go to college unless someone can help them. Is it enough to just teach in any old school? Could I live in a nice little suburb and teach polite-ish kids who are automatically on the fast track to superficial success? What if I have to go back to a temp job in a cramped office? One year from now, will I be glad I stayed in America or will I wish I'd returned to my home-away-from-home?

Granted, if I go back to Korea, I'd be teaching the same little rich kids I had before in the same affluent area I'd gotten used to. However, in Korea it was more about what I did on my evenings and weekends than how I punched a time clock. I could go back and volunteer at an orphanage again. I could work at the soup kitchen again. If I went back, I'd really like to get involved with North Korean refugees this time around.

Can I make a life here that's just as meaningful as my life there was?

When people ask me what my favorite thing about Korea was, I tell them I liked who I was there. I liked that even when I was eating ramen and watching Friends, I was on an adventure overseas. I liked that I made a concerted effort to love others in whatever tangible ways I could offer, teaching English or ladling kimchi jjigae. I like that I always knew exactly how much time I had left there, so I made sure never to waste it. I'm scared I won't be as good at that here.

So that brings me back to the question I can't figure out. If I happen to be offered a job that doesn't offer any intellectual stimulation and doesn't make the world a better place, can I still be content knowing that my only opportunity to make a difference lies in my extra-curriculars?

yes, it's true. i'm not married.

I know what the Bible says: that it is not good for man to be alone, that marriage is a symbol of Christ's unending love for the church, that an excellent wife is worth more than jewels. I recognize that raising a family is one of the most significant ministries a person can be a part of, and that it's probably a good idea to have some kids around to drive me to the doctor when I get old.

But I also know that Jesus spent thirty-three years on this earth without a "significant other" other than the Father he served, and I'm pretty sure he wasn't whining about it. Paul says in his letter to the Corinthians that it's better to stay single and that singleness is a gift.

Now, I recognize that I'll never be Paul, and I certainly will never be Jesus, and statistically it's incredibly likely that I'll get married. But that doesn't mean I need to spend every moment of my singleness eagerly waiting for this cursed season to end so I can start my "real" life.

I was talking to one of my friends the other day about someone we both know who is single. My friend made an offhand comment that she thinks this person isn't really the marrying type, but she immediately corrected herself, saying she hopes she's wrong. It was almost as if saying that someone might not want to get married is an insult, that it's implying that he'd never reach first class status. I didn't mention anything in the conversation at the time, but the comment has stuck with me. Why do we assume that it's wrong or shameful for someone to choose a path other than marriage?

Certainly there are people out there that choose to remain unmarried for the wrong reasons. If you're too selfish to want to share your living space, or if you're terrified of commitment, or if you're dating too many people and can't imagine choosing just one, maybe your priorities aren't quite in order. But I think a perfectly sane person can also choose to not walk down the aisle.

I know too many women who have given up on their former goals because their husbands had something else in mind. I know couples who've only been married a year or two who already wish they'd made a different decision. And I have friends who're pondering the kinds of adventures they could have had if they'd waited a few years before tying that knot. My heart breaks for those friends, the ones who thought getting married would solve all their problems and make them complete. The thing is, it doesn't take two halves to make a whole in marriage; you both have to be whole from the start.

I wish I'd realized this sooner. I spent all of college sizing up my friends, trying to decide if any of them would make a decent husband. I felt like every new class was a race to snatch up the single guys, and I was secretly disappointed every time someone chose to pursue one of my friends because I couldn't figure out why no one ever wanted me.

Sadly, this mindset didn't disappear when I was handed my college diploma; I continued to believe I would be second-rate until someone finally took pity on me and agreed to be my husband. I begged friends to set me up, I tried every online dating site anyone mentioned, and I scouted every room I walked into for The One. And man, was I miserable.

It wasn't until I was sitting on a rooftop in southern India that I realized what an amazing gift this season has been for me. I'm committed to no one but Jesus. I've been able to quit my job and move across the world because no one else was counting on me. I've had the beautiful pleasure of traveling across Asia on my own, making friends for the day with other lone travelers and scheduling my entire trip the way I want it. When I teach, my students are free to be the most important ministry in my life. If I had a husband and children, my time would be divided, but I'm able to allocate all of my energy to the kids in my classroom.

Being single doesn't mean I've failed. It means my life doesn't look exactly like yours, but neither does my haircut. That's okay. I'm deeply grateful for the life I have, and I sincerely hope you are just as thankful for the life you've been given. And sure, if someone comes along with whom a lifetime commitment is the logical conclusion, then fantastic! But I'm not going to start by desiring that commitment then seeing if I have any takers. I don't think my singleness is something to "fix". Getting married is going to have to be a significant improvement on what I've already got going on, and I have to be honest, this life I've got is pretty spectacular.

So don't feel sorry for me that I don't have a ring on my finger. I'm not waiting for my life to begin; I'm smack in the middle of living it. And if I have to dance to "Single Ladies" at a few more weddings, that's not the worst thing in the world.

i know you mean well (i think)

I'm on a search for a new city to live in. I've been at my parents' house for a week and a half now, and after my vacation to visit Lauren in San Francisco, I have to figure out what comes next. I know I'm not going back to Seoul, but that only rules out one out of a few hundred thousand in the world. After living in Korea's capital, I really miss my big city, so I pulled up wikipedia's list of the biggest cities in the US. I scratched off a few I'm not interested in and called the rest my potential homes.

The thing is, the more I talk to people here, the more discouraged I get. Every time someone tells me that I need to "just get this out of my system" or that I should "do this while I'm young so I can settle down soon," a part of me curls up inside and hides away. I don't think that my desire to travel, my desire to make friends all over the world, my desire to see cultures other than my own and learn the way the world is so intricately knit together is a virus my immune system is working to get out of my body. I don't think this is some kind of inferior state, a mistake where I'll recognize my folly and come to my senses and have a "normal life." What if this is just me? What if these passions are part of my DNA, what if this is only the beginning of a life that seeks to know the world in a way you can't simply by reading about it?

I know people mean well when they tell me that they want me to live close by. I know deep down that they are just trying to find a way to say, "We miss you when you're not around. Please stay." But when I throw out a city I'd like to explore and it's met with a "eh, how about Columbus?", I feel like they're telling me I'm a failure. I'm not saying that everyone who chooses to live in Columbus is a failure by any means. What I'm trying to articulate is that when people tell me I shouldn't live in San Francisco or Chicago or Bangkok, I hear that I can't. I know they're just trying to keep me close to home so they don't have to drive as far to visit, but what I hear is completely different. I hear that I'm not clever enough, not strong enough, not brave enough, not capable enough, not something enough to handle living the life I dream of. And all it makes me want to do is prove them wrong.

Honestly, I probably wouldn't mind living in Columbus, but I want to move there because God tells me it's the next step on my journey, not because I "can't handle" living anywhere else. I want to know I chose my next city on my own terms, not because I was afraid of disappointing everyone who refuses to drive more than an hour to get to me. When things get hard (as life inevitably does), I want to stand firmly on the conviction that I'm living exactly where God told me to be and not have to wonder if I'm somehow in the belly of a whale.

I went to the doctor the other day, and the woman who checked my weight and blood pressure and such asked me if I was excited to be home. I told her I'm excited to start a new adventure, and she said she hopes I get this out of my system before I have kids. With the most polite smile I could muster, I informed her that when I have kids, they'll just have to come with me.

not really for you

I've been wanting to post on here nearly every day since I got back, but there's a little voice in the back of my head that talks me out of it every single time. You're not overseas anymore, it tells me. Your story isn't interesting right now. If your life were a movie, everyone in the theater would have gone to the bathroom or the snack stand for the time being.

But this morning, as I was surfing the internet, trying to figure out what on earth it is people do online for hours at a time, a thought struck me. Do you really write for them anyway? Or is this blog for you?

Oh right. It's for me.

With the blog being my primary means of communication with most of my family and friends while I'm overseas, I've gotten accustomed to the idea that things I post on here need to be interesting, exciting, entertaining. I feel like I need hilarious stories and breathtaking pictures to make my posts worthwhile, but honestly, I'm probably the only one who consistently reads my posts anyway. Well, me and my grandma. Hey, Grandma!

I know it's March and the last thing anyone's thinking about is New Year's Resolutions right now, but I've been thinking about them lately, and, as we just established, this is my blog. So we're going to talk about resolutions. Or bucket lists. Something about goals. Yeah.

The ever-present teacher in me came up with this really cool (note: "really cool" is subjective here) idea for a lesson about being specific in your writing. A car didn't just drive past; a 1969 silver Camaro roared down the windy country road. She didn't just fall down; the pig-tailed girl in the polka-dotted dress toppled out of the tire swing. You get the idea.

This idea of being precise in your descriptions can translate to being precise in your goals. "Go to the gym more" is ambiguous, hard to reach. So are "make more friends" and "travel." The goal is too vague to be practical; it's hard to wake up in the morning and think, "Ahh, today I shall be healthier." What does that even mean?

Our goals should be specific, concrete. Instead of "take more pictures," which is indefinite and difficult to measure, give yourself a tangible goal. Perhaps you could take ten pictures at every family gathering, or find one thing a week to take a picture of.

Yesterday I was in the car with my mom and little sister, and we were talking about bucket lists. My former roommate, Emily, had a "30 before 30" list that she kept in a spreadsheet on her computer (she made my heart so happy), and I always thought that was a fantastic idea. I'm discovering as I sit in my dad's big comfy chair day in and day out that adventure doesn't usually just happen to us; we have to go out and make it happen. Sure, it's challenging and we'll often be stretched more than we thought we could handle. But I'd much rather regret the things I did than the things I left undone.

I'm not going to force myself to write thirty goals for the sake of having a "30 before 30" list. I'd rather have five goals I'm actually passionate about than come up with thirty on the spot just to round out this blog post. I'm sure I'll get to thirty eventually. And I'll organize them all in a spreadsheet. And it will be magical.

Some (specific) things I'd like to do before I'm thirty:
- Perform an original poem at an open mic night
- Read a book in Central Park
- Hold hands and skip across the Great Wall (is this legal? eh, being in chinese prison can be a goal too)
- Teach at an underprivileged school in my licensure area
- Get five new stamps in my passport
- Perfect one recipe from each country I've lived in
- Memorize a book of the Bible
- Attend a conference or convention about something I'm passionate about once a year

Oh, and I suppose one of my goals is to finally write about my time in India. It'll show up here eventually, once I figure out how to boil three months of watching God do amazing things into a handful of paragraphs on a backlit screen.

And thus begins the countdown

Beginning with the moment I stepped off the plane last fall, I’ve been keeping track of my time here. Whenever I met a new friend, I was asked the same series of questions: what’s your name, where are you from, and how long have you lived here. I still get asked those questions, but now instead of listing how many weeks or months I’ve called Korea home, I tell people how much time I have left. I can’t remember when it switched, but it turns my stomach every time. I’m leaving Korea in three weeks and two days.

I’m ready to go home. As amusing as living here has been, I long to be able to make small talk when I’m shopping, to talk to my waitress, to find food I recognize at the grocery. I miss driving my car and listening to the radio; I miss smiling at strangers and knowing they’ll smile back. I want to be able to ask for directions and buy movie tickets and read street signs. I miss my country.

But unfortunately, I can’t return there unless I leave here. And I love here. I love the students I get to see every morning, I love the hustle and bustle of big city life, and I love the people I fill my time laughing with. I’ve been really happy while I’ve been in Korea, and I feel like the more I clutch onto my last days here, the more they drip through my fingers like water. I just want to freeze time and not forget these moments.

Which is why I haven’t written anything on here in the last month. Every time a day happens that would make a good blog post, I wrap it up as tight as I can and hide it away inside my memory. I know it sounds silly, but I feel like every time I write a story on here to share with everyone back home, I have to give that story away to you. When I got here, I wanted to do that. I wanted to break the stories into little pieces and send them out to anyone who was willing to guard a tiny bit of my memory. I liked knowing that people back home were laughing at my mistakes and talking about my pictures. But  right now, I just want those things to belong to me. I’m afraid if I share them with anyone, they won’t be worth as much to me anymore, and I need them to stay important. I feel like instead of life happening to me and being something I should share, life is happening for me. Moments that are so heartfelt and emotional feel like they only belong to me, like if I shared them it would somehow cheapen them. I’m overwhelmed by the joyful quality of my life here, and I’m desperately holding onto it with everything I am.

I know you want to read the stories. I rode an elephant in Chiang Mai last week, and one of my kids made me laugh so hard yesterday that I couldn’t breathe. I got kicked out of a coffee shop for being foreign, and I made friends with a girl named Banana on the night train in Thailand. The stories are funny and exciting and what life is all about, but right now, I just want them to belong to me. I have pictures of all those things and hundreds of other moments, but every time I go to upload them to facebook, I become strangely possessive. I want to be the one who looks at the pictures; I want to be the one who knows all the stories. I don’t want to let any of it go because if I do, I have to admit it’s almost all gone.

I know one day I’ll look back on the blog and wish I could read all the moments I haven’t written. One day, I’ll forget about the man who gave me his seat on the subway because I was crying or the family waving goodbye to the girl getting on the night bus to Bangkok. I may not remember all those stories, but I hope I remember the feeling of being filled with gratitude and appreciation for the story I’m living. I hope I can remember being so passionately in love with the life I’m living that I didn’t want to risk losing a single drop of it.

So that’s why you won’t be reading the stories just yet. Maybe once I get home, I’ll write down the ones I know people will enjoy the most; or maybe I won’t. Maybe you’ll have to sit across the table from me, sipping an overpriced (but fair trade!) Starbucks coffee and ask me about the time someone peed on my pillow or the time a prostitute showed me pictures of her precious two-year-old daughter and I hugged her because I didn’t know the Thai words for what I wished I could say. Maybe that’s the way stories are meant to be shared anyway, watching the other person’s eyes light up when they laugh or fill with tears when the story is hard to bear. I’ll always appreciate the power of the written word, but right now, I don’t want an audience. I want a conversation.

And I want to slow time down a little bit before Korea disappears into just a memory.

There's a baby laughing at the end

I heard once that vulnerability is beautiful. If that's the case, then look out. This is about to be the prettiest blog post you've ever seen.

Saturday morning, I attended a friend's housewarming party. There were tons of people crammed in the living room, and the tables were overflowing with food. Someone brought out Catch Phrase, which is (in my opinion) the devil's favorite game. I mean, come on. Whose disgusting idea was it to put words in a beeping piece of plastic then make a room full of people pass it in a circle like it's about to explode while everyone else in the room shouts words and phrases like a Tourette's support group? That thing is a frickin' anxiety attack with batteries.

Where was I? Oh yeah. Partially to avoid the incessant beeping, I headed to the back patio. A tiny cluster of my friends huddled together under blankets while two or three strummed guitars. Esther and Anne's patio has a really great view of part of the city, and there's not much in the world that's better than singing along to Ke$ha played on the ukelele. There was nowhere else I wanted to be at that moment, and I remember thinking that sometimes, life is so beautiful that it's almost unfair. (Actually, I said that out loud, and promptly got mocked for sounding desperately like a Hallmark card.)

I overstayed my welcome at the housewarming party, and by the time I got home, Tiffany was ready to make dinner. There's this little restaurant near my old church that serves my favorite meal in all of Korea, and I've been begging Tiffany to figure out how to make it so I don't have to fly all the way back to Korea when I'm craving it in the States. We ran to the mart for ingredients and wine, and returned to her apartment to experiment. We had a lovely dinner (not quite the same as Cafe Comeon, but still delicious), followed by singing along to youtube videos because we were too lazy to walk to a noraebang. A few glasses of wine later, I headed back upstairs to my apartment, where I should have gone directly to bed.

I've been debating back and forth whether I should actually write this part of the story. For some reason, I feel like if I skip over it, I'll lose faith in my own blog. I started this blog to record who I am while I'm in Korea, and yet I still want to hide behind the facade of "silly storyteller" instead of showing any significant emotion. On top of that, I process the world around me by writing about it, and I know that it'll take me a lot longer to move past this if I ignore how much it hurts. I suppose I could write the post then never actually post it... but I'd really only be doing that because I'm afraid of people knowing I kind of suck. Alright, here it goes.

Without going into, well, any detail, I ended a friendship on Saturday night. In all fairness, I had been clinging to it for all the wrong reasons, and I'm certain my life will be healthier without it. In the vaguest terms I can muster, I finally acknowledged that a specific relationship was not what I had taken it to be, and I was crushed. He doesn't read my blog, so I could probably whine and complain about how much I think he wronged me, but that wouldn't really do any good. Making someone else appear small only ever accomplishes diminishing people's opinion of you.

I guess the reason I want to write about it, then, is because I'm heartbroken. I've never entrusted one person with so many of my hopes before, and being rejected hurts. If you've known me for longer than ten minutes, you likely know that I don't date (and if you don't know me, then this post is probably really awkward for you). I have no idea why I refuse to trust anyone but myself, but I tend to push away anyone who seems even remotely interested in dating me. This guy was different, though, and I fell ridiculously fast. It turns out I need to be a little more careful that someone's ready to catch me before I jump.

I feel like since it wasn't actually a relationship that I don't deserve to hurt. How can you miss something you never actually had? But there's a strange part of me that appreciates the pain. Hurting means that I cared deeply for him, no matter what labels our relationship had. The fact that my heart is broken means that it loved well in the first place, and I can't find it in me to regret that. Perhaps my trust and hope were severely misplaced; but at least I tried. I cared more about someone else than I did about myself, and I think that's pretty good.

The one good thing about not dating is that you never have to go through a break-up. I know this isn't the same thing, but isn't a break-up really just when a relationship that mattered suddenly ends? Unless you count when I was fourteen, I've never gone through a break-up before, and it's honestly quite strange. I feel overwhelmingly disappointed and a little empty, like I set down a part of me and forgot to pick it back up. I can't help but wonder what I could have done differently to change it, but I guess you simply can't make someone love you by sheer willpower.

The crappiest part is that it's making me unbearably homesick. I cried today at CostCo, just because I was in a CostCo. I had to walk away from a bag frozen hamburgers because they reminded me of my Cincinnati friends and all the barbecues I'll be missing once it gets warm. I miss the people I'm used to hugging when life gets hard, and honestly, I miss how much more life made sense before I moved to Korea. I'm hurt and confused and hurt some more, and I don't know what to do to make it go away.

Wow, so um, that was pretty heavy. Here's a video of a baby laughing to lighten the mood:

I'm different now

Author's Note: I'm fully aware that you'd rather hear about how I chased seagulls on the beach than my sappy life reflections. Unfortunately, as my dear friend Angie once said, this isn't a blog about Korea; it's a blog about me while I live in Korea. I love writing stories, but I don't want to look back and only have stories. I'm changing more than I ever knew I needed to, and I want to remember what all this growing up feels like.

As I close in on the halfway point in my adventure, I find myself reflecting even more than usual. Okay, so I'm more reflective than a well-polished soup spoon on an average day; I'll give you that. I've been keeping lists (upon lists upon lists) in my planner of blog topics to commemorate my six-month anniversary, and tonight I decided I'm going to start writing them out. I like making lists, and the next handful of posts are sure to be chock-full of them. I'll change the formatting on the bullet points to spice things up. Don't worry about thanking me; I know you appreciate it.

Without further ado: The Ways Korea Has Changed Me: For the Better.


I wear makeup now.
I never really wore makeup before I moved to Korea. Well, that's not exactly true; I always had powder on my cheeks and mascara on my eyelashes, but I usually put those on without looking in a mirror, so on a good day they were in their proper locations on my face. One night on the way home from work, Tiffany needed to stop at a cute little cosmetic shop to get eyeliner, and she talked me into buying purple eyeshadow. I bought it and kept it in a bag on my dresser for about a week before I decided to give it a shot; the first day I wore it, I was terrified I had put it on wrong. Much to my surprise, people complimented me! It's almost as if makeup makes me look prettier. Who'd have thought?

I'm more independent.
My parents hate this one because it means I don't think twice about visiting Japan sans a chaperone, but I really can't get enough of being on my own. I thought that navigating a ginormous Asian city would be cripplingly terrifying, and it never ceases to amaze me how much I really can do on my own. Right after college, my parents bought me a GPS because I got lost nearly every time I tried to get to Springfield from anywhere but Springfield despite having lived in Ohio my entire life. With that kind of track record, I can see why they were concerned about the prospect of my trying to find my way around a city that has no street names, but look at me go! I've only gotten "I'm-gonna-die-oh-my-gosh-where-am-I?" lost once in six whole months; in fact, I usually face geographic confusion with a sense of mild amusement. It turns out that panic actually doesn't help you find your way hardly at all, while looking at a map and using common sense are almost guaranteed to assist.

I'm more independent, part two.
I remember right when I got here, I wrote a post (this one, actually) where I talked about how beautifully content I was sitting in a coffee shop alone, watching thousands of people walk by the window. I said in that post that one day, sitting alone in a coffee shop was likely to make me homesick and unbelievably lonely, and I'm still kind of waiting on that day. I've discovered in the last six months that I really enjoy my own company. I like hanging out at a coffee shop alone, shopping alone, walking down the street with no specific destination in mind alone; I like being alone. I always kind of had the idea that if you're in public by yourself, it's probably because you're too annoying to have friends (which I suppose I shouldn't entirely rule out as an explanation for my solitude). Don't worry; I still really enjoy being around people and it's unlikely that I'm going to turn into a hermit or anything. I've just come to appreciate myself a lot more, and I don't need people around to make me feel like I'm worth something.

I write things more.
This point feels kind of silly considering I've been quite sporadic in my posting in the last month or so, but I honestly have been writing more things. I'm keeping most of them to myself for now, and I'm going to be obnoxiously cryptic for the time being so I don't have to be embarrassed later on if my writing ends up just taking up space on my hard drive. I've written a decent amount in the past (most of which will never be seen), but I've become more intentional with what I write, and I've been using words to explore life as I try to figure it out. I'd like to take this opportunity to be the first to acknowledge that my paragraph about how I'm becoming a more practiced and focused writer is entirely incoherent. A little dose of humility is always good for the spirit.

I join different things.
In Cincinnati, I was really involved in the Children's Ministry at the Vineyard. When I say "really involved", I mean I used to live with the family who ran it. I'd take my shoes off when I got to church, and I'd taken naps just about everywhere I could find something soft enough to be considered a pillow. I belonged in DiscoveryLand, and I liked it that way. In fact, if you're not a member of my family or one of my college roommates, five bucks says I met you while I was stamping kids' hands or giving a puppet a Texan accent. Therefore, when I came to Korea, the easiest thing for me to join would have been the Children's Ministry, but I decided that would be the one place I considered off-limits. I wanted to challenge myself to try something that didn't come as easily as breathing, and I'm so ridiculously glad I did. Thus far, I've been involved in the Christmas play, the homeless ministry, the orphanage ministry, a human trafficking conference, and a prayer team. I know I overload my schedule like a high school senior desperate for community service hours, but I honestly can't see my life any other way. I love all the things I do, and I just feel so crazy-blessed that I have the time and opportunity to do them.

And now... The Ways Korea Has Changed Me: For the Worse.


My eating habits suck.
At home, I was a decent cook. I never made gourmet meals or anything, but I cooked for myself almost every night, and I was really good with a CrockPot and a toaster oven. Here, I've got two gas burners. That's it. No oven, no microwave, no George Forman grill. Two gas burners. In the last six months, I've gotten a little better at making food that looks moderately edible, but my primary diet still consists of American junk food people have mailed to me. Basically I subsist exclusively on Cheetos and Peanut Butter M&M's unless I pick something healthy up on the way home (like Burger King).

I don't clean, like, ever.
I never really thought I was a messy person, but I never lived by myself either. It turns out my propensity to clean up my messes was really only a ploy to get my roommates to like me. Now that I have no one to impress but myself, my apartment looks like crap. I still have Christmas decorations up, my laundry stays on the drying rack until I wear it (folding is for losers), and I must have decided at some point that keeping dishes in the sink is more practical than, you know, washing them. Every purse I own is in a pile on the floor, and I can't even sit at my table because of all the crap covering it. Every single time I walk in the door, I wonder who the heck left such a train wreck of a mess in my apartment before I throw my bag on the ground and dig out a space to sit on my chair. I really should be more embarrassed about my inability to do anything domestic.

I watch a lot of TV.
Here's one I actually am embarrassed about. When I worked at the library, I read a few books a week, and I really only kept up with House. However, since coming to Korea, I've gotten addicted to nearly every television show in America. I guess I could blame it on my desperate desire to feel like I'm still a part of American culture, but really I think I'm just lazy and cheap. Reading a book involves strenuous activity, like moving your eyes back and forth and occasionally turning the page, not to mention the seven to eight dollars I'd have to spend purchasing a book to read. It's so much easier to pull up sidereel.com and dramatically collapse onto my bed to watch shows I've never heard of. I am actively trying to fix this one, though, so if you have any books you think I should read, um, mail them to me.

I had about twice as many things on the original list I wrote, but I think if you made it through all that, you deserve a gold star. Next up: things I already know I'm going to miss about Korea.

A thankful post

Thanksgiving is already half-over here in the ROK, but you wouldn't know it. I'm at work, just like any other Thursday, and there was something in my soup that looked like tiny brains. My five-year-olds are discussing the current political affairs ("Teacher, did you know four people died? And thirteen more got hurt? It is North Korea's fault!") while they practice Christmas songs and color pictures of what they hope Santa brings them. I'm sitting at my desk, refreshing the google newsfeed every five minutes. My hands are shaking as I type this, but I don't know if I'm cold, scared, or sad. Maybe all three.

Yesterday was one of the worst days of work I've had in the three months I've been here, and I stayed up until one in the morning crying to Carie about how things are just not the way I hoped they'd be right now. It's impossible to not imagine what I'd be doing at home right now; fighting with my family over which Thanksgiving dinner to attend and reading the Black Friday ads to map out our 5 AM shopping plans. It's my first Thanksgiving abroad, and it's harder than I thought it would be. It doesn't help that one of my kids just suggested playing "bomb shelter."

I could write a post about all the things that feel like they're falling apart. I'm sure quite a few of you are curious about my exchange with the principal yesterday, and I probably have more information than the American media is providing you regarding the bullies up north and their not-so-secret uranium plants. But today is a day for being thankful, not miserable, and I firmly believe in the theory of "fake-it-til-you-make-it" during circumstances such as these. And thus, here is a list of things I am thankful for today.

I'm thankful that I have a job to hate. This time last year, I was unemployed and couldn't afford to buy groceries, and now I have a job where I get to listen to "Butterflies in the USA" while watching some really adorable kids try to sing and sign along. Sure, my boss pissed me off yesterday, but doesn't that happen with any job?

I'm thankful that I'm American. I'm not the sentimental, patriotic type, but in light of current affairs, I'm so proud that my passport has an eagle on it. Yes, you could say that the US just has its hands in everyone else's business, but it's because of America's willingness to assist countries who need it that I am safe right now. One of my Canadian friends posted something yesterday about how he was waiting for Obama to send more troops over, and I felt a little rush of pride. No matter how much you hate the US, most foreigners here are trusting America more than their own countries to stand beside South Korea, and that makes me so thankful.

I'm thankful for adventure and the ability to chase it. It's mind-blowing that I'm in a geographic location where I can hop to Japan for a weekend just to see a movie, and I'm so incredibly blessed that I had the opportunity to follow this crazy dream of moving to Asia alone. Life is a bit surreal when you're literally in the middle of living out your dreams, and I'm just so grateful that all of this is possible.

I'm thankful for skype and the people who have made time to talk to me on it. It's remarkable that I have the technology to talk to my friends and family on the other side of the world whenever I need them, but in some ways, it's even more remarkable that I have so many people to talk to. I haven't been able to keep in touch with all the people I care about as much as I would like, but that's one of the best problems I've ever had to deal with.

I'm thankful for my family, and it's been far too long since I've seen them in person. I'm so grateful for the way my family has handled this ridiculous adventure of mine, particularly now that things are kind of dangerous. Even though my parents hated the idea of me moving to Asia (and my mom even threatened to put a box-cutter in my carry-on so that I wouldn't be allowed on the plane), they supported my right to make my own choices and dream a little too big. My parents, sisters, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and cousins have been so great these past few months, sending me packages every few weeks, talking to me on skype all the time, and reading this blog religiously. Thanksgiving's really hard without you, but I hope you're enjoying the seaweed paper I sent home especially for this occasion.

I'm thankful for the family I have here. I'm thankful for the other teachers who commisserate when the school makes me want to pull my hair out and for the people at Jubilee who have listened to me cry more times than I'm comfortable admitting. I can't believe I've only known you all three months, and it already devastates me to think about the fact that we'll all be going our separate ways far too soon. Without you all, I'd be heading home right now for sure.

I'm thankful for forgiveness and grace and God. His faithfulness and blessings are completely undeserved, and they are the reason everything else on this list exists. All good things come from God, and I have more good things than I ever thought I'd have.

Wow, that worked amazingly well; I'm much more peaceful and grateful than I was an hour ago when I started typing this. Happy Thanksgiving, fellow Americans. We have a lot to be thankful for.

In case you were wondering, I'm crazy.

It's been almost a week since I last posted. I've been a little busy, what with fall retreat last weekend and that silly job thing I go to every day, but that's not why you haven't heard from me. I'm kind of embarrassed to tell you the actual reason, but I owe you the truth, don't I?

Two weeks ago, I discovered that my blog has a built-in counter. Google provides me with a "Stats" tab that it took me four months to find (modern day Sherlock right here), and it tells me EVERYTHING about my blog and its viewers. I mean, really, I have your social security numbers and a PDF of your great-grandmother's birth certificate.

When I first discovered this tab, I had significantly more page views than I expected, including regular visitors from Malaysia, the Philippines, Germany, Poland, Ukraine, and Russia (to name a few). My teensy mind has had a heyday trying to process this, and I've gone through the following phases:

1. Pride: I must be the best writer in the WORLD! People from countries everywhere check my blog and it is absolutely because I'm a frickin' champion. I have more fans than JK Rowling, the Olson twins, and Big Macs combined! My words are magical and my jokes are superb, and the second I leave here I'm going to publish a book of all my amazing and unique stories! Now if you'll excuse me, Elizabeth Gilbert's agent is on the line.
2. Fear: Wait, I have how many people reading my blog? And one of them found it by googling the keywords "health check + my butt"? Oh my goodness what have I done? What if the school finds out I've been posting videos of the kids? Or if I start getting stalkers waiting outside my building? I need to delete this blog and change my name to something less famous, maybe "Angelina Jolie."
3. Curiosity: I wonder if there are any other people in Korea who had the brilliant idea to write down their experiences? I'm sure I must be the only one, but I'll check just in case...
4. Self-loathing: There are 191,000,000 results on google for "Korea blog". And every single one of them is better than mine. None of my experiences are original; if my family and friends found out about how many other Korea blogs there are, all of them with a much higher standard of writing, they wouldn't need me anymore. A drunk monkey could type a better commentary on Korean culture, and he'd look way more awesome doing it. I'm a failure.
5. Self-pity: I can't believe I even tried to write a blog, and I doubly can't believe people actually read this garbage. I bet the thousands of page views are just my grandma refreshing the page every six minutes. If my friends here found out about all the "new" and "exciting" things I've written about (that aren't new or exciting for anyone who's been here more than five minutes), I'd be the laughing stock of East Asia. I also had to google whether it was "laughing stock" or "laughing stalk" - ie, I'm the most pathetic English major on the planet.
6. Denial: Blog? What blog? Oh no, I'm not the one who wrote that mess. You must have me confused with someone else; my name's Angelina Jolie.

It's quite hard to formulate a coherent blog post when your mind is tumbling around like wet gym socks in a dryer (man, I wish I had a dryer). I considered turning my blog into something "for the masses" and writing about more of the business side of my adventure. I'm sure if I hadn't had a friend to explain everything to me as I went through the application process, I'd have followed random foreigners' blogs too. I could write about the different kinds of schools, what types of restaurants to avoid when you're not with a Korean, and what songs you can put on your ipod to keep yourself from bursting into tears on the subway. But I'm not very advice-y. I tend to write about life as I see it, and my life is messy and hilarious and (if I'm being honest with myself) pretty average. I don't know how long she's had it up, but I realized today that the tagline on my friend Angie's blog says "it's not a blog about korea. it's a blog about me... while i live in korea." Amen.

This blog isn't really about Korea. Sure, I've told some stories that wouldn't happen in the States, and honestly, most of you probably wouldn't be reading if I didn't live in a foreign land where tiny octopi are considered a delicious contribution to a lunch tray. There are hundreds of other places on the internet that you can go if you want to learn what it's like to live in Asia; this blog is about what it's like for me to live in Asia. Some things are horribly commonplace and some things are pretty special to my adventure, but it's all just my life. This blog isn't going to become any bigger than it needs to be because it's already far bigger than I ever dreamed. And I'm not going to stop writing it, no matter how many other Korea blogs out there have already covered my material. I'm not writing for them; I'm writing for me.

I'm reading a book called Bittersweet right now, and there's a little excerpt that I love. Shauna Niequist (who is fabulous, by the way) talks about art and how many people there are in the world who are creating and how we can get lost in the shuffle.

     The world doesn't need another band, per se. It doesn't, strictly speaking, need another book or another photograph or another album. The general world population will survive without one more stage production and one more gallery showing.

     This is the thing, though: you might not. We create because we were made to create, having been made in the image of God, whose first role was Creator. He was and is a million different things, but in the beginning, he was a creator. That means something for us, I think. We were made to be the things that he is: forgivers, redeemers, second chance-givers, truth-tellers, hope-bringers. And we were certainly, absolutely, made to be creators. 

So there you have it. It's funny; I knew conceptually that moving to Korea was going to teach me a lot about myself, but I don't think you can really know what that means until you're in the middle of it. I expected to "grow and stretch and change", but I don't think I ever thought about what that would look like. I find that I'm constantly bombarded with things to consider: business ethics, culture shock, morality, standards of education, my own brokenness and incompetencies. I thought my blog would be a place where I'd post pictures and tell funny stories before they slipped out of my mind, but it turns out my little website is where I rummage through this world of sensory overload and learn what it means for me to become a part of it.

And you're just crazy enough to read about it.

Two month mark

Two months after I moved in with the Wilkinsons, I got a job at the library.

Two months after I started at the library, I started working at other branches on my days off.

Two months after I started the job at the day care, I quit.

Two months after I started the job at iSqFt, I quit.

Two months after I started the job at Amend, I started applying for jobs in Korea.

Two months after that, I moved to Asia.

For those of you who haven't yet caught on to where this is going - I've been in Seoul for two months.

*taps fingers on desk*

The past week or so, I've been fighting a general discontentedness. I mentioned it to my friend, Angie, yesterday, and she told me that most people go through a bout of homesickness/depression/what have you every three months. She said the first one hit her a month early, and it sounded to her like that's what  is hitting me right now. The more I considered it, the more it seemed to fit; that is, until I realized my own pattern.

I can't keep doing something for longer than two months.

I'm not throwing in the towel, and if you offered me a ticket home, I wouldn't take it (sorry, Grandma!). I still adore my job, my friends, the subway system, street food, you name it. But I'm just feeling... I don't know... meh. (yes, "meh" is the best word my college-educated mind can produce. thank you, miami university.) I'm in a routine now, and I'm really, really terrible at routines. I don't like when things stagnate, and I've been here just long enough to start to feel antsy. Every day, I get up at the same time, take a shower (washing everything in the same order), eat the same breakfast, walk the same route to work, and wrangle the same group of kids. I don't want a new adventure or a new life; I just want to be excited by this life again. I don't get lost trying to find McDonald's anymore, and I haven't pulled out my "100 Things to do in Seoul" book in weeks. I can read Korean now, and I finally have enough equipment to start preparing meals at home. Things are starting to steady out, and I'm not good at steady.

This is the part where I get nervous. What if this is all there is? What if my life follows this same pattern every single day until I die? What if I never meet new people or see new things or travel to new places? I'm struggling against the urge to flip my life upside down again. I could break my contract and go teach in Thailand, or sign up for a DTS somewhere in Africa, or go to seminary here at Torch. I'm in the middle of Asia with only two suitcases worth of possessions to my name; I could literally go anywhere or do anything. The thing is, though, I don't actually want to leave. I'm happy here, like that deep-rooted happiness where you can fall face-first into a pile of manure and still think "man, my life is good." I'm growing and changing literally every single day, and if Paris Baguette isn't my soulmate, then I don't know the meaning of the word. For this season of my life, I belong here - I mean really belong - and I wish I could stop fighting against it.

Due to my "meh"-ness, I spent today robotically completing my tasks and teaching my kids. After school on Mondays and Thursdays, I teach an extra class for kids who used to attend Gate but are now in elementary school. Usually it's the most painfully boring part of my day, but today was a little different.

While I was teaching, one of the boys kept peeking inside his backpack. I finally asked him what he was doing, and his eyes got huge, as though he truly thought he had been invisible the whole time. Jokingly, I asked if he had an animal in the bag. The kids all laughed, but David just crept lower in his chair. "Seriously, kid. What do you have? A mouse?" He shook his head. "A turtle?" He stared. I stared. "David, do you have a turtle in your backpack?" He nodded. "Like... a live turtle?" Another nod. "I'm... going to need to look inside your backpack."

Yep, the kid legit brought a reptile to class in a ziplock bag. And I was worried my life was getting boring.

Vitamin drinks at Seoul Station

I'm really hesitant about posting this story because I know it will make some people uncomfortable, and I hate doing that. But I've adamantly avoided this aspect of my life thus far in the blog for fear of coming across a certain way or alienating people who don't believe the way I do, and I've decided recently that's not fair, not to me and not to God. This is what my life is about, more than the adventures and hilarity, and I'd really like to write about it.

I recently joined the homeless ministry at Jubilee, Jehoveh Jireh. My natural instinct was to run to the children's ministry, but I was afraid that I'd get burnt out on children if I had to work with them on Sundays too, so I found another place to serve. I missed the soup kitchen excursion last weekend because I was at Everland, but yesterday morning, they had a prayer walk at Seoul Station. I'd done prayer walks in college, and they always consisted of a group of people wandering around in circles talking to God and each other. Pretty non-threatening activity, really. When I got to the station, the Jehoveh Jireh ministry divided up the group into teams, and each team had a Korean speaker. I thought that was kind of odd, but it turns out I had misunderstood the whole game. We each took two vitamin drink things (they're a huge deal here, but I honestly can't figure out why) and set out in teams of three to hand them out. This was still a good plan; I like having something tangible to say "God loves you in a practical way" (which is why the Vineyard and I got along so well). The instructions were to wait for God's prompting and ask people if they wanted us to pray for them when we gave them the drinks. I was honestly pretty relieved; no matter who I picked to give my drink to, Miji would be the one doing the talking since she was the one who spoke Korean. My reluctance toward being faithful is such a shame.

We walked down the street and handed out a few of our drinks, but when we passed a guy sleeping on a curb, all three of us knew that we wanted to go talk to him. Miji gently shook him, but the guy was out. An ajuma (a middle-aged Korean woman, typically found wearing work-out gear and a large visor) stepped up and grabbed his arm, shouting "they have something for you!" in Korean. The man woke up confused, and Miji proudly offered him a drink, confusing him even more. As he came to grips with his surroundings, Miji asked him if there was anything he'd like prayer for. This is where I always start to become uncomfortable. Prayer is such an important part of my life, and the lives of so many of my friends, but I've somehow convinced myself that unless you're "crazy Christian" like we are, prayer is offensive. I have no idea where this idea came from, and I'm completely embarrassed to admit it, but there it is. So this man told us that he hadn't seen his parents in years, and he was worried that they were no longer alive. He asked us to pray that his family was safe and that one day he would be reunited with them. This is where Korean style of prayer is convenient; we all prayed for him at the same time, so I didn't have that awkward moment where I tried to come up with the floweriest words to impress the other Christians (are we all this insecure, I wonder?). After we finished, Dan said he felt like we should lead the man through the sinner's prayer.

If offering prayer makes me uncomfortable, offering the sinner's prayer makes me want to dig a hole and hide in it. For those of you reading who aren't familiar with Christian lingo, the sinner's prayer is essentially a declaration of faith. You admit that God loves you but that you have sinned, and that the only way to reconcile yourself with God is through the sacrifice of Christ. It's really simple, and the words themselves don't matter as much as the heart behind them. I've never had anyone throw daggers at me for offering the sinner's prayer, so I don't really know why I'm so afraid of it, but when Dan suggested it, the first thing that went through my mind was "oh man, why'd you have to go and ruin it?" I waited for the man to jump up and storm off, shouting Korean curses at the Christians who were too pushy in their faith... instead, his eyes lit up and he nodded, like we had offered him the thing he had been missing his whole life. Miji directed him in what to say, and even though I didn't understand the language, I knew exactly what she was telling him. When he finished, he reached up and took off the black hood he had kept wrapped around his head the whole time we were talking, almost as if he knew the beauty in the symbolism of the act. We talked with him a few more minutes, and my one regret is that we didn't leave him with a connection point - a church, a shelter, a something where he could learn more about the God he had just professed faith in. But even though we forgot, God won't, and he's taking care of that man today too.

The moment we got to our feet, another man approached us. He told Miji that he saw we were praying and wanted us to pray for him as well. He walked into the shade and knelt down with his hands pressed together in front of his chest like a little child and waited for us to pray for him. It was almost surreal.

I don't know where I got the idea that only Christians are interested in God. In the years leading up to my becoming a Christian, my journals are full of desperate cries that there must be more to this life than what I was seeing. I remember writing poem after poem (I was really into poetry in high school - and terrible at it) about needing there to be something else to live for, something more than money or popularity or grades. I remember begging the universe for some kind of sign that there was something out there to make life worthwhile. When did I forget how desperately I needed God before I found him? I'm not naive enough to believe that everyone I know is sitting around writing poorly constructed poetry to the night sky, but I also shouldn't think that everyone who wants to know God already does. If it weren't for the people who patiently listened while I pompously explained how their God is a fairy tale but whined that life had no meaning, I wouldn't be where I am today. I think I've become so consumed with wanting to seem "normal" even though I love God that I've tucked that part of my life into a little folder for Sunday mornings. I've convinced myself that no one ever wants to talk about God with a Christian (and sadly, sometimes that is true) because I don't want to seem pushy or turn someone off. But every single person, whether they declare it proudly or keep it bottled up, has wrestled with the "God" issue and come to some kind of conclusion, and most people like to talk about things they've decided on. I don't believe at all in the US Government, but I'll talk about it, even with a politician should the opportunity arise. So why wouldn't people feel the same way about God?

I guess I'm learning that God is moving in everyone's life, even the ones that don't know it yet. I'm not going to turn my blog into some kind of sermon series, but I'm also not going to ignore the ways I see God working anymore. The other day, I was talking with a guy, and I asked him what he was passionate about. He started talking about healthy foods, how he believes that if you eat the right combination of foods, you'll find inner peace. I listened politely, but all I could think was "Keep your carrot sticks, baby. I've got a living God."

I'm on an adventure, you know.

Every time I post something, I find myself thinking, "Well, that's it. That will be the last interesting thing I have to say about Korea. Everything will be smooth sailing from here on out."

I'm so glad I'm always wrong.

Today I'm feeling ridiculously reflective, and I've been examining my life through a microscopic lens all afternoon. I haven't sorted it all out just yet, but I think I'm coherent enough for the stream-of-consciousness babble that has so often overtaken my posts recently.

After my kids left, I took a little break to catch up on all things internet before working on my lesson plans (which I never did finish, if you're wondering). So many of my friends are very talented writers who lead awfully interesting lives, so catching up on blogs is one of my favorite pastimes. Today, my friend Angie posted something on her blog that referenced me - and started this whole mess of introspection (thanks, dear!). In her post today, Angie talked about a few of her friends that she is particularly proud of because they are living out their dreams, and she included me in that list.

Me. Nikki Raasch.

And you know what? She just might be right.

Angie's post got me thinking about what my dreams really are. In high school, I wanted to be successful, and I meant it in the most superficial way you can mean the word. I wanted to have a college degree people would envy, a job I could describe while looking down my nose, and so much money the president would look to me for bail-outs. In fact, I was voted "Most Likely to Succeed" my senior year, and the yearbook picture that accompanied it was me laying in a pile of fake money. I can remember daydreaming that Harvard had "heard" of me and would do anything to win the honor of my presence. (On a side note, I kind of wonder how I had any friends in high school.)

College changed me, though. Most of it is thanks to the community that loved me while I was there, and of course, to the God who didn't give up on me even when I was basically a shallow embarrassment to humanity. Not even a month into my freshman year, I changed my major from prestigious "pre-med" to not-so-envied "education", and by junior year, I was living in a house full of girls who frequently had to remind each other why we were in college in the first place. The fantastic ladies I am lucky to call my friends were crazy passionate about loving people, and it rubbed off on me. We watched Invisible Children and wanted to move to Uganda; we read Irresistible Revolution and wanted to move to the slums. In high school, my only dreams of visiting far-off lands consisted of beach resorts and exotic mixed drinks, but by the time I hit my senior year of college, my plans were drastically different. Before I went to college, I knew what I wanted to do with my life, but by the time Miami was ready to send me off, I had gone through so many dreams I wasn't even sure what was real anymore. As graduation drew nearer, people asked more and more what I wanted to be. I stopped trying to come up with a career choice and started just telling people I wanted to be happy. It was pretty much just a cop-out, but I'm realizing now how much I meant it.

At some point in the last three years, I've wanted to live in nearly every country I can name, but I don't know that I ever thought I'd actually do it. I regretted having not studied abroad, but that was about the extent of my wishes. I think I may have surprised myself the most when I actually started taking steps toward moving here. Korea was never my dream. The 10/40 window always pulled me, but I never once sat around plotting how I could get to Korea. Honestly, I knew there were two Koreas and one of them was bad, but I didn't really even know which one that was. All I knew was that I wanted to go on an adventure. I really liked my life in Cincinnati, but it suddenly struck me that middle-class suburbia would be all there was if I didn't force myself to do something else. I don't think I came to Korea because I was afraid of growing up. I think I was afraid of not really living. I was afraid of getting to my next big milestone (what's that? 25?), looking back, and wondering what I had accomplished. I was afraid of making the easy choice all the time and not getting to see what life could be. I think, in my mind, traveling the world was the epitome of adventure, and that word - adventure - was what I was sure I was missing.

Here's the thing, though. Adventures aren't really all that sexy. Yeah, I live in Asia, and yeah, some of my life is more blog-worthy than it was two months ago. People back home are jealous that I live such an exciting life now, and sometimes I understand why. Sometimes, I eat soup that I think has mushrooms in it, then find out I've been eating snails. Sometimes, a guy comes to my apartment to fix my refrigerator and doesn't speak a bit of English and we stare at each other awkwardly for a whole minute. But sometimes, it's just life. Back when this whole Korea thing was just a crazy suggestion from a friend, Ben said something I can't shake. I was getting myself all worked up about how hard it would be and how I didn't know if I could handle everything, and Ben said, "Yeah, but even in Korea, I'm just me. I mean, I still like ice cream and stuff." Okay, so it doesn't seem as profound typed out, and maybe that's the beauty of it. I'm on this wild adventure and people I haven't talked to in years are stalking my life, but you know what? I haven't changed who I am. True, things about me have changed, and I'm learning things about myself that I never expected to discover, but in the middle of the night in Seoul, South Korea, I'm still just me, and I still like ice cream.

So today when I read on Angie's blog that I'm one of the girls she's proud to know because I'm living out my dreams, I was actually kind of startled. Am I really living out my dreams? Do I even really know what my dreams are? If I dreamt of adventure, and now I'm sitting in my apartment eating oreos and watching Glee, then have I succeeded? I like to think I have.

I think I'm learning that adventure isn't about the big things (Kirsten tried to teach me this months ago, but I'm a slow learner). Adventure doesn't mean getting lost on the subway or letting fish eat your toes, although neither of those things is bad. I think I'm realizing that the biggest adventure, and the only one that really matters, is trying to find yourself. It sounds trite and cheesy, I know, but maybe there's a reason it's so overused. My favorite thing about Korea isn't the flashy signs or the tourist spots or the bizarre foods or the whiny language. My favorite thing about Korea is me. I feel like I'm an entirely different person than I was a month ago, and at the same time I feel like I haven't changed at all. I know it doesn't make the slightest bit of sense, and I wish I had better words to explain it. I feel like the person I am here is the same person I always was, but I never really let myself be her. Maybe I was afraid of failure, rejection, disappointment, something, but I'm not really afraid of those things anymore. I'm comfortable knowing that I'm worth something and that I matter, and life is simple because of it. I kind of wonder if everyone else already knows this about themselves and if I'm just the last one on that particular self-esteem bandwagon, but even that doesn't really bother me anymore. I came to this realization on my own time, and I'm happy with the results.

Angie also referenced a few of her other friends who are living out their dreams, and she linked to her friend Ally's blog. Ally is taking six months to travel all fifty states with a friend, and she's documenting every step of the journey. I adored stalking this girl I've never met, and I think I want to duplicate her adventure whenever life leads me back to the States, but my favorite thing about her blog is here. Ally is living her dream too, but she's already realized what I'm coming to learn - that the adventure isn't just in the big things. Even on the adventure of a lifetime, it's still just life, and we all still like ice cream.

This entire blog post can be summed up with a quote I've had on my facebook for as long as I can remember: "Don't ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive then go do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive." I can't help but think that God's delighted with my discovery - that being alive and being me is the greatest adventure I could hope for.

A million things

Okay, okay, okay, so I know it's been nearly a week since I posted, and you're all absolutely beside yourselves wondering what I've been up to. I was waiting all week because I knew I was going to a Silent Disco tonight, and I wanted to be able to post videos and pictures of the hilarity... then my disco got rained out. Don't worry, it's been rescheduled for next weekend, and I have plenty of other things to talk about.

WARNING: I'm crazy in love with Korea right now. Like the way I loved Justin Timberlake in the seventh grade or Boy Meets World reruns, um, always. If Korea were a guy, he'd totally have a restraining order against me. I feel exactly like Jessica in her affirmation video - I like my friends! I like my church! I like my city! I like my kimbap! I like my subway! I like my apartment!

I know, I need a tranquilizer. But you don't have to read these, you know.

I realized that there have been some events in the past few weeks that I totally forgot to blog about, so I'm going to start with those. This is going to be a hodge-podge of all things Seoul, likely ending with a reflection on how I'm so happy I might pee myself. Let's begin.

First, I can't even believe that I haven't written about Dr. Fish. As soon as I got here, people started telling me that I needed to check it out asap, but no one seemed to want to accompany me. One of Courtney's friends from OSU is here, and we decided to meet up one afternoon for coffee. As soon as I found Jill at the subway station, she suggested we go to Dr. Fish, and I was thrilled. What's Dr. Fish? you're asking. It's a little cafe where you put your feet in a tiny pond and fish nibble the dead skin off your toes. NO JOKE. My uncle had done this disgusting yet hilarious thing when he was on business in Asia once, and I couldn't have been more excited that there is a cafe like that just down the street from my house. Jill and I went to the cafe, ordered drinks, and waited to be called over to the fish tank.

Once it was our turn, we stepped up onto the little platform and took off our shoes. We had to wash our feet (apparently the fish are super picky about dirt and germs), then the cafe worker pointed at the tanks: "Five minute little fish. Ten minute big fish." Alrighty. We can do that! I crawled over to the "little fish" tank and peeked inside. The fish were about the size of guppies, and there were easily over a hundred of them. Jill politely waited for me to go first, and I was feeling all kinds of brave, so I dropped my feet in.

I know it's really blurry, but you can see the teeny tiny fish. I could hardly feel them scooting across my feet; it felt more like I had put my feet in a bottle of pop and bubbles were everywhere. I giggled and we took tons of pictures and the fish wiggled around between my toes. All good stuff. Then I decided it was time for the "big fish" tank. Jill had told me right from the beginning that she wasn't going to do big fish, but I knew I'd totally regret it if I didn't at least try it, so I crawled on over. Here's what was in the other tank:

Okay, not really. But it did look like this:

Pardon my language, but those are some BIG ASS FISH. As soon as I sat down beside the tank, my heart started racing. I'm pretty sure I would have been less nervous being chased by a bear (Okay, that's a lie because Michelle and I almost got eaten by a bear once and I was so scared I thought my heart would stop). I sat next to the tank for a good two or three minutes, staring down at the fish while they stared back up at me. Some of them were pushing their terrible little faces up out of the water, trying to get at me and gnaw of my entire legs. The longer I sat, the more terrified I became, but I knew that I'd regret it if I walked away. I made Jill count to three and I splashed my feet in the tank.

My feet stayed in there long enough to take this picture, then I yanked them out like the water was on fire. I swear those fish were trying to KILL me! The other tank felt like little bubbles, but this tank felt like when a cat bites you - not bad enough to draw blood, but not something anyone really enjoys. And there were DOZENS of them! A few of them actually came up out of the water because I pulled my feet out so fast and they were still stuck to me. I think I might have a heart attack just reliving the experience.

I went back to the little fish tank to let my heart slow back to its normal pace. Jill and I chatted and took a few more pictures, and everything ended smoothly.

Next story...

I told you about my rain excursion on Tuesday of Chuseok and my birthday shenanigans on Thursday, but I never told you what I did on the actual holiday. A girl in my small group, Angie, invited me to visit some palaces and temples with some of her friends, and I had been wanting to see those anyway. The day started off very well; I bought these in the subway station:

That's a waffle in the shape of a tiny ear of corn and filled with some kind of pudding-like cream. Weird? Totally. Delicious? Absolutely.

I don't know any of the history of any of the places we visited, but the buildings were really pretty, so I'll show you some pictures :)

In case you're wondering, that's not a swastika. Apparently those face the other direction, and this is actually an Eastern sign for peace. Also, these palaces/temples/shrines are really cool because they're just right in the middle of the city. You can see regular buildings in the background; modern-day Seoul just grew up right around all the history. It's neat to be in a place where some of the buildings are significantly older than the country I grew up in.

Next...

(This is completely disjointed and random, but it's getting really late and I just don't have the energy to make appropriate transitions. I'm pretty much just looking through all the pictures from the last two weeks and posting interesting/funny things)

Here's a video of the little Asian boy who has stolen the hearts of all my friends back home. He brought his workbook up to my desk the other day, and he had written his name funny. I asked him to read it to me...

This is doubly hilarious because it reminds me of this.

And next...

Yesterday was my friend Kristen's birthday. She had a little party Friday night at a coffee shop, and yesterday we went to Hongdae. I hadn't been there yet, but I heard it was really artsy and fun; the girls from the women's ministry had planned an outing to go there for some art market, so I jumped on board. The market was closed due to that silly rainstorm, but we wandered around the streets and I took some pictures that I'm sure you'll love.

That's where I really work. The teaching thing's a cover.

"Look at this charming pouch and FLAMES WILL SHOOT OUT OF YOUR EYES!"

I don't wanna be your friend on facebook either, fool.

After the women's ministry event was officially over, Kristen, Jo, Jillian, and I decided to hang out a little while longer. Kristen got to pick our destination since it was her birthday...

I knew she was a good choice for a friend.

I have a million pictures from inside, and I'll upload them to facebook sometime tomorrow (promise!). For now, here's a sampling:

That's my pretty Kristen friend. The sign says "Oh yay! Happy party!" :)

Cutest. Drinks. Ever.

The ceilings were Asian-sized :)

And here's the part of the post where it gets really sappy. You should probably get a barf bag.

My three new friends and I sat at the coffee shop for a few hours just talking about life. We joked about our kids, told stories about boys we left behind, and just enjoyed life together. Jo and I have both been here about a month, so we're still in the honeymoon phase of life here, but even Kristen and Jill are delighted with their lives in the ROK. It blows my mind that an average Saturday night consists of a Hello Kitty Cafe in a place called Hongdae with two Canadians and two Americans. I feel like this can't possibly be real; this can't just be life here, this can't just be a regular Saturday night in a regular coffee shop. My new friends are wonderful and hilarious and so perfect for me, and I wonder what on earth I did to deserve such joy. I just really feel like I belong here, maybe more than I did in Cincinnati. The people and the place fit me. On the surface, I don't fit in at all - I talk too loudly on the subway and I'm the only one wearing pink anywhere I go - but my heart fits life here, and that's all that really matters in the end.

One of the things we talked about last night was how freeing life is here. From the beginning of high school, all I can remember is being asked what my next step was. Where are you going to college? What are you going to study? What will you do after graduation? Where will you live? Are you worried about your pension plan? There were so many questions about life that's far out in the distance and I always tried my hardest to answer them. I think I've imagined thirty different lives for myself in the last ten years, ranging from pediatrician to missionary to writer to teacher to hobo, and I wholeheartedly wanted all of those things in the moments that I wanted them. But here, no one makes me decide what job I'm going to retire from. No one asks what the next step is or how what I'm doing fits into my overall life plan. All people care about here is where you're from and who you are in this moment. People want to know your story, and your story only goes up until today. You don't have to worry about whether you know what tomorrow's going to be, let alone where your kids will go to school. All through high school and college, I felt like I needed to be focused on what I wanted my whole life to become, like I needed to know what my plan was and chase after it with focused ambition. But here, I don't know what life is going to look like in the next step. I know I'm in this step, and I'm living each day one by one without wondering what comes next. Sure, I think about the future. I know I don't want to live here forever, but I haven't yet decided whether I'll move to Georgia the state or Georgia the country when I leave. I love imagining the future without feeling any pressure to strive for it. In college, I nearly dropped out every time I found a new African country I thought couldn't possibly survive another day without me. But here, I'm already living an adventure, so that part of me is being fulfilled. I'm free to dream without worrying I'll miss out on something if I don't start now. I'm here at least eleven more months; I'm not going anywhere else. I'm not trying to find a better job or get a nicer car or move to a different part of town. I'm going to be right here in this tiny apartment until September 1, 2011, so I'm free to dream without the need to pursue it immediately. I was always afraid I'd miss out on life if I didn't get to the next step as quickly as possible. Now it feels like someone paused my life - just made everything freeze for a moment - so I could actually stop and enjoy where and who I am. I feel like I'm really living every day instead of just gliding into tomorrow. My heart is full and I'm content and God is so very good.