While on Ko Sukorn in January, I asked my friend Palm if he went home to his village after work each night or did he stay at the resort. The village is only a few kilometers from the resort, so I assumed he went home. “No,” he told me, “I stay at the resort because I’m afraid of ghosts.” He raised his hands to eye level and made a kind of clawing motion and a scary face, indicative of the apparitions. I thought it humorous at the time, but here is a Bangkok Post article that reports on Asians’ fear of ghosts [NOTE: The article is not available, so the link leads to a similar article on USA Today]. So, for them, it’s not really a joking matter–they do believe. The article points out that rituals and cremations normally follow the deaths of loved ones, but there are still thousands missing, so the ghosts will roam the beaches until their earthly remains are found and cremated. This belief is keeping Asian tourists away from Thailand, and elsewhere, by the thousands. Very interesting article.
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Yup, I got them all posted to the Photo Gallery these past few days. Now, I’m going to go into the blog and post photos to the relevant entries. I’m nothing if not thorough (or anal, as some might say I’m keeping in touch with my friend Palm on Ko Sukorn, and he told me in a recent email that there are many tourists there right now. That’s great news and just what they need! He usually gets laid off during the low season (June-October), but finds another job in Thailand. He invited me to visit him wherever he might be working. I’ll do so. Right after or right before I visit Nai in Laos. It’s good to have friends in other countries, and if they ever want to visit Korea (or the Middle East) or the U.S., it will be my pleasure to host them. I also sent in my first job application to the Middle East for a position starting in September. This one is at a university in the United Arab Emirates, a relatively safe haven in that part of the world. Pay is great, free housing, and many other benefits, including 2 1/2 months paid vacation. (Why is it that workers in Europe get all this marvelous time off from work and laborers in the U.S. are lucky to scrounge 7-10 days vacation time from their stingy bosses?) The weather is still cold here, but tomorrow’s forecast calls for 1 or 2 inches of rain and temperatures in the high 40′s. Spring is just around the corner, I hope. More later. Chinese New Year, that is. It’s a 3-day holiday in Korea, having started yesterday and continuing through tomorrow. So, no teaching, meaning I will have had 7 out of 9 days off through this coming Sunday. Next winter I’m going to plan my vacation so that I’m in Bangkok on the New Year–I’m sure it’s a fascinating celebration there. With the extra time, I’ll keep posting more photos. My lost disc doesn’t seem to be such a great tragedy; I’ve found quite a few Ko Sukorn photos on the other discs and memory cards, and any that were lost were probably repeats from my summer vacation there. Again, Happy New Year. Go ahead, take the day (or 3) off. Tell your boss that you’re Chinese; he or she will understand. Finally, I’ve started posting some photos to the Gallery. I processed some of the Bangkok shots this evening, so click on the Gallery on the main page to view them. I also discovered, very dishearteningly, that one of the cd’s I transferred photos to in Bangkok is corrupted and unuseable. It was fine a few days ago, but when I went to access the photos today, the cd wasn’t readable. I think it was filled with Ko Sukorn shots, so it looks like I’ve lost most of the island photos. (Sigh) The weather was very nice today for a change, in the mid-40′s. I see Montana is getting cold again. We’re certainly not synchronized: when it’s cold here, it’s nice there and vice-versa. More later. The weather recently has reminded me a lot of Montana, with low temperatures in the low teens, high winds, and a bit of snow. I would guess the wind chill is running near -20 F. One of the office workers said that it snowed at Jeju Island, South Korea’s “tropical” getaway. We’re supposed to leave our water running in our apartments all the time due to poor planning when they put in the water system. Last winter the main pipe froze and we were without water for several days. The extended forecast calls for temperatures to moderate next week. Because of my recent vacation to Thailand, “moderate” to me means 70-80 degrees! I’ll have to wait a few months for that. I still haven’t gotten around to processing my Thailand photos–laziness, classes, etc. Whatever the reason, I’ll definitely work on them this weekend. Moon-sub and Jun-suk, a couple of the high school guys, soon-to-be college students, in one of my classes, invited me to a movie yesterday. The local public library shows free movies Tuesday through Friday and we watched a Chinese movie with Korean sub-titles. Since I don’t understand either language, it was interesting to try to guess what the plot was in this martial-arts/love story. It was fun, all the same. More later. |
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