I finally have internet in my house!!!! It's even in my room!!! Wow, luxuries of luxuries!!! Albeit it is dial-up!! Booo! Booo! But something is better than nothing. Yeah yeah!! (insert-the clanging of cymbals) Yeah-yeah-yeah! (insert-the echoing boom of drums)

By the way, I just want to tell you before I crawl into bed (and my bed is one foot away I'll have you know......HEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE(this should be read as a mad cackle)) that I was watching Donald Trump on Larry King Live earlier and it was astounding how.....um... how shall I put this? arrogant he was. It reminded me once again that are a lot of people out there who are obsessed with money and power. His assumptions were punching me in the face. At times I was like, "is he serious?" But, of course, he is, Joyce. Hello, there are lots of people out there like this-remember??!! One caller asked him on live TV, "Which is bigger: your ego or your bank account?" hehehe He answered to Larry, "I haven't met one successful person who doesn't have a big ego? Have you, Larry?" Actually, I felt like at times he was making Larry King uncomfortable-if that's possible.

For all those who have recently gotten a blog (because it seems like lately blogger only has ugly templates for new bloggers) or for those are tired of their blog template you can go to http://blogskins.com/ to get a new template.

I had one of those dreams this morning that really sucks you in. I was really emotionally involved in this dream until my alarm went off and even then it took me a while to shake off the emotions it evoked. Now that I'm writing it, it sounds kind of goofy but at the time it was real to me. I was getting married. It was the day of the wedding and everyone was there. I was singing a song to my husband-to-be about my love for him but when I looked at him I realized I didn't love him. I knew at that moment that if I married him I'd be making the worst mistake of my life. But then I started to panic because I was going to have to tell him and all the guests that the wedding was canceled. So that is what I was in the middle of doing when my alarm went off. My husband-to-be was so upset and so were all the guests. I guess it's all the marriage talk in my office lately. It's giving me nightmares. :-)

I've been avoiding writing lately. It's hard for me to write if I can't just break open and be honest about what I'm feeling right at the moment. Unfortunately, at this point in time I'm feeling annoyed and stressed in combination with the feeling that I don't have time to delve into what I'm really feeling. It's also annoying me that I'm just beating around the bush and thinking to myself "I've got to go, I can't get into this right now."

Tonight I had dinner with Min, Sandy, Ro and Jeannie in one of the school's restaurants. I actually had two pieces of pie not to mention the piece of pie I had with my lunch. I've been eating a lot ever since I got back from Uzbekistan. This fact caused us to start discussing the possibility that I might have a worm. Which, of course, became a big joke and a great scapegoat. When I'd say something slightly inappropriate (which I'm occasionally known to do) it would, of course, be the worm's fault.

This is one of those times that I'm not in the mood to write but I'm doing what I know I should do instead of doing what I feel like. What a good girl. I'm mostly doing it for all the faithful out there. (yo word up... faithful out there is meant to be read with a rapper accent) I've been listening to this old 80's song, "Don't Dream It's Over" for the last 2 hours that I've been in my office. In the last couple hours I've gone through a wide range of emotions. I'm wondering if it's the influence of the song's nostalgic feel. For a while I was thinking about old friends that have faded into my past and the good times we had. Then I was thinking about my grams. I was thinking about what she told me once after she got out of an over-night stay in a hospital because of a minor surgery. Her room had been on one of the top floors of a sky-scraper sized hospital. "I watched the whole city wake up through my window. The highways below looked like strings of light and then you know what I saw? I saw a moth flying near my window. Isn't that something? A moth way up there." Something about her curious musings about that has always struck me as poetic. Perhaps because I remember it with the backdrop of the relief I felt that she was alive and not seriously ill as I feared before her surgery. Healthy enough to leave the hospital with me and tell me about the moth that visited her window.

This is my first blog entry from my new notebook computer. This is a special moment. :-) Tomorrow is my first day of classes and sadly I've been way too busy with non-stop meetings to prepare the way I would like. This weekend we had the small group leaders retreat for Handong International Church, our English speaking church on campus. God's doing great things in that ministry. Ro and I were talking about what a pity it is that we are leaving after this semester is over. This one of the best churches I've ever been apart of.

Right now there's a lump of sadness in my heart. There have been so many things on my mind and not enough time to process all of it...

Bummer. Maybe I've procrastinated too much on the work I have to do on my classes to write on my blog with peace of mind.

It struck me earlier today that it's probably strange to the American readers that I'm preparing to start my semester in March. It's funny how you get so caught up in your own life that you forget not everyone is on the same page. Korean universities start in March. Super weird-when I think of it from an American point of view.

I feel kind of overwhelmed about how to convey what God did in me, my team and the Uzbek students on our trip to Uzbekistan. Especially, since now I'm super busy with meetings and prep for my classes that start Tuesday. So I have decided that I'm going to unload just little snippets about the trip here and there for the next week or so. Here's my weird blogger confession: I find it hard to write freely unless I speak from what I'm experiencing at that moment. If I try to dig up back-loaded revelations or ideas it's more difficult to write and I end up staring at a blank screen.

Snippet number 1:
Today I was thinking about Jess. The most amazing thing about Jess is her persistence. The woman does not give up. Trust me-she'll drive you nuts about something until it's done :-) but in the end you end up respecting her a lot. Many people have great ideas but they don't always see them through to the very end. That's what Jess does. She's had a great impact on our department in a short time because frankly she's a maniac with a cause. So I was reflecting on this after we finished discussing the website for our department. (that her and I dreamed up, sweated over and now it's almost done...thanx mostly to her) It reminded me of before went to Uzbekistan.

My dreams about Uzbekistan seemed like an eluding fog, a crazy dream that no one had a passion for but me. I felt it in my heart that a team should go again in the winter but it didn't seem like anyone was interested and where would I get the money anyway? I was and am saving for grad school. It's interesting to look at those feelings from the other side of the trip. I reminds me of a big lesson I learned through that: Don't give up. I really learned about stepping out in faith through organizing that trip. So many times I just wanted to give up and say well, it probably wasn't God's will anyway. But God kept telling me "do what you can and I'll do the rest". So I called people. People were interested. But I thought they'd flake out, so I canceled a meeting and they showed up anyway. (that was God's little joke on me to show me what a lame-o-lacking-in-faith chick I am.) God said to me after that, "see, Joyce, just do what you can and believe". After that I just did everything I could and gave the rest to God. So I went to churches even though in my heart I thought we wouldn't get that much support emotionally and financially. I was wrong. I learned to do just everything I could then give it to God. And even more importantly I learned to never give up on what God had put in my heart.

We sent out support letters, but there was no response for weeks then in the last month the money started to come in through church visits. It was just one step at a time and God kept telling me just do what I can and then believe. It was amazing. We didn't have our plane tickets, our visas or enough money until 2 days before we were supposed to leave because of various complications that we had no control over. I remember that faithful Monday that we were busy packing and copying material by faith, even though we weren't sure we could even leave but then everything fell into place. We got the tickets (meaning they were available now we just had to have the money to buy them) and the visas. Then after that Anna came to me and said we were about 100,000 won short of being able to buy the tickets and I just knew by that point it was just going to be there (in our team bank account). I told her it'll be there but if it's not call me. When she checked the account the exact amount we needed to buy our plane tickets was in our team account!! I'm serious!! The exact amount-not too much, not too little but exactly what we needed. Wow.

"Don't be afraid, just believe..." Mark 5:36

Here I am back in Korea. I just got here an hour ago and now I'm using the lovely free internet access in the airport. I also have finally removed that ugly shout out message and replaced it with a functional commenting system. Well, there is a lot to be said and I'm glad to be back. However, right now I feel like a big gross homeless person cuz my clothes are kind of dirty and I haven't taken a shower. I need to go buy a ticket to Pohang. So I'll give you the full report on Uzbekistan later.

Well, here I am again. There's a computer center on the campus ran by a Korean NGO worker here. We've come to the school early the last couple days because of different projects lately. So I have a chance to write. However, I don't really feel comfortable writing a lot because the connection here is expensive (even though it's free for me). There is so much to say which I hope to share when I come back. One thing I have missed is writing on my blog. It's just a great release. A way to make sense of things. I read quickly most of my friends' blogs yesterday and I almost got tears in my eyes because of the beauty of being able to connect no matter where we are. I love you guys!

Hi everyone from Uzbekistan!! I can't write long but I just wanted to say hi. Thanks for all your prayers. God has continued to take care of us and open doors. I was sick the second night we had our English camp. I threw up 2 times during the night. I'm totally better now though. However, it does make me feel like I'm just starting the camp even though this is our fourth day. (I had to skip teaching the second day of camp) It has been great to see all my students from last summer. Please continue to pray for us here. Later!!!!!

I'm here in my office with the Uzbek team. It's freezing cold outside and we are partially warm working on lessons for our English camp that is coming up. I think I'm not going to be writing for a while. Cuz right now I'm really busy organizing the team. I might not write again until after the trip. We're leaving Jan. 28th so please pray for us!!! We'll be back Feb. 18th.

Phew! I have my rough draft done for my grad essay finally!!! Yeah! Yeah! Now I've got to start preparing for the Uzbek team orientation. Which starts tomorrow and goes on until we leave. We are leaving Jan. 28th for Uzbekistan and then Rachel and I returning the 18th of February. (Kalibek and Anna are staying there until the 24th because they have friends and family there.) So now for the interesting part. The team and I are going to be working on the website, preparing logistical stuff and preparing lessons for the two week English camp we are going to be holding. Another challenge is that the Chinese New Year is coming up and everything is closing. But thankfully we have a plan of action. Please pray for us as we train and pray for me as I try to lead this small team. It's so amazing-God has provided all the money for our trip!!

Finally, I've had some uninterrupted time to work on my essay and applications. It's been enlightening and invigorating so far to have to articulate why I want to teach English for an academic audience. Come to think of it, I guess it's my first time writing an essay on this subject for an academic audience since ESL was not my undergraduate major. It's kind of fun because I have a lot of pent-up ideas in my head that are just tumbling out. At times I'm struck by a self-revelatory feeling of, "Wow, that is how I feel about that." or "Yeah! Well said. That's exactly what I think." I suppose that's what happens when you express yourself in writing succinctly about one of your passions for the first time. Or at least that's what happens when you are Joyce writing about one of your passions for the first time.

I said previously finally I have time to write because this week, which was supposed to be sanctified for grad stuff, has been one giant interruption. I spent hours this week going back and forth from the immigration office, changing grades, receiving countless calls from students that can barely speak English over the phone and replying to emails about the Uzbek trip. Actually, earlier today I was beginning to wonder if it just wasn't God's desire for me to work on my apps and I should just change my expectations. However, instead of coming to that conclusion I decided that life is just like that sometimes and I should still keep plugging on with my essay and applications. But to do this I had to put my foot down to the constant phone calls I was getting about grades today (this is the last day for the students to contest their grades) because I was pretty sure that anyone calling was just trying to squeeze another point out of me and I couldn't take anymore of it!! (My grades for my day students had been lower than they or I had expected, so for this reason I had checked their grades very carefully before turning them into the admin.) Maybe it was not nice of me but I just decided to not answer my phone anymore today (except for calls I need to receive-like from my boss or something) because I was getting so many calls about grades and most of the time I either had already taken care of it or had to stick to my guns about the grade. So thus ensued the case of the incredible, constantly growling cell-phone. I put my cell-phone on vibrate but soon it became the never-ending growling background music of my room. So I moved it under my pillow. BERRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!! GRRRRRRRRRR!!!! So then, I stuffed it between the cushions of my couch. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!! BRRRRRRRRR!!! BLLLLLLLRRRRRRGRRRGGRRRR!!!! I could still hear it in my bedroom-the bottomless beckoning growl of my students to annoy me with requests I can not fulfill when I desperately need to do other things!! So finally I put the demon phone in the room furthest from my room and it's been quietly hummmmmming there ever since. The End. Good night children and remember the lesson we learned tonight in this bedtime story, "Don't annoy your English teacher when you grow up to be a big, grade-obsessed college student!" Good night! :-)

This webzine looks very interesting. I like their premise of being a place where everyone can contribute regardless to whether they are a well-know writer or not. So I'm linking this url here merely for the pragmatic reason of not wanting to lose this web address. But I hope you find it interesting too.

Some really exciting things are happening with the Uzbek team that I need to share soon. It's amazing how God has brought it all together. Kalibek is Uzbek so he knows the culture and speaks the language. Anna is Russian so she speaks Russian. They are both Computer Science majors so they can teach computer classes in Russian and perhaps more importantly they are going to make the website we are planning for the Uzbek people. We are going to try to have the site finished before we leave so Anna and Kalibek can teach the Uzbek students how to navigate the site. Web surfing is something that Uzbeks aren't familiar with. Then there is Rachel who is Korean so she can correspond with the Korean workers in Uzbekistan. Finally, there's yours truly. I'm the native speaker that knows how to design and organize English camps. Presto! There's a great team. Thank the Lord.

Don't read this unless you want to hear someone rant...
I don't know if I can actually muster up enough emotional energy to rant but it made feel better writing that warning anyway. I had such a bad day today. I can feel the stress-induced blood rushing through the veins in my neck when I think of certain episodes today and my back is aching. Just chill out Joyce... I feel like crying and I feel so frustrated. I don't know what's worse: that I have to pay another fine for a string of visa problems that no one quite understands and definitely no one is going to take responsibility for or that I lost my cool at the immigration office and raised my voice at the immigration workers with tears in my eyes with statements like, "This was not my fault and now you want to take more money from me! I paid 500.000 won to go to Japan (to get a new visa) and now this!" All this being said as I mindlessly counted the money and threw it on the counter. And then one of the immigration workers started raising his voice at me saying, "It's your fault! You should know Korean immigration laws!" There is some truth to that. But the problem that started all of this is the big mystery and that's why we started getting upset about it because somebody made a mistake (for a long time I was pretty sure the immigration office made the mistake but I failed to noitce it until it was too late) but it's not clear who. And the one thing I'm sure of is that I just did what I was told, they said "bring this paper" I brought it "ask for this" I asked for it. It's true I should have checked more, been more aware of the process but I was new to it all and trusted that my school would watch out for me. That's where I was wrong. I guess the word on the expatriate scene is "always watch your own back because your school might not" What has cost me is not what they told me but what they omitted. Now I'm learning the hard way what I should have known but was never told.

Anyway, I need to get this in perspective. I wish my friends were here (they are all gone on vacation) so I could go on and on about how upset, frustrated and helpless I feel. Pray for me about this that I'll let it go and act decently when I see the immigration workers again. (probably tomorrow)

I was just watching videos of old American TV shows that Ro inherited from an old roommate. It's weird to watch Friends or Mad about You from 1998 or 1999. The culture is different but just a bit. That was five years ago! Can you believe it? It seems just like yesterday. Tonight I had kind of a sad and profound thought. The saddest feeling is not the absence of a parent, loved one or boy/girlfriend but almost having that love in your life then losing it. Or seeing a shadow of that love but never being able to embrace it. Almost having it hurts more then never having it. Now that's a sad echoing feeling...

Which reminds me of a poem I wrote a couple years ago. This poem is about romantic love but I think this feeling can relate to other kinds of love also...

There's a gnawing pain eating away at my heart
throbbing, aching
nothing can make it go away

It's you

It's your absense

It's the lack of you!

I can't help but see the bigger picture of this feeling. That there is an aching that no human can satisfy.

I'm two days away from finishing my winter essay class. My other goals for this winter break are to fill out applications for the grad schools I'm interested in and prepare to go to Uzbekistan. Tonight as I started researching grad schools again, comparing prices and programs I got the feeling for the first time in quite a while that maybe I'm not ready yet to commit to grad school. "Why?" you ask. Because I've been wondering silently within myself for sometime if English teaching is enough for me. Maybe I'm not sure enough about what I want to study to spend 30 thousand dollars or more. I would like to combine a MA in Teaching with an International Studies or International Policy masters degree but I haven't been able to find a program like that. People have also told me from time to time that when it comes to English teaching having experience and an MA in something are all you need (not necessarily a MA in Teaching). However, if I want to get a masters in International Policy a lot of the programs require you to be quite advanced in a language even before you apply which is ok but would take a lot of time on my part. (And plus I think I stink at learning languages but that could be tolerated.) The question is: is that what the Lord wants-I'll take that time if that's what he wants. Which leads me to if I'm not totally sure about which degree I should get then maybe I should just wait. *sigh* Lord, what do you want?

Anyway, meanwhile I'm going to research, apply and pray...

Often I have the feeling "Why aren't I more like this person?" or "I should be more like this person." Floating around deep in the layers of my subconscious there's this feeling that there are strikes against me or some how I'm not enough. I was praying today and that same old emotion that somehow I've failed started floating in an indefinable form around in my brain again. And I asked myself what have I failed in? What am I doing that I should be ashamed of? What do I have to regret? I realized that even though I've made mistakes there is nothing that I'm hiding from. That I've tried to face the world bravely, tried to face myself, tried to follow my dreams, tried to love people and as much as I'm aware of I face it all. Despite the scars and deformities I carry I charge on facing myself, seeking to love God and people. And as I pondered this, I felt something in my mind saying, "But you haven't done this..." or "You haven't done this well enough." But then I answered, "What? Haven't done what..." Finish your sentence. I could have started listing things that I've done wrong or somehow I failed in but then I realized that as far as the measuring stick of my dreams go I have succeeded. But here's the amazing thing: sometimes I've done the right thing, sometimes I haven't but because I clung onto God he covered it all. He has given me everything even though I wasn't always faithful. It just made me realize once again that the bottom-line is not my performance but my reliance. Even though I didn't get the best grades in high school, here I am a professor at a university. Even though I grew up with a reckless ethic of money management, here I am not in debt.

I was thinking again about money and how everything is against me saving it. (I'm trying to save for grad school.) For example, I got this huge fine for my car because of a Korean law I never knew about. And then there was the emergency trip to Japan because of visa mistakes that were not my fault. Things like that make me think everything is against me saving money! Then God says "What are you stressing about? Are you saving money?" And I have to reply "Yes, despite all those things I still am." I worry about it but he always knew those things would happen. Even though I worry about all these things: "who I am, what I've done, what I am doing" in the end I realize those things per se aren't going to make me or break me. It's my dependence on God that will make or break me. He lifts people up and puts them in places despite who they or what they've done.

Oh...this gets the award!! All you English teachers are going to love this! http://www.engrish.com/

Happy New Year everyone!

Notes on my first day of 2004:
Today was my first day of my "3 day get-away" high a top an apartment building of skyscraper proportions (at least compared to what I'm used to). I'm staying in Ro's apartment on the 18th floor while she's gone. I'm loving it!! It's my safe lighthouse a top a craggy hill keeping me safe even though the oceans of stress rise and thrash against it. Where do I go to get away? Hawaii? Costa Rica? Now way! Why would I go there when I could be in Heng-hay with its streets that drive like old school Pac-man video games, fish markets and drunk old people walking in the street with no fear. No, give me a dsl connection, total isolation and Ro's apartment high aloft a Sam-do apartment building and I'm close to heaven. It's my warm womb, my sacred tomb.... hehe... ah-hem...

Anyway, I'm having a good time. But on the more serious side, so far this has been a much-needed time of random internet surfing, thought and prayer. The verse that I'm kind of using as my theme verse for this time is...
"...because so many people were coming and going that Joyce didn't even have a chance to relax, Jesus said to Joyce, "Come away with me by yourself to a quiet place and get some rest." Mark 6:31 (italicized words were embellished by yours truly)
That’s great isn't it though?

An appropriate, peaceful song by Watermark that I've been listening to today...
still
the more I get alone the more I see I need to get alone more
cuz just when I think that I'm alone your spirit calls out to me
even silence has a song
cuz that 's when you come and sing over me
still
let me be still
let me be ok with the quiet in my heart
still
I want to be still
I'm so quick to move instead of listening to you
shut my mouth
crush my pride
give me the gift of a broken life
still
hush this world that flutters around me
...even stillness makes me move cuz that's when my heart learns to dance with you

Well, I wanted to share some cool sites and interesting articles I found today. I ran across an article in Christianity Today about what they think are the top 12 events in 2003 that will influence evangelical culture in the coming year. Interesting, very interesting.

I also found the website of Sojourners magazine which I was really excited about. Someone in a church in Oregon told me about this Christian magazine that was really into social action and gave a bit of a different political angle than typical Christian magazines. However, I could never find it and here all these years later I stumble over it. The website's title is Sojourner: Faith, Politics, Culture Sounds cool...eh?

Ravi Zacharis rocks! I knew he was cool but I didn't know he was this cool. I listened to a couple of his sermons today. He's so insightful, relevant and articulate. You can listen to tons of his sermons online and even download them as a Mp3 file for free. I recommend "Understanding the Spirit of the Age" addressing the topic of logic and the secular mind.

Ok, I have a special announcement. My Israel/Palestine and Egypt pictures are now in my photo albums!!! (Well, maybe 1/4 of the pics are up but I do have a Holy Land album up) This is really amazing and exciting for me. I've had the negatives of this trip forever but it never occurred to me before to scan the negatives onto disk until now. So my Israel pics have gone digital! Not all of them are up but they will probably all be up in the next two weeks.

ahhhhhhh! blogger! ....I just corrected a mistake in my last entry for the second time or third time! Blogger is out to embarrass me! It better publish my real entry now! Anyway, it's New Year's Eve here in Korea and I'm going on my 3 day get away soon!!!!!!!!!!!!! Yeah!!! It's just going to be me, my books and the internet!!!!!!!!!!!! Yeah! Yeah! I'm so happy! Finally some solitude!

Yeah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I remember a dream I had
There was a tall house with many rooms
Inside wood paneling was everywhere
And there was an emergency in the house
The memory is fading…I think it was a fire
I remember a frail woman in a bed covered in a quilt
She was always forgotten
I was crying because we always forgot her
Suddenly I was carrying her in my arms out of the house
Long, frail, and holding on to me in weak dependence
I faintly remember crying and crying

Joanne, Ro and I were talking about dreams tonight at dinner. I was talking about how for me there have been times when a dream has convicted me. There are certain dreams when I remember them I'm instantly struck with something. Usually when meaning is conveying someone has to open their mouth and form words then the hearer combines the tone, the body language, the context and the meaning of the words to make meaning in their own mind. But sometimes there is a different kind of knowing or understanding. The kind of knowing that skips words but injects pure meaning into your mind without needing the vehicle of words. This is the kind of knowing that sometimes hits me when I recollect certain dreams. I just suddenly have a wordless knowing that’s hard for me to even put in words. That’s what it was like with this dream I knew instantly it was somehow about my grandmother and that I felt sadness but even now I can’t say specifically about what. There are obvious reasons for sadness in the dream but I can’t help but feel the sadness is bigger than that.

I don’t know why I felt like I wanted to talk about that. I had that dream many months ago and at the time it troubled me. I remember telling friends about it with tears in my eyes but it got brushed away accidentally in conversation. Perhaps, it’s because when I was chatting online with a friend today she asked me if I’ve prepared myself for the inevitable concerning my grandma. I guess I’ve been asking myself that question my whole life. For all of my high school years and most of my college years my grandma was my anchor. She was basically my only parental figure during my teen years.

Well, I had wanted to talk about my 27th birthday. Wow! “27” It seems so amazing to even type that. Am I really 27? Have I messed up on my calculations? I have to go to sleep, so I’ve got to stop here. I have one on one conferences with my students all day tomorrow so I need my beauty sleep. So musings about turning 27 will have to wait. Something that I wrote in the middle of my 26 year that I’ll probably talk more about later, “I tried to be great, but learned I was a child.”

These last weeks have been really stressful, a combination of teaching an intense essay class and having two close friends preparing to go overseas among other things. I stole away at dusk Sunday and took a run to the lake on campus. It was a quiet, calming friend. I wrote this there.

Simple Peace
the bank is bathed in faded gold
the sun dims
green water ripples
the tree branch cradles me
I want to laugh
I want to cry
birds greet me
brisk wind covers me, calls to me
silence calms me

My office still has its unbroken morning quietness. The heater's slowly warming it up like a tiny oven and I'm still wrapped in my jacket as the dull sun light streams in. Yes, it's back to the books for me. Yesterday I had conferences with my students about thier essays all day. Today it's back to teaching and studying my grammar books. The verse that touched me this morning, "know the mystery of God, namely, Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge..." Col. 2:2-3

I'm recovering from my hard-hitting essay class. I don't know what hit me but whatever it was it knocked me out. Last night I went to bed (passed out) at 10 pm which is like a world's record for me the queen of night owls (well, maybe the mayor or governor of night owls) Needless to say that class has been exhausting me probably in combination with the end of the semester stress. I feel kind of lame saying that because I think there are a lot of people that work harder than I do but here I make a big deal about it and am talking about it to all my friends.

Lately, I've been feeling on the edge of tears in what seems to me random situations. Yesterday in the middle of my second day of class I had been teaching for about an hour and half then suddenly realized that I desperately needed water. The English department has just moved to a gorgeous newly constructed building but unfortunately currently there's no drinkable water in the building. It hit me that here it was 2 in the afternoon and I hadn't drunk any water since 8:30 am. First of all, that is not healthy but if you're a teacher you know that's suicide for your voice. So my voice was started to get all messed up and hoarse. There was this moment in class that I kept mumbling to myself that I needed water like a weirdo and at that moment I felt so frustrated I just wanted to cry. (Thankfully, Sandy came to my rescue and brought me some apple juice later on.)

It just struck me as funny that I consider myself a pretty interesting person if not more than interesting because I'm kind of weird and random. While this might be true, I think my entries into my blogs tend to be about mundane things like how I brushed my teeth today. haha... The irony of it all. Why am I that kind of blogger? Oh,oh...

Anyway, on to deep and interesting things. Just kidding. Probably on to how I made my bed today. The truth is I've felt this kind of numb, sad evading feeling lately. Sometimes when I read other peoples blogs or certain poems or I watch certain movies I get this feeling that I don't have many complicated emotions and deep inner worlds in me. Sometimes I'll get a glimpse of an emotion in some song or poem and I'll get this sad, empty feeling like if I dug into myself I couldn't really come out with that much emotion but I just feel blank nothingness. It just makes me wonder lately if I know who I am. I think people who write often have a deep inner world. They know what they feel. Knowing them on the outside is like just like scratching the surface, you have to soak in their poetry, read their thoughts, perhaps view their art or whatever medium it may be to get a glimpse a view of their deep inner world. And sometimes I feel I don't really I have that but I want that richness. Sometimes I wonder if I'm afraid to look inside myself and let what's inside me really express myself. Perhaps for me to look into some of those emotions is to face a lot of self-doubt and perhaps self-loathing.

That's one of the fascinating things about art and blogging to me. Did I just put art and blogging in the same sentence? My ideas about art have been developing over time but as far as my own philosophy goes I think one of the key things in creating is being deeply honest. For the artist the kind of honesty that knocks them to their knees often in pain. It's possible, of course, to create not being transparent but I believe the art that penetrates us the most is usually the most strikingly honest and transparent. The songs, the movies that often pierce us are the songs or movies that the writers had to dig into themselves and pull things out that maybe they didn't want to look at. That's why writing poems is so good for me because I can�t write them unless I'm honest about where I am. It's one way that I try to dig into that world in me, take out some emotion and turn it over in my hand like some precious stone.

Yesterday I started my winter essay class. They were really cheery, so that was cool. Hopefully they will stay cheery even though they're going to have a ton of homework. As for me I feel way too busy. I think that will subside after my class gets into a groove. I just started with my new Taekwondo teacher (my teacher last semester left for the army today) so that's going to be interesting. Already he taught ro and I this cool hand thing. Gotta go prepare. So far I like this class but the prep makes me stressed!

Hello and happy December. It's kind of strange and surreal being in Asia during this commercial Christmas month. There are certain atmospheric tips that you get about what phase of the year you're in. I remember in high school it was baseball, as soon as the softball and baseball teams started practicing for their season out on the ball field that's when I got the signal school is almost over for the year. That always made me happy when I saw them because I then knew summer was just a couple months away. This December I know cognitively what time of year it is but the amount of signals just aren't there. When I tell my students what a crazy, stressful and chaotic month December is in America they just can't imagine why. Then I say, "Well, everybody's shopping and the malls are packed. People are stressed preparing for parties and worried about their budgets." But you just can't convey the feeling of Christmas to them, they need to walk into a mall and see the strained, tired people racing around for gifts to the background music of overplayed Christmas songs for themselves. Last night I went to the theater with "the girls" and laughed loudly about Love Actually. After watching that movie I thought, "Ah, there's the Christmas I remember..."

Ok, here I go again about the movie, "The Passion" by Mel Gibson. The movie is ready to be seen right now at theaters, however, they're having problems getting theaters to show the movie. There has been a lot of media talk that the movie is anti-Jewish, pushing Christianity and so on. So far it sounds unreasonable-many worldviews are expressed through the art form of film and Christianity has the same right to be heard.

Here's an excerpt from the website and if you want this movie to have a broad viewing go to the website and help out. Just by putting your name and zip code down that let's them know how many people want to see this movie. And this is not just for Americans, anyone in the world can take part.

"As some of you may know, you may never get a chance to see this movie! Many of our visitors have asked us if there is anything they can do to help. The answer is yes, and here are ways you can...." And hey-if you have a blog, why don't you link this page and suggest your friends put their name down as wanting to see the movie. Just my humble suggestion....^^

I wish I could just connect my brain to my computer and just purge out all my thoughts onto my blog. It's such a bother to cram all my thoughts into squiggly letters and make sentences. At least I wish I could just talk and my computer would type everything for me. There probably is a program out there that would do that. hmmmm.... There is something I spend a ridiculous about amount of money on.

As Morpheus said in The Matrix 1, "Time is always against us." And in my case as usual I should probably go to sleep but I just wanted to see if I could squeeze some of my thoughts out before I hit the sack. Right now I'm having this reoccurring feeling that I have once in a while. It has to do with having too many worlds in my brain. My visual image of this feeling takes the form of a kind of collage or mosaic of all these people inside of my head talking about their views on different topics. No, I'm not hearing voices. :-) That's just the picture that comes into my mind. There is something perplexing, mysterious, troubling and intriguing about how we all live on the same planet together but each culture (not to mention subcultures within cultures) is so wrapped up in itself and often truly believes it is the only one reality. I often experience this tangibly through simple exchanges with my students. And it really trips me out sometimes. It goes something like this, I'm working with whatever culture-it may be Spanish or Korean or whatever and we are having a conversation about nothing special. Then one of us will say something that suddenly makes me realize in that moment that even though we are standing right next to each other and have some pretense of knowing each other really we are worlds apart.

However, after a while even though I might not agree with the perspective of whichever culture I'm living in their view starts to seep into my brain. I begin to understand them to some extent. I begin to have a duel brain. I can see a situation form their point of view and also from my culture's point of view. But then I travel some more and then more. Soon many ways of seeing the world have seeped into my brain and it amazes me because I understand each of them and yet I know that each one thinks they are "the only way" of seeing the world. It's not quite as confusing as it may sound because I know what I think in the sense that I have a core worldview, Christianity, that acts as a grid and guide for what I experience. It's not that I don't know what I think; it's just that I feel like I sometimes have so many worlds in my mind. When you live in another country long enough or talk with a certain culture enough it's like their perspective leaks into your veins. But what is perplexing and sometimes almost laughable to me is that I sometimes feel all these views or empathies live in my brain but they all believe they are so totally the only truth. For example, I feel I can really understand the Korean mind sometimes. Perhaps I can even think like them even though often I choose not to. Then I go to America and I can think like them, too. I also know that they often think their way of thinking is the only way. I can understand both these ways of seeing the world. They both live in my brain but in so many ways they are so contradictory. So in that way, sometimes I feel there so many ways of seeing the world whirling in my brain that I think my brain is going to explode.

Um, that was way too hard to express! I'm going to bed. :-)

Wow, there has been a bombing at some synagogues in Turkey today. I'm watching it right now on the news. What a tragedy. Oh, what are we going to do about the Middle East. Speaking of this area of the world as I mentioned before I'm trying to get together a trip to Uzbekistan. There are two people that are seriously thinking about it not including me. However, they are both women so now our team needs at least one guy to seriously think about it. So please, please pray God would call the people he wants to come and that he would just bring together all the details.

I'm feeling kind of sad and uncertain about my winter break right now. As you might know I went to Uzbekistan last summer. I went with a missions team here on campus. The student group is going on more missions trips this winter including a trip to China among other possible countries. I have proposed a trip to Uzbekistan because I think there is great potential for powerful ministry in the universities and I'm interested in starting a program between our univeristy and some of the universities there in Uzbekistan. I am not sure though, maybe it's just not the time now. So should I go at all? I don't know. Also it doesn't seem like anyone else has this vision and it's hard to organize something like this unless you have a lot of people behind you. So please pray for me when you read this. Please pray God would open the right doors and close the wrong doors.

I haven't written for a while. Right now I've got my frayed sweatshirt on and my shoes are covered with mud. I just came to my office really quick to get a book then I'll go back to my house to prepare for my lesson today. This semester my free time is in the morning and I teach at night. So this morning I had my Tae-kwon-do lesson and then went stomping around the little lake on our campus taking pictures for my online photography class. I'm borrowing one of my student’s camera so I always have limited time to take pictures because he needs it back during the weekends. It has been raining nonstop for the last couple days making us all depressed and making it difficult for me to take pictures so now I'm relieved I can finally take some pictures outside. I'm kind of stressed about my lesson today. I need to teach about poetry and that makes me a bit insecure. I also just don't have the time today to do all the research that would take. So I hope today isn't a nightmare. Gotta go prepare...

I can't believe this! MIT has put 500 of their courses on the internet for anybody totally free. I just reviewed it quickly but they had classes from "Drugs and Culture" and "Middle Eastern Poetry" to "Neuroloical Studies of the Brain". Wow and it's all free... It's called Open CourseWare. Wow... I'm going to go crazy now looking through that info...

I've stayed up too late. I'm sleepy but I think I'm still going to go home and read for a while. However, I must let you know why I stayed up too late in my office. I told you a while ago about how I walked around the fishing villages around my university and took pictures. Well, I've got some of the pics up and I really like them. Not all of them are up but a good portion. I think I captured some cool scenes. (if I do say so myself:-)) Take a look... I strongly recommend you put in it on "slide show" if you have a fast connection.

Ok, I've been sitting in my office chair so long that my leg is aching. Am I getting old? Actually, I don't think I've been sitting in my chair that long. It might be that ever since I started Tae-kwon-do my hamstrings have been constantly soar from my new stretching routine. You know if you're not flexible you just physically can't do some things in Tae-kwon-do. Sometimes when my teacher teaches me something and I'm having a hard time instead of modeling the kick again he just makes me stretch again.

I found out at church today from a fellow prof. that I was on the news in Korea lately. Well, not just me but the university I work at, too. Last semester MBC came and filmed my class for about 10 minutes. So about 1 minute of that time is on this video that was shown on MBC. So if you want to see it I have the link, but first you should have a fast connection and you'll have to brave the Korean website. I'll try to give you clear directions but you won't understand most of the writing on the website and also the speakers on the video are Korean. But I think it's still really interesting and not too difficult to find the link. So go to this website (the Korean website, not the English one) and look for the "Handong PR video" title. The title will be in English. The first video link will have the letters "MBC" that's NOT the correct one. Go 3 links down and you will also see MBC again. That's the right link. Click on that and you will see me in about 2 minutes after starting the video and you'll also see other professors from my school.

I'm sick and kind of sad. I've been home all day lying around my house. I haven't been this sick in quite a while. My voice sounds pathetically croaky and I've got a cough. I should have been lying in bed but instead I was glued to my laptop surfing the internet for hours. Honestly, I can't remember what I was doing on the internet for so long. Hmmm...Let's see I typed out all my goals, did research on different books on making documentaries, researched laptops, researched pda's... Oh, I guess that's what I did. I have that kind of mopey, lump on a log kind of feeling. Like I'm trapped inside my body. I don't want to lay around- I want to do things, go places but I just don't want to move my body.

I was supposed to speak for MNE on the topic of "Spiritual Warfare" today but I had to cancel. That would have been great, hopefully I will get to speak for them later this semester. I also canceled my classes today. Thankfully my night class is taking a test, so another teacher is going to drop off the test for me and the students will take it with out me there. Another thing that was canceled today was the filming of my life. :-) Actually, it's true. A student's taking a documentary class and would like to make a documentary on a foreigner's life in Korea. I was really excited this student asked me to do this because I'm also interested in making documentaries and would like to learn as much as I can.

The desire to learn about documentaries has grown in me. I travel a lot and see such amazing things. I would like to capture some of those things and share them with people. It's a way of not having so many experiences, ideas and images bottled up inside you. Photography, making videos, my poetry and this website are methods I use to keep myself from feeling isolated or locked up inside myself with my experiences. I guess that isolation could be thought of as the other side of expression. In the past I thought artists expressed through their art just for the purpose of expressing. It never occurred to me that it was also a way to feel community or to feel less isolated.

I've finally started corresponding with, Frontiers, the mission agency I'm interested in working with . So I'm really happy about that. I've been trying to establish contact with them since the end of July. And it seemed somehow my emails didn't get through to them or the on-line vision survey I took didn't get through to them when I sent it to them through their website. But at last we are communicating and the "California rep" and I are starting to dialog over email. So we'll see where this goes.

Today I went with Ro, Sandy and some Korean guys on a hike to a temple on a mountain with the purpose of enjoying the changing fall leaves. It was beautiful. Fall is my favorite season. I love the crisp air coupled with the bright sunshine and the changing leaves. I think Ro gets tired of me going on about this though. And she often reminds me of why she doesn't like the fall, "It's the coming of death!" She's referring to winter, which she greatly dislikes. I mention this because the contrast in our moods about fall strike me as humorous. Well, I'm going to go do some reading. I just wanted to write a little bit. Hopefully, I'll write something more inspiring and deep next time...:-)

I should be writing a test but instead I'm surfing the internet and correcting the dates on my poetry page. It's really weird but when I viewed my poetry page the template was totally different (not of my doing) but I ironically I think I like it the best out of all the templates I've seen. So I hope it'll stay but when this quirky stuff happens with blogger it usually goes back to normal the next day. Thankfully I copied the html (A-ha...I'm so clever) so I can keep the template. So now that I've bored anyone that's not into blogger or websites I'll tell you that this was a "cool movie" weekend. I saw 2 movies that really touched me and filled my mind with things to meditate on. One was About a Boy and the other Equilibrium which I saw in the theater. Equilibrium really impacted me. It's been rattling through my brain the last 24 hours; I think I need to see it again. Its premise is really fascinating. Another movie that has been thought provoking for me, even though I've only seen trailers is Lost in Translation. It's a movie that I can really relate with in the sense that I daily have to interact with a culture and language I don't completely understand and doesn't completely understand me. Some of the scenes from this movie are like the story of my life in Korea. You know until I had a blog I had no idea that I cared about movies. Isn't that weird? But I guess I do cuz I'm noticing a trend in my blogs that I often talk about movies.

Ok, my poetry page is finally up. I want to put the real dates for when I wrote the poems but as you know I've had some probs with the page. So not all the dates are correct for each poem. Some of the dates are correct but not all. I'll change them later.

oh my gosh, there's my entry after all. Blogger is being so weird and flacky! Is blogger being wacko for anyone else!?

I'm really, really sad. I erased accidentally the entry I just wrote. I also have been working on a poetry page but something keeps on being weird with blogger. I've spent hours trying to get that thing published then the entries don't even show up. So it's like I totally wasted my time. Sometimes technology makes me so mad!

I've made a poetry page and I'll be adding it soon to my site. I'm using blogger for this page but for some reason I'm having a lot of problems publishing it. Usually I don't have any problems with blogger. So that's made me in a slightly annoyed mood. I've spent way too much time trying to fix it. Oh well. Soon as I get it fixed I'll let you know. I'm pretty excited about it. It's really amazing to see my poetry up in such a format. I put up whatever poems I could find (and I felt comfortable posting) scattered through out my journals of the past 5 years. So that was interesting to skim through different journals. I hadn't done that in a while and it was so enlightening. I realized that I had been praying about certain things a lot longer than I thought. I found certain prayer requests and concerns that I thought were more recent but I've actually been thinking about for years. Each poem reflects a period or circumstance in my life. It's so interesting for me to look at them all together as a kind of anthology of my life. I can see them from my eyes, remembering that time or I can see them through the eyes of someone else. They look so different when I look at them that way.

This weekend was a melancholy, lonely weekend. I was alone for the weekend for the first time in along time. It's hard for me to be alone usually during the weekends because I live on a campus in the forest with all my friends (fellow profs). So basically we are always together. But just by some fluke last minute situation everybody left for the weekend but me. Normally, this would be no problem at all because I do well alone for extended periods of time. I'm pretty good at entertaining myself. But I was sad anyway to begin this weekend. It turned all right though because after I got over the initial surprise of being alone I started to think of all the things I would like to do but never get a chance. So I walked around the fishing villages near my university taking pictures and filming people. It was great. I love doing that. I used to do that in Jerusalem all the time. It's so meditative. You can somehow soak up the culture more. Walking dusty streets, strolling narrow alleys, passing average fishermen entering their average house gets you in touch with something basic, something foundational in the country. And by the way, I’ll put those pictures up eventually, too. I didn’t take them with a digital camera so it’s going to take me a little longer to get them up.

Ok, this is going to be Joyce's "hook-up" entry. I often think of things or connections that have helped me out and I just thought I should share some of those things with you. So here they are. First, we've got two newsletters that have given me so many connections over the years. I strongly recommend them. One is a weekly newsletter for mission-minded people. If you want to be in the know about resources and networking with mission-minded people get on this list!
~Send an email just saying you want to subscribe (one sentence will do) and if you decide you don't want it you can easily unsubscribe
*To subscribe, write to brigada-today-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

*To check out their newsletter online go to at http://www.brigada.org

Ok, the second newsletter is bi-monthly and is called the web-evangelism newsletter. It’s also got a lot of great resources and info.
~To JOIN, send a blank email to: web-evangelism-subscribe@lists.gospelcom.net
You can also check it out online at http://www.gospelcom.net/guide/resources/bulletin.php

Now here is an absolute LIFE SAVER for people who have acne problems. This is the only thing I know that really, really works without going to a doctor, spending TONS of money and almost destroying your liver with medication. It's a bit pricey but totally worth it. You also have to stay with it for over 6 months to get almost totally perfect skin but you do see results immediately. So suggest it to anyone that really struggles with acne-it works!! And no, I don't get anything out of this just the satisfaction of helping someone cuz I know what a bummer it can be.
www.proactiv.com

Some people want to support a missionary, they just don't know who or how. Well, I know a terrific organization. They are really reliable. A hundred percent of your money goes to a native missionary in Asia (as opposed to advertisement fees and such unless you specifically allocate your money to home staff and fees-which are important, too) You can "adopt" one missionary and pay about 20-30 dollars a month and that pays their salary. You also get a letter from them once every couple months telling you their prayer requests. It is written through a translator because most of the missionaries are village people. Another thing I like about it is you can sign up for automatic withdrawal out of your account, so that you won't forget. So here's the website. Check it out---www.gfa.org

Well, those are all my "hook-ups" for now. :-)

It's after work and I'm sitting in my office. Perhaps I'm finally beginning to get into my schedule since I've come back from Japan. This semester I'm working nights and starting classes at 3pm. So far I like it. One thing that I really like about it is that it gives me time to do things in the morning when I'm fresh. Something I'm really enjoying so far this semester is taking Tae-Kwon-Doe lessons in the morning. I get up at 8am, throw my clothes on and then run to meet my teacher near the cafeteria. So far I really like it. I was trying to analyze why I like it so much. For me it's so beautiful, so artful. Even though one could argue that in dance or sports a person trains their body in a similar way to produce some sort of movement. But in my opinion martial arts are the most beautiful. It was funny yesterday my teacher taught me a new kick. The first time I tried it he said, "Have you learned this before? It's like you already mastered it!" I think perhaps I was lucky the first time but it was true that kick came more naturally to me than other kicks. I was thinking later about why that was then it dawned on me. As many of you know I'm a major Matrix 1 fan and I've probably watched that movie 20+ times. (yes...it's true--in a sheepish voice) I’m pretty sure that Neo does this kick a couple times and one particular time really pronounced. So I realized that watching that movie a million times might have sub-consciously helped me out. See-it does pay to watch certain movies multiple times. :-)

You know the famed fables that some how involve one character being in a group where he tries to belong but there's always an ache inside him telling him that he doesn't quite belong. For example, the story of "The Ugly Duckling". Do you remember it? Its story line is something along the lines of a swan that grows up with a duck family. So it grew up thinking it was a duck but it was a terrible and supposedly ugly duck. The swan grew up thinking it should swim more like the other ducks or look more like the other ducks. It must have been so eye opening when the swan first realized who it was. I can imagine what it would have been like when the swan was first around other swans. They would have swam up to him and greeted him as one of their own. They wouldn't have been surprised at his size or looks but simply expected him to look like this because he was a swan, of course. The swan probably would have looked at the other swans and thought, "They swim like me! They look like me! They act like me!" Stories of such situations remind me of sometimes what I feel like in Korea. The interesting thing is though that I didn't always feel this way but it has grown in me. See-normally I just live my life like the ugly duck. I have a life here. I fit in here. I'm swimming pretty contently with all the ducks. But once in a while I'll get a glimpse of the invisible boundary between me and the Koreans. Like today I was interviewing potential members for MNE (Missions and English-a student lead missions group on campus) with other members of MNE who are Korean. One of the potential members came in and we began to ask her questions. She is Korean ethnically but she is Russian. She grew up in Russia and doesn't speak very much Korean. Within a couple minutes she made me realize once again that her and I are so similar and in some intangible way the Koreans are so far away from us. What I mean is her mind is western. I don't know her. I might not even agree with half of her ideas. However, that's not what I'm talking about, it's not about agreeing with each other. It's about sharing a mind-frame, a certain orientation. It's hard for one to put their finger on what it is exactly. Perhaps like how the swan felt when it was young. It couldn't see itself clearly in the water it just knew it wasn't the same as the ducks. Some sense or aching or longing inside. What's interesting is that I forget about the difference between my mind set and the Korean's mind-set until I'm with a lot of western people again. Then the difference between us glares so brightly.

This longing can work both ways. I can long for other "swans" but I can also long to belong with the "ducks" that I love and admire. Because if a swan is always around ducks it can begin to feel like one of them even though it always knows deep down that it isn't a duck. This can be especially acute for me when I start to feel romantic feelings for a Korean. There is the sense that I know them, that I'm drawn to them. But then there is that wall between us; our cultures are too fundamentally different. So I guess I'm like the swan that swims with a lot of ducks and I long for their company but our closeness can only go so far. So then I long for those who are fundamentally like me.

Here's a fascinating article called "Should Christians try to Convert Muslims?" It was on the front page of Time magazine. I was really impressed in a lot of ways when I read this article because the author had really done his homework. I felt he really knew about the evangelical mission movement; in fact I thought he probably knew more than a lot of evangelicals that aren't mission-minded. I also thought he represented Christians fairly and brought up issues that Christians themselves dispute. Read it-because it's more relevant than ever in these post 9/11 days.

I'm now in Tokyo at Ro's parents’ house. It's been a whirlwind of feelings and experiences. I got into the Tokyo airport last night and made my way through 3 confusing trains (3 hours later?) to the Potters' station. I also made a Taiwanese friend along the way when the book in my sweatshirt pocket stabbed her when I sat down next to her. We started to chat in English after she asked me to stop stabbing her with my book which, of course, I was unaware of. Once there Dr. Potter picked me up and I was once again reunited with the Potters at their home in Tokyo. Today I got up and Dr. Potter and I figured out how to get the embassy and Dr. Potter gave me impeccable directions as usual. I then proceeded to make my way around the maze that is called Tokyo's train system. You might think, "What's the big deal?" The deal is simply said- tons of trains. Not only that but tons of trains going to one destination but the trains are all different. One is the express train, one is the local train, one is the red, the blue, the green. So blue, green, yellow and red might all go towards the stop you want to get off at but one is faster so it only stops at major stops. (therefore skipping your stop) On top of that the signs are all in Japanese with English in small letters sometimes. At times there are crowds of people running everywhere and trains leaving and it seems you have to make decisions about which train to take in a split second or you might be left waiting for an hour. I also didn't mention some trains are only by reservation and/ or are way more expensive than others but they're also going in the direction you want to go. But you get the point-right? Did I mention that often you have to change the train 2 or 3 times each trip you take? ....OK, I'll stop going on about it. So thank goodness for Dr. Potter and his incredible thorough directions.

I finally got to the Korean embassy and when I got to the window they told me they closed "the visa time" 3 hours ago. But I said outside in the lobby it's says the visa time is from 1:30 to 4pm and it says that on the internet, too. So she says, "Well, it's wrong. We changed the time a month ago." Thankfully she took my passport and visa application anyway. After that we had a long discussion about just what had gone wrong with my visa anyway. Because technically my visa had 5 more months until it was invalid. So we went through the big discussion that I have had a hundred times by now and at first this immigration lady couldn't understand why the immigration people in Seoul had disqualified my visa. So we had a thoroughly confusing discussion and she finally thought she understood which I wasn't so sure about. Which just goes to show me once again out of this situation that a lot of the times even immigration people don't understand half the regulations concerning visas and that I've got to know what's going on with my visa because a lot of people don't know what they are talking about. At the end of our conversation she concluded with some slight doubt that I had been working illegally since Feb. 2003. That was her theory based on the paper work she had seen. Which I was pretty sure was not the case and somehow she didn't understand some part of the process. Anyway, all of this was not really relevant to the current visa process but more her and I trying figure out what went wrong. But it left me thinking this visa situation is so crazy and no one knows what they're talking about.

After that I headed back to Tokorozawa, which is the lovely suburb where Ro's parents live. I got there, I'm proud to say, splendidly and even met Ro's youngest brother, Brent, on the bus on the last leg of the 2 hour trip. I've known Brent since he was 10 years old but only seen him sporadically since then, so every 3 year increment I’ve seen him I've been astonished by how much he had changed . Especially when I saw him at 13 I felt like he had grown 2 feet since the last time I had seen him. This time it's like the boy I knew never existed and there's just this mature young man standing in front of me. (He’s 18 now.) I'm getting to the age when you can see people grow up and that in itself is weird. It also makes me feel like the dreaded relative that we all had whether it was an aunt or great cousin that said, "Haven't you grown like a weed....I seems just like yesterday that you were a tiny tot running naked through the sprinklers....and then there was when...." I'm turning into that person!! Oh no!

There's a lot more I could say about Brent and I doing dishes to Vanilla Ice's classic "Ice, Ice Baby" or eating dinner with the new missionary family that is joining the Potter's mission team in their area or how the Japanese dress so funky in comparison to Koreans or how I have felt anxious and sad about my money and future but also hopeful because "God can do more than we ask or imagine...". But I've got to go to sleep. Maybe later I can talk about the Muslim church planting book I'm reading (as one of my Uzbeki students once said, "It's just what the doctor ordered!") or some observations I've made about Japanese spheres of personal space. Good night!

I talked about it earlier now it's come up again. I get a web-evangelism newsletter and this was on it. This is a Christian website that is really influential in dialoging with non-Christians through film. This is what the web master of that site is saying. So Christians go on there and dialog with people on that message board. I'm going to try to go on the board also. ALso pray for venues for the film to be seen, people are protesting againest it being show in theaters.

MEL GIBSON'S FILM - YOU CAN HELP

Dave Bruce of Hollywoodjesus.com writes:
"Our message board for Mel Gibson's THE PASSION is being overloaded by
pre-Christians. I can not get to them all. The board is running 75%
pre-Christian, with very few solid Christians responding to those who
are
anti-Jesus. I have never seen anything like this!
Passion page: http://www.hollywoodjesus.com/passion.htm
Board: http://forums.gospelcom.net/view/hollywoodjesus/passion
Please post responses and get others to post. Needs 'Jesus makes a
difference in my life' personal responses. Goal: off-the-board dialogue
with
pre-Christians. Pass this need on too. It is going to be one of the
most
culturally-explosive films ever released!"

It's weird. This is the Monday of my second week of school. I feel both busy and in slow motion. I have the lightest schedule I've ever had at Handong. And that is exaggerated I think because the first week a lot of the things I'm going to be doing hadn't even started yet. I feel strange and strangely guilty like there is something I should be doing. At the same time I have felt preoccupied with my whole visa mess. I'm going to Japan to get a new work visa as soon as I get the paper work from my school. It looks like it's going to be a crazy ride though. Because I'm getting stand-by tickets from Ro's brother, who is a pilot. Stand-by is unpredictable and often stressful. I have only a short window of time to get the visa because of the most important holiday in Korea is coming up and the Korean embassy will be closed. But I have to get my work visa before Chusuk (the holiday in Korea) because my tourist visa will expire. So please pray for all the details that have to fall in place as I travel to Japan. A lot could potentially go wrong. well, I have got class.....

Wow, what a ride. I'm finally back in Korea. I had a lay over in Tokyo and it turned out that something was wrong with the plane so all the people on the plane had to stay in a hotel. (with all expenses paid) The hotel was about an hour and a half away from the airport and then it took another 45 minutes to check in. While waiting in line I really wanted to lie down on the floor by that time I had been up for a long time. (I didn't sleep on the way to Korea) The nice thing about going to the hotel though was that I got to sleep in a nice bed instead of a bus and a plane. I also took a hot bath, which was wonderful for my stiff back. Then I got up at 3:30am to catch the bus back to the airport which we were informed was now leaving a 9:50am instead of 7am. So more waiting around with the passengers of the plane that I was now well acquainted with. Then I got to Seoul and was told at the immigration booth that my working visa had expired. After sitting in the immigration office and having Joanne talk with the immigration officer (over the phone in Korean) I am still confused to what happened and worried about it. They let me in the country with only a 30 day tourist visa. This is actually quite serious. All I know is that I did what I was told and in Feb. when my visa was expiring I went to the immigration office in Pohang and renewed it. Obviously, something was seriously wrong. But I have no idea what happened, I remember specifically asking the immigration guy, "Is this a multiple visa?" We had a hard time communicating but I thought we both walked away with it solved. But I guess not. Please when you read this pray about this for me because I don't know what we are going to do. Jun-mo is going to call the immigration lady to find out what happened as soon as Joanne reaches him. I have the nagging feeling that somehow this is my fault even though I know it is not. Well, I'm still in the airport in Seoul so I better go and call Ro to see if she can pick me up at the airport in Pohang.

Oh great, suddenly I feel like I have nothing to write about. I've written a couple blogs in my head today, so where are they?
You know you are in America when:
*you receive the food you ordered and you gasp at its great size
*people drive so obediently and orderly
*there is an abundance of everything (you walk into Costco or Wal-Mart and can't believe the pure abundance)
*almost every young woman from 12 to 30 is showing part of her stomach (at least in Southern California)
* white people are trying to be really brown and somewhat succeeding (in contrast to Korea where everyone is always trying to be whiter)
It's funny cuz I a year ago I wrote a list like this for Korea (you know you're in Korea when...) to process some of the external cultural aspects when you first visit. I wrote it in my first semester in Korea and then later realized that I no longer noticed the very things I wrote about. But I wrote it mainly to illustrate the external things that usually strike the person who first travels to Korea from the West. And when I did this I tried to do it the other way and imagine what a person coming to the US would first notice. And to tell you the truth-I couldn't do it. I guess I couldn't become that objective. So today I realized that a year and a half later I have acquired some sense of objectivity about the US, so that certain things struck me as different or foreign.

Read This to See if Joyce Runs Over a Cow
(also read it cuz I spent way too long writing it)
I don't know where to begin about Uzbekistan. I told you on July 28th a brief sketch of the country. I'll tell you about some things that you would see if you came to Uzbekistan so you get the context, then I'll tell you some high-lights for me. I, actually, don't like to tell these details sometimes because I find beginner travelers and/or people who don't travel to industrializing nations really over-emphasize these points often intentionally or unintentionally with a kind of superior attitude. It's just life an industrializing nation-no reason for us to be snooty about it. With that out of my system-if you were to go to Uzbekistan right now probably the first thing you would notice would be that it seems like you went back in time 50 or 60 years as far as technology goes. Almost all the cars are 1950's style and any other form of technology is about the same. You would also notice that there are often a couple cows roaming freely in the street or along the street as you ride around in the back of your 1950's taxi with your smoking in the car every 15-30 minutes taxi driver. You'd also notice the toilets are some what crude porcelain holes in the ground with no toilet paper available.(which if you're a smart traveler in the 2/3's world you'll have tissue in your purse which you must throw away in the small garbage can next to the toilet NOT in the toilet...the piping can't handle toilet paper. And if you clog up the toilet with the toilet paper the cleaning lady will surely be yelling about you, "stupid foreigner" in some language you don't understand.) Another thing you would notice would be how many of the women dress. Especially in the rural areas almost all the women wear long, airy, loose fitting dresses and the older women wear scarves around their heads (usually more in a Russian style than Arab style) However, maybe one girl out of 20 girls walking by you will be wearing a sexy tank-top and pants. These girls tend to be Russian most of the time. Most of the people in Uzbekistan are of Uzbek ethnicity which means they are Muslim, which means they are more conservative, which means they should dress accordingly. But if they are of Russian ethnicity their culture is actually quite different from pure Uzbek culture. However, I believe this is different in the capital city, Tashkent, where everyone tends to be more liberal. I'm speaking mostly from my experience in Fergana, a semi-large by Uzbek standards city, in the conservative country side.

I was just up getting some tea and because of the music I'm listening to thought of how they dance in Uzbekistan. It's really amazing. I actually tried to see if I could still remember how to dance in their style in my living room. :-) But I just couldn't remember, the dance style is so different. You could say, "All Koreans sing and all Uzbekis dance". For enjoyment in groups Koreans sing and for enjoyment Uzbekis dance. So when I was over at this Uzbeki girl's house with a bunch of other Uzbeki girls for dinner after they wanted to dance. Their native music is more Indian or Arab style and so is their dance style. It's so beautiful, artful and sexy. It's kind of similar to how a belly dancer dances if you've never seen Indian dancing. It also reminds me of Spanish dancing, too. So the Korean girls from my team and I tried to dance with them but we looked so stiff and clumsy compared to them. I actually picked it up a little after dancing awhile but as I said I can't do it now (or maybe it was the non-Arab music I was dancing to).

Now on to my personal high-lights. I also could say a lot of things about what it was like to go on a missions trip with a group of students from a different culture than my own. I was the only "white person" on my team and the only person who couldn't speak Korean. There was one other male prof. on the trip who is Korean American so in many ways we are the same culturally. That helped to have one other American on the trip but he still had an advantage over me obviously because he speaks the language and is a part of Korean culture more than me. Being the only one that was totally non-Korean was educational but hard at times. But most of the times it was fine. One thing of many things I gleaned by being with a Korean team is what God is doing in the Korean mission force. I stayed with various Korean missionaries. Their dedication to the field and to souls is really inspiring and challenging. They are doing a lot of great things, for example, I visited a dental clinic and children's hospital that offer free services to Uzbekis totally ran by Christian Koreans. (They are secretly planting churches through these organizations...even though Uzbekistan says it has freedom of religion-it doesn't really...Uzbeki Christians are highly persecuted and missionaries not allowed in the country) Did you know the second highest missionary sending nation is Korea, after the States? And perhaps per capita Korea sends the most missionaries world-wide. I really thank God that I've had the unique experience of working for God with a culture other than my own, I think it will enable me to think beyond cultural restraints more easily and it makes me a more diversified person and future missionary.

Ok, now I'm really going to talk about my personal high-lights. I think one of the things that sticks out the most in my mind is the class I taught for a week in Fergana University. I had 8 students in my class, one of them wants to become the future president of Uzbekistan (he's almost fluent in Korean and English) From the beginning it was clear to me that these students were very smart and eager to learn anything they could. Because of the economic state of Uzbekistan they just don't have the materials or access to information that we have. I felt like they knew about everything they could know about. They were thoroughly versed on politics and geography-I felt more than a lot of students I've taught. Right away we started talking about deep things freely, they delved into the discussions without hesitation. The first day we discussed relationships and they went around the classroom surveying their classmates about different opinions on relationships as one of the lesson activities. We had many interesting discussions about marriage customs and dating customs. For example, usually in Uzbekistan men marry around 20 to 23 and women marry from 17 to 22. And when you get married you live with the husband's family until you have enough money to build your own house. By the end of the week, we had discussed abortion, Iraq, the Palestinians, Christianity and Islam and the spiritual world.

Probably the day that penetrated me the most was the day I gave the students a survey on the "supernatural". It was so cute and I still laugh about this when I introduced the topic for the day one student that's really funny said, "This is just what the doctor ordered!" I thought it was so hilarious that he said that. Anyway, that's not the point. The survey has different unexplained supernatural experiences on it such as out of body experience, fortune teller, ghosts and UFO's. It's really great for discussing spiritual issues. They go around the classroom and ask their classmates if they believe in these things and why or why not. We got into a very deep talk about worldviews and discussed the different answers to world view questions. Such as, what are humans?, Is there a God?, and why is the evil on earth?. For each question (there are more questions) we wrote together on the board how different worldviews answer these questions. Such as how would a naturalist answer "what is a human?" or how would a Hindu answer this question. So we went through all these questions but at the end I said ok, now we've discussed what different worldviews believe. But how do you know which one is right? Should we just believe the worldview of the culture we were born in (because what if it's wrong....cuz they believe Hinduism is wrong but they could've been born in India) or should we test our own worldview and others to see which best explains reality. Well, the truth is they were mesmerized and I think impacted. So this led to other discussions and I told them most of my family isn't Christian. Christianity was something I found as I was searching for truth (humanly speaking). The implications, of these ideas for them, of course, were that they shouldn't just believe Islam cuz there parents believe it. So that was a very thought provoking class.

The most exciting thing that happened, though, was that at the end of the one week camp we had church at the missionary's house and many students came. We invited them to join us but wanted to be very clear that it was church so they wouldn't feel tricked. Well, more of them came then we thought would (maybe 15) and prof. Abraham shared the gospel. And after the church service the missionary spoke in Uzbek and told the students if they were interested they can come every Sunday and the service will be in Uzbek. (By the way, we were in the missionary's living room not a church building) Here's the most amazing thing to me though that after the missionary said some stuff in Uzbek to the students the students started discussing emotionally something. After I asked one of my students what he had said. He said that he had told them that Uzbekistan isn't like some Middle Eastern countries that think Christianity is wrong but that it is possible that Christianity is not wrong because we both believe in Moses and Jesus. This was quite a amazing thing to come from his mouth and could be quite a transforming idea to Uzbeki culture. Basically, it means they are open to hearing the gospel and won't out right reject it like some Muslim countries. So hopefully that faithful Sunday a church was born in Fergana. So please pray for those students that I taught and that continue going to that missionary's house! Ok, I can't write anymore. But I hope you read this cuz I spent too much time writing it. :-)

When I went to get a cup of water after getting up from bed this morning I remembered a funny dream I had had. In the dream I kept drinking glasses of water again and again but my thirst was never quenched. It was the topic of everyone's conversation in my dream, "Can you believe how much Joyce is drinking but she still wants more..." I must have been thirsty during the night. I laughed to myself as I remembered how obsessive I was in my dream about wanting more and more water.

I was taking a walk on the dirt roads that lead to various rice fields behind Ro's apartment today (it's like a little forest). Enjoying the feeling of the soft breeze on my arms and the warm sun on my skin. I've perhaps been a bit of a hermit for these last couple days since I've been back from Uzbekistan kooked (for the life of me I can't remember the spelling of that word...so please put it on a shout out) up in Ro's apartment online almost all the time. I'm really enjoying it though. I wanted to read some poetry as I gazed at the green rice fields (some times for relaxation and attempting as they say in the Dead Poets Society "to suck the marrow out of life" I read poetry out loud to myself somewhere out in the outdoors) but I could only find a book about Rich Mullins. But that turned out to be great. He has some great song lyrics and many deep thoughts. He is inspiring. He was and continues to be an influence in my life. I clearly remember when he died. I was in Israel and dealing with a lot of life and death issues on a new level. I remember listening to his songs on my walkman on the roof of my school over looking the white stone old city of Jerusalem and thinking about his words, his death among many other things. Here are some snippets from a chapter on temptation from a book called Rich Mullins: An Arrow Pointing to Heaven,

(Rich Speaking) "I've been in and out of all kinds of things-like self-deprecation, self-interest, ego trips, alcohol and other addictions. I've failed many times to avoid those kinds of temptations. But that's not really what the devil was really interested in. What he was trying to do is make me feel apart from God. Now I know that what Satan would like to take from us is our true knowledge of who we are-which is children of God."
(the book goes on to say...)
"The goal of the enemy of our souls is to destroy our relationship with God by getting us to accept the lie that we are not loved. As strange as it might sound, the actual sin itself, while damaging to the person, is not the primary issue. Musician Billy Crockett, who played guitar on many of Rich's albums noted, "We have a religious culture that tries to keep its nose clean all of the time, but in Rich Mullins you met someone whose allegiance was to something much greater than not sinning. His life is always pointing to a greater reality.""

Wow...good stuff....
Here's part of a song Rich wrote relating with this topic that I can relate to.
When a million voices whisper
And they tell me I should leave
Into the shadows that the moon casts
On these alleys and these streets
But I know that chasing shadows won't get me anywhere
'Cause I've been there

I spent some time chasing my own plans and agenda but it always leads nowhere. And now for the final quote from this book which is actually from C.S. Lewis (don't skip this....it's really insightful I think)

"Only those that try to resist temptation know how strong it is...That is why bad people know very little about badness. They have lived a sheltered life by always giving in. We never find out the strength of the evil impulse inside of us until we try to fight it: and Christ because He was the only man who never yielded to temptation, is also the only man who knows to the full what temptation means-the only complete realist."

There's this fruit-loop sounding Christian guy on CNN right now discussing Christian Zionism. I just couldn't take it, so I turned the TV off. He was being so offensive! It was embarrassing! Anyway, I wanted to put a link on here so I wouldn't lose a site. (right now I'm staying at Ro's house so I can't save stuff on favorites) This article is so great! It's really easing my headache about buying a new laptop. I need to do research and make sense of all the crazy acronyms out there (RAM,SDRAM, USB, PCI, SCSI, EIDE, CPU, PCI, MIDI, NTSC...) It was stressing me out! But this article (and all the articles linked to it) is really helping me out. advice on buying a computer I feel a little lame putting this on my blog when really what I should be doing is filling you in on my Uzbekistan trip. :-O But that will come soon...good night...

It's my second day back to Korea. Yesterday I got here half way through the day and basically bought a little food then watched a movie and went to bed. Then I woke up today around 12:45 in the afternoon. It was an exhausting trip and I didn't sleep hardly at all my all night trip here.

I've decided I'm going to try to tell about my trip to Uzbekistan little by little on my blog so that I don't write a ten page blog thus exhausting me and you. :-) I'll start by saying I think the trip changed me. Another thing I'll mention just as a short summary to start us out is that Uzbekistan is very poor and very hot. I'm also considering working there or in Central Asia on a long term basis if it's God's will. (more about that will come) What makes Uzbekistan worth while is the people and their potential. In the short interaction I had with the people I found them to be passionate, intelligent, inquiring, open, searching, desperate for opportunity and change, and impressionable. The country is very undeveloped. I hadn't been to a country that was that undeveloped in a long time. It was interesting to see the change in myself that I hadn't realized. When I was last in a country like this one I saw the poverty and lack of economic development but at that time I just didn't realize the full social and economic implications of what I was seeing. I guess I just wasn't as much of an adult then. India was very poor (and actually nobody in Uzbekistan is as poor as the poorest I saw in India) but there was still the impression of business in India -the free process of buying and selling and all that goes with that such as advertising. But in Uzbekistan there was little advertisement and often stores gave me the impression that they were somewhat out of stock. I think the country that it reminds of most is Albania, which would make sense. Because there history is somewhat similar-a post-communist country trying to make its way after opening up to the world. In the case of Uzbekistan it used to be part of Russia but became independent in 1991 when communism fell in Russia.

Well, I should go to sleep. I'll write more later. I'm leaving more San Diego 5 days...wow. In the meantime I have a lot to think about. I want to take advantage of this free time while I have it. Can you believe this is my first chunk of free time this summer!! I can't believe it either! Please pray for me as I hope to spend some serious thinking time on the subject of my Master's degree and my next step. For those close to me, they know this is something constantly on my mind because I need to start making some decisions soon or so I think.

hey, I'm back...actually I'm in the airport in Seoul....I'm trying to figure out which way I want to get home to Pohang...plane or train....unfortunately....I'm sick to my stomach....so I just want to lay around....well, Uzbekistan was mind-opening and I'm coming back to Korea with a new perspective....I'll tell more about that after I recover...so more coming soon!

I just sent my newsletter so hopefully some of you will be stopping by. If you'd like to read more about my Uzbekistan trip click here. If you'd like see wonderful pics of this last semester click here. Otherwise, please feel free to read about some of the things that are happening in my brain or in my life.

Wow, I just read a fascinating review of the Matrix discussing the symbolism in the movie concerning post-modernism and modernism. Did you know that Neo's name means new and Morpheus means change. You've got to read it.

A Pohang (the lovely steel mill city I live in) update for all you Pohang lovers out there (you know who you are). The street where they built the new theater is now booming. It's amazing! It's not the same street. It's lined with cars and there are now food booths outside on the streets to feed the new crowds of teeny-boppers. And get this-there's a Subway sandwich shop now!!!! Yes, I said Subway!! Can you believe it!!? When I first saw it I stood gaping from across the street. Then, of course, I went and bought a sandwich which for some reason was terrible. But I'm still ecstatic that there is now a Subway in Pohang!! Wow, aren't we getting modern!?

Today I pretty much finished my summer school class. The only thing we have left are the finals Monday. For some reason, which I'm not quite in touch with yet, I really enjoyed my summer school classes. I'm thinking maybe it's because I'm their only class so they are really enthusiastic about my class. Sometimes during the school year, particularly Sophomores get burnt out and I really see it in class. I've been doing some reflecting on my expectations for my classes and my students lately. I think I have a tendency to expect my students to be passionate about my class or I start to get ticked off. Maybe I expect too much. Today their presentations were so great. As usual there were a lot references to me (they always make references to the teacher and their unique habits...like the way they say something or organize something) For example, I often group students into groups of two by saying, "you two, you two, you two.." while pointing to the students. So, of course, in one of their skits they do this and everyone thinks it's hilarious when a male student dressed like a woman starts saying, "you two, you two". Yes, when they do skits I learn about all the things I do that stick out in their minds that I had no idea about. They really went all out today. I was really proud of them. Each skit was about 20 minutes and they had music and costumes. One was about how agent Smith had kidnapped me and two of my students had to go into the matrix to find me. It was sooo funny. Then when they finally found me I didn't want to leave because agent Smith understands my "art" which is a reference to my super dorky drawings that I draw on the white board to explain a concept about grammar or writing.

Well, I found out today, tragically, that joy (less) travel loused up my plane ticket to the US in August. They misunderstood the price and after I sent them the money they told me two days later that the price is 200.000 more won then they thought. (I'm going to kill them!) Why do I use them? Well, from now on I'm going to use a different travel agency. They also caused a lot of probs for Ro's travels this summer. Please pray for me about this, because it's complicated. Because I'm leaving for Uzbekistan soon and other factors. (Basically, I had calculated my money carefully and now this messes everything up)

I am now officially leaving for Uzbekistan July 11. I found this out 2 days ago. All of MNE left yesterday except, prof. Abraham Lee and I. Strangely, Abraham's and I visas were delayed while everyone else's visas were fine. When Betty (the gal in charge of MNE) asked the travel agent what was the problem he gave the strange reply that a computer in the Uzbek embassy is broken and that's why the visas won't be ready until July 11. Hmm, that makes everything clear as crystal. But both Betty and I were like, oh well, let's just give it to the Lord cuz it's beyond us. Everything should be fine for leaving July 11 though. And now I think that’s probably better because it gives me more time, instead of racing off right after my class finishes. Especially, considering I have to sort out everything with my ticket to the US.