Ya-gu

"For it's root, root, root for the Giants, if they don't win it's a shame..."

Being from southern California and cheering for the Padres and Dodgers my entire life, it's tough to bring myself to root for the Giants. Here in Pusan though, rooting for the home team Lotte Giants is easy. Yesterday I spent my first day out at the ballpark and I'm going to be making a habit of it.

Baseball (ya-gu) is extremely popular here in Korea and the Korean national team had a stunning outing in the World Baseball Classic, going undeafeated for six games before dropping the semi-final to Japan. The
Korean Baseball Association has 8 teams all of which are sponsored by local businesses, Kia, Hyundae, LG, Samsung, etc. The Giants are sponsored by Lotte, a huge Asian corporation bent on world domination. The Giants, however, haven't dominated anything as of late and have been low in the KBO standings for years.

They had a good showing on Sunday against the Unicorns however. Yup, that's right. One of the KBO teams is called the Unicorns and apparently they suck. Spotty picthing all day by the Unicorns gave way to a 9-1 route. Such a lopsided game led more to drinking than to actually watching the game.

Tickets cost $5 and you can bring in as much food and drink as you can carry. We took them up on that offer and brought in a case of beer. Thoroughly drunk by the 5th, we applied ourselves to learning the Korean chants and songs that were constantly sang by the near capacity crowd. They cheer and chant for every player and every play. Yelling "No, we don't like it" when a pitcher checks the runner at first and "Give it to a kid" when a ball slices foul into the stands. I picked up quite a bit of Korean with the help of two Korean teachers that went to the game with us. My friend Todd also helped this learning experience, but not in a way I appreciated.

"Try this one," he told me. "She-bal. It means 'way to go, good job'. Try it." I did try it. Yelled it, in fact, right after the next good play. When Todd started laughing hysterically and I was hit on the shoulder by the Korean teachers we were with, I knew something was up. I hadn't yelled "good job" but rather the Korean equivalent of "son of a bitch". I spent the next five minutes punching Todd as hard as I could and calling him a son of a bitch in English.

Great times at the ballpark. The Korean fans are so much more into the game than are Americans and with a smaller stadium it feels much more personal. Like I said, I'm going to try to get out there as often as I can. I'm spending next weekend on Geoje-do, an island an hour from here. I'm going with Sarah and I think we're going to have a great time. I'll have pictures to post and a description next week. Take care.

Monkey Butts

I can't really explain this one. All I know is that I love it.

I hate being sick

I've been sick for two weeks now. Stuffy nose, coughing, mild fever. For two weeks. I'm sick of it (pardon the pun). This morning I woke up at 6:30 with a earache that felt not unlike someone pushing an icepick into my brain. I downed some aspirin and made my way down to the doctor who I was assured was great and spoke English.

Both counts turned out to be true, thankfully. She gave me a cursory inspection and told me that (tada!) I have a cold. She said my ear looked fine but would prescribe a few days worth of antibiotics just to be safe. And to top it off, she gave me a shot in the ass. In Kyrgyzstan it was really common to take injections instead of pills and I think I was told by a doctor that it really doesn't work any better or faster if you inject the medicine. Regardless, the doc here gave me a shot. It was kinda strange, I've never had a shot in the butt that I can remember. The nurse who gave it to me spoke no English so it was accomplished by awkward hand gestures. She also slapped me a few times which weirded me out. "Is this some sort of holistic thing?" I wondered. I discovered she was just distracting me from the shot since she told me I was done before I felt anything. So I got slapped on the ass by a nurse and should be better in a few days.

And all for the grand total of $20 including meds. Korea certainly has the medical system figured out. I can't imagine how much more a visit to the doctor, an injection and a filled prescription would cost back home. It's all part of the delightful, "everything is so much cheaper here" phenomena.

Take haircuts for example. I got my haircut last weekend for 5,000 won ($5). It's not a great cut (like Kerrie would give back home) but it'll do. How is it so cheap? Well, parts of it I found are do it yourself. After it was cut I was asked if I wanted a shampoo and I said yes. I was led to a back room, shown a sink, soap and some towels and then left to fend for myself. It took me a few minutes to figure out that I was supposed to wash my own hair. Not that I'm opposed to that it's just that washing your hair in a tiny sink isn't exactly easy. I made a mess of it and ended up soaking my hoodie but it was funny more than anything. It's those weird little differences that make being here so much fun.