Homely Planet

Here's my new punk rock song, inspired by that the wonderful Korean dude who stalks teachers and says that we're spreading AIDS.

Why most teabaggers are racists.

I know things have been a bit quiet over here at Showbiz Central since I got back from the Philippines. It's probably because I spent the majority of last week dead drunk but I'm drying out now and donning the tie and teaching reject community-college kids who were too lazy or thick to actually get into a good Korean university, if such a thing even exists.

Back into the swing of things, as it were.

I'll hopefully be posting more this week (I got a few PI posts brewing), but in the meantime, check out Doug Stanhope's top ten targets for Al Qaeda's next strike. I've been away from The States for a while now and am not familiar with all of them, but I appreciate the sentiment nonetheless.

Trainer is killed by orca during Seaworld show.. It's like when the white tiger chewed on the gay German guy's head in Vegas. The interesting thing is that this particular whale has been implicated in three human deaths before, yet they STILL FORCE IT TO DO "TRAINED ANIMAL" TRICKS.

You'd think these folks would have gotten the picture by now.

Marijuana use on the rise among seniors

Tonight is our last night in Palawan. In the morning we fly back to Manila, chill for a night, and then head back to Busan on late Saturday/early Sunday. It's been a hell of a run and the last two days were the perfect way to cap this particular time out.

Coron and Busaunga Island are historically important because this area is where The Battle of Coron was fought. On September 24th, 1944, a large group of US bombers launched from Admiral Bull Halsey's carrier group suprised a group of Japanese supply ships that was attempting to reinforce the Philippines. It was a surprise attack resulting in the devastation of the Japanese flotilla. To this day these ships lay where they were sunk, and are open for exploration by divers.

We did four dives in two days. Yesterday we hit two large freighters, "Olympia Maru" and "Morozan Maru." It's ironic that the first bears the same name as my hometown. We were with our German divemaster and a young French couple that live in China (when asked what they were doing here, the vaguely answered, "working."). The wrecks were amazing, in 26 and 25 meters of water, respectively. We spent time on the face of the ships, as well a lot of time going inside, which really was the best part. After sixty-plus years on the bottom, the ships have become coral reefs in their own right and are teeming with tropical sealife. We took in lion fishes, a crocodile fish, a big sea turtle, and thousands of others bright swimming things whose names I remain ignorant of.

Today we dived the "Moroza Maru," an aircraft tender, and the huge tanker "Akitasushima." They both were fantastic, with the tanker really standing out, if just for its size alone. The current was strong outside of the wreck, and after diving bow to stern - mainly inside though some dark and tight passages - we floated back to the bouy-line along the lip of the wreck, barely having to swim at all. A huge wall of coral-encrusted metal shot straight down to the bottom, and loads of huge fish lingered in the sheltering outcroppings that now were host to all sorts of life. It was psychedelic, awe-inspiring, and just straight-up fucking awesome. Definitely one of the coolest things I've done in my life, as far as pure thrilling experience goes. We got down to 35 meters (over 100 feet), which is almost double our qualifications as Open Water Divers, but as long as you're with a good divemaster they don't seem to be so strict about these things over here.

So tomorrow it's back to the swampy, crumbling environs of Manila, where I'll try to assemble my thoughts and prepare myself for yet another sememster on The Peninsula. There have been some great characters and stories on this trip that I've only touched on so far, so hopefully I'll be able to process them into a couple of good pieces for this here blog or more glorious outlets, with a bit of luck.

Sam cut his foot some days back and now it's infected. It swelled up three days ago and got all pus-y and painful. He went to the doctor yesterday and got some antibiotic horse pills that seem to be doing the trick, but whether he will be able to get any dives in during the three remaining days we have in town is up-in-the-air. I've been waiting for the last two days with him, hoping that he'll heal up quickly, but starting tomorrow I'm going to strike out on my own, if I have to. I've spent the last two nights listening to divers talk about all the cool Japanese wrecks they saw during their days, and I can't take it anymore. I'm gettin' my ass on a boat and going DOWN.

In other news, the German cockbag from the boat and his buddy keep giving us dirty looks when we see them in town. If if happens again, we may have to have a word. I think he's still pissed because I beat him off the boat and got the last room at the main place to stay that first night we rolled in. He needs to let it go before I get all Normandy on his ass.

This has been the first time I've taken a laptop travelling with me and it's weird. I had no idea there would be so many wifi connections in remote parts of The Philippines. I've suddenly found myself with an internet connection pretty much all of the time, so I have to resist the urge to get lost in the cyber-vortex while a whole tropical paradise passes me by outside.

So now I'm just waiting until 5 o'clock, when it officially becomes okay to start getting totally drunk again.

Let's me start off by getting this out of the way: I'm tired and grumpy today. Yes, I'm in a beautiful port town with a tropical breeze blowing through my mussed-up hair, but I'm feeling misanthropic and full of bile. I've had a strange impulse to grab a few random tourists and chuck them off the deck of the guesthouse into the green waters below, hopefully right in the path of a really nasty jellyfish.

Why do I feel like such an asshole? Maybe it has to do with the fact that it is Valentine's Day, and despite my manly affection for my friend Sam, I'd much rather spend the evening with someone who has a charming smile and looks good in a skirt. I did meet a lovely girl (civilian) down in Puerto Princessa and would have loved to go back down to see her, but that would have blown my plans for diving here in Coron, which is really the crown jewel of the trip. Of course there are plenty of OTHER options for a man with time and money, but that's really not my bag, believe it or not.

Like I said, I'm just tired. That is all. Yesterday we boarded boat in El Nido and rode up through the Calamian Islands - some of the most remote and beautiful in the word - to the port of Coron, on the island of Busuanga. The trip was supposed to take 6 hours, but instead took 11. A big wind was up and the sea was extremely choppy, hindering our progress and forcing us to take an alternate route. I was worried about becoming seasick, but fortunately didn't succumb, the lone victim being one emaciated, puking Frenchman. We were tossed and turned and soaked, but the islands were amazing and the sunset worth the fare alone. I got tons of reading done and made progress on a NY Times Sunday crossie (got a whole book). Aside from the trip taking twice as long as normal, the only shitty thing was the fellow passengers. Aside from two cool Israelis and the seasick French dude, everyone else was either German or Scandanavian and just sat there, frowning, saying nothing and looking miserable for all 11 hours. What I would have given for three or four Brits, who would have inevitably had a good laugh at the absurdity of the whole situation. I love that about the English - or the Irish - for that matter. Instead we were stuck with the most stoic bunch of northern European sourpusses to ever strap on backpacks. They sucked out any sense of joy or fun that managed to creep into our wave-tossed little cabin. The proverbial camel's back-breaking straw came when a young German guy started busting the captain's balls about the time:

"You zaid zis vould only take 6 hours. Ve are now 9 hours. Vy did you say to us 6??? Zis I am not understanding."

Did he not see the 10 FEET WAVES splashing over the bow of the boat? What, did he want the poor little captain to control the weather, or make the boat fly? Did he realize where he was?

The rest of them just sat there resigned, looking like their pet dogs just died. I know it's not their "way" to be outgoing and friendly, but aside from The Frenchman and us, the only people who weren't acting like they were in a boxcar bound for Auschwitz were the TWO JEWS.

As you may have surmised by my joyous posts from the Philippines, I've been enjoying the hell out of this place. The islands are beautiful, the water clear and full of amazing life, the prices are cheap and the people are just great. I totally endorse this place as an exciting and really fun travel destination, with one caveat:

The food. My Kiwi friends took some umbrage when I made fun of their stodgy hobbit fare, so now let me piss off any Filipino readers.

It's not that the food is awful here - it isn't. It can be quite good. Adobo and calderetta are probably my favorite common local dishes. They vary greatly in quality and are pretty simple, but when done well they're nice. They also do some good noodles - notably pancit bihon and pancit canton. These are fried noodles that can be a bit oily, but sometimes that's just what I'm in the mood for. The best food here has undoubtably been the variety of fresh seafood available. I've eaten alot of big slabs of fish, including tuna, blue marlin, and lapu-lapu (grouper). The locals have generally cooked 'em up straight ahead, without any bells and whistles (no silly yupped-out sauces). Perhaps the best fish dish is "kilawan," which is raw fish mixed with chilis, onions, vinegar and kalamansi (a kind of local lime). I had it several times in La Union and was well impressed - perfect hot weather eats.

Like I said, the food can be good, but it's almost never GREAT. I did have two home-cooked dinners in La Union that were great, but those have been the exception. The rest of the time I have been eating in restaurants and the quality has been a culinary yo-yo ranging from tasty to nasty. What I can say is that the local food - the purely Filipino food - just lacks the flair of the cuisine that you find in other parts of the region - I'm talking mainly Vietnam and Thailand, whose street stalls alone can knock your socks off. These places are poor countries as well, where many people can't afford to eat in the type of restaurants the cater to travelers. Even so, there are many local options available where the food is cheap and fresh. Here in the Philippines the food tends to be salty or tangy, but there's no real complexity to the spices; stuff is served up really bland. They don't appreciate much heat in their food, and I would advise anyone who comes here to never order a curry. They've been universally awful, so far.

The Philippines has its cheap local places as well, but the food is hardly fresh. These are often called "canteens," and they consist of trays containing a variety of meat and fish dishes set on tables, with no heat sources to keep them warm other than the tropical sun. The stuff just sits there ALL DAY, sometimes feasted on by flies. The owner lazily hangs out in the corner while watching a blaring TV. When a customer comes, the said owner dishes out a plate of coldish rice and puts whatever pre-cooked congealed schlock is requested over it and hands the plate away. It's all very half-assed, with no passion or pride taken in the food. One gets the impression that the country operates with such a mindset on many levels. I've found ALMOST NO little local places that prepare food fresh to order, other than a couple of pho' places run by Vietnamese immigrants. And you can't blame this on poverty, because other countries of similiar means have no problem sorting it out.

The result of this is that I've been forced to mainly eat in the tourist restaurants attached to guesthouses on near the beach. While they always serve up a few "local dishes," the menu is dominated by generic international fair - pasta, burgers, pizza, fish, and chicken cordon bleu, which has been featured in just about every fucking restaurant I've visited over the last three weeks. I ordered it once and was sick for a day. I felt as if I had eaten a three pound ball of pig fat. After five years of Korean food, my system just can't process such a grease-filled gut bomb.

Maybe I don't know what I'm talking about. Maybe I'm a dumb tourist who has yet to be shown the way, but in the context of the region and what is available here (Freshness, Spices, Peppers!), Filipino food has a long way to go.

One of the things I like about travelling to tropical environs is that it usually resets my body clock to that of a human being. I'm almost always up at 7 or 8 in the morning, bite off a huge day, come back for dinner, a few beers (in hand), and am in bed by midnight. Such is a welcome break from my vampiric existence in The Land of the Morning Calm, where sleeping before 3 a.m. is personally seen as a sort of sacrelige.

This was supposed to be a relaxing vacation, but it hasn't been. I was supposed to hunker down in a bungalow on a white sand beach and spend the days writing and drinking coffee, the evenings eating light meals of grilled fish and a reasonable amount of beer. As far as the evenings go, I've been relatively successful, but my day times have been FAR MORE active than anticipated. I've been out snorkelling, motorbiking, diving, or swimming just about every day that I haven't been travelling. I return sun zapped and wonderfully spent. I've lost a bit of weight (despite the copious lager intake) and feel more physically in tune than I have in ages. But... the writing has been put off....

Last night I was officially certified by PADI (Professional Associations of Diving Instructors) as an Open Water Diver, which means I can pretty much go anywhere in the world and dive on my own (with a buddy, of course), or join in on a a trip. What I can say is that it's nice to go on vacation and actually accomplish something concrete. I now have a card and certificate. It cost a bit of scratch but was well worth it, since they forwent the whole swimming pool thing and trained us in the open water, meaning that we got to do six dives in two days, in some of the most amazing diving water on the planet. I saw sea turtles, moray eels, stingrays, and hundreds of varieties of fish, not to mention endless corals, sea anenomies, giant clams, sea urchins, jellyfish, and other creatures/plants that defy terrestrial description.

Diving is at once relaxing and physically taxing, especially for the newby. The gear alone presents a challenge, along with the the reality of breathing underwater, which is really one of the most counterintuitive things a person can do. And trust me, your body tells you this, at least right at first. We had to do a load of challenges and exercises to get certified, including emergency training, compass work, and removing our masks, letting them sink to the bottom, swimming in a circle, retrieving the masks, putting them back on, and clearing out all of the water by breathing out through our noses. The latter was the most difficult, and pretty much sorts out those who are cut out for diving and those who are not - a litmus test of sorts.

Two days of this, along with the two weeks of prior activity and travel have left the two of us dead today. This has been my first day of nothing to do since La Union, and I spent it sleeping, uploading photos, and writing. I'm currently in the Art Cafe, a slightly overpriced joint that overlooks the bay and plays music perfect for the surroundings (currently listening to "Candela" from "The Buena Vista Social Club" soundtrack). I've been here since about four and now it's seven.

Sometimes things just work.

Our three companions left town today, heading back to Puerto Princesa to catch flights to other parts of the Philippines. We evacuated the beach house and Sam and I found a decent room nearby to spend the next couple of days, before catching the boat north to Coron. Tomorrow shall be more motorcycles: this time 200 cc dirtbikes. We're going to do a loop of the northern bit of the island. After that we'll have another down day, and then sail away.

I really like it here. As General Douglas McCarthur famously said of the same place:

"I shall return."

So, Palawan has so far lived up to its reputation as an unspoiled getaway, a tropical eden of sorts. Sure, it is the Philippines, so things are a bit scruffy, but my stay here so far has been off the charts.

Currently I'm in El Nido, which is on the northern tip of the island. El Nido is located in a cove, along side some huge limestone mountains (kharsts, for the uninitiated). Next to the little town is a massive bay, containing numerous untouched islands, where you can swim, snorkel, just relax, or dive.

I've chosen to dive.

Today was day 2 of my PADI Open Water Diver certification. They get to the business pretty quick around here (no futzing around in swimming pools), and after a night of orientation videos and tests, we woke up at dawn, boarded a speedboat, and by 9 a.m. I was breathing underwater. I did three dives today, accompanied by Sam and our instructor, a Filipino named Jeff. The scenery literally had me gasping into my regulator, with psychedelic coral and thousands of fish of so many colors and varieties that my receptors had a hard time taking it all in. I've taken to diving reasonably well. I'm very comfortable in water and have no problem equalizing my ears to the water pressure as I go down. The equiptment was awkward at first, and it took me a bit to get the hang of clearing my mask by blowing through my nose, but by the end of the day I definitely had the hang of it. The water here is generally clear as can be, though there are some orange algae blooms that cloud it up a bit in some spots. Tomorrow we go out to dive a bit deeper with the proper teacher, an English expat here. He's a good guy with a singsongy northern accent (Birmingham?), so it should be a gas.

Oh yeah - I also saw three sea turtles. Three. One on a dive and two from the boat. I've always been fascinated by turtles and have never seen a marine species in the wild. Evidently there's an island in the bay that's a turtle sanctuary, so observing them is not out of the ordinary.

Fucking. Awesome.

We're staying in a house right on the beach, which we're renting with three other guys we met down in Puerto Princesa. Get this: two of the guys - Scott and Matt - are from Olympia, my hometown. Scott is a whip-smart guy who decided to drop out of the beeline for success for a few months to get his travel on; Matt is a guitarist now living in Portland and working at a super-cool music shop there. They're a good bit younger than me (12 years so), but we still know all of the same places and a few of the same people, even. Scott also plays guitar, and I brought mine along, so we've spent the last few evenings sipping San Miguel on our spacious porch while passing it around. Our fifth companion is a guy names Esteban, from Santiago, Chile. He's an engineering student who's exploring The PI for a month on his own. He's very chilled and can generally keep up with Sam and my beer consumption, which sadly can't be said for my hometown compatriots (Scott barely even drinks at all and never smokes, in stark contrast to the rest of us scumbags visiting this country.). Whatever the case, it's a great little improvised crew, and we got lucky scoring this cheap place instead of some shitty guesthouse full of scabies-covered Aussies on their "gap year."

So... yeah. So far the Philippines has exceed my expectations. And one of the best things about this place is that, despite the fact that there are some travelers and tourists here, it's still very small, not-overrun, and still has the feeling of being undiscovered.

People flock to Thailand and Bali because they are lovely, and the Philippines often gets a miss. Let's hope it stays that way for a while longer, so please don't encourage too many people to read this post.

When I hear the word "brownout," I think of something that happens the day after I've eaten heaps of grilled pork and downed oceans of shitty, Korean beer. Electricity, or the lack thereof, isn't really the first thing that springs to mind. We happen to be in the midst of a brownout right now here in lovely Puerto Princesa, but alas, my computer still works, thanks to the generator that Kiwi Andy has fired up. The only drawback is the noise. Like everything else here, the generator is really LOUD.

The last couple of days have been spent exploring the area. Yesterday we took our motorbikes up to Honda Bay, where we hired a boat, checked out the islands that dot the area, and snorkeled. It's a protected area, so the reefs are pristine, exploding with fish so colorful that my eyes hurt. At night I went out with some of the guys staying here (a cast of characters to be described later), along with three of the beautiful girls who staff the place (no, they're not "working" working, but they're dead hot). We went down to the bay walk downtown, where I won 300 pesos playing soccer ball roulette, one of a few very ghetto low-stakes gambling games set up on the hill above the bay. After that we hit a little club, where all of us drank and danced our asses off. It's been a long time since I really got my got my dance on. Today we rode to Sabang, on the other side of the island, through jungle that opened up into limetone country very reminscent of Laos. The village is famous for an underground river the runs nearbye, supposedly the longest navigable underground river in the world. Everyone around here tries to sell you on the tour, which involves multiple boats that gouge you each time. Having done my share of "cave tours," I elected to give it a skip, despite the fact that not doing it is considered some kind of tourist sacrelige. While I'm sure that it's cool, it's just one of those things that I know sounds cooler than what it really is...

It's really loud, like I said. Aside from the generator, old-school country music is blasting from the speakers, and about three different guys are attempting to engage me in conversation, making further writing not only difficult, but impossible.

The Philippines is a loud place. It's seriously noisy here. The cities and towns are choked with diesel-belching jeepneys (sort of jeep/minibus hybrids) and tricycles (motorcycles with side cars attached); eardrum splitting music is piped out from EVERY store, business, and from many of the homes, as well; TV's blare around the clock; dogs bark at the air and roosters - which are omnipresent - do their thing at all hours. Something I learned long ago is that a rooster does not need dawn to crow.

I'm currently in the town of Puerto Princesa, the provincial capital of Palawan, the long far-western island of the Philippines where, I'll spend the next two and a half weeks. I'm with my buddy Sam, who I've done a hell of a lot of travelling with over the last five years. We're staying at a small cluster of cottages a bit out of town, close to the beach. It should be quiet here, but the owner and staff have deemed it fit to keep a TV fired up all day, which pretty much only plays an American cable network dedicated to true crime re-enactments. While I can usually get down with these types of programs, I have a really hard time writing when a TV is screaming in my ear. So, while the owner was out, I took the liberty of shutting the fucker off.

I brought a laptop with me this time - borrowed from a friend in Busan. Amazing enough, they have a wifi zone in the restaurant/bar area, so I've had easy and quick access to the internet this whole time. These things never cease to surprise me. This is one of the most remote islands in an undeveloped country and the net is still at my fingertips. Of course, we are in the one populated part - the only one with regular electricity and ATM's - but the fact I'm able to post this right now is simply astonishing.

So far it's been a great trip. After a brief stint in the ragged environs of Manila, we headed north to La Union to visit our friend Sonny. We spent six days at his palatial beach house, heading up to the little town there to carouse with the local surfers. It was a fun and crazy time, complete with a cast of characters that could never be invented. I'll write about them in detail later.

My general reflections of this country are positive. Yes, there is the noise, but for the most part the people are gracious, courteous, and extremely friendly. They're probably the best I've met in all my travels in Asia. Sometimes the service can be a bit surly, but they're being paid very little and are overworked, so I give the rude ones a pass. These are the exception, though, as most Philippinos are very curious about visitors and go out of their way to make sure that our stays are good ones.

What really fascinates here are the expats, who are generally older men who have escaped their former countries to come here to drink, drug, and bang younger girls. Up in La Union they were all surfers, spending their days on the waves on their nights on intoxicants and women. This place where we're kicking it now is owned by a grizzled old Kiwi named Andy with a massive gut, who rules over the place like a kicked-back duke, train-swigging rum and cokes and growling at the guests. He's actually a nice guy, but has that look of any old white man who has been here too long.

What you find about these old boys in the Philippines is that they are absolutely shameless about their hedonistic lifestyles. It's as if the constant sun has baked their brains, and now they exist on a pure level of physical satisfaction, one without consequences or santion. They are proud scumbags, breast-thumping douches. They brag about their exploits, while guzzling booze and chain-smoking cigs. They're strange bellowing animals, with sun-leathered hides and bloodshot eyes. Sitting down with one of these cats can be a good session, but after a while you begin to feel a strange mix of anger and pity, or, in my case, fear: Fear that twenty more years in Asia will turn me into one of them.

I currently find myself in the surfing capital of La Union province in northern Luzon. We're here visiting our friend - and local surfer, Sonny. He's married to an American girl and they're currently renting a HUGE house on the beach. To call the place a mansion wouldn't be a stretch. They have a two year old and a couple of Sonny's counsins stay at the place as well, providing some security (you gotta watch your shit here) and doing the housework. There's a whole jolly crew.

We've spent the last couple of days lounging on the lawn in front of the house, swimming, eating (the fish is amazing), driking, and walking the beach. There was a giant swell yesterday and the surfers were out, which was pretty cool to watch, since a lot of the guys up here are seriously good. Sam was going to go out and try to get up yesterday, but the waves were simply too big and he would have been eaten alive.

As for me? No surfing. I can barely stand on a skateboard, let alone a piece of fiberglass on water. It just ain't happening. I will rent a body board today and play around, though. I used to do a bit of that when I lived in Southern California and it is good fun.

Balut is a delicacy here in The Philippines. What is balut? It's an almost fully-formed duck fetus cooked in its own egg. Men eat it for "stamina."





I ate balut the other night. The waitress at the streetside bar was kind enough to capure the ordeal on my digital camera.

Step 1: Crack the top of the egg open.



Step 2: Drink the "soup."



Step 3: Peel away the rest of the shell.



Step 4: Eat away the yokey bit that surrounds the fetus.



Step 5: Put the whole thing into your mouth and chew up the really crunchy feathered baby bird.





Step 6: Wash the eggy avian infant taste from your mouth with a healthy swig of cold San Miguel beer.

Manila has a reputation for being a bit of a shithole, and I can't say that it's unfounded. It's rotting, crumbling, and loud, with filthy sidewalks and air that tastes like a diesel pizza. Yes, a lot of travelers do poo-poo Manila, and while they're not wrong, per se, I think that the city has a bit of charm if you scratch a bit beneath the surface.

Keep in mind I have only been here for less than ONE DAY.

We arrived late last night, taking the East Asian red eye express from Busan. Immigration and customs were painless, and before we knew it we were in a taxi heading straight for our hotel, which I had booked over the internet. Yes, it is overpriced, at about 40 bucks a night for a very small room with two lumpy beds, but sometimes piece of mind is worth it. I wasn't about to roll into one of Southeast Asia's most notorious cities at 2 a.m. with no confirmed place to stay.

We're staying in the district known as Malate, which is host to a load of hotels, restaurants, and girly bars. It's a bit similiar to the area around Soi Nana in Bangkok, though much smaller and definitely more run down. After checking in, Sam and I wandered the streets, resisting the calls from each bar to come in and see "beautiful laydeee," and instead sat our asses down at an outdoor affair, where we watched the street life while sipping from ridiculously cheap bottles of San Miguel, the local beer.

We woke up today in the late morning and grabbed a breakfast at the Cafe Adriatico, named for the street that makes up the main drag of Malate. While a bit spendy by local standards, I had the pleasure if eating one of the best omelettes of my life, and boosted by caffein and egg power, we got our walk on.

One of the reasons this city is so maligned among travelers is that, aside from getting drunk and banging whores, there's not a whole lot for the tourist to do (within the city center, at least). We spent the day wandering through the walled Spanish old town of Intramuros, taking photos of the streetlife and seeing the lovely cathedral. We managed to make our way into the slummy area of the district as well, walking down streets where we were both subjected to friendly hellos and hard, thug stares. There is a simmering sense of violence here. Most of the people are the friendliest I've encountered in all of Asian, but some of them look at you like a dog does a raw T-bone. After that we visited Fort Santiago, an instillation built by the Spanish and occupied, at different times, by the British, Americans, Japanese, and finally the Philippinos themselves.

This city is a gritty one, to be sure. Many of the building seem encased in tropical mildew; the poverty kicks you in the nuts. Whole families lay on the sidewalks, with pantsless, filthy children pawing in the muck. They've recently built an immaculate golf course next Intramuros, which is full of bloated Aussies and dour Koreans hitting white balls while their eager-to-please Philippino caddies sprint behind. On the other side of the fence lie countless groups of destitute locals, cooking on open fires, passing the days in demoralizing poverty. It is truly obscene, but aren't all golf courses?

I'm not immune from such obscenity myself, coming here as a tourist, throwing my money at bar tabs and breakfasts while people are scraping for rice just down the block. I chuck some change to the random beggar (to give to all would bankrupt me, and does it do any good to begin with?), but am reallly here to satisfy my own curiosities and indulgences...

I've travelled around Asia plenty now and have seen a lot of poor folks, but, aside from Cambodia, the poor of Manila take the cake - and I've just seen a decimal of a fraction. Keep in mind that I have not yet been to India, where they are said to do poverty expertly.

Tomorrow we will jump on a bus and go north to the province of La Union, where we will stay with our friend Keoni, who evidently has a very nice house right on the beach. It's always best to stay with locals for at least part of any journey, so we're as keen as beans, if I may invent a really stupid idiom.

I'm off to the Philippines for a month, where I shall learn to scuba dive, eat balut (chicken fetuses still in the egg), and get some serious writing done. Or silly writing done. Whatever the case, I'm bringing a laptop with me and intend on using it.

Keep your eyes peeled to this here blog for, hopefully, some amusing posts about my adventures. The Philippines is a new country for me, in that I haven't been there before, so things should be nice and fresh.

Just when you thought you've seen it all, here are a series of photographs of Koreans and other Asians serving in the German Army in WWII, complete with uniforms.

Thanks to Im-Guk, for this one.

I should have been home, but I wasn’t. I should have been at her bedside - holding her hand and whispering in her ear. I should have been there to sit and cheer her up, to tell her stories and push her outside for some sweet wet air, but after four years of false alarms and perpetual crises, of midnight phone calls, of bad news followed by worse - the death of my dad - I chose to stay away. I was on a beach. I was in Koh Chang, Thailand, with L, surrounded by what seemed to be the whole nation of Sweden. I wanted to enjoy the beginning of a new year, in the tropics, with my girl.

So that’s what I did, until I got the email from my brother Mark:

“Chris. Call home. Urgent.”

I sprinted from the PC shop on Koh Chang’s main tourist strip back to our dark wood, beach front bungalow. L was sipping tea and reading a book. Luckily her phone was rigged for international calls (mine was not), and after a few attempts, I got my middle brother, Glen, on the phone.

“I just got the email. What’s up?”

She was still alive, which was more than I was expecting, given the tone of the email. I’d received scores of alarmist emails over the years of my parents’ decline, most of which usually informed me about a new diagnosis or hospitalization – but the word “urgent” had yet to appear. It is a word of power and we all knew it. When we see something addressed as “urgent,” we think one thing: Someone is dead.

Mom had suffered a year in which God threw a Jobian mountain of misfortune her way. Both my father and she had been in declining health for years – the result of chain-smoking, shitty diet, lack of exercise, and an infuriating refusal to change even the remotest aspect of their lifestyles for the better. My father finally died from complications of diabetes, leukemia, and emphysema in late January, 2008. In less than a year, my mother would lose not one, but both of her legs, her dogs (who she adored), her house, and worst of all, her dignity. In her last few months she was at the mercy of nurses and caregivers, lacking the necessary upper arm strength for even the most basic mobility. A very independent and stubborn woman (of German and Danish stock) became infantile in her dependency. This, to be certain, is what really killed her.

I was back in Busan within two days; two days after that I stumbled off of the Northwest Airlines Tokyo to Seattle flight that I know so well. Washington was as bleak as it always is in the winter – a canvass of grays, blues, and dark greens, with the sky perpetually three feet above your head – and soon enough I was in my white PT Cruiser rental (they had nothing else), Neil Young in the CD player, screaming down Interstate 5 towards the facility where my mom was housed.

The smell smacked me in the nose as I pulled into the Puyallup River Valley where Tacoma - Seattle’s white trash little sister – sits splayed out in all of her muddy splendor. It’s known as the “Tacoma aroma” in Washington State, the result of the pulp mill that still operates near the mouth of the river at Commencement Bay. On the hill that sits beside the sad downtown I saw St. Joseph’s hospital, the place where, almost 37 years before, I was born. Both my parents were from Tacoma. They grew up and were married there. I had spent the first six months of my life in one the town’s unglamorous suburbs, and luckily remember none of it. It’s an ugly town – Rust Belt-like in its boarded up businesses and palatable lack of optimism – but, as is often the case with such places, a huge heart beats underneath. It’s unpretentious and all about getting to work, as good place as any to die, I suppose.

Following complicated directions copied from my computer (Yahoo map quest I love you – isn’t the internet grand?), I arrived at the nursing home where my mother was staying. She had been moved there two weeks earlier, when it became clear that her care needs far exceeded those of the adult group home that we had begrudgingly chosen for her two months before, when I came home to help move her out of the house. It was a place of antiseptic smells, fluorescent lights, and an underpaid, indifferent staff. I rushed through the corridors in a manic attempt to locate her room. When I found it, I sucked in a sour breath and entered. She was in the back, one of two occupied beds. My brother Glen sat next her, stroking her hand and whispering soothing words. He stood when he saw me and wrapped me in an embrace.

“How was the flight?”

“It gets shorter every time.”

She lay there, asleep, looking grey and empty. Each pained breath was piercingly audible; a struggled wheeze. I leaned down and kissed her forehead. It was sticky and cool; I faintly tasted her sweat on my lips.

“Where’s Mark?” I asked.

“His flight gets in just about now. Hopefully he’ll get his car and be here within the hour.”

We sat there for the next forty-five minutes, staring at this woman who, up until this year, had been an immovable force in our lives. She had anchored us all through our worst times. She had given us words of hope and most of all, listened deeply, beyond language. She was now weak, reduced in limbs and spirit, her body and will irreparably broken. I gripped my brother’s hand and he mine. Mom’s breaths became weaker and less frequent.

“She’s going now. She’s going.”

My brother – having worked as a paramedic and surgical tech, as well as having lost several close friends – knew more of death than most people should.

We now stood over her, made the sign of the cross, and recited the Lord’s Prayer:

“Our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name…”

Within five minutes of completing the prayer, she died. I had gotten there just in time.

My sister Molly had come to the nursing home shortly before the end, but chose to stay outside of the room, just as she did for my dad’s death the year before. She had been both my parents’ best friend and caregiver during those last years, and despite dealing with the awful day-to-day realities of caring for the sick, she had no stomach for death itself. My brother Mark was still absent. Unlike me, he hadn’t beaten the clock, so I waited at the entrance for his arrival. He eventually pulled into the parking lot, and as he emerged from his car, I calmly approached him.

“How is she?”

“I’m so sorry, Mark…”


* * * *


I buried my mother on my 38th birthday. “Interred,” would be the more accurate term, as she was cremated and her remains put into a wall, alongside my father’s, in a large cemetery in Tumwater, Washington, next to my hometown of Olympia. My brothers were very apologetic when they informed of the date of the funeral, but the church was booked up. What more could they do? In the strata of life events, a funeral always trumps a birthday. This truth is self-evident.

I delivered my mom’s eulogy and got through it without choking up. I barely cried at her funeral at all. I was astounded by this fact, given that I’m an emotional person who has been known to tear up after watching a Kodak commercial. But my eyes were dry that day. Could it be that I was out of tears? Four years of constant dread, four years of sadness compounded with sadness had sapped a lake’s worth of tears from me. It could be that, once the eventuality was realized, once it was over, I had nothing left. Or, more than likely, I was in shock.

That night I did manage to celebrate my birthday. My Uncle Dan had us all over for a massive pasta feed and they even managed a cake. Happy Birthday was sung, and for the first time, since childhood, I spent my birthday with my family. I ended the night at my good friends Scott and Elizabeth’s, where Scott and I knocked back cans of Rainier and listened to vinyl until three A. M.

I stayed in Washington for the next couple of weeks after that, spending time with family in the area and staying with friends. I even went fishing, making a pilgrimage to a half-frozen lake on the Eastern side of the mountains with my friend John, who said little during the trip and just fished at my side as our blood turned to ice. That was enough.

Two days before I had to fly back to Korea, I went out to dinner with Scott and Elizabeth. We chose a Thai restaurant in downtown Olympia. It was as dreary of a day as the Northwest can offer. The place was under heated and we wore our coats and hats. Portraits of the King and Queen of Thailand loomed prominent on the wall. As I sat with them, nursing a cold Singha and pecking on a shockingly bland panang curry, I began to laugh. They gave me a puzzled look as I laughed and laughed, looking out the foggy window into the black, drizzly night.

“What, dude?”

Three weeks before I had actually been in Thailand – sipping cold Singha and eating blistering curries. I was now playing at the Siamese experience, and it felt cheap and absurd.


* * * *


It’s been a year to the day since we lost our mom. It’s a dizzying thing to contemplate. Often I reach for the phone in an attempt to call her, before reality stops my hands in its trajectory. I wasn’t sure what to do today. How do you commemorate your mother’s death? Is such a thing even appropriate? Should I go to mass, despite the fact that I really don’t believe? Should I hike up a mountain and try to speak to heaven? Should I surround myself with friends and anesthetize myself with booze – my usual coping mechanism?

I decided to write. So here I am, alone in my apartment, just me and a computer. Writing. In doing this I have tried to sort out the madness of that day – one year ago. I have also helped to resurrect my mother, via memory – at the very least honor her. Her and my dad’s absence is a shot in my gut that I feel daily. But the sting of the wound lessens with each month. Like any chronic pain, it flairs up on its own, and will never vanish. The best I can do is live with it, and hope that it lessens over time.

I can only hope.