Full Disclosure

11:17pm, Jinju, South Korea.

But, for how long? That's the question of the moment.

I spoke on the phone with Christie, one of the few American English teachers that I've met here. From Michigan. She was one of the first girls here I thought perhaps would make me stop thinking about you in that way.

Full disclosure.

I needed to speak with someone after work. I told them I was positive that I was going, all the while visions of drinking with Dan, talking with Min, bitching at Buz, eating with Dad danced in my head. The home bug was in full attack mode, this morning's conversation making it all the more poisonous.

Emily, the director, seems definitely bothered by this -- and not just because she'll have to go through the process of having yet another foreign teacher. I really thinks she likes me. I think the teachers like me. And, tell you what, I like them too. But, will that be enough?

Back to Christie. I wanted to get a drink, I wanted to purge myself to her, to someone. Someone I could connect with, someone who could understand. Someone who could get me. Why did I choose her? She's cute for one. Second... she liked my Buz's CD. Reasons for things don't always have to be concrete or absolute.

We're meeting at Holly's Coffee to talk tomorrow. We talked a bit tonight. I heard things I've heard before. The usuals:

"I would cry in my apartment so much. I was so alone. I missed home so much. I didn't know what I was doing here."

and...

"If you can get through this, you will be able to go anywhere. You will have so many cool stories to tell, so many experiences to remember."

Despite my moments of despair to the chosen few honored/cursed to witness (you know who you are), I do not hate Korea. I have found things to enjoy, people who I can hang with, drink with, bitch with, sing with. I have sang at Zio Ricco's and talked with another new teacher who plays guitar and likes Dave Matthews Band. I've seen a number of pretty girls, foreigner and Korean. I planned to have a dinner party Sunday night. As the day went on, more and more people said that they couldn't make it. But, in the end, the two I knew would come came, accompanied by four others I didn't expect. We ate chicken and spaghetti. They complimented me on my cooking. We had a great time. I went to Gojae Island, my director's hometown, Saturday. I bowed to the tomb of her parents, stood inside a buddhist temple, met a lovely Korean woman there who speaks fluent English who said when she was next in Jinju, her and her husband (the Buddhist monk in the temple, by the by), would love to see me.

I do not hate Korea. But, when the moments arise, when they rise from the ashes of the last good thing to be burned in the wake of my uninterrupted firestorm, nothing else matters.

So, Christie, you want to talk tomorrow. I want you to give me a reason to stay. Please, give me a reason. Over two years of dreaming can't die in 35 days.