the past couple days - daegu and white lily and a lot of fish

first: images and facts... to be followed by word rambles


took the train from seoul on friday ...
down to daegu with su-yoon... julie... and "gabi" the interpreter





upon arriving we checked into our motel... (more on that motel later)
... and got a cab to white lily - where julie was adopted from...
we were greeted by sister theresa... or terry... or... tess... a... nun with a sense of humor and generosity... (more on her later as well)

white lilly no longer serves as an orphanage but instead as a montessori... (closed in 1994) ... it is (in my opinion) a former ghost of itself... a story that will be told... known by only a few... already it is receding into some kind of past memory... it seemed that every question received an "i dont know" or "the files are gone" ... but they do still have the basement where the orphans were kept... which... my cynical side found almost humorous (thought to self "oh sure keep the orphan babies in the basement")

sister theresa... was a world in and unto herself... and if there is a heaven im sure that she shall be leading the comedic relief section...

i wondered a lot about the phrase "a history erased" ...




















































upon leaving white lily (after sister theresa had bought us dinner and shared wine made by the sisters - with us (memories of homemade wine in sirvintos with rita and her family and memories of rita's stories about her grandmother getting drunk off of siphoning the wine) we were picked up by a taxi driver who mistook us for future nuns (thought to self at that moment of friends in minneapolis "see! i told you!!!) who was quite concerned about our religious beliefs and our finding our birth parents (thought to self: he's like the white people - everyone telling us how we need to feel and what we should do next)

gabi headed back to seoul... and we went back to the motel waiting for anja and sora to arrive...

come to think of it... if there is a heaven i think that gabi will be the one taking photos of every little nuance on her mobile phone and squealing in delight... that being... if there is a heaven and if heaven has mobile phones

we spent the next day wandering around daegu shopping... and shopping... and shopping... and shopping... i swear to whomever that i have not shopped this much since i was 18 as i have in the past 3 weeks... i could only think of friends back home who would have been in some kind of shopper's paradise... you go into a kind of shopper's trance...

the streets in downtown daegu were literally named for what was sold... i.e. "herbal medicine street" and "sock street" and "rice cake street" ... personally i was most fascinated with "fish pole street" (ok it wasnt a full street just one giant telephone pole pegged with fish... )

daegu (according to the web and tour books) is known for its textiles apples and beautiful women... apparently several miss korea's have come from daegu...

... ive tried to contain my jealousy on that one ;-)

anyhow... so here are images from shopping and shopping and shopping... and the "shanel motel" which was located near the versace motel and the bulgari motel... designer rip offs are everywhere... ive collected some cards from the entrance of the motel steps that i think some friends back home may enjoy (a bit too much)

oh and i also had this huge fascination with the fact that the building outside of our hotel room had 40 replica busts on its walls... tis true that it is the little things in life which matter most...













































































we left daegu today (sunday) ... and just got back from the casino tonight - casinos are only open to foreigners... went with su-yoon julie anja and scott higgins ... (somehow i think that grandma and grandpa wall would quite like the idea of scott and i hanging out in seoul playing blackjack... )

unfortunately pictures werent allowed in the casino... gailor - im sure that you will be able to get a pretty good mental image of what i will look like (fixated on the slot machines)

tomorrow is our last full day in seoul... in korea... we'll have been here for about 3.5 weeks...

i dont know that being here has resolved any questions... more than anything raised more - the unresolved no longer feels avoidable... ... which i guess ive always suspected would happen... hence my waiting so long to return...

but ... im glad that we have come here... im glad that i had a friend to come with... more specifically im glad that julie and i were able to do this together... 3.5 weeks and we havent killed each other... (im sure shes had moments of wanting to throttle me... )

but in all seriousness... not only for the fact that its incredibly difficult to travel with another person plus to do so overseas... plus to do so for 3.5 weeks where you are together everyday... and then to compound it with the reality that this has not and was not just some winter holiday... but rather... coming back to the place that we were born... when we both have different intense emotions about it... i dont know... to say the least...

i am grateful.

... ....

going back to minneapolis... i dont know... how i feel about this... whiteness... realities... questions from friends... im not ready to be bombarded nor to cheapen this whole experience with tales of "we saw this and went there" nor am i ready to explain the things that i have yet to share... ...

... and yet it will be quieter... less crowded - no one to shove past or be shoved by... no people spilling out from the underground... no 4am busy streets... etc etc etc... back to the solitude of my flat... staring out the window feet propped up on the sill... staring onto the neighbor's backyard...

and i do have the concept for the play that im supposed to write for the playwrights center for the spring... got it over a week ago sitting in a bar listening to some band play... i have the title and the idea - the direction i want to head or rather that it wants me to head...

but

... i also have more anger... or... i now know what my anger is... ive not been able to name it for 32 years... and now i know it... and to name a thing is to know it...

i know that i believe that international adoptions need to come to an end... that celebrities are not heroes for collecting babies... that what needs to happen is for the social system in countries like korea needs to be changed - re-structured so that its children are not being sent away....

i know that i believe that ... it is important to grow up in the country where you were born... or rather to have the choice...

that love... does not make everything ok... that love is not an excuse to erase someone's history...

that adoptees... are their own breed... their own race...

we are neither here nor there...

its hard to explain this

i think ive been trying to...

... i cant help but wonder... what it would have been like to grow up here... i never used to wonder about this... but now i think about it all the time...

ive never felt proud of being from florida or the states... maybe thats why it was always so easy to assimilate into whatever culture i lived in overseas... this is the first time in my life that i have ever genuinely felt proud of being from a place...

i know that i am not "korean" ... but i was born here... and i am proud of this... and proud to see the people with all of their idiocyncrisies (only men can smoke in public... if youre over the age of 50 its ok to cut everyone in the que... to hack snort spit and hock in public... for alternative lifestyles to be declared "non-existent" ... that a pound of coffee costs more than my winter electric bill and just a little less than when i have the a/c running... etc etc etc) ...

... i AM looking forward to seeing friends again... to have time alone... to be back in my flat... to smoke where-ever i please... to see the dirty pretty thing that i have found myself missing more than i expected to... to have saturday brunches... (in fact just to have brunch will be wonderful)

but the food the people the sights the sounds the smells the... knowing that this is where i was born and somewhere in this city of 12 million i have a birth mother etc...

... im not sure what it will be like to be back...

i guess just as with any journey... once you leave you never really truly go back... and if you did then it would mean that the journey was for naught.



(photo by julie at "shanel motel" in daegu... all video clips on this blog are also by julie)