Finally, a day off. I guess I can take the baby crying from somewhere off in the distance, outside the window, as I sit here, trying desperately to take a break from the work a day noise, chaos and pollution. After all, babies cry. No big deal, right?
But then there's the soul searing sound of yet another Korean man clearing his throat so loudly, that I can hear every disgusting detail from way up here in this cramped little high rise. An incredibly offensive and just plain revolting sound that is soon followed by the horrific din of the same man hocking up fresh phlegm. Or... maybe it's a different man....
Baby crying relentlessly; okay. That's life. Deal with it. More unsanitary public spitting; now that's another story entirely. I know these people have toilets. But... what? The streets are for spitting? YUCK!
Oh well. To be fair, public spitting isn't quite as bad in Korea as it was in China. In China, the sound of spitting in public was so frequent
that I've since estimated that I was forced to hear it, on average,
about 4 or 5 times an hour. That's once every 10 to 15 minutes.
ALL. DAY. LONG.
And then, when I had no other choice, for whatever reason (work, food, etc) to go outside, I'd have to also SEE the locals spit. Watch where you walk now, foreigner! There's fresh spit on the sidewalks every few yards. When the weather got really cold in Shanghai, there was even frozen spit on the sidewalks. I'd never seen frozen human spit before. Now I have. Unfortunately.
And I wish I could forget.
THAT'S why East Asians take their shoes off when they go indoors. That's why. Not because of some misty eyed, greener on the other side, idyllic garbage. That's really, honestly why. 'Cause it's still the Middle Ages here. Despite the import of ultra modern cell phones, computers and even nuclear weapons. It's still the Middle Ages in many respects.
ALL. DAY. LONG.
And then, when I had no other choice, for whatever reason (work, food, etc) to go outside, I'd have to also SEE the locals spit. Watch where you walk now, foreigner! There's fresh spit on the sidewalks every few yards. When the weather got really cold in Shanghai, there was even frozen spit on the sidewalks. I'd never seen frozen human spit before. Now I have. Unfortunately.
And I wish I could forget.
THAT'S why East Asians take their shoes off when they go indoors. That's why. Not because of some misty eyed, greener on the other side, idyllic garbage. That's really, honestly why. 'Cause it's still the Middle Ages here. Despite the import of ultra modern cell phones, computers and even nuclear weapons. It's still the Middle Ages in many respects.
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| In Seoul, near the US embassy, sits "Sejong the Great," medieval master of a Korea that once was (and in many ways, for both better and worse, still is) |
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