Stay
june 09, 2008 09:28pm – in Korea
"Stay" is a simple word. It sounds inactive. An antidote to "go." I can hear the friends I'm making now asking me to stay. And I am making friends: real, honest-to-god, bare-your-soul type friends. I'm not smart enough to keep my emotional distance.
I'm starting to understand why people don't leave after their year. They make friends, establish goals, and begin to feel life here becoming normal.
"A year is such a short time."
"You'd have to fail to connect with this place completely."
That as it may be, I can only spend one year in suspended animation. I'm having a really good time here, and I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings, but this is a one-year deal.
When the time comes for me to hear it, the idea of staying will sound so simple, and going "all the way" to California will be the complicated alternative.
And this is me before my trip to California. "Trip to California." That still sounds weird.
In other news Andrew posted a response to my last chllenge:
Obviously he's serious about this. He works hard on these. Well I'll come up with something appropriate.
Here's a cool picture of Gwangju last month during the protests.
