shitty day

About the only good thing that happened today was my staircase work. I'm starting back a bit, not trying to do one whole staircase even though I did manage 26 floors on Day 30 of my 30-day project, which ended on February 1. This past Monday, February 5, I did a modest six floors, and this morning, I did fourteen. By the end of next week, I ought to be back to a full 26 floors, and the week after that, I'll be starting 1.25 staircases (i.e., 26 floors plus another six). We had a sudden bit of snow yesterday, but judging by the streets and sidewalks today, nothing really accumulated. Still, yesterday's precipitation was enough to keep me inside this morning even though, as it turned out, nothing had stuck to the ground. The schedule is supposed to be staircase work on MWF, and long walks on TRS, with Sunday as a rest day.

And that little bit of exercise was my one high point today. I got back to my place and tried to sleep... and for over a fucking hour, either my next-door neighbor or my overhead neighbor decided to engage in some sort of drilling project. It was loud, and there were moments when I was tempted to bang on the walls, but I grumbled and kept my temper even though the whole experience jangled my nerves and soured me.

Next, when I got in the cab to head off to work, the driver turned out to be deaf, an idiot, or both. "Daechi Station, please," I said in Korean, and he paused to show he hadn't understood a word I'd said. In 95% of cases, the cabbies understand me just fine, and some of the talkier ones will even engage in conversation, going so far as to tell me how clear my pronunciation is (they usually follow up by saying how difficult it usually is to talk with foreigners), but the remaining 5% are hopeless. My working theory is that they're the ones who, upon seeing a foreigner, go into brain lock, automatically assuming a foreigner can't speak Korean, so no matter how well or clearly I might pronounce my words, they're so convinced they can't understand me that they don't understand me. (To be fair, I do realize the reverse form of this idiocy happens in the States. Not that that matters in this case.)

"Daechi Station," I said, and the cabbie—an old guy—said, "...Saechi Station?" How the fuck do you not hear the difference between a "d" and an "s"? We went through several rounds of this nonsense, with me getting increasingly agitated. Finally, I had to spell the name of my destination out letter by letter. The guy at first used the typically Korean strategy of blame-shifting, saying, "Your pronunciation..." —but I knew my pronunciation was fine because 95% of cabbies have no trouble with what I say, and I told him that. Only the idiots have trouble, and it's likely because of the foreign-face-brain-lock thing. He slightly changed his tune seeing how angry I was getting, and said, "Oh, yes, I didn't understand you..." in a half-assed attempt to mollify me while still not accepting blame. At this point, though, I was convinced the guy was an idiot and deaf. I tried to say something more to him, but this only earned me another "Huh...?", so I waved his incomprehension off and sat back in my seat, steaming. He did finally seem to understand when I said to let me off at the first light after a particular intersection, and when he said goodbye, I managed a terse goodbye of my own when I really wanted to throttle the bastard. So now, I had two reasons to be pissed off at the world.

Incident #3 happened at work. I had broken out my bokkeum pan to heat up the remains of my gumbo; I had also brought a plastic container of rice, some bowls, some utensils, etc. All of that needed to be washed. Our branch has a kitchenette, but two ladies were in there when I arrived; the younger one was washing dishes, and the older one was just standing there, flapping her yap. I stood there in full view for a long second to give them some idea that others were waiting, but they didn't take the hint, and the older lady just went on and on. One of the young male staffers came out on his own kitchenette run; he saw me sitting outside, patiently waiting; he went into the kitchenette, and I heard him whisper something about my needing to do dishes. The two ladies emerged from the kitchenette a few seconds later, with the older one giving me a breezy "I'm sorry," indicating that she was anything but sorry. I pasted on a fake smile and went in to do my dishes. The Korean word for consideration is baeryeo/배려, and neither of these ladies had any. So if our building is burning down, and I have to choose whom to pull out of the flaming wreckage, I don't think I'll be choosing either of these two. I quietly thanked the male staffer as he left the kitchenette.

So I spent the day thoroughly pissed off. Normally, I tell people that I've lived in Korea for years because, even though the people can drive me crazy, the good outweighs the bad. But today, I spent the day contemplating a short-but-brilliant career as an axe murderer, cursing myself for taking these various slings and arrows so passively. Were I more fluent in Korean, I'd have been cursing everyone out quite colorfully, but the idiot of a taxi driver was the only one to hear me say "Idiot"—assuming he heard and understood me at all. Fuck.