Amanda Takes Off...

Last night's class was fun. We headed over to Master's Brother's studio. I haven't set foot in there since I first toured it over a year ago. Usually his studio meets us at ours. The boys (they were all boys) did sparring while those of us doing poomse watched. Then we were tested on our poomse.

I've been doing my poomse more slowly, aiming for more power lately. I am sweating after doing two forms. And that applies to the first form! I was told to slow down (I was keeping pace with the others). I was using as much power as I could, and my kiyaps completely drowned out the three other girls I was testing with. I scared some of the kids from the other studio. That was nice. (It was also nice realizing that my front kicks are easily above my head. I thought that was so impressive when I was first starting and I could barely kick to chest level.)

But that wasn't the really fun part. The fun part was talking to people from Master's Brother's studio.

I talked to Goalie and Goalie's Brother's Mother. She is a second degree black belt. I managed to use the honorific form when talking about her with Master ("Is that Goalie's Mother?") and when talking to her ("Are you going to the tournament Sunday" amongst other things).

Because I was sitting next to her, another Brother's Studio guy was on my left side. He started asking me questions, but it was hard to understand him. Korean women whine when they talk, Korean men tend to mumble. (Good Man is a mumbler! In Korean or English!) I finally understood him, told him my belt, when I came here, when I started in taekwondo... Then he asked if I was a college student. I looked at him and laughed, "No, I am a teacher. I taught in the US for three years and came here."

He looked confused and asked my age.

"Twenty-eight."

His eyes popped out of his head. He checked my age using pure numbers and Sino-Korean numbers. I laughed and assured him that I am 28 Korean age. I asked how old he was. "Twenty-one," he said, "I thought you were twenty-three." I could have kissed that boy man young man.

Master heard us laughing and looked over as us, "Why?"

I said, "I am an ajumma."

He shook his head, "No, you are a movie star."

A few seconds later what he'd said struck Young Man, who laughed and then turned and asked if I was married. I said no and for the rest of class he kept stealing glances at me. I pretended I didn't notice.

Meanwhile Most Obnoxious Girl Ever would not leave me alone. This girl makes me crazy. Every time we meet Master's studio, she's there. She talks and talks and talks at me. She screams for me across rooms (or buildings!). She introduces me to all over her friends, and acts like she really knows me. She doesn't understand being ignored, she doesn't understand "stop it," and she doesn't understand "I don't want to talk to you."

She was acting obnoxious as usual when I was trying to talk to other people and I told her to stop. Master turned around and I said, "관장님, 항상 아만다예요. 태태로 모비 스터예요. 하지만 저 여자 말할대 저는 동물 공원에서 원숭이예요." Master, I am always Amanda. Sometimes I am a movie star. But when that girl talks, I am a monkey in a zoo. He understood immediately what I was saying and both Masters scolded her while the younger kids from the other studio said, "Oh! Oh! She speaks very good Korean!"

"I think you're the only person I've dated that I could live in a one-bedroom with without wanting to kill."

"Oh, that's so nice."

Last night, on the way home I was listening to Josh Ritter's "Good Man." (I ignore the fact that I think he's talking about his guitar.)

Babe we both had dry spells
Hard times in bad lands
I'm a good man for ya
I'm a good man

I knew Good Man would be waiting for me when I got home. I kept willing the subway to go faster. Alas, it didn't.

Sunday, while on our double date, I dropped off two rolls of black and white film at the photo lab. I had no idea what was on the rolls. Turns out one roll was photos from Costa Rica in June 2005 and the other was photos from Germany taken in April 2006.

The color has probably shifted, and there are flaws on the files on the CD. I'm not sure if that's from the processing (lab's fault) or due to me trotting these things through countless airport X-rays and subjecting them to temperature changes for years. It could have been a problem with my camera, though I don't think my other photos taken around the same time had dust on them. I haven't used my 35 mm camera once since Germany, I am 99.97% sure.

I saw the photos from Germany and immediately remembered why I didn't get them printed. I had accidentally exposed the film while rewinding it. I didn't get the photos printed immediately because I didn't want to moan over which pictures I'd accidentally destroyed.

The only picture I remember taking on this whole roll turned out.

Mark