Amanda Takes Off...

"None of the bathrooms have toilet paper," I complain to Good Man.

"We can get some at Seven-Eleven," he says, steering me toward the store.

Inside the store I pick out a pack of travel tissue with a sheep gracing the wrapper. "운동할때...when you're doing sports...운전할때...when you're driving...여행할때...when you're traveling...핸드백속에...in your handbag...사무실에서...at the office..." I read. "And there's a sheep. Fabulous. You know," I say, turning to Good Man, "I just think bathrooms should have toilet paper in them. And soap. Toilet paper and soap."

He laughs.

"OK, that's it. I'm done with Korea. Time to go home. Adventure over," I say.

"There you go."

Tonight I met Lab Guy (a friend of Good Man's who studies at Kyung Hee and is constantly in the computer lab, hence the nickname) with Good Man. Good Man and Lab Guy spoke mostly in Korean, which was fine with me. But Lab Guy kept thinking I was bored. He didn't understand. I wasn't bored; I understood quite a bit of their conversation and was interested in seeing Good Man interact with his friends. So I didn't mind that they were speaking Korean.

"Have you met [Good Man]'s parents, Amanda?" Lab Guy asks as we're walking him to the subway station.

I shake my head. "No." I bite my tongue and smile while formulating the Korean in my mind. I am a foreigner. So his parents don't want to meet me.

When he's gone, I say, "I bit my tongue about your parents."

"I know. And it is good, cause [Lab Guy] has good feelings toward my mother."

"I wish I could say the same. I'm sorry."

Good Man shakes his head, "No. You don't have to."

Good Man and I are in the elevator with an ajossi. We exit on my floor. As soon as the doors close, Good Man spits out, "I don't like that man!"

"Why?" I'd said goodbye to him because he'd held the door when I'd yelled "please wait!" on the first floor, and well, he lives in my building.

"He saw you like this," Good Man says, running his eyes up and down my body twice.

I have never seen Good Man so upset about something. "He looked at me? Like how? Like, 'God, a foreigner?' or 'I wish I could see her body under that coat?'"

"Xenophobia!"

"Yes, but honey, I live here, I need to be polite."

Good Man shakes his head. "I know. I don't care. I don't like that man."