Shameless Self Promotion and Misc.

I wanted to get ahold of some profs at my old university, so I was looking around on the fine arts website and found one of my paintings. OOOOhhh! My English Town kids are right!! I AM famous afterall. Here it is:



This painting was made using spraypaint and dripped wax; right now it's sitting in my old bedroom at my parents house. So famous!!

The class we have in today is so cute it's not even funny. They all have the dialogues memorized perfectly and treat me as though I am this wonderful big doll to look at and talk to (in Korean, so I have no idea what's going on). The boy who speaks the best english asked be if I was single, then went and reported my answer to all his buddies. And the girls follow me around holding my hand and asking me for stickers. "Sunsangnim!!! Sunsangnim!! Sticker juseyo!!" (teacher!! teacher!! sticker please!!). Of course I say no; I've become a bit of a sticker Nazi; "You, child! You may only recieve a sticker if you deserve it!!", "You lost your sticker??? Too bad!!! No sticker for you!", "If you talk, NO STICKER!!", " If you don't talk, NO STICKER!!" and so on.

Mom, this next picture is for you. For Christmas can you send me some of this hair gel? You can find it in any shopper's Drug Mart or some such place, but NOT in Korea since people don't have curly hair here (except the old ajumma's who have their hair permed). It's called a "curl booster" on the label, and it smells nice, and I'm running out already!!















This next picture is just plain funny. Packaging is so bizarre. There's always gotta be a face on everything or it's just not edible. These are some delicious potatoes that also coincidentally have cute faces.

The Way in Which Korea is Destroying My Brain

This may end up being a bit of a rant. I know I'm supposed to be writing a dreamy "dear diary" about the majestic Korean mountains, the interesting cultural ideas, the people etc etc. I should be whiling away my hours with useful, interesting pursuits. And of course, while at work, I should be working instead of writing this!!!

But here I am, and the thing that is slowly shutting down my brain is t.v. Every night when I get home from work I watch the show "America's Next Top Model". It's about a bunch of dumb, bitchy girls competing to have the best walk and prettiest touched up photo's. It's a trainwreck, But I watch it anyways.

This morning as I walked to school my mind was wandering (as usual) and I found myself imitating the model walk from that stupid show. *shudders in disgust*

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
HHHH!!!

I blame you korea, for only playing bad action movies (usually featuring Steven Seagall) and reality tv in English. Of course I could blame myself for turning on the tv, but that's not what whiners such as myself do.

"Oh!!! So Beautipul!!" (in Konglish accent)

This is a picture of Alex and myself at my little birthday gathering. Mom, if you're thinking "my, Cathy and Alex look like they may just be drunk", banish the thought!! I would never!! Hahahahahhahahaaha. Yeah, I'd had some soju by this point. So of course we were talking about the students, and started joking about their favourite pose. Of course it's much cuter when it's two little Korean girls rather than two drunk waygooken.

So yeah, not much going on in the ET today. We've got a bunch of little monsters in from Yongsanpo. We're working our way through all the fifth-graders in the area and the boys are little shitheads. I've had to employ the "Cathy-stare-of-death" on several occasions, and sometimes it doesn't work for very long. Having a hideous face can come in handy every now and then to scare some kids.

Note: Alex is wearing a big home-made poppy that Maura made for everyone because it was November 11th.

My First Teacher's Workshop

A screaming success by all accounts. Ha ha ha. Three people showed up. Today there was some sort of volley ball tournament, so there was only a couple of diehards, which I didn't imnd. A small class is so nice because most adults are very shy about their English skills. Since there were only a few of them, it was a lot easier to get everyone talking. We played "two truths and a lie", which was fun. I had to do an example first, and my lie was "I have six children". Needless to say they got it right!

It ended up being very laid back and S-L-O-W. I'm still not very good at speaking slowly and simply. It was nice to get it all over with though, for whatever reason I had been slightly stressed about it (due to the fact have I have recieved "worrying genes" from my mother, the biggest worrier of all time!).

Loves ya mom and dad and siblings and extended family!! I just want to go home for the weekend and see everyone, but that, of course, would be crazy. I would spend most of the weekend on the plane!! Gak!!

The Place to be in Naju-shi

Three months later, I finally have my first teacher's workshop today. We shall see how that goes. It's hard to believe I've already been here three months!! So, nine month's more of being the waygook puppet (dancing for everyones entertainment), which sounds good to me.

Randomness as Per Usual

Happy Birthday to Marcia!!
Happy Birthday to Marcia!!
etc. etc., da da da da do do

So old! OLD!! (two years older than me). Criticise my grammar will you!!!

This week we have a bunch of fifth graders in from the same school, and I don't know what they're teachers have been telling them, but for some reason I'm a HUGE celebrity. All of these kids have digital cameras and they want a picture with the "Round eyed godzilla-esque celebrity" named Kesi (that is how my name is spelt in Korean- 캐 시). (I have no idea how to spell "round eyed godzilla-esque monster".) Needless to say it's been a lot of fun. They all stare at my pictures in the textbook then look at me and whisper to eachother. Of course it's in Korean, but I have a pretty good idea it goes something like this:

Ji-hwan: ohh!! It's her!! I heard her name is Candy!

Hae-young: Dude!! She is weird looking!!

Ji-hwan: Is that a perm? Did she dye her hair?? Her head is so narrow and funny looking!

Hae-young: Maybe. Oh god, she's looking at us. Don't look at her!!

Ji-hwan: Do you think she knows we're talking about her??

Of course I know!! You're gesturing at me and whispering!! Bunch of heathens!! But I don't actually mind; usually it's really funny.

Hmmm.. not really sure what else is worth writing about. Not really a lot going on in the Cathy universe at the moment. Watched an interesting Korean movie (called "Welcome to Dongmakgol") over the weekend.

It was set during the second world war in a village in South Korea that was so isolated that the inhabitants had no idea that there was even a war going on, or what a gun was. First an American soldier crashes his airplane near their village and they take him in. The most hilarious part of the movie is when the smartest man in the village tries to talk to him using a phrase book. The old man asks "How are you?" and the American is supposed to reply "Fine, and you?" but of course the American starts talking to him normally. The old man becomes flustered and complains to the other villager that the American doesn't know the rules to conversations. This just struck me as so unbelievably true. Kids always come up to me and say "teacher! Teacher! How are you??" and if I reply with anything other than "fine, and you?" they are completely lost. The American pilot's name is something boring and stereotypical like John Smith, but all of the villagers call him "Su Miss!!". Quite apt.

Next a few North Koreans happen upon the village after their gang of soldiers has been killed in battle. Then, of course, a couple of South Koreans, which results in craziness and humour. I had never seen a WW2 movie from the Korean perspective, so it was very interesting.

Have a nice day!! Choun ha-roo doi-sei-yo! 좋은 하루 되세요!

Cathy!! Get over it!! It was just a mountain!!

that's what I would be thinking if I were you, because here are some more Wolchulsan pictures. Please bear in mind how bored I am a t work and the fact that these pictures were sent to me, and they were pretty.


This one's just a pretty picture.

This is Alex on a little side cliff at the top.

And Kristen and I on a small ledge on the way up.

My Personal Hell

Somewhere on tv, this commercial is playing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MP490j9U7zc

To truly grasp the Korean experience, you must know a little something about Korean advertisements. Try watching this commercial about five thousand times and you will almost understand.

Demonstration Day

Today Naju ET has a 40 minute demonstration for various big-wigs and what-not (basically a bunch of old Korean guys in nice suits) to show what our classes are like. Of course, usually it goes from 9:30am until 3:30pm, but I'm sure we can fit it all in under an hour. No problem. The really annoying part is that that is the only class I have today.

I'm here for eight hours and I'll have an hours worth of class today. I was supposed to have a teacher's workshop, but couldn't possibly do it today; I'm far too busy!! So my workshop has been cancelled for the third time.

All else is well though. Except for a tiny cold, I am well rested and not too annoyed with anyone. It also helps that it's a Friday. Friday's are freaking wonderful. And I've decided I'm going to have a low key, relaxed weekend so that I don't feel like crap on Sunday, which is usually the way it works. My scheduled itinerary:

Friday night: take a bus to Mokpo to hang out with Kristen and Alex and whoever else we meet up with. Maybe see a movie if we can find an english one in theatres.

Saturday: head back to Naju, dump my stuff, then take a bus to Gwang-ju for some hardcore Christmas shopping for people back home. I'm probably just going to buy the weirdest stuff I can find!! There's a really good shinae (downtown) shopping area in Gwang-ju that will hopefully supply me with lots of konglish t-shirts, buddha's, and whatever weird, interesting stuff I can find. If anyone has some requests, get them to me soon, before I send out my packages.

Sunday: laze about, watch some old episodes of "Sex and the City" on tv (the tv here is turning my brain to mush), clean my apartment, and take a long walk on my mountains.

Sigh. Sounds good to me. I haven't had a single weekend where there wasn't some sort of big elabourate plan that resulted in me not sleeping for a night or two!! And no Soju for me this weekend either!!! Soju is a vodka like drink that is insanely cheap and easy to get and makes Cathy feel like crap.

Oh man, creepiest website ever!!! www.najumary.org. There is quite a cult following of the Naju Mary. On the site there are even pictures of the statue with the tears of blood!!! Creepy!! It's so weird to think that a huge pilgrimmage stop is literally a five minute walk from my apartment. I don't know why I'm so fascinated with it; but I just am. This is a little excerpt straight from the website (spelling errors and all) describing the "event":

Our Lady of Naju !

It was almost midnight on June 30,1985 when the Blessed Mother wept for the first time through her statue in Naju, at that time Julia Kim,the owner of the Statue was running her own a Beauty Salon in Naju.
The Blessed Mother's weeping tears and tears of blood continued intermittently for the next 7 years for a total of exactly 700 days until Jan 14,1992 Simultaneously with weeping,Our lady was also frequently sweating and bleeding, throught her nose.Another sign that the Blessed mother gave us in Naju was the fragrant oil through the same statue.She said that this fragrant oil and the fragrance of roses represented her presence,love and friendship for us.
Our lady gave us these signs for the conversion of sinners. She had accumulated the fragrant oil in the top of her head by squeezing all of herself for 400 days and began exuding the oil from the statue on Nov 24,1992 to Oct 23,1994 for 700 consecutive days.

Through centuries,the Blessed Mother has appeared at different places and given us the messages of Jesus ,for example,
in Guadalupe / Lourdes / Fatima / Medjugorej / Akita / Banneux and so on.In recent years, she has been weeping at several locations in the world. Especially, in Naju,Korea


CREEPY!! Alex says that I think everything's creepy, but this DEFINITELY is!!!!

Almost a Teacher

I actually felt like a teacher today. After ET was done for the day, I had my extra class with about 20 grade five and six kids. And I think I may have done a pretty good job. They may have actually learned something. My co-teacher sat in the back and didn't say much. IT WAS AWESOME.

More Wolchulsan Because I took So Many Pictures!!!

So here they are. My favourite is the one with Kristen and the random Korean men. The guy on her right is wearing a two-peice pirate skeleton jumpsuit. Very sexy!! I also like the "Danger Bear" warning that was on the suspension bridge.







I've decided that I need some sort of mission while here to keep me busy during the week, so my mission is to lose a little weight so that I can fit into some of the Konglish t-shirts I bought. There's apparently a gym somewhere in Naju, but screw that. The mountains will be my gym!! And I can do sit-ups during commercial breaks at night as I watch "On Style" tv (On Stle is my crack. All that is ever on is the worst of the worst American tv. Reality, bad sitcoms like friends and sex and the city, and more reality). Sound half-assed?? Oh, it is!! But this way I feel like I'm doing something. There's not much to offer in the way of entertainment in Naju.

My Class Ended at 12:30pm Today

What to do to fill time?? Well, for the first couple of hours I attempted to "surf" the web while also trying to look somewhat serious and busy. My co-teacher's are not fooled, I'm sure. So, I guess I'm going to blather on for a while about this and that. I was just reading other people's blogs, and they were filled with optomism and good attutudes. Bunch of freaks.

Not much going on here. Mr. Yoon is the nicest co-teacher anyone could hope for, but every morning when we greet the kids and he introduces them to me he says "Cathy lives in Naju, in Sangwol Joo Gong". Dude!! What are you doing?? I already have enough kids following me down the street, in the grocery store and around my apartment complex!!! Yesterday, a twelve year old boy (probably eleven in Canadian years), asked me if I had a boyfriend, then proceeded to tell me that he was single. So cute!! If only he was about fifteen years older. Of course if I told him to be quiet he would have no idea what I was saying, but is able to ask me about my romantic status. Those nutty kids. One day a boy came into the english town wearing a shirt that said "Reading is Sexy". I wanted to get a picture of me and him as I read a book SO FREAKING BADLY!!! But he had no idea what his shirt said, so he wouldn't have gotten it. Other funny shirt I saw; a grade two boy with a shirt that said "This is my boyfriend" and an arrow beneath. Love it.

Here are some pictures of the festival that was held at my school. It was absurdly cute.






My pictures didn't turn out very good, but there was also a little cowboy-girl number. Easily the cutest thing I have ever seen. Little kids shooting their fake guns into the air in a choreographed dance. Sometimes its a little disturbing how many kids like to carry around fake (but real looking) guns. And not cute little ones; big machine guns. I guess the boys are just mentally preparing for military service later on! The traditional dances and costumes in the festival were the best, particularly the fan-dance. I need to learn me some of that shit!!!



This is a "for-the-hell-of-it" picture featuring Alex at Wolchusan. It's one of those pseudo-artsy silhouette pictures. Enjoy.

Interesting

the availability of street meat, and other street foods. There are always ajumma's on the street selling something. On my walk home I can count about 10 vendors each day.

1. First, there is street meat lady; selling various meats on a stick.
2. Then on the right is squid octopus and and shrimp seller dude. I love watching shrimp swim around. They're really cute. They've got all those tiny little legs that are always flailing about. The guy that sells them is also really dreamy.
3-7. Various ajumma's selling leafy greens and mysterious grain products. I steer clear of them because they stare a lot and I have no idea what they're selling.
8. the sock man. just a big tent in the middle of the street I have to walk through. There are lot's of kinds of socks out there.
9. The guy with the big truck selling blankets and sleeping mattresses. I bought a mat from him and he made sure to tell me I was getting a sweet discount. Every Korean seems to know the word discount. If I'm in a cab and the price is w2100, he'll only take w2000 and say "discount!! discount!!". (In CDN, that would be about 12 cents.)
10. The fruit and vegetable lady. Persimmons, figs, bananas, grapes: whatever is in season.
12. The pastry fish vendor. They're deep-fried pastries with red bean in the centre. Ugh. Red bean is evil. It's touted as a "delicious and sweet" dessert type food, but I don't believe it.
13. Every now and then there is the "dried fish" vendor selling... various dried fishes. I'm going to send some home for christmas to scare people. The only kind I've had so far is the little minnows. It's the entire fish, but it's so small that it's just a little chewey and crunchy. Tastes like fish.

There's always a lot to see on the five minute walk home.

Wolchulsan Mountain 3

We make it to the top baby!!! Wooo!!! The view from the peak is of course, freaking gorgeous, and the day is clear and smog-free enough that we can see for miles. I could almost see the haze from the LG factory in Naju!!






Getting down the mountain only took us about an hour and a half because we took a very direct route so that we could make it out of there by nightfall. going down was also WAY WAY easier than going up!!! On the way up we were crawling over rocks, pulling ourselves up using ropes and going up the almost-vertical stair-master's from hell. It was a lot of fun!!!!

Wolchulsan Mountain 2

Since blogger doesn't want me to put more than a couple pictures up at a time, this'll be coming in chunks!!





This is us on the suspension bridge!! It was pretty sturdy, I'd say. After we'd gone across, we took a close look at the cables that hold the bridge up, and theyu appeared to be some sort of rubber or plastic!! Does that seem safe to you?? And there was also some sort of goop holding some stuff together which looked pretty shady, but we survived. By the time we got to the suspension bridge, I felt like we should be close to the top, but no no no. There was more to come. It took us almost four hours to get to the top because apparently we took the most picturesque and difficult way up the mountain. Just when we could see the highest peak, we'd end up going down the side, then up, then down etc.







These are just a couple of the sweet pictures I took. I ended up taking about 100 pictures at wolchulsan. I think people probably got annoyed with me as I had to stop multiple times so I could get a shot of some craggy mountainside for the twentieth time!! Today I'm in a lot of pain. My legs are pretty useless at the moment. There are about four steps I have to descend to leave my apartment in the morning and I almost didn't make it (a bit of hyperbole, shut-up marcia).







And here's me getting in the way of some more beautiful landscape. We had a little rest her on a small ledge and just looked at everything for a while. The higher we got, the more cold everything was, so it was nice to be able to rest in the sun and not freeze our asses off.






This is a picture of the view from that ledge which was pretty cool. It's slowly morphing into autumn over here, which makes for some pretty pictures.

Wolchulsan Mountain 1

Words cannot express how freaking huge and amazing that mountain is!! Since I come from a flat place like Ontario, this was easily the biggest mountain I've ever climbed. We arrived in Yongam at about lunch time and from the distance wolchulsan looked like no big deal. Wolchulsan is about 800m high, which isn't all that tall, but for a hick like me it was pretty amazing.





This is us after entering the park and preparing to tackle the mountain. Of course this was a great photo opportunity, so we enlisted the help of a friendly passerby to take our picture. Then when they were done, they wanted their picture taken with us!! If you look closely, you'll notice the random man on the left has a truly heinous mullet!! Mullets are a very frequent thing here in Korea which is both puzzling and entertaining for me. I can't quite pin down Korean style, and I don't think I ever will. It's definitely interesting. When we paid and were about to park, we saw about 10-15 tour buses and we realized we'd be sharing the mountain with A LOT of people!! We got a lot of "hello!"s and stares all day long, but that was okay.






Some of Stuart's middle school kids were even there at the extension bridge featured above and below, so he was a huge hit! At one point we were walking behind a huge troupe of Korean men, and a man in front of me turned around and thrust a candy into my hand saying "here". So I took it and popped it into my mouth with a muffled "komsamida" (thank-you). Then laughed to myself as I thought about what I would do if a strange man offered me candy in Canada. Here people are constantly giving me things on the street, or I'm giving my students stuff; it's just widely acceptable here, which I think is pretty awesome. At lunch I was offering oranges and pepero's to any Korean who would stop to look at us/ ask us where we were from. People always say "American?" and I always reply with "no no no!!! Canadian!!!!". Not same same.

Sience 1996

So the Naju-ites and I have officially found a new and interesting place to go. I'm not sure what the place is called, but we've lovingly dubbed it "Sience 96" (it's supposed to say since 1996, which is still funny, because 1996 wasn't that long ago)because that's the only thing on the sign in english. The outside is really cute and rustic, which is what initially drew us there. The lady who owns the joint was really friendly too! Not a word of english, and more than willing to laugh at our butchering of her language, but really smiley and helpful. My favourite part:





this "snack" she put on our table looked exactly like packing material. It was even shiny and came in strange colours not found in nature. Of course I ate some, and I'm pretty sure it tastes exactly like packing materials as well! But it's still a really cute place with cheap drinks!!

Pepero Day!! Everything I ever could have imagined!!!

Saturday, November 11th is something called "Pepero Day" over here in S.K. It seems to be a national day of eating cracker sticks covered in chocolate. Why?? I have no idea. Was there a dude named Pepero that we are honouring everytime we eat one? Perhaps, but I don't think so. I'm pretty sure Pepero day was thought up by the company that made pepperos so that they could actually sell their unremarkable chocolate covered treat. But I'm not complaining. A bunch of kids came up to me to give me some pepero's (then an equal number came over to beg some off of me), which was nice. The festival was today, and it was pretty cool! One of my co-teachers took over my class for me so I could watch for an hour. I've got picture's I'll be adding later.

On ACTUAL peppero day, I'll be at the top of Mt. Wolchusan, gazing over the wonderous vision that is smog-covered South Korea. At the top of the mountain is a big red suspension bridge that is supposedly really scary. I can't wait to go accross it!!To get all the way up and down the mountain apparently takes about 6 hours! EEkkk!! The important question: Will I pass out and die??

My Mountain

First, mom, dad, I got the stickers and DVD!! When I saw the DVD (Arrested Development Season Three!! Sweeeeet!) I gasped and scared the crap out of an old ajumma standing beside me waiting for the elevator. Whoops!!

So anyway, last night after work I went for a walk on my favorite mountain. Here are some pictures. It was a cloudy, rainy night so I was pretty much the only person on the mountain.










Pretty no? The last one is a picture of the entire city of Naju. It's pretty small eh? I can walk from one end to the other in half an hour. The pagoda at the top of the mountains makes for an excellent view. Just wait til next week! This weekend I'm going to go to Wolchusan (a HUGE mountain) with some friends. Those pictures should be way better as long as there isn't too much smog. I had no idea, but aparently there is a "yellow dust" season in Korea. Every spring the yellow sand from China blows through the South and covers everything including people!! At that time all the inhabiatants have to wear masks (some do already). Weird!!!

The Famous Naju Mary

I finally found the statue of Mary that cried tears of blood! Cool! One night when a couple teacher's were over at my apartment, I had them point it out from my apartment building. The funny thing is, I'd walked by it multiple times and never really noticed!

Meanwhile back at Naju Elementary, there's going to be a festival this friday put on by the students, so all morning they were dancing to some Korean drums nearby the English town. Korean traditional music is very distinctive. The two instruments: kkwaenggwari (a little bronze gong) and janggu (a double ended hourglass drum) are all about the crazy beats!! And really loud!! The dancing I've seen so far is also pretty cool, with the super long "sleeves" that are kind of like a gymnast's ribbons (they're all about the cool effects). The festival should be interesting. For my birthday Yuni, one of my co-teacher's gave me her copy of "Bridget Jone's: The Edge of Reason" "for my single life" as she put it. And Mr. Yoon is going to take us out to dinner and buy me a pair of glasses!! Mine haven't been the same since Alex slept on them when we were at Wando.

Restoring My Faith in the Human Race

So Alex decides to find some friends by making a sign that says "Free Hugs" in Korean:









When I saw them I thought they were so cute I had to steal some from his website. Those crazy waygooks. Just seeing them made me feel better in general. As you know mom, after our last conversation, I've been feeling a little stressed!! Some times the language barrier can be REALLY frustrating!! But a hug's a hug no matter where you go. Most Korean's are so friendly!! Apparently they got over 100 hugs in less than an hour.

More Seoul and Life as a Celebrity!

Heylo. I was just looking through some of my pictures and saw some more I'd like to add. The first is a perfect example of how Itaewan (the "western" section of Seoul) was a bizarre and seedy place. Is this a mistake? What kid of a place is this?? Does it serve coffee. Directly accross the street there were several transvestite prostitutes, so I didn't stop to check it out (and no, I didn't take pictures of the prostitutes, much to Alex's chagrin! I felt bad for those "ladies").





The next picture is me in front of a dragon statue made of bamboo that I thought was pretty cool. It was just on a random street that we were wandering along a little lost after getting into Seoul.





Next: the ladies who come in everyday and clean Naju ET. They're the one's who've taught me so much about super junior, their cell phones, and how much they don't like their hogwans. Everyday they crowd around my desk to try to ask me questions in English or otherwise just look at me for a while. They all want to see my cell phone so they can get my number. This is how our phone conversation would go:

Cathy: Hello?

Geum-bi (for example): Hello Kesi!!

Cathy: Hi. Who's this?

Geum-bi: Cho Geum-bi.

Cathy: Oh, Hi! How are you?? (every kid has learned how to answer this question if you ask slowly enough)

Geum-bi: I am fine. And you? (this is the response that every child has learned)

Cathy: Ohhh, not too bad. Not a lot going on here. What's up? (I've totally lost her)

Geum-bi: Ahhh...

Cathy: I am fine as well.

Geum-bi: OOOOhhh! Good!

Cathy: Yep...

Geum-bi: yes.

Cathy: So... I'll see you at school?

Geum-bi: Yes, yes.

Cathy: (long pause) Okay, bye!

Geum-bi: Bye Kesi!!





They are also always talking about coming to visit my apartment, but they're always busy at night (hogwans) and I'm gone on the weekends so it hasn't happened yet! I'm sure we'd end up watching tooniverse (popular cartoon channel) and talking about super junior!!

Today we had a camera crew in to film the class for some sort of instructional video which was... un-freaking-bearable!!! Dude, do you really need that close-up of my face as I try to pronounce "visiting"?????? STEP BACK!!! We had a future Orson Welles (or Stanley kubrick if that reference was too old) in our very own ET, bossing everyone around and telling everyone where to stand for a few hours. Brendan, a waygook represenentative for the Jeollanamdo Office of Education (very important!) was even called in to "help out". Mrs. Kim, my own personal dating service made sure to mention how woefully single and alone I am. "Cathy must spend time by herself always", "Cathy must go for walks by herself" and the outright "Cathy is single. Are you married Brendan?" etc etc. Kill me now!! But it was all in good fun, and made for an interesting day.