The Trot Must Be Stopped

As I get ready to leave Korea for 6 months on a honeymoon that is bound to change my life, I am gathering a growing number of things that I will definitely miss while I'm gone.

One thing I will not miss, however, at all, in any capacity, is the trotters. The trotters are the women in high heels who trot on the sidewalks to get in front of you in order to trot up the stairs before you do, so they can clunk down the escalator before you do, shimmy through the turnstyle before you do, and trot across the platform and push themselves into the last inches of space left on a full subway car, all before you do.
The constant little click-click-click-click-click-click-CLICK-CLICK-CLICK that follows me down the sidewalk has been eating away at my commuting soul and I can no longer handle it. Every time they slam their little spiky shoe onto the concrete chips away at some happy place within me, the happy buffer I have wrapped around my heart of Rage is diminishing.
And why don't you just leave your house like, oh, I don't know, 10 seconds earlier? Because it's not a constant trot that propels these women in front of me (which is actually not what bothers me. As many people who want to may walk in front of me, get on the train before me, whatev. I'm over that. I leave my house at the right time so that no matter what happens, I don't have to hurry. Or trot.) it's 7 trots and then regular walking for a few seconds and then like 4 more trots and then regular walking. And seriously, it's the stupid little noise that kills me.
Oh, and don't even get me started about the people who are transferring and run with abandon up the stairs onto the platform like hungry dogs just to stand in a line.
I mean, I get it that it's important to be on time for work. But geez! If you have to be to work at the same time everyday, get your shit together and stop showering before work, duh. Because that's how I make it to work on time. I don't ramble out of the bed with an hour to get ready, fry me up some eggs and pancakes, check my email, and leisurely shave my legs and then take my time pulling on my ridiculous stilettos only to trot it to work. Heck no. I am sleeping until the latest possible moment, giving myself a maximum of 7 minutes bathroom time which includes morning pee, washing face, brushing teeth, applying extra coats of deodorant, making sure I don't have boogers in my nose, and possibly doing something to my hair. Also, mourning the fact that yet again, I will walk out into the world with only one eyebrow because I didn't remember to pluck those suckers. Add about 2 minutes to sniff my clothes to figure out if I can wear them again before pulling them on and heading out the door.
That is how you avoid trotting. Or, you could just not wear high heels. If you wore awesome silent-soled shoes that didn't do the clicking noise and feel like the equivalent of a paper cut filled with lemon juice on my ear drum every time your child-size foot slammed into the ground with trot-force, you could run, sashay, tap dance your way to the subway and cram yourself onto that car every day if you wanted to and I wouldn't say a word. Okay, maybe like one or two words, but it would not warrant letting The Rage out to play in the sun. Negative.

Although I am still not totally on board for hiking through the Himalayas for two weeks (this is the husband's dream and I'm just following him and praying that perhaps I can take some strong drugs to make the time and pain pass more quickly), I am ready to be there. Because there are no high heels in the Himalayas. And I'm definitely ready to be in India for a few months. And there may be high heels there, somewhere, but not where I'm going. And being in the States, where there are plenty of high heels, many of them on my friends and family, will not bother me because we do not find ourselves trotting to the subway on sidewalks in the South. Praise God.

End Rage.

Say Kimchi!

Kenny and I took some of our wedding/future fund when we visited the States, used the rocking exchange rate to maximize our won and bought a freaking awesome camera. I don't know exactly what it is (I'm not the camera expert by any means) but it's a Canon EOS something. The names here are not the same in the States, so even if I knew exactly what model and number and all that our camera was, it wouldn't really matter to all the exposaroonies out there. I heard my sister's wedding photographer say it was probably the Rebel XSI. But who knows. I'll get all that info and add it here later for the hundreds of photographers who live in daily anticipation of my photo posting. Riiiiight. So, we got the camera. And we made sure to purchase a wide-view lens as well, because what will the Himalayas be without a wide-angle?

And. It. Is. Awesome. Thought I'd share the proof with you guys! 

This is one of my favorite pictures, pretty much ever. This was taken at Kenny's house and that's my mother-in-law! Isn't she beautiful?  

Wide-view lens, Seoul Metro station, waiting on Hein to take our second round of engagement photos in a small cafe. 

The dreaded transfer from Line 2 to Line 8. Not bad on the weekends, of course. But picture this entire hall packed from wall to wall with commuters. Traffic jam!

And there's proof of that donut I ate! Yep, I'm at Krispy Kreme. And let me tell you, it's hard to pass up Krispy Kreme. You know how you can stop at the ones in the States when the "Hot Now" sign is on and get a fresh donut? Well, in Korea, the "Hot Now" donuts are handed out free of charge while you stand in line to put in your order. So, you can get free donuts and then decide you don't want anything else and move on. This is Kenny's strategy and it seems that enough people want other kinds of donuts and coffee that it's profitable for the Krispy Kreme to hand out free hot, fresh donuts. It's awesome. I had my free donut eaten before I pointed to the Mocha chocolate donut on my plate (topped with choco-covered coffee beans! Yes!) and asked for an Iced Caramel Macchiato, my caffeine drug of choice. 

Of course, you can tell who hogs the camera. But I really don't mind. He's trying to teach me a bunch of stuff and I'm really excited to learn. But I still have a tendency to just point and click! Right now, I'm learning how to focus or unfocus on certain objects in a frame. It's fun and I'm so glad we'll have a great way to document our could-go-disaster-or-triumph honeymoon! 

(Oh, Honeymoon Update: We're skipping Tibet altogether and this makes our heads hang low, letting our chin get to know our chests a bit better. But the permits we have to have to get in and the group tours we'd have to take to get them are a little pricey for our taste and we couldn't get the train from Beijing to Llasa going in the right direction. So we're heading straight for Nepal and the Annapurna circuit. Which will freeze all our body parts and we'll probably die. But whatever. We'll have damn good pictures documenting our demise! After Nepal we'll spend a few months in India, volunteering at Mother Teresa's house, visiting a few missionaries that Kenny knows through his father's work, and generally honeymooning in our hut on a beach. Oh, and wearing saris! And eating curry! Woot.)

On another note completely unrelated to this post, which is something I know you regularly thirst for, I am MAKING myself meet a bunch of people tonight in Korea. A bunch of other expats who write incredible blogs. I can't read all their blogs too regularly, because it starts to depress me. Ah, writers. How petty and jealous we can be! But anyway, the point is that I am making an effort to socialize outside the fiance. He may be coming (probably not) but I've sworn myself to participation no matter what. And I totally had a dream about Roboseyo last night. A very weird, awesome, dream in which he owned a huge boat that had two Olympic size swimming pools and allowed me to wander onto it whenever I pleased and he hosted an engagement part for Kenny and me there. It was totally strange and I wore my wedding dress into the pool to thank everyone for coming. And then I was self-conscious because I wasn't wearing a bra underneath my dress. And there were puppies there. And a lot of people were there: Ruthie Martin Kolb (new mommy in real life), Jennifer Wilson McCaman (whose dad took us to her house that was down the street from the boat), and the guy from ZenKimchi was there, another blog I read. Isn't that strange? I guess it's a sign I should definitely go and meet these folks if I'm already dreaming about them! And sometimes, Roboseyo turned into Doogie Howser and that was awesome. 

Digression #53: If you get a chance to go see the British film Happy Go Lucky, do so. But do not under any circumstances get the jumbo caramel popcorn and devour it all while only sharing small handfuls with your almost-husband after having had four spoonfuls of awful school bipbimbap and a piece of foul kimchi for lunch. Just see the film and enjoy a regular size popcorn and make sure you share. A lot. 

No More Excuses

I'm pouring sweat, and that's a good thing for this ChubbO because it means I did something besides salivate over the waffle with ice cream served downstairs in my coffee shop or walk vigorously towards the nearest iced white-choco-week's-worth-of-calories-mocha. I have found the perfect no more excuses method of working out and because I know I'm not the only ChubbO out there, I thought I'd share how I'm whipping my butt into shape for Le Wedding, and more importantly Le Honeymoon.  

Le Honeymoon will consist of 3 months spent trekking in Tibet, the Himalayas in Nepal, and India, followed by 2 months of supreme vacation at the parent's homestead in good old Tennessee along with some traveling through Georgia and Florida to see wifeys, sister-friends, and grandparents. So, needless to say, the first three months of my dream getaway with my Korean require me to be less ChubbO on the outside (but still the same "did somebody say pizza rolls" ChubbO on the inside).

Stairs. Oh lovely ladies (and gents) who are whining about the weather, the time restraint, all the perfect size zero and perfectly naked Korean girls in the changing room at the local gym: stairs is the answer. Buy yourself a set of ankle weights (I got mine cheap from a wholesaler for about $10.00 and they're a kilo each) and head to the nearest stairwell. My apartment has 14 floors and I live on the 9th, so that's where I start. Because Koreans are always in a hurry and the elevators are much quicker than taking the stairs, I am always alone. I strap on my ankle weights and head down the stairs to the first floor, not allowing myself to use the handrails to work on my balance. Then I go back up to floor 9. Repeat, going only to floor 2. Back up to floor 9. Down to 3. Up to 9. Down to 4. Up to 9 until you're walking down one floor and back up. That takes me close to 15 minutes because I do walk, not jog the stairs, and allow myself usually 30 seconds to a minute's rest every time I reach the 9th floor.

You should be sweating proficiently by now, unless you live in some dream apartment building where they air condition the stairwells. Otherwise, you should be tired. So I remove the ankle weights and go back down to the first floor. This time, definitely clinging to the handrail because my feet want to go much faster than my brain because of the sudden weightlessness. Then, I try to jog all the way back to my floor. 

There are 14 floors, so I guess there's always room for improvement. But for now, that's my no-excuses stair workout. I can do it when it's raining, when it's really hot outside, when I only have half an hour, or when I want to be incredibly  antisocial and do something besides the Han riverside trail where I will be stared at the entire time. 

Oh, and make sure you STRETCH afterwards!

Let me know if you try the ChubbO stairs workout. Or if you have any failproof ways to stick it to the wedding dress! (Yeah, kind of like sticking it to the man. You would think I love my wedding dress, but in reality I despise it. Until I look freaking hot in it, of course. And then I will love it. But for now, we're sticking it to the Dress, okay?).

Resisting the Waffle,

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