’n Liedjie vir katliefhebbers

Daar is katmense en hondmense. Af en toe kry jy ’n draadsitter, maar gewoonlik is katmense en hondmense redelik eens oor hulle onderskeie troeteldiervoorkere. Alhoewel ek as kind ’n hele rits honde gehad het, is ek sonder twyfel ’n katmens. Dit het my baie lank geneem om my voorkeur vir katte bo honde te tem. Intussen het ek tot die insig gekom dat ek nie honde kan blameer omdat hulle nie katte is nie. ’n Hond is ’n hond en kan nie daarvoor help nie.

Alhoewel hondmense soms hulle eenstemmigheid omtrent honde kan vokaliseer, raak hondmens nie juis so opgewonde oor honde soos katmense oor katte word nie. Ja daar is daardie groepies hondmense wat hulle honde na hondeskoue en parades toe neem, maar daardie tipe hondmense is ’n subkultuur binne die groter sfeer van hondmense. Katmense, daarinteen, is altyd opgewonde oor hulle katte. Hulle ken mekaar ook gewoonlik uit. Dis iets in ons houding teenoor die wêreld wat maak dat een katmens ’n ander katmens kan identifiseer. Ek vermoed dit werk bietjie soos “gaydar” – daar die telepatiese radar wat gay mense het om mekaar uit te ken.

Katmense kan ’n helegesprek hê oor hulle kat. Hierdie katgesprekke is ook anders as hondmense se kompeterende gesprekke. Katmense sal bymekaar oor hulle katte gesels, en terwyl hulle hulle onderskeie katte met mekaar mag vergelyk is dit nooit ’n “My kat is beter as jou kat”-gesprek nie. Wanneer een persoon se kat iets wonderliks doen (wat ’n ander persoon se kat nie doen nie), sal albei persone opgewonde wees. Die eerste persoon is opgewonde oor haar eie kat so spesiaal is. Die tweede persoon is opgewonde oor die uniekheid en wonderlike aard van die katspesie in geheel. Alhoewel elke katmens se eie kat(te) ’n baie spesiale plek in sy of haar hart het, is katmense ook gaande oor ander mense se katte – selfs die irriterende katte, omdat die irriterende katte ook ’n ander unieke aspek in die katpersoonlikheidspektrum uitbeeld.

Sekerlik die aspek van ’n kat waarvan katmense die meeste hou is dat katte nie so afhanklik, en irriterend onvoorwaardelik lojaal en beslobberendlief vir sy eienaar is soos ’n hond nie. Dis asof ’n hond geen keuse het nie. Honde is pakdiere en die eienaar is deel van die groep en dus ’n onvoorwaardelike instinktiewe waaistertverwelkomende deel van die hond se eie psige. Die hond beskik byna nie oor die vermoeë om nie-lief te wees vir sy eienaar nie. Soos elkeen wat hierdie ding mooi deurdink het sal weet, is so ’n tipe liefde ’n laer tipe, elementêre liefde – nie werklik liefde nie, eerder instink ter wille van die trop. Dit is wanneer “liefde” ’n vrye keuse vereis, dat dit werklik Liefde, in die ware sin van die woord, word. ’n Kat vereis ’n verhouding – dis nie onvoorwaardelik tropinstink nie, maar ’n gedeelde keuse wat albei partye aangaan om mekaar se kat en mens te wees.

Met honde is die orde grootliks gebasseer om die mens: “Ek is die mens, en jy is my hond.” Hierop reaggeer die hond, “Jy is my Meester, en ek is jou hond.” Die hond kontempleer nie eers daarop nie. Aan die anderkant sal geen selfgerespekteerde kat sal so ’n repliek “instinktief” gee nie. In ’n kat-mensverhouding is daar nie ’n “meester” nie. Die verhouding is grootliks gelyk, met effense variasie in die rolle afhangende van die vereistes van sekere situasies. ’n Kat-mensverhouding is veel nader aan ’n boesemvriendverhouding, as ’n goedgesinde meester-slaafverhouding.

Onderaan ’n liedjie deur Jack Off Jill oor haar “kat.” Dalk nie haar regte kat nie – nietemin, ek kry die gevoel dat sy wel ’n regte kat het, en dat sy inderdaad ’n katmens is.

Estetiese argitektuur en ander toertjies

Aanvanklik het ek nie veel belang gestel in argitektuur nie. Toe ek my honneursgraad in Engels gedoen het en ek 'n vak uit die Kunsgeskiedeniskurrikulum kon kies was Argitektuur een van die opsie. Wel, dit was geensins 'n opsie vir my nie. Ek het glad nie daarin belang gestel nie. Ek het eerder Drie-dimensionele objekte (Postmoderne beeldhoukuns) gekies. Maar hoe meer die jare aanstap, hoe groter raak my belangstelling in argitektuur. Onder is paar oulike fasades en interesante wolkekrabbertorings wat my aandag getrek het... wat enige een se aandag sal trek.

Staab Argitekte se FLARE-fasade in Berlyn



Ned Kahn's Technorama-fasade in Switserland:



Mader Stublić Wiermann se Uniqa-toring in Vienna:



Jacques Ferrier se konsepsiële Hipergroen-toring ("Hypergreen"):



Die Roterendetoring gekontrakteer vir Dubai; David Fisher se "Dynamic Architecture":

A Masculine Cell Phone

I stumbled upon this advertisement that depicts the Motorola Droid cell phone as deliberately not-pretty (i.e. not cute). Maybe this is just my attempt at redeeming my masculinity after the previous post; be that as it may, I like the ad. The narrator states that the Motorola Droid "...is not a princess; it's a robot," and various images of machinery and techno-stuff are juxtaposed against pretty-girly stuff, with the girly stuff being destroyed by things masculine.

And it actually works. After watching the ad, I felt completely convinced that this is the type of phone I want. It sounds strong and efficient. I even went to the official website.

My first degree in Business Communication & Graphic Design still struck a chord in me, making me fascinated with advertising campaigns, and the way the media manipulates us and specifically plays the genders against each other. The interesting thing is, it works. There are fundamental (stereotypical) differences between the genders or otherwise companies would not spend millions of dollars on marketing campaigns. Regardless how artistic I am, and how in touch I am with my feminine side, Motorola’s masculine Droid is still the phone I want.

Is Cute Sexy?

The video above is about a book depicting men acting maternal, which, it turns out, is somehow sexy (and maybe even erotic) to women (especially "new moms"). Now while I can understand how new moms can find it appreciative and a thankful relief when her hubby helps out with the children, I don't think I quite get how this is sexy. I guess it is similar to guys with puppies... It looks cute. But why does "cute" equals "sexy."

Personally I do not find cute girls sexy – it borders too much on paedophilia. This is a major reason why many Asian women do not do it for me. Asian women (or is it Asian men?) thinks that cute looks and cutesy behaviour is sexy. I guess people present themselves to society in a manner they think their potential partners would like. If Asian women believe that the men like women that look like school girls, then that is the kind of looks and behaviour they imitate. The Lolita look is quite prominent in Korea and Japan. I think in Japan more so than Korea.

So let my try and understand this. To look sexy, one has to look cute? Okay. Here is my attempt at trying to look cute … uhm, sexy. Let me know if I succeeded. Sorry, I didn’t have any access to babies or puppies.

Madame Tutli-Putli

This is a short film (2007) about a woman (Madame Tutli-Putli) that boards a night train (the train to the after life?) with all her earthly possessions. As the journey continues into slowly turns nightmarish. Apparently the whole stop-motion film, just around 17 minutes in length, took nearly four years of collaboration to finish. You can read some reviews of the film here.

The whole film is rich in suggestions and meanings. I’m personally still trying to figure out what the moth is a metaphor for. Is it supposed to be her guiding / protecting angel or does it have a more sinister meaning? Any ideas?

Online Video Watching Made Easy with Magma

In a previous post I mentioned one way I stay abreast with what’s happening on the Net, without spending hours upon hours of surfing. I revealed TweetMeme.Com as a tool to know what the world is tweeting about.

Another great tool I recently started to use is Magma. This great website brings together the latest and greatest in online videos. It sorts through all the main video sites like YouTube, Hulu, Vimeo, Dailymotion, and even takes into account videos mentioned or rated through other social media sites like Twitter, Icrerocket, StumbleUpon, Digg, Delicious, and Reddit. It also assembles videos from formal sites like the New York Times, TED, and BuzzFeed, as well as other online channels like Viral Video Chart, BlipTV, CollegeHumor, and Break.

By visiting Magma you have all these video channels congregated conveniently on one page, and again, like with TweetMeme.Com, other people are doing the work, so that you can merely get a quick overview of “current” videos. This frees up more time for you to research deeper into the videos or topics that tickles your fancy.

In the YouTube-video below, Adam Ostrow gives some advice for companies on how to use social networking sites, like blogs, to find out what are the current trends.

Self-Portrait: Black Hoodie & Moustache Series

 

North Korea Revalues Its Currency

North Korea has revalued its currency yesterday at a rate of 100 to 1, against the old notes. A further tragedy for the North Korean people is that the dictator Kim Jong Il’s Worker’s Party is only allowing people to change 150, 000 Won in cash and 300, 000 Won in savings accounts into the new currency. That means that people that have saved up more many will lose their savings. It is clear that the government wants to keep its people poor, as the poorer they are, the more dependent they are on the dictator government.According to South Korea’s Chosun Ilbo (as cited by AFP), a reason for this revaluation is to “tighten control over society before an eventual power transfer from leader Kim Jong-Il to his son Jong-Un.”

I would have thought that the South Korean expat blogosphere would be buzzing with thoughts about this, but to my surprise it doesn't seem to be newsworthy to my fellow expat bloggers at all. The only blog I've found so far to have mentioned it is Northeast Asia Matters: The Korean Peninsula. You can read the Northeast Asia Matters' update on the story here.

Basiese Grammatika? Nee, Basiese Woordeskat...

Ek het vroeër vandag gehoor dat my lysie vakke wat ek moontlik volgende semester gaan aanbied intussen ’n bietjie verander het. Glo gaan ek nie meer Essay Writing aanbied nie, maar in plek daarvan Basic Grammar. Ek is geensins gaande oor grammatika nie. Nogtans, dis dalk nie ’n slegte ding nie. Hierdie is ’n geleentheid vir my om weer my Engelse grammatika op te skerp.

Soos reeds genoem is Essay Writing met Basic Grammar verruil. Ek het dit geniet om Essay Writing te gee, maar dit vereis nogals baie nasien werk; hopenlik vereis die nuwe klas minder nasien werk.

Wag... ek het nou net oor die telefoon met die departementele assistent gepraat en glo is die nuwe vak wat ek gaan aanbied nie Basic Grammar nie, maar Basic Vocabulary vir tweede taal sprekers, en daar is drie lektore wat die klas aanbied vir eerste jaars. Nou ja, dit is hoe vinnig dinge in Korea kan verander. Dit is heel moontlik dat die huidige lys klasse steeds kan verander voor ek volgende jaar begin.

Ek het ook intussen verneem waaroor die vak Literature and Visual Arts handel. Die volle titel van die module is “Literature and Visual Arts: Shakespearean Performance and Movies.” Die Departement vir Engelse Studies bied twee modules oor Shakespeare aan: die een fokus op tragedies en die ander een fokus op komedies. Nou hierdie Literature and Visual Arts klas is ’n derde klas betreffende Shakespeare en dien as aanvullend tot die ander twee Shakespeare klasse. Ek sien ook dat dit is op vierdejaarsvlak. In Suid-Afrika sal dit dus as ’n honneursvlakvak dien. Ek dink dit het die potensiaal om ’n baie lekker klas te wees.

Nobody But You

A current famous K-pop song is "Nobody But You," by Korea's Wonder Girls.



I stumbled upon this police officer (or at least that is what I think he is, judging by the uniform) doing the "Nobody But You" dance. It is quite funny, and just gets funnier towards the end as two other officers starts to join in. So this is what the Korean police do during their lunch breaks. You have to give it to Koreans, they are excellent dancers.

Talking (and Singing) to Oneself

I sometimes talk to myself. Do you?

Charlie, in the YouTube video below sings to himself; and not a bad song either.



So what do I talk about when I talk to myself. Actually, most of the time I'm "writing" something. I'm composing letters, or essays, or poems, or blog posts, or arguments, and I do this either silently or verbally. Then I would interrupt myself with counterarguments or other points, and I will strengthen my argument accordingly. So my personal conversations are not that interesting. Unlike a previous roommate of mine who had serious arguments with himself, especially while showering. My bedroom was right next to the bathroom, so I often heard him having fights with himself. It was somewhat troubling. His self-talk stopped when he started to date.

While I do occassionally talk to myself, most of the time I just laugh at myself. To live with me, you need a sense of humour.

Possible Classes Next Semester

(Image Source: University of Texas at Austin)

I received the list of subjects that I am likely teach next semester; they are:

• Intermediate English Listening and Speaking
• Essay Writing
• Research Methodology
• 19th Century British Poetry (Romantics)
• British and American Essays
• Literature and Visual Arts

They are all three credit classes (i.e. three hours per week), with the exception of Research Methodology which is a one credit class (i.e. one hour per week); in all, sixteen teaching hours per week. This will be the most hours I taught so far since I started my job here. This semester I taught fifteen hours, and last semester I taught thirteen. Contractually I need only teach twelve hours per week, but the contract does state that the department can ask me to teach more, for which I would, of course, be paid overtime. While sixteen hours a week may be a little tough, the overtime pay is, naturally, not to be smirked at. I got between $300 and $400 per month extra this semester because I taught an extra three credits. If the proposed schedule does not change, then I will be teaching four credits over my contractual requirement, which will possible increase my pay with over $400.

A positive thing about the schedule is that I taught five of the six classes last semester, which means that I have much of the material already prepared; therefore, I will not need that much preparation time. I can now focus more on fine tuning the class, rather than developing syllabi and teaching material. I'm also looking forward to teaching Romantic Poetry again, as well as British and American Essays.

The only new class on the list is Literature and Visual Arts. I haven’t had time to speak with the department head, so I have no idea what the class is about, but it sounds tremendously interesting. However, I really hope that it will not take too much preparation time. I’m optimistic to spend some time on my own academic pursuits next year; particularly, I hope to write some articles and work on my PhD.

On another note, my department head told me that I do not have to worry about the renewal of my contract. In other words, they are likely to renew my contract after it expires at the end of next semester (July 2010). This means that if I wish to continue working here after my current contract expires, I can. In a world suffering from economic concerns and job shortages, I guess that is good news.

In the meantime there are only two weeks of classes remaining before the final exam. And after the final exam, another two weeks for me of administrative work (e.g. grading papers). Five weeks in all before my long holiday commences and I can go visit my loved ones in South Africa again. I can hardly wait!

Getting More Visitors With Keywords Such as "Korea" and "Sex"

A couple of months ago the daily visits to this blog doubled. It used to be around ten, now it is over 20 unique visits a day. Not bad for a blog that doesn’t have any specific niche or goal in mind. It is merely a place where I share things that I may be thinking about, stumble upon, or experienced recently. It is not focused at all. This is basically a notepad and sometimes a diary. Still, I couldn’t help wonder why the number in visits doubled. Then I thought, maybe it has something to do with sex. After all, sex sells.

A while back, about the same time I noticed the increase in numbers (around September), I wrote a post on sex in Korea. The title of that post is “A Sexual Korea,” and was about the dichotomy I noticed between the supposedly prudish Korea that Koreans like to present to the world on the one hand and a very overtly sexually charged Korea on the other hand. My hypothesis is that Internet surfers searching for things related to sex in Korea are probably ending up at my blog, which is boosting the visitor numbers. Now if my theory is true, then the visits to this blog should increase even more after this post, since the word “sex” is repeated quite a number of times in the same context as “Korea.” I recently heard that searches for giraffes mating are also quite popular, so in theory if I write more about the sexual escapades of Giraffa camelopardalis, aka giraffes, I should get more visits too. I don’t know what is so cool about giraffes mating. Furniture porn is probably much more interesting in my opinion.

Now I’m not planning to turn this blog into a blog about sex. There are enough porn sites on the Internet, so that I don’t see the point, even if I wanted to. Albeit, I do not think that there are many Korean porn sites, since XXX is illegal in Korea. Unless the porn sites are of “Koreans,” but hosted in another country, and most likely featuring other Asians porn actors pretending to be Korean, and since most of the world cannot differentiate by looks alone between, say, Japanese and Koreans, I guess the fake Korean porn websites will be relatively equally effective than authentic Korean porn websites providing Asian porn movies and pictures. I don’t know if you noticed, but the previous sentence was deliberately long, with many words related to sex and Korea. Let's see if this experiment works and if Google will index these keywords and direct more visitors here (only to find a South African's musings about Life, the Universe, and Everything, and Korea).

Now what I find interesting from the increase in daily unique visitors to my blog is that not only did the daily new visitors increase, but also the regular visitors increased too. I guess people came to find posts related to Korean sex, but found something different, yet still interesting enough to come back.

Whatever way all you new regular visitors came to visit this blog, I hope you feel at home and I’ll try to keep things interesting. Well, at least it is interesting to me.

Vampire's Blood Test

And speaking of vampires . . .

51 Things I'm Thankful For

1. Häagen-Dazs Ice-Cream, particularly the Green Tea flavour (only available in Korea and Japan) and their Belgium Chocolate flavour.
2. Internet, especially fast Internet.
3. Hot water in large quantities and all the luxuries that go with it – a hot shower, a hot bathtub. Bliss.
4. A good job.
5. Autumn. Just imagine how awful it would have been if we did not have that gradual transition into winter. I’m also thankful for the autumn colours which make the dreary greys of winter more bearable.
6. The Ozone layer. I have sensitive skin.
7. I’m really thankful for the fact that my first cat, Tai-Chi, was a cool cat. Just imagine if my first cat was one of those crazy cats, then I might have turned into a dog-person and I don’t think I could live with myself if I were to be a dog-person.
8. Glasses. I like seeing. My glasses make seeing so much better.
9. Great transportation systems – at least here in Korea.
10. Open Source Software.
11. Mozilla Firefox, with all its snazzy add-ons.
12. Digital cameras.
13. Innovative people.
14. Orgasms.
15. YouTube.
16. Independent news is a great blessing in a world where the mass media news have become gatekeepers of the news, rather than dispensers of the news.
17. C. S. Lewis. Yes for the Narnia books, but especially for all those other books that changed my life.
18. Friends. Not to be confused with acquaintances.
19. Coffee shops. Not American style take-away coffee shops, but real European style coffee shops where you can sit down and relax and take your time to enjoy your order, your company, and the atmosphere.

20. Martial Arts. It is neat that people can defend themselves, and it made the action movie genre so much more fun.
21. Synchronicity.
22. God. (At least the God as I understand God to be – not that “other” one.)
23. Common interests are such a nice thing. Some things are more fun when shared.
24. Berries.
25. Fantasy and Sci-Fi.
26. Things related to dental care: Toothbrushes, toothpaste, floss, dentists…
27. PlagiarismChecker.Com makes my life as a teacher so much easier.

28. Vampire movies with sexy and scary vampires.
29. The idea of Truth.
30. Talents. I’ve got a couple and I’m very thankful for them even though I sometimes take them for granted.
31. Good Afrikaans music which cancel out, at least a little, all those other terrible Afrikaans music.
32. Kimbab.
33. Flowers; especially the aromatic ones, like lilies and magnolias and roses.
34. Photoshop with which I can make my average photos look great and even turn myself into a model.
35. The blow that Postmodernism gave that self-righteous arrogant conceited Modernism.
36. Negative ions during thunderstorms. The smell of rain.
37. The contribution of Blues music.
38. The Gospel. Anyone that truly understand the Gospel, in its purest form, must stand in admiration of it, even if you don’t believe in it.
39. That improvisation that Jazz brought to the music scene.
40. Podcasts and podcast downloaders other than iTunes.
41. The Teacher and lecturers that entertained my non-conformity and inspired me to make something of my life.
42. Alternative music.
43. The Sabbath. It is just the greatest thing. You can be how stressed, but come Sabbath all those issues are put aside and all work deadlines suspended for 24 hours.
44. Aesthetics. Not merely beautiful things, but the ability to appreciate things for their aesthetic quality in that moment, in that context.This can make even a ruin, or a dirty downtown alley, or a piece of rotten wood look "beautiful."
45. Thai Curry.
46. Alternatives.

47. Things that create ambiance: candles, incense, soulful music.
48. An imagination.
49. Cutlery.
50. People that have cared for me through the years.
51. That I was able to attain my goal (a New Year’s Resolution) of getting my 4th degree black belt before the end of this year.

Image Credits: 
Green Tea Ice Cream -- Yaokui
YouTube logo -- YouTube
Dracula -- Goth Girl of the Week
"Strummin' Blues" -- All Posters
"Creating Ambience" -- Chitra Karma Design