The exhaustion plateau

Have I mentioned yet that the washer can now be added to the do-not-use list? I'm pretty sure I did last night.

Tonight I ended up walking home because it got above 10 degrees. I went to Lotte Mart because I want cheese & the grocery stores only sell weird, chemically-Korean cheese, & Gouda. For Christ's sake, Gouda just grabbed these motherfuckers! It's a good cheese, don't get me wrong, but when I go to Costco next month, MAN WILL I SHOVE ASIDE MEAT FOR SOME FUCKING CHEDDAR. It's not a thing here. Except for some shredded with Mozzarella. Anyway, on the way home & even more remarkably in Lotte Mart, I felt no anger or disgust. The little kids were cute, I was happy to know some of the customs & use them & appreciate them for being different but interesting & no trouble. I figure that I've been irritated & upset by everything so long that I think I actually exhausted my anger!

But I get home determined to do more on this course. I'm really behind on the coursework for teachers looking to move to remote jobs. These other teachers are all looking to get out of teaching, whereas I feel like I'm not done with the job itself, but am definitely done in Korea, in Asia, in really anywhere that ISN'T Western Europe, & I'm nowhere near ready to pull the trigger on that yet. So, I joined this course to help me get a job I'll like that can (PLEASE PLEASE PLEEEEASE UNIVERSE!) allow me to live, pay off that debt, & move forward with my plans.

But on the facebook page everyone's so motivated & enthusiastic, whereas I'm feeling overwhelmed when she posts the new week's work & I still haven't done last week's. I want to do writing but when I have to come up with topics, or pitch ideas, or write regularly about some nonsense & keep trying to find someone to publish it... I just can't. I have nothing to say. I'm exhausted & overwhelmed & stuck & feel trapped. I'd need to secure this job in about March or April when Sue will ask about my plans. & I CANNOT stay here, in this apartment. I have great coworkers & students but I have to leave Korea. But if I don't have that job soon (& 3 months is the most likely timeline), I also can't do full time 'til July, which again will be 2-3 months before my contract here ends. But if I don't have a job lined up when she asks? How can I say no when I need the money?

Jesus, teaching here was supposed to help SOLVE the money issue!

It's not my habit to ignore the universe.

As silly as it would sound to some (well Mark mainly), I believe in signs. For example, when I was working on my TEFL certification, waiting for it to finish & wait until March or April to give my notice that I was leaving for Chile in June. The workload for the course had been picking up, & I'd thought, "God, if only I could just not have to come into work, & just concentrate on this." Later that same month, I was laid off. Unemployment pay & everything. To me, that was a sign I was on the right path, because exactly what I'd wanted to happen, had happened.

& I can't help but think Korea & the universe are likewise telling me I should leave.

It is a week after I notified the building that not only was my stove not working, but the fridge & sink, since the sink was leaking. When I told my boss Sue, she told me to leave my apartment's key code with the manager. Well, I left it with the security guard/door man guy. Who, as you may recall, I'm convinced is senile, because he couldn't figure out what to do with said information.  & that day, the real estate agent  called Sue to say that the building manager didn't seem to have the info.

So yesterday, after no more word on it nor progress, I asked Sue to check on the status. Apparently, the real estate agent, who I BELIEVE IS, never mind speaks, Korean, asked the building manager for the key to my apartment, but not the key CODE. So he was confused. & being Asian, he can't admit to that, so he has to save face & say I hadn't left anything. Indeed, I hadn't left a key-- I'd left a code to enter into the keypad. Since that isn't a key, but that was what she requested, no clarifications or questions were asked further by either party, & this concluded the whole matter in every Korean mind involved. My frequent offers today & last week to tell Sue the code so she could send it to the agent, merited literally no response, each & every time. So I have been unable to use my kitchen for a week. I have to wake up halfway through sleeping to take leftovers out of the freezer so I can microwave or cook them in the oven. I have to take my lunch containers out of the freezer as soon as I get home so they can thaw enough that I can scoop out lunch servings for the next day before bed, then put everything back into the freezer. I wash my dishes in the bathroom. In short, it's a massive inconvenience.

So: I can't breathe (woke up because my nose was stuffy & runny, plus sore throat), I can't use my kitchen, this is the 3rd time this winter I haven't been able to use the kitchen sink. The stove keeps shorting out the apartment, I needed to use my own money to buy a freezer. My heater also went berserk for a weekend. Some of my closest friends here are leaving Korea in March, including the glue of the group who hosts wine night. I hate the country, & developed food allergies & continue to by hypothyroid after 5 years or so of stability since coming here. I feel like everything is strongly pointing to leave, except for the whole host of other problems leaving brings, which are just as significant.

I'm going to start trimming the workouts down so I have more time in the evening for the remote working after teaching course, & can secure some job. If not, I don't see how I can leave. No, I just can't leave if I haven't. Or trim my workouts, honestly. I know I won't, & definitely didn't last night (Wednesday night). Then I look on the forum for remote work for teachers & they're all excited & motivated, whereas every day I'm falling further behind in the coursework (watching videos/interviews with people, doing research/soul searching on what jobs, found nothing on the job list she sent out, applying for the jobs I'm supposed to have found). & in any event, no job is going to include health care which means I can't live in the US. & I can't tolerate the rest of the world, except at least the rest of the world has health care options. I can't even say FML because it has been fucked in one way or another all along.

But hey! At least I can now say with certainty that the Korean plumber who came & looked but did nothing was right that a pipe in the back is the problem, because while I was able to do laundry 3 weeks ago, last night I looked up from what I was reading & saw my apartment flooding! I got to wring out the clothes that were in the washer after soaking the dirty clothes to stop the water from spreading throughout the apartment!

I'm beginning to think I just have faulty memory of words & appliances. I had this fucked up crazy idea that stoves were supposed to cook food, when it turns out that here, at least, their real purpose is to short out the whole apartment. The washing machine is meant to wash your floors with too much, not-entirely-clean-smelling water. The fridge, instead of keeping food cold, is actually just for decoration & making it look like every bit of tiny space is being used. & I thought the kitchen sink was supposed to let me clean dishes & drink when in actuality it's just there to freeze over the winter & annoy with the constant dripping which at least isn't flowing out of the duct tape or broken pipe in the back. Oh Korea! What a great, fully developed place with a fully-developed mindset!

Success again!!

I was just sitting here listening to the tiny, stead stream of cold water, when all of a sudden the water pressure went all the way up. Turned the faucet to the left, & no loss in water pressure! It started heating up. I have hot water in the kitchen again! Now if my fridge worked.....

I found my limit.

My limit is waking up to the hot water pipes frozen this morning. This is AFTER leaving the hot water running all Wednesday night & all day yesterday. They froze in about 7-8 hours. The cold water works fine!

So, that's it. I am now leaving when my contract ends in July. I can't take this 3rd world shit hole. I think there has to be a new problem in the building. NOT. ONCE. did my pipes freeze at all last winter. Twice now in a month is too much. I have the heater going on under the sink while I'm here at work. I now think it had nothing to do with the heater last time so much as the temp going up to about 40. It won't get above freezing until Wednesday at the earliest, so I'm not counting on having hot water again until then.

I had the heat on, I kept the cabinet open, kept the sink running & often at a pretty good stream, but it still fucking froze. These buildings were ALL built in the 80s & 90s, by the way. They just didn't insulate them or the pipes because they're lazy, illogical, backwards fucktards.

So more than likely, not sure how the whole plan I had is going to work since I'll almost certainly have to leave the debt repayment program, as even I can get a remote job in time (which I'm starting to work on), there's no way I'll be able to send off $410 each month there until next fall.

I'll have $2500 less from the pension too. All of this sucks far more than I can convey & I'm not sure now if I can do what I planned since getting loans to help with grad school in Europe, even the little it would require, is likely out, never mind the mind-bending loans I'd have to take out for the $25K teacher certification. So I'll likely have to give up on Europe. I hate this place far more than I can say, for making everything so impossible. But that's where we are.

I hope they reunify under Kim, they should go back to living 100% like the backward fuck show this place is.

I have a weird preoccupation

It started as recently as last night, when I was looking for an arm & ab/core workout since I didn't feel like doing my usual one. I found a video by a girl who I now have in my regular rotation (and not the one I didn't want to do last night). In the introduction, she said that everyone has those things they don't like doing and/or aren't good at, so they skip them. For her, they're push-ups-- even though she can do them, she doesn't like doing them, & never does them.

My reaction: YOU CAN DO THAT?! You can just skip the shit you hate doing because it's too hard/you're not good at it, don't like it, whatever?! That's POSSIBLE? That's doable? & this fitness instructor skips shit?!

I always remembered Tony Horton say during P90X to do the things you're bad at. I felt pretty bad at all of plyometrics, pull-ups, etc., but since I was doing the videos, I just did what they did. It never once occurred to me, even when he admonished people to do that, that people could do that. There was even a big thing on people skipping the yoga day because the (mainly men) weren't familiar with it, weren't good at it, etc. I remember thinking it was idiotic for them to skip that, especially since it was only one day of the week & I definitely find yoga to be indispensable.

I hate pull-ups because I've just never been able to do them, & to make matters possibly worse, I can't even work on them without a gym because once you leave the US, you will find far fewer doors in your home, and weirdly not one doorway will have a lintel &/or will be in a corner, so you can't use those doorway pull-up bars. But when I did P90X, I did the stupid modifications even though I barely got better & never really got close to doing one.

I despise doing one leg squats, especially because I suck at them. I've been doing them because I have pistol squats as a goal. & I've been pondering how the hell to cut leg day from the 1.5 hours it is now. Leaving out those, or any of the other extras I do were unthinkable, even though especially recently they make me angry & frustrated because progress is SOOOO slow & gradual. But if this fitness chick can skip stuff solely because she doesn't like them, why the HELL can't I??! Why did I never consider this as an option before??

So now, fuck those, I'm not doing them anymore, or not until I've built up enough leg strength that it isn't such a long, slow, upward battle that I do kicking & screaming (metaphorically, though not-infrequently literally as well). I can skip all the special shit that I hate doing & work on balance & strength & flexibility more and through other ways, & not hate everything about a particular exercise anymore. Because that is a thing. Every second of life doesn't actually have to be a battle I'm constantly fighting against myself, as I realized now that long ago on this blog that I so often do. I'm opting the fuck out of that shit, because it's a thing you can actually do! Not doing something because you don't like it & aren't good at is an option! Initially I was actually upset because she was skipping stuff she hated & I wasn't. & at first it didn't even occur to me that I could do that too. But now that I realized that doing that is absolutely an option, I'm soooo fucking doing it! I going to do the not-doing-something-anymore because I don't like it & I'm not good at it. I'm so thrilled. What other shit can I stop doing?!

OMG! IT WORKED!!

Full water coming out of the faucet! SOOOO did not expect that!! Oh I'm so happy! Would admittedly be even HAPPIER if our paychecks had cleared our accounts yet, I have 6,000 won in there ($6). Thank GOD for Xmas money (thanks again Mark-- you bought some kids some sticker books, & me some dinner!).

I've wracked my brain,

but I'm not really seeing any silver linings these days.

To start with, the trip home I was SOOOO excited for for 6 months, was anticlimactic and, at times, disastrous. From most of my nephews having the flu (good times for the parents AND kids during Christmas!) to none of my friends being around to my sister thinking I was out partying instead of spending time with my nephews when I was stuck sitting around most nights unhappy (didn't want to risk getting the flu one of the two rando weeks I have off each year, & no sick days, so if I were sick when I got back, I'd have the unmitigated pleasure of teaching with the flu) to 2 friends being too tired to come see me the ONE TIME I'm home in 2 years for a week on my last night in town, coming home was not all I had been dreaming of. It DID however make me hate Korea even MORE since Chicago's pretty, with nice architecture & clean air, as compared to Seoul's cement jungle covered in huge blazing neon signs & blasting kpop music & crowds. My skin took 2 days to clear up (minus the stress breakout I had). I cried so hard when I got back because I just hate it here so much. So that was a super fun bonus! I was depressed the whole first week back.

Lately I've been blessed with being unable to sleep before 4:30 AM, even with melatonin. Once I WAS able to sleep, I've started waking up because my nose is running like a faucet. Which is a bit ironic since that woke me up 2.5 hours before my alarm went off today, & when the alarm DID go off, I woke up to realize that last night I really DID need to leave the kitchen water running, but did not, so when I turned on the faucet today, nothing came out. Well, it WAS really fucking cold. A whopping 6 degrees last night, & we're not going above freezing til maybe Saturday or Sunday. NATURALLY, when I went downstairs to the office, that old useless fucker wasn't there. EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. I go down there for him: because the pipes froze today, or the whole apartment blew a fuse, or whatever, that old dick (who is the same useless guy who didn't tell me my 10 lb of chicken had arrived, so I had the unmitigated joy of throwing ALL of it out) is not there.

I texted Sue, & she called, so the building manager came up, with useless old guy in tow. Building manager points to me & says, "Hend pone?" Meaning, give me your phone. So I do. Guy puts the phone to his ear. Repeatedly. I was like, "ARE you KIDDING ME right now?" I take the phone, bring up the dialer, hand it back. He keeps pressing the green talk button without dialing, & again holding the phone to his ear. Mind you, ALL he has said or indicated at this point is that he wants my phone. Then he tells me to call me. ME. Call... myself. I can't even begin to be mystified when he FINALLY says, "Call manager." Ahhhh, Sue! I call, it won't go through, I call, he hangs it up. THIS is what I deal with day in, day out in this fuck show, btw.

He finally gets her on the phone. I'm to try to put my heating fan on under the sink tonight, but folks let's face facts, that is NOT going to work! The fuckers are frozen now, & they're staying frozen since I'm here at work 'til 10. Soooo... pretty damned pointless to try to heat them up after that much time, but I'll do what I have to, since I remembered while working out last night I needed to leave the water running, but forgot at bedtime. Stellar of me to forget on the coldest night of the year.

It's only the kitchen sink, too-- the bathroom works just fine (though I left that faucet running today, just in case).

So, I'm tired, my nose & sinuses are pissed off about the air here, my skin is falling back into not being happy here, I froze the pipes in my kitchen, I have 6,000 won ($6) in my bank account, & can only pray Sue will pay us tonight since tomorrow is pay day. & OH YEAH! In February, during the Korean New Year, we'll have a Friday & Monday off, but us expats have to take out all cash we'll need for the weekend on Thursday because the Wori bank cards may or may not work.... all weekend. Someone posted about getting a notification on this, & others confirmed they had as well. PERFECTLY REASONABLE to limit or deny people access to their bank accounts, ESPECIALLY on a holiday weekend when NO ONE will be working. WHY? No one will be working, so wtF will they be doing that will require  repeated, random inability to use our bank cards? Keep in mind as well that NO ONE here can use their cards EVERY NIGHT between like 2-6 AM, some range in there, each bank is different, because that's when the banks do maintenance on the servers or systems or something.

I live in a developed country. I live in a developed country. I live in a developed country.

Send help, send sanity, send alcohol. I get to do this for another 1.5 years.