Windows Movie Maker is a Pain

I have rediscovered that my Sony camcorder will not work with Windows Movie Maker.  For the last year, my Sony HDD worked perfectly with WMM; however, as you know, my PC hard drive broke, so I needed a new one and consequently needed to reinstall Windows.  I can't for the life of me remember how I got WMM to edit my Sony videos when I got this camera last year, and I've been looking for three days now.  Last year, somebody online gave me a lead/link to something that made WMM work great with my camcorder's videos.  Of course, I didn't write it down. This year, all I can get on the Net is that I need 'another program' in order to convert files to make WMM work.  I don't.  I know that.  I used WMM for a year without any additional program to convert files.  As you can imagine, it's frustrating.  I'm using the iSight on the Mac to make videos at my desk, so don't expect any videos "from the field" until I figure this out.

Ripping a new one

The other day I was riding along on my motorcycle, and I noticed that I had this HUGE rip down half the left side of my fairly new jacket! WTF? I still have no idea how that happened. As far as I could remember, there was a clothing repair shop in my neighborhood, but I couldn't find it. Maybe I just misremembered. So I rode around on my bike in and out of all the little streets looking for a clothing repair place, and all I could find was this laundry. The name in Korean translates "Laundry Village." What's a little funny, too, is the other sign sticking out perpendicular from the wall reads "Soju Village," soju being the national grain alcohol they drink a lot of... a lot. However, the laundry lady was sober, and she said she could fix the jacket, "If that's all right." I guess she had sensed my apprehension at having a mere laundry lady sewing up a rip in a jacket. Red-faced, I left the jacket with her, and yesterday I picked it up. It is so well done, I can't tell where the rip used to be! She carged me the equivalent of $3. That's another thing I like about Korea. Real people doing honest work are fair and honorable about what they charge.
For some reason, I woke up at 2 AM today. Isn't that a pain? Couldn't fall back to sleep, so at 4:00, I got up and gave the cats their breaky and made myself a cuppa tea. With my PC all back and running perfectly, I'm thinking of getting some speakers for it... nice speakers. Right now the PC is using some tinny pieces of plastic crap I had in a box in the closet. Yuck.

The Price is Right

This is a bad picture I took out the window of a train, but I have seen these fields of strange crops, and I have no idea what they are.  I've never seen plants like that.  These plants have a stalk about a half-meter tall, maybe more, with a round single leaf at the end.  If anyone knows what this plant is, please tell me.  It must be something edible, or the Koreans wouldn't grow it.

In other news, my PC came home from the repair shop today.  I was at the phone office trying to find a way to get my phone repaired (the screen is broken) when the delivery guy called.  So I told him when I'd be home, and he told me it'll be 4000 won.  The phone office didn't know why the Motorola shop couldn't repair the phone, so they called, and it turns out that they don't know when they'll get any replacement LCD screens in for that model.  You'd think they'd just order one, but this is Korea, and if it's sensible, it probably won't be the 'correct' way to do things. I can receive calls on the phone, but if I miss a call, there's no way for me to know about it. Anyway, the Motorola shop told me they'd call me when a screen came in.  Hope I don't miss the call.  Those folks don't seem like the redialing type.

My classes are getting better every day.  We're playing The Price is Right all week as well as watching some YouTube snippets of the TV game show.  It's fun, and even the rebel kids who just come in and plop down in a seat are getting into the game.

 

Right and Wrong

Anybody who knows me, knows that I distrust the nationalist party, what they call the "republican party," but I came across an interview with Newt Gingrich, a nationalist, that I agreed with.  Newt is socially unresponsive, but his ideas on this 700-billion dollar welfare cheque for Wall Street are right on, as far as I'm concerned.  You can see/hear the interview here.  My idea is, though, if you're going to give away 700 billion dollars, why not parcel out the money to each American household?  It's better than giving the money to Wall Street fat cats who already have most of the nation's money anyway.  Let those super-rich bastardos pool their own resources and bail out one another.  Can you imagine them dipping into their own savings to bail out their failing businesses?  I don't see it happening.  It's easier to mug the American public for quick cash.

Dies Horribilis

If you want to know where to do it, just read the sign.

Today I had a brilliant idea.  They say you can put Windows on a Mac if you use the Boot Camp program that comes with Mac.  Well, sure enough, Boot Camp partitioned the drive, and Windows had 32 gig all to itself.  It started out fine as I began installation, but then Windows asked where I wanted to install it.  I chose the 32 gig partition that was set aside by Boot Camp, and Windows said, "I can't go there!  It isn't NTFS formatted!"  So installing Windows on my Mac came to a screeching halt until I could figure out how to make the partition NTFS formatted so Windows would load on it.  Couldn't find out, because I couldn't get the other side of the drive, the Mac partition, to start up again so I could get online!  What a nightmare.  So I let it all sit idle while I went to Busan to see if I could find a good laptop computer as a back-up so this will never happen again. My students send their homework through the internet, so I need a working computer.  Couldn't find any of the laptops CNET recommended, but I'm thinking the Samsungs probably aren't too horrible... pricey, though.  Didn't buy one, because Joel sent me a text message on how to get the Mac up again:  hold the "c" key during start-up.  Easy peasy.  But I still have the apparently unusable Boot Camp partition on my Mac drive to deal with.  Online I've found that if I shell out money for a program, I can get the partition to accept Windows.  Isn't that always the case with Macs?  You have to pay for this, then for that, then something else before you have everything you need to use the damn thing.

Anyway, had lunch with Rob at McD's at the Mega Mart in Dongnae in Busan, then went to his place to try to find the control panel on his computer.  His wife insists the computer use the Korean version of Windows, and it was impossible to find the control panel.  I told him just to install the XP I had given him and let her gripe, because she can read English IF she needs to.  All she does is go to Korean websites, and you don't need a Korean version of the OS for that.  Men, on the other hand, need to work with the computer and do stuff on it, important stuff. ㅋㅋ 

My cell phone somehow got crushed while in my front pants pocket.  The screen is broken.  I can use the phone, but the screen is unusable, which basically means I can't see to read texts, to dial, or any of the other uses of the cell phone screen.  Ugh.  This phone has been cursed from day one.  I doubt they'll fix this bit for free, however, since it must be my fault, though I can't think of anything I did that would cause the screen to break.

Poor Baby Went Boom

This is my PC in the shop.  Before the Mac crowd starts nodding and getting that superior look on their faces, this was a hardware malfunction, not software.  The guy checked my storage hard drive, and it's OK, but the main drive is broken.  Samsung isn't open on weekends, so he can't get a replacement hard drive until Monday.  The guy will ship me back my computer on Tuesday.  That's something I like about Korea.  You don't have to run around to stores, you can have things picked up and delivered for pennies.

While I was at the electronics market, I decided to look around at laptops.  I'd like to have a portable computer to carry back and forth to work, traveling, and so forth.  Since Macs can run Windows, I might consider the MacBook and install Windows on it.  The only drawback is, you can't share Windows between two computers.  Microsoft requires you buy a separate copy of Windows for both of your computers.  That really isn't fair.  You should be allowed to install it on two computers and that be the cut-off on what you can register.  A lot of people have a desktop and a laptop, and Windows is damn expensive to have to buy two copies when really your laptop is just a portable extension of your desktop.  That's my take on it, though, and what do I know?  I'm not smart or rich like those guys.

  

The Keys Errant

I was reading an article in the International Herald Tribune about the North Korean dictator's illness, and it mentioned Imjingak, which is where I was on Saturday.  So this is the closest South Koreans can get to North Korea.  I didn't know that.  The rest of the DMZ is fairly wide, about 4 klicks they say.

I lost my keys while on this trip.  When I left town, they were in my bag, because I remember tossing them in there in the office.  Anyway, the liaison in the departmental office let me in my office yesterday, and he said he'd get a key made for me (for 2000 won).  So today he still hadn't got a key for me.  I was in no mood for bullshit games, so I took matters into my own hands and borrowed a key from the security desk, went to a key shop, and voila!  I have two copies of my office key now.  I had a spare key for my bicycle lock, so that's all right for now, though having only one key won't do in the long run.  The memory stick that was on my lost key ring didn't have anything important or embarrassing on it.  I'll just get a new one.  We'll see if Joel finds my keyring in his car.  That's the only logical place left to look of all the places I was last weekend.  Simon said it wasn't at his place.

Can you believe the week is half over already?  That's the good and bad of working for a uni here in Korea, time marches apace.

I'm devouring the book Wolf of the Plains by Iggulden.  Very good book; I highly recommend it.

The Big Bike Ride

This weekend is the Korean version of "harvest home" or what North Americans might call Thanksgiving: Chuseok.  Saturday morning a bunch of us got together at our friend Vaughan's place where he had rented us some motorcycles to make a day-long tour.  Above, you can see me on the Harley Sportster 883cc he got for me.  More on that son of a bitch later (the bike, not Vaughan).

We traveled first up to the Imjin River, famous for many battles during the Korean civil war in the early 50's.
Here you can see the new railway trestle over the river going into North Korea.  This is the first time I have seen part of North Korea.  You can see a guard tower on our side and one on the North Korean side.  There are guard towers all along the river. They sell some North Korean stuff here, but it was all alcohol of one kind or another.  Apparently alcohol production and consumption are popular on both sides of the DMZ.

I was happy with the bike tour for the first few hours, but after this stop at the Imjin River, the "big boys" (avid and experienced riders) led us off in the wrong direction into the neighboring province, and the whole trip was almost 12 hours long, 90% of it riding.  My ass hurt like hell, and I still (literally, I am not joking or exaggerating) have only partial use of my right hand.  I still cannot hold chopsticks or tie my shoes.  (If you could see how I'm struggling now trying to type this, you'd be laughing your asses off!)

The Harley had the stiffest clutch release I have ever manipulated.  After 6 hours of stop-n-go traffic, my left had could barely stand to pull it in and hold it, even for a few seconds.  My boot toe wouldn't fit under the clutch lever, so I was constantly having to wiggle my foot in sideways to change gears, which in the heavy traffic we were in was a lot of gear changing.  I couldn't leave my foot resting there, either, as the gear lever would start moving down and literally pinch my foot to the footrest!  Ouch!  But it was holding the twist throttle that was the killer.  I now know why big bikes have cruise control!  It's been almost 27 hours since we came back, and my hand is only slightly improved in functionality.  I hope I regain full use before I have to teach tomorrow.  I can't write yet, and I write a lot on the board in class!

Though the trip wasn't what I had envisioned or wanted, there were aspects that were good.  I got to ride a big bike for the first time ever, and I think I would enjoy touring on bikes, but ON MY TERMS, not some alpha males' hyperactive need for danger.  (Yes, I'm glancing at Alex and Bart).  If I do this again, I'll go with people who just want to ride somewhere, do something fun like a picnic or some beach cricket/softball and then ride home... a good time resulting in good feelings and happiness all around.  Am I right?  My hand is hurting from typing, so I'm gonna shut up now.

YouTube: The Love-Hate Relationship

I have trouble all the time getting YouTube to show in English, so I went online for help, and the guy told me that next to the YouTube logo, there's a choice between the local language (determined by IP address) and ENGLISH.  Well, in Korea, if you can read Korean, you can see that my choices are:  KOREA and KOREAN.  No 'English' option for YouTube here.  I clicked every button that says "English" when I signed up; I have lied and said I live in the States, all to no avail.  YouTube, I guess, insists that if you don't live in America, you don't speak English!

It's such a pain that YouTube is inflexible for users.  This is what I deal with.  I'm an English speaker who happens to be in Korea, but if by some miracle I get YouTube to display in English, it won't stay there for long.  Just click a link to an AMERICAN video, and it's back to Korean!

Today I only had one class.  Some girl sat in on my class, because she wants me to let her join the class so she can be with her friend.  It might be possible, though I don't like adding students.  I much prefer dropping them! heh heh

Laura told me there's a computer shop over near the ghetto where the other English teachers live.  I'm taking my poor widdle sick PC over there to see if the hard drive can be fixed.  If not, I'll get a new one.  I've heard of hardware failing, but if this is broken, it'll be the first time I've had a piece of hardware break on me.  The noise I heard from it just before it crashed was disturbing, so I'm not holding out much hope.  My problem is, I animate personal possessions... so it's hard to deal with "losing" a thing that has been a part of my life.

Tomorrow I start special tutoring "Mr. Pak" whom I should have failed last semester.He came to me and begged me in Korean to let him pass, and since he's majoring in Buddhist studies, I didn't see any reason to fuck up his life over English class. Reaping the whirlwind now, though.  He can't even read the simplest words or say the simplest things in English, so I told him to come see me on Thursdays for special lessons and not go to the regular class.  Hope something good comes of this.

This is a still from the video I made of my bike ride today.  Went out some county road I found and explored a little.  It was impromptu, so I didn't carry any water and had to come back early. 

My PC main drive is whacked, and I think, from the sound it's making, that it's physically broken.  So I'm working on the Mac for a while.  My bike ride video is a series of clips, so when I put it on iMovie, it made a nice seamless video, but the audio doesn't come across on iMovie from my Sony camera.  I'll keep playing with it.  Macs are just the most stubborn, difficult things to work with since they are incompatible with almost every piece of hardware on the market.

I found men's deodorant at HomePlus!  Nivea.  First time I have ever seen men's deodorant for sale at a Korean store.  Also found a can of Blue Sky organic ginger ale stuck on the top shelf of the drinks section.  Korean stores only sell colas, ciders (like Sprite/7UP), and Fanta orange and grape.  So when I saw the ginger ale, I grabbed it.  Once it's gone, they won't restock it, so it's nice to have a little ginger ale squirreled away for a special occasion.

Sushi Rolling

This is the statue of General Kim on the top of a hill over in the park near my place. Today was the first time I'd ever gone up the hill to see it, though it is lighted at night; I've seen it from afar before. I have a video, but haven't done any work to process it into anything yet.
Went looking to buy a new motorcycle helmet, but the shop is closed on Sundays apparently. There might be other shops, but advertising isn't really a Korean thing. You do see advertising, but not how you think it would (should) be. I'll check the motorcycle shop out tomorrow. I don't work Mondays... though I need to do some lesson prep. After meeting my students last week, I'm discouraged and need to alter my lesson some. Last spring when the semester ended, my students and I had a nice rapport, but now, only a few of this batch are my students from spring semester (freshmen take two semesters of English). They and I had a good time this past week, but the others who don't know me just sat there like dullards.
Had lunch at a 'kimbap' restaurant. (Kimbap is what they call a "sushi roll" back in the States, 'makizushi' in Japan. In Korea, sushi rolls usually don't have any fish in them unless you ask for it.) Anyway, I will eat kimbap if I'm dying of hunger, but that rarely happens, so today I ate spicy pork and rice instead. Good stuff.
It was a nice day out on my bicycle. Rode along the river mostly.

Rat on a String

I was running around town trying to find sheet music for Korean traditional songs (no luck, really), and I saw this "prize" in one of those arcade-type games where you pay 50 cents and have a few seconds to use a hook to grab something from inside the glass case. It's right out there on the street. Wonder if the kids know what it is.

I did find a book teaching a few traditional songs using the traditional bamboo flute. Eh, it'll do for now. I have a traditional flute, so maybe I'll learn something! heh heh
Sat on the edge of the run-off creek/drainage canal... whatever the hell it is... and made a little video for my YouTube site. Other than all that, I didn't do much... Washed ALL the dishes in my sink, though. Quite a feat. Had to rest afterward, but the sink is clean and smells good. Either tonight or in the morning, I'll be making banana nut muffins. My bananas never got eaten, and I can't let them go to waste, so I'll make them go to my waist instead. Oh, behave!
Got kitty litter and a ropey-thing toy for the cats... they don't like it, of course-- the toy, not the litter. They have been pestering me all evening to play "fake rat on a string" with them, which I did, but no matter how long I play, it isn't enough.

Party Poop

I was on a website this morning, and they asked me to type in some figures in order to weed out spammer programs. As you can see, I think I typed the correct numbers, but I got a specific rebuff saying I had entered the figures incorrectly! I never could get my information uploaded, so screw it. If they want to play games, they'll have to play without me. There is no website on the Internet that is so important or crucial to my life that I feel the need to keep trying to convince them to let me in.
I listened to some of the Nazionalist Party speeches from St. Paul. Exaggerations and outright lies for the most part. So far, they haven't addressed any of the specific things Barack Obama said at the Democratic Party convention. The Nazionalists had better start addressing the issues, because their convention ends soon! Obama outlined specific plans, but nothing like that has come from the St. Paul crowd. Nazionalists usually rely on scaring the shit out of the mostly ignorant American public. Effective on the nescient, but pathetic to those of us who can think for ourselves.
Beautiful day today. Oh, Vaughan wrote and invited me to join the gang on a motorcycle ride up in Gyeonggi-do a week from Saturday! Can't wait! It's Korean Thanksgiving that weekend, so it might end up being a pleasant ride since the Koreans will mostly be at their ancestral homes eating fancy food. My experience riding with others is... well, I have no experience riding with others, so this'll be a new thing under the sun for me. Might get a good video out of it.

Armature

You can see here that I have made my first claymation armature! I followed what some guy did on YouTube, though I didn't have all the same stuff he had. I told the guy at the hardware store I needed wire to make a puppet. He just stared at me. I thought I had the wrong word for puppet, so I just repeated the Korean word for wire. He grunted and walked down the aisle and stuck his thumb out at the rolls of wire as he walked past them back to some crap he had apparently been sorting before I interrupted his day. I needed a vise, too, and lo! he had a nice little one just perfect for making armatures!
I have clay, but probably not enough for a claymation puppet. This weekend, I'll go look for more of the same type of clay.
Any ideas what I should make? I was thinking of a TVangelist so I can make fun of the christians and republicans. What about that convention, eh? Those republicans are just plain nuts, if you ask me. I guess people actually do buy into all that foolish nonsense after all.
My one class today went well, just another introductory class. Each of my classes only meets once a week, so I have to go through this intro crap six times. Next week we'll get into the lessons and some fun stuff.
I'm weighing options for the next academic year already. The semester will go quickly, as they always do, and I need a plan either to stay here or take another job up in Gyeonggi Province. This university doesn't seem to care whether we stay or not; they haven't thanked us for our service, offered incentives to stay or anything.

First Day

I went in to the university late in the morning to try to get ready for my first day of teaching in many weeks. The weather seemed unsettled, so I wore rain gear, but didn't really need it. My first class was at 3:00, and I had a little presentation as an introduction to the course, but it was made on OpenOffice, and the Microsoft Office on the classroom computer wouldn't open it. What a disaster! So I had to do it all from memory on the whiteboard... boring!
Between that class and the one at 6:00, I downloaded and installed OpenOffice in the classrooms I'll be using the rest of the week, plus we had a faculty meeting for just us English Conversation teachers. The university is hiring at least seven new teachers for next year, but they're really looking for people who are already in Korea. So in October they'll advertise, and in November they'll interview candidates.
I discovered that I missed the deadline for signing up for Fall classes at NAU. For some reason, I thought I had lots of time. I had agonized over and organized what I wanted to study, but all for naught, since I didn't read the webpage properly. Live and learn, though. Next time I will be a lot more on the ball.

A Kind of September

There's a nightclub in town called "Ho-bahk Nah-eet-uh". Ho-bahk means pumpkin, and "nah-eet-uh" is just the English word 'night' with a Korean twist. Anyway, they have a small fleet of these vehicles with the pumpkin on top, apparently just for advertisement. They'd be great at Halloween, but Koreans don't do Halloween unfortunately. Wonder if they rent them out... hmm.
Went to the university and picked up my class lists. They come with pictures already on them! Cool. Tomorrow I have two classes late in the afternoon and early evening. Never did get my syllabus translated into Korean, but I don't know anybody who can do that anyway. Not around here, that is. Eh, it's good practice for them to read English. Some of the teachers have such complex systems of grading and homework and what-not that they need to tell the kids in Korean what's what. My system is rather simple. I'm having them do homework online to save paper and hassle. Their weekly homework is just an email to me about a topic I assign, and they have to use the grammar and some of the new vocabulary of the week. They have until every Sunday to get me their week's homework. If it's late, they get a zero, but I will read it and comment on it all the same, for their edification... maybe. Depends on whether they're serious learners or not. Some of these kids could not care any less about learning to use English.
Rained most of the day. The humidity was oppressive even though it wasn't hot. My laundry is having a hard time drying on the rack.
Oh, have to make a jab: Focus on the Family, the radical religious group in the U.S., prayed for rain to ruin the Democratic Party convention last week, but it looks like God got all confused about whose convention to ruin. Too bad Louisiana has to suffer, though. Damned Republicans.