Yesterday I asked the students to write their own stories. They had to decide on characters, setting, and action by answering some simple questions. We took notes before actually writing the story. This one girl, She is probably 15 years old, was cracking me up. You probably had to be there:
Who? Waterman
What? drinks water
Why? thirsty
Where? Jejudo
Friday, April 24, 2009
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Mountains
I want to see mountains and hike deep into the wilderness. Dry mountains are preferable to wet ones. I hate it when this feeling of restlessness comes on. I want to get out of here, go somewhere real. The mountains seem real.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Sunday Evening Thoughts
I have been enthusiastic about the future since I was young. Star Trek probably had a lot to do with that--watching the crew of an intergalactic star ship cruising around on diplomacy meetings with aliens and meeting far out aliens with strange god like powers. Who wouldn't be excited about that? I might not be able to go Vulcan but Korea was as far as I could reach for now. Educating children has also seemed attractive to me if for no other noble reason than to see if I could do better than those teachers that so miserably failed at inspiring me but also to honor those few that did really blow my mind and encourage me.
But today, alone in Pohang, I've had a few thoughts about the world we live in. One thought comes from the pastor's sermon today from the book of Romans chapter 7. The other from hours of mindless Internet surfing that came after the sermon.
First: There seems to be this truth that I find absolutely true in my life and I think if people are honest they will acknowledge is true in their own. That I try and do good but I end up doing bad. Why is that?
Second: I am convinced that the best education is a father walking with his child through the woods, or a mother cooking with her children. All the gimmicks we come up with only lead to more stress and in the end. I have to wonder if, for example having a global online education actually increases happiness. I am pretty sure it doesn't.
So if my efforts to do good so often end in failure and the global project to advance technologically and culturally are not a means to happiness than what is it we are all doing when we work so much?
I saw a movie called "Knowing" yesterday and the narrative has become all too common today in art and culture. Man fouls up the world so bad that it brings about destruction but aliens or angels or both step in in the final hour and save us from certain destruction. It is a sad and helpless plot line.
So again, I'm coming at this from around the edges, whittling away at the corners, but I can't help but feel that this project we have all agreed to work so hard on is in the end a lie. And today I have this urge to tear it down and start over, start fresh. I'm not looking for aliens to save me or angels. I'm simply wondering where the wild at heart go these days when it looks as though more and more people are becoming face book drones and work-a-holics. I want to go to a wild frontier, not to control it but to be part of it. There is something wild and powerful and AWESOME that my heart longs for but I can't find, it isn't in Korea and it isn't on Deep Space 9. But it is there, in the old poems, behind wardrobe doors.
The pastor gave it a name today, and I shifted in my seat when I heard it named. I realized, yes, that is what I've been looking for: Grace. I want to find Grace.
But today, alone in Pohang, I've had a few thoughts about the world we live in. One thought comes from the pastor's sermon today from the book of Romans chapter 7. The other from hours of mindless Internet surfing that came after the sermon.
First: There seems to be this truth that I find absolutely true in my life and I think if people are honest they will acknowledge is true in their own. That I try and do good but I end up doing bad. Why is that?
Second: I am convinced that the best education is a father walking with his child through the woods, or a mother cooking with her children. All the gimmicks we come up with only lead to more stress and in the end. I have to wonder if, for example having a global online education actually increases happiness. I am pretty sure it doesn't.
So if my efforts to do good so often end in failure and the global project to advance technologically and culturally are not a means to happiness than what is it we are all doing when we work so much?
I saw a movie called "Knowing" yesterday and the narrative has become all too common today in art and culture. Man fouls up the world so bad that it brings about destruction but aliens or angels or both step in in the final hour and save us from certain destruction. It is a sad and helpless plot line.
So again, I'm coming at this from around the edges, whittling away at the corners, but I can't help but feel that this project we have all agreed to work so hard on is in the end a lie. And today I have this urge to tear it down and start over, start fresh. I'm not looking for aliens to save me or angels. I'm simply wondering where the wild at heart go these days when it looks as though more and more people are becoming face book drones and work-a-holics. I want to go to a wild frontier, not to control it but to be part of it. There is something wild and powerful and AWESOME that my heart longs for but I can't find, it isn't in Korea and it isn't on Deep Space 9. But it is there, in the old poems, behind wardrobe doors.
The pastor gave it a name today, and I shifted in my seat when I heard it named. I realized, yes, that is what I've been looking for: Grace. I want to find Grace.
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