Planes, Trains, and Wagons East

So there’s this truck parked on the side of the road near the subway station. It arrives just before dinner time. In the back, roasting on five spits, are chickens. I’d walked by that truck at least twice a week for three months before trying it. My life has not been the same since. For $9 I can get two perfectly roasted chickens, ready to eat when I get back home. Being the gourmet that I am, I don’t eat them as is. I turn on The Roots and do a little rapping and dancing on the way to the kitchen. Then I carve ‘em up (I’m slowly learning how to do that), dice up some red and green peppers and onions, fry em up with the meat, spice it up with some ground pepper corns and basil, spread it over rice, and top it with a bit of cheese and some Thai sweet chili sauce. It is the best meal ever. And healthy too.

I’ve been cooking for myself a lot more lately. I haven’t had a school lunch in a month, what with winter break and winter camp, so I have to cook. And I’m pretty good at it too. More surprising, though, is that I enjoy it. But lets get back to winter camp. It’s great. I work from 9am to 12:15pm and then I get to go home. I teach the same group of kids all three hours for two days, then I get a new class. They are 3rd graders (the best age ever) and today I taught the biggest group so far: 13 kids. The smallest was four. I make my own lesson plans – animals one day, jobs the other – and I teach by myself. Half of one day is making a bumblebee, half of the other is watching Toy Story. And did I mention I get to go home at 12:15? If only the rest of the year was like this. The good news is this is my 2nd of four weeks of camp. Next week school resumes (but only for two weeks, don’t ask me why, I equate this to Albemarle High School’s need to have exams AFTER breaks) then camp starts again for two weeks.

I’ve also been reading a lot more lately. It started in Hong Kong where I read Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. Then I came back and read The Kite Runner and The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. That was the first book I ever read cover to cover in one day. Now I’m immersed in The Cellist of Sarajevo. Some days after work, at noon, I walk ten minutes to a nearby gym and swim some laps (I’ve also been exercising a lot more lately). On those days, and most others, after lunch I make my way to Sun Bean Coffee shop in the shopping center near my apartment. I order myself up an Americano, two sugars, from my new friends Jenny, the owner, and her assistant, Jennifer – it’s a good thing they look nothing alike – head upstairs to the quieter seating, away from the door (and the cold air that blows in) and have myself a good read. I’ve also been drinking a lot more coffee lately.

I’ve been playing guitar a lot more lately. I even wrote a song. My very first. It has music, lyrics, and a melody. Because the microphone on my laptop is crappy, as all you folks I’ve skyped can attest to, I got a new one that’s only marginally better so I can start recording some stuff. Not for posterity, but for myself, so I can remember what I wrote when the next inevitable long break in guitar playing occurs.

I've been enjoying Korea a lot more lately.