college | The Drama Llama

Man by Relient K

Posted on May 10, 2019 by Nami

This weeks song is “Man” by Relient K. Golly gee, it resonates with me. I actually feel it in my soul. I feel like I’ve made a mess of my life – I regret so many choices I’ve made out of immaturity and mostly fear, and I want something to kick my butt into gear.

— 2 —

Nope, that’s IT as of “Welcome to Waikiki S2” episode 11, I officially am Woo Sik. Ouch.

Like…the way he cries at the end, finally admitting that he’s NOT ok? I feel that. He’s been holding everything in. What? you ask. How does he hold everything in when he gets irritated so easily??

He gets irritated so easily because he holds everything in. And because anger seems to be the only emotion he’s comfortable expressing. He can’t let other people know that he feels anything else, especially not Soo Yeon, because his feelings could be a burden, so he tries to grin and bear it. But he can’t.

— 3 —

Also, my posts may not feature pictures for a while (or at least not pictures specific to the content) because I’m in a crisis of conscience as to whether I should use photos from the internet or not. So I will try to use some photos, and break up my giant walls of text. OTL

— 4 —

I’ve finally started seriously reading an abridged version of The Three Kingdoms that I bought, what, at least two years ago now? From what I’ve searched about it, it’s a rather integral piece of East Asian myth/legend even beyond China, so I found it important to read. It follows three men who meet when volunteering themselves in service to their country, and essentially pledge themselves blood brothers. We follow the (tragic) happenings as they fight for their country and their ruler, and the various coups that lead to the fracturing of this brotherhood.

It’s tough for now. The academic reading muscles have atrophied (as have the writing ones) but, with more frequent use they’ll be back up to speed eventually.

— 5 —

The Reacting to the Past class I took in college that I’ve probably mentioned, wherein we roleplayed as Chinese officials, oddly prepared me for reading this. All governments are filled with corruption and intrigue and have their own rituals; but the rigid, ritualized machinations of East Asian governments have long fascinated – and frustrated – me.

I played a Confucianist Chinese official in the court of Emperor Wan-Li at a time of upheaval – natural disasters and fear of invasion by the Mongols were a threat, and on top of that Wan-Li wanted to name a successor. He wanted to name the younger son of his concubine, but the Confucianists in the group wanted him to name his eldest son successor in keeping with tradition. Each person had a very specific role and goals to fulfill – we had someone play the Emperor and the First Grand Secretary, and the rest of us were just called…secretaries, if my memory doesn’t fail me.

As a Confucianist I had to walk the fine line of basically criticizing the Emperor without criticizing the Emperor and, wow, was that stressful. Mix Confucian ideals with the Mandate of Heaven and you get impossibility.

One thing I did enjoy: since I wore the wrong colors to class and could’ve gotten in trouble if the Emperor noticed, I decided to follow my character’s own thinking. I brought it up to the Emperor, apologized profusely, gave him a chocolate bar, and said I would reflect on my lack of virtue. I also pretty much kowtowed to my classmate in public (with these classes things must also be done outside of class, alliances formed and such). I think I unsettled him and I relish that because I don’t unsettle people easily.

— 6 —

I have discovered a new cafe that I didn’t initially know was run by Koreans – they just have really good (expensive) coffee – but knowing and studying Korean has gotten me a few free drinks so I can’t really complain about it. Plus, it has a nice atmosphere – plenty of light but somewhat cave-like, really, and cool.

— 7 —

Matcha can be really, really strong. I’ve just eaten a matcha affogato and while I don’t mind a matcha latte…matcha ice cream is too much. Also the nuts on top – I don’t like nuts in my sweet. Ah, well! I tried something new.

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

Misaeng and Moving On

Posted on April 2, 2015 by Nami

*Be advised that if you intend to watch Misaeng, you may wish to do so before reading this post, as it contains major plot spoilers. And if you don’t intend on watching it, I suggest that you do, because it’s worth it. Also, I cannot tell you how much I want to write all these names in Hangul.*

So this is not at all the post I was expecting to be writing at this point, especially not on Spy Wednesday/Holy Thursday. (Unfortunately, Lent, Holy Week, and Easter have all crept up on me). But what can you do? You finish a drama, and it affects you, and you have to write about it.

If you follow kdramas at all, you have no doubt at least heard of Misaeng, aka Incomplete Life. A (surprisingly from me) short synopsis:

Jan Geu Rae manages to land an internship at a trading company through personal connections. Despite his lack of qualifications–he only has a GED–he passes the internship and becomes a 2-year-contract employee. Over the course of 20 episodes we see no more and no less than the triumphs and struggles of Jang Geu Rae and his colleagues in their corporate lives.

I like the show for many reasons, but the one I want to mention here is something I’ve talked about before, actually: the concept of moving on.

You see, the end of the series really resonates with me.

When One International refuses to extend his contract, Jang Geu Rae leaves the company. But for him, leaving the company isn’t so much about leaving the work he does; it’s about the people. He feels bad enough for inadvertently causing his beloved Manager Oh to quit, and on top of that, now he can’t even give Manager Oh the consolation of having received a permanent position. Then there’s Assistant Managers Kim and Cheon, Senior Manager Seon, and his peers, who all did their best to get encourage the company to fully hire him. It seems to be both a relief (not being constantly reminded of Manager Oh) and a pain (leaving his coworkers and disappointing his former manager) that he fails to make the cut.

So Geu Rae returns to his unemployed state. Yet he doesn’t become listless or despairing, but proactively builds up his skill set, so that he may one day work as a company man again. We even see him three weeks later, cleaning his mother’s floor while practicing English. When his former coworkers all want to have a drink with him, he meets them and has a good time. When Manager Oh offers him a job at a new startup company, he takes it. When he’s given the responsibility of chasing down an errant salesman, he hops on a plane to Jordan and gets to it. He grabs the bull by the horns, something he never would have done at the beginning of the series.

Like, he literally runs after the errant salesman. And leaps from a rooftop to a window and lands just like this. Yay dramaland!!

Instead of being stuck on his failures, or even stuck in the good memories of the past, Geu Rae cherishes what he had and continues on with his life. I am convinced that he would have done this even had he not seen Manager Oh again. Don’t get me wrong, Geu Rae grieved for what he had lost. The day Manager Oh left, the day he himself had to leave, Geu Rae was crying (beautiful performance by Im Si Wan, and everyone really). But he knew that for everything to get even a little better, he had to move on. That, as Manager Oh always said, his best skill was his endurance, and that we have to endure these incomplete lives of ours. So he gratefully took the lessons he learned from his time at One International and put them to good use. And life got better.

His life isn’t exactly as it was before. True, he’s working with both Manager Oh and Assistant Manager Kim (who couldn’t take not being around the two of them and so joined Manager Oh’s company), but Oh’s company is smaller, more at risk of failure, and his job is less stable. He doesn’t get to work with Manager Cheon, Seok Yeol, Yeong Yi, or Baek Gi. That time in his life is over and done. Geu Rae can’t pause his life just because of that.

The reason that part really pierced my heart was because it reminded me exactly of when I left college. I wasn’t being let go from a job or anything, and I hadn’t really let anyone down, but I was leaving a place and people I loved. On graduation day, after the flurried rush of chatting and pictures, we all dispersed to go home, and that was it. I was bawling. The last friend that I said good-bye to had to leave hurriedly and so I had to give him a hug with my mascara running and everything.

No runny mascara, but you get the idea.

I knew I would see my friends again, but nothing would ever be the same. We will never again have the same closeness, the same environment fostering discussion and fellowship and camaraderie, the same opportunities to learn. If we get to see each other again, wonderful; if not, then we can cherish the memories we have all the more. Most importantly, we grew and changed in those experiences, and hopefully learned from them, so that we can work on our incomplete lives, on living how we should.

And I think Incomplete Life, or “Not Yet Born” is a pretty good way to describe our earthly lives. Because here, this world, is not the place for our lives’ completion and fullness. We only find that after death–with God. And even though there will be happiness, to get to that point, we have to be like Jang Geu Rae and his friends and endure a lot of suffering and pain, sometimes by fighting back and sometimes silently, biting our tongues. To be like Christ, who suffered the ignominy of the crucifixion for us, that we might finally realize the completeness and fullness of our lives in Him.

Miss Korea: Pride and Irresponsibility

Posted on August 10, 2014 by Nami

I’m back! Sorry I was gone so long: job searching and what not. Finally got a job, so now I can structure my time and get blogging once a week. This week, it’s k-dramas (you’ll get a lot of posts about those) with Miss Korea, about 25-year-old Oh Jiyoung, a young woman working as an elevator girl at a department store. Miserable at her job and infuriated (rightly so!!) at her boss’ mistreatment of the girls, she decides to try out for the 1997 Miss Korea beauty pageant. At the same time, her ex-boyfriend from high school, Kim Hyungjun, runs Vivi Cosmetics, which is about to go under because of loan sharks both national and domestic. When an investor says he’ll give Vivi money if Jiyoung becomes Miss Korea, Hyungjun tries to get her to work with him.

I’m in the middle of Episode 9 right now, which reveals just why the two broke up in high school. Since I love analyzing relationships, I just had to write this before I finished the episode.

In high school, the two mooned over each other, and Hyungjun promised he wouldn’t be ashamed of her if she didn’t go to college.

Hyungjun, inflated by the intellectual pride of a young college student, IS ashamed of Jiyoung not going to college. College has become such a staple in everyone’s education nowadays that people think you can’t learn outside of it, and that you’re not smart if you don’t go. Which is stupid because that’s now how it is (but I have that mindset at times too, so I know how pervasive it is). How do we know Hyungjun thinks thi way? Because he won’t admit to his classmate that she’s his girlfriend, and he doesn’t want her coming to his school. That means he’s ashamed of her in some measure: he doesn’t want other people to know that he’s connected with her.

However, I trust that that is not the only reason he wants her to go to college, nor is it necessarily the main reason. He clearly wants Jiyoung to do something with her life, which is good. He takes life seriously and wants her to take life more seriously than she has hitherto. He doesn’t want her to just party her life away and find it meaningless and then regret it. I don’t think Hyungjun actually cares in the long run if she becomes an elevator girl (his intellectual pride does, but he gets over that), he just wants Jiyoung to thoughtfully consider what she wants to do with her life and not just be carefree and careless. Since he’s in college and as has been mentioned is intellectually prideful, he thinks college is the best way to do something with one’s life. Because he has let himself get too caught up and busy with school, Hyungjun doesn’t think things through and approaches the issue the completely wrong way, by trying to force her to study.

Jiyoung, playful and jocular as she is, doesn’t take life seriously, so Hyungjun is right to push her to do more. She doesn’t seem to use her time very constructively, doesn’t use it to better herself or help others: we only see her work at the smoke shop and party. Jiyoung truly needs to evaluate her life and decide what to do with her life, and think of how she might support herself or her family if anything happened to them. I don’t know quite how those family dynamics work in a collectivist culture like Korea, so perhaps they would all live together anyway [note I don’t mean this disparagingly: it’s just a different type of culture and I don’t know how it works, so I can only examine it through my admittedly individualist lens]. The fact remains that Jiyoung needs to learn to take on responsibility.

Yet she too has an extremely valid point: she wants to spend time with Hyungjun. If you love someone, especially if you’re dating someone, you spend time with them. It’s clear from the fact that she’s partying with others, and by Hyungjun’s own admission, that he’s not spending time with her. He excuses himself by saying he’s busy with midterms, but what that really means is he’s not willing to take a breather and slow down. Just as much as it’s important to take on responsibility, it’s important to be joyful and enjoy life. You end up burning out or just being a miserable person (or being chased by loan sharks) if you don’t. It’s a balancing act, not an either-or issue. Hyungjun takes life too seriously and won’t spend time with Jiyoung, which puts him in great danger of being a workaholic–endangering any relationship he enters.

I think the fault in the breakup lies mostly with Hyungjun: he treats her like a child, forcing schoolbooks on her and saying, “I’ll help you; I’ll send you to college.” Then, when she returns those books to him–books with no sentimental value to either of them– and says, “I don’t need it,” he returns a baseball that Jiyoung had written encouraging words on and says, “I don’t need it either.” Bad move, Hyungjun. He later returns to the smoke shop to buy see her under the pretext of buying some cigs, but he’s carrying the schoolbooks, so he hasn’t given up on that fruitless avenue of convincing her. She closes the window on him, and instead of remonstrating with her or trying to talk to her, he just leaves. Jiyoung stares after him, wanting to speak with him, only closing the window on him out of anger, but clearly expecting that he would make more of an effort. His departure probably leaves her with the idea that he really doesn’t care about her.

Despite their differing career interests, both Jiyoung and Hyungjun could make a relationship work if they wanted because they would balance each other out. Jiyoung would make sure oppa doesn’t spend all his time working and refreshes himself with leisure, while Hyungjun would encourage her to use her time constructively and take on responsibility when she needs to. Their inability to see these problems in themselves and to articulate them properly to each other constitutes the biggest reason for their breakup, as far as I can tell. I can’t say their breakup was all that surprising, as young as they were. At 18, 19, 20 you think you’re an adult and that you know everything (even when you realize you don’t know things). It’s only when you have more experience and reflect back on those times that you understand what you didn’t then. In that sense, it’s better that Hyungjun and Jiyoung are meeting again now, when they’ve at least slightly matured: when Jiyoung realizes maybe she doesn’t want to be an elevator girl for the rest of her life, and maybe college would’ve been good; and when Hyungjun realizes that people are just as important as work, that it’s not just his job and company on the line, but everyone else’s livelihood.

I like these characters and this drama: the story is interesting and the characters have depth. If you’re interested in it, happy k-drama watching!

The End of the Road

Posted on May 2, 2014 by Nami

— 1 —

MY THESIS IS FINALLY FINISHED AND TURNED IN!

— 2 —

Which means…I’ll be graduating soon

— 3 —

Which I am still kind of in denial about s

— 4 —

But seriously–as I left my last class I realized that it was my last class ever of my undergraduate career. I got accepted to grad school but I got a deferral. I’m taking a year off so I can make money to pay for school (since though right now I have no debt I also have no income), to supplement whatever financial aid they can give me. It’s also entirely possible that in a year I’ll decide I don’t want to go to grad school anyway (though that’s not too likely). So though it’s probably not, it could also be the last class I take ever. Which is a really weird, scary, strange thought.

— 5 —

AND I’M LEAVING ALL MY FRIENDS AND PROFESSORS, DANGIT!

First off, I’m totally gonna miss my friends. Grad school is in another state so I’m going to go there to get a job and live for a year…and I’m leaving everyone behind. I am ridiculously thankful for things like Skype and Facebook and airplanes and cars and highways, but it’s not the same. And I’m scared out of my mind that I won’t make friends when I move.

Not to mention I will also miss my professors. As much as I will be SO HAPPY to not have homework to do, I enjoyed my classes and loved my professors. So many of them are extremely intelligent, and fun, and being able to just talk with them about stuff was a blast. When I thought I was gonna stay in the area, I was even gonna learn Welsh from one of them…*sniff*….

It really will be weird, though, not having the same people around every day, not being able to just go and see them whenever I want, or call them and meet up with them in five minutes.

— 6 —

Along with finally finishing my thesis, I have done some other things recently, including:

Started watching Isshuukan Friends, or One Week Friends, which so far is ridiculously cute even if it seems like 50 First Dates: Anime Version

Went to see Captain America: The Winter Soldier and really liked it. As a movie it certainly could’ve been better, but there was something about it, and the fact that it’s Captain America (he’s my favorite Avenger), that made me love it to pieces.

Got a Tumblr. Don’t ask me why I did it. Tumblr is such a dangerous place.

I guess it’s because for all the horrible, nasty, disgusting, perverted things you can find there, there’s a lot of good stuff, too. Like some wonderful fanart! And people posting quotes. And having discussions about things–though sometimes those turn nasty and make want to pull my hair out but anyway. Oh, and reaction gifs. Gifsets. And the certain brand of humor that is just unique to Tumblr that can be used in good ways as well as bad.

It’s also just a completely different type of blogging than something like WordPress or Blogger. It seems to be for shorter, more instantaneous sharing. Sort of like Twitter is Facebook with only status updates, Tumblr seems like a blog but freer. Like I said before, it has its own brand of humor, and it’s definitely a community of sorts, in a way I don’t think Twitter and Facebook are. Those two are more private–or at least you have the option to make them so. Tumblr, you can post things privately, but to me there doesn’t seem to be much point.

It also has a freer, more casual feel than what we think of when we think of just a blog. It’s more like comboxes, in some ways. You don’t have to use proper grammar and punctuation, and you don’t usually use paragraphs. While much thought and effort is put into some posts (fanart, fanfiction, cosplay, etc.), often little thought is put into others and they are simply, to quote Wordsworth, “a spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings.” And Tumblr is all about the feels.

And the reason I think Tumblr feels like a community is because fandom has sort of taken it over. Not that you don’t find non-fandom-related Tumblrs, but flibbertigibbet are there tons of them. I think of the number of Shingeki no Kyojin ask-blogs I’ve stumbled on all for the same character…

That’s it! That’s why it’s different! Sorry I just realized, so lemme ‘splain you:

If you don’t know what an ask-blog is: Tumblr is set up so that you can post text, pictures, audio, video, conversation text, quotes, and links. You can also receive messages. Some are public and some are private. The public ones are called asks. I haven’t had an ask so I don’t know exactly how it works, but as far as I can tell, if the blogger answers an ask then it appears on their tumblr.

And this is part of what I think makes Tumblr different from a regular blog. It’s a bit more personal because it invites you to be personal. That function is called ask for goodness sake! And fandom, which is intensely personal already, adds to that by having ask-blogs. Which means someone decides to play a certain character–for example, Levi from Shingeki no Kyojin–and he invites his readers to ask him questions to answer in character. This leads to interactions of sorts between bloggers, especially since the person playing the character–referred to as mun, from mundane–often posts as themselves as well.

— 7 —

Ok, I was planning to cheat more on this post than I already have by using gifs, because I have a paper to write, but Tumblr got me talking. *shakes first* Darn you Tumblr!!

Look. Tumblr is so crazy that there’s even a gif made specifically for this. What. I just. Ugh.

Suffice to say, however, that with graduation nearing and much free time on my hands, I will probably more active. After mid-May, of course, since I’ve got finals to take, graduation to graduate (?), and friends to hang with before I leave.

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

Silver Spoon and Golden Time

Posted on November 30, 2013 by Nami

Since I’m still technically on break I’ve started watching a couple of new anime, Silver Spoon and Golden Time.

Silver Spoon follows the escapades of Hachiken Yuugo, a kid who goes from a preparatory middle school to a agricultural high school. He’s a city boy who’s not used to much physical labor or to the realities of farming. To be honest, it was rather amusing to see him be grossed out about the fact that chicken eggs come out through the anus. Not a nice reality, perhaps, but not bad. All the kids are straightforward, honest, and quirky, and help Hachiken settle in to his new life. The first two episodes are engaging and I look forward to seeing the rest. It seems like a nice kind of slice-of-life high-school dramedy. My favorite character so far is Aikawa Shinnosuke–blondish hair, closed eyes, and a kind personality.

Golden Time intrigues me a bit more. It’s another dramedy by the writer of Toradora! except it takes place in college. Tada Banri is a rather moe-looking young man who, because he’s late to his law school entrance ceremony, meets a girl named Kaga Koko. Kaga has decided that she’s going to marry her oldest friend Yanagisawa Mitsuo, who’s she’s chased to university. Yana avoids her, but Tada notices that there’s more to her than an unhealthy fixation on Yana.

I’m very interested to see where this goes–Koko really is lonely, which is probably the reason she’s clung to Yana for so long. Hopefully she’ll come to some type of self knowledge throughout the series. I like how Tada is rather perceptive about her, but he does seem so far an idealization of the “nice guy.” Hopefully he’ll get some character development too.

EDIT:
So Tada has a reason for being somewhat of a bland character so far: he’s got amnesia! This is making the story a lot heavier. HE’S CRYING AT THE BEGINNING OF EPISODE 5!!!! *cue my tears*

And some people in the comments on Crunchyroll were calling Yana a jerk–he’s not a jerk! He just doesn’t want to get stalked and wants to actually have a relationship, not get dragged around by someone. He cares about Kaga, like he says.

My Sadly Late Quick Takes

Posted on November 9, 2013 by Nami

— 1 —

Apologies are in order: I’m sorry this is late, but as I’ve said before, school work takes precedence. College seniors are busy people. Sometimes I don’t know how I manage to get everything done! And this quick takes will probably be rather quick, as I’ve got a paper on Mary’s Perpetual Virginity that I need to work on this weekend.

— 2 —

I really do enjoy playing board games. Scrabble is fun–my mom usually wins because she rakes in the points even with some of the simplest words. Clue is another of my favorites; I used to absolutely love Cranium, though I never usually found enough people to play it with; and through my decrepit Milton Bradley Boardgames PC game I discovered Parcheesi. I haven’t played that in a while–I need to find it!

I don’t know if any of those qualify as strategy games. I’ve never considered myself any good at strategy games–Stratego is fun but I think I’ve won maybe one game of it my life–so I was extremely surprised and delighted when I played Settlers of Catan for the first time in my life last night. I ended up winning. If you haven’t played it, and you’re into strategy, and building settlements and trying to sabotage other people building stuff, then you might enjoy it.

I’m just hoping next time I play it I have more than beginner’s luck.

— 3 —

Though I am a poor broke college student, I am dying to go see Thor: The Dark World. It has a 66% on Rotten Tomatoes, and I know it’s not art-house cinema, but I could use a good superhero flick right about now. Which is probably why I’m going to watch Iron Man 3 tonight.

I ramble too much: look what internet surfing does to me! I go to look for Thor 2’s score on Rotten Tomatoes, and I find they’ve made a movie of The Book Thief. It’s an interesting book by Markus Zusak set during WWII. I need to read it again–I think I read it when I was too young to really appreciate it.

— 4 —

And I’m rather excited about this.

Of course I won’t see it for a while (if ever). I’ll have to look up spoilers once it’s actually out. The only mildly sad thing about it is that it will make the Levi fanfiction I’m trying to write more drastically AU than it already is.

And in searching for his age, I’ve found that from what Isayama has let slip Levi is somewhere in his thirties. Which is about where I had pegged him, thankfully. If it turns out he’s much older than that I won’t believe it.

— 5 —

Some of the comments on the above article are people saying they think Eren has more character depth than Levi. I’m really rather skeptical of that. Eren acts pretty predictably and he seems to be defined mostly by his rage at the Titans and his extreme determination. As I’ve already discussed, he is compassionate, though with a psychopathic tendency. Also, he seems emotionally weaker than other characters, as he recklessly goes to fight a Titan by himself when’s he fresh from the Training Corps, and because he won’t fight Annie at first because she’s his friend. His lack of control over his emotions is one of the reasons he fights so ferociously in Titan form. So Eren has depth, but he doesn’t (to me) have the most interesting personality in the show because he’s extremely easy to read and we understand his choices.

Levi, on the other hand, is extremely controlled and Stoic-faced. We still see his emotions, but he has enough control over them that they don’t affect his actions: after his whole squad dies, he doesn’t have a meltdown. He mourns them on the inside and does what he has to do–rescue Eren and get everyone the heck out of that forest. He hates the government, and so he probably has an anger that nearly matches Eren’s at the Titans. He just lets it out in snark instead of yelling and recklessness. We don’t completely understand his choices, which makes him more mysterious: why is he working within a government system which he hates? Why does he trust Erwin so much? Why is he so cold and snarky when he obviously cares? Why did he become an expert fighter if he hates senseless killing?

I don’t think either character lacks depth–I just think one is easier to understand than the other.

I’d venture to say Levi has more depth, but I am biased.

— 6 —

More fandom gloriousness/craziness: SHERLOCK WHY CAN’T YOU COME OUT SOONER?!?!?!?!

Well, I guess I’ll just pray for a snow day early next semester so I can marathon some Sherlock and watch the premiere.

— 7 —

Did I just say next semester? Where did this semester go? Not that I’m not happy to be closing in on graduation, but….but….

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

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