I have arrived to the land of eternal summer. I will be in America for the next month, dodging COVID and getting chubby, while I take my teaching exams and catch up on holidays with the family. Time is slow and languid like molassess here. The streets are wide but empty, the neighborhood is sunny but devoid of human life during the weekdays. The air is clear, the sky is wide and blue, and there’s not a coffee shop for literal miles. Koreans would be confused: “are you talking about the countryside?” No, just the strange in-between that is suburbia. I love the green and I’m thankful that the mild…

Busan’s ice rink certainly took me by surprise. For once in my life I was 15 minutes early and for once in my life this did not help. The woman at the door explained in Korean what I assume was something like they needed to disinfect the area and resurface the ice so I should come back in 15 minutes. I thought of the conversation I had when I went thrift shopping with some other expat women yesterday. The thrift shop ladies were amused by four foreign women squatting on provided baby stools thoroughly rifling through the 1,000 won piles but those ladies didn’t avoid us or make us feel…