have you seen this man?

if you have any information regarding the whereabouts of this man, please call any of the following numbers: 080-whafuck or 080-whereami or 080-whoami

as many of you know, there exists here in our little East Sea hamlet of gangneung a watering hole called bar bumpin', which has always been a haven of sorts for expats in this city, a place to convene and listen to good music from the West, mostly from europe and north america.

it has always been a place to sit with a good friend--or even a person--and have a drink or too many while writing poetry, discussing politics, dancing, taking off your clothes, diving into the bar, smoking ganj, nailing a one-night stand, playing poker, listening to the Spoken Word, forgetting your problems (or creating new ones), simply sitting at the bar, mourning the departures of loved ones, experimenting with booze, sampling fabulous cooking from the head drunk/chef/barkeep, staring at your fuzzy navel, and/or passing out.

it has always gone through cycles of popularity with the expats and hasn't always been populated with local koreans because of their fear of us rowdy roundeyes. it probably was at its most popular in '04 and '05 because a lot of the expats during that time could be found on any given day, at any given hour, in any given stage of sobriety or inebration, under any sort of conditions patronising the bar. these were expats who had been in gangneung for several years, not just transient expats, and they had gotten to know the local language, the local culture, the local seasonal vibes, and, of course, the owner of bumpin'. to many of us, he was considered a friend or older brother. he wasn't just the owner of a bar we frequented; we knew about his personal life, his ambitions, his dreams, his dislikes, his issues, his happiness--and he knew the same about many of us. bumpin'--and consequently, the owner--was not just a place to imbibe, it was a part of us, like a ribcage or a spouse or a member of the family or a third nipple or gonorrhea, to name a few.

as the turnover of expats really began to, well, turn over in the latter half of '05--about a year ago now--the bar began to lose itself a bit. other pubs catering to expat tastes had also opened--and still others were yet to open--and these types of pubs found themselves more popular with the new expat arrivals than was bumpin'. bumpin' was a place for drinkers; there were no billiards tables, no dart boards, no rule requiring patrons to eat food or, even, to wear clothes, no Cocktail-type drink-making light shows that are the rage in bars the peninsula over these days, no discrimination against people because of their nationality, gender, sexual preference, or socio-economic status. as the dynamics of a population change, so do the preferences of keeping oneself entertained and bumpin' suffered a bit (or perhaps a lot) from the influx of new expats rolling into town, though some other places found business to be better than before.

gyung-sup had been hinting at quitting bumpin' as long ago as last winter, but kept plugging away at keeping it open. at first, some months ago, the first signs of gyung-sup's discontent came when we'd roll up only to find bumpin' occasionally closed on a tuesday or wednesday, nights usually prime for drinking, hanging out with gyung-sup, making your own song list and cranking them up loud because of the lack of patrons. then, as spring became summer, it became common to hesitate going to bumpin' during the week for fear that the doors would be shut and gyung-sup out on the drink or, even worse, out of town on the drink with no hints as to when he would be back.

finally, about six weeks ago, a vicious rumour swung through the air with all the fuzzy warmth of a rusty but still-sharp scythe: gyung-sup was finally closing the bar and moving to busan, in the south of korea and the nation's 2nd-largest city, with his new girlfriend. efforts on a tuesday night to confirm were met with his drunken slurring that he was leaving town for good the next day. we'd heard such drunken threats before, so we decided to go visit him at bumpin' the following night only to have it confirmed by him in the late afternoon that he already was in busan. there has been much pondering of the situation since that night and, in fact, the first time yours truly has gone back downtown for drinking was just a few nights ago, this past weekend. after a month of spurning downtown's beckonings, and after a few hours of proclaiming that we were staying in the neighbourhood where we lived to drink, we broke down and went chasing the new rumours that gyung-sup hadn't sold the bar, but had given the keys to a mate of his for upkeeping it while gyung-sup cavorts around busan. as it was past three o'clock in the morning when we got downtown, bumpin' was closed and the mystery of when it opens its doors these days, why gyung-sup really bolted and what he is doing in busan, who is going to buy it, is the pub seriously for sale, and when will gyung-sup come back to town all remain. there is a another stilted rumour that he was in town a week or so ago, but it's not yet been soberly confirmed.

so, if anyone sees a gyung-sup lee bearing any resemblance to the man in the above photo, please notify this web site via "comments" section, or email me, or call any of the toll-free numbers here in korea, or just keep the info to yourself if that's how you see fit. many thanks in advance for whatever it is you choose...

a lonely job

it's a lonely, disparate job, trying to keep a gleeblog updated on a point in interstellar internet space.

weeks or days pass by and no words come to the fore to keep either the writer or the reader entertained or informed.

thoughts flag listlessly like a flaccid penis on downers.

ideas remain clogged in the synapses of the brain like phlegm in the throat of a flu-stricken patient.

the web site sits blank, unblinking, like dubya at his desk in the oval office.

lethargy sits mockingly on the writer's shoulders, sweating whispered nothings in his ear, stealing time from the voluptuous muse, who sits jealously in the locked recesses of the condor's nest that is the dormant imagination, waiting her turn to whisper sweet somethings into the writer's ear.

coherence hovers in the ice cream swirl of cottony colourfulness like a rising moon not ready to rise.

if only these things would write themselves sometimes--or at least could be written through the osmosis of passing out on the monitor and just remaining there while the subconscious dutifully transcribed its stream-of onto the electronic vellum.

keith olbermann's comments on the events of 11 september 2001

hard to believe that this guy used to be an anchor for ESPN's "sportscenter" in the States a few years back.

he dug his claws in quite deep with these comments, made monday on america's MSNBC, about the events in new york, washington, and pennsylvania five years ago. in fact, olbermann's begun to make a habit of criticising the bush regime and lambasting their lying, empirical ways in recent months. kudos for his having cajones to ridicule and criticise the regime when most journalists are less news deliverers than lackeys promulgating the bush regime's poisonous ideas and lies.

however, his boldness does beg this question: when is it that a death "due to strange circumstances" will befall olbermann?

mourning steve irwin...

*editor's note: this piece was started on monday night, 4th september, a few hours after hearing the news of steve irwin's passing. circumstances have precluded me from finishing this until today, 7th september. the stuff from monday is in blue, the stuff from today in black.

steve irwin died today. the crocodile hunter is dead.

i never thought it would happen--his dying, i mean. i guess i thought he was immortal. he wrestled gators, rode crocs like they were nothing more than a favourite barstool in his favourite bar, stared face to face with snakes whose venom could kill you in minutes, swam with beasts that most of us irrationally feared before he taught us about them.

the way in which he was killed today was ironic and atypical of what one would have thought, given all of his dealings with such deadly animals. from the reports i've read, he was killed while snorkeling in the sea off the northeast coast of australia. apparently, he was swimming with stingrays when a barb from a ray's tail struck him directly in the chest, piercing his skin, sneaking its way through ribs and directly into his heart, making a hole in his heart and causing cardiac arrest. the man who survived countless close calls with far more deadly animals killed by an animal that is usually not the least bit dangerous. true, stings from a ray's barbs are reputed to be extremely painful, but they are almost never fatal. however, this sting was perfectly placed and irwin died within a minute or two.

when i first began watching him on TV years ago, i remember that my feelings about him were hot and cold. the fact that he had enormous passion for all sorts of animals was appealing, the fact that he spent so much of his time and money on educating people about animals--most often the animals that we ignorant humans have unwarranted fears about--was awesome to behold. on the other hand, the fact that he had so much goddamned energy and named all of the animals at his zoo was a bit annoying.

however, as the years rolled on, i began to find myself appreciating everything about him and being less annoyed than impressed by his energy. interviews with the man gave me a better understanding of him and i came to appreciate his passion and enthusiasm. it wasn't until i saw an interview with his dad, from whom steve learned to wrestle crocs and from whom steve received his passion for animals, that my appreciation fully bloomed.

he had his detractors, as we all do, but i pay them no heed. i know many australians who were a bit embarrassed at his being the unofficial ambassador of "oz" culture, at his enthusiasm and non-stop energy, but, from all accounts, his on-air TV persona was about the same as he was in everyday life away from the camera. in my opinion, if a person's the same in real life as he or she is on TV, then he or she deserves respect and praise. so many TV personalities are full of shit and so different from their everyday life and i couldn't help but admire irwin for being himself.

so, now that i've had a few more days to reflect and as i sit and watch the animal planet's airing of an old episode of "the crocodile hunter", my feelings about irwin's passing have grown even more sad. i've read a lot of things written about him in different gleebs in aetherspace, most of it positive. however, i have come across an unfavourable thing or two written about him and all i can say is those people who take shots at the recently deceased are cowardly jackasses. in particular, there is one woman who really rusts my crank:

some moron disguised as a feminist has been ripping irwin for the last few days, saying irwin was an “embarrassment” to australia and that he treated animals with “massive insensitivity”. i won’t even disgrace my aetherspace by giving her name, other than to call her GG.

this moron, australian-born and an embarrassment to feminists everywhere, has likened irwin’s wrestling crocs to the old lion tamers of yesteryear, saying his antics were disrespectful toward and an exploitative of animals. mind you, this is the same dumbass who, a few years ago, ranted about the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy because it attracted “spaced-out hippies, environmentalists, free-market libertarians, social conservatives, pacifists, new-age theosophists, sexists and racists the world over.”

she seems to hope, now that irwin is gone, that these animal shows that depict animals so disrespectfully will cease to exist. “i am sick and tired of programs that tell me that the world is full of wicked, nasty, powerful, deadly creatures,” is her argument.

um, okay, GG. the next time you’re wandering in the Outback and encounter one of those snakes irwin taught us about, just use your natural instincts to do whatever stupid damn thing it is that you think you should do. we’ll be sure to mourn you in a manner respectfully befitting you and your types.

you know, now that i’m down off my soapbox, we should mourn irwin’s passing because the world has lost someone original and passionate, someone who taught us about animals and our environment, someone who gave so much of himself to the other beings that co-inhabit this planet with us. anyone who did as much as irwin did to bring awareness to us about the environment and animals should be mourned because what he did was important. even if you disliked his style, he deserved our respect. his passing leaves a big void in the world of conservationism education and the question should be asked: who will take up his mantle?

rest in peace, steve. crikey, we’re going to miss you, mate.

the four faces of gangneung

thanks to papa geno for allowing me to nick this from his site, though i cropped the photo a bit in order to make it more mount rushmore-like...

no holds barred

well, there was such great success and favourable feedback from "sporal illage" a few weeks ago, we decided to have another poetry reading/open mic/orgasmic word orgy. it will take place on friday, 1 september 2006, at the ubiquitous Bar Bumpin'. tune back in after a day or two for details and how it went...

 

Sporal Illage, 4 August 2006

A time out from my obsessing over alternative news sources and anguish over the desecration of Lebanon to look at the more romantic side of life...

There is a little bit of poetry in all of us. Some are brave (foolish?) enough to display proudly their wont in this regard, others are a little less forthcoming (more embarrassed?) about it. Nonetheless, the urge to speak, think, and express oneself in more less prosaic terms exists in each and every one of us.

It may come out in a song of dedication carved into a tree, on a cocktail napkin about the barmaid's cleavage, in our private diary complete with combination lock, or it might just be a catchy haiku we make up in our mind and never let escape.

Some poets are more gifted than others, still others gift us with their wit and humour. The poetry can be romantic, semantic, pedantic, frantic, or born of panic; it can political, hypocritical, social, lyrical, critical, or diametrical. Or it can just be...

Regardless, the world has become a more dangerous, more empirical place to live because people don't take the time for poetry anymore. Poets are deemed to be mentally unbalanced or nominally out of touch. Poets are often seen as untouchables or god(desse)s who are mysterious and unapproachable. Poets can be regarded with fear or condemnation because they dare to put voice to what the everyman or -woman actually feels or thinks about. Poets are intimidating because one never knows what a poet is thinking and/or if a particular time you've spent with him or her will end being the subject of a poem. A poet evokes a quickening of the pulse because when you see him or her lurking in the corner of a bar with a pen, drink, and piece of paper, you're unsure what it is he or she is doing, but you're dying to find out. When you hear a poem, you wonder was the poet near you when he or she wrote, reading your thoughts, accessing that private part of yourself that no one knows, because this damn poem could be about you, it could be about your life, your viewpoint, your fantasy, your forbidden fruit, your orgasmic dilemma.

Most of all, poets are the mystics in our lives, who can uplift us with magic or come down on us with rage and vengeance; they can make us want to dance or compel us to fuck with abandon; they can touch us with a single word that reshapes our thinking or they can invade us with a series of words that awaken our primordial urges or they can own us with the images they paint that dust off our dormant lustfulness and bring them to life.

Or, maybe, poets just bore the shit out of us.

Anyway, A few weeks ago, here in gangneung, at Bar Bumpin', the bar to end all Korean bars, the inaugural Gangneung Poetry Night was held. Originally christened "Oral Spillage" it metamorphosised, with typical poetic licence, into "Sporal Illage" and thus was born what might become a monthly--or so--happenstance.

Thanks to the fruits of Dylan Butler's and Gene Justice's labours, as well as to the hospitality of Bumpin' owner, Gyeong-sup Lee, a lineup of four poets was created: the aforementioned Dylan and Gene, Michael Hutley, and yours truly.

As a spontaneous addition to the madness, after some prompting from his original Polynesian shirt and a couple friends from Asahi or Sapporo, making the quartet a quintet, Melvin Palmiano stepped up and delivered a haiku of subtle beauty.

And what night of open mic would be complete with the incomparable Bryce Surbrug and his guitar, belting out his own tunes and covering some others in his typical hard-boiled, red-faced way...

melvin and the shirt of inspiration, serving up a little haiku action

michael in his smooth, classy way entertaining with humour and style

gene entertains us all with his song and dance and faux forgotten-line rendition

dylan and his "soju", but not before reading some verse off a trash bin and ignoring belligerent korean intelligentsia

yours truly blathering on, replete in undying support for the palestinian cause

bryce doing his thing and singing his songs

the poets/haikuists/singers had a splendid time sharing their words and thoughts and if, as it is hoped, those in attendance enjoyed themselves even the slightest bit, then it was a smashing success not to be duplicated again, but perhaps to be enjoyed on a slightly different scale , but nearly similar astral plane, sometime in the near future.