죠스

When I'm out on the street, or on the Subway, or doing anything at all really, people (especially younger people) tend to look --no... STARE at me. I don't even do anything particularly intersting, just walk to school, walk to the station, occasionally sing to myself, but I seem to attract attention nonetheless.

Last week, walking home from school with Amber Teacher, a particularly rowdy group of teenaged (~14?) girls came a-running over to us. "Hello!Hello!" Usually, I just say hello, and they giggle to each other and run away, but this particular crew wanted to chat. They asked us the usual questions: American? (Amber is, but I, am always am not). Why are we in Seoul? Are we lovers? (I'm used to lying to people and telling them Bree Teacher is, when they see me with her. I wonder if Bree Teacher would consider it cheating if I tell these ones that Amber is my fake lover?). The way they ask though is "Lub? Lub?" It's weird, they're obsessed with the subject--

Then they ask my name...
Since I've settled in, and know a few things about the language, this is a question I'm sometimes reluctant to answer. So I just don't. Amber, though, takes the lead: "His name is Josh," and they immediately burst into hysterical laughter. See, my name is approximately the same word as a kind of Korean ice cream 죠스. This has provided my students, and now random girls on the street, with endless entertainment. A lot of kids from my school called my Joshieba, and I thought it was because they were dumb, and couldn't pronounce my name, until one of them called me "ice cream teacher."

The 죠스 bar, (which is actually pronounced more like jyo-seu than Josh or Joshua -- but to them it's close enough, apparently) is shaped like a shark, and it's blue on the outside, and has red goo on the inside. It's only 500 won, and it's actually pretty good. At least they named me after something good--