Mistake in speaking English

When I was a university student, I visited USA for the first time in my life. That was my first overseas travel and my first experience of flight. In 1991, there was not many big shopping mall and tall buildings in Korea. Every moment that I spent in New York was a little bit strange and exciting as well.

At that time, I was not good at speaking English. Whenever I had a chance to speak English, I felt so nervous and discouraged. I thought my knowledge of English was better than that of my friends. It was very immature, though.

In New York, I was walking along the street of downtown. I had company and should be together with them. I had no chance to go to the bathroom. I needed to take a piss. I couldn't hold it anymore. I told one of my frineds that I would go to the bathroom for a minute and started to look for a bathroom. I found one big building and got inside. But it was so big inside and I couldn't find any sign of bathroom. It was so desperate and I asked a guy passing by.

"Excuse me, where is the bathroom?"

"It's over there. Go straight and turn left."

I understood where it was and I wanted to thank him. But the words coming out of my mouth was,

"Oh, you're welcome."

Saying this, I walked away from him and directly ran to the direction for the bathroom. What a embarrassing moment! I couldn't take it back. I should have said 'Thank you' but I said to him 'You're welcome.". I said what he was supposed to say after my gratitude.

I learned those words like a formula, 'You're welcome' after saying 'Thank you'. But at that urgent(?) situation, they were switched. I've never wanted to imagine what he thought of me so far.

For studying a second language, they say we need practice and repetition. It's still not that easy to learn and practise English. But now I speak much better than before. Embarrassing moments turn into precious memories after all. This is the beauty of life.

A funny story in Tim Hortons

One Korean man entered Tim Hortons for a cup of coffee. After paying, he asked a staff for a receipt. Then, the staff rejected to give the receipt to him. The man was really pissed off and kept asking but the staff never gave it to him.

Several years ago, I stayed in a canadian homestay house. One day, the homestay mother told me a funny story from his Korean student.

There is a popular coffee shop in Canada, Tim Hortons. One Korean student bought a cup of coffee and requested a receipt but a staff flatly refused. He kept asking but the staff never gave it to him.

The Korean student was not good at speaking English and he couldn't argue with the staff anymore. He just heard 'No' from the staff.

There was no way for him and he came back home. He started to talk about what happened to his homestay mother. When he finished his story, she laughed out loud.

He talked to the staff like this,

The student : Can I have a recipe?"

The staff : No way.

He took a receipt for a recipe. He used a word ' recipe' and the staff thought he was trying to find out how to make Tim Hortons coffee.

It's very difficult to learn a foreign language and we often make this kind of mistake while learning. However, a mistake becomes another experience and knowledge. We don't have to be afraid of making mistakes. We should be afraid of doing nothing.

The unbearable lightness of being : How small I am!

I had an opportunity to visit the Minnamurra rain forest with my friend living in Sydney. It is always amazing experience for me to stroll deep in the forest for several hours. Few people, nature all around me. I took lots of pictures and came back home in the evening.

As soon as I arrived home, I turned on the computer and transferred all the pictures to it. My friends and I started to see them. After some pictures, one of my friends saw one picture and passed it with no words.

Me : Hey, you didn't see me on that picture?

He : Sorry? Were you there?
Me : Yes, I stood by the tree.

He went back to the picture and said.

'Wow, I thought you.. you were a leaf. The color of clothes is also green."

I certainly knew where I was. But if someone sees this picture for the first time, he/she might not see me.

So tiny existence of me, compared with a enormous tree. 
I just laughed and let it go but on the other hand, I learn 'Modesty' from my small look.

When I was young, I thought the world where I lived was everything. 
I didn't have any intention of going somewhere, even never thought about it.

Useless pride that what  I did was the most interesting.
Delusion that other people also liked as I did.
Arrogance that everybody needed me.
As I get older, my own thoughts are destroyed.

One simple fact that I am a  part of nature in this world and one human being among many people.
However, we don't need to have shame for ourselves.
Just listen to others as much as we can.
We should have patience and wait until others enhance my value.

Isn't this the virtue of modesty for living wisely in this world?

The land on which we are standing,

the earth is spinning around the sun at 30 kilo meters per second.

Besides, it is rotating at 500 meters per second.

Nobody can detect this huge movement. 

We are nothing but a dot on earth.

What is the standard of happiness? - [Travel Essay 1st]

There is a beautiful island called 'Palawan' in Philippines. It's famous for El nido, Coron and Underground river. Unlike the other famous places in Philippines, it's much more peaceful, natural and beautiful with its own beauty.

I had worked in the capitol city of Palawan, Puerto Princessa, for a year. The place where I worked was 1 hour away by bus from the downtown. Once in a while, I visited downtown for buying some materials. Due to the hot and humid weather all the year, it's like a war to come back to my office in a bus from downtown.

Now, the bus called RORO with air-conditioner is available but when I started to work, I couldn't imagine air-conditioned buses. Even buses didn't run on time. They usually left the bus station when all seats were occupied.

For many times, I had to sit and wait in a hot bus for almost an hour and it was a good thing for me to sit and go. While going back, I had no choice but to open the window as it was too hot. With the window opened, my hair got all messed up and sometimes, I used to have a headache with long exposure to wind. Either going downtown or coming back to my office from there, it was always an unwelcome job for me and I always complained.One day, as usual, I was going back to my office from downtown in the bus and I found the sight I've never seen before on the road.  What I saw was one big jeepney(Philippines typical transportation converted in their own way) with full of young students.

There are not many jeepneys in Palawan. The most popular public transportation is 'Multicap', which is a remodeled small van. The jeepney in Palawan is usually used for a long distance travel with low cost or loading all kinds of materials. It's very old and noisy.

I supposed they came back home after school. The jeepney ran at 50~60km/h. Students sitting on the top looked comfortable but most of young girls put their feet on the edge and grabbed anything. They even smiled at me. When I saw this for the first time, before saying safety, it was a kind of culture shock to me. Even after, I saw this kind of situation several times. It might be their own natural way of living.

Inevitable situations, instead of complaining, they seem to have learned how to adapt to the situations since early years. We, strangers, could judge them by many different ways but truly, it is nothing but one aspect of the life to them. One muggy day, a smile rested on my lips in a jam-packed bus as I saw them living in accordance with what they had.

Happiness was not over there. At the moment, I was as happy as they were.