Oliver Twist my ass!

Have you ever been to a orphanage? For some reason I didn't think orphanages were real. You don't here much about them in the United States and to be honest all my information on them has come from Oliver Twist. I volunteered over three months ago to visit this orphanage outside of Seoul on the weekdays twice a month. I put my name on some list that was circulating around my workplace and I forgot about it pretty damn quick after that. Well, it turns out someone kept that list and I got the call at the beginning of the week. Although I'm not in the "cheer up poor kids" kind of mood lately something inside of me would not let me say no. I had about two excuses ready to go too. I hoped on the bus after work and it took about an hour and a half to get to this warehouse looking place. To describe it as dirty would be to insult all things with dirt on them. This place was pretty nasty. Again, it's not like Korea is the cleanest place on the planet but this place was pretty damn foul. I knew I was in for some shit before I walked through the door.

About two months ago I took my emotions and feelings and buried them somewhere deep inside my shell. So I thought I was good to go with these little Korean kids. I was going to phone it in. I was going to smile, maybe make a silly face or two and then catch the bus back to my home. It took a total of twenty seconds for these little Korean bastards to melt the frosty shell that covers my heart. These kids don't have shit. As they say if shit was worth something these kids would have been born with out assholes. They are the very definition of poor. The country "takes care of them" but their futures are not looking too good because money buys education in this country. Money also buys good health and I was coughed on pretty much the entire time. There also seemed to be an unusual percentage of deformed little ones moving around this place. But they were so freaking happy to see us. They were thrilled and it wasn't just for the candy. They just wanted to be around us. I get the feeling we (meaning foreigner) don't look at this population the way Koreans look at them. I didn't want to look at these kids like I felt sorry for them and I didn't want to look at them like they were disgusting. I didn't feel pity for them and they were very far from disgusting (although some of the workers treated these kids like they were slightly less than human). To be frank, this was a warehouse of rejects. These were the kids that society does not want but I found them to be beautiful in their own way. They didn't speak English so I spent the majority of the time getting them to repeat words they didn't understand and just acting like a fool. Laughing of course is universal and there was lots of it going around. I try not to like small children but I failed miserable in this case. They got to me. It felt like the Grinch on Christmas. It was like they took a long needle and injected a large dose of "good" directly into my soul. It just felt good and its been a long long time since I felt like that.

I actually felt a little sad when it was time to go. My plan was to go this one time and then make some shit up for the reason why I was not going to be able to go back but that's just not going to happen now. My wallet is going to suffer because I'm bringing back a shit load of candy and little toys next time. Again, it makes me feel kind of silly for complaining about my own circumstances when stuff like this happens to me. Not to say my feelings are not relevant but life could always be so much worse.

I think I'm going to be visiting this orphanage for the rest of my time in Korea. If my I get my information for my visa in time then that will take me into late spring of next year. If not then I guess I'll get to see those little bastards one more time before I get kicked out of the country. We'll just have to wait and see I guess.

Oh yeah, because of this whole poor, dirty kids in an orphanage thing, I also got suckered into running a 10K this coming weekend on the southern tip of Korea. A 10k is a little over six mile which I do at least once or twice during the week anyways but this run is going to totally cut into my "feeling sorry for myself time." I mean, come on people, Orphans and running for charity? I didnt' come to Korea for this feel good shit!

By the way, not a single one of those Korean kids sang or danced....Oliver Twist my ass!!!