Thieving cable guy!

I know foreigners who've been in Korea as long as I have, and do not speak a word of Korean. Well maybe some words, but not too many. I used to look down my nose at these sorts. But I've increasingly come to the opinion that there may be a quiet dignity in having not tried.

Lets take this past Tuesday as an example. I was frantically searching my room, looking for an envelope containing the equivalent of $200 USD in Korean won. After tearing apart everything I owned, which isn't much, I had no choice but to conclude that the cable man had stolen my money.

This takes us back a day further, to when the cable man paid me a visit. At the moment I am living in what's called a ha-sook-cheep. It's kind of a cross between a dormitory and a guesthouse. I ended up here after being kicked out of my apartment when my school went tits up. The residents are mostly university students, and I've come to know almost all of them by at least a passing nod, me being the only white man on premises.

Redirecting attention back to Monday, as I sat waiting for the cable guy in my room while he went up to the roof. I got bored, went to take a crap, and when I returned he was in my room finishing up with things. Thanking the man for his troubles, I forgot him as soon as he left, and sat down to download some po--- look for analysis of the National Assembly elections in Korea.

Because he had been alone in my room I concluded that the cable guy was the only one who could have taken the money. I called my Korean girlfriend to howl in protest. She immediately informed me how stupid I was to leave that much money in an envelop in my room. And I'm thankful for that, because not only was it exactly what I wanted to hear at the time, I'd never once stopped to consider that maybe it WAS stupid of me, and certainly hadn't already chastised myself over and over for being an idiot.

She went on to inform me that not only would I have to explain everything to the landlord and police, but that my Korean was up to the task. I wanted to suggest that her Korean would certainly be MORE up to the task, but she already has too many things to lord over me.

After spending two years in country, with a stated goal of learning the local language, a situation such as this should not be overwhelming. Yet that's how I felt as I went to look for a Korean buddy who lives on the same floor.

Things went more or less ok with him, I got my point across but only because he gives me a lot of leeway in sounding like a blinding idiot. It was a bit more difficult with the landlord, or haa-sook-ajuma. I fumbled my way through an explanation of my situation, using many hand gestures and even a simple diagram at one point. The more I said, the more she looked like she was wondering how white people ever managed to conquer anything, nevermind the world. All of this so she could tell me what I already knew. That there was nothing she could do about it.

I sat sulking on the bus on my way to work. In a sudden burst of inspiration, I realized that I in fact had the cable guy's number in my mobile phone. Not having the balls for an outright phone call in Korean, I decided on a text message.

I casually inquired as to whether he knew where my money was. The inference, however, was pretty strong. I not only accused the man of stealing my money with no proof whatsoever, I insulted his dignity by doing so in a language I command no better than an elementary student.

Incredibly (though not if you know me) I did not plan for him to actually call me, which happened about ten minutes later. I missed half of what he was yelling, but the opening "What the hell are you talking about?" set the tone for the rest of the rather one-sided conversation.

I arrived home that night feeling worn out and wanting the day to end. Feeling even more anal than usual, I decided to set out my underwear for the following day. Picking from the bottom, I sunk a hand deep into the pile of briefs, and felt paper. The paper of an envelope containing the equivalent of $200 USD in Korean won.

I'm currently in the process of composing my sincere apologies, also to be sent via text message, to the cable guy. One could take several morals from this story: don't jump to conclusions, always use the Last In First Out method of inventory control when laying out your underwear, languages are learned faster by being spoken rather than text messaged, and so on.

In the end, I'm sorta just happy about the money.