smiling seoulites

in terms of work, yesterday was kinda shitty. prior to being hired i told my boss at kbs that i would be out 6 weeks this winter to help sissy with her new baby. but suddenly it seems that this is a problem and consequently i may not have a job when i return.

after that bad news, instead of going home i took the subway waaay out to onsu to hang out in a pc bang (internet cafe) until my next meeting. this seemed like the lesser of two evils: that vs. the hassle of commuting home and back for a 30-minute homestay. but... a last-minute cancellation meant that i spent 3.5 hours in a smoky pc bang out in gyeonggi province amongst young men and boys who play video war games that constantly project sounds of gunfire and women screaming.

anyhow...

after work i rolled back into shinchon around 9:30 pm. for some reason, i was inspired to get off one stop early to walk the long route home through the seas of slow moving younguns, whose selfabsorption typically irritates me. thankfully i had corny taiwanese pop ballads to soothe my frazzled nerves.

so, cajoled forward by my formosan soundtrack, i waded through the mass of oncoming foot traffic. to my surprise, a good 75% of the people i passed were smiling or laughing. i guess it makes sense that we're happy when in the company of family, friends or lovers, but is humankind truly this pleased with the state of the world? anyhow, irritable work shit aside, it was nice to see this evidence of society actually working, and i couldn't help but find myself smiling back.