Before moving to Korea in 2007 I lived in the Pacific Northwest -- Washington State in particular. While the state may be best-known for its apple and timber industries, the 1960s music scene is also worth noting. The I-5 corrider between Seattle, WA and Portland, OR saw a plethora of bands emerge, with three in particular achieving a large measure of fame.

The Ventures were formed in 1958 and are best-known as the band behind the "Hawaii 5-0" theme, but they're more than just a one-hit wonder. The group has had 38 albums chart, with 5 appearing in the 'Billboard Top 100' at the same time. They're also the first group to have two versions of the same song - from different years no less - break the Top 10. Before there was surf music there were The Ventures, and the band is credited with the first concept album and the first use of a fuzz pedal for guitar. And as an interesting aside, the band's original drummer went on to become a four-star general.

Next up is The Wailers - also known as The Fabulous Wailers after Bob Marley's reggae group shot to fame - who also got their start in 1958. The Wailers fused 'dirty' R&B with rock and roll and might just be the world's first garage band. Thanks to the patronage of The Wailers the next big band to break out was The Sonics, in 1960. Taking a much louder and cruder approach than their contemporaries, I've heard people credit The Sonics as the first punk band. Several of their 45 rpm singles were reissued through Norton Records and there's nothing like throwing them on a turntable in the summertime and cranking the volume.

With the history lesson out of the way, I recently came across a couple of ukulele songs from Japan that were originally done by The Ventures. They're pretty good. Full credit goes out to Liz for originally finding and sharing these:

There are a large number of fascinating creatures that live in coral reefs, leaf litter, and the ocean floor. One animal that inhabits all three ecosystems is the flatworm (phylum Platyhelminthes), and in particular the non-parasitic Turbellaria. The larger members of this sub-division are often brilliantly-hued and share a few other special characteristics. All flatworms lack a body cavity and specialized organs for the respiratory and circulatory systems, and in addition to this they use ocelli to sense light and dark rather than 'true' eyes, and expel waste material through their mouth, since many also lack an anus.

Of course, the trait that catches most people's attention is in relation to their reproductive habits. I first caught mention of penis fencing in Tim Birkhead's Promiscuity: An Evolutionary History of Sperm Competition but the behavior is discussed, not surprisingly, in a number of other sources. Flatworms are hermaphrodites - each animal possesses male and female reproductive cells - and obtain a much greater evolutionary pay-off by playing the male role during copulation. Pregnancy is such an energy-intensive endeavor that each member of a mating pair would prefer to inject their sperm and be done with it. As a result, mating flatworms each try to impregnate the other without falling victim to the same fate themselves; the circling and jousting that often takes place during these sessions is what gave rise to the term 'penis fencing'.

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Korean Airlines Boeing 777 at Sea-Tac International Airport

Last week was our academy's summer vacation and I took advantage of the time off - and free airline ticket - to make a trip back to my old home in Washington State. With only three full days and two half-days to accomplish everything there was a good chance something would go wrong, and naturally that's exactly what happened.

I spent two days sitting on a couch at home in order to spend time with my family because my sister didn't want to leave the house.* On top of that, an elementary school friend - the first person to contact me when I mentioned when I'd be back - wanted to have a barbecue with a few friends during my visit but then ignored my emails about the timing of the event. He also had me keep calling him back for three days straight. He has quickly sunk to the bottom of my list for "people to see on my next trip back to the United States." I did meet a couple other friends and did an insane amount of shopping ($1000 on clothes), so at least that was something nice.

I was assigned a seat in the middle of the row on the flight from Incheon to Sea-Tac, with an older Korean woman situated next to the window and a younger Chinese man seated by the aisle. While serving the dinner meal the stewardess helping our section of the plane addressed the Korean woman in Japanese and the Chinese man in Korean. I was half-expecting her to use something other than English when she spoke to me, but no such luck. However, that's certainly an unenviable duty -- obviously she needed to say something, but it's not always easy to tell which language a passenger speaks based on just their appearance.

My flight home also saw a run-in with the biggest assholes, from Italy, in the Sea-Tac airport. They repeatedly tried to cut in line, the husband - probably in his 60s - elbowed me in the ribs and then hip-checked me out of the way when it came time to board the VAL to the departure terminal, and then they literally pushed a steward out of the way when they were asked not to board an escalator due to the large crowds waiting on the floor above. Real classy, guys. Perhaps the oddest thing about this is that I never have problems with being shoved in Korea, despite it being a common complaint among English teachers on the peninsula.

Overall, my experience in America was actually pretty underwhelming. They did more construction in Uijeongbu over the five days I was gone than in the year since my last visit to my 'hometown'. I took six photos in Washington State and 400 my first weekend back in Korea. Go figure.

* Technically I could have gone out and done things without my family, but that would have been a bit rude in light of the fact that my sister took the train from out-of-state to see me.

We frequently have parents stop by our academy to get a tour and speak with the academy director prior to having their child take a placement test and signing up for classes. Today saw a mother come in with her two daughters, the oldest of which may be a future student at our branch. What made this visit noteworthy is that her family spent three years living in Washington State before returning to Korea.

Most of the Korean families I've met in Washington first settled in the area around through south Tacoma, but the girl from today had been living in Vancouver -- which is also a city that I have called home in the past. (Although for me it was before entering preschool so I have no memories from our time there.) The girl didn't seem at all surprised to meet a fellow Washingtonian in northern Gyeonggi-do, although her mom did seem to have a mild reaction to the news. I later heard that her speaking level is quite advanced but she does relatively poorly when reading; I wonder what class she would join if her mom has her enrolled here.

In other local news, two of my students told me a story last month about a schoolgirl who collapsed while participating in a running event at her school's field day. She was taken to the hospital but died before reaching the emergency ward. This comes only a month after I wondered why Uijeongbu only makes the news for negative reasons.

Meanwhile, the sky is falling in neighboring Pocheon (포천). Or maybe just pieces of it containing dated military hardware. The original article (in Korean) is from Naver and includes a video of the firefighting efforts; at the 32 second mark you can see just how close it came to crashing in the city itself. Pocheon is located adjacent to Uijeongbu, and the accompanying map indicates that the jet fighter wasn't that far from the border with my current hometown.