PC Bang
I dislike video games. Well, truthfully, I dislike World of
Warcraft, Starcraft, or any game that resembles them. The narration behind the games is too
fantastical, and among its players there are a disproportionately large number
of social outliers. At least addicts to
the various titles released by EA Sports have some semblance of interest in
athletics.
In Korea
those who need a daily fix of role-playing head to what is known as a “PC
Bang,” or “PC Room.” As one might
expect, these places consist of nothing more than row after row of computers,
equipped with quick broadband connections and the latest video-game
technology. Admittedly, they are in a
league of their own when compared with the computer game lairs one might find
stateside.
Yet while
the technology is pristine, its users are, as one might expect, not quite so
hygienic. They aren’t obese and smelly
in the way that American computer addicts usually are, but they certainly
aren’t the most well bathed elements of society. A large portion of the clientele consists of
middle and high school boys who have not yet come to appreciate shampoo,
deodorant, and shaving. Their female
counterparts appear to be better dressed and groomed, but clearly they haven’t
attended any etiquette classes. They
smoke and curse enough to make a pirate blush.
Knowing
this, one might reasonably ask, ‘why did I ever go to PC Bang’s?’ The main reason was that I didn’t have
internet access in my boarding house, and the second was that going to these
places gave me a much-needed opportunity to leave my room. It is better to be surrounded by nerdy, acned
strangers than nobody at all.
However, there is one PC Bang,
which shall go unnamed, that I have sworn to never enter again. While working on a paper there one afternoon
I began to feel the after effects of my lunch, and headed to the men’s
bathroom. I sat down in one of the
stalls, which seemed relatively clean for a place frequented by computer nerds.
One of the
disadvantages of having a penis is that it moves around, often seemingly of its
own volition. In particular, while
sitting on a toilet the penis has a terrible habit of smacking up against the
edge of the bowl. It does not matter how
much care one takes to avoid this; the penis does as it pleases.
This
instance was not unique in this respect; my penis smacked up against the
bowl. But whereas usually the penis
merely taps the bowl, this time it stayed attached to the bowl for a second. “Odd,”
I thought, “I didn’t realize that my
penis was adhesive.”
Looking at
the tip of my penis there certainly did appear to be some sort of adhesive
material present. Reaching my hand down
I stuck my index finger out to probe the area of the bowl to my penis had
grazed. Sadly, it became clear that
while the adhesive material had come from somebody’s penis, it had not been
mine. As a friend eloquently remarked, “Dude got wazoo on your wazoo maker!” I ran home and took a shower, followed by
another shower, and yet another shower.
I still feel dirty.
I wonder
what type of person would jerk off in a PC Bang. But even more, I wonder what kind of weirdo
would have to presence of mind to aim with such precision for the rim of the
toilet while doing so. Couldn’t they
have at least finished up in toilet tissue and disposed of it? On the one hand I’m impressed that their aim
was so accurate, but on the other hand I would like to wring their neck
mercilessly.
Bathrooms
in general seem to be an area where the cultural divide between the western
world and the Korean one cannot be overcome.
I always have to be careful when pulling my pants down that I don’t drop
the cuffs in a pile of spit left by an ajosshi who, astonishingly, did not
realize that the toilet bowl would have been an appropriate place for his
drool. My favorite bathroom behavior of
Koreans, though, is what I like to call the “smoke and shit.” In an effort to increase efficiency, many
ajosshi have combined the bathroom break and the smoke break. Once, while opening the stall door in the
bathroom at my gym I came across a little man, about five feet tall, squatting
over the hole in the ground that passes for a toilet. A cigarette trailing out the side his mouth,
he looked up at me, smiled, and gave a nodding grunt as I quickly tried to
erase from my memory what I had just seen.
I’m not
sure that there’s a satisfactory explanation for this behavior; people tend to
act in inexplicable ways. I do wonder,
however, if some of this can’t be explained by Korea’s tendency to view their
world as their neighborhood and their fellow citizens as their relatives. Really until half of a century ago most
Koreans spent the majority of their lives living in a small village with their
family, doing whatever their family had done for generations, and doing so with
the understanding that their families would probably continue in such an
existence for the foreseeable future. I
suppose that if one wants to they should be more than welcome to take a “smoke
and shit” break on their own rice paddy (though as a rice consumer I might have
to take issue with the practice).
Much like
visiting the washroom, walking on the crowded streets of Seoul is inherently
dangerous. Delivery boys on motorcycles,
couples blissfully unaware of their surroundings, and ajumma on a mission to get
somewhere before everyone else are just a few of the numerous hazards that
await Korean pedestrians. Try as one
might, these obstacles cannot be avoided.
An ajumma will at some point push you out of the way, a couple will at
some point obstruct your path for what seems to be an eternity, and a delivery
boy’s weaving motorcycle will at some point cause you to reexamine your life
insurance policy.
The best
course of action is to simply remain nonplussed by the various forms of
misbehavior in the street. Pushing the
ajumma back might break her ankle, but it probably won’t change her
attitude. Yelling at the couple will
only convince those around you that you are an asshole bent on ruining the mood
set by their matching outfits. And as
for the delivery boy, do keep in mind that the big boat rule applies: when motorcycle fights pedestrian, pedestrian
tends to lose. Should one’s attempts to
remain calm fail, remember that there are far worse fates than bearing the
brunt of rudeness in the streets. You
could be shot. You could be hit by a
bus. Or perhaps worst of all, you could
find your penis in someone else’s adhesive material.
Unfortunately, smoke n shit is not confined to 아저씨 only. I have been victimized (poisoned?) by many college-age smoke n shit idiots in SNU, Sogang, and even on the KTX train itself. I have a strong feeling that this pastime is acquired in the military service.
ReplyDeleteInterestingly, I've seen smoke n shit many times on trips to China, but never never ever in Japan. Just like I've seen motorcycles on sidewalks plenty of times in China but never in Japan. Just like I've been bumped on the street in China but never in Japan. Just like groups annoyingly block the sidewalk in China, but rarely in Japan.
Basically, though I am more fond of Korea and Koreans, I wish that in some ways it were more Japanese, and less Chinese. Especially in the realm of smoke n shit.