Kimchi Chronicles – July 2004
I never realized just how dependent I’ve become on coffee in order to function throughout the day. What’s sad is that I don’t really believe that I drink that much coffee on a day-to-day basis. I normally drink three cups in the morning, and about half the time, I drink another two cups in the afternoon for a pick-me-up. It doesn’t seem that much, really. But then something happened to make me realize how bad I need coffee in the morning…
Last month I was told I have to have a medical evaluation because I was too skinny to take the Air Force physical fitness test. So I called Osan Air Base to book an appointment. After getting a date and time, the doc told me, “Oh yeah, we’re going to take some labs so you need to fast for about 12 hours prior. All you can have is small sips of water.”
Uh oh…
My appointment is at 10AM. So I catch the 7:30 bus to Osan and snooze along the way, the entire time lamenting the fact that I haven’t had any coffee. Once I arrive an hour later, I still feel like I’ve just gotten out of bed and that my head weighs about ten pounds. I’m also getting a fairly considerable headache. I walk to the clinic and immediately head to the lab. They take me in an hour early and draw three vials of blood. I ask, “Is that it? Am I done? Can I stop fasting now?”
“Sure,” the Airman says.
So I immediately head to the cappuccino stand in front of the BX and order a large. I took that first sip and instantly started looking around, completely bewildered, because I could literally hear the 80′s Folger’s commercial theme music.
“The best part of waking up!”
The cappuccino lady was staring at me like I’d just pulled a circus monkey out of my pants while juggling flaming bowling pins. I sheepishly pointed to the gauze on my arm then shrugged and walked away.
Another disturbing trend is my recent confusion in the morning. I’m not getting any younger, and I’ve found that lately my mental faculties aren’t quite as sharp as they use to be first thing in the morning. So most mornings now, I’ll find myself in front of the coffee pot with an empty filter in one hand, and various things that are NOT coffee in the other hand. Sometimes it’s creamer, other times my cigarette lighter… one time I think I grabbed a bagel out of the cabinet. It’s at this point that my brain follows a path similar to the following:
“I’ve got a coffee filter in one hand, and a lighter in the other. What the hell am I trying to do? Was I going to smoke? If so why am I trying to light this coffee filter? I should have a cigarette in this hand. Wait a minute… I can’t smoke in my room. Maybe it’s not a cigarette I should have… So what the hell am I doing? I’m getting no where fast, here. Let’s try a different approach to this. Why would I have a coffee filter in my ha… COFFEE! THAT’S what I was doing! I was going to make coffee!”
After many years of ‘making coffee’ being my absolute first priority in the morning, you can see why I’m starting to worry.
Ran into another problem with the language barrier here. I can’t seem to get the Korean barbers on base to cut my hair short enough. It seems that no matter how clearly I try to convey my intent, they are afraid to cut it too short. So the last time I went, I tried to add in some visual reference. I explained how I wanted it cut, and I indicated just how short I wanted it to be with my fingers. The guy nodded then asked me a question. Now, it takes a very long time to get use to trying to understand people who cannot physically pronounce certain letters in the English alphabet, and I have only been here five months. I had no clue what this guy had just asked me. Out of fear that he wouldn’t cut my hair short enough, I answered, “Sure.”
A lady then got up and walked over to me and started cutting and filing my finger-nails. The barber had asked me if I wanted a manicure. I figured since I’ve been biting my nails off for about two years that I might as well. My fingernails were very short… but my hair wasn’t. I won’t get another manicure however, because it caused all sorts of havoc with scratching, picking scabs and opening soda cans.
Tags: Coffee, Kimchi Chronicles, Korea