Kingdom of the Neon God – Korean Konundrum
3-24-2013 Jeonju, South Korea The Kingdom of the Neon God – a K orean K onundrum Soul can be so geometric! A glass tsunami....a kinky building or ten. “ And the people bowed and prayed...to the Neon God they made.” ~ Simon & Garfunkel That is what Korea feels like to me. Sometimes I think, a writer's body is like that of a woman – if the old blood doesn't come out, she feels crummy. There's something in a writer's system that makes it mandatory to distill that dry residue of one's experience periodically and let it out into the world. Being a neophyte waygook, I've been observing the ways of Korea with the eyes of a curious, somewhat impartial outsider. And, I must say, I've NEVER been to a country with which I feel less resonance. Not ever. I now realize poignantly my naivete thinking that just because I've spent over a year trotting around many parts of Asia, Korea would be anything like them. Even remotely relatable. It ...