Arg...

OK, I should know better. In fact I do... But, I got into a conversation with 3 Koreans, an American, and a Candian (from Montreal). Next thing I knew, I was trying to speak 4 languages. This is not a good idea when:
1) your Korean is 15 years old
2) your French is poor at best (long forgotten after High School)
3) your Spanish is barely better than your French and still very fragile
4) you are trying to learn a language, rather than use the one you know (english

Anyhow, I started slaughtering all 4 languages and realized I didn't know any of them well enough to "jump around." The Koreans wanted me to speak Korean for the French-Canadien girl and then I realized that I had to speak Spanish for everyone there to actually understand me.

One of the Korean guys (after I had told him I lived in Korea for 2 years and after he heard me speaking pretty good Korean - albeit interupted with occasional Spanish), proceeded to tell me about how there are 2 Koreas (North Korea and South Korea) and that the North Korea was different from South Korea and that Communism reigns up North and democracy down south. I had asked him where "in Korea" he was from.

Dur!

Really - I think that's the best word to respond to this history lesson. I don't know why he felt so impressed to "teach" me this, but I had already heard from some other students that he "taught" them the same thing. This is his standard reply to "where are you from?" Naaaaah... He couldn't just say, I'm from 20 minutes south of Seoul. Why? It's like me telling people that I'm from The United States - the colonies that broke off from Great Britian. We're separate contries with separate governments.

Oh "where" IN the US am I from? Well, I'm from one of the western states - added to the Union AFTER the civil war and long after the rebillion abainst mother England. It's in the southwest of the (now) United Sates (once 13 colonies).

Anyhow, I'm being somewhat facietious (ok, sarcastic) but really - I said, "where in Korea are you from?" Why is it so hard for people (he's unfortunatly not alone in this problem) to answer the questions they are asked.