Tourist in the UK

I went to London on Monday to get my visa processed. All went well and they are due to send it back to me by Tuesday of next week!
This did leave me with a whole day, armed with a Tube-pass, in London. I decided to take a wonder and enjoy the novelty of being out of Hampshire, and of being a stranger.
I hopped the train to Embankment and found a coffee shop somewhere just off of Strand, I felt distinctly wanker-ish reading my book whilst having a huge cup of coffee, I'm used to doing these things with other people.
There is, however, something freakishly liberating about being in a big city by oneself and having no agenda. I was flanked on every side by suits, students, tourists and workers. Where did I fit in?
Metropolitian life is new to me, I'll have to get used to the crush in a short space of time!

Contracts and angry white pyjamas.

My contract and Notice of Appointment arrived today, it perked me up when I saw the letter with the words 'Congratulations on becoming a successful EPIK teacher.' The last few days were much needed, but my mood has been practically subterranian and a physical reminder of what is to come in the next few weeks was a timely lift.
The Korean Embassy is thankfully a little closer than the Apostille office, so a trip to London will be hopefully a little less stressful. They should be able to review my documents and issue me a visa, unless they decide (and I assure you, with my luck, they will) to conduct a rarely-seen initiation involving a chicken and a length of bamboo that leaves me walking like John Wayne all the way back to the tube station.
I'm all for Korean culture, I've had my hand in a very Korean passtime for years: TaeKwonDo.
I could bore you lovely readers with technical intricacies and history of what has become a truly international Martial Art/Olympic Sport. I need all the readers I can get so I will stick to the interesting stuff, and my own experiences with it.
At eight years old, with a Dad who could already see I was hopeless at anything to do with coordination, I took my first class. It happened to be in the gymnasium of the school I later went on to attend, and if nothing else is certain then this next fact is: I was crap.
It wasnt that I couldnt follow instructions, though I couldnt. Or that I was very unfit, though I was. It was more to do with being a big bloody wuss.
Put it this way; in any activity where the principle aim is to exploit weaknesses in another person's body by using speed of thought and foot (and sometimes just downright scaring them) I was bowing to my opponent and then doing a very good impression of Forrest Gump the second the referee called 'Shizak!'
I had an instructor called Des, who if I'm honest, was probably one of the biggest (but not a patch on my Dad) influences on my life as I grew up. He was old-school, but he had a daughter a year younger than me and that reminded him to include the kids as much as possible too. He'd growl at you if you were being lazy, but would always reward hard-work and this self-discipine he instilled in his students was possibly what made me able to cope with the world at all.
The competetive edge still eluded me, I once entered a tournament aged 13 and reached the final against another fighter who really should have won. I flukily excecuted a jumping back-kick and caught him in the jaw and he went down like a sack of spuds, I then infamously put my hands to my mouth and started apologising to him, forgetting that I had just won a gold medal.
My blackbelt examination was taken at 16 under the jurisdiction of Grandmaster Park Soo Nam, the only 8th Dan Black Belt and 6'5 Korean I've ever met. He was, for want of a more eloquent phrase, fucking scary. I passed, collected my belt and promptly lost all my interest in Taekwondo...until now.
I had a stint running a club at Uni, and of occasional guest sessions at my old club, but you cant go back. Des rarely runs it, and the club has less members to keep it open.
What could rekindle my interest more than a stint in the home country of the martial art?
Exactly, I'm packing my kit, and apologies in Korean.

As keen as Daejeon mustard

My contract has been sent, according to DHL. They failed to give me a reference number, however so with any luck I'll be in when it arrives.
This week we'll say goodbye to Grandad, I'm reading a passage from Corinthians and am having to put my atheism under my hat for the day. Without having faith, I am still thankful that he is now no longer in any kind of suffering and I hope that is enough.
Daejeon, my new home in the ROK, looks to be a buzzing place that is in a premium location as far as travel is concerned. To Seoul on the KTX (bullet train) is 55 mins and to Busan takes 2 hours. Bearing in mind that Korea is about the same size as England (not the whole UK), this is a good thing to know as I might be able to escape over the weekends if I so wish.
Next step: get E2 Visa and buy ticket. I'll worry about packing later.
'Be the dragon that rises from a ditch.'

Two types of news

Sadly, and with less warning than we'd imagined we'd ever get, Grandad Riley died on the 4th of January.

He had been in a nursing home for the past 19 years as a multiple stroke victim and had a few brushes with death since. We all knew he would go, and that with that would come a sense of relief that he no longer had to suffer.

My dad, however, has been hit very hard by it. As you would no doubt expect.

I was never that close to Grandad as a person. It was when I was 2 that he suffered his first stroke, which was shortly followed by two more. He was a victim of his own generation's lack of awareness about excess, as a postman in 1950's Preston, you worked hard and you drank and smoked a lot when you had the time to do so. As with all people, he assumed he was immortal and despite doctors orders, didnt attempt to curb his lifestyle to suit his medical condition.

In my conscious memory I have always known Grandad as he was after the strokes. That makes my grief secondary; I feel sad at the idea of my dad losing his rather than at my own loss, it wasnt really there to begin with. Not that Grandad was entirely absent from my life, he had a charm about him that transcended his condition and would often punctuate our meeting with the words 'Bloody 'ell'. This phrase was one of the few he could muster without too much effort or pain, but it held a multitude of meanings. He could rarely get enough of seeing my (admittedly much better looking than me) sister, and would exclaim his staple-phrase louder whenever he got a proper look at her.

He did have some days however, where he was in pain. And stopping by to see him on these days was the most difficult task ever. My Dad would put a brave face on it and my Mum would be her usual self of chatting and interacting. I was fine as long as I didnt look at Dad. To have seen him in that condition, it doesnt really bear thinking about.

The 4th January was also the day that I heard back from EPIK. I got accepted to go and teach in Daejeon, my 3rd choice. Obviously, I'm very happy. I also dont quite know how to deal with going away a month from now, leaving Mum and Dad to have lost Grandad, and now me.

Whenever I think of it though, I can only summon an image of Anthony Gormley's 'Another Place', which we visited at Christmas. I took a candid photo which I blew up for Dad's birthday and there is something irretrievably sad and beautiful about the similarities of a figure standing and looking out along the bay.

I only hope it proves as a token of my return, and as a form of protection over my father while I'm away.