seoul society
The nice thing about me making horrible puns using the name of the city of Seoul is that my daemon isn't going to kill me.
One of the strangest things about traveling around Seoul was that everyone kept trying to talk to me. Packs of school children in museums shouted hello's as they swirled past me. A crowd of teenagers surrounded me and I was besieged with a dozen introductions and a waving crowd of hands to shake. A random old man gave me a subway map in English and Japanese, explained it to me in something that might have been English and might have been Korean and which I'm fairly sure was unintelligible to native speakers of either language, and then insisted on having a photo with me. Another random old man stopped and told me six times that my braid was a Korean style from a hundred years ago, asked me three times who had taught me to wear my hair that way, and offered about a dozen times to buy me lunch (specifically steak; I think he forgot what he'd already said to me. Or maybe he thought I didn't understand him. Or maybe he didn't understand my responses).
Perhaps the most surreal was the middle-aged man who approached me while I was resting my aching feet in the lounge of the National Museum. He came with his adorable daughter, and spoke to me in Korean. After I demonstrated that my grasp of Korean was limited to counting to ten and saying please and thank you (granted, I can also say things like "bow to the black belts," "salute the flag," "World Form #1," and "spinning back kick," but these have severely limited conversational value) and waved to his cute, grinning daughter, he went away, and I went back to staring out the window and eating my muffin. Except then he came back again with a different daughter, who might have been cute had she not been terrified, crying loudly, and hiding behind her arms. He insisted without words that I pay attention to this girl as well, and even held out one of her resisting hands for me to hold.
It was awkward beyond my ability to describe. I had no idea what to do. I was so relieved when he was finally satisfied and wheeled the poor kid away again.
May 3: Saiunkoku ficlet; Ryuuki and Shuuei
This was written, ironically, just before someone posted a summary of Saiunkoku book 11. So it's been made somewhat irrelevant by canon. Or perhaps it has been codified by canon. It's hard for me to say as of yet.
The Emperor's gaze was steady and unyielding, and it pierced Shuuei through to his very core. "We will do our best to make sure you never have to choose between your family and us," he said. "But we doubt that your family will do us the same courtesy."
"Your Majesty," for once Shuuei was at a loss for words; the inscribed hilt of his sword dug into his palm. "I don't-- that is, I can't--"
"Sou Taifu once told us, 'never enter a fight unless you know you're going to win.'" Ryuuki turned his burning eyes over the pond, and it took all of Shuuei's discipline not to sag in relief. "We will think about what you said."
Shuuei bowed low and left the garden. The sword the Emperor had gifted him with had never felt so heavy. He unclenched his hand from the guard and raised it in front of his face: the raised iris pattern was imprinted on his skin. A flower, a symbol of absolute trust-- but trust, like a flower, was a delicate thing.
May 4: The Robert AU (or rather, the beginning thereof)
It's rather pathetic to write one's own fanfiction. Notice how that hasn't stopped me. Nghia got to keep his Vietnamese name, though, his honesty always wins out. Emrys is more of a chameleon. And incidentally, I never write Nghia properly.
I remember exactly the way that we met. I mean, I remember every detail. It was one of those hot autumn days where the sky is so perfectly blue, and it seems like the trees in the park are on fire against it. So clear-- but I wasn’t even thinking about that, I barely even noticed. I had just gone shopping for the clinic, and my arms were full of groceries. I was trying to get my keys out of my pocket without dropping anything, and I felt a little annoyed and overheated. Even more so because I noticed a man walking past along the sidewalk. He could stop to help, I thought irritably, trying to balance my bags against the door and juggle for my keys at the same time. People these days, they never go out of their way--
One of my bags slipped, and I shifted to try to catch it, but I couldn’t quite get it. Packages went everywhere, and I cursed, trying to maintain my grip on the other bag as my keys went skittering to the pavement. I noticed out of the corner of my eye that cans were rolling towards the street-- “Hey, can you get those?” I yelled at the man who was walking by.
When I had the remaining groceries settled and picked up my keys from where I had dropped them, he already had the groceries back in the bag. He took the other bag from me, and I let him-- mostly from surprise, because now that I could get a good look at him, the fact that he was absolutely gorgeous struck me all at once. He was much shorter than me, with a slight build neatly defined by an impeccably tailored suit. His hair was longer than the average, confined in a short tail at the base of his neck, and it was that same white-blond cornsilk color that you sometimes see in very young children, straight and soft. He was pale, almost colorless, untouched by the sun. And his eyes-- that was the most surprising thing, because they were a strange mahogany brown, set in a finely featured, almost feminine face.
It must have been only a second, but I felt as if I had been staring at him for much longer and quickly fumbled for the door knob. “Thanks. Here, if you could just help me bring them inside--”
“This is-- a shelter?” he asked, glancing up at the sign over the door.
“A clinic.” I got the door open and led the way inside, flipping on the lights. “But we also serve food three times a week. Here, the kitchen’s in the back . . .” I held the door for him, and he walked past me and deposited the bags on the counter. “I’m cooking tonight.”
“What are you making?” He was opening up the cabinets in the clean but worn kitchen as if it was perfectly natural for him to be doing so. As if he belonged there, leaning against the Formica counter in his perfectly tailored suit, with his neat hair.
I pushed mine out of my eyes and started unpacking the bags onto the counter. “Just pasta. I’m not much of a cook.”
He had apparently already figured out how the kitchen was organized, because he was putting the cans neatly on the appropriate shelves. “Do you have any tomatoes?”
And just like that he took over the kitchen, cooking, all the preparations. Before I knew it he’d taken off his coat and rolled up his sleeves, and he was ordering me around-- not offensively, but with the absent command of someone completely certain of what he was doing. I felt like laughing, but I was far too busy chopping vegetables.
It wasn’t until the dinner was over and I was up to my elbows in dishwater that it occurred to me to ask what his name was.
He arched a pale, perfect eyebrow at me over the plate he was drying. “Robert. Robert Hunt.” He paused for a pointed moment.
“Oh. I’m Nghia,” I said belatedly, offering him a wet, soapy hand.
He accepted it with admirable grace, and had a firm grip despite the way his fine hand disappeared into mine. “Do you work here a lot?”
“Yes, well,” I shrugged. “I started volunteering here while I was going to university and at about the time I graduated the old director needed someone else to run the place. I enjoy it, and I didn’t really have any other direction then. And since I was qualified, I took over.”
“You do a very good job,” he said, and something in his voice told me that he was not the type to give compliments unless he meant them.
One of the strangest things about traveling around Seoul was that everyone kept trying to talk to me. Packs of school children in museums shouted hello's as they swirled past me. A crowd of teenagers surrounded me and I was besieged with a dozen introductions and a waving crowd of hands to shake. A random old man gave me a subway map in English and Japanese, explained it to me in something that might have been English and might have been Korean and which I'm fairly sure was unintelligible to native speakers of either language, and then insisted on having a photo with me. Another random old man stopped and told me six times that my braid was a Korean style from a hundred years ago, asked me three times who had taught me to wear my hair that way, and offered about a dozen times to buy me lunch (specifically steak; I think he forgot what he'd already said to me. Or maybe he thought I didn't understand him. Or maybe he didn't understand my responses).
Perhaps the most surreal was the middle-aged man who approached me while I was resting my aching feet in the lounge of the National Museum. He came with his adorable daughter, and spoke to me in Korean. After I demonstrated that my grasp of Korean was limited to counting to ten and saying please and thank you (granted, I can also say things like "bow to the black belts," "salute the flag," "World Form #1," and "spinning back kick," but these have severely limited conversational value) and waved to his cute, grinning daughter, he went away, and I went back to staring out the window and eating my muffin. Except then he came back again with a different daughter, who might have been cute had she not been terrified, crying loudly, and hiding behind her arms. He insisted without words that I pay attention to this girl as well, and even held out one of her resisting hands for me to hold.
It was awkward beyond my ability to describe. I had no idea what to do. I was so relieved when he was finally satisfied and wheeled the poor kid away again.
May 3: Saiunkoku ficlet; Ryuuki and Shuuei
This was written, ironically, just before someone posted a summary of Saiunkoku book 11. So it's been made somewhat irrelevant by canon. Or perhaps it has been codified by canon. It's hard for me to say as of yet.
The Emperor's gaze was steady and unyielding, and it pierced Shuuei through to his very core. "We will do our best to make sure you never have to choose between your family and us," he said. "But we doubt that your family will do us the same courtesy."
"Your Majesty," for once Shuuei was at a loss for words; the inscribed hilt of his sword dug into his palm. "I don't-- that is, I can't--"
"Sou Taifu once told us, 'never enter a fight unless you know you're going to win.'" Ryuuki turned his burning eyes over the pond, and it took all of Shuuei's discipline not to sag in relief. "We will think about what you said."
Shuuei bowed low and left the garden. The sword the Emperor had gifted him with had never felt so heavy. He unclenched his hand from the guard and raised it in front of his face: the raised iris pattern was imprinted on his skin. A flower, a symbol of absolute trust-- but trust, like a flower, was a delicate thing.
May 4: The Robert AU (or rather, the beginning thereof)
It's rather pathetic to write one's own fanfiction. Notice how that hasn't stopped me. Nghia got to keep his Vietnamese name, though, his honesty always wins out. Emrys is more of a chameleon. And incidentally, I never write Nghia properly.
I remember exactly the way that we met. I mean, I remember every detail. It was one of those hot autumn days where the sky is so perfectly blue, and it seems like the trees in the park are on fire against it. So clear-- but I wasn’t even thinking about that, I barely even noticed. I had just gone shopping for the clinic, and my arms were full of groceries. I was trying to get my keys out of my pocket without dropping anything, and I felt a little annoyed and overheated. Even more so because I noticed a man walking past along the sidewalk. He could stop to help, I thought irritably, trying to balance my bags against the door and juggle for my keys at the same time. People these days, they never go out of their way--
One of my bags slipped, and I shifted to try to catch it, but I couldn’t quite get it. Packages went everywhere, and I cursed, trying to maintain my grip on the other bag as my keys went skittering to the pavement. I noticed out of the corner of my eye that cans were rolling towards the street-- “Hey, can you get those?” I yelled at the man who was walking by.
When I had the remaining groceries settled and picked up my keys from where I had dropped them, he already had the groceries back in the bag. He took the other bag from me, and I let him-- mostly from surprise, because now that I could get a good look at him, the fact that he was absolutely gorgeous struck me all at once. He was much shorter than me, with a slight build neatly defined by an impeccably tailored suit. His hair was longer than the average, confined in a short tail at the base of his neck, and it was that same white-blond cornsilk color that you sometimes see in very young children, straight and soft. He was pale, almost colorless, untouched by the sun. And his eyes-- that was the most surprising thing, because they were a strange mahogany brown, set in a finely featured, almost feminine face.
It must have been only a second, but I felt as if I had been staring at him for much longer and quickly fumbled for the door knob. “Thanks. Here, if you could just help me bring them inside--”
“This is-- a shelter?” he asked, glancing up at the sign over the door.
“A clinic.” I got the door open and led the way inside, flipping on the lights. “But we also serve food three times a week. Here, the kitchen’s in the back . . .” I held the door for him, and he walked past me and deposited the bags on the counter. “I’m cooking tonight.”
“What are you making?” He was opening up the cabinets in the clean but worn kitchen as if it was perfectly natural for him to be doing so. As if he belonged there, leaning against the Formica counter in his perfectly tailored suit, with his neat hair.
I pushed mine out of my eyes and started unpacking the bags onto the counter. “Just pasta. I’m not much of a cook.”
He had apparently already figured out how the kitchen was organized, because he was putting the cans neatly on the appropriate shelves. “Do you have any tomatoes?”
And just like that he took over the kitchen, cooking, all the preparations. Before I knew it he’d taken off his coat and rolled up his sleeves, and he was ordering me around-- not offensively, but with the absent command of someone completely certain of what he was doing. I felt like laughing, but I was far too busy chopping vegetables.
It wasn’t until the dinner was over and I was up to my elbows in dishwater that it occurred to me to ask what his name was.
He arched a pale, perfect eyebrow at me over the plate he was drying. “Robert. Robert Hunt.” He paused for a pointed moment.
“Oh. I’m Nghia,” I said belatedly, offering him a wet, soapy hand.
He accepted it with admirable grace, and had a firm grip despite the way his fine hand disappeared into mine. “Do you work here a lot?”
“Yes, well,” I shrugged. “I started volunteering here while I was going to university and at about the time I graduated the old director needed someone else to run the place. I enjoy it, and I didn’t really have any other direction then. And since I was qualified, I took over.”
“You do a very good job,” he said, and something in his voice told me that he was not the type to give compliments unless he meant them.