Nothing says culture like communal hand ripping of animal flesh from the bone. Why bother with a plate to start with? I would shit a water buffalo if one of these people bothered to use that spoon or fork after lubing up with pig grease.

I don’t know the history of Filipino social trends so that’s the only one I can think of at the moment. In the USA, its currently those damn Bluetooth earpieces. A person eating in Taco Bell, too much effort to stop eating and get the phone? I saw people checking into La Quinta wearing them. Listen…. if you’re staying at La Quinta or any hotel under $200 a night, trust me on this: You are not important enough to need that much connectivity. In WalMart, those big huge ghetto booties with their grip-n-sip of purple drank, got four kids of different races and a cart of generic brand everything? And you can’t be bothered to reach for a cell phone? I think the worst was USA late 80′s when people carried around those car-battery mobile phones on a shoulder strap.

I cope with large amounts of Tanduay rum and take-out food. And mangos, loves me some mangos.

My room was disgustingly foul because the owner thought it would be a good idea to open the back door while I was gone so the walls, clothing, bedding, furniture, every single item is covered in a layer of unsanitary mold. As I sat watching her person clean it, she dares tell me its not bad. Had to throw out a lot of clothing, ruined. Even the medicines in blister packs were molded, which tells me the place was flooded with steam at one point. I thought about confronting her on this but of course, shes Filipina so its automatically a lost argument.

While I’m cooling from the day, she tells me I have to move because someone is renting my room for 6 months. I object about getting kicked out after renting for a year and still having deposit credit: she says I’m not getting kicked out… “you can move to the room next door”… I said, “thats kicking me out!” She thinks not.

Think I’ll be looking for another place to live.

When they called on the intercom doctors or medics on the plane, a few of our eyes met and knew we’d better keep our mouths shut. One idiot didn’t and went back where they expected him to do some over-the-Pacific life saving — what a dumb-ass. Watched her a few times trying to wander off, trying to sleep but not making it, stomach pain…. I knew exactly what it was. This girl was on shrooms at 40,000 feet and couldn’t handle it.

They put her in my center row seating right about the time I started hallucinating tracers from a lack of sleep and too much cold medication. She appeared to be the only one noticing my condition and tried telling me it was gonna be OK. Great, the crazy girl is taking care of me now.

She spoke English but kept using some kind of hand signals to communicate… oddly enough, I understood. She couldn’t figure out if she was hot or cold. I slept finally and we woke to differing movies…. of course, I was thinking of taking her for a mile-high club membership but figured I’d get arrested for taking advantage of a crazy person. She signed her desire for my bottle of Gatorade – I gave it to her. Not because I was nice but ’cause I wanted to shag her in Korea.

Woke again shortly before landing……… she was gone. Her stuff was gone. The flight attendants asked where she had gone to which worried me, losing a person on a plane over the Pacific Ocean doesn’t normally happen.

Korean Air planes are nice and the service staff has got to be the best service attendants I’ve seen anywhere in the world. One note, unless you speak Korean, take your own entertainment. The western movies are in Korean and even the subtitles are in an Asian symbol-language. The in-flight magazines are mostly Korean as well as the SkyMall, which is huge but mostly women’s cosmetics and accessories…. and in Korean. An mp3 player with a lot of blue-collar comedy recordings goes a long way.

The flight back didn’t go as planned so I never made it through Moscow but instead stayed in Seoul overnight and got back a day earlier than planned. I gotta say, Koreans (in Korea) are possibly the nicest, most polite humans I’ve ever encountered. Considering how they act here… who knew? Guess I went from living 15 years in war zones to living in the Philippines a few years ago, and forgot what real hospitality and nice people were like. People in the US are also nicer than here but Koreans take the award, hands down.