The Seoul metropolitan subway system spans some 287 kilometers of track, linking stations in the Gyeonggi-do province, Seoul and Incheon. An estimated 8 million trips per day on the 10 running lines make this system one of the most used in the world. Despite the obvious crowding industriousness of it all, the Incheon subway system is the single life-line connecting me to the economic and cultural pulse of South Korea – Seoul. And I love it…most of the time.

Every Friday night I travel around 45 kilometers, stopping and weaving through 29 stations and three color-coded lines on the way to my friend JP’s apartment. Though this seems a hassle at 10pm after work on a Friday night, JP is a lawyer. He’s an attorney… This, of course, means his apartment is magnificent. I have my own room, a soft bed, cable television. My apartment in Incheon is a dump. The view out my bedroom window, above the broken washing machine, is a trash heap featuring abandoned motor scooters in varying forms of decay and dismemberment. Stray cats battle for supremacy below my window, mostly late at night. Soju bottles have been smashed, men have passed out. The unspeakable occurs, on a regular basis, in what could be called my courtyard. I can see the Hagik-dong prison out of my kitchen window. On Friday afternoons they perform jumping jacks and knee bends on the front lawn. Next to that the academy I teach at. I don’t want to see these things on Friday night, so every weekend I commit renter’s adultery.

I jump on the Uijeongbu Bukbu subway up to Yongsan Station, then the 6,000 won cab ride to Yaksu-dong, Namsan Town, Beotigogae Station, and JP’s palatial estate, tucked amongst the numerous national embassies and dignitary suites. One nice thing about the subway on this particular evening, amidst all this soaking humidity and the rotten-sweet kimchi fumes, is the throttled air conditioner, especially comfortable when the carriage is basically empty, as it is when I leave my home station, Juan (JOO-ahn). By the time we pull into Bupyeoung, the station connecting the Incheon and Seoul lines and the shopping hub of youthful Incheon, however, the car is at capacity and the A/C becomes a pleasant daydream of stations long passed.

I’m done with Dostoevsky for tonight. I’ve tackled Prince Myshkin and all his ballyhoo for long enough, surmising he is indeed an idiot. Besides, I’m sleepy, which happens every time I step onto a subway platform. Actually, I’m a chronic traveling narcoleptic, passing out in cars, trains, planes, sometimes on bicycles, my scooter, while whitewater kayaking. Invariably, I’m jarred awake to the nasty realization that my mouth has been yawning horribly at all these poor commuters, my eyeballs shooting left, right, left – oop, open for a sec – left, right. Lord knows what sort of stabbing accusations my limbs have made towards these folks, while I wrestle an alligator at the North Pole, or some such dreamscape. If it’s moving, I’m sleeping, and this ride up to JP’s is no different.

Now, picture a chubby Korean fellow, the sort whose chin donuts over his collar, whose fingers are three separate Johnsonville mini-wieners somehow connected by sinew and ligament. He’s dressed in a pink and white striped button down short sleeve, and over that he’s knotted a powder blue tie. This tie is silk, and it is very shiny. His slacks are black and nicely pressed, his shoes are matching. They are Velcro loafers, but still, you know…they match the slacks and belt. This fellow, pouncing down into the last seat available, just to my right, is the bubba who rouses me from my slumber. Dostoevsky tumbles out of my lap, and I say something like, “Gaaahh-uumph…egg…oops.” Actually, that’s verbatim, totally accurate.

No worries. I lean over to stuff the novel into the small Black Diamond pack at my feet, nod at my new seat mate and lean against the corner railing again, a Pearl Jam album helping me sleepily jam out. Ipod’s were specifically designed for narcoleptic subway patrons, a little known fact.

I had just found that perfect resting spot for my head on the shiny metal railing, right in the soft spot located mid-back on my cranium, arms folded politely and nearly asleep, when our man in the pink interrupts me…again. I crane my head sideways, pink-ways, to see this fella leaning onto my right shoulder, jaw agape and eyes glued shut, abusing me like a pillow. His head is actually grazing on my shoulder. His mouth is mumpy, and he’s kind of gumming the seam of my tee shirt. It’s not nice. For anyone. Especially me.

“Eghck,” I say. It’s time to make a move, I guess, but deciding how to interrupt Pink’s insta-sleep is a matter of logistics and careful planning. I have to be gentle, lest something awful occur. Here’s the situation. If I lean back just an iota, kind of sinking my shoulders into the backrest and scooting down in the seat a hair more, he will flounder directly into my lap. That’s a negative. No grazing allowed, no gumming rights granted. Six inches forward, perhaps to give someone across the aisle an enchanting thumbs up and convivial wink – ‘s ok, lady, this happens all the time! – and he’ll keel over all akimbo and sideways, likely conking his potatoey noggin smack and slip right off the metal railing. Neither of these outcomes is desired, especially after I wonder how many times I have caused these horrible moments of desperate decisiveness.

What’re you gonna do, though? There’s no way I’m to let this behemoth enter some violent, or even worse, sexual dream world, treating the packed carriage to some grotesque, debauched parade of pawing and slobbering panting. I will not politely feign ignorance; I vow to not accept this delving into my decidedly American sphere of personal me-ness. Actually, I’m incapable of such acts, being raised a good Midwestern boy to fear all things slightly too near.

It’s not a cheerful thought, but something must be done. With our man still gurgling on my shirt sleeve, I rev up a gentle shoulder shimmy, a sort of hip hop, side-to-side bee bop. Nothing. Okay, that’s fine, I’m capable of much, much more. My defenses are impenetrable, but it’s getting close. Becoming discombobulated, I carefully lean into pink’s jowls, creating a kind of melted plastic tide up the side of his face, and then quickly prod my shoulder into his jaw, not unlike one would shoulder livestock into a waiting tractor trailer.

“Eeeph,” he says. His head gently rises like a balloon in a light breeze, kind of floats there for a second, perfectly flush and directly between his shoulders. It’s a very fragile moment. I purse my lips, eyes widening, and quickly reach down into my pack, searching for something I don’t need. I need a cover for this small act of subway violence…now where is that damn book? Can’t find it. No matter, I’m sleepy again. Very carefully I recline into my former posture, positioning my head just so on the railing, and slowly close my eyes…slowly.

No dice. He’s back on my shoulder like an old girlfriend, gnawing at my shirt’s seam, out instantly. Damn it! So, gunning through plans B to F, I shuck, jive, straighten up, wheeze and gasp and grunt, zip and unzip and zip my pack again, open my legs wide and obtrusively, close them, do a lot of “eeeehhhhhh, eeeeehhhhh, eh eh eh” harrumphing. Regardless, every time I settle for a moment of reprieve, Pink’s lumpy head plops back down onto my shoulder, his mouth opening and closing like a gasping carp. When he begins purring I suppose I’ve had enough. I can’t be expected to handle this. No one should.

Standing up, I grab my pack and grimace as the man in pink whithers into my seat at a 90 degree angle, actually bouncing once. He misses my metal pillow by maybe two slim inches. And in all that fidgeting consternation, amidst all my cunning maneuvering, my stop, Yongsan, zipped by two stations back. Damn sleeping man in pink!

And now I have to use the restroom. Suddenly, of course, I have to pee like it’s my job. So I jump off at the next stop, Seoul Station, hail a taxi, and wanting desperately to take a leak and relax, reach JP’s second floor apartment door almost twenty minutes later.

After knocking a couple times, hopping on my tippy toes and displaying the deformed Oh-God-I-have-to-pee-so-bad screwed up cringe, JP finally pokes his head out of a tiny crack in the doorway.

“Drop off your stuff, come back in half an hour,” he whispers, all gaspy and luscious and obviously in heat. He’s looking love-tussled and happily disheveled, the evil bastard.

“Ohhhh kay. Sorry. Uhhh, I need to see a man about a horse, anyway. Yeah…” Shucking my pack and dropping it in his entryway, body and feet still in the hallway, his girlfriend Yeo Sang peeps around the corner wearing a college cross country tee shirt and big white boxers – both JP’s. She’s brushing her teeth. Giggle. Disappear. Hmph.

“I have errands anyway, you know.” I’m mumbling, urine coursing like Satan’s tears through the pelvic crest and teeth clenched to hold back the deluge.

“Dude,” JP whispers, “this is why you’re my best friend.” Very diplomatic thing to say, time like this. Wry smile on his face, he floats back through the door crack on fumes of erotic miasma. Then he slams the door in my face.

“Right,” I say. And then I curse him a little, but not too much, because after all, it is his door, and his girlfriend, and his apartment. So, I spin on the rigid heels of my rigid body and stumble down the stairs as the bud of lust swoons, opens, and blooms behind the hallway door of room 202.

Just down the alley from JP’s luxury love hostel rests a homely little bodega, where tonight I buy a pack of Marlboro Reds and a bottle of makkoli (unfiltered Korean rice wine). There’s no choice but to wait this fever out – lest I risk peeing in some snooty dignitary’s back lawn – so I take a seat across from the bodega on some red plastic lawn furniture. I pull out a smoke and unscrew the lid of my plastic wine bottle, smiling at an elderly couple sitting at the plastic table next to mine, a nice little twosome who obviously share my soft spot for the finer things in life. They acknowledge me with a raise of their own bottles, and as I raise mine in return I almost spray them with pee. But I don’t. I hold on.

Five minutes later, while a track dog sprints laps through my bladder, I’m lost in a conversation – fully in Korean, with which I am all thumbs – with a break-dancing thirty year old man. He has purchased me a beer, which is the last thing I need, because he wants me to assess his moves. He’s trying to bribe me, because of my presumably evident talent for critiquing the minutia of the break dancer’s routine. So I crack the beer, wave my hand for him to carry on, and the show begins.

JP told me to wait half an hour. Half an hour in Korea can last a lifetime…

Here in Korea, there’s an eight year old in my class. He sits in the front row, on the right side of the class, and he’s always wearing his tae kwon do uniform. Normally white, his smock is stained orange here and dull yellow there, a testament to his snacking habits and utter lack of motor skill command. His fingers are sticky. A filthy little ninja in my class, and his name is Rainbow.

Today we’re reading a parable of familial bonding and oedipal confusion, a child’s illustrated story called “Chompy’s Big Day.” Chompy is a big green dinosaur, the kind stuffed in the third aisle of every toy store, the kind with rounded teeth and full, smiling lips. This dinosaur…everyone wants to pet this dinosaur. I want to pet this dinosaur. I want to sing it songs about those bastard T-Rex’s; I want to offer protection and candies. I can’t even imagine how the kids feel about the cute little monster. Anyway, Chompy goes on a picnic with mom and gets into some sticky business with a cranky Triceratops, biting into its tail thinking it a piece of fruit. His mother saves the day, and the picnic turns out to be a great success, despite Chompy’s mischief.

Rainbow is crazy for Chompy; he can’t stop squirming in his seat. He stands and lisps – Rainbow has a remarkable lisp, and a raking, raspy voice – to read the next page, constantly adjusting his uniform and retying his belt.

“Teasher! Teasher! Me read!”

“Hold up, Rainbow. Next. Next. Okay?”

“Teeeeaaaasher!”

“Sit down, ninja. Wilma is next. Chomkoman (“wait” in Korean).”

Rainbow releases a balloon full of air, squeaking, slowly lowering like a hydraulic automaton shutting down. Rakes my damn nerves, to tell you the truth, as he’s up and down like some bizarre piston gone crazy. Normally he’ll shoot out of his desk as if Chompy had taken a piece out of his ass, running around the class and usually landing on his back and flailing his arms and legs like a flipped turtle on methamphetamines. But not today. Today he hisses and then goes stoic and quiet. And he sits, turning pages to his own beat, absolutely oblivious to Chompy’s great literary adventure.

This silence is unnerving. Silence is dangerous in a class full of eight year olds. Silence is a harbinger of mutiny, especially with Rainbow. Nevertheless, each kid reads a page, slowly, carefully, finger following each word on the page. I love these kids, most of whom really want to learn English. Their progress is amazing, smart little buggers. But still, Rainbow has stopped hissing and lisping and roaming aimlessly about the classroom. I can smell the danger…it is pungent and grim…

And then the rapture is broken, and the children begin a chorus of “Teacher, oh sangsangnim! (“teacher” in Korean)”

“Sam, man, what’s the problem? Wilma, what’s up?”

“Teacher. Rainbow. Look.” Deborah is beside herself, stabbing accusations at Rainbow with her bony little hands. All the children are chirping now, pointing at our man, mouths agape. The silence has broken, and the wave begins to crest.

So, I look at Rainbow, and by god the little deviant has succeeded again in making my Korean teaching career an awkward and hellish landscape. Rainbow is slumped in his chair, a confused grin smeared upon his goofy face. I notice for the first time that Rainbow is a little cross-eyed. I think he’s looking right at me…maybe. Googly-eyed ninja.

Insane eyes or no, below him sits a lake of piss. Rainbow has peed his pants. Quietly. Rainbow peed in absolute silence and thus avoided detection during the act. He also peed on his desk, on the floor; the streams are slowly crawling towards me at the front of the classroom in horror movie slow motion. His tae kwon do uniform has suffered the ultimate indignity.

The kids are beside themselves, throwing fits at Rainbow’s lack of integrity. Chompy is lost to them now; only Rainbow’s pee-fest remains. I don’t know what the hell to do, as one doesn’t want to ostracize Rainbow for sprinkling the lawn by throwing him out of the class, or telling him to go see the secretary. One must be gentle; one must take care not to put into motion some psychopathological juggernaut that will someday carry our protagonist into the throes of multiple homicides.

So, I decide on no action. There’s only two minutes left in class, then Rainbow goes home and the afternoon middle school classes begin. Let his parents deal with it; I am most definitely not paid for pee patrol. Maybe if I ignore the whole mess this will all go away? Yes. It will. Everything is ooohhh kayyyyy…

“Wilma, page 186.”

“But teacher…”

“Wilma…”

“’Chompy ran up the hill…’”

The bell thankfully rings, and I spend my ten minute break cordoning off Rainbow’s desk with newspaper and string, trying to mop up the mess and making sure no one plops down in his befouled seat. My eight year olds’ classroom looks like a crime scene. I have no hazmat suit, I have no rubber gloves. Only Rainbow’s pee puddle and an open reading book, Chompy smiling at me and wondering what a triceratops’ tail tastes like.