Buffalo, Round One:

After finishing college, I returned to Buffalo, NY with the Iraq war in full swing abroad. I lasted about six months. The problem was that I simply couldn't make enough money to feel stable, and (yes, this is true) I was rather impatient.

Apgujeong-dong, Kangnam-gu, Seoul, South Korea

So, me being me, I decided to fly out to South Korea, where I taught English and did some technology integration stuff with groups of teachers and students. It was great, and I got my first taste of what real electronics markets were like. Here are some photos from my trips to the Yongsan Electronics Market in Seoul.

Bad Shit

September 2nd I got a phone call from my dad while walking along the Han River with my friend Ryan. My sister Victoria had been killed in a car accident. Mr. Han, owner of the school I was working at, got me a flight home and helped in every way he could. I eventually returned to Korea a year later. There's not much I can say about this time that is really worth mentioning. It was very bad. Oh, I was in a car accident, too. My back hurt a lot. It kept doing that for 4.5 years. I don't know why.

Seoul, 2nd Round

Anyway, I went back to Seoul with my messed up back and went back to work. To this day I don't know what was so screwed up-- the lack of sleep, the ridiculous feelings of not knowing if I should be in Seoul or in Buffalo or in space, or the stupid back injury, but I eventually headed back towards Buffalo (one year later) to try and put things together.

Buffalo, Round Two:

I brought my girlfriend with me, and that went badly. In retrospect I'm quite sure that was my fault, weather or not I could actually do anything about it in the physical state I was in at the time. It was pretty crappy. Anyway when Min Kyoung moved out of our apartment, I did too, to stay with my parents. My back was pretty solidly screwed up. Over the next year or two I had and screwed up a relationship with a really great girl (and again I don't know if I could have done anything about it or not-- this time I probably could have, but didn't) and of course moved back out of my parents house because well, yeah, not culturally appropriate in the states, you see. My folks were really awesome about things, though.

Anyway, then one day I found myself in Buffalo, still quite dissatisfied with Buffalo, and the phone rings. Remember folks, sometimes, opportunity knocks and it's just plain idiotic to say no.

Reseurrection:

On the phone was someone offering me a very lucrative job teaching and doing tech integration in China. Somehow they'd heard of what we did in Seoul, and wanted to know if I'd come to China and teach High School History & Econ classes. I knew that I had nothing better to do, and the money was more than fair, and I wanted to get a peek at more Asian electronics markets, so I literally got set to fly out the next day. I gave away everything in my house, and I don't even know what happened with my wonderful cat Wilson, due to some bullshit that transpired with the landlord after I'd left the apartment, my friend said he couldn't get in to get my cat.

David Duckworth, owner of 265 W Niagara St, Buffalo, NY, please consider yourself called out as an asshole, once again.... but I'm pretty sure that Mr. Duckworth knows he's an asshole, and just doesn't care. I don't get it, but oh, well.

China: Taicang Senior High School / 太仓高级中学

If you've never moved to China it's probably pretty tough for me to fully express to you how disorienting a move China is-- and this is before the GFW fully came into play and Google disappeared, all the way back in 2012, when China had a semblance of the Internet and its cultural transition softening effects. The language is illegible (at first-- I eventually became so-so at reading and can speak better than so-so, though I am a little bit rusty.) and the culture is like what you're accustomed to-- except inverted. While the first few months were stressful, they were also really fun. China had this vibrancy about it that I'd never experienced at home. Probably because America is too damn busy blowing shit up with all of our money instead of building it. In a future article, I'd like to take you folks on a tour of Taicang, Jiangsu province, the town I proudly called home for my first two years in China by using Biadu maps, which probably outclasses even Google's prowess in the mapping department-- and accomplishes propaganda goals at the same time! (The p word doesn't mean what you think it does...)

When I said resurrection, I meant it. I've called this "the renaissance in my being"

For a change, I was happy. Every day. I had purpose and a buck to spare. Things were good, really good. I began dating, fitfully at first, since like many other things, dating in China is like a mirror image of dating in the United States, but eventually found someone pretty great. The thing is that the world didn't stop changing. I'm of the opinion that the world is actually changing faster than we are designed to handle at this stage, and the next chapter is all about that.

Education is obsolete (Eg: Jacob finds his purpose)

The second year in Taicang was still fun, but the fact is that I wasn't teaching in the expected manner. I was doing 100% internet enabled classes, and helping students leverage the web to expand their knowledge. Generally, they drove the classes and I coached/guided. This went swimmingly the first year, but during the second there was someone who didn't think that was the right way to do things, and try as I might to adapt, I knew that it wasn't going to happen. When may rolled around and I had the opportunity to renew my contract, I declined. I wasn't really sure what I was going to do, but I'd been learning taobao the whole time in China and I'd bought this:

.... and another six tablets from similar manufacturers, including this one:

....and that's where we stop for today. It's now a little bit past dawn in Hanoi, and I should get some shut-eye. Tomorrow, I'll take you through how I ended up in Hanoi, what I'm doing here and how I hope that will impact Steem and the interconnected world :).

Hint: Those Tablet computers showed me the way to a place called Hua Qiang Bei.....
:)

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But we came to see tits! Show us the tits!

Her tits are not my tits, but they're nice tits anyway, and I hear that the more tits a post contains, the more exposure it gets, so here goes (Purely Scientific test!):

I'd tell these stories for free. On steemit I get to tell them for some cash, if people like them. Enjoy the creative commons licensed boobs above and brace yourselves for the third installment of the world from my eyes! BTW, if you're having a hard time, best advice I've got is to go for something great, and never stop never, ever stop. You only lose if you stop.

For anyone in doubt, here's the cash I got from the bank that is derived from STEEM I earned right here.

This was pretty significant to me: I realized that the world really was changing. The potential of this platform is almost unlimited, and in fact that's the topic of my next blog post, likely to be pounded out right after this one.