BTW- “my OWN money” refers to calling mom and dad and asking for allowance. Don’t be fooled.

Then I saw the ‘minimum payment’ line. I fell in love with the ‘minimum payment’ line. It meant I could throw down $50 or so a month and keep living like a queen.  And, I got so good at that that they’d raise my limit! Sweet! More spending!

Until it got to the point where the ‘minimum payment’ line became higher and higher and I started hating it more and more.

Thus began a downward spiral. My debt was so out of control that I kept it a secret from EVERYONE. I even tried denying it to myself. It was the biggest burden I ever had to carry. A deep black hole that weighed on me daily. Being in debt is not something I would wish on anyone.

Coming to Korea finally gave me the advantage to pay off all my stupid mistakes. ALL of them! So now, I love my credit card again. Especially since it’s a mileage card I use it to rack up miles and points to help fly me around the world.

Knowing I’ll be jobless and planning a 3 month trip probably comes across as irresponsible to some. I totally get that. Especially the way things are these days. Who knows when or where I’ll find another job. But, while I do acknowledge that, I am not going to let it stop me. My purpose for moving abroad five years ago was to see the world. I don’t want to leave here without seeing some of the most magnificent places that are at arm’s reach from me.

I hate that money is such an important stipulation to live these days. It seems wrong to me that a man-made ‘necessity’ like money be the driving force of life. I totally respect working hard and earning your way through life. If it weren’t for my parents’ hard work and their ability to save my bank account ass countless times, there’s no way I’d be able to do what I am doing today. But, I wish money wouldn’t be the thing that limited us in our ability to explore life how we dream to.

Thus, I come to terms with spending my last earned dollars won on seeing this corner of the world. I’ve set a budget that I am DETERMINED to stick to. No more irresponsible credit card charges. And, whenever and wherever I happen to be when I’ve reached that limit, I’m either gonna find a job nearby (fingers crossed I run out in Bali!!) or use those miles to fly myself to South America! …. I mean HOME.  Home.

(After a few months in Argentina.)

What’s that something new, you ask? Well, I too would like to know.

I’d like to have a well thought out plan to my post-Korea life, but I actually only have a clue to about the following three months and even that is pushing it! But, three months is a lot of time to do a lot of stuff and that’s what I hope to do.

My plan is to do this: Go. Explore. Engage. Learn. Love. I’m not doing anything no one before me hasn’t done (wow, so many negatives in that sentence…you get it? aka “I’m not reinventing the wheel.”), but that doesn’t make me any less excited about it.

And, clearly I’m excited about it…I’m blogging again!

First I’ll journey to Hong Kong.

I hope to meet with some friends (currently living in Shanghai) for a mini-reunion along the beautiful banks as we drink a beer and look at Hong Kong’s sprawling skyline.

After a few days there, I’m off to Yangon, Myanmar.

To be honest, I don’t know what much to expect of Myanmar but I loved to read Lonely Planet’s quick take on it. It has recently undergone a political shift and tourism is starting to open up more now than ever before. I’m currently in the process of obtaining my visa and finding places to stay for the first few days and what I read again and again is how warm and welcoming the Burmese people are despite living under an oppressive military regime for so long. I truly can’t wait for this part of the adventure.

When this is all said and done, I’ll head to Thailand to meet Justy and Nicole!

I’m thinking there will be some elephant riding, some beaching, some monkey swinging, some scuba diving…also, I know I am going to do some yoga down south and get me a traditional bamboo tattoo (shhhh…don’t tell dad!).

That’s all I have officially booked. After this I plan to hit up Laos, Cambodia, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, and of course Bali!

At this point, the only money I am certain to have is the amount to get me to Mexico to one of my best friend’s wedding at the end of May. After a weekend of some long overdue celebrating with best friends, I’ll hope to have something to get me back to Colorado.

If not, I’ll be making tamales and surfing on the seashores of Mexico until I do.

***Oh, and HUGE caveat! This is what I WANT to do. Not set in stone. I could jump on a plane with Justy and Nicole and be back in Colorado in time for…April Fool’s? But really…I could. No joke.

I’ve been a terrible blogger lately. I quit this and went to Tumblr and post things that only interest me so I am sure I’ve lost a lot of you over the past few months.

But, here’s a call for you to come back. I am preparing for my adventures post-Korea which begin in one month’s time. I plan to document it as much as any wireless signal along the road will give me time to! It is going to be a glorious adventure and I want to share it with you all!

So come back and check in. I’ll be better at keeping update. Not sure whether it will happen here or there, but it’ll happen. More to come soon.

So, I am switching over to my Tumblr that I’ve posted random stuff on for awhile now. It’s easier and more accessible for me to post stuff there.

This will still be here but I’m gonna give it a go over here and see how it works for me. I’ll let you know if I switch back.     MyJanglinSoul.tumblr.com

Also, coincidentally the official last day of beach season.

-Cooking. I buy all these awesome veggies and breads and tofus and the decide that I want to eat sweet potato french fries or fried tofu or a raw pepper instead of actually creating an entire meal. I’ll eat cereal for breakfast, lunch, snack and dinner instead of cooking.

-Apparently not watering my plants. Or watering them too much. They are all slowly dying.

-Although they could be dying because they haven’t seen the sun in 2 months straight because apparently Korea now has two seasons.  Cold As Hell and Wet As Hell.

-Which means I haven’t been going to the beach.

-Which means I haven’t been getting a tan.

-Focusing. On anything. I have so much to pull together and I can’t keep my brain on one topic for over 2 minutes. This set of blogs is an anomaly. But, to be fair to my disrupted attention span, this has only taken me about 3 minutes.

-Studying Korean. I now lie about how long I’ve been living here so people don’t give me shit for speaking such shitty Korean. I’m a lazy student.

-Anything fun. I’m boring.

So in celebration, here’s one more post about nothing!

Enjoy!

-Crying over the Bachelor Pad (awww, Ames! I heart you!)

-Watching some pretty bad television (see above).

-Reading some pretty amazing books in place of watching bad TV.

-Witnessing middle aged women battle it out in the street. Throwing shoes. Swatting each other with umbrellas. Screaming. All the while their men raise their fists as if to hit them to make it stop. Spectators to this awesome street brawl at 8pm: 1. Me. It was awesome.

-Getting epic massages from my favorite masseuse, Mr. Choi. 90 minutes spent so good.

-Breaking all things technological. Computer: erased. External hard drive: busted. iPod: who even knows.

-Thinking that while I love Apple, it clearly doesn’t love me (see above.)

-Buying awesome baby and wedding gifts for my favorite girls back at home.

-Planning March-May 2012. China, Hong Kong, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Malaysia, Singapore, and Indonesia. Let me know where you want to meet me.

-Oh, and working.

And, yes, that is the poop sign on the board behind her.  I really do have to stare at that all day long too.

THEM (as in overly excited teachers amped to go on this trip):  Please choose the duration of the trip.  LONG or SHORT.

ME (as in not particularly wanting to go this summer for no real reason): SHORT

THEM: Long it is.

~~~~

THEM: (as in every colleague who has asked me one bazillion times why I don’t eat meat) Choose your lunch for the retreat- chicken, fish, or duck.

ME: (flabbergasted that I have to have this conversation once again) I am vegetarian.  I don’t eat meat. 

THEM: Ok.  Chicken it is.

~~~~

Day of retreat conversation:

THEM: (As in person responsible for informing me about said retreat) Did you bring your swimming suit?

ME: (As in dying to wear my swimsuit at least once this summer but unable to due to mass amounts of rain) NO! You didn’t tell me too!

THEM: Oh, that’s too bad.

~~~~

THEM: (As in it’s 10.00am) Beer?

ME: (As in it’s 10.00am) ABSOLUTELY!

~~~~

THEM: (As in lucky enough to know of these sweet ass places to go) Isn’t it beautiful?

ME: (As in wishing my camera didn’t die at our first stop)  ABSOLUTELY!

~~~~

THEM: (As in they who have been noraebanging since 10am) Sing us a song, Lori!

ME: (As in been listening to their noraebanging since 10am) No, thank you.

THEM: You MUST sing a song.

ME: No, thank you.

THEM: No, really.  The principal demands it.

ME: No, really.  I don’t want to sing.

THEM: Ok, I will choose for you. 

ME: No, really.  I don’t want to.

THEM: But, Lori. YOU must. 

ME: I don’t think that is in my contract.

THEM: Ok, ABBA then?

ME:  (as in uber-annoyed and trying to maintain from punching someone in the face, look for Cee Lo’s newest and greatest number in the song book.)

~~~~

THEM: (as in @*#(&%*#^*&) BEER?

ME: (as in @*#(&%*#^*&) ABSOLUTELY!