On sinusitis and chicken asses - random ramblings of a sick ajumma

I'm sick. I've been fricking sick on and off for a week. My sinuses are making my head explode. They're also making it hard to work and be the bouncing Bianca as affectionately but inaccurately recently dubbed by Clare.
I'll be braving the Annapurna Range in less than a week and I don't seem to be recovering. If anything, every day I feel more and more blah. Before I finally hop on that plane - and what a relief it would be, - there are all these things to be done.

While Clare is happily googling and accumulating knowledge about our trail (I bet she knows by now which village shops on our trail sell the most Starbucks-tasting coffee and where one can find the best quality rugs), I'm trying to keep my big throbbing head close to the grindstone and be on top of my grading. BUT the aforementioned fricking head is pounding and pulsing with sinuses clogged, inflamed and infected. Not only am I a sorry sick ajumma (the picture is actually a bit of stylized me the way I look today), I'm also stressed out (BTW if YOU feel sick of my complaints, don't read, buzz off!). There are more things that have been eating Bianca's berries than I'm willing to share publicly, but I will mention some:

Sandra, my friend, is not coming in February. Instead of rolling in white sand on a Thai beach with me, she'll be rolling in a white hospital bed recovering after her thyroid glands surgery. My own glands have been depending for long months now on the kindness of two then one pill a day of hormonal supplements. Sandra's problem started like that - and look at her know - scalpel bound. I hope to God she'll be fine. She's the most positive person I know, but in her last night's email a bit of negativity was thinly garbed in some short-hemmed humourous lines.

My original degree certificates that must be shown to the Korean immigration authorities for verification purposes have been suspended god knows where between Canada and the ROK. I did the tracking number check: the package left Canada Nov. 29th, was supposed to be in my hands by Dec. 6th, except that it's not. My brother (with best intentions, of course) had sweetened the documents with many, many, many little SPLENDA packages (an artficial sweetener that doesn't leave any aftertaste). For all I know (and fear) the envelope containing these time-sensitive docs is somewhere in the hands of Korean Customs, every little package open and tested for drugs.

In a mad bout of desperation, I sent ridiculous/childish emails today to some contact people at Canada Post and Korea Customs. "Please, sir, baaah, madam, baah, if I don't get the package on time, I'll be kicked out of Korea, and I'll be doomed to teach bratty high-school kids in Canada. Puuuuhleease, do something, get my package back to me." Like they have nothing better to do. Did I mention that the envelope contains my REAL original degree certificates, pulled out of their fancy expensive frames? Am livid with Hansung for misplacing the certified copies of my docs - then again, part of me is not sure:have they returned them to me? am I the one who misplaced them?! Rumour has it that people who fail to present their originals to the immigration officials until Dec. 31st, we'll be kicked out of the country (deported like common criminals, in chains and gagged) or perhaps sentenced to inhabit and till the fertile lands of Deok-do in a manner Australia was populated by convicts. It will be a community of former teachers with false documents. BUT I I am innocent. There are many things fake about me (you'd be surprised!) but my degrees are real thang earned in the sweat of my face and dark circles under my eyes. AND I don't have until Dec. 31st, I have until Dec. 16th. What' s a girl to do?

Hiked yesterday which was nice but cold. Breathing heavily in the cold air always aggrevates my sinuses. No surprise then that I woke up this morning with that familiar heavy lumpy feeling in the head. The area behind my nose and forehead felt as if filled with molten lead. Advil and other drugs helped a bit, but 'bit' is the buzz word here. As I'm typing this I do it with eyes closed (had 2 years of blind typing, thank you very much, and was a blimey secretary for 3 years), checking ocasionally for typos and other nonsense by alternately opening left or right eye. The glare of the computer screen hurts.

I did manage to correct a batch of quizzes (with sunglasses on, paper being too white and bright), but haven't touched the assignments, yet. Brian (the quirky colleague) kindly offered to create a spread sheet for me to easily tabulate all the grades, as I have no clue how to do it (now we know who the real fruit is!). May god give him the best lucid dream ever!

I have a meeting tomorrow with Prof. Hong and Brian. We'll discuss changes in the curriculum that will affect both of us. I am afraid, I don't like the sound of it. Hope my schedule will not be changed too much. I like having my hump day off. No humping, though, just a day off! I have a dinner to go to and X-mas presents to shop for, also need a new backpack and thermal underwear... This on top of having to wrap up the semester... I just don't know how I'll manage to do all of this in the short 6 days before Nepal. For someone who has such a long vacation, I'm pretty frazzled at the moment. I wish I could hire a buttler...or at least a part-time personal assistant.

Just a short week or so ago, Clare, referring to her aching knee said that it ain't fun getting older. I told her not to worry - one gets used to dull aches and pains. Bollocks! (yep, saw B. Jones' Diary for the umpteenth time recently). When I said it I was not in pain, but today I am.

To end on a light note: read yet another unintentionally funny article about curative powers of kimchi. Yep, it's, of course, about kimchi and the avian flu. 13 out of 16 (or something like that) sick chickens got healthy after being fed some agent extracted from kimchi. I hear (am not joking, actually, I read it) that Europeans, especially Germans are examining their sourkraut to see if it has the same miraculous agent). A funny Kyopo guy who calls himself Kimchihead wrote in his blogs how he saw 'chicken asses' on sale as food articles. The most delightfull bit in his entry:"the word for chicken ass in the Korean langauge is "dong chib" (shit house); call me crazy, but I ain't eatin' nothing that's named shit house." Isn't Korean a very humorous langauge? Another example: the word for blister in the Korean langauge is " mul chib" - water house. Come to think of it, sinuses must be called "dongee apa chib" (shitty pain house) in Korean. Suddenly, 700.000 won and many hours of my still somewhat young life that will have been spent on Korean lessons in January make more sense. If only this pain would go away... Pain, pain, go away.... Please. Pretty please. With chocolate sauce and a cherry on the top? What, no? Just, go away, you no good herald of woe! Disappear! Bugger off! (thanx B. Jones, again) Ouch!