The Funk

Image from Invest Talk Blog

Sadly, this does not refer to a genre of music. This is The Funk, capital letters, proper noun. I've observed The Funk in many of my friends in the past few months. The Funk has followed our completion of a nicely rated two year masters program at a good school which promised to prepare us for fabulous jobs, and settles in when the two years and many hours of resume editing fails to snag said fabulous job. I've also noticed The Funk increasingly in a number of military spouses who are savvy, ambitious and newly landed in their roles as MSs.

Symptoms include: mood swings ("I'm amazing, I'll get this job!!... I suck at life, why do I even bother?"), several attempts to reinvent the self ("Maybe I'll be a spin instructor instead of a lawyer. It's way cooler anyway. Or maybe a chef. Or a Tibetan climbing guide..."), excessive sleeping ("I'm just catching up on my rest from the last three years of crazy... and I have nothing better to do... wow, it's 3 pm.....") and friend/family/significant other/spouse support and bafflement in stages ("You're totally going to get that CEO job... absolutely, you're the best for the job. And yes, you are crazy right now").

I've also seen various stages of grace in dealing with The Funk. When talking to the lucky brutes who landed the non-profit/big firm/dream job clocking 80 hours per week, they marvel, "Wow, you have such an opportunity to travel, relax, read, sleep, learn a new language, take up parasailing, etc." And while those in The Funk most often know this is 99% true, it can't feel like a vacation unless the clock is ticking toward when the fun is supposed to stop. Not to mention vacationing can be difficult with no/low income. However, some in The Funk have managed to seize moments of opportunity, even labeling the nebulous time of unplanned, unending job search as "funemployment." My hat is off to them.

Great advice from a friend and former Funker: Plan at least one thing to look forward to each week other than job searching. If it's a yoga class, visiting a tourist attraction, dinner with girlfriends, or watching your favorite episode of your guilty pleasure tv show, let that mark time in this dreary stretch. Make small lists, check off do-able victories like working out, sending notes to friends/family you wish you had time to keep up with and finding at least one volunteer opportunity to keep you engaged. And know that you are not even close to alone- another Funker can be great company if you can find him/her.

 
Vocab of the day:
Korean: setback = 방해  bang hay (a blind leap of faith into the arms of BabelFish...)
Military: PSYOPS = Psychological Operations (a la Men Who Stare at Goats, or finding a job overseas)


Update! Great article- 17 Ways to Build Confidence While Finding A Job.

Best Free Korean iPhone applications

Image from Kawanet Tech Blog

Deviating from life-pondering and going consumer reports here.

As an iPhone nerd, I've been loving having the iPhone for travel. I'm also hosting a bunch of awesome people in the next few weeks so I got to digging through the Korean apps that are most helpful/I use the most.

Unless noted, these are great for foreign travelers as they don't require internet (i.e. roaming charges) unless otherwise noted. My favs in no particular order:

• Subway maps--  
• BPMetro- Static map, route planner and gives estimated times and cost in won. Five stars.
• Seoul Metro Lite- Static map, but can search for particular stops or nearby stop with GPS. There are many similar, but this allows you to pan in and out most easily of the ones I tried.
• KorSubway Lite- static maps for Seoul, Daejeon, Daegu, Busan and Gwangju
• Translators-- 
• iTranslate (by Sonico GmbH) 
• Language Translator (by Piet Jones)
• both pretty decent, but have their quirks and troubles (left as in left hand or left behind?)
• Phrasebooks-- 
• Vovavox Korean Phrasebook
• Lingopal Korean (great pickup lines)
• Korean Essentials
• Food-- 
• Korean Food Dictionary (by O'ngo Food Communications) AWESOME APP with pics Korean and English, doesn't have all the foods I'd like but it's pretty helpful when you can't remember which jigae you liked that one time. I use it all the time.
• Various Travel/location specific--
• Travel in Korea: Seoul (/all)- I'm pretty sure these are government-designed apps. They have pretty good lists of cool places to check out. I've sused the Seoul (city) and Gyeonggi-do (surrounding province) versions, but if I recall they cover most of the provinces.
• iKorea-awesome
  
  

Anyone want to pay me to review your English-based Korean iPhone apps?=) I'd love the chance to!

Vocab of the day:
Korean: iPhone = pronounced "I-Pohn-ee", yes iPony. I claim rights to whichever band first realizes this is an awesome name.
Military: POTS =Plain Old Telephone Service

Finding home

I've come to discover that living in a place doesn't necessarily make me feel like it's home. Sometimes for quite a while- three months in the current case. In fact, I've decided that the one thing that truly emphasizes the idea of home is leaving and flying into the local airport.  It's that feeling of, "I know this place. When I get to the end of this trip, I'll be in my bed, using my shower and cleaning up my space again." When I moved to Seattle, it probably took five or six trips into Sea-Tac before I could pick out landmarks flying in, mentally drive to my neighborhood and plan my next exploits of going to school, grabbing groceries or coffee and planning a night out with the girls. It's being able to visualize myself in a place that helps solidify its home-ness, and the airport is a key place for me to truly understanding where I live.

For the moment, flying into Seoul still seems totally bizarre- how can "home" be a place where I don't speak the language, where most of my friends don't live, I don't have a job and I can barely figure out how to buy laundry detergent on a good day? But somehow, each trip whether an hour away or around the entire world (see month of June... or imagine it as I didn't post then) helps the relief settle in just a bit more when I hear our talking front door welcome me home, even though I've yet to learn the phrase it uses.

As with most military families, I'm sure I'll learn to adjust more quickly the more moves we make. I can't imagine the upheaval that comes with moving 5, 6... 10+ times during a careers and how the families that don't strangle said career person dragging them from state to state or country to country.

So for now I'm going to settle in with a mug of tea and my coziest blanket for an episode of a crazy Korean drama and be happy I'm home.


Vocab of the day:
Korean: home = 가정 (gah-johng)
Military: HD = home defense