Writing an Article Eats all my Time

May 15^th, 2011

It doesn't feel accurate to say that the day of the 송파산대놀이Songpa Sandae Noli full length performance had come at last because in fact last year we did the full length performance in October, so it had only been about seven months. At any rate, we had the full-length performance.

Observations:

1) So many members from other groups showed up to congratulate the Songpa Sandae Noli folks, including people from Bukcheong Saja Noleum, Yangju Byeolsandae, and Hahoi Byeolshin'gut Talnoli but I couldn’t do more than bow, I was busy stuffing 떡 (a Korean dessert) into bags and boxes. Then during the show I never saw any of those people (I think they all left). 전경욱교수님 Professor Jeon Gyeong-uk stuck around until perhaps halfway through in his guise as a 무형문화재위원회원 – government evaluator.

2) We used the ground as seating to reduce the size of the huge 서울놀이마당 Seoul Noli Madang space. That was great. Everything went off very well.

3) After the show I learned a bunch of cool upcoming stuff.

Then I went home and kept working on the KOREA article.

May 16^th, 2011

For the KOREA article (after a whole morning writing) I went to meet 이정윤 Yi Jeongyun, one of two principal male dancers from the National Dance Company of Korea, and a photographer, 박정로 Bak Jeong-roh who does work for KOREA magazine on a regular basis. I was really impressed with Bak- I immediately felt comfortable with him. Perhaps I just like photographers.

He took photos of Jeong-yun outside, then inside, then we sat on a rooftop there at the National Theatre of Korea and I did a two hour interview.  It was at times hard to come up with what to say-- I don't really think like a magazine reporter and I didn't really have enough background about him-- it turns out he's a real star, but even that I didn't know until I got home and did some more background checking based on having learned that he'd done this major featured performance in early April. Wish I could have seen it. The interview went so long that either I'd be late to Bongsan Talchum or I'd go home and get to work, I opted for the latter. The interview took me until about 5 a.m. to finish translating and editing, although I did take some time off to talk to Kim after she returned to my house (she spent Sunday night with another friend).

May 17^th, 2011

I worked on the KOREA article all day, including doing a two hour interview with 안은미 Ahn Eunme who is a personal friend and a very remarkable modern dancer. In fact the pieces of hers that I like the most are the best modern dance pieces I've ever seen in my attending-far-too-many-dance-performances life. I'd say my list of top modern dance pieces has two of hers as 1 and 2, and then probably 4 and 5 are hers, too. The interview was partially to get ideas for the KOREA article (since it's on use of Korean elements in modern dance and ballet) and partially to see her and partially to see if talking with her stirred up ideas for other stuff I should write in my dissertation.

Promo photo of Ahn Eunme from the internet

After that Kim and I went back home and I eventually headed to 상모 sangmo though I had totally spaced that we now start at 7 (we haven't started at 8 since December) and so I was a good half hour late. Then after a solid diet of coffee all day I was so out of it I couldn't spin properly. Went home, write until 4 a.m. on the article.