Kobarea: Music From the Motion Picture

Or: My Year in a Playlist

(Now with commentary!)

Part One: Getting Settled
1. Suicide is Painless [theme from M.A.S.H.] (Manic Street Preachers) [I couldn't think of a more appropriate song to lead into a year spent in Uijeongbu. Also note the theme of this blog. Cough cough.]
2. Welcome to the Working Week (Elvis Costello)
3. It's 5 O'Clock Somewhere (Alan Jackson & Jimmy Buffet) [True, Alan Jackson isn't singing about drinking on a Wednesday night so much as he's singing about drinking on his lunch break, but the sentiment is close enough.]

Part Two: The Hagwon
4. Hard Knock Life (the Annie soundtrack) [It is a pretty hard knock life if you're a Korean kid.]
5. Who Needs Sleep? (Barenaked Ladies) [Certainly not high school students.]
6. Fight For Your Right to Party (Beastie Boys) [These kids could do with a little more fighting for their rights to do anything except go to classes and lessons and activities.]

Part Three: The First Few Weekends
7.Heroes and Villains (Beach Boys)[I would say that Seoul is full of heroes and villains. Heck, even Uijeongu.]
8. I've Got A Feeling (Black Eyed Peas)
9. Fire (2NE1)
10. Woo Hoo (The 5, 6, 7, 8s)
11. Just Dance (Lady Gaga)
12. Gold Digger (Kanye West) [Korean women do have a bit of a reputation...]
13. Bublitschki (Gogol Bordello) [I can think of no song that's more aesthetically appropriate for the post-partying fatigued/semi-hungover English teacher bumbling their way through Seoul. I think it's the tuba part.]

Part Four: The Acclimation
14. I'm Afraid of Americans (David Bowie) [I still feel weird around white people. Unfortunate, considering my current location.]
15. (I'll Never Be) Far From Home (Tiga) [The sentiment of "As far as I go, as far as I know, I always got a place called home. I cross all the seas, it's fine by me, 'cause I'll never be far from home." is something I think I already knew about myself but confirmed while in Korea: home is something I create around myself, not just the country on my passport or the town where I was born or the area where I grew up.]
16. Damn it Feels Good to be a Gangsta (Geto Boys) [Well, it does...]

Part Five: The Departure
17. Changeless (Carbon Leaf) [Basically anything I have to say about this song, I already said here.]
18. Take This Job And Shove It (Johnny Paycheck) [Korea I miss, sure. But hagwon politics? Eh...]
19. Leaving on a Jet Plane (John Denver)
20. I Bombed Korea (Cake) [I did. And I have my beer, and my stories to tell.]

Fellow (ex) expats, what would go on your playlist?