A.C. Ahn's Blog, page 6

Shifting Tracks

The porch stretches forward, sticking out beyond the neighboring houses by two and a half yards, reaching for the edge of the sidewalk like an old man reaching for his toes. An extended roof shades most of the wooden floorboards from what the townsfolk refer to as the “Tears of God.” The rain pounds on the misaligned house, as if trying to tear it down for being different, out of line—more than ordinary.The proud porch supports the rocking of an antique chair, occupied by a veteran just as dilapidated and frail. The veteran’s drooping eyes gently close as he brings the remains of a cheap cigar to the edge of his shriveled mouth. He inhales slowly, flings the stub into a ceramic pot, and engages in a terrible coughing fit, drown out by the rain and heard only within the rectangular prism of the porch.“You should really give that a rest,” says Peter while leaning against the front rails of the deck, staring out across the filmy street. His dark hair gleams with fresh droplets of heavy rain.“Never,” says Barry after finally conquering his hacking reflex. “They’re the only things that make this damn life worth living.” He pauses, as if contemplating, and adds: “That and golf.”The chair reestablishes its tempo, rocking back and forth, perpendicular to the lines of the planked flooring. Peter turns around and faces the gray-haired veteran, who, compared to two decades ago, appears dwarfed in his rocking chair. The tips of Barry’s sandals barely graze the floor and his shoulders stoop well below the head of the chair.“You remember, Barry?” says Peter. His clear blue eyes drift towards the veteran’s new sandals. “You remember way back, on this very porch, when you convinced me to marry her?”Barry nods. “Yeah, I remember.”“And you brought up some crap about God lending good looks, and how personality is the most important thing about a person. That personality is something that can’t be taken away from you, and how it’s something that will always be yours 'til the end of time. And you told me—you were sitting right there and I was standing exactly right here—and you told me to marry her because she has a great personality, a certain kind of understanding.”“And I wasn’t wrong, was I?” The rocking slows to a halt. “You and Jenny were the happiest young couple that I’ve ever seen.”Peter quickly turns around, slapping one hand on a wooden beam with the other buried in his pocket. Barry reaches for a small box, embroidered with meticulous carvings of elks and trees. He procures a cigarette and a cigar, sticking the latter in his mouth while holding out the cigarette in his relaxed hand.“How about a smoke, son?”Peter returns his gaze on the street. “I quit, Barry, remember?”“Yeah, I guess you did,” Barry says, fumbling with his cigar cutter.After several failed attempts, he eventually snips the cigar to his satisfaction and lights it. A green sedan drives by, splashing water collected in the holes on the street. Peter flinches and retreats a couple of steps.“I’m sorry about what happened between you and my Jenny,” says Barry. He attempts to get up from his seat, thinks better of it, and slides back into what many believe will be his final resting position. He draws deep from his cigar. “But ain’t that the gamble you took when you married her? That’s the gamble everyone takes in that chapter of their lives. As time goes on, people change. Not drastically, but just a lil’ bit. You can feel it more than you can see it, really. What they want in life. What they want in a partner. What they can’t put up with anymore. Their priorities, their goals and dreams. You can’t ignore it, it’s a damn given.“Only the lucky ones shift together, like two metal rails of a single train track, diverging while also staying steady on the same path; the wooden boards keeping’em together and balancing out the tolls of their marriage.” He breaks off to puff his cigar and continues. "But for most of us, for everyone else, our tracks split apart, the boards aren’t strong enough to dampen the tremors, and an inevitable train wreck awaits.”Barry runs his cigar past the embroidered box and crashes it into a speckled ashtray, killing the embers within. Thin, black smoke escapes from the wreckage. Peter shakes the water out of his hair with his hands and turns back around.“You know what, old man,” he says with a weak smile, “I think I’m starting to get what you’re talking about.”The eighty-five-year-old veteran salvages his cigar with a flick of his wrist and a spark from his lighter.“Well, it’s about damn time, Peter. ‘Bout damn time.”

Chad’s Coffee Cozy Collection (CCCC)

During my time in Korea, I developed a taste for coffee, mainly because Seoul is littered with cafes. On some streets, that’s all there is—cafes with multiple floors, selling sweets and coffee. And the coffee isn’t cheap, mind you. Most of the time, a cup of coffee is around ₩5,000 (about $4.50), and some locations they don’t even sell large sizes! While certain people spend their money on “drinks,” I spend mine on coffee.One day, while strolling with a latte (my usual drink of choice), I decided to pocket the cardboard cozy around my cup and recycle the rest. When I got home, I wrote the date on the inside, along with the names of whomever I had coffee with. (On most of them I simply wrote “me.” Sad, I know.) Before I knew it, I had collected a tower of coffee cozies from all sorts of cafes (yes, including Starbucks, and unfortunately not including the times I drank “for here”). And like the rings of a tree trunk, the layers of cozies began to tell stories: with whom I hung out with frequently, which areas I visited often, days when I felt adventurous to try something new… even the changing of seasons just from the designs alone. Each cozy represents a separate memory, stacked and combined to tell a chunk of my life. It’s a journal, story, and art all in one!The whole project sort of reminds me of what Junot Díaz had to say about short stories:“…What a short story does is, it more realistically mirrors what it means to live in the real, where sometimes we feel our lives are divided by chapters. Where we remember a person that we used to love, and in that moment they were everything, and now they are completely gone from us. You remember a town where you went to college, and while you were living there in college it meant everything to you, and now you are far away and you haven’t thought about it in forever. In a short story collection I feel like it mirrors the internal succession of worlds that many of us have within ourselves… the short story has a lot more punch for what it means to live in a world where many of our choices are final and end way before we’re ready for them to end.”It’s pretty obvious that when I moved back to California, there was an abrupt change to the cozies from intricate designs to generic brown paper. I wasn’t ready to give it up: the lifestyle, the culture, the colorful cozies. I wasn’t 100% ready to leave. But I’m glad I documented my time there, and I know I’ll be back.I just wish it was the norm in America to have nice designs on coffee cozies as well.--Years later, CCCC has grown to surpass the ceiling.

Congratulations!

In the late night of December 22nd (2014), I decided to take a break from Korean films to watch a British drama/comedy, Happy-Go-Lucky. I picked out this movie because it stars one of my favorite Hollywood actress, Sally Hawkins. (I thought she was amazing in Blue Jasmine, but let me stop myself and save this for another post). And it was one of those films filled with intense drama that made me think of how volatile life can be—it all really depends on your personality and outlook. So I went to sleep, feeling both enlightened and satisfied. Little did I know I would soon receive an email that didn’t start off with “Thank you for sending us…” and end with “…We wish you the best of luck…”I checked my email first thing upon waking up and I, like, couldn’t even; it just didn’t seem real. I was expecting another rejection letter, but this one started with “Congratulations!” It’s such a strange feeling, because a couple of months back, I thought if I win a competition or get published, then that’s it, I’m set. But it doesn’t really work like that, does it? I realized that this email was just a confirmation that my writing isn’t just personal crap that only Alex and I view in the highest esteem. (Most writers probably know what I mean, the feeling that something you type down can’t possible be any good, because it’s something YOU typed yourself. But to see “The Dragon and the Snake,” one of my precious compositions (if not the most precious... Gollum, Gollum), labeled as the best crime story in the Writer’s Digest Popular Fiction Awards was an immense boost in reassurance. However, I already feel the confidence in my writing slipping away as I type these words.If my story won, then how good were the others? How many stories did I beat and dreams did I keep caged down to perhaps never see any sort of much-needed recognition? What made the judges choose MY story?But you can’t really think these thoughts, can you, or else it’d be an insult to all of the other writers. But at the same time, I didn’t want the win to get to my head and elate it. And so I read through my story, many many times. The first time I read it, I thought, did I really write this? I knew that my sense of judgement was a bit skewed now that “The Dragon and the Snake” won such a huge competition. But each time I read through it, I understood that it’s not perfect, and that perhaps an extra paragraph or two would have given it more sustenance. But if you start thinking like that, then really, in the end, no piece of writing is perfect. You’ll end up analyzing specific word choices and sentence structures everywhere. EVERYWHERE. At some point, the story has to be “complete” and I’m just glad that my story “completed” as it did.The first hurdle is always the most challenging to overcome, and now that my jumping legs are loose and have tasted that angle of success, I know I can get into the rhythm of it and eventually end up crossing hurdles that I’ve never imagined that I could conquer. Something I wrote brought in money, so I guess good old Stevie King now considers me as a respected writer. But the money is not important here—it’s all about the prestige and the realization that success in writing is actually possible. So make sure to fall asleep with a happy outlook on life, because apparently positive vibes can attract positive outcomes. Who knew?

Lol 3 – gobbledeegoop

They met at 2:00 P.M. at the only diner downtown. It was your typical prefabricated restaurant, with a counter, a casual atmosphere, and classic American meals. The AD Carry loved this place for two reasons. 1. It opens very late. Very, very late. Sometimes late enough for him to get a hot snack after a weekend gaming session before bed. 2. It is located only one block away from where he lives.  The twins’ apartment is on the other side of town. They still managed to arrive a good ten minutes early since the Jungler made sure his brother was ready to leave at half past one to give them enough time to find parking. They decided to walk a block down and wait for the AD Carry outside his building since they thought they might get better service if the AD Carry represented the group.

The Whisperer

The harsh winds blew past me, whispering in my ears. Today’s the day, they told me. I shut them out with both hands, but through the cracks between my thin fingers, their words leaked through. Today’s the day, Peter. Today’s the day.I continued down the deserted path, ignoring the company of the winds. I tried to put my mind elsewhere, in a world far different from my own. But a canticle of sadness already occupied my thoughts, taking the form of a raucous watchdog, preventing me from entering my reverie. The song spoke of the sacrifice of the many for the unburdened life of the few, and no matter how many times I placed myself, I always ended up within the many—the unfortunate, insignificant many. I wanted nothing more than to be one of the few. I did not want to throw my life away for nothing.It was two days since I left camp, two days since I shared a word with another, two days that I survived on the run. I abandoned my gear long ago, with only a rifle and canteen left by my sides. So far, only one proved useful. I had planned to keep it that way.The oaks and pines swayed as the winds grew louder, giving them precarious postures, like drunken men downing what’s left of their beer. I held down my hat and walked on, not knowing where I was headed. You could have called me a coward for abandoning my comrades, but I think it takes a certain intrepidity to journey into the unknown all alone. Bravery gave me a feeling of ease. A little peace of mind is all I ever wanted, but it would be long before I’d experience the quiet.A sudden sharp snap stopped me in my tracks. I quickly took cover behind a nearby bush and prayed, prayed for an animal of sorts to pop out from behind the rustle. But God had other plans for me.A soldier of the opposition emerged onto the path appearing as weary as I was. You could say in a sense that my prayer was answered, for a swastika patch was sewn firmly onto his dowdy uniform. I did my best to keep still and silent as the soldier dragged his tattered shoes across the dirt; but the winds had it in for me since the very beginning. With one callous gust, my hat flew onto the common path.“Was zum Teufel?” The German soldier pulled out his pistol. His voice shrieked at such a pitch, that I stumbled into his line of fire. I immediately held up my hands in the air, telling him to wait. I could tell from his misty eyes that he understood.“Don’t shoot,” I said. I slowly got up with my hands still reaching out towards the sky. I felt the sudden absence of the wind—for the first time in two days, the air fell silent. I heard the irregular beating of my heart.“Nicht bewegen!”I stood still as the soldier placed both hands on his gun. We locked eyes, neither of us taking the chance to blink. It dawned on me how young he appeared with the innocence in his voice unlatching freely from his words. His facial hair seemed plastered onto his smooth face, in an attempt to keep his youthfulness concealed.“Don’t shoot,” I said again. “I’m not going to hurt you.”He hesitantly took a step back with his pistol frozen in place. “You’re lying,” he said with a surprisingly clear accent.“No, I’m not.” I took a small step forward. “Put down the gun and just let me go.”“No.” His gaze shifted between my eyes and my canteen.I heard over in Japan, the government convinced civilians through propaganda that the marines would rape and kill whoever was captured. So the mothers, while crying, threw their children off cliffs and jumped after them to their deaths. They responded no better than caged rats eating their young, despite translators shouting through megaphones not to jump, that they would be protected and given food. People believe what they themselves are capable of—the monsters inside them turn false fears into bitter realities.The boy didn’t believe me, because he himself was capable of hurting me. In his mind, if he didn’t kill me, I’d end up killing him.“I’m like you,” I said, “I’m running, running away. Just let me go, and you can go on too.”The young soldier slowly lowered his gun, his body trembled with a combination of fear and anger. “No,” he said, his voice softer than it was before. “Don’t move.”“Okay, I won’t.”The beating of my heart sunk in, matching the tempo to the hymn in my head.“Give me,” the soldier said, pointing to my canteen. His dried lips bristled when he spoke.“Okay, okay.”I slowly dropped my hands to my side and pulled the canteen off my shoulder. I tossed it to his feet, which compelled him to step closer to pick it up. He shook it in one hand, beckoning the sound of water, and like the oaks in the wind, he bent back to take a sip, only to receive a bullet in the chest. The canteen and pistol both fell to the ground, with the boy following them shortly after. I strapped my rifle back over my shoulder and retrieved the canteen before his blood had the chance to sully its rim. With the last of his strength, the young soldier reached for his pistol, but before he could grasp it, I shot him again, this time through the skull.And like his words, his blood unlatched from his head, staining my uniform and boots.He was now one of the many, dead for nothing. And with his death, I became one more person closer to the few. The melancholy echoing in my head grew slightly sweeter in tone.The pistol was proof of our crossing, so I decided to keep it, smudging off the blood on the barrel. I needed another gun anyways in case my rifle were to fail me. I opened the pistol's chamber and found it empty. The kid was bluffing the entire time! He played me like a cold killer. But then why did he reach for the gun in the end? Was I wrong to believe the monster inside me? I killed a man, because in my mind, he was going to kill me.I killed him, because he was going to kill me.The winds returned as if never having been gone, breathing again into my ears. I welcomed them, knowing what they had to say.“Today’s the day,” I whispered. “Today’s the day.”But instead of dying out from my acceptance, they continued on with their obstreperous chanting. Today’s the day, Peter. Today’s the day.Within an hour after I fired my rifle, I was surrounded by two members from my camp. Officer Brian had the decency to track me down himself, leaving the other soldiers to prepare for their inevitable end in the absence of their dear leader.“Private Nolan, you are advised to accompany me back to camp, where you will be punished for your desertion.”“Now Lieutenant Brian, sir, hear me out,” I said. “I spotted an enemy scout near our camp and chased after him. I did not have time to alert you or the Captain.”“Yes, I saw the body, Private,” replied the Lieutenant. “Quite a number you did on him.” The observing private had his gun pointed in my direction. “However,” continued Officer Brian, “I don’t believe a goddamn word coming out of your mouth.”It’s funny, how the remedy to my previous encounter drew in my captors. With no other option, I followed Brian back to camp and received a brutal beating for all to see. Luckily enough for me, a battle erupted the very next day; I was spared to die at the hands of another. But what my punishers didn’t know was that I became capable of more than just compulsory participation. I fought to kill, in order to survive—I’m here, aren’t I? That day, I eradicated myself of all false fears and drank in a life of bitter realities. To become one of the few—the survivors—I had to kill as one of the many. And kill I did.

Bar Fight

Somehow, Josh manages to place himself in-between Michael and Jimmy (whose name I’ve managed to catch from Jeanette’s repeated pleas for the two to stop), but his intrusion is met with a swift blow to the face. Jimmy, accidentally or not, elbows Josh during the pre-scuffle, sending him straight to the ground. And in a flash, Michael responds with a quick swing to the side of Jimmy’s head, landing him next to poor Kapoor on the floor. A collective gasp escapes from the spectators, and the fight is over as soon as it began, with Michael as the last man standing.

The Assisting Whip

Out in the fields, the sun hounded on the workers’ bare backs, drying up the fresh wounds of discipline. White men dressed lightly with generous hats, patrolled back and forth on horseback, occasionally cracking their whips as a reminder to both the slaves and themselves of the power that they possessed. Whack! Snap!At the sound of the whip, a young slave, no older than 14, collapsed into the very batch he was picking. The other workers continued on, ignoring the depleted breaths of their fallen comrade.Whack! Snap!With one final gasp, the boy grew forever silent, as the sun began to evaporate the newly drawn blood on his peaceful back.

Lol 2 – The babies got louder while the sitters stayed quiet.

THE first game they played was always a warm-up game.  It was important for them to orient their thinking solely on the game and forget their everyday worries.  The Jungler made sure to point out any mistake he witnessed his team make.  He was usually very strict with everyone, especially with his brother, but he knew they knew it was better to fix mistakes now than in a real game for glory.It was easy for him to critic since jungling didn’t require him to be in a constant battle for creep score, which gave him a lot of free time to spectate how the lanes were fairing.  This was one reason why he was probably put ahead of the AD Carry as the team leader.  Everyone knew the AD Carry was the most skilled player on the team, but his consistent whining often caused his teammates to overlook this fact.  The main reason was that no one else could control the Mid when he was in full rage.  Of course the Jungler had other duties to fulfill in lieu of being captain.  Someone on the forum put it best, “The game is the equivalent of a game of chess: the pawns are the creeps, the rook is the Top, the knight is the AD Carry, the bishop is the Mid, the Queen is the Support, and the king is the nexus. The chess player isn’t the gamer, but instead the Jungler.”  To the Jungler, this couldn’t be any further from the truth.The next game found them down five deaths only seven minutes into the game.  Situations like this were never a good start for team morale.  The conference call went from a harmonized role call to a dysfunctional scream fest. The babies got louder while the sitters stayed quiet. The Jungler did the only thing he could do – try harder.  More ganks, more pings, more campings, more invades, and even more ganks.  Besides the ganks however, the most important thing he could do was not blame anyone for anything, and after a grueling fifty minutes, it worked, somehow.

Beer and Pastries 3

“Guys. Guys!” My eldest brother yells with his deep, commanding voice, which promptly shuts the twins into an alienated silence. Eugene acts and is built like the ideal older brother of three younger siblings. He is the sole reason as to why my day-to-day experience of public education is unhindered by physically abused peers who attempt to take out their enmity on easy prey. During the fifth grade, I use to have a classmate by the name of Charles who picked on me for looking different. Eugene, who was in the ninth grade at the time, already had his balls dropped, resulting in his signature low voice and the formation of rippling muscle. In his first year of high school, he became the star player of both the wrestling and swimming team. When asked why he never joined the football squad (they pretty much begged him every year to tryout) he would reply simply with “it’s not for me.” And I would have to agree with him, even though he would have easily broken the Eagles losing streak (our school mascot used to be the Bulldogs but was changed due to be too unoriginal).Anyways, one day during recess, Eugene appeared on the playground, grabbed little Charlie by the scruff of his loose pants and pulled upwards, giving the fifth grader the illusion of temporary flight. Tightening his grip, Eugene howled into the boy’s face, asking him if he looked “like a chink.” During this time, I took the pleasure of watching Charles’s jeans grow slightly darker in hue as my brother threw him on the ground and gave him a beating of his life–I’m pretty sure even his own father didn’t hit him that hard. Charles appeared at school a week later, still bruised all about the face with bandages on his right arm. After that, he disappeared, transferred to another district most likely. While I would had preferred Eugene to go about it more peacefully, being a pacifist and all, Wee-wee Charlie was my pass and is my current talisman for a stress-free high school experience. And even though I don’t wear it proudly, it's there, like the scarlet “A” on Hester Prynne's dress (guess what I’m reading in English class these days).

Beer and Pastries 2

Benny is already 16-years-old, but unlike his twin brother, Daniel, has never had a girlfriend. The two are fraternal twins (if you haven’t already guessed), so it may come to no surprise that Daniel is a rather good looking guy with a nice set of eyebrows and is very popular among the girls at Rockridge High. Most of the time, I can’t help but feel sorry for Benny, who is constantly reminded that he is in no way better than his younger twin brother.Despite the size of my family, I have my own room, cozy enough to fit a bed, desk, and a set of drawers comfortably (the twins share a room, of course). I plop on my newly made bunk and finish the tart in a couple of generous bites, ignoring the minuscule crumbs flaking onto the covers. As soon as I finish, my door opens with Benny and Daniel cramming through.“Alright, fork it over,” says Benny, his lanky arms expecting some sort of offering.“It’s not for you, Benny,” replies Daniel in my stead. “Be the older brother for once, yeah?” This flips a switch as Benny swings his arms at Daniel.“You don’t understand, Danny, I never had the chance to be the youngest. Mom and dad never peppered me with sweets and special attention like they once did for you and Eugene.” Even though his remark isn’t directly Daniel’s fault, a wince of guilt appears on the clean-cut face–the bold eyebrows tilting sideways would make young girls sigh. In an Asian family like ours, age holds a heavier importance than in the typical American society. So the four and a half minutes between Benny and Daniel actually operates as more of a nine month buffer between the two.“C’mon, you know they treated us the same. Equally.”“And you know you’re full of shit.”It was typical of the twins to get into such arguments. In fact, they fight all the time, the most amongst the family. Over the years, I’ve witnessed that eventually the twins pipe down and forget about the arguments at hand, until another one arises. The house, without question, would definitely be more peaceful without them. But then again, where’s the fun in that?“God, Benny. You always have to play the fucking victim. Maybe mom needs to send you to see a psychiatrist. I mean it.”“Yeah? Well maybe you should come with me then. Let’s just hope the psychiatrist is a woman for your sake. A gay man would be good too.”“What the hell is that suppose to mean?” replies Daniel, who has a gist of what Benny is getting at.Just when the argument is about to turn physical, a third intruder storms into my bedroom.