The Way I See It

December 31, 1997

I'd been spending more time on the computer and shortly before my departure to Korea, discovered an internet message board dedicated to male/female relationships. I wanted to educate myself, to understand how to make a relationship work--to understand the woman beast. My upbringing brought me virtually no education in this area, and friends I'd met since my enlistment just told me to get laid, so I figured I could use a little healthy education. In a world of pimps and whores, a man who wants to live above the carnal beast looking for a wet bar to prep for his next orgy fix would need to dig deeper.

At first I asked advice but eventually was giving advice, and then became one of the requested people on the site. People liked what I said and thought me wise. I think it may have been because I didn't call them derogatory names, or perhaps because I didn't approve of the growing male role model--the drooling, humping dog who didn't even have the decency of a dog to let his seed of lust live, but to have its head crushed and brains sucked out in the name of choice, as the political/moral climate was moving towards in the U.S. I was so fed up with the sesspool of filth that was America.

My advice was working for others, but I was utterly alone myself. I didn't want to be romantically involved with anyone while in Korea. Ten years prior, I'd met a lady in Japan, in a relationship that was accelerated because of my short stay there, a relationship that was now ending--it was deja vu.

Here is how I met Jinny Chang (in yellow...she sent me this picture six months later). She was a Chinese student from Hong Kong going to school in Vancouver, British Columbia (one of the most beautiful cities I'd ever seen), and only 17 at the time. She was my very first internet friend. She asked me by-name for advice. I'd read her postings while in Virginia when she'd used a different name. It was obvious she was very young and needed advice--I called Miimii over to read her postings, and we both laughed. We were never parents, but we liked lending words of advice to those younger ones who asked us. Months later, in Korea, I found out this was Jinny. As Thanksgiving approached, I sent her an email holiday greeting.

On December 20, when I was in a particularly cheerful mood and wanted to see Miimii off to Japan for her second Christmas vacation to see her family, a family I'd fought for nearly ten years to meet but was never allowed to, I got a little too jovial on chat. Miimii got upset and said she didn't want to talk to me anymore. She cut me off completely, and we didn't speak again for almost two months. My isolation was complete--it was ironic how I saw this whole thing unraveling in my personal life while I was in Turkey just a year before, feeling more comfortable staying in my tent at Incirlik than returning to Virginia to rejection by those who, at the time, said they missed me. I took over 100 pictures of my family in my bags to Turkey. I'm very visually responsive. By some strange intuition, I took not a single photo to Korea.
On the night of December 31, 1997, drunk from a Christmas party, Jinny and I had a falling out. She said she had feelings for me. I was way older and treated her with respect. I also expected her to respect herself. I guess that's a fleeting quality in a man these days? The whole idea about feelings was not unexpected, but made me uncomfortable chatting with her. I didn't want to hurt her, so I tried to have a serious conversation about her feelings, but she kept ducking the subject and at that point she wouldn't even tell me her first name. Finally I grew impatient, said some things I shouldn't have said to illicit a response, and we had a falling out. I suddenly felt I was chatting with a child and I couldn't have it anymore. We didn't communicate for a few months.