Tag: ROKon Magazine

You’d Think I Was Napoleon Escaping Elba When It Comes To A Return To South Korea

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The key thing is — as of right now, there is zero chance of me ever returning to South Korea. I just have the idea of one day returning on the brain at the moment since I’m not getting any younger. And, really, the world is so big that who knows, maybe I might have the means to return to South Korea, only to get distracted and go to Europe instead.

Back when I was a DJ at Nori bar.

At the moment, I just don’t know.

I only bring all of this up because something mysterious happened in my Webstats — someone went specifically to the post I did of me dwelling on what I would do if I went back to South Korea for a little trip. I have no idea what that means. They were in Canada, so it could very well be someone who knows me and is interested in any plans I might have to return to the Land of the Morning Calm.

The thing about me ever returning to South Korea is I would go back without knowing the context of my return.

It could be that it will be a nostalgic, uneventful little journey and I will return home to go on my next adventure somewhere else. OR, it could be a massive clusterfuck with all these people who remember the Bad Old Me giving me jump scares as they “accidently” run into me and confront me for all the crazy shit I did between late 2006 to early 2008.

The late Annie Shapiro and me, back when I was cute.

But I haven’t been in South Korea for a very long time. While I know I was really fucking weird at times while I was in South Korea the first few times….I’ve changed. I really have. All I’ve done the last decade or so is dwell on what went wrong with ROKon Magazine and how I could have done things differently.

And, what’s more, the person at the center of most of my fucked up behavior — Annie Shapiro — has shuffled off this mortal coil. So, really, everyone should just move on and let me visit my old stomping grounds in South Korea without giving me any grief.

I am very curious if Nori Bar is still open. I’m sure everything has changed if it is. It’s not like I could DJ there again for a night like I used to. I’m sure they just use something like Spotify to pick music, no need for a DJ. I had a lot of good times at that bar, I have to say.

Did I See A Ghost?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I was leaving the grocery store the other day when I saw a ghost. Or, at least, I saw a doppelgänger for the late Annie Shapiro. As I approached the woman, my mind was in something of a panic: is that Annie?

The late Annie Shapiro

While Annie Shapiro is the only person I know who could successfully fake her own death, I think I have to accept that she is, in fact, tragically dead. But it was surreal seeing someone who looked so much like her.

Annie was probably one of the weirdest individuals I’ve ever met, and this is saying something given how fucking weird I AM. But, who knows.

The crux of how I think about Annie now that she’s dead is that we never had a chance to reconcile. And, yet, lulz, it was a long time ago and nobody cares anymore.

But I continue to think what happened between Annie Shapiro and myself and what a great novel or movie it might make. It was really, really fucked up.

It Was A Long Time Ago & Nobody Cares Anymore

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The events of ROKon Magazine are pretty crazy. It once took a third party 30 minutes to explain the drama surrounding the magazine. It was then that I realized that the story of that failed magazine was pretty….great.

Anyway. I have Romanized what happened all those years ago a great deal, to an absurd degree. And, really, it’s been so long ago that no body — NO BODY — cares anymore.

But I do think that in a world where Saltburn is a hit, that the bonkers story of what happened with ROKon Magazine seems viable. And, yet, I really digging into what happened with the magazine to write a six novel project that is a downlow screed against extremism in general and MAGA specifically.

That doesn’t stop me from thinking about how someone, somewhere might want to tell the ROKon Magazine story something akin to literally. It’s got everything — sex, drugs, rock and people going crazy in Asia.

I think I need to just be content with the novels I’m writing, though. Absolutely no one cares at this point.

I Really Miss Living In Asia

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The thing they don’t tell you about living in South Korea is there is something of a time limit. But the time limit is different for everyone and you can reach it without any notice. This is definitely what happened to me.

But as 2024 rolls around, I find myself thinking of my first journey to South Korea in the summer of 2004. Living in Asia totally, totally changed my life and world view. There is a before and after, especially once the whole ROKon Magazine catastrophe took place.

The issue is that ROKon Magazine kind of kneecapped me on an emotional basis because once I got home, a combination of grief and not knowing what I wanted to do with my life put me in neutral for about a decade. I had ambition but no motivation.

I wanted to either go back to Asia or move to somewhere like New York City, but I just did not have the emotional strength to pull it off. So, I did nothing. Now, of course, I have both ambition and motivation when it comes to the novel I’m working on.

The problem is, of course, that if I should blow up with my DJ (novel money) and suddenly have the resources to get married and have kids…I will be about 20 years late relative to my peers. And all my female peers would be in their 50s and, as such, unable to have kids.

Everything would be far more complicated than I thought, even if I finally achieved the success by living up to the “potential” that the late Annie Shapiro told me I had all those years ago.

I still want to return to Asia, though. And, yet, if I did sell my first novel and had the means to return to Asia in some capacity, even that context would be different. My time in South Korea was sooooo long ago that only a few Koreans might remember who I am. (Which, given how crazy I was in South Korea, is probably a good thing.)

It’s all very muddled because in my mind, I’m 20 years younger but I’m now reminded on a daily basis that I definitely am NOT that young anymore. At least I’m alive and (reasonably) healthy.

That’s all I’ve got going for me at the moment.

The State Of The Novel As Of December 4th, 2023

Well, If You’re Interested in The Story Of ROKon Magazine, Here It is

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I have noticed a bit of an uptick in interest in ROKon Magazine. What happened with the magazine changed my life. And I still think that there are only two people who could properly tell the story — other than me — Phoebe Waller-Bridge or Emerald Fennell.

If you want to know what happened with the magazine from my POV, here’s the below:

Somehow.docx-2Download

Emerald Fennell, Have I Got A Story For YOU

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m just being silly, but I find it interesting how people are spooging their pants over Emerald Fennell’s “transgressive” movie Saltburn when I lived a real life story that is just as fucked up (in its own way.)

Emerald Fennell
I have not seen Saltburn, but from what I’ve read of its plot — oh boy. But it *does* remind me of how totally fucked up the story of ROKon Magazine is. There are so many twists and turns — and it’s all so character driven — that there are only two people I can think of who could write and produce a movie that properly conveyed what a fucked up situation all that was: Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Emerald Fennell.

Even though I hate to admit it, the only way to tell the story of ROKon Magazine is to use a framing device like that found in Daisy Jones & The Six. And, really, *I* should be the one to tell the ROKon Magazine story, given how important it is to me and my very specific vision.

The closest I’m coming to doing that at the moment is writing six novels that draw heavily upon my experiences in Seoul, what I know to be true from first hand experience at that point in my life.

Somehow.docx-1Download

Angst For The Memories, South Korea

Somehow.docxDownload

It Happened *AGAIN*

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Yesterday, I suddenly started thinking about Seoul again out of the blue. I didn’t think anything of it — I think about Seoul all the time to this day. And, yet, today, I checked my Webstats and would you believe someone from Seoul looked specifically at the “ROKon Magazine” tag on this site?

It was all so long ago. I was very curious and dramatic when it happened, but it was a long time ago and nobody cares anymore. I guess? To this day, I wish I could convey what a fucked up, dramatic situation those few months in late 2006 — early 2007 were. And it didn’t stop there. The drama lingered until around my birthday in early 2008.

I still don’t know what to make of what happened in Seoul all those years ago. It was all so curious and mind-bending. It really changed my life and self-perception.

But, if nothing else, it gave me a lot of memories and experience to use as a stepping stone with my first novel that I’m working on. Much of what goes on in this first novel — which is intended to be part of a six-novel project — comes directly from what I know to be true because of what happened to me in the months that ROKon Magazine existed.

Anyway.

Angst For The Memories: South Korea Edition

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The older I get, the more I reflect on my time in South Korea as an English teacher. The whole hagwan system in South Korea is so fucked up that I worry that some of my former students who are now adults might have some very vivid memories of how weird a teacher I was.

Just the fact that a number of my students from that period in my life would be old enough to be curious about what I’m up to now is enough to rattle my cage. I say this in the context of continuing to see pings to this Website from people in South Korea.

Now, to be clear, I was so totally over the top and whacked out at times during my time in South Korea that there are many, many different types of people who might be interested enough in me to look me up.

It could be some old, long-term expat interested me just as much as it might be a former student. In fact, that was something that used to bother me with a lot of my fellow expats when I was in South Korea — they acted like the Koreans they interacted were, like robots, like they weren’t, like real.

I was always very aware that the Koreans were just a human as the expats and, as such, there was a very logical explanation for why they acted the way they did. That knowledge now leads me to be weary of why I keep getting pings from South Korea in my Webstats.

The good olde days with the late Annie Shapiro.

It is difficult to articulate how…unique…I was during my time in South Korea. I was so fucked up that I ended up in a self-published book about crazy expats. That was tough, let me tell you.

Anyway, I do find myself contemplating at least one last return to Asia before I drop dead. The problem is of course, that it’s been so long since I was in South Korea that things will be dramatically different to the point that it will be very jarring relative to my extremely romanized memory of that period in my life.

It’s over. Despite my best hopes and dreams, I’m just too old to ever return to Seoul and fix all the things I did wrong when I was there as a far younger man. Everyone has moved on.

It was a long time ago, and nobody cares anymore.