The Talking Wall

Of all the wonders I've experienced since arriving in Seoul, I want to share with you the most utterly amazing discovery.  Allow me to offer up the remote possibility that God is not a Republican in the United States Senate, but may well be Korean and speaking to me through my living room wall.  Not wanting to offend anyone's sensibilities or come off as blasphemous, I need to emphasize that this is all just conjecture.  But conjecture can serve a purpose.  Columbus thought perhaps the world wasn't flat when he set sail and darned if he wasn't right.

There's a high tech panel mounted on my aforementioned wall that performs a remarkable number of tasks.  It allows me to see who's at the downstairs entrance if and when the intruder buzzes up.  I discovered a couple weeks too late that it even lets me converse with the intruders to identify them.  Early on, I just put a finger to the magic spot on the touch pad and let anyone who buzzed, none of whom I recognized, into the building.  I thought maybe it was just Emart employees popping in to befriend me.  Some of my summoners showed up at my upstairs door to perform legitimate tasks, others didn't.  Who were they and where did they go?  Nobody knows.

That leads to another function of the versatile touch screen.  I can alert security.  I can summon up a brigade of security guys for big trouble or a lesser number for not so threatening disturbances.  I can conjure up a live cam shot of the hallway immediately outside our apartment door.  I can speak to anyone standing there.  I can phone people in our building complex, and once we clear the bureaucratic hurdles of getting phone service, I think I'll be able to talk to people anywhere in the world through this amazingly gifted panel.

This is all stuff I expected when we relocated to one of the most technologically advanced countries on earth.  Lights flash, screens activate, buzzers beep, and I leap up and out of my easy chair to respond to their beck and call.

This is where the mysticism creeps in.  Every time the touch panel performs a legitimate function, the screen glows, and bells and whistles sound.  Occasionally however, since our arrival, the panel or perhaps the entire wall in which the panel is embedded begins to murmur softly in Korean.  No light, no sound to announce anyone's presence.  Just an all encompassing, seemingly instructive, passive voice.  At times, it's nearly inaudible and it doesn't last long, but I press my ear to the wall hanging on every word wishing I could comprehend the elusive message.

I thought I saw the face of Jesus on my frozen waffle the other morning, but when I brushed at it, it turned out to just be frost.  This wall mystery is more perplexing than that.  

What if the wall is trying to tell me something important?  Something life changing?  As if there hasn't been enough of that lately.  I've begun Korean language lessons and not a moment too soon.  I'd invite a Korean in to translate, but the messages are so infrequent and random as to render that impractical.  And what if the wall went silent or is only audible to a select few like me.

Can you sense my frustration?  I'm not giving up.  I'll keep my ear tuned to the wall, continue my Korean lessons, and keep you posted.

Oh, and hold off on the pilgrimages.  I'm not yet really sure what's going on here.