10,000 hits

Sometime before or after this post I will have reached 10,000 hits. I remember installing site meter and getting excited over 9. That was just over nine months ago. A dedicated reader recently asked me to consider how 'blogging' has impacted my experience here. An interesting question that I'll try to address.

Well, I've always been an off and on journal keeper, most notably when I'm sad and have things to work out. I hadn't been writing much of anything until about two years ago after a tough break up when I went through a period of figuring stuff out; what I want, what I care about, who I am. All that stuff that I had never taken the time to figure out since I'd been preoccupied with less important things. So I wrote daily. I lot at first and progressively less and less as things started to look up. Maybe I'm getting off track.

I started to write this blog in January when the excitement for my upcoming adventure was keeping me up at night. Alright, it never ceases to keep me up at night. I didn't at first give the address out to everyone I know because there wasn't too much Korea related material and I didn't want my day to day words to be out there for everyone. But I relished the comments and 'hits' that I randomly received. I liked to be noticed. I like to be complimented. I like to be on display. At some point within this blog I remember writing about this part of myself. Many of my previous jobs have been performance based; swim instructor, tour guide, TA, and now teacher. Then there's the karaoke. I like to be the one who knows.

And having a blog is just that. It's a selfish thing, really, I think. You write and expect people to flock to your space. If I had no readers would I continue to have an online journal? Probably not. Scratch that, of course not. It's not just to keep people that I know updated but to share my experiences which I, perhaps selfishly or maybe generously, think are interesting or useful to others.

Now that I have that covered, how do I think it has changed my experience in Korea?

Without this blog I think I would feel lonelier here. It's been a good way to meet some new people and to feel like part of a community. I also have something to come home to after a hard day of work. It's a responsibility that I make sure to attend to. The comments and emails that come through it mean a lot to me because they make me feel as though I'm not alone. Or as if my ties at home are still strong.

If I didn't have this journal I wonder how my interaction with people would be different. Maybe I'd be more aggressive in building relationships but I doubt that.

In any case it will result in a wonderful documentation of this period in my life, n'est pas? Does anyone know how I can save it all to disk?