The trouble with picking up a little of the local language is that you start to understand what people are saying about you. Wherever we go — at least out here in the suburbs — there's a little ripple of excitement, a murmur through the crowd. And now, with my slightly expanded Korean vocabulary, I can pick out the voices crying out, "Miguk! Miguk saramieyo!" "American! It's an American person!" They are the voices of old ladies, shopkeepers, passing strangers, children. Especially children. Oh, so very many children.

We live just up the block from an elementary school, and no matter what time we pass, it seems class has just been dismissed. A zillion children run after us shouting, "Hi! Hi! Hello! Watchurname? Nice to meetchoo!" in English, and whispering, "Miguk! Miguk! Ishishi seonsaengnim (ECC teacher!)" in their own language. They follow us into the Internet room, crowding around to watch the Miguk type. I'm at a loss to explain the appeal to an eight-year-old of watching someone browse email in an incomprehensible language. On the other hand, I've never questioned the entertainment value of going to zoos to watch baboons eat lunch. All the attention can be disconcerting. I feel like I'm in the movie Being John Malcovich: no matter what's happening or where I am, everything is mysteriously, inscrutably about me. Except I'm not being stalked by Cameron Diaz, which would actually be pretty cool; instead I'm instantly recognizable to children. I sometimes feel like I'm walking around in a Tinky Winky costume, my burbling voice merely tolerable to adults but strangely compelling to children. Parents don't discourage the assaults, either. They may be too polite to clamor all over me and shout in my face, but I think they get a vicarious thrill by letting their little ones poke the funny monkey. Worse, I've had shy children shoved at me by mothers who desperately want them to say hello to what is clearly a hairy monster of some sort, and in this way I have made children cry. (This feels much worse than making children cry in a professional capacity, which I do regularly by insisting that crayons are not for combat and that not just any three pencil strokes on a page qualify as an acceptable capital A.)

Adults are far less likely to approach us; the ones who show the most interest are the middle-aged men who ask whether Jenny is Russian — "Roosiya? Roosiya?" — which is a coded way of asking whether she's for sale. But that's not to say that all adults are clever or polite enough to recognize us as entirely human. I mean, if you were stuck in an elevator with complete strangers at a department store, would your first instinct be to say hello? Koreans don't say hello to other Koreans in such circumstances, but I regularly get a "Hi," invariably followed by embarrassed giggles. These people have nothing to say to me. They are not interested in either receiving or imparting information in a normal human context. I'm being treated like an exhibit, and they only ever ask for the information that should be on a plaque somewhere: what my name is, where I come from. I don't want to make it sound like these are the only interactions I ever have. Some people push the conversations two questions further, asking the purpose of my visit and whether I like it here. And still others actually want to communicate, going so far as to listen to my answers and respond to them. But an appallingly high percentage of my conversations with Koreans boil down to nothing much more interesting than "Malcovich! Malcovich! Malcovich!" Just the other day, for example, as Jenny and I walked home from kindergarten, a man drove up next to us, rolled down his window and simply giggled and stared. When we stared back, he began to nod vigorously. I resorted to my current mode of revenge, which is pointing and shouting, "Hanguk saramieyo! It's a Korean person!" But this only encouraged more nodding, until finally the man smiled, pointed to the sky and drove off. Perhaps the worst, though, are the overly solicitous people who proudly display their English by telling you useless information. The other day we walked up to an Internet room, tried the door, found it locked. A stranger wandered up. "What are you looking for?" he asked in English. "Pishi-bang," I said. "PC room." He stepped back to look up at the side of the building, which was adorned with a very large sign advertising Internet connections inside. Then he tried the door, which was locked. Then he shook his head at us. "No pishi-bang," he explained. This was about as helpful as having a man tell you it's raining when you've already got your umbrella open. But he wasn't telling us because we needed to know; rather, it was because he wanted to be friendly to the foreigners. World Cup was just days away, after all, and Koreans have been endlessly exhorted to be friendly to the foreigners.

Sadly, Koreans haven't got a clue what foreigners want or how they'd like to be treated. They've spent tons of money putting the destinations in English on each bus, but they haven't made any maps, and how much good would it do you to know that this next bus starts in Gumjeong and ends in Ansan? I thought so. Likewise, they've gone to enormous lengths to promote the games, but you can't watch them with English commentary in your hotel room — not even the games taking place in Japan, much less the ones happening all the way on the other side of Korea. But then, you can probably find a Korean who will helpfully flip channels for you until he finds the game on the Korean Broadcasting Service and then proudly tell you the score in English. I guess it shouldn't be surprising that people react to us strangely. There just aren't that many foreigners around — especially way out here in the suburbs — and I admit that I look up every time I catch a glimpse of one, too. But then, having caught that glimpse, I just nod and smile and keep going on my way. Maybe it's a New York thing, this ability to see someone who looks unusual without needing to talk to her; maybe it's an American thing. Or maybe it's something that only happens in multiethnic societies, which means most societies but not this one. Whatever it is, I wish I could explain it to the creepy kids who follow me around shouting "Miguk! Miguk saramieyo!"