They weren't kidding when they told me that life would move fast in college. Why, it was only a week ago that those Koreans sent me a PS2 fishing controller by mistake, and just this past weekend that I got creamed during a tourney at the hospital. Little did I know that my involvement with the Koreans was far from over.

The note should've tipped me off that trouble was ahead. I guess that crazy foreign mail-order place figured out their mistake and sent me a postcard of warning. On the front it had a picture of a monkey with a parrot on his head. On the back was the following hurriedly scrawled message: "Attention, we will be extensive please! Being and being incorrect the controller whom it sends be. The all thing bad person is going now from afterwords you!"

I wasn't sure what to do about that, so I continued with my daily regimen of Virtua Fighter 4 practice. Not only did I set up the controller to sidestep and uppercut with a flick of the wrist, I also figured out a way to drop into the flamingo stance just by tilting the controller down. I wasn't just a badass when it came to the arena... The fact is, a man who has a firm grip and tight control of his rod is also a hit with the hoochies.

Then last night there was a heavy knock on my door. The men who proceeded to bust uninvited into my room spoke hardly a word of English, but their body language said it all. Well, that, and the too-small dark suits, sunglasses, black gloves, and crud-encrusted baseball bats. They closed the door behind them and slammed the bats into their gloved fists menacingly. They didn't need to hand me a business card for me to figure out the deal: This was the Korean Mafia.

One of them spoke in guttural tones, then made the gesture of a fishing controller. The other one snarled at me with missing teeth. I held up the fishing controller and pointed to the TV, where Virtua Fighter 4 raged on, oblivious to the conflict. The two men looked at one another, confused. I pointed to the controller and then pronounced "Vir-tu-a Figh-ter!" Slowly it dawned on them that I was using the experimental and illegally imported controller to play a fighting game. One of the men screamed, in english, "That BALLS crazy!"

So of course they wanted to play me. I guess it must've been pretty impressive, they kept fighting over who got to play me next and game after game I kept beating their asses down, no matter what character they fought me with. Before long they were laughing and patting me on the back all friendly-like. The one guy even put a bandana around my head.

They let me keep the controller. In fact, before they left, they gave me a handful of gold fillings, keys to a black Daewoo sedan, and my very own machette. I'd have to say, of all the mafias in the world, the Koreans are way underrated.