Suncheon's drama set getting a workout.

Used to be the Suncheon Drama Set's claim to fame was being used for the SBS drama "Love and Ambition" ("사랑과야망"), but lately it's been seeing much more action. Part of the new blockbuster drama plagiarifically-titled "East of Eden" ("에덴의 동쪽") was shot there this month. It survived. There's a photo gallery here of the modifications made to the set in preparation for the highly-anticipated drama, whicih reportedly cost 25 billion won to produce. Here's another one from February, so apparently they had been filming for quite some time, unbeknownst to me.





I guess they had signs up around town this week, but I must have been sleeping. That one is across the street from Choeun Plaza, at one of the busier intersections in town and one I pass every day.



Interestingly, on the drama's trailer and also on the website one of the taglines is "사랑과 야망, 그리고 복수와 화해의 대서사 드라마!" the first part (사랑과 야망) being the name of the drama for which the Suncheon set is sometimes named. Also, according to the Suncheon city website, recent activity also includes the movie 님은먼곳에, starring the lovely Su-ae as a woman who signs on as a singer and goes to Vietnam to be with her boyfriend. Variety, surprisingly, has a review and summary:

Sun-heui (Su Ae) is a traditional country girl, with a gifted singing voice, who's trapped in an arranged marriage to Park Sang-gil (Eom Tae-woong). Under pressure to produce an heir, she regularly visits Sang-gil at the camp where he's doing military service; only problem is that he's really still in love with a college sweetheart.

When Sang-gil suddenly disappears to Vietnam without even telling her, Sun-heui determines to track him down. Script hardly establishes in its early scenes a convincing enough reason -- apart from sheer filial duty -- for her to persist in what turns into an increasingly hazardous venture, weakening the whole film's emotional substructure.

Sun-heui finds that the only way she can get to Vietnam is as a "consolatory singer" (i.e. troop entertainer), and she ends up in a band run by sleazy con artist Jeong-man (Jeong Jin-yeong), who rechristens her Sunny. With long hair, trashy '70s duds and a buccaneering attitude, Jeong-man livens up what looked initially like a pure melodrama, and Jeong ("Hi, Dharma!," "King and the Clown") confirms his smarts as one of South Korea's most unconventional actors, especially good at comedy.

The band's odyssey from Saigon to the battlefront includes Sunny initially blowing a gig in front of some U.S. grunts but later finding her feet entertaining Korean troops. (American military is portrayed in an unflattering light throughout, unlike the kindly Koreans.) Later reels, involving the Viet Cong and a mad dash by helicopter to find Sang-gil go way beyond the bounds of believability. But then, the whole premise was never that believable in the first place.

Gusts of Popular Feeling should go see that movie so he can tell us more about it and its take on, um, history. What the review doesn't mention is that the characters apparently travel through time in order to bribe officers in 1971 with five-dollar bills from 2001, lol.



According to the set's official site, other recent projects include the horrific-looking 블러디 쉐이크 (Bloody um, . . . ?) which was filmed in July, and 분교이야기. Much to my surprise, Mapado 2 and Once In A Summer (also with Su-ae) were also filmed there. The Suncheon city site is pleaesd with all this activity and plans to play on it to attract more tourists. I can't seem to link directly to the release, so I'll just quote it directly. It's Engrish-y, but take a look anyway:

In May 'The Story of Branch School', in July 'Bloody Shake', and in August 'East of Eden'

In recent day, Sucheon Drama Filmed Location is busy and contributes to the revitalization of local public relations and economy and by the photographing of famous movie and drama.

For the while, 'Love and Ambition' of SBS, 'Summer of the Year', 'Mapado 2', and 'East of Eden' of MBC were attracted, and the movie, 'The Story of Branch School' starred Park, Cheol Min was filmed in May, and also 'Bloody Shake' in July and 'East of Eden' in August will be filmed.

Also the 'King's Man' was filmed in January and is waiting the opening on 24, July that the movie is introduced and Suncheon City's Webpage and sightseeing place are introduced in the Movie Webpage. The movie 'My Lover is in Vietnam War' directed by Lee, Jun Ik was attracted and it contributed to the local economy by using the restaurants and accommodations.

In 2006, Suncheon Drama Set was opened at the land of 3,636㎡ that was the biggest drama set in Korea and could see the phases of the times at a glance, and 420,000 of tourists invited. As the open set, it is attracting the movie interested persons and is leaped into the tourist attractions.

The tourists invited Suncheon give an excellent grade to the fresh impression and spectacular of drama set, and especially, the photographers invites the set continuously.

In this chance of the movie, Suncheon City will reinvigorate the local economy through the development of attractive travel packages connected to Suncheon Bay, and especially, the City have plan of 'Suncheon Familiarization Tour' for drama writers. The City publicizes actively the Suncheon sightseeing places that are the best place of the filmed location such as Suncheon Bay, and Naganeubseong where is traditional folk village as well as Suncheon Drama Set.

Oooooooh, Bloody Shaaaaaake, now I get it! 님은먼곳에 is incorrectly referred to as King's Man, known better as 왕의남자, the very popular 2005 film with Lee Jun-ki. The director of 왕의남자 also did 님은먼공에, so that's probably the cause of the confusion.

I've been to the drama set twice, both in the pouring rain, and have blogged about it in more detail here. The set pretty close to one of my schools, and if you want to stetch your legs you could walk there from Suncheon's New Downtown, but since it's kind of hard to explain how to get there, you might as well take a cab or bus 777 and walk back. It's a neat way to spend an hour or two, so I recommend it to fellow Suncheonites. Except to those pricks who ignore me when I be neighborly and say hi at the bus stop or grocery store. Stay miserable.

That's awesomely bad.

Saw this posted on the "I lobe Konglish" Facebook group, but I'm not sure who originally took it. Looks like it also caught the attention of at least one newspaper and one vigilant Korean blogger.

* Edit: Ooops, looks like andyinsk already did a good write-up on it. He posted it to the group, I just realized.

카라 - Rock U

Well, this video is . . . sugary.



The latest single "Rock U" (lyrics here) from the group "Kara," who added a 14-year-old sometime in the past year. She's the one rocking the shit out of the Blossom hat. It's a break from the gangsta stylings in their earlier video for "Break It." There's a higher quality video of "Rock U" available if you click through to YouTube, in case you were curious about that.

I can't find the exact wording now, but I remember somebody commented in our Orientation handbook a couple years ago that everything in Korea tries to be cute, in the same way everything in the States is "Xtreme" and too cool for school. Korea uses a cartoon to advertise where the US would have a gravelly stoner voiceover, and Korean videos often feature cuteness exaggerated to a sickening degree where American videos would lots of brooding and feigned indifference.

Koreans, LPGA, English.

I couldn't really think of a good title for this post as I'm a few days behind the curve with news that the LPGA will require its foreign golfers be able to speak English by 2009 or face suspension. While I agree that it'd be nice for foreign athletes competing and winning in the US to show common courtesy and be able to give interviews, the LPGA is being pretty crass coming out with this, rather than just circulating an internal memo or whatever it is they do.

The Chosun Ilbo has a pretty level-headed story on it today. An excerpt:

How proficient is their English? First-generation golfers such as Pak Se-ri and Kim Mi-hyun, who blazed the trail to the LPGA Tour, have no problem because they learned English for survival. Grace Park, Park In-bee, and Gloria Park, who learned to play golf in the U.S. and Australia when they were young, can speak English almost as fluently as native speakers.

Some players who left Korea for the U.S. only four or five years ago do have problems speaking English. They have played on the LPGA Tour in a favorable atmosphere created by the first-generation Korean golfers and had no big problems because the LPGA even employed Korean staff for their convenience.

It would be quite embarrassing, I think, if these women ended up not being able to speak, though, given that they've had a year to prepare, have studied the language since grade school, and have been exposed to the language their whole lives. I don't remember where I read it, but it suggested that this English push was part of a larger plan to make the LPGA more attractive to viewers and sponsors. In fact, Libba Galloway, deputy commissioner of the LPGA, said "We live in a sports-entertainment environment," and

“Being a U.S.-based tour, and with the majority of our fan base, pro-am contestants, sponsors and participants being English speaking, we think it is important for our players to effectively communicate in English.”

That business about "sports entertainment" is especially low. First of all, it's women's golf, a popular sport American women participate in, but few watch on TV or follow in the papers. Second, the focus on entertainment has caused problems before, hasn't it, since women's golf's biggest name is Michelle Wie, a woman who stubbornly insists to compete with the men but who fails every time. She is becoming golf's Anna Kournikova, an athlete known more for her sex appeal and celebrity than for any skills she might have. Finally, some of the biggest names in American sports leagues are foreign, players that spoke little to no English before arriving, yet who have gone on to be among the best in their respective leagues. Yao Ming in basketball, Ichiro Suzuki in baseball, to name only two, plus the countless European players in the NHL. Closer to home, Mario Lemieux spoke no English when he came from Quebec to Pittsburgh in 1984, but went on to become fluent, to be among the greatest Pittsburgh athletes in history, and to eventually buy the team. The US might not be the most foreigner-friendly environment---but hey, at least foreigners get a chance to play---but the evidence shows it's ridiculous to say foreigners are bad for business. East Windup Chronicle has a little more on the potential trend toward the "Sexy LPGA."

You'll find more intelligent commentary on this elsewhere, from people who know more about the culture of golf and who are . . . well, more intelligent. What caught my eye flipping through the papers was how, underneath the Chosun Ilbo's piece, was some related articles that ran in the paper. Like I said, their article is level-headed, but I was curious going in since I wondered how indignant a paper could be after writing an article titled "Korean Golfers 'Invade' U.S. Women's Open."

Oh, and of course there's the classic "Culture, Social Factors Behind Success of Korean LPGA Golfers," which we looked at before, and its coverage of why one Korean professor believes Korean women are so good at golf:

Among the factors Shin attributed to the success of female Korean golfers were 1) the Korean "Golf Boom" that began in the 1980s; 2) the toughness of Korean women; 3) the close father-daughter relationship in Korea in which fathers are quite indulgent of their daughters; and 4) excellent hand-eye coordination that is a product of a culture in which women traditionally sew and people use chopsticks.

You all know my weakness, and know I can't talk about Korean women golfers without bringing up this article.

What enables South Korean lady golfers to be so formidable in the U.S. LPGA Tour? It is nothing less than the Koreans' talent to make things skillfully with their hands, a trait handed down from generation to generation for thousands years. Celadon in Koryo and the Yi dynasty are world famous for blue and white china in quality, and you know that pottery involves the same skills as playing golf.

Not to change the subject, South Koreans' special talent to make things skillfully with their hands is also believed to greatly contribute to their making almost a clean sweep of the World Skills Competition. By the same token, Koreans are good at various sports that are played chiefly with the hands: handball, archery and table tennis, to name a few.

Professor Hwang Woo-suk of the Seoul National University who led the first cloning of embryonic human stem cells told in a public lecture that one of his assistants surprised the stem cell big shots of the world with his skills, which were beyond their imagination but actually nothing for Koreans. Professor Hwang, referring to the use of chopsticks, mentioned that the Koreans’ skill with their hands contributed to their success in cloning embryonic human stem cells.

An editor golf fan of an English daily newspaper mentioned that one of the root causes for Korean ladies to play such great golf in the U.S. is closely connected to dexterity, which is also critical to preparing delicious Kimchi, a Korean side dish loved by the people around the world.

Japanese, who also use chopsticks like Koreans, once produced a golf great named Ayako Okamoto, who became a member of the LPGA Tour in 1981 and won 17 events between 1982 and 1992. She was recorded as the first woman from outside the U.S. to top the LPGA tour’s money list in 1987. Among Japanese golfers playing in the PGA of America is Shigeki Maruyama, who is often compared to South Korean golfer Kyung-ju Choi. Despite this, the Japanese do not surpass Koreans in the golf world possibly because they do not attach as much importance to the hands in preparing foods. They use sashimi knife in preparing raw fish, their all-time favorite, instead of directly using hands as Koreans do.

Similarly, the Chinese do not distinguish themselves as much as Koreans in the LPGA tour of America because they do not stress the role of hands in making foods. Their food culture features fire. Mostly they use fire to create taste instead of using their hands. Among Chinese golfers, Hong Mei Yang became the first Chinese player to win a tournament in the United States in April 2004 by capturing the IOS Futures Golf Classic in El Paso, Texas, the developmental circuit for the LPGA Tour.

Of course, there are some other factors that make all the great achievements possible including tenacity and indomitability, two characteristics of Koreans, along with quite a lot of synergy among the South Korean golfers. But without the dexterity unique to Koreans their great success would be hard to imagine.

I'll say it again, that's the worst use of "not to change the subject" I've ever seen.

Tangential to all this, perhaps, but if this story does become big news in Korea---which I expect it will---I wonder if it will call attention to the caps on foreign players in place in the professional volleyball, baseball, and basketball leagues here. Granted these leagues don't attract top talent from around the world, as US leagues profess to do, but I wonder if any outrage directed at the LPGA will cause people to reexamine the quotas in place in Korea's pro leagues.

They got it half right.

This week the Suncheon News called attention to the handicapped parking spots at Suncheon Bay's Eco Museum. The gravel path leading from the lot to the park outside the museum is blocked by a stone stump used to prevent motor vehicles from using it. Hopefully the newspaper just caught the museum with its pants down, since these parking spots are brand new, and I'm sure the museum will figure out a way to remove the barrier. But it's good to see people speaking up about wheelchair-friendliness and making sites more accessible for everyone. I have no idea if the museum has elevators or stairs inside, though.

The weekly cartoon was also used to draw attention to this situation, in a piece called "Yet another obstacle." Whoa, Get it? Draw attention? Cartoon? *cough*

Quite the arresting magazine cover you've got there.

The latest issue of 한겨레21, with President Lee Myung-bak. They're apparently picking up the theme from last week, when the 한겨레 (Hankyoreh)'s newspaper ran a cartoon with Lee Myung-bak as Hitler overseeing a concentration camp.

Remembering mortality.

A sad story out of Gangneung last week, which ran under the unpleasant title "Kids stay in apartment after mom dies drunk."

A housewife living with her two young daughters away from her husband due to a family dispute died after a heavy round of drinking, but the children stayed in her studio apartment for four days without knowing she was dead.

According to the Gangneung Police Station, Gangwon, the housewife, only identified as Ms. Choi, 36, was found dead in Gyo-dong by her neighbor, Kim, at 4:40 p.m. Thursday.

Choi’s three- and six-year-old daughters were also in the studio. Twenty bottles of soju and beer were scattered throughout the room.

. . .

“Choi’s older sister called me and said, ‘I cannot contact my sister and please check on her,’ so I went to the room,” Kim said. “The room had a rotting smell. Then I found the children.”

Police said Choi’s hungry daughters were eating raw corn when they were found but were otherwise healthy. They were taken by their father on the same day.

I remember a thread on one of the forums a couple of years ago where teachers speculated how long it would take for somebody to find them if they were to die in Korea. And, how long it would take for news to get back home. For people without a social network or careful employers, a person could easily spend a weekend or a long holiday undiscovered, their presence unfortunately not missed by anyone. It wasn't but two months ago that Korea Beat brought us a story from the Chosun Ilbo about an American teacher found dead in his apartment, undiscovered for some time to the point that, as the witness who called the police said, "there had been a strange smell coming out for several days." I also recall reading a year or two ago about elderly Koreans living alone who would sleep with their front doors open because, having no spouse or children around, they feared dying and being left undiscovered. Elderly dying alone and foreigners feeling isolated aren't exclusive to Korea at all, of course, but this being a Korea blog I brought those up here.

Being reminded of mortality while back home and how much of a process dying actually is put me in a different frame of mind, pushed, too, by that story out of Gangneung, and I started to think about what would happen . . . if something should happen to me while here. I'm embarrassed to say that I've never given it much thought before. Well, no more Crown J updates, that's for sure, but I of course meant less for the blog and more for my family who, among other things, would have to deal with the hassle, for lack of a better word, of coming to Korea and getting my affairs in order. Under the best of circumstances it can be difficult for foreigners to navigate this country, and downright frustrating when dealing with banks, post offices, pension offices, and the police. For someone who's never been to Korea before and suddenly asked to accomplish rather complex tasks relating to their dead son, I'd consider it about as close to impossible as you could get while still being possible. Complicating matters greatly would be if my death were in any way suspicious, which in all likelihood it would be, because as we've learned from cases of suspicious foreigner deaths like Michael White and Matthew Sellers, neither Korean nor American authorities can be counted on for anything but obstacles and headaches. To say nothing, of course, of any financial burden beyond my means my family might incur should I be hospitalized.

So even though it's a pretty busy time of year now, I've decided that I need to start compiling a guide to send home that will walk my parents (or whomever) through some of the things they'll have to do in Korea to square things away. I'm not talking just about distributing any assets I may have, because for the time being they can handle those however they set fit. I'm talking more about the basic stuff, the things that would be quite difficult for first-timers in Korea, especially when fatigued, under duress, and most likely alone. How to get to Suncheon, for example, from the Incheon airport. How and where to get a bus ticket, how to find my apartment, where to find all my important paperwork, how to get to my bank, how to empty my account, how to retrieve my pension funds, how to mail stuff home should they find anything they want to keep, and who they can contact for help in case there's none coming from my employer. It will take a little homework, but it seems the responsible thing to do. I'm thankfully my irresponsibility hasn't been a problem . . . in this case.

Reminder about your friendly neighborhood teachers' forum.

Back in September, 2006, my Orientation roommate set up a messageboard for public school teachers from our group to keep in touch, stay on top of happenings and gatherings, share lesson plans and tips, and do whatever else people on messageboards do. It's Waygook.org and isn't exclusive to Jeollanam-do or to public school teachers, although I'd especially encourage teachers in the area's program to join and contribute. Now that the new semester is here it's nice to know of another resouce for materials and teaching tips. To my dissatisfaction the first batch of teachers weren't as involved as I would have liked, and in general weren't very interested in sharing, but business has seen some spikes since then and there's a nice collection of stuff so far. Anyway, an online community is only as strong as its contributors, and the more the merrier and all that jazz, so if you're looking for a place to trade and get feedback on lesson plans, talk about teaching, gab about the news, or go to a place a little more civilized than the bigger forums in town, take Waygook.org for a spin.

"He's a little fur ball."

As the proud brother, you could say, of a cockerspaniel-poodle mix, this story tickles my heart.

A 15-pound cocker spaniel-poodle mix named Pawlee scared off a mother bear and her two cubs Sunday morning after they strayed into his owners' back yard.

Whether his bark was worse than his bite, Pawlee's tactic worked just fine. These three bears got the hint and took off.

"We had just let him out for the morning and he ran into the yard and started barking his head off," owner Fran Osiason said.

Osiason said her 9-year-old son, Jacob, went outside to see what the commotion was about and came running back in to report there were bears in the yard.

She was worried that the mother would come after Pawlee to protect her cubs, but the pugnacious pup, just 8 months old, had other plans.

His barking drove the two cubs up a tree, and they eventually climbed down and hopped over a fence with their mother and retreated into the woods.

My family got our cockapoo---brown with white paws and a white chin, similar to "Pawlee" in that photo---when I was ten and he's still alive 17 years later. Cockapoos are not only durable and intelligent, but adorable, too, as are their puppies, so much so that google suggests that search term for you.

If he writes "e'er" I'm going to poop my pants.

Another visit from poet and former professor Choi Yearn-hong, who for some reason is permitted to write free verse in the Korea Times about South Korea's territorial disputes. Last week was a lengthy piece about the Liancourt Rocks, today it's "Oh, East Sea."

Listen, the Japanese imperialists!
The sea is our commons.
Do you know the tragedy of the commons?
The sea makes the Earth beautiful,
Living, Green and Blue.
Do you see the Earth
As we see?

Why didn't anybody tell me the KT was auditioning for the part of "high school literary magazine"? Ironically, August 18th is "Bad Poetry Day," though Choi has decided to celebrate it for the entire week.

Those are some interesting garage doors.

Taken from here and here respectively, these photos show murals of Olympic weightlifter Jang Mi-ran that have gone up in Gwangju's Daein Market in preparation for the 2008 Gwangju Biennale. From the Joongang Ilbo:

With the 2008 Gwangju Biennale 10 days away, the Daein Traditional Market in Gwangju decorates using art from the Bokdeokbang Project. Bokdeokbang means real estate agency in Korean. The team of artists behind the project tries to fuse art with public places.

The Biennale, which I can never remember how to spell, is one of the premier attractions in Gwangju and a top art exhibit in the country, and will run from September 5th through November 9th. I consider it must-attend for people in the area. Plenty of good photos available through Naver and Flickr, including this one:

G-Dragon's not thinking about the children (hopefully).

G-Dragon, one of five members of one of your students' favorite boybands "Big Bang," wore this, um, inspired shirt at the Mnet 20s Choice Awards, which aired on August 23rd. The 한국경제 noticed, bucking the trend of Koreans paying no attention when people wear vulgar English shirts, as did Pop Seoul. Click to enlarge and read.



I caught part of the show on TV at the gym, not my fault. One of the highlights was Lee Hyori performing Uhm Jung-hwa's "D.I.S.C.O" and Uhm performing Hyori's "U-Go-Gull." Video here, while it lasts. And some other guy, like, held a microphone and walked around and grinded the Wonder Girls while Justin Timberlake's "Sexy Back" played in the background, I don't think even making an effort to sing along because you really only hear his voice over the track when he chimes with "everybody" before the bridge. Clearly, as Jin Jun reminds us, those motherfuckers don't know how to act.

That rendition's look, with the silhouetted dancers and the flirtatious runway girls, was *cough* borrowed from Justin's performance at a Victoria's Secret fashion show back in 2006. Take 'em to school, JT:



One more time 'gain, from the same show:



Those with the same birthdays need to stick together.

I'm all for students showing initiative in learning English, but . . .

this seems too much.

Jeon Young-ae, 37, together with her daughter stepped onto a city tour bus arranged for foreign tourists by a Seoul-based tourism agency over the weekend. Jeon took the bus not for sightseeing but to give her daughter an opportunity to learn English.

``It’s the fourth time my daughter has taken the city tour. I am glad when I see my daughter understand what the tour guides say in English and talk to foreigners without fear during the tour,’’ Jeon said.

Jeon is taking advantage of a program provided by Cosmojin Tour, a travel agency. Cosmojin says it sees a growing number of parents with their children participate in the tour program. ``More than 100 Korean children boarded our tour bus during this summer vacation. Students can learn how to introduce Korean cultural heritages in English and they can naturally mingle with foreigners,’’ said Jung Myung-jin, the company president.

More from the Korea Times, including a line from the company president saying they'll soon open official tours but will restrict the number of Koreans. Currently on the English-language Seoul tour site there's no mention of foreign clients being subjected to Korean children, and no advance warning given. Perhaps the practice won't bother tourists in Asia for the first time so much, but after living here for a bit I know I wouldn't want to be used by Korean children and their pushy parents while on vacation. Especially when we're often subjected to "curious" and "friendly" and "want to practice English" students---and adults---whether we're at a tourist site, strolling through the park, walking around a department store, or exercising at the gym, enough that it's extremely annoying and perhaps considered harassment. It doesn't help that so much of those interactions involve catcalls like "helLO" and "HEY" and "hi hi hi hi," or things we've heard a million times like "Where are you from?", "Do you know kimchi?" and "When are you going home?"

The article's title, "Students Take Advantage of City Tour to Learn English" is on the mark with the "take advantage," that's for sure, and I wish the people pushing this forward would take a minute to think about what's best for the paying customers on vacation. There are literally countless opportunities for Koreans to learn and use their English every day, opportunities they misuse or don't take advantage of, and I wish they wouldn't be so zealous to intrude on foreigners like this.

Pretty good turn-out at the celadon festival.

Gangjin's Celadon Culture Festival (강진청자문화축제) attracted some 680,000 people over nine days---the Gangjin Shinmun says 650,000---up from 410,000 last year. That's a nice turn-out for a township that ordinarily has a population of under 2,000, in a county of 41,575.




Helping things, I'm sure, was that the festival's opening night had a concert with SS501, Jang Yoon jung, Ran, and others (small photo gallery here). Yoon Do-hyun was also there, and he's likely to have brought his noraebang-friendly hit "사랑했나봐." SS501, damn, that's pretty big for Gangjin. My students would have been all over that like . . . well, like middle school students at an SS501 concert. Other attractions included fashion designer Andre Kim,




international marriages

,

and white people.





Roughly 6,000 foreigners attended, according to one article, and practically every photo album I browsed on Naver contained at least one photo of foreigners doing something or other, thus keeping alive the belief that having white people at your event in Korea lends novelty and legitimacy to it. I wish I could have attended, but it was held while I was still in the US. The festival was typically held in the fall, and was in October when I went in 2006, and in September last year. Lots of good photos available via a Naver search, and some videos as well.

I've arrived, too, sort of.

It's a big day. Like The Marmot's Hole, I've finally gotten an intro to my site on Naver. I'm happy about that, and everything looks okay, doesn't it?



Could be a lot worse.

There's a bug in Jeollanam-do that's, like everything else, considered good for stamina.

No, not "run a marathon" stamina, but "good for the man" stamina. From KBS, which always seems to have lots of interesting little stories, comes news that the Cultural Heritage Administration has named a type of beetle as a natural treasure because.

A buprestid, a type of beetle with a lustrous color, has been designated as a natural treasure.

The Cultural Heritage Administration recently announced that based on the latest studies by experts, the buprestids only inhabit certain parts of the South Jeolla Province. The CHA said it has tentatively reached a decision to designated the beetles as a natural treasure of Korea.

The buprestids are known for having the most beautiful color out of all the insects found on the Korean Peninsula. The CHA said the species' cultural and ecological values as well as their limited number were the main reasons why it chose the buprestids as natural treasures.

The larva of a buprestid is around 30mm long and a fully-grown beetle is around 30-40mm long. They have a distinct metallic luster. The buprestids lay eggs in broad-leaved trees including hackberry trees and silver magnolia trees and live on rotting tree trunks.

Traditionally, the beetles were used as an aphrodisiac in the southern parts of China.

The article's called "'Viagra Beetle' Buprestids to Be Designated as Natural Treasure," but, as you can see, it doesn't get into any specifics and in fact doesn't mention its medicinal value until the final sentence.

Jeollanam-do already has 877 designated cultural properties, of which 18 are national treasures and 44 are natural treasures. The Jindo dog, though, is the only animal or insect on the list, with most other natural treasures in the province being trees, breeding grounds, or areas used by migratory birds. And if I'm reading it right, it looks like Jeollanam-do has fifteen "cancelled" natural treasures. You can generate a variety of lists by playing around with the search engine on the CHA's English-language site, and can get a county-by-county list here. Suncheon has a whopping 106 designated cultural properties, a province high by a wide margin. Most of them are at Seonamsa and Songgwangsa temples and Nagan Fortress, although what's interesting is how many you'll happen across while wondering through older neighborhoods. That site is pretty Engrishy, though, and one of the most annoying habits on it is how it writes the names of the properties phonetically in "English" without using spaces. For example, using Songgwangsamyobeobyeonhwagyeonggwanseeumbosalbomunpumsamhyeonwonchangwamun to name a particular portion of a prayer book kept at Songgwangsa temple. In my experience the best source of information for cultural properties, at least at smaller sites you'll find throughout Jeollanam-do, are the plaques you'll invariably find in front of each site.

Because I don't want to devote a whole 'nother post to it, I'll just mention here that KBS also has another article about Jeollanam-do on its front page, this one about how Haenam county has posted signs directing pilgrims to its Ttangkkeut Village, located at the peninsula's southern-most point. In what's becoming a disappointing trend in KBS stories, the article doesn't mention who these pilgrims are or what they're doing or why they're doing it or even where Haenam is.

Haenam County recently warmed the hearts of Koreans by installing large sign boards along a pilgrimage route with words of encouragement for the pilgrims. A total of 20 signboards have been set up every 5 km along the route from the village of Ttanggeut, which literally means the "end of the earth," in the direction of Gangjin and Yeongam.

Haenam County's heartwarming project is a part of efforts to establish the village of Ttanggeut as the mecca of Korean pilgrimages. Each signboard bears motivational phrases such as "You are the symbol of new hope" and "May you, who challenge the impossible, have an iron will."

Pilgrims say that the signboards have been immensely encouraging and have contributed to adding enjoyment to their hard but meaningful journey. They also thanked the county for providing them with fresh drinking water along the way.

In addition to the encouraging words and fresh drinking water, the residents of Haenam County have also opened their schools and their civic centers as accommocations for the walking travelers and have even provided them with various goods.

As of August, some 3,000 pilgrims from 40 organizations have visited the Ttanggeut village in Haenam as part of their nationwide pilgrimage trips.

Seriously, after reading that I'd like to learn a little more about what's going on. I had to chuckle about Haenam becoming the "mecca" of pilgrammages---no doubt an Islam-free Mecca---in the familiar spirit of hyperbole and exaggeration, and at the phrases like "May you, who challenge the impossible, have an iron will" that appeared in the article. The phrase written on the signboard in the article's picture? 여러분 화이팅! Navering "국토 종단" tells me that people are travelling across the country, but for what purpose I have no idea. Another signboard:

Would you let this man write poetry?

Somebody did. Ooooo, that's bad. That's "paint your nails black and draw pentagrams on your math notebook" bad. Our old friend has visited us before, most recently with his opinion piece on the territorial dispute between Japan and Korea, with the basic thesis of "Dokdo is ours because Japan is bad," in which he said the current crisis ought to have the same urgency for Americans as the rise of Hitler. In another article on the topic (see a trend?):

Fairness should be derived from the political history of the land and the sea, and historic international relations between countries. The Sea of Japan and the East Sea are the two legitimate names of the waters between Japan and Korea. The Sea of Japan, eliminating the East Sea, has been the prevailing name since Japan emerged as a powerful military nation around the turn of the 20th century and colonized Korea in 1910.

This is part of the sad and unfortunate political history of Japan and Korea. Modern mapmakers should recognize the lost name of the Korean people and their sea under Japanese rule and should print the two names of the sea for the purpose of restoring the dignity of the once colonized nation. The two names in this case reflect the existence of the two nations, and remind people that their history is one of unequal relations. One name over the sea between Japan and Korea is not just and fair.

*sigh* Another writer mistakenly believing that just because the name in Korean is "East Sea" that it thus has legitimacy as the English name. Does no one see how ridiculous that line of reasoning is? Nobody's trying to change the name in Korean from 동해 to 일본해, they're just objecting to forcing the name change in English.

Earlier he wrote that the US attempts to sell its beef to South Korea "is a crime against humanity," since it was widely believed at the time that Americans were trying to unload diseased beef on Koreans.

As good a day as any for a Hitler political cartoon.

Three guesses which paper ran it.

“None of you move!!” yells President Lee Myung-bak.

In his concentration camp he has the KBS president, the MBC program “The Producer’s Notebook,” Koreans who are charged with encouraging a boycott of companies that advertise with the big three conservative newspapers, “candlelight” protesters, and now, Korean athletes in Beijing.

“I’m not part of the ‘critical elements,’” says this Olympic medalist. Members of the Korean Olympic Team who have completed their events are being kept from returning to Seoul so that they can all return together. It is widely believed that the governemt is supporting the event to create favorable conditions for itself.

Regarding the last part about the Olympics, that same newspaper has a write-up about that situation. I consider myself pretty proficient in English, but I can't make heads or tails of it. Do they want the fucking parade or not? And how is getting a parade of athletes together "going back to the era of authoritarian rule"? Seems to me it would be popular with athletes and with pretty much every Korean. According to the article some people would rather the Korean Olympic Committee invest the money into less-popular sports like handball.

Comments left by some say they wonder what the athletes in less popular events, who did not get medals but are worthy of applause, would think.

No doubt, though, that after the national wave of outrage due up after the Korean women's handball team lost tonight to Norway on a controversial last-second call, they'll be welcomed back as heroes and as tragic symbols of how the world is always out to screw Koreans.

Jindo dog show coming to Jindo.

From the Chosun Ilbo:

The dog festival is scheduled to run for three days starting on Oct. 3. Organizers in Jindo, located off the coast of South Jeolla Province in southwestern Korea, will host various events for visitors. These include dog training classes and canine therapy sessions on top of the usual dog show program to select an overall winner.

Jindo dogs have been designated as the 53rd national treasure of Korea and were recognized by the World Canine Organization in 2005.

Given the poor treatment these "treasures" are given around here, it's clear the training classes are needed. I'm sure these neglected animals will appreciate the therapy, too.


Jindo pen in Gangjin, 2006. I count nine.


How many Jindos are living, from Lonely Lifetime.

Speaking of Jindos, have you seen this?

Flags flying over Dokdo in "Sera Korea."

Sera Korea, apparently a type of "Second Life" online game, in tandem with Hite beer is encouraging users from August 14th through September 30th to assert South Korea's claim over the Liancourt Rocks by flying Korean flags on the disputed islets and submitting screen captures as part of some promotion or other. You can read more about it, in Korean, on the Hite website and on the Sera Korea one.



Here's a couple of photos from a Sports Seoul article:



Damn it, I came across all that garbage while just trying to Naver around for more information on this:

The construction of a state-of-the-art solar-powered passenger ferry modeled after the Geobukseon, a Korean warship that resembles a turtle, has nearly been completed.

It has taken the Jeonnam Development Corporation 15 months and 4.6 million dollars to complete the turtle-shaped ferry. The commercial operation of the ferry will begin in October.

The ferry weighs 350 tons and can accommodate up to 180 passengers. The iron roof of the ferry has an oil pressure gauge and can be opened. Aluminum was used in key areas to reduce the weight of of the ferry.

A Jeonnam Development Corporation official said the ferry features a 3D movie theater that screens a documentary that demonstrates how Admiral Yi Sun-shin defeated 130 Japanese ships with only 13 of his own.

The ferry, which is expected to emerge as one of the leading tourist attractions of the South Jeolla Province, will be operated four times daily.

Hmm, killing Japanese is a theme that never gets old. The article, though, doesn't say where the ferry is. A Korean-language article says "명량대첩제," which must be recognizable to Koreans because it doesn't give a town or county. Looks like it's at Haenam's "Land's End" (땅끝), or "Land's Edge," or whichever translation you prefer, the southern-most point on the Korean peninsula. It's a pleasant area, or at least was until the warship moved in, and is worth a visit. Oooh, and if you want to stick with that theme, you can stay in the 땅끝관광호텔, a tourist hotel built in the shape of a turtle ship.

* edit: Well, after looking around a little more I see that 명량대첩 is Myungryang Strait, the location of a famous battle with the turtle ships. I couldn't find that great a map, but it looks to run between Haenam, Jindo, and Muan. There is a small annual festival, hence the "제" at the end of the "명량대첩제" up there, meaning that the ship will probably debut there and then.

Foreigners continue to meddle in domestic affairs.

KBS reports that Koreans are handing out some one million stickers in Washington D.C. and neighboring areas to promote South Korea's claim on the Liancourt Rocks and the Sea of Japan.

Koreans in the Washington, D.C. area are distributing 'Dokdo stickers' they made to promote Korean ownership of the rocky islets.

This comes at a time when Dokdo commercials are also airing on American television.

An alliance to protect Dokdo, comprised of Korean residents in D.C., Virginia and Maryland, have distributed one million of the stickers that bear a picture of Dokdo, the Korean Peninusula map and the phrase 'Do you know Dokdo?'

Alliance chairman Choi Jeong-beom says they started the campaign in hopes of informing Americans that Dokdo belongs to Korea and urging Korean Americans to join in the fight.

Yonhap brings us the pics:


While navering around for that picture I came across three newspaper ads that apparently ran in the Washington Post recently. They were translated into Korean by the blog from whence I stole them. Sorry, I can't find bigger scans, but if you click on them and squint you can kind of read some of them.

If somebody broke into my home and named my son Dakeshi I'd do what any parent would do: build a research center in my driveway.





Also from KBS, last week, Korean-Americans are doing their part in the struggle for independence and self-determination to promote South Korea's claim on the rocks:

They also designated September 27th as "Korea Day," a day in which ethnic Koreans will hold a celebration for the protection of Dokdo. On this day, a parade will be held and those in attendance will be encouraged to wear shirts reflecting Korea's sovereignty over Dokdo.

White people still exotic, still all look same.

Here's a video of swimmer Stephen Parry getting mobbed in Beijing as a crowd thinks he's Michael Phelps.

More evidence that Chinese gymnast He is 14.

Pretty convincing evidence, actually, in the form of two official documents produced by the Chinese government. Documents that have since been removed, but are still available in Baidu's cache if you view the original Excel documents as HTML.

Women on welfare giving birth three times as often.

From a Census Bureau study "Fertility of American Women: 2006," issued this month. From pages 14-15:

The 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) gave states greater flexibility to formulate and implement initiatives to reduce welfare dependency and encourage employment for members of low-income families with children. For the nation, in 2006, 10 years after passage of the Act, the birth rate for women 15 to 50 years old receiving public assistance income in the last 12 months was 155 births per 1,000 women, about three times the rate for women not receiving public assistance (53 births per 1,000 women).

There's something very wrong with that picture, but of course suggesting that *gasp* women exercise discretion when reproducing, or that certain economic groups have fewer children at our expense is considered the height of political incorrectness and tantamount to an attack on American freedoms. Entire report available here as a .pdf file. From Carpe Diem.

EBS video short on aerial warfare and bombings.

Anybody else catch this six-minute video on EBS lately? I don't understand all the text, but it seems to be about the "advancement" and "development" of aerial bombing campaigns---insofar as you can use those terms without being ironic---with, um, special attention paid to the US military. Seemed a little "adult" to be on EBS, a channel that generally sticks to chalk-and-talk programming.



Taken from here, posted on youtube for posterity, since Naver links seem to change a lot. The person who uploaded the video also has a blog, where you can see screen captures of most, if not all, of the slides in case you don't feel like watching the video. The video description numbers it 452, so I guess it's part of a series. The blog I just mentioned has previous installments if you click through where it says "다른방송보기" above the first screen capture, or if you click back through the page numbers at the bottom. They seem interesting enough to try and get through eventually, and it was nice---and probably super time-consuming---for the blogger to post all those screen captures.

More Opening Ceremony unpleasantness: dancer paralyzed in rehearsal, accident hushed up.

Photo taken from this Korean-language article.

This story's almost a week old but I haven't seen much made of it yet. A young woman was to perform the ceremony's only solo routine, but was injured in a late-July rehearsal, and the story was buried until last week. From the New York Times:

A talented, 26-year-old Chinese dancer was seriously injured during a rehearsal for the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympic games just 12 days before the show, and faces the prospect of being paralyzed for the rest of her life.

Liu Yan, considered one of the country’s top classical Chinese dancers, was preparing the performance of a lifetime: the only solo dance in a four-hour spectacular that was expected to be seen by a global audience of more than one billion people.

But on July 27, during an evening rehearsal at Beijing’s National Stadium, the so-called Bird’s Nest, she leaped toward a platform that malfunctioned and plunged about 10 feet into a shaft, landing on her back, according to family members.

. . .

Her head was not badly injured, and she can move her arms. But she has no feeling below her chest, she said in a hospital bed interview. She cannot move her lower body, including her legs.

Doctors have told her family it is unlikely she will ever walk again.

. . .

The organizers of the opening ceremony initially asked witnesses and friends not to disclose the accident ahead of the Olympic Games on Aug. 8, according to people who have visited Liu in the hospital.

But earlier this week, after inquiries from several newspapers, members of the Beijing Olympic Committee visited Liu and announced that they would soon hold a news conference.

For the most part, the Chinese state-run news media have not reported the accident, although Peoples Daily, the Communist Party’s official organ, mentioned it in a small article on Tuesday.

. . .

“I hope one day I can just stand up like a normal person,” she said wiping away tears.

The fireworks were fake, the singer was fake, the children representing China's minority groups were fake, and now this, to say nothing of the American killed in broad daylight at a Beijing tourist attraction, the gymnasts that more and more evidence is suggesting are underage, or the other scandals that have yet to be revealed. What a mess.

Go read the NYT article, it's short. In it Zhang Yimou expressed regret at what happened, saying if he had given clearer instructions there may have been fewer injuries. Zhang talked more about the, um, "challenges" of planning and rehearsing the Opening Ceremony in an AP report compiled from varous sources.

[Zhang] told the popular Guangzhou weekly newspaper Southern Weekend that only communist North Korea could have done a better job getting thousands of performers to move in perfect unison.

"North Korea is No. 1 in the world when it comes to uniformity. They are uniform beyond belief! These kind of traditional synchronized movements result in a sense of beauty. We Chinese are able to achieve this as well. Though hard training and strict discipline," he said. Pyongyang's annual mass games feature 100,000 people moving in lockstep.

Performers in the West by contrast need frequent breaks and cannot withstand criticism, Zhang said, citing his experience working on an opera performance abroad. Though he didn't mention specific productions, Zhang directed an opera at New York's Metropolitan Opera in 2006.

"In one week, we could only work four and a half days, we had to have coffee breaks twice a day, couldn't go into overtime and just a little discomfort was not allowed because of human rights," he said of the unidentified opera production.

"You could not criticize them either. They all belong to some organizations ... they have all kind of institutions, unions. We do not have that. We can work very hard, can withstand lots of bitterness. We can achieve in one week what they can achieve in one month."

Read that whole article, too, for context, but here's another excerpt:

Some students of the Shaolin Tagou Traditional Chinese Martial Arts School in Henan province who began training for the event last May were injured in falls on the LED screen that forms the floor on which they performed and was made slippery by rain, said Liu Haike, one of the school's lead instructors.

"At one point, the children had to run in four different directions. ... When one fell, others quickly followed," Liu said, adding the injuries were minor.

While in Beijing, the constant exposure to the dizzyingly hot summer resulted in heatstroke for some students, particularly during one rain-drenched rehearsal that stretched on for two days and two nights.

The students were kept on their feet for most of the 51-hour rehearsal with little food and rest and no shelter from the night's downpour, as the show's directors attempted to coordinate the 2,008-member performance with multimedia effects, students and their head coach told the AP.

"We had only two meals for the entire time. There was almost no time to sleep, even less time for toilet breaks," Cheng said. "But we didn't feel so angry because the director was also there with us the whole time."

Table tennis not sexy enough.

Because of disappointingly low attendance at Olympics matches, the International Table Tennis Federation wants its female competitors to show a little more T and A.

Women players mostly wear baggy shorts and shirts unlike their tennis counterparts who dress for comfort as well as style.

“We are trying to push the players to use skirts and also nicer shirts, not the shirts that are made for men, but ones with more curves,” International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) vice president Claude Bergeret said.

I was gonna write how typical this was coming from Beijing, but it was actually a French guy who said it. The article goes on to cite Japan's Naomi Yotsumoto as an example of a woman who's got it right.




We live in Asia, after all, where nobody passes up an opportunity to snap upskirt pics.



The directive to get sexier came also in 2007 during the Women's World Cup of Table Tennis in Chengdu, China. A few examples of the results available here and below.

I guess American beef wasn't so bad after all.

Hell, if Michael Phelps ate it:



That's from a Chosun Ilbo cartoon last week, and the Joongang Ilbo tells us that American beef is numer 2 in Korea behind Australian.

Now that the ban on imports has been lifted, U.S. beef is rushing into the Korean market. After imports from Australia, it now ranks second among imported beef by shipment volume and volume to pass quarantine inspection.

. . .

To restaurants, the advantage of U.S. beef is its low price. According to the industry, 100 grams of premium Korean-bred hanwoo beef sells for between 6,000 won ($5.73) and 7,000 won at a butcher shop. The same amount of Australian beef sells for between 3,000 won and 4,000 won. E-net Corp., a U.S. beef importer, sells its product for around 1,000 won.

Back to the cartoon, that same weird depiction of Phelps showed up the day before, next to Korea's champion weightlifter Jang Mi-ran.



Hey, anything to take the sting off.



Then again, I guess he does kinda look like that, but still. I watched a surprising amount of events back home, but hadn't yet tuned into the Korean coverage until tonight. Do they really have the same coverage on all the networks? I don't get how or why that works. Man, everyone was right about them showing highlights of Korean matches rather than events featuring other countries, and they really lay it on thick. Anyone else find it hard to root for Team (South) Korea? And then feel kinda bad getting as worked up about Korean nationalism as the Korean nationalists you're annoyed with? Yeah. I think I stick up for Korea more when I'm at home than I do here, and remember the US more fondly when I'm half a world away from it.

Something else that caught my eye was a thing SBS had on called "1분 차이나," with short little vignetes on Chinese culture. I like how they included---among representative Chinese sites like the Temple of Heaven, the Terracotta Warriors, and the Water Cube----Zhang Ziyi from The Road Home.



As they should have, mind you, because she's hot. At first I figured she was just thrown in there either for no reason or because she's a generic smiling pig-tailed Chinese girl in that shot, but after watching the first "episode" maybe they threw her in as a nod to Chinese cinema and to Zhang Yimou. Well, SBS ought to be thankful it's doing anything at all in Beijing after the stunt they pulled, leaking footage of the Opening Ceremony a few days early.

Google Korea is upsetting Victorian sensibilities again.

Google Korea is in the news again, this time in the Chosun Ilbo in an article today titled "Google Video a Hotbed of Illegal Videos." I scratched my head upon first seeing the title, because whenever I'm looking for a Korean music video or a clip from a Korean TV show, the first places I turn are Naver, Daum, and the lot. But the article focuses, too, on the threat of pornographic and dirty videos, a tune we've heard before around here. A couple excerpts:

The Korean version of Google Video, the search engine recently launched by Google Korea, is becoming a hotbed of illegal clips. Despite its powerful search technology, the site seems powerless to prevent users uploading pornography and copyrighted content.

. . .

Google's negligence has caused concerns about copyright violation. For example, Type in "Prison Break,” the popular American TV drama, and set the parameters to "more than 20 minutes," and as many as 2,480 43-minute clips show up.

. . .

A similar video search service is also provided by domestic web portals Naver, Daum and Empas, who filter search results in various ways. In the case of Naver, monitoring personnel review search results. But Google is determined not to impose such restrictions on its search function, remaining faithful to the concept of freedom of information.

And the caption to the accompanying photo:

The search word ‘sex’ yields more than 1 million video clips in results on Google Video in this screen capture.

By contrast, typing sex or other dirty words into Naver will bring up an age-verification screen. Once I was looking for a TV clip I had seen on Jeollanam-do, but wanted to see all the videos relating to the area, so I typed "Jeolla" in Korean. Turns out it means "naked," so the search wouldn't go through. I'm not sure what's beyond the formidable ID check, and whether porn will show up after you verify your age. People would be leery, perhaps, of browsing such content if they knew their movements were being recorded.

I talked a little about Google Korea last week when an article came out talking about YouTube Korea's potential adaptation of the "real name system" used on Korean portals. I mentioned that Google Korea eventually agreed to censor search terms on its site, meaning that if you search for something dirty you'll get an age-verification prompt above the results. (However, I'm not sure what's preventing people from searching those same terms on google.com, which does not have such filters.) I couldn't find the original articles that ran at the time, but many were a little over-the-top in accussing Google of exposing children to pornography and other filth, as if the search engine were to blame for the children doing the actual searching. That hubbub came around the time the South Korean government announced it was blocking foreign pornographic websites after apparently some dirty movies were uploaded to an internet portal.

Major internet portals have come under fire recently for a lack of responsibility.

On March 18, two pornographic videos were posted on Yahoo Korea, the nation's second most visited portal and over 20,000 users downloaded the files. Yahoo Korea has faced a barrage of criticism for having left the clips for six hours.

Daum carried a video of half-nude foreign fashion models for seven hours last Tuesday. Naver is also being criticized for not having removed a nude photograph for about four hours.

When you type in a variety of dirty terms in Korean into Google Video you'll find some hardcore porn and nudity, but not surprisingly I guess it's usually foreign. That tells us that not only is Korean porn kind of lame, but that you also have Koreans uploading this foreign pornographic material to Google, unless people from other countries are typing filenames and descriptions in Korean. And clearly Koreans were the ones doing the uploading to the Korean portals, which if I'm not mistaken prohibited foreigners from signing up with them at the time. Google has consistently come under fire in large part, I think, because it is foreign and represents a foreign menace, and South Korea neither likes foreign invaders nor plays nice with foreign companies.

Ironically, South Korea is the biggest consumer of pornography in the world, with the average Korean spending almost four times as much as the average Japanese and nearly twelves times as the average American. I came across those stats from this 2007 blog entry, which is worth a read. An excerpt:

. . . [T]he South Korean government has recently been clamping down on internet sex after some laughably tame incidents in March. An article entitled Foreign Porn Sites Will Be Blocked explains that it all started when two porn videos appeared on Yahoo Korea on March 18th. "Daum, the second-largest portal site, also carried an audio-visual file of foreign fashion models exposing their breasts for approximately seven hours last Tuesday," Korea Times reported. "On the same day, a Web surfer posted a nude photo of a woman at the top portal Naver but the company did not remove the picture for about four hours."

The South Korean government responded to these "wardrobe malfunctions" with wild abandon. “We are set to deny access to porn sites based overseas, with details being unveiled early next week,” said the Ministry of Information and Communication. According to ZD Net Asia, the government's Korea Internet Safety Commission will use domain name and URL filtering methods to check not only IP addresses but also file indexes and sub-directories as well -- "because most of obscene materials originate outside South Korea".

Heh, have a look at the Seoul Times, an English-language online newspaper that routinely has nude and NSFW images in its photo galleries, the one I linked to having been up for the past six months or so. Unsurprisingly they tend to be of foreign fashion models. If you want local talent . . . hmm, I guess you don't have any options outside of the major newspapers, the entertainment websites, the blogs, and the internet cafes devoted to racing girls.

Minnesota school teacher and blogger dismissively told to mind his own business concerning Korean affairs.

Wait, no, actually, this school teacher and his Dokdo-related blog are the subject of a Korea Times piece "American Urges US to Recognize S. Korean Sovereignty Over Dokdo" today. An excerpt:

An American elementary school teacher said Sunday that the United States should designate the Dokdo islets as South Korean territory.

Mark Lovmo, a teacher at a Minneapolis primary school, is now operating an independent Web site about Dokdo, which is also claimed by Japan.

According to Yonhap News, Lovmo supported his argument by saying that "Japan's 1905 incorporation of Dokdo did not follow accepted protocols, and was done almost in total secret... the Japanese made sure that Korea had no ability to dispute the claim at the time."

So I guess Americans are encouraged to write about "sensitive," "Korean" issues provided they don't take the unpopular side. HT to GI Korea, whose ROK Drop blog had the story from Yonhap a couple of days ago. He and his guest posters are right to point out the questionable journalistic standards of news agencies national newspapers who cherry-pick the opinions of a random American as if he's an authority on the matter, one qualified to speak on behalf of the US, or one representative in the least of American sentiment.

Shoes with the Liancourt Rocks on them.

Models show sneakers inscribed with three designs of the Dokdo islets at an E-Mart in Hwanghak-dong, central Seoul, yesterday.

Also today, the Hankyoreh has a column about relations between the two Koreas, titled "Avoiding another meaningless battle between the two Koreas." An excerpt of that:

We saw a return of the old diplomatic stand-off at the ASEAN Regional Form in Singapore last week. Seoul tried to make the shooting death of a South Korean tourist at Mount Geumgang (Kumgang) an issue of concern for the international community and ended up embarrassing itself.

But you all know that your average Korean column in an English-language paper isn't complete until two things happen: (1) the writer embarks on a tangent at the very end, and (2) the writer tries his best to contradict himself. In that spirit:

No one can deny there is a clear difference in the national strength of North and South Korea. It will be hard to get beyond the endless, wasteful battles if the South does not work to take the lead in the relationship with the composure and tolerance. The reality is that running around trying to place the blame on whoever is supposedly responsible for the infighting ends up embarrassing the whole household instead of winning sympathy. It is largely because of this that we are losing ground on Dokdo.

And since we're here, here's another bit:

Even more problematic is that third countries hardly care to tell the difference when something is clearly amiss. One of the two Koreas may have engaged in acts of terrorism or tested a nuclear device, but the negative image that results hurts “Korea.” “Koreans” look like a people who are belligerent, ignore international norms, and won’t grow up.

I love the flippant mention of "may have committed a terrorist act," I'm surprised he didn't follow it with "or whatever." On his last point, let's think about the past two months: After mutilating pheasants outside the Japanese embassy, after cancelling student exchange programs between South Korea and Japan, after pulling Japanese condom advertisements from the Seoul subway, after neglecting a sick baby for a weekend to spread Dokdo propaganda throughout two foreign countries, after a newspaper editor fantasized about starting a war with Japan, after conducting military exercises at the Liancourt Rocks, after announcing plans to put a hotel on the uninhabitable rocks, and after spending an inordinate amount of time and energy in trying to "rectify" the way a sovereign foreign government calls disputed territory in the English language that quite literally nobody outside of South Korea cares about, all while 1/3 of "Koreans" are starving and oppressed above the 38th while those below it are more interested in fighting over some rocks, I can't imagine why people would hold such awful stereotypes.

More troubling news about the Beijing Opening Ceremony, female ushers asked to strip during auditions.

I can't find the original story, but a bunch of sites are running with the report that the female ushers were forced to strip for judges in order to determine whether they were qualified to participate in the Opening Ceremony. An excerpt from a Bangkok Post article:

Thousands of young women from colleges and dance academies in Beijing competed for the chance to appear before a huge worldwide audience.

During the selection process, the women were required to strip so teachers judging whether they were qualified could measure their body proportions, The Beijing News said.

In an interview with one of the girls who competed for the high profile job, the 20-year-old college student Zhang Fan told the paper that the girls were put in a room and teachers measured them with a ruler.

No specifics were given but the measurements were called "bone measurements" which typically include measuring the width of shoulders and waists, length of waists and height.

The women had to be at least 1.66 metres tall, have a pretty face and possess youthful energy, the report said.

It looks like a lot of the goodwill and enthusiasm generated by the impressive Opening Ceremony is quickly slipping away. First was news that the pyrotechnics that appeared on the television broadcast were actually computer generated since Beijing's hazy skies made visibility poor on August 8th. Then was news that the 9-year-old girl who sang the Olympic theme was actually lip-synching to the song done by a 7-year-old deemed not cute enough to be on television. Then, the children who were representing China's many minority ethnic groups were actually Han Chinese in costume.


Gold medalist Deng Linlin with her coach.



What has many in the US talking is the Chinese "women's" gymnastics team and the controversy over whether the girls participating actually meet the minimum age requirement of 16. Nobody watching on television can imagine they're long out of middle school, although we have to take into account that white people generally suck at telling the ages of Asians. The New York Times did some digging back in July and found loads of records showing two of the Chinese gymnasts were only 14 years old.

Officials with the International Gymnastics Federation said that questions about He [Kexin]’s age had been raised by Chinese news media reports, USA Gymnastics and fans of the sport, but that Chinese authorities presented passport information to show that He is 16.

Online records listing Chinese gymnasts and their ages that were posted on official Web sites in China, along with ages given in the official Chinese news media, however, seem to contradict the passport information, indicating that He and Jiang may be as young as 14 — two years below the Olympic limit.

And another telling excerpt:

Yang Yun of China won individual and team bronze medals at the 2000 Sydney Olympics and later said in an interview on state-run television that she had been 14 at the time of those Games. A Hunan Province sports administration report also said later that she had been 14 when she competed in Sydney.

One more closer to home:

[Bela Karolyi] recalled Kim Gwang Suk, a North Korean gymnast who showed up at the 1991 world championships with two missing front teeth. Karolyi, who said he thought Kim must have been younger than 11 at the time, and others contended that those front teeth had been baby teeth and that permanent teeth had not yet replaced them. Her coaches said she had lost them years before, during an accident on the uneven bars.

At those world championships, Kim was 4 feet 4 inches and about 62 pounds, and she claimed to be 16. At one point, the North Korean Gymnastics Federation listed her at 15 for three straight years; the federation was later barred from the 1993 world championships for falsifying ages.

“Oh, come on, she was just in diapers and everyone could see that, just like some of the Chinese girls are now,” Karolyi said. “If you look close, you can see they still have their baby teeth. Little tiny teeth!”

An interesting counter, perhaps, to some of this comes from EastSouthWestNorth, on a page that loads very slowly and sometimes not at all on this computer, brings us news of a documentary on Chinese athletics and preparations for the Games made in 2003. It has an interview with gymnast Jiang Yuyuan, whose name has popped up in this latest controversy. During the interview she gives her age as 12, meaning she would be born in 1990 or 1991. You can watch the video and see a few screen captures in Chinese here, or visit ESWN for the same content with some English captions.


Jiang Yuyuan stating her age in a 2003 interview.

ESWN says that while it's possible the Chinese may have recently altered documents, it's unlikely that they would have done so all the way back in 2003, since these girls were not yet on a national team and were basically no-names. To that I would first say that since a lot of these girls are taken from home at age 3 and put into training camps, it's not unreasonable to consider that degree of control and manipulation, especially since by 2003 China knew it was getting the Games.

But what occurred to me while thinking about this controversy is the way East Asians determine age. For example Koreans and Chinese consider themselves 1 at birth and a year older at the next Lunar New Year. When I ask my students how old they are, they always answer a year or two older than their Western age, leading me to believe that Jiang might have simply reflexively given her Chinese age in the interview and thus making her 10 or 11 according to our reckoning.

On the New York Times blog I also found a post asking how the Chinese swimmers got so good all of a sudden, and basically saying that they're doping.

What the Chinese don't seem to get is that the passion to succeed at all costs and damn who gets in the way doesn't really sit well with other people. We see this in Korea, too, where our students cheat on everything from tests to bingo games, where dishonesty and plagiarism are routine in a variety of fields, and where people like Hwang Woo-suk are national heroes. It may fly well within the contexts of these heavily-populated, neo-Confucian countries, where a complete disregard for those outside one's own circle is commonly practiced, especially when their interests conflict with your own, but on the world stage it's neither expected nor appropriate.

Another slant-eyed picture from those lazy, greasy sp*cs.

Like the Spanish men's and women's basketball teams, the Spanish tennis team also posed for a slant-eyed picture in preparation for the Beijing Olympics.



The above picture was, and still is, on the team's official site. The pictures and the explanations offered by the Spanish teams---"We felt it was something appropriate, and that it would be interpreted as an affectionate gesture" said one Spanish NBA player---make for good talkshow fodder, I guess, but what I'm really looking forward to is Italy's women's soccer team reenacting another stereotype held of Asians: the sideways vagina.

Truth and Reconciliation Commission on Gurye massacre.

A Truth and Reconciliation Commission has released its findings in a probe into civilian killings in Jeollanam-do right before the Korean War. KBS has the story:

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission has announced probe results on a civilian massacre incident that occurred around the time of the Korean War.

It confirmed that during an uprising in the Yeosu and Suncheon areas in Jeolla province just before the Korean War, the police and military killed some 160 civilians in Gurye county between late 1948 and July 1949. The killings were justified by saying the civilians were cooperating with rebels and attempting to enter the then labor party.

The commission says another 600 were killed in Cheondo county in North Gyeongsang Province and 140 in Ganghwa, Gyeonggi Province by police and military on charges of collusion with North Korean communists.

The commission says most of the victims who were farmers were killed without due legal process. It is calling for a state apology and memorial projects.

These commissions are always a little iffy and political, and could also be called "Truth and Reconciliation Omission," so initially you'll have to take the story with a grain of salt. However I don't have any reason to doubt civilians were rounded up and killed in Gurye county given what went on throughout the region and what little I've read about Gurye's history. Matter of fact they had a small service for 12 victims of the Yosu-Sunchon Rebellion, or whatever term you'd like, of 1948, near Gurye's Bongseongsan mountain in 2007. I can't quite tell if it's a funeral service, an excavation, or if the human remains are being reinterred.



For a little more reading from this blog on that rebellion, browse this category. More on this latest story and the incident in Korean here and here.

Pretty hot Korean-American actress to star in ABC Family's "Samurai Girl."

I thought the woman in the commercials looked familiar. It's Jamie Chung, 25, probably best known for being on MTV's "Real World: San Diego" in 2004. She'll be playing "Heaven" in an ABC Family mini-series called "Samurai Girl" that will start its six-hour run on September 5th. The plot summary:

Based on a series of popular young-adult novels, "Samurai Girl" follows the journey of 19 year-old Heaven (Jamie Chung), the sheltered adopted daughter of one of Japan's wealthiest and most powerful families. Protected and watched over at all times by her loving but enigmatic father, Heaven is raised in opulent but confined surroundings, with every detail of her life tended to and extravagantly provided for in the tradition of Japan's hierarchal society. But when Heaven finds herself in San Francisco for her arranged wedding to the son of one of her father's business associates, she has no idea that her protected life is about to be shattered and that her past is linked to an ancient secret prophecy which both good and evil forces will fight to the death to control.

That's from ABC Family. The one on Wikipedia starts talking about Yakuza. MTV has a little bio on Chung from 2004:

Jamie is a "tell it like it is" young woman of Korean heritage. She is no nonsense and in your face. Jamie was raised by first generation, traditional parents in San Francisco. She works two jobs to pay her tuition, studies hard at school, yet still finds time to party. Jamie's friends feel she does not have the best taste in men. She is very picky when deciding who to spend her time with, but in the end overlooks some huge red flags.

I remember her Korean being pretty bad on the show. Anyway, you can see more of her here and here, and can find her all over Youtube, like here for example. Um . . . well, after watching that I'll say she's still attractive to look at, can't say the same about listening to her, though.

Dokdo is ours because Japan is bad.

A lengthy opinion piece in the Korea Times titled "Educating US, European Mapmakers About Dokdo." At first it goes through a few examples of locations keeping their original names, such as Hawaii and Niagara Falls, and uses that as justification for using Dok-do. No comment on using the names "Korea," "Japan," or 미국. The piece gets to be a bit, um, much by the end when it follows the "it should be the East Sea because Japan started World War II" device. Here's a long excerpt:

More than several famed American geographers including H.J. De Blij printed East Sea alone or East Sea with the Sea of Japan long before the National Geographic adopted East Sea with Sea of Japan in their textbooks. Why? They believed in the legitimacy of East Sea over Sea of Japan. They saw the sad history of Japanese colonial rule over Korea in the first half of the 20th century. They believed that the East Sea had legitimacy over the Sea of Japan. Fairness should not hide the justice of historical facts and evidence. Fairness should not be compromised by the National Geographic, Defense Intelligence Agency and Central Intelligence Agency map makers. Fairness should be based on the grounds of intellectual history in this case.

Japan has become one of the superpower nations in the world after World War II. Japan's wealth and image today cannot hide past crimes against humanity before and during World War II. Many Japanese people thought that their war crimes were purified in the atomic bombing by the United States of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945. Their imperialist mentality is the same as their military expansionism during World War II. Japan made an alliance with the United States as it had an alliance with Adolf Hitler's Germany and Benito Mussolini's Italy during World War II. I thought the world had progressed since 1945, but it has not. This world is not yet civilized.

European powers should cleanse themselves of their crimes of colonizing American, African and Asian continents with the Bible in one hand and gun in the other in the 17th and 18th century. As long as they justify the use of Liancourt Rocks over Dokdo, I can see the old European power rearing its head. Their maps were made for the purpose of exploiting innocent people and their continents. Half a century has passed since the colonized nations were liberated. Making an alliance with Japan against Dokdo is a shame. They should criticize the Japanese motive to take the Korean island, and ostracize Japan from the international community.

Japan which was forced to open its doors under the threat of the gunboat diplomacy, modernized first among the Asian nations, then quickly colonized Korea with its modern weapons and controlled Korea for half a century in the most critical time of modern history.

In 1941, it started the Pacific War. The war scar is still seen in the face of the comfort women who served as sex slaves to the Japanese soldiers in the Southeast Asian jungle. The division of Korea was caused by Japan's colonial rule and by Japan's request of the Soviet Russia's intervention at the end of the Pacific War. But the Japanese people do not feel any shame of their past history with Korea. The U.S. Congress passed a resolution to condemn the Japanese government to cover up the comfort woman issue in 2008. Hon. Mike Honda, a Japanese-American, took a leadership role in the U.S. Congress. How admirable this was on the part of Mike Honda!

When I contributed my articles on this issue to the New York Times and the Washington Post, the editors sent me back a nice letter saying that my articles dealt with just one issue between Japan and Korea. What they are truly saying is: ``Dokdo is not our business.'' Yes, it can be.

Then, I asked them a question: ``Hey, why does the Holocaust Museum exist in Washington, D.C.?'' ``Did American people kill Jewish people?'' According to their logic, the Holocaust Museum should be constructed between Germany and Israel. But they were silent on my responses.

Why did the United States participate in the European War? The American people should watch Adolf Hitler's victory after victory. They could not. Why not? The human conscience. Isn't it?

Why did the U.S. participate in the Korean War? The U.S. could watch the North Korean invasion of South Korea and accept the unification of Korea under Kim Il-sung's communism in 1950. President Harry S. Truman could not just watch the war, and sent the troops to save South Korea. Many GIs were killed. Why? Human conscience and a sense of justice.

Justice can be served with human conscience. Now, American people and European people do not serve justice when they are standing neutral between Japan and Korea on the matter of Dokdo. As a matter of fact, they are disturbing the sense of justice.

Also in the KT today, we see Korean representatives from Skype handing out Dokdo buttons at Incheon International Airport.

YouTube Korea in trouble?

From the Hankyoreh yesterday:

Google’s YouTube (youtube.com), the world’s largest video site, has become subject to the real name system, which obliges Internet users to use their real names when posting information to Web sites. YouTube now stands at a crossroads and must decide whether to adopt the real name system or alter or drop its service in Korea.

The government announced on July 22 comprehensive measures to protect online information, expanding the number of sites subject to the real name system from media outlets, portals and UCC sites getting up to 300,000 visitors a day to those getting just 100,000 a day. YouTube, which was getting 800,000 visitors weekly as of the second week of August, will from next year be subject to the real name system. An official with the Korea Communications Commission said that YouTube, even though it is an overseas site, will not be exempt from the system, and that Google has, in the past, accepted Korean regulations, such as those regarding underage protections.

The article continues to tell of YouTube Korea's increased traffic over the course of 2008, even though it was lampooned early on as being a failure. I'm curious, though, besides being written in Korean, does YouTube Korea differ from any of the other YouTubes? Is there anything beyond the language barrier preventing people from contributing should the site go down?

Google, which owns YouTube, hasn't been very successful in Korea. That January KT article I just sited said Google and Yahoo each have less than 5% of the market-share of internet searches. A lengthy Associated Press piece from 2006 goes into why Google may be struggling. An excerpt:

Still, Google faces an uphill battle, simply because it can be tough to change Internet users' habits.

Many Korean Internet users start their Web browsers with portal sites such as Naver that offer detailed category listings, online shopping and news headlines. Koreans embrace the visually rich websites because they also benefit from being a world leader in per-capita broadband connections — meaning fancy graphics and animation flow quickly onto their screens.

That's a marked contrast to Google's celebrated bare-bones approach, with sparse graphics and a single search box. The company has only recently sought to change its approach and become a place on the Web for people to hang around and not just jump to other links.

Lee Jae-suk, a 24-year-old university student in Seoul, said he prefers Naver for searches because of the wealth of its results that skim websites, blogs, news and video and organize them by category.

"Google's site is just not enough for everything. Their search results especially are too limited," said Lee. "I think Google is paying less attention to Korean Internet users' demands."

A Business Week article from January, 2006 said basically the same thing:

Why is Naver so popular? One reason is that Naver can deliver more relevant search results than Google can, at least on its home turf. A simple Google search will return only certain kinds of Web pages, and a user needs to click another link to find, say, related images or news stories. NHN offers a mix of categories including blogs and community sites unless the user specifies a particular kind of document. A Naver search for a subway station, for instance, will return a map, information on the subway line serving the station, connecting bus lines, restaurants and shops near the station, blog entries mentioning it, and more. "Google has a superb search engine," says Choi Jae Hyeon, NHN's search chief. "We have, however, built up knowhow and a database by extracting knowledge from users' brains."

Blogger The Daily Kimchi offered his take in 2007:

Although I am a big fan of Google's products and services (Gmail rocks my socks), I believe Google will fail to dominate the South Korean online search market. Why you ask? Things work differently here, as Koreans have an immense amount of pride towards their homegrown products and services, as opposed to foreign companies. Prime examples of these failures? Think Walmart (now E-Mart), French retail giant Carrefour (now owned by E.Land Corp), and recent B&Q's failure to penetrate the Korean retail markets. These large multinationals have suffered greatly and have been forced to sell off their remaining stores in the country to local Korean companies (B&Q is still up in the air). Even automobile manufactures have a tough time in the Korean market. The majority of the cars you see here are either badged Hyundai, Kia, or Samsung.

Considering that South Korea is one of the most wired countries in the world, the people here definitely are web-saavy. If their preference of internet portals is along the lines of their retail choices, then Google might have a higher mountain to climb than expected. Google Korea might take a large number of users away from Naver and Daum (although Google is now working with Daum), but it will never be viewed as the number one search engine in Korea--the people here won't let it happen.

TDK goes on to compare the simple look of Google to the busier-looking Korean portals, saying, like those interviewed in the AP story, that Koreans prefer a more complex look. I don't know anything about that, but I recall reading something on the Metropolitician a while back (can't find the link now) about the iPod, and how some were skeptical it'd do well because it was too simple-looking, and didn't have any of the bells and whistles Korean consumers, supposedly, expect. In spite, or maybe because of its simplicity the iPod has been popular in Korea from what I hear. If I'm remembering the Metropolitician's point correctly, and I may not be, he said it had a lot to do with how it was marketed, and how it came to be perceived as cool.

A Year in Mokpo looked at "Naver vs. Google" in a November post, and directed us toward an OhMyNews article with a different theory as to why Google failed compared to domestic sites like Naver.

A prevalent theory in Korean dotcom circles is that Google failed to impress demanding Korean customers with its lousy service. This is at least what Naver and other major local portals want Koreans to believe.

Choi Mi Jung, who leads Naver's "Knowledge Man" service, a Wikipedia-like online encyclopedia built by the spontaneous participation of Netizens, scoffs at the sloppy interface and unfriendly way Google's Korean site presents its search results. "It is how meticulously their service was designed that made the difference," she says.

However, the real reason behind Google's difficult path in Korea is that its highly praised search technology was rendered practically useless in the Korean language sphere when major portals decided to block Google search robots from crawling around the content they hold, industry observers universally note.

But to echo again what has been said before, given the failures of other Western corporations in South Korea, due to their failures to adapt to the local market or to a citizenry fiercly loyal to domestic products, I wonder just how successful Google and its products can and will be. But I'm not a tech blogger, and don't know anything about that, so others will have to debate what's going on in more detail.



Anyway, related to both the beginning and the middle of this post is the news story I thought of immediately after reading the Hankyoreh piece. A couple of years ago Google was in some trouble for supposedly exposing minors to explicit content. In contrast to Google at the time, Korean portals have an age-verification system, meaning if you search for what's considered adult content you'll be diverted to a screen requiring you to type in your name and national ID number (주민번호). Google eventually agreed to checking users' ages, but not before locals started slinging the mud, accusing Google of exposing their children to pornographic material. As if the search engine is to blame rather than the children actually doing the searching. Keep in mind, too, softcore porn runs on many cable channels after dark, and it's not all that unusual to see a topless woman or somebody's backside go prancing across the screen. And, again, what's preventing a Korean user from just typing in adult-themed search terms, in Korean, to Google.com, rather than Google.co.kr? Unfortunately I can't find any of the original articles on the moral panic, but I remember the hot air and indignation at Google obscured what otherwise would have been fodder for a reasonable debate: whether Google should have to conform to Korea's standards or the other way around.


My friend Google turned up this picture of Kim Hye-su in the film 타짜, on Korean TV every once in a while. Couldn't find the picture of her backside, or one without a blurred nipple, but Lord knows I tried.

Google also ran into some trouble back in 2006 when hundreds of thousands of those citizen ID numbers were revealed to be wholly or partially exposed online. This Chosun Ilbo article makes the connection between Google and the reported leak, but provides no evidence. In fact, it says the number of victims could be much higher than the 900-some-thousand found in the government search

since there is no protection of personal information on international search engines such as Google or MSN.

Gotta love this line, too:

The first six digits of ID numbers, meaning their date of birth, of an astonishing 808,446 people were exposed on 5,344 websites, revealing an abject failure on the part of domestic public agencies and private firms to protect personal information.

Um . . . yeah, the first six letters are the person's birthday, thanks for keeping that secret. Considering the regularity with which we hear about online security breaches here, I don't know if there's anything about Google that makes it particularly less safe. But perception is reality, sometimes, and perhaps it's much easier to prey on the inherent distrust of foreign entities.

OMG white women in bikinis! In our country! How exotic!

Some white women were wearing bikinis at a waterpark in Gangwon-do. Um . . . that's about it. Thanks to Korea Beat for bringing this breaking news to light. There's a photo album of these foreign beauties currently up on the Chosun Ilbo site here. LOL, it was picked up by Yonhap, too, so a Naver search will pull up other photos.



Maybe they were random white people photographed to legitimacy to the place and to Korea. After all, you know photographers and event organizers around here jump at the chance to have pictures of foreigners doing stuff, and practically every festival's home page includes shots of grinning white people. Or, maybe they stood out because white women are considered exotic, helped by the assumption held here that they're sexually promiscuous. Or, maybe they were affiliated with the bathing suit fashion show they had.



This all happened at the Vivaldi Park Ocean World resort in Hongcheong county, Gangwon-do. The resort has used entertainer Lee Hyori in its advertisements this summer, and the little commercial with her and temporarily bikini-clad swimmers in the wave pool is more up my alley. It's on the front page of the website, and is also available here, just until I can rescue it from the Korean video sites and put it on youtube.

Endangered lotus species found in Shinan.

Cool. From KBS:

The thorned lotus, an endangered plant species, has been discovered for the first time at the bottom of a waterfall in Shinan County, South Jeolla Province, which is known to never dry out.

According to the county, a local resident discovered dozens of thorned lotus flowers with leaves more than one meter in diameter. The flowers were discovered in a pool located behind Bigeum Elementary School.

I don't know what "is known to never dry out" means either, but Shinan is one of three Jeollanam-do counties comprised entirely of islands, Wando and Jindo being the others.

Dokdo commercial on NBC?

Apparently.

NBC, the official broadcaster of the Beijing Olympic Games, aired a 30-second commercial reaffirming Seoul’s sovereignty over the islets on Monday afternoon American time.

The commercial was sponsored by a Korean market scheduled to open in October in Los Angeles.

I'm guessing it only aired in LA, then, because I haven't seen it, and I would have remembered throwing a lamp at the TV if I had. Maybe this is it?



Uninformative? Check. Ambiguous? Check. Lame "Do you know?" tagline? Check. Breakdancers? Breakdancers? Nope, no breakdancers this time. City Market is distorting Korean history!

2008 Miss Korea second runner-up stripped because she stripped.

Another one for the "see how nothing gets reported when everyone goes on vacation?" category, the 2008 Miss Korea second runner-up was stripped of her title on the 12th because of some racy and sort of topless photos she did a couple of years ago that were dug up by netizens last week. The 24-year-old model Kim Hee-kyung (김희경) was crowned Miss Jeollabuk-do (미스전북) before entering the national pageant and becoming, if I'm understanding the bracket correctly, one of three second runner-ups (미) behind the two first runner-ups.


No longer listed among the winners on the Miss Korea website.

What makes the story a little weird is that, according to Pop Seoul, the judges already knew about the pictures during the contest. The photograph below, of her in the black outfit, is one of the pictures to recently surface and shows her as she appeared in a 2006 music video of the "슬로우잼" variety. If you're interested you can find slightly more revealing ones via Google and Pop Seoul.

Why didn't that really hot ballerina come here?

You can't imagine how many times I've muttered that to myself. Acclaimed ballerina Kang Sue Jin has apparently toured "provincial areas," in order to give people outside of Seoul a chance to see ballet performances, but did not visit the most provincial of areas, Jeollanam-do.

``Somebody has to start passing on culture to other provinces. Usually, people come all the way to Seoul to watch me perform. It was meaningful that it was the other way around this time: me visiting them,'' Kang said in an interview with The Korea Times.

The youngest ballerina to join Germany's prestigious Stuttgart Ballet in 1986, she won a host of major awards including the Prix de Lausanne and Prix Benois de la Danse. She was also the first Asian honored as a Kammertanzerin, or chamber dancer, by the German government.

She made news a couple of years ago for the wrong reasons when photos of her mangled feet were made public. I don't want to make too much of that, because she is still dancing at the age of 41, but just about every article I've found makes mention of her feet, including this long one from KBS with a, uh, weird way of putting things in that second paragraph:

She won the first prize in famous Roxanne Concours, for the first time among Asians, in 1984. She also was recorded as the youngest person to join Stuttgart Ballet, one of the world’s top five ballet troupes. Thus, she seemed to have made her debut in ballet splendidly, but most people know that in reality these achievements were results of her painstaking efforts. Her feet that twist like a person who is suffering a rare disease, or a tree with nodes, aged hundreds of years, tell her career in ballet that has been built up through silence and passion.

Her feet are being hailed as the most beautiful feet on earth, and an increasing number of people hope to kiss on her feet. This is because they are so much impressed by her painstaking efforts: she changes more than 1,000 pairs of toe shoes per year because she practices more than 10 hours per day.

The article goes on to mention "her natural born beauty as an Asian," that she "holds mysterious beauty of Asia," and concludes with "Even at this moment, she must be dreaming of becoming a true artist, while creating beautiful balance between flying and plunging," so there you go.


Photo from this interview.

Part of the Opening Ceremony fireworks computer-generated.

Still awesome, though. An excerpt from MSNBC:

While the dramatic display actually happened as portrayed on television, members of the Beijing Olympic Committee said it was necessary to replace live video with computer-generated imagery because the city’s hazy, smoggy skies made it too difficult to see, according to The Beijing Times, which first reported the story.

Committee members also said they were concerned that the helicopter pilot who would have flown overhead to film the fireworks would have been “at risk by making him try to follow the firework route,” according to a quote from a committee member reported in a Daily Telegraph story.

And:

NBC broadcasters Matt Lauer and Bob Costas made mention of the alteration as it aired.

"You’re looking at a cinematic device employed by Zhang Yimou here," Lauer said. "This is actually almost animation. A footstep a second, 29 in all, to signify the 29 Olympiads."

Costas responded, "We said earlier that aspects of this Opening Ceremony are almost like cinema in real time. Well this is quite literally cinematic."

I heard that last exchange by Lauer and Costas, but I thought they were just being coy, since most viewers wouldn't have even heard of Zhang Yimou or his day job.

More mistranslation fun from the Korean papers.

Perhaps the papers should leave English-language news to reporters who actually understand the English language. Apparently a line about Korean swimmer Park Tae-hwan upsetting the favorite Grant Hackett to go on to win a gold medal was taken to mean that the Australian swimmer was angry with the Korean. An excerpt from a Seoul Shinmun article titled "호주언론 '박태환, 해켓을 화나게 했다,'" translated by Gerry Bevers in a comment to a Marmot's Hole post:

Most of Australian media barely reported news of Bak Tae-hwan’s gold-medal, but among them, one of Australia’s leading newspapers, “The Sydney Morning Herald,” reported, “News of Bak Tae-hwan’s gold medal made Australia’s gold medal hopeful Grant Hackett angry.”

Also, it made the sarcastic remark, “The Korean was spruiked going into the Games as ready to break the 2002 world mark, but qualified with a 3:41.86.

On the other hand, the newspaper expressed disappointment by saying, “Hackett finished an disappointing sixth place behind China’s Zhang Lin and America’s Jensen.”

In an interview with the newspaper Hackett expressed disappointment, “I guess this event was not what I was looking for,” and, “It would have been nice to stand on the medal podium.”

Bevers dug up some of the sources on which the Korean article was based. Here's one:

Korea’s world champion Park Tae-hwan, who upset Australian medal hope Grant Hackett to take gold in yesterday’s 400m freestyle, came in ahead of the mighty American.

And here's another:

“I guess it wasn’t the time that I was looking for,” Hackett, the silver medal winner in Athens four years ago, said after the race. “I would have liked to have been up on the medal podium, but it was a fast field today. I thought I had a bit more in me than that, but it didn’t come out unfortunately.

I have no idea what "spruiked" means, but judging from the context of the original article from August 10th I take it to mean "boasted":

Korea's world champion Park Tae-hwan a man who spruiked going into the Games that he was ready to break the 2002 world mark, qualified third in 3:43.35.

I couldn't find any articles about Park coming right out and "spruiking," but one article said his coach believed that to take the gold in 2008, one would need to approach Ian Thorpe's record time of 3:40.08. Another article said he announced before the Olympics that he would break the record, but I couldn't find a direct quotation. Likewise an August 5th article from Arirang in the Chosun Ilbo is titled "Swimmer Park Tae-hwan Aims for World Record," but doesn't get into any specifics, so if this "spruiking" turned out to be a case of an overzealous Korean media hyping its athletes to the sky, I wouldn't be surprised.

Anyway, some very nice investigative work by Mr. Bevers, who has contributed plenty of well-researched pieces over the years and who also runs a nice site devoted to observations made while studying the Korean language. Unfortunately he's probably best-known for being run out of his Korean university job for doing research on the Liancourt Rocks that went against popular opinion in South Korea.

Major sporting event biased toward South Korea, what else is new.

Or so writes a Korean high school student in the Joongang Ilbo:

On the third day of the Olympics, I watched Park Tae-hwan win the first gold medal for South Korea in swimming. I was really proud of Korea and was very excited.

Then I read an article saying that Park had been tested for doping twice; it is unusual for an athlete to be tested more than once. It is understandable that the Chinese are suspicious seeing a Korean doing so well in swimming.

But why only Park? They should have done it to others also. In addition, when athletes have to take a doping test, testers should make sure that he gets minimum disadvantage in practicing due to the test.

However, Chinese testers didn’t do that. Park had to even take a blood test which took one hour in all, which disrupted Park’s practice schedule.

Also, I found out that archery has only 4 gold medals while swimming has 24 gold medals. Why such a difference? Then I heard that there used to be many more medals for archery but that was changed since South Korea gets all the medals in archery.

Why indeed does swimming have so many medals at stake? Many Americans tend to win them. The United States, which is the most powerful country in the world, must want to win as many medals as possible. So I guess they made some effort to achieve that.

These are some unfair aspects of the Olympics. The Olympics are supposed to promote world peace. However, if there’s a lot of unfairness in it, how can it achieve peace? I think the officials concerned with the Olympics should try not to make things favor their country.

More on Korea Beat, including accusations that the Chinese archers were acting unfairly. Perhaps this here student should read about Roy Jones, Jr., the American boxer who was robbed of a gold medal during the 1988 Seoul Games. From Wikipedia:

Jones represented the United States at the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games where he won the silver medal. Jones dominated his opponents, never losing a single round on route to the final. His participation in the final proved to be hugely controversial when he lost a highly disputed 3-2 decision in the final. Jones lost to South Korean fighter Park Si-Hun, despite pummeling Park for three rounds, landing 86 punches to Park's 32. Allegedly, Park himself apologized to Jones afterwards. One judge shortly thereafter admitted the decision was a mistake, and all three judges voting against Jones were eventually suspended. An official IOC investigation concluding in 1997 found that 3 of the judges were wined and dined by Korean officials, but the IOC still officially stands by the decision. Jones was awarded the Val Barker trophy as the best stylistic boxer of the 1988 games. The incident, along with another highly disputed decision against American Michael Carbajal in the same games, led Olympic organizers to establish a new scoring system for Olympic boxing.

Also on the topic of students who don't know history but yet feel compelled to write about it for the Joongang Ilbo, an excerpt from a column yesterday:

Korean history dates back 5,000 years, whereas the United States is not even 250 years old. However, Korea takes its history for granted. In contrast, the study of U.S. history is compulsory for all students in that country. Now think of the Dokdo islets. They most certainly belong to Korea, and there is enough evidence to prove it, evidence that far predates the evidence presented by Japan.

That's a line of thinking and a measure of arrogance I love to hate. Actually, the Republic of Korea will turn sixty years old later this week, making it some 172 years younger than the United States. *cough* Yeah, not sure why we're comparing the age of a country to that of a culture. Or pretending that the United States can't trace any roots to Europe before 1776. Or that what we know as Korea today existed as an entity independent of China for some five millenia. I wouldn't have devoted a paragraph to it were that line of reasoning uncommon. I mean, it certainly speaks tjafowj98fw3jfd hey, wait, shouldn't that middle school kid be studying, anyway? Get his ass off the computer.

South Koreans half as productive as Americans?

That's what the latest figures say. Back in May Forbes magazine ranked South Koreans as the hardest working people in the world, and we all had fun chuckling about the flexible definitions of "busy" and "work" around here. I still remember life at my first hagwon, when we were required to come into work at 3, prep for an hour, then take an hour off for dinner, prep some more, and finally teach from 5:30 to 11. When we had meetings they weren't held during these two-and-a-half hours, but were scheduled earlier in the afternoon. The Korean teachers would come in even earlier, often around lunch time, but would pass a lot of their evenings napping or updating their Cyworld pages or doing some online shoppping, because there's really only so much work to be done during an eleven-hour day.

But productive is such a loaded word, and I'm pretty sure the KT editors were aware of it. Some Koreans have a flair for feigned self-depracation when it gives them the opportunity to both call attention to their acknowledged disadvantages and reaffirm their strengths when they respond to perceived slights. On that self-depracation theme is this line:

The institute suggested that Korea make all-out efforts to strengthen the competitiveness of its services sector in order to join the ranks of advanced countries.

Now, as we know South Korea ranking near the top 10 largest economies in the world is usually a great source of local pride, as it should be. But you'll notice that South Koreans sometimes refer to themselves as citizens of a developing nation, or one aspiring to the company of acknowledged powers like Japan and Western Europe, in order to backpeddle and save some face. See point number eleven of Roboseyo's post last month for a little more. Then, when people focus on South Korea's size, or provide what's considered dated information about the country, BAM, out comes the talk about its cutting-edge technology and its awe-inspiring economic development.

Likewise, focusing on quote-unquote productivity, and comparing South Korea's to the United States' will give people who are particularly defensive a chance to point out all of America's flaws, this time by criticizing the article's fixation on quote-unquote productivity from a Western perspective. As a citizen of a reportedly productive nation, I'll gladly save them the trouble. Like I said productive is a very loaded word, and quote-unquote productivity comes at an enormous social cost. I included the following except in a May post about Forbes ranking South Koreans as the longest quote-unquote hardest workers in the world. From the book Confucius Lives Next Door, which deals mainly with Japan and which was talking about how statistics on productivity and diligence are limiting, and cannot be simply examined out of the context of their respective societies:

A more significant explanation for the low rate of unemployment, even in recession, is that the Japanese have made a national calculation of comparative costs. They have decided that the social costs associated with large-scale unemployment would be greater than the costs required to keep people at work. "There are always costs involved in unemployment," the economist Takeuchi Hiroshi, the chief forecaster for the Long-Term Credit Bank of Japan, explained to me once. "The only question is who bears the expense. In your country, it's usually the worker first, and then the government, and then the society as a whole because you have all those people on the street without a job. In Japan, the company is expected to bear the costs, because that's better for society as a whole."

This policy explains why Japan, despite its emergence as a global financial and industrial power, always rates fairly low on global comparisons of productivity. My economics text defines "productivity" as "the relative efficiency of economic activity---that is, the amount of products or services produced compared to the amount of goods and labor used to produce it." This means that a company or country that turns out a lot of product with few people working on any given job than you would see in another country. In purely industrial terms, low productivity is a Bad Thing; it increases direct costs. But for Japan, low productivity is the secret weapon. It's a key reason why the socieity remains civil, stable, and safe. Other countries have to spend far more money, time, and energy combating crime, drugs, and family decay than Japan spends. So economists may find, when measuring the direct costs of producing a new car, case of beer, microchip, or whatever, that Japan has low productivity. But Japan has also reduced the indirect costs that stem from the rigors of high-productivity societies.

Maybe I should join up, too.

The Korea Times tells us that some Korean-Americans will join a lawsuit against "PD Diary," the program that helped turn the fear of Mad Cow Disease from imported American beef---known as "Mad Bull Shit" on this blog---into a national pastime. The reason they're getting involved?

The ethnic Koreans are claiming they have been humiliated and ridiculed by other Americans over the turmoil regarding the safety of U.S. beef in Korea, which was partially triggered by the program.

LOL, that's a ridiculous reason to get involved, and I wish these, um, concerned Korean-Americans had spoken up earlier. After all, Americans weren't humiliating and ridiculing Koreans-Americans . . . at all . . . but if I'm obligated to complete that thought than I should say that Americans weren't humilating and ridiculing Korean-Americans because of "PD Diary," they were humiliating and ridiculing Korean-Americans because thousands upon thousands of Koreans were taking to the streets in protest of American beef based on absolutely irrational fears of Mad Cow Disease. I feel confident in saying that most Americans have no idea what "PD Diary" is, or what role it played in instigating Mad Bull Shit, especially since the program barely registered in the media back home even after CNN first reported on it last month. Say what you will about the other issues that involved themselves in later protests, but we musn't forget that countless students, teachers, and citizens were saying things like:

Cha Yoon-min, 13, attended the protest with his mother, a lawyer in Seoul. "I am afraid of American beef," he said. "I could study hard in school. I could get a good job and then I could eat beef and just die."

Have a look through the earlier entries in the "Mad Bull Shit" category if you need a refresher course in what, I'm sure, many around here will begin to deny happened at all. But, on the topic of this KT article at hand, I was repeatedly questioned and harangued by panic-strickened Koreans who believed everything they heard on that program, so I guess that means I have a stake in this, too. Hell, I was ostracized at work and nearly lost my job disputing what the program said, and colleagues in Jeollanam-do still believe the program is true because of an unwavering distrust in the quote-unquote conservative papers that reported on the show's distortions. So I wonder how much money I can get from this.

Opposite days.

ROK Drop just had a post about South Korean President Lee Myung-bak cheering on a Korean team with an upside-down flag. There must be a screwy flag factory over in China, because I've seen a number of upside-down flags on TV, including the one carried by the earthquake survivor during the Opening Ceremony. He's pictured below alongside basketball star and flag-bearer Yao Ming as the two of them led the Chinese team during the Parade of Nations. Google tells me I'm not alone at all in noticing this. I'm pretty sure I saw upside-down American flags, too.

LOL, perfect time to reignite a territorial dispute with China over a submerged rock.

From the Korea Times:

The government will ask the Chinese government to rectify the description of South Korea's Ieodo Islet as Chinese on a Web site of a state agency of China, a senior official at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade said Friday.

The Web site states that the islet is China's, arguing it lies within China' 200-nautical-mile exclusive economic zone (EEZ). The site also referred to the islet as ``Suyan Rock'' in Chinese.

``South Korea and China agreed in 2006 that the Ieodo Islet is a submerged rock, not an island, so that it would not be subject to a territorial dispute,'' the official told reporters, asking not to be named.

``The Internet site referring to Ieodo as Chinese territory is against the agreement. So, we will take necessary measures to rectify the territorial claim, including demanding the Chinese foreign ministry correct the record,'' he said.

He dismissed the claim that Ieodo is in China's EEZ.

``Ieodo is located 81 nautical miles southwest of our island of Marado, and 147 nautical miles northeast of China. There is no doubt that Ieodo is in our EEZ,'' the official added.

Yes, let's not dispute this land because it's a submerged reef and thus not subject to a territorial claim. And because it's ours. Referring to the site by a Korean name seems equally territorial, and, you know, I'm sick of seeing the word "rectify" thrown around whenever somebody disagrees with something. An overview of "Socotra Rock" available from Wikipedia here. There's a Korean-language website about the spot here, which reminds us that January 18th is apparently Ieodo Day. But let's not dispute this land.


Korean-built heliport on the reef's research center.

"Dokdo Belongs to Korea" shirts at Dunkin Donuts, for a limited time only!!!

The shirts are available from August 8th through August 15th. The latter date is Korean Independence Day, when Korea was liberated, passive voice, from Japan somehow. More information on the shirts available here. "Do you know?" is the catchphrase that was used when that singer ran his ad in the New York Times.

Some pictures of Lee Hyori for no particular reason.

Stumbled across some recent photo galleries---here and here---of singer Lee Hyori the other day on Chosun.com, if you're into collecting those sorts of things. The picture I inserted above is a little hyorish and probably not safe for work, by the way, so exercise some caution.

In other news, there will no longer be cash prizes given to police officers who arrest unruly protestors. From the article:

The Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency had initially planned to give 50,000 won to officers whose detainees were arrested and 20,000 won for indictment or submission to summary justice. The plan was to ``encourage'' officers ``suffering from the severe stress of dealing with protestors,'' it said.

The stress would include getting attacked with weapons and being kicked by thugs, I guess, points Amnesty International and the local hippie douches choose to ignore.



That all deserves a post of its own, but I didn't want to lead with something so newsworthy and serious heading into the weekend. From what I understand, though, the prizes given by the Ministry of Gender Equality for not having sex with hookers on New Years' are still on. The only catch is you have to not have sex with hookers on New Years'.

Update to the story about the guy from Gwangju who spread rumors that riot cops killed a girl at a protest.

I'm not following the Korean news too closely these days, so I'm getting to stories whenever I get to stories. Seems like everyone else is on vacation nowadays, too, so I guess it doesn't really matter. About a week ago I posted a link to a Korea Times story about a 23-year-old student from Gwangju who spread rumors online that riot cops had killed a girl at one of those anti-beef rallies. To refresh your memory:

The student, identified only as Kim, spread rumors that police killed a female student and cut off one of her fingers, the police said.

Kim was also suspected of collecting donations worth 20 million won ($20,000) from some 1,000 netizens after claiming he would advertise her death in newspapers.

And I rolled my eyes at the last line:

Students and civic groups in South Jeolla Province are protesting the arrest.

Of course they are. Anyway, the KT had an update on August 5th that I just found. What jumped out at me was:

Police said the 23-year-old student at Chosun University in Gwangju, spent part of the donation at massage parlors and night clubs.

The rest of the story is really confusing, so try to get through it on your own. I'm also puzzled by the last line:

Police sought an arrest warrant last Sunday but a court refused to issue one.

Bad timing.

Greyhound has put a stop to its "There's a reason you've never heard of bus rage" ad campaign after . . . um, one passenger decapitated another onboard a Greyhound bus in Canada last week.

Since 2007 . . . and, um, proud of it?

Here's another interesting passage from Confucius Lives Next Door, a neat little book I quoted in an earlier post. This one is about goofy English in Japan---specifically the practice of advertising "since ____" and then giving a year, like, two years ago---and comes after the author has spent a few pages giving some examples of the nonsensical English he found all over the place. I've excised those passages since those types of things are quite familiar to anyone who has ever spent time in Asia, and instead we begin in medias res (pages 39-40):

Over time, as we saw more and more of this fractured English prose, certain patterns began to emerge, and we realized that some of these slogans actually had meaning, in a manner of speaking. For example, that sign we spotted the first night we were in Tokyo--"Fine Boys Since 1987 says Lets Sex!"--seemed like total nonsense at the time. Gradually, though, we realized that this slogan was full of meaning for the Japanese.

In Japanese English, the words "boys" and "girls" are used to describe trendy, popular young people of dating age, roughly from eighteen to thirty-five. The words "fine" and "fashion" are adjectives that suggest "up-to-date" or "cool." (The terms "high-sense" and "high-touch" also convey a sense of living on the leading edge of the latests fashions.) The expression "since 19xx" is used for precisely the opposite purpose of its use in English-speaking countries. In England, snooty shops and manufacturers of luxury goods like to use "Since . . ." on their labels to suggest they have been around forever: "Purveyors to the Royal House Since 1734." In Japan, "since . . ." is used to suggest that a store or product is brand-new, like "since 1996." In fact, the "since 1987" on that billboard was the oldest "since . . ." I ever saw in Japan.

As for the concluding phrase, "Let's Sex," this is simply a translation of a common pattern in the Japanese language. The Japanese verb shimahshō, meaning "let's do it," can be used with any noun: benkyo shimahshō, "let's study;" ryoko shimahshō, "let's travel." And so it seems perfectly normal for the Japanese to take the English translation of their verb "let's" and combine it with any English noun. You see patterns like this all the time: "Let's Skiing." "Let's Business Meeting." "Let's Recreation." "Let's Sex."

So if you want to get across to youthful Japanese consumers the message that your company is a fashionable new endeavor targeting a market of upscale young men with romance on their minds, there's a perfectly clear way to convey this information: "Fine Boys Since 1987 says Let's Sex." What could be more obvious?

It's always good to have another take on Engrish, and to remember that yeah, it does sort of, kind of mean something to its audience, even if it sounds ridiculous or repulsive to actual English speakers. That out of the way, I can't say I approve of the bastardization of my language, though, or in using it for decoration, or in rendering it ridiculous. Can't say I approve of the indifference toward actually getting it right, or to showing some respect for the meanings its speakers actually attribute it. Especially when we've got "Fucking Freezing" shirts on teachers, or "Let's Sex" on billboards, "sexy pose" going on all over the place, and . . . um, this:

Damn, we almost got rid of them.

A classy KTEWU cartoon equating the threat to Koreans of Mad Cow Disease from imported American beef to the then-recent earthquake in Sichuan, China and Cyclone Nargis in Burma.

The Korea Times reports that the Ministry of Unification is now refusing to permit members of the Korean Teachers' and Educational Workers' Union to visit North Korea. Too bad, I'm sure they'd like it there. From their "Founding Manifesto":

Meanwhile our dictatorial regime and its selfish educational profiteers, such as MoonGyoBu [the former Ministry of Education], DaeHanKyoReon [the former Korea Federation of Teachers' Association] etc. have distorted our intentions and trampled on us remorselessly. With their irrational behavior, they are on a wild rampage, intent on impeding the advance of history.

BUT HEAR THIS!

400,000 teachers, firmly united in accordance with conscience and truth, would make this wicked regime and these selfish profiteers' attempts futile. We act not out of fear of their threats or lies, but for our students' smiling faces and shining eyes.

Comrades! Let's unite and fight for our students' smiling faces!

Comrades! Let's work together for the democratization of education, the democratization of society, and reunification under the banner of the KTU!

For Korean education! For democratic education! For humane education! For solidarity with the Korean Teachers and Education Workers Union!

We've read about the union before on this blog (here and here), in relation to their enthusiastic participation in this spring's demonstrations, and we've seen other examples of their activities elsewhere in the papers and on the blogs. An excerpt from that last link to One Free Korea:

Take a gander, for example, at this paper on the KTU’s “Peace Model of Reuinification Education", and take stock of the KTU’s associations* with obvious North Korean stooge and provocateur So Kyong Won, who in 2003 teamed up with some student radicals to provoke a fight with three American soldiers on the Seoul Subway, kidnap one of them, Private John Murphy, transport him to an anti-American rally on a South Korean campus, and force him to make a videotaped “confession.” So and the former chairman of the KTU traveled to Pyongyang together for a “solidarity” trip in 2003.

At the time, Roh’s government did next to nothing about this or other contemporanous acts of violence against American service members, which may explain why violence has continued to gain acceptance as a means of political expression in South Korea (but I digress).

Bungee jumper dies in fall at Naju amusement park.

From the Korea Times:

A bungee-jumper was killed in a fall in Naju, South Jeolla Province, Tuesday, after the cord connecting him to the bungee jumping structure failed.

The 36-year-old man jumped from the 37-meter structure at an amusement park but the cord did not sustain his weight and broke. He hit the ground after missing a safety air mattress.

He sustained severe external and internal wounds to his head and was pronounced dead upon arrival at a nearby hospital.

The picture above is from this Korean-language article in the Seoul Shinmun. That article mentions what the KT piece doesn't, that the accident took place at the Jungheung Gold Spa & Resort, one of the three waterparks in Jeollanam-do.

Homer Hulbert something something Korean language something something good.

I know very little about Homer Hulbert, but googling around shows me that he was a man who cared deeply about Korea and the Korean language. Matter of fact his tombstone reads "I would rather be buried in Korea than in Westminster Abbey," and as it turns out he is. I did have to scratch my head at the Korea Times article titled "Hulbert Extolled Superiority of Korean Language." The evidence?

The document showed that Hulbert called Korean superior to English as a medium for public speaking.

``So far as we can see, there is nothing in Korean speech that makes it less adapted to oratory than English or any other Western tongues. In common with the language of Cicero and Demosthenes, Korean is composed of periodic sentences. Each sentence reaches its climax in the verb, which comes at the end; and there are no weakening addenda that often makes the English sentence an anticlimax,'' Hulbert wrote in the report.

He also spoke highly of the grammatical superiority of Korean.

``In Western languages, differences in sex, number and person, are carefully noted. But in the Korean language, these are left to the speaker's and the hearer's perspicacity and attention is concentrated upon a terse and luminous collocation of ideas. This is often secured in the West only by a tedious circumstance,'' Hulbert said.

Um . . . not exactly a slam dunk. The article talks about the Hulbert Memorial Society, but their webpage doesn't seem to have the publication in question. The KT article says it was originally in the 1903 annual report by the Smithsonian Institute, though I'm not sure what makes it particularly newsworthy now, or why the Memorial Society is re-releasing it. No sign of it online as of yet, even though other annual reports seem to be available via Google Books.

Gangjin's temples, part 3: Omcheonsa (옴천사).

Here's the long-overdue third installment of "Gangjin's temples," which has already looked at Nammireuksa and the cluster of Baekryeonsa, Okryeonsa, and Yongmunsa. I also profiled some of Gangjin's notable residents in a post "Gangjin: It's people and their places."



There are plenty of temples in Gangjin, and a couple of quote-unquote famous ones. They are pleasant enough, and are fine places to wander and rest during a hike on one of the region's small mountains, but admittedly they do look like temples you'll find in every other part of the country. There are two idiosyncratic temples, though, worth a visit if you're in the mood for something a little different. The first is Nammireuksa, which has the tallest Buddha statue in Korea. The other is Omcheonsa.

Omcheonsa (옴천사) is known for having countless little stone pagodas piled up on the ground, on statues, on other pagodas, and just about everywhere. I say "countless," although it's referred to as a place of 3,000 pagodas (삼천불탑). Have a look at this profile from Korea Temple, including this list of cultural properties, and browse some other photos I took back in 2006.






Getting there and back is a little tricky without your own transportation. When I went there were no buses from Gangjin-eup, so I went to nearby Jangheung county and took a bus bound for Omcheon-myeon. It stops in front of the temple's entrance. To get back to Jangheung after walking around, you have to purchase a ticket from the little general store next to the temple's driveway. Buses pass by once an hour, nearly on the hour, so try to time your exit accordingly.

Gwangyang's Traditional Knife Museum (광양장도박물관)

Found out earlier this summer that there's a traditional knife museum in Gwangyang city, Jeollanam-do, so now I can't really say there's nothing to do there. You can browse the exhibits here, in Korean, and can dig through some pictures of exhibits and workshops on its Naver cafe. Also worth noting is its resident intangible cultural property, craftsman 박용기, whose name looks to be often followed by the suffix 옹 meaning "elderly man." If you're in the neighborhood and want to pick up some souvineers for home, this is a place to do it.

The museum is accessible via buses 77, 777, 99, and 99-1 from Suncheon, and is a three-minute walk from Gwangyang Girls' High School. If you want you can practice Korean phrases through this little page on the Gwangyang Jangdo from the Gwangyang English Town.

Masan schoolchildren want to kill President Lee.

From today's Joongang Ilbo. An excerpt:

A video clip recently posted on the Internet of elementary students writing insults against President Lee Myung-bak in the Jogye Temple guest book has sparked public ire.

Many Internet users have been shocked by the 51-second video clip, directing their anger at the person who filmed it.

It was recorded by one of the demonstrators taking part in a sit-in protest against the government’s resumption of U.S. beef imports at the central Seoul temple.

The three male and three female elementary students visited the temple from Masan, South Gyeongsang on a field trip.

The children, all ten years old, wrote several insulting words and phrases, including “I will kill you,” in reference to President Lee in the guest book.

The school, Samgye Elementary, has since issued a statement. The video's here along with a few photographs of what the students wrote. Not too different from the sentiments expressed by protestors of all ages during this summer's demonstrations, and not too different from the opinions you'll find a lot of students parroting.



Earlier this summer we saw elementary school students from Gwangju writing letters of support to cheer up the president. We also learned about teachers directing their students to make posters lampooning President Lee and his courtship of tainted American beef. A couple of years ago, in probably the most extreme example of hateful Korean students, we saw middle schoolers under the guidance of their teachers making anti-Japanese posters that were hung in some of Seoul's subway stations (photos here and here).

Korea Herald: "You don't understand Korean culture."

Korea Herald reporter Bart Schaneman was nice enough to do a write-up about my netizen troubles and the conversations local bloggers have been having about a foreigner's place to comment on Korean culture. The article can be found on the Korea Herald site by clicking on "Expat Living" on the left sidebar. You can take a look there and give the site its due ad revenue for lending a sympathetic ear to us. But, since the page doesn't allow direct links to articles, and because it has adopted the practice of making readers pay for articles older than a couple of weeks, I'll copy-and-paste the article below for posterity.

'I think foreigners do have a right
to speak about problems in Korea

and to address sensitive issues from our own perspectives.

At the most basic level we are invested in this society, even if for only

a short time, and we pay taxes,

function as consumers,

participate in local communities,

and teach local children.'

- Brian Deutsch


In 2007 and 2008, in a span of 12 months, seven school children from Jeollanamdo died in traffic accidents. Suncheon-based teacher Brian Deutsch found it interesting how educators mobilized their students to protest American beef imports, but said little about traffic safety.

He wrote an opinion piece for the Korea Times titled "Rallies Have Little to Do with Food Safety."

In the piece Deutsch, an American, wrote: "Encouraging students to skip school to attend these candlelight vigils and rallies is not only inappropriate and outside the bounds of a teacher-student relationship, but it detracts attention from more pressing issues students are facing.

"Namely, they are far more likely to be killed on field trips or while walking home from school than by contracting mad cow disease, which as of yet has claimed no Korean or Korean-American lives."

Add that to a previous piece about the use of Nazi imagery in a Korean company's skin care ad, both of which were used in a modified version for the Gwangju News magazine, and Deutsch had attracted the attention of the netizens.

Who told you to talk, foreigner?

The internet campaign was led by a Gwangju native, Kim Hong-su. He started two blogs to counter Deutsch's stories and posted the American's name, blog url, and Facebook profile online in Daum cafes along with an accompanying letter. He also posted the names of Deutsch's schools and advised people to direct their complaints there. Deutsch went to the police but was told they were too busy.

Kim's message was written in Korean, and it was then translated on Deutsch's blog.

"What galls me the most is that these foreigners are growing fat and rich in Korea teaching their native tongue while making fun of the same people who are paying their wages," he wrote. "I need your (other Koreans') help in correcting this kind of behaviors (sic) from foreigners. I would like you to e-mail the editor and those of you who are local to Suncheon should track down this Brian Deutsche (sic) and find out which school or hagwon he teaches in. You can assist me when you find that information. I seek full and unfettered cooperation in my campaign to correct this foreigner's behavior. If we cannot do that to a foreigner on our own soil, how can we hope to correct the behavior of U.S. President Bush?"

Kim was contacted for comment in this article, and responded via e-mail.

"Before you try to learn about Korea via a Korean, you should learn Korean and ask the questions in Korean first," he wrote.

The Gwangju News is operated by the Gwangju International Center. When Deutsch consulted with the staff at the GIC, they told him they didn't like his articles, either. They didn't like the Nazi story or the traffic safety story, and they also didn't like the story he wrote about the death of a 14-year-old American boy, Michael White, who drowned in a sauna near Daegu.

Staffers told him the magazine was publishing stories that were too foreigner-intensive. On top of that, the publisher of the magazine told Deutsch that they might as well close down the magazine if it wasn't going to be appreciated by foreigners.

Deutsch quit the magazine, but his troubles weren't over.

'Generalizations are kind of fun'

Anyone can be a blogger. It takes minutes to sign-on to Blogger or Wordpress, then you can put up a few pictures, spew some vitriol and start checking the site meter for hits. While living overseas it's a good way to stay in touch with friends and family. The days of the mass e-mail are over - they can check the blog for live updates.

It's common for English teachers and other non-Koreans to start up a blog. Most of their sites die a slow death, however. It's difficult to update often enough to keep readers; what seemed like a good idea at the time can easily turn into a bore.

Still, there a few prominent expatriate blogs in Korea that receive a lot of hits. The six we are interested in here are: The Marmot's Hole, Scribblings of the Metropolitician, The Grand Narrative, Ask a Korean!, Roboseyo and Deutsch's - Brian in Jeollanam-do.

The Marmot's Hole is run by Robert Koehler. It is the most heavily trafficked blog of the foreigner-in-Korea set. Koehler, with the help of a handful of guest bloggers, posts news items, analysis, entertainment and pictures of old buildings. Koehler is American, the editor-in-chief of SEOUL magazine, and has been operating the blog for five years.

"Our role is to offer commentary and criticism from a fresh, outside perspective," Koehler said. "That being said, it's easy to overthink these things - personally, I don't think the 'foreign observer' has any special role beyond that of any observer, which is to say, relaying observations he or she has made."

"All countries are open for criticism. The question that really needs to be asked is whether anyone should take what we write seriously. For the most part, the answer to that would be no.

"Most of us are guys with too much time on our hands who like to bitch about things we don't really understand. Which, granted, would make our uneducated rants little different from much of what passes for commentary on Korea, Western or Korean.

"I have a warning on my blog asking readers not to generalize from anything they read on my site, but still, many seem to do it anyway. Besides, generalizations are kind of fun - nationalistically hysterical Koreans, pot-smoking over-sexed English teachers, condescending expats - who doesn't love 'em. It's all a question of how seriously you take what you read."

Do you see what I see?

Scribblings of the Metropolitician comes from Michael Hurt. The blog is a mishmash of social criticism, international politics, pop culture and comments on Korean media. Hurt first came to Korea from America as a Fulbright English teaching assistant in 1994. After earning his master's in ethnic studies from the University of California-Berkeley, he came back in 2002 to finish his dissertation research on Korean nationalism. Now in his eighth year in Korea, he edits the Korea Journal and teaches social issues at Honguk University.

Both Koehler and Hurt brought up Alexis de Tocqueville, a Frenchman who wrote "Democracy in America" in the first half of the 19th century. Both men consider this book a great commentary on the United States.

"The fact that we're foreigners shouldn't disqualify us. I look at American social commentary and social criticism and some of our sharpest and best social critics have been foreigners, people coming from a foreign perspective," Hurt said.

"We have eyes, we have ears. We can read your newspapers. We read what you read. We have access to your information.

"I pay taxes, I buy (things), I live here, so why do I have any less say than you do?

"Why would I put all this effort, why would I even care, or put myself out there, why would I do this if I didn't actually give a (expletive)?"

We're not that different

New Zealander James Turnbull runs The Grand Narrative. He calls it "An irreverent look at social issues." Much of his work deals with Korean advertising and media as well as social commentary. In his eighth year in Korea, Turnbull teaches English in Busan.

"I find the notion that only Koreans are 'permitted' to speak about Korean problems simply absurd," he said. "That isn't to say that all foreigners' opinions on them are equally valid, but if the roles were reversed then I'd be quite happy to hear the opinions of, say, a Korean person who had spent some time in New Zealand and who made an active effort to study and know New Zealand society and learn the language. In fact, probably more so than someone who was merely born there.

"The majority of netizens aside, I've actually found a significant number of Koreans to feel much the same way about the opinions of non-Koreans.

"Koreans are not unique in readily dismissing the opinions of foreigners, but they do seem more defensive about foreign criticism than most. For that reason, it is very important to use Korean sources as much as possible.

"Another advantage to using and considering Korean-language sources as much as possible is that it makes you realize how much you may stereotype and generalize Koreans yourself without being aware of it.

"Without any Korean ability, foreigners are usually forced to rely on either the limited English language media or books for the bulk of their information, and both have problems: the former for often presenting a rose-tinted version of Korea to the world, and the latter for being quickly out of date in a country as rapidly changing as Korea."

Koehler also emphasized using the native tongue.

"Do it in Korean, and in a major Korean newspaper," Koehler said.

Writing complaints in English may be "cathartic," he said, but it does no good.

Why do foreigners complain so much?

Another pair of bloggers, a Korean man living in America (Ask a Korean!) and a Canadian teacher in Seoul (Roboseyo) put together a two-part series dealing with foreigners' criticism and social commentary.

Ask a Korean! wrote, "many complaints from expats that the Korean has seen show a certain level of ignorance. This is not to say that complaining expats are dumb. It is only to say that were they more aware of certain things about themselves and about Korea, they would not be complaining as much, and the pitch of their complaints would not be as strident.

"Expats rarely venture out of large cities in Korea, and they only really interact with Koreans who are fluent in English. Do you know what makes a Korean fluent in English? Money, tons and tons of it. So not only are expats insulated from older Koreans, they are also insulated from younger Koreans who are poorer. What kind of understanding about Korea could an expat possibly have with this kind of limited exposure?"

About social critics, Roboseyo wrote, "Naming a problem is the first step to solving it, and maybe some of these critics are attempting to be a legitimate part of that process - that is, they're writing because they want to see Korea become a better place - in which case, Koreans who are upset about non-Koreans criticizing Korea need to stop and take a careful look at why that upsets them, because the problem does not lie in the complainers or their intentions.

"To be fair, sometimes the social critics' intentions are good, but their methods are poor: the sometimes bitter and mean tone of certain critics can be hurtful, and as I've said to some of my friends who complain about Korea with a rude or condescending tone: 'when you talk so harshly, even when you're right, you're wrong, and even if you win the argument, you still lose.'"


'You don't understand Korean culture'


Deutsch plans to continue writing for the Korea Times and updating his blog.

"I like doing it and I like staying on top of current events and discussions. On the one hand I totally recognize that I'm being paid to teach, not to think, and I say that without being cynical at all. Most people couldn't care less about the particular issues foreigners face, whether in the classroom or in society at large, and hearing a foreigner talk about them probably isn't very interesting.

"I've also had to question how welcome those opinions are. My colleagues themselves told me that it was not my place to opine on what are called 'sensitive issues,' and a recent letter to the editor in the Gwangju News suggested that I, and foreigners, mind their own business and not worry about Korean internal affairs.

"But I think foreigners do have a right to speak about problems in Korea and to address sensitive issues from our own perspectives. At the most basic level we are invested in this society, even if for only a short time, and we pay taxes, function as consumers, participate in local communities, and teach local children.

"Moreover these issues are so prickly because they're not black and white. While it might be unpleasant for some Koreans to hear the other side of the story, I don't think it's inappropriate for it to be raised.

"Our opinions are often dismissed with a line about 'you don't understand Korean culture.' Often this comes when something unpleasant happens to a foreigner, or when a foreigner expresses an opinion disagreeable to the Korean listener. It's well beyond my abilities to explain why this happens, but it's patronizing and inappropriate. I do believe that although foreigners can sometimes dwell on the negative when writing or talking about Korea, I think taking a critical look shows an interest in the host culture that can be healthy if applied properly.

"I realize that a greater measure of tact is necessary when addressing sensitive issues and when trying to foster conversations across cultural boundaries, but even with a lot of coddling I remain cynical that people are ready to hear what we have to say just yet.

"I would love to have Koreans who disagree with me take the time to point out their objections, rather than simply railing against a foreigner who dares to publish something against the grain. And I would love to have Koreans spend more time trying to educate us about their culture and their views, then, since so much energy is spent telling us how wrong and misinformed our opinions are."

Deutsch said he was asked by his school to drop the case against Kim, and that his job was also placed in jeopardy because of what he has written.

Yes, a couple of weeks ago I was, um, "persuaded" by my school to drop the charge against Kim, as part of a package that would allow me to keep my job. After my efforts to be heard in Suncheon were stalled I sent a letter to the Civil Affairs Office in Seoul, as per the instructions on the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency website, but they were sent back to Suncheon as apparently I'm under their jurisdiction. They notified a couple of my bosses about the complaint before letting me know it was back in their hands, and I was called in to the office for yet another meeting and dressing-down, this time for potentially damaging the school's reputation by moving forward with the complaint. I instigated the trouble by writing about current events in the first place, according to my supervisors, and so whatever netizen problems that followed were my fault. Moreover, even if I proceeded, they said, and won the case, I still would be an outcast because my opinions would never have the support of Korean people.

I was escorted to the police station to formally drop the complaint, but I got a little encouragement from the kind police officer---the first one I had been permitted to meet in person---who said he supported my right to free speech and wasn't pleased that I was dropping the case not wholly of my own accord. He took the time to read and record all the evidence I had prepared, and it was the first sympathetic Korean ear turned toward me in a month, which came as a much-needed reprieve from torrential downpour of negativity I had been experiencing. However, if dropping the case---a case it was clear would not get a fair shake---will ease tensions at the office and will show my willingness to move forward, than I suppose it's as fair a trade-off as can be expected. I still feel I was given a raw deal, and my points of view were grossly misunderstood in certain circles, but this affair has prompted some interesting discussions about foreigners' roles as commentators, and it has taught us an important lesson about the lengths some people will go to silence outside voices.

There are a number of ironies in this incident. For example, I was scolded for taking a public stance as a government employee and for potentially disturbing students and their parents, even though one of the teachers' unions here is hyper-political and even though a blog hosted by Ohmynews has pictures of my colleagues participating in rallies side-by-side with students. I was also criticized for meddling in what was called domestic issues, even though things such as the FTA, the military, and September 11th have as much to do with the United States as they do with South Korea.

Yet, I'm aware that free speech isn't a given, for a teacher or for anyone else, and even in the good old US of A people are dismissed from their jobs for having contrary ideas. I have never considered myself a crusader, as some critics have labelled me, but just a guy with some opinions, a computer, and a camera, and who wanted to talk about what was going on around him. I guess I was made an example, that's all. This has been a cautionary tale for in many respects so, um, 조심해요.

Sperm donors required to pay child support?

Just saw a little feature on this topic on Good Morning America, but a quick trip around google shows this isn't breaking news. Matter of fact last year in Pennsylvania a court ordered a man to pay child support to the lesbian couple that used his sperm after, get this, the couple broke up and one of the women needed help to pay her own court-ordered child support. And in this case from last year a man who had a relationship of a "patriarchal nature" with the child, was forced to pay child support conveniently around the time the child was set to enter college. I'll have to google around and see if, in the same spirit, women now have to have the father's approval before having an abortion.

Moreover, the Good Morning America report said this is holding true even for anonymous donors, in cases where the mother needs help paying her own or her child's medical bills or, for the time being, other extenuating circumstances. So a woman can decide to impregnate herself and can then proceed to shakedown a stranger for money? As if being a husband and/or a father weren't a dangerous and financially risky enough proposition nowadays.

2008 Gangjin Celadon Culture Festival: August 9 - August 17.

* Here's a little wrap-up of the 2008 festival.

Original Post:



The 13th annual Gangjin Celadon Culture Festival is coming up next week. It revolves around celadon (청자), a type of pottery that has been manufactured in the region for over a thousand years. It's estimated that 80% of Korea's celadon treasures were made in Gangjin, and you'll recall that some pieces from the area completed a 65-day US tour earlier this summer.

The festival is held in and in front of the Gangjin Celadon Museum in Daegu-myeon, and is a short bus ride from the county seat of Gangjin-eup. Buses run back and forth frequently during this time, and finding your way to the site should be no problem. Though I wouldn't call it one of the top festivals in the country, as some tourist websites have done, it's a surprisingly decent time for a county festival. You can check out some pictures I took from the 2006 festival here, and can browse the "Gangjin" category for more on the local attractions, if you decide to make a weekend out of it.

Gangjin's smoke-free village.

Here's an oldie-but-goodie from January, 2007 about a village in Gangjin county, Jeollanam-do, that kicked their smoking habit. An excerpt:

There are 27 households (61 residents) in Sangdang village, where villagers have not smoked for the last 6 years. In the village you cannot see anyone light up while taking rest in the farm fields.

As recently as in 2000, males in the village had been smoking for 40-50 years.

Following Park Bong-geun (81) who has broken the habit of over 40 years in 1998, a few people in the village started quitting smoking, prompting an “anti-smoking craze.”

People got rid of their ash trays and set some anti-smoking rules: a 1,000 won fine for getting caught, no free cigarettes, and preventing outsiders visiting the village for weddings or funerals from lighting up.

The anti-smoking drive in the village gained momentum when a habitual smoker Mr. Jang (88) was diagnosed with larynx cancer and lost his voice after having his larynx removed.

The village has become smoking-free in January 2001 when the last holdout Park Hyun-soo (60) finally broke the habit of over 40 years.

“I quit smoking not to be an outcast. Phlegm and cough have stopped. Most of all, I feel good when I wake up in the morning.” said Park.

There are a few Korean-language articles here, here, and here.


Stolen from here.

I smoked a pack a day for ten years until I finally quit in April. Wasn't really my choice, but I was pretty sick and came down with a case of bronchitis that along with some other diseases lasted over a month. By the time I got a little better I figured that I had already gone that far without smoking so I might as well keep it up. But there's not a day that goes by where I don't spend most of the time craving a cigarette. It's embarrassing.

Believe it or not, smoking cessation is considered good for your health by some medical professionals. I guess I feel better, I don't know. Actually, with being sick plus being stressed out of my mind for the past few months, it wasn't that I was really feeling good, but that I was sayinig to myself every morning, "If I feel this shitty without smoking, imagine how I'd feel if I were going like a chimney every day after school." It's also tough to expect sick days or sympathy with a habit like that. But, it's still hard to watch Korean and Chinese movies because the characters are like smokestacks, and hopefully the more I exercise the less I'll feel like smoking.

Anyway, Sangdang is in Jakcheon-myeon, a township of about 3,000 in the northern tip of Gangjin county. I couldn't find any pictures of that village, but the Gangjin Shinmun has an interesting feature that'd be more interesting if my Korean were good. They profile a bunch of the little townships and villages around the county, and talk to the people who live there. They sometimes include pictures, too, that together with the features will give you a little idea of what really rural Jeollanam-do is like if you've never been. Actually, skimming those weekly county newspapers every once in a while is kind of fun, even if I mostly just look at the pictures.

Suncheon Outlet (순천아울렛)

Those in Suncheon have no doubt seen advertisements for "Suncheon Outlet," (순천아울렛) or may have already visited it themselves. It's being installed in the empty space around Lotte Cinema in Deokam-dong, across from Homever, and will be a nice addition to town I think, a good supplement to Home Plus, E-Mart, Homever, and both downtowns Old and New. Already a few shops have been thrown into the ground floor, with the first three floors to be filled in sometime soon, I take it. The outlet's generally uninformative official website is here.

While you're at it, have a look at this huge development project, Suncheon Eco Valley, scheduled for eastern Suncheon's Haeryong-myeon, the half-rural township that shares a border with Yeosu's Yulchon-myeon. Part of a number of projects scheduled for the Gwangyang-Yeosu-Suncheon region. Photo comes from this article, which I've seen reprinted in a few different papers.

Koreans still worried about foreign books.

From the Korea Times today:

A systematic government campaign has become necessary to help foreigners better understand Korea as many foreign textbooks contain erroneous information about the country according to the Academy of Korean Studies (AKS), Sunday.

and

``In the past, Korea was mainly known for fast economic growth and the Korean War (1950-1953). But now, many textbooks have started to introduce Hallyu or the Korean cultural wave, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon or the successful 2002 World Cup as well as its long history,'' she said.

Cool, I'm sure American students would love to know that the land where tens of thousands of their countrymen died two generations ago is actually famous for spicy food. And the country that made the news recently for spending months vigorously protesting American beef actually held some soccer games or something there six years ago. Much lengthier remarks on the issue of foreign books and their approach to Korea to come later, in my forthcoming contribution to Roboseyo's series. Just wanted to point out that when they go after textbooks they're not simply trying to shape Korea's image abroad, but are doing so by arrogantly trying to manipulate other countries' histories.

The irony isn't lost on me. Who is some Korean academy or some local publisher to say that Korean entertainment warrants mention in an overseas history textbook while the Korean War doesn't, or that Ban Ki-moon ought to be emphasized over the country's industrialization? For better or worse, from an American perspective the two noteworthy things about South Korea are the Korean War and the region's economic growth. And it isn't like Ban Ki-moon or entertainers like Rain developed in a vacuum, independent of the influence of the massive economic development that took place after the Korean War and fostered in no small part by aid from the same foreign nations that are apparently misrepresenting Korea's image today. In the same spirit, perhaps South Korean history textbooks would consider deemphasizing the occupation period and giving the whole comfort woman thing a rest in favor of more flattering write-ups about Toyota and Hideo Nomo.

Man, this widespread impulse to sanitize Korea's image abroad and paper over what it feels it has outgrown makes me wonder if universities here put Korean History in quotation marks on diplomas and course catalogues.

Jeolla people at it again.

From the Korea Times a couple days ago:

Police have arrested a 23-year-old student of Chosun University in Gwangju, for violating electronic communication laws by spreading rumors online that a female college student was killed by riot police.

The student, identified only as Kim, spread rumors that police killed a female student and cut off one of her fingers, the police said.

Kim was also suspected of collecting donations worth 20 million won ($20,000) from some 1,000 netizens after claiming he would advertise her death in newspapers.

Police are questioning Kim as to why he spread the rumors and what he used the collected money for.

Students and civic groups in South Jeolla Province are protesting the arrest.

Protesting the arrest. Of course. Story and more links in Korean here.

Whoa, pet chipmunks!

Came across some chipmunks for sale in Suncheon, a few storefronts down from the Medical Rotary.







Awwwww, cute even when sideways. Google tells us that it's not so rare to find pet chipmunks, but it's strange for me because the wild variety are so common in Pennsylvania. I see them running around outside all the time, but judging from my friends' reactions in Korea, they're not so common over here.

The store also had about three dozen koi in a big tank in the window, and tons of smaller fish inside. Wikipedia tells us that goldfish in aquaria need about one square foot of water per animal, and other sites say three or four gallons per inch of fish, or ten gallons per animal. One reason goldfish seem to die so quickly is because their tanks are far too small. I was trying to buy a tank off one woman in town who said she kept four fish in a one gallon aquarium! However, even the small tanks here are ridiculously expensive, with the cost making anything over 10 liters or so prohibitive.

Sitemeter issues causing sites to crash.

The consensus on the Blogger help page---and everywhere else---is that Sitemeter is causing pages to crash in Internet Explorer and hit viewers with the "operation aborted" pop-up. Sorry about that, I'm working on it. Same thing seems to be happening with The Marmot's Hole, The Grand Narrative, Deadspin, and everyone else using Sitemeter. The pages still show up through Google reader, so that seems to be your best bet for now. More troubling is that a lot of legitimate blogs have been marked as spam by Blogger and are thus locked until their human operators request a review, but thankfully it looks like that hasn't happened to mine. According to the Blogger help group and other sites reporting on the issue, removing Sitemeter will let your blog open properly, but you'll apparently lose data for the time it's off.

Fuck the fragrant chicken cartilage.

** Anybody else besides me getting "operation aborted" when they try to visit my site? **



Well, you know that is what I usually say when offered mystery meat at school, but this time it's just another humorous menu translation from China. Way to represent, Pennsylvania. HT to Deadspin. Also on Deadspin I saw a link to NBA.com's article "Chinese Nicknames for NBA Players," which reveals . . . some nicknames Chinese people have given to NBA players. LOL, German Racecar.

Quick addendum while Asia sleeps, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette happened to run a little article on Chinglish in today's paper. Nothing new for us, but here's an excerpt:

When Everett Griffith was teaching English in China in 2001 and 2002, he started chronicling incidences of Chinglish on his blog, www.pocopico.com.

The blog, which has been featured in media accounts across the world, includes examples such as "pleasanty surprise of groping" in a shopping mall advertisement, "the slow measure of the chanted war song as soldier do, and bold and high" on a congratulations card for a newborn baby and "Genitl Emen," for gentlemen, outside a public bathroom.

Another reason why Korean public transportation is vastly superior to that in North America.

Very disturbing story out of Winnipeg:

Witnesses say a man was stabbed to death and then decapitated in what appears to be a random act of violence on board the bus that was en route to Winnipeg late Wednesday.

That Adrian Deutsch.

While navering myself a while back to see how widespread that netizen attack was, I came across mention of an article I had written for the Korea Times back in August, 2006. I've found no record of the original article, but a man responded in the paper a month later. An excerpt:

A few days ago, the Korea Foreign Teacher Recruiting Association announced on the Internet a blacklist of unqualified instructors including their names, misdeeds and background information. They are believed to have committed crimes such as forging university degrees, submitting counterfeited documents, leaving Korea without notice after vacation, stealing personal computers, committing sexual harassment, etc. The purpose of the blacklist is to assist language institutes and employers in Korea to avoid hiring unqualified and illegal foreign instructors and also prevent any potential harm to our young English learners through sharing with one another information about unqualified foreign tutors and instructors.

I was angered by Adrian Deutsch's article titled ``Let's be honest about English teaching,’’ in which he used the words ``amateurish, hate-mongering and race-baiting’’ regarding the announcement of the blacklist of unqualified foreign instructors. Deutsch writes, ``If I try to get into this country with no degree, that's my mistake. But if I succeed, it's no longer my problem.’’ It is totally outrageous to use such an argument to justify one’s falsifying their background to get a teaching job in Korea. Does this also mean that if I succeed in committing a crime such as a theft or even murder, it is not my fault but the victim's fault? What nonsense this is!

LOL, for some reason nobody is capable of getting my name right (1, 2, 3). The whole article may be worth a once-over, but it consists of the word "unqualified" ambiguously applied to a number of offenses, and a lot of grandiose yet hollow language describing the "art of teaching" typical of quote-unquote education pieces in the local newspapers.

You may remember the hubbub with the KFTRA's blacklist a while back, when the association comprised of recruiters published the names, nationalities, and passport numbers of teachers it disapproved of. If you don't remember, you can revisit this post on The Marmot's Hole. There was a lot of discussion about it on Dave's ESL Cafe, most notably here, but with other threads on the topic here and here. There was also some information floating around last fall about teachers who were interested in suing, since the KFTRA was obviously breaking laws by publishing this information, but I haven't heard any updates. I can't find the blacklist now, though the KFRTA site does contain this little overview of some of our proclivities, including the tried and true "drink alcohol after work and hang out with Korean women":

한국에 온 이유가 오직 즐기기 위하여 온 강사.
수업 끝나면 여자들과 어울려서 술마시고 다음날은 피곤해서 아프다는 핑계로 빠져주지만
그래도 저녁에는 꼬박 꼬박 술마시러 나가는 유형.

Like I said the article I wrote doesn't seem to be online anymore, ever since the Korea Times switched their URL a year or two ago. Sometimes articles on education are mirrored elsewhere, like Choi's, but mine wasn't. I did save the email of my article to the editor, though, which I will reprint here:

As an English teacher in South Korea I'm inevitably caught up in the on-again, off-again relationship between foreign English teachers and the Koreans who employ them. While it would be much smarter to detach myself emotionally from the fray, I find it difficult to remain unaffected by the amateurish hate-mongering and race-baiting that sometimes goes on in this industry. Case in point, the revelation of an English Teachers' Blacklist, as covered on August 16.

The blacklist, found at www.kftra.co.kr , contains 20 or so names of guilty foreigners, Koreans, and recruiting agencies. According to the Korea Times, those on the list were charged with " leaving for their home countries without notice, hence breaking their contracts." Additionally, "[o]ther accusations include forging university degrees, stealing personal computers and sexual harassment." The teachers' names, background information, and--most upsetting--passport numbers are included on the website. The Times article did not report how these charges were brought about, or whether there was any truth behind them.

The hunt for illegal and "unqualified" teachers has gone on for years, and there are a number of steps in the application process to ensure that teachers are, in fact, "qualified." Just last December, nearly all foreign teachers were required to visit immigration to present their degrees in a sort of be all, end all registration process. Additionally, prospective E-2 holders must present their diploma and passport numerous times both before and during their tenure in South Korea. It should stand to reason, then, that all native English teachers have been checked and rechecked, and that all native English teachers fit the definition of "qualified."

Yet with each moral panic in the newspaper, we see that the lax attitude of school directors and officials has brought about little change. After all, who hires these teachers? Who pays them competitive salaries? As a teacher once quipped to me: "If I try to get into this country with no degree, that's my mistake. But if I succeed, it's no longer my problem."

No one would argue that quote-unquote unqualified teachers must be checked and be removed from the industry. It is a shame, though, that the idea of "unqualified" is a shallow and incomplete one, hammered out by monolingual businessmen equally "unqualified" to run a foreign language industry. Furthermore, it is hypocritical, since deceptive, money-hungry schools and agencies are actively seeking and employing these "unqualified" teachers in the first place. Without honest self-reflection, little reform can happen in the industry.

Most native speakers who got wind of the list saw it for what it really is: another excuse to negatively portray native speakers in the media. If it weren't for the ravenous demand for English, and if it weren't for unscrupulous hagwon directors driving the market, such problems would occur less often than they do now. Moreover, if the directors themselves were held to the same standards of honesty and loyalty as they apparently hold us, we'd hear fewer horror stories of the English education system.