More from Amur

An adendum to the last post (short blog posts always deserve adendums) -- I came across this essay in the Dec. 17 economist, called The Amur's Siren Song. It's a decent read, more of slightly politicalized, historical review travel log than anything.

No mention of any North Korean loggers, but it gets into the history of the region, some of which is also reflected in this piece on Foreign Policy, a piece of a five part series called Where Russia Meets China. The FP essay (called "Don't Call Them Twin Cities") concerns Blagoveshchensk and Heihe. I'll let you guess what city is in what country.

The comments on The Economist piece are also worth a look. Two commenters have been to remote Amur, and another is complaining about the author's us of "The Sea of Japan/East Sea" to describe the body of water east of Korea and west of Japan.

North Korean Loggers

In the days after reading about the North Korea loggers that that recently defected to the South I found myself drawn to one particular aspect of the story.

North Korea sends its people to work in a number of overseas countries to try to secure valuable foreign exchange. In the Amur region, nearly 1,500 North Korean workers are employed at a series of remote logging camps, according to a BBC report earlier this year.

Conditions are grim, with winter temperatures usually some 30 deg Celsius below zero. Apart from two holidays a year, the North Koreans are said to work year-round whatever the weather. The North Korean state takes 35 per cent of the proceeds from the logging, about US$7 million (S$9.8 million) a year, the BBC reported.

Here's where Amur is. I think of logging as a pretty grim occupation anyway -- I'm imagining freezing cold temperatures, numerous injuries, missing fingers, slivers. But 30C below zero? That's extreme cold. I've been chipping away at Raymond Carver -- A Writer's Life by Carol Sklenicka, and by virtue of him having lives in Yakima, Washington, and other places down the Oregon/Northern California cost, there are a number of references to people working in the logging industry during the early half of the 20th century.

Also came across this interesting gallery of logging photos, most of which are from the same period of time. Here's to hoping those loggers have some peace of mind in their new country.

Kara Bakery -- Sweet-n-Flaky

I do like music, as the first post on this here blog somewhat indicates. I have a funny relationship with Korean pop music. When I first moved here I thought it was insipid and beneath contempt. Then I started to view it as more of a sport -- you have your favorites, your heroes and villians, you root for the ones you like and against those you don't like.

I tend to like girl groups. That is to say, I like Korean girls doing Korean pop music as opposed to the guys. So sue me. That's not to say I don't like any male K-pop artists or songs. But it's probably something like 80-20%, and I'm much more likely to dispise male K-pop artists. At least I'm in touch with my feelings on the matter.

One of the more popular groups going these days is Kara, who, say what you will, produced one of the catchiest songs of the year called Honey. I don't know what other foreigners think about Kara, because we don't talk about this sort of thing. By virtue of being Korean, all Koreans like all K-pop songs and artists, which is probably more the way it ought to be. But I'm a critical guy. I gots me opinions.

Kara are super cute. Sometimes the music jives with me and sometimes it doesn't. Honey is a great song, mostly because of the instrumentation, specifically the synth-washes. I also love the white/purity image they were running with at the time (note the sports metaphor). I say running because Kara changes it's image often, much to the dismay of some foreign bloggers.

So the big news is that Kara has opened its own bakery. As I understand it, the bakery is a TV show concept, but the bakery itself is real. It's part of the Crown bakery chain, the Wondergirls did a similar show/campaign a bit back. As far as Korean bakeries go, I'd place Crown at No. 4 or 5, which isn't very good considering there are about six in total.

So why is this worth posting about? Well, because they each did promotional videos and in this one you get to watch Hara dance around with a phallic, shake her 언덩이 and lick what looks like, um, frosting, off her fingers.



I suppose I could put myself on the couch and really get at my perceptions of gender, the hidden symbols of women in Korean pop music, and how this will play out in the Korean society of tomorrow, but frankly...that would be boring.

Cham Jinju

The Korean government recently flew some former Peace Corps volunteers that served in the country during the 1960s. I've come across a few stories in the last week regarding this, so I'll bite and give it time here on my blog (audience of two, including myself).

This particular story is by a columnist based in Everett, Washington, writing about a guy who served in Jinju, a city I visited for the first time only recently. You'll find all the latest news on Jinju linked at the bottom of this page. I'm sure the man, William McCloy, was blown away at the changes. He met a Korean woman while here and ended up marrying her and taking her back to the states.

The 64-year-old Edmonds area man served as an English teacher in South Korea. He met wonderful friends and students, but also saw great need. He remembers struggling to stay warm, and teaching Korean health workers about basic hygiene.

Jinju is another one of those scary cities I mentioned a few posts ago, and I did meet a guy at the bus station who was mentally ill and told me he was in town to pick up his meds. Probably a case of a small sample size. It's just a backwater town, very industrial, with several clusters of smokestacks that have got to be pouring something very evil into the air at a high rate. I know a guy who was born in Jinju, but was adopted by an American family shortly after birth. He moved to Jinju to teach English for a few months, I'm sure in part, to reconnect with his hometown if not find his parents outright. He lasted about two weeks before moving up to Seoul for the duration.

Like Cheonan, Jinju gets the "historical city" tag due to the fact that there's not much there there's a castle there. I took a quick look at the Jinju Wikipedia page. Sounds like someone who works for the city of Jinju has been doing a little work on it:

The Nongae Festival, held in May each year commemorates and celebrates the sacrifice of the beautiful and patriotic gisaeng (professional Korean entertainer) Nongae's suicide-assassination of a Japanese general together with the 70,000 Koreans who lost their lives in the battle of Jinju Castle during the Imjin War.

Actually, there's a link in the above quote that goes to this page, which is a very nice photo essay (possibly written by the same person that wrote the wiki) on a blog detailing the Nongae Festival. I'm even half tempted to go back and check it out.

Slight tangent here: while doing a search for the Peace Corps folks revisiting Korea I came up with this goofy story about a local-boy-makes-good from Rhode Island who teaches English in Korea and does photography as a hobby. Basically, the story is an interview with him about Korea. Nothing wrong with that. Everyone gets 15 minutes and all that. He's thinking of joining the Peace Corps by the way. Hopefully he'll have a blog. The world needs a few more. A-hem.

And in case you're wondering, Cham Jinju, or really Charm Jinju is the tourist slogan, which gets a few points, in the great contest of dorky Korean city slogans, because it works in both English and Korean -- 참 (pronounced "cham") means true or genuine. Close enough to charm.

Korea to Employ English Teaching Robots

You (as in myself, the only reader of this blog thus far) might have noticed at the bottom of the page here is a newsfinder contraption that will pull in different stories related to cities in the Busan area. I'm sure I'll get into further topics concerning Masan later, but the city is one of two (the other being Daejeon) that next year will introduce English teaching robots at local schools.

This story is from Xinhua, which is a Chinese source, so lets account for the fact that there might be some baiting going on here, but I'm intrigued by this idea. The story specifies that the robots will be introduced "in an attempt to better serve students in provincial cities." So that kind of follows along the lines of the Vietnamese women that are being introduced (probably into similar areas) to better serve men in provincial cities.

I might also suggest the introduction of robots as English students in Korea. That might solve a few problems as well.

Mass Weddings in Chunan

The other day when I was poking around for info on Chunan (as opposed to Cheonan) for the previous post I came across some photos of a mass wedding that happened there on August 1, 2005. The photo caption reports that 4,600 couples from 186 countries around the world participated in the event.

When I first moved to Korea and taught at an English language school for adults I met a Korean guy that had married a Japanese woman. At the time I was just becoming aware of the fact that Koreans typically went to great lengths to marry other Koreans, and also that Koreans and Japanese people hated one another. You can certainly fiddle with those two accusations -- today Koreans are marrying foreigners more than ever and the Japan vs. Korea rivalry is currently at a low ebb -- but I'm simply trying to represent the two conclusions I was starting to make at the time.

I liked the guy, and what I'm getting at is that I liked the fact that he'd married a Japanese woman. We talked about it in class a fair amount, and only toward the end of the class month did I realize he was a Moonie.

I don't have any big beefs with the Unification Church. I will say that was one of the few things I knew about South Korea before I moved here, and so it's always surprised me that the church isn't more visible within Korea. That student is the only Moonie I've ever met here, and I don't typically see advertisements, churches, or much of anything Moonie-related in Korea. That said, Koreans are pretty good at sweeping image-encroching things under the rug -- the Moonies being no exception, I guess.

I haven't spent much time looking into this, but one thing that's always struck me about the Moonies, mostly the idea of mass weddings, fits into modern-day Korean culture pretty well. As far as I can tell most post-war marriages in Korea up into the late 80s were arranged, and arranged marriages are still happening today, under the guise of the Buddhist-based ma-sun, for which people basically go to a fortune teller (with their parents) who then suggests partners based on numerology compatibility. I think most of the arranged marriages back in the day followed a similar route, with the cavait that today's Koreans (in most cases) have more choice in the decision.

Today, most Korean weddings occur at wedding halls that have as many as two or three weddings happening at the same time on the same floor, with a number of other weddings going on other floors in the same building. This is changing too as people have more money to spend, and spend it on more private wedding affairs where you'll see just one wedding at a time. But that costs money of course.

Frankly, I don't have a big problem with arranged marriage. I'm guessing more good marriages happen due to the fact that the couple is willing to make it work rather than the fact that they both put the cap back on the toothpaste tube or both like science fiction movies. Again, I'm not going to back this up with any hard evidence, but I think it's safe to say the Korean divorce rate is a lot higher today than it was 30 years ago, despite the fact that people have more freedom to choose partners. This probably has more to do with people being less willing to just stick it out in a bad marriage. But if you feel like you have fewer options, chances are you'll make it work one way or another.

Unfortunately, I only taught that student for a month. I'd be curious to know what he's up to now, several years later. I'd like to know if his marriage is still together (bet it is) and how he's managed to keep it going.

Photos from www.life.com.

Cheonan and Chunan

The title is the same word for 천안, a city about an hour south of Seoul. The first is the newer romanized spelling, and the second the olde, postwar way.

I've been to Cheonan a few times now. Ordinarily I'd put it into my list of "scary" Korean cities. Scary isn't necessarily a fair description, and I doubt it's all that scary, actually. But there are places in Korea where there aren't many foreigners, where the buildings are a little old and run down, and where I see what seems to be a disproportionate number of drunk men during the daytime.

Put the above three together and you have the makings for a "scary situation," which is essentially a drunk, old man chasing me down a rundown street. In reality, this has only happened to me a couple times, and only when I've had a Korean woman on my arm, but from time to time I still worry.

At any rate this trip to Cheonan was perfectly pleasant and it ended, as it has before, with me killing time in the Cheonan/Asan KTX station for more than 90 minutes. The station itself is somewhat isolated, on the edge of what was Cheonon. Was, because like a number of Korean cities it's being transformed into something else entirely, using the KTX station as the center. This Korean blog actually has a photo essay of the transformation process, with the "before" photos, in which the area is nothing but countryside, saved for the end.

I walked around the station several times. The Asan station is part of the Seoul Subway network. The KTX station was built onto that, so now the city/cities are connected to Seoul in two ways -- one which takes about 30 minutes and costs 19,000 won, and the other which takes about 90 minutes (I'm guessing) and probably costs 3-4,000 won. About a year ago the Cheonan/Asan station looked like spaceship landed in the countryside. Now, a number of apartment building projects are going up nearby. But the grand plans, which are showcased in drawings around the station, are a sight to behold.
In the states, we might label something an "up and coming" neighborhood if it's being rejuvenated. Ft. Greene in Brooklyn is one area that while I was living there, was being transformed from a dump, to a hipster hangout, and finally to an expensive neighborhood that attracted young moneyed couples looking to start families.

In Korea this works a little differently and it all has to do with modernization. Usually, in the middle of nowhere, a subway line with be built, and then 15-20 apartment buildings, each 20 stories tall, with pop up. This is happening in Cheonan, but on a larger scale. There are 10 apartment complexes going up, as well as a number of malls (the one at right here is the Y-mall, currently being built near the train station) and skyscrapers being planned. It's going to look something like the photo up top. Dig the Dubai hotel-style thing in the background. Also in the photo you can see the KTX line running though the center.

I know these architectural renderings look a little like someone's wet dream, but it's all still impressive. I believe the square looking building in the foreground is going to be some kind of city government center. If I was looking to move somewhere in Korea and start a family I'd probably give serious consideration to this area, and not only because of the spastic "golf resort," which looks less golf-y and more waterslide-like. I'm a fan of waterslides. I'd love to bring a special someone here one of these days...

Spastic is the right word, no?

Cheonan is known as a "historical city" in Korea, which means it has nothing else going for it but historical sites and temples, most of which you could find anywhere else in Korea. Famous food? Sundae soup, which is a kind of blood sausage made from cow or pig intestines. I'll pass, thanks.

But once all this other stuff is built Cheonan is going to be a nice livable city, and I'd even say it'll be one of South Korea's fastest growing cities. "World's Best City"?, as the city's English page so humbly proclaims? Hmm...maybe I'll wait a bit before designating it that. I'll stick with "livable," and no longer "scary."

Grown' Up

This kind of story always blows me away, partially because I've watched it happen before my very eyes. Koreans are taller than when I got here. I had a girlfriend once tell me that if we had kids she'd "know how to make our kids tall." I had no idea. I'd always thought hanging for hours on the swingset in the backyard was the way to go about that.

From the New York Times:

A growing conviction that tallness is crucial to success has prompted South Korean parents to try all manner of approaches to increase their children’s height, spawning hundreds of “growth clinics” that offer growth hormone shots, Eastern herbal medicine and special exercises to ensure that young clients will be the ones looking down, not the ones looked down upon.

“In our society, it’s all about looks,” said Ms. Seo, 35. “I’m afraid my daughter is shorter than her peers. I don’t want her to be ridiculed and lose self-confidence because of her height.”

I don't mean to oversell this. I don't think I saw many Koreans taller than 6'3 when I arrived here, and plenty of guys around 5'0. Now the site of a 6'3+ fella is commonplace, and while the little guys are still running around, bein' cute and everything, the number of tall young people in this country -- both men and women, as the story says -- is startling.

...Shhh

Starting this blog has become such a non-preoccupation that the test post has been sitting here for two weeks. Off to a good start.

I live in Busan, Korea. I've been here a few years. I travel around the country quite a bit for my job, so I'm thinking I might have a few interesting things to say. Maybe not.

Tonight I was walking home listening to Miles Davis Shhh Peaceful. I used to have it on record a decade or so at home in Oakland, but I don't think I really got it until tonight as I was walking home from the bus stop. I was walking really fast, to the point that I wondered if I was looking foolish. I must have been. But the beat on this song had me walking in this cathartic walk-jig, and next thing I knew I was catching the eyes of a few women. Might have been my hat. Might have been the music they couldn't hear. I like that. I jutted into a crosswalk on a red light. I live next to it and I know how to time it. But the intersection after, that's a different animal -- the traffic is unpredictable and the cars faster. But I jutted right into that too and danced across the street.

Whipped past the mandu restaurant that's not all that great and then peered into the hairdressing shop where the beautiful woman works, but never looks at the passing eyes outside (mine aren't the only eyes...believe you me).