Penultimate Beer in Memphis

A late evening's drink in the Holiday Inn near Memphis International Airport:

I'm sending this from Seoul, having just returned home from the Incheon Airport.

Cheers, everybody!

Paul McCartney - Out There Tour

My family and I did something together yesterday evening. We attended Paul McCartney's Out There Tour concert held in Seoul's Jamsil Olympic Stadium, and I actually had a great time. I generally steer clear of big events because I'm a little-events kind of guy, but my offspring really wanted to go, and since we had four tickets, I went along. My wife took a few photos as proof:

None of us are in the photo here, but it does serve as evidence, I hope . . . Next, inside Jamsil Olympic Stadium:

I think that's Paul on the big screens. Here's another shot:

A lot of lights! There were even fireworks at one point during the show - exploding into the sky to the tune of "Live and Let Die"! But we were so enthralled to the multicolored lights shooting into the heavens that we took no photos. Finally, here I am:

And that's all for today . . .

Biking on a Busy Day . . .

We went biking yesterday together, Sun-Ae and I, something we've not had time to do for a couple of years now, so busy we've been with our editing and translation work, and we saw both old and new scenes on our bike trip up the Jungnang Stream to a pathside place where we used to stop for lunch and beer, back when we had more time, and the woman there, the proprietress of the outdoor food-and-drink place, was glad to see us, and maybe for the final time since we have so little time to spare for such trips, and little time for stopping and taking a few photos, such as this one of a fisher bird of some sort:

He looks like a lone sentry in a landscape of Brutalist architecture, awaiting friend or foe, but encountering us, a couple of puzzling creatures who capture him in this, his De Chirico moment.

And then, there's this:

Reeds that grow between biker and stream . . . albeit with highrise apartments looming in the obscure distance . . .

'Twas a chilly day, but worth the trip.

Interview at the Asan Institute

Seoul

I was interviewed yesterday at the Asan Institute for a position as editor in charge of their English publications. A couple of good scholars whose papers I've edited recommended me on the basis of my editing skills. I have the rare combination of wide-ranging knowledge, writing ability, attentiveness to detail, and years of experience. The job probably could have been mine for the taking . . . but I lack administrative skills, and I know it. I'm not a people person and just wouldn't be good at directing personnel. I told them the truth, so they appreciated my honesty and seemed to like me anyway. They asked if I knew anybody I could recommend. I reflected but couldn't think of anyone with my combination of abilities, not even to mention the skills that I lack, so I told them that, unfortunately, I didn't know anyone. Handshakes all around, and I left.

Any of you out there with all of the relevant skills might want to look into the Asan position . . .

Autumn: Sidewalk of My Seoul

Sun-Ae and I were out walking along a street near our apartment a couple of days ago when she stopped to capture the moment. Leaves were falling as she took this photo, but they seem to have evaded the lens, perhaps embarrassed to be caught in the moment of their fall, though that would have been of little moment.

Later, I was reading something the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, had said about the "sense of absolute immersion in the richness of the moment" that somehow encompasses us at certain moments in our reading, and I thought, "How rare that is," not an experience we can strive for and attain, but something that happens to us, like falling in love, rare moments when even Faust would have uttered those fateful words, "Verweile doch, du bist so schön."

Platoon Kunsthalle in Seoul?

Platoon Kunsthalle

A recent student of mine informed  me of an interesting event coming up from September 24 to October 2 in the Platoon Kunsthalle here in Seoul, a philosophical event involving presentations by Alain Badiou (France), Slavoj Zizek (Slovenia), and Wang Hui (China):

I'm a student who took Academic English last semester, majoring [in] fashion . . . I'm not sure if you would remember . . . Anyways, Slavoj Zizek is visiting Korea to have a conference at Kyunghee University, and there is going to be an event at Platoon Kunsthalle for three days. I was asked by a friend who organizes this event if I could invite professors who would be interested in this event, and I thought you might be interested....

Platoon Kunsthalle is a very 'German' venue (founded and run by German people), and they have great German tap beers, which is rare in Seoul (so I've heard . . .)

Unfortunately, I probably can't make the event (though it appears to last longer than three days), and I regretfully told the student so, to which she replied:

It's unfortunate that you cannot make it to the event! However, Platoon is a very interesting venue, and you should check out the place . . .

If only I had wealth and leisure, I could enjoy these events. A Kunsthalle, incidentally, is something like an art museum, but without the permanent exhibition. As for "platoon," it's a military term for a unit comprising from two to four squads and having anywhere from twenty-six to sixty-four soldiers, and what it has to do with art, I don't know. Maybe this is just one more example of postmodernist influence. Or does it resonate with the also intrinsically military expression "avant garde"? Here's what the Platoon Kunsthalle has to say about itself:

PLATOON KUNSTHALLE opened its doors on 11th april 2009. PLATOON KUNSTHALLE is set up in seoul as a space for subculture in asia. its programmatic orientation towards cultural movements beneath the radar creates a dynamic space where new ideas are born and presented . . .

Go to the link for more, though there appears to be no explanation for the choice of "Platoon."

An Unexpected Look at Syngman Rhee

Syngman Rhee
Syngman Rhee Institute

A few days ago, I received an email from Professor Lew Seok Choon (류석춘) of Yonsei University, a sociologist, but also the director of the Syngman Rhee Institute. The message was all in Korean, so my initial thought was that the email was spam, but I happened to see the Yonsei address, so I clicked on "Translate" and received a Google-garbled version that I just managed to make out as a serious message. I therefore asked my wife to decipher it for me. She explained that Professor Lew wanted to show me the Syngman Rhee Institute. Why? That wasn't clear. Nevertheless, the honor of being asked was sufficient for me to reply that I would be honored to visit.

My wife and I set up a meeting for Monday the 29th, around 11:00 a.m., and when we arrived, we were shown two documents -- Syngman Rhee's log book, which includes up through World War Two, but stopping before Liberation from Japan, and his wife Franziska's Korean War diary -- both in English. The institute wants to publish both documents in transcription and facsimile. They have a Korean-American assistant transcribing and a Korean scholar checking the transcription, particularly the names.

What did the institute want from me? A careful editing to ensure that the transcription was accurate. I think that I can do that, despite my inexpertise on Korean history.

After settling the duties, we went out for lunch in a nearby restaurant for excellent Korean food and a great view of Inwang Mountain -- the very one that Park Wan-suh had to go over as a child to reach her school. We followed up the tasty lunch with an even more inspiring view of that same mountain from a coffee shop at a higher elevation, where we enjoyed excellent coffee and talked politics and economics -- concerning not only South Korea, but the North as well!

Professor Lew promised another meeting some time after the work is done so that we have more time to discuss such things as the National Security Law, North Korean markets, and China's changing view on the North and the South . . .

Professor Suh Ji-moon on Namdaemun (Sungryemun)

My friend Professor Suh Ji-moon (English Literature, Korea University) and I recently advised the Korean government's Cultural Heritage Administration -- part of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism -- on the English translation of the plaque that offers historical information on the restored Namdaemun (Great South Gate, aka Sungryemun, set ablaze by an arsonist in 2008), and she sent me some photographs with an email:

I'd put aside yesterday afternoon to go and see the restored Sungryemun and the plaque, and I did go, in spite of the rain -- which was not heavy, but enough to interfere with photo taking. There are two identical plaques on two sides of the gate plaza (if the small space can be called that) . . . . Before the fire, it never occurred to me to go near the gate to observe it at close range. I overheard, at the gate, people saying that before the fire, viewers were allowed to go up the stairs to see the gatehouse but that the house is closed to public now, becuase that's how the arsonist had access to the house and set fire . . . .

I guess the English part of the plaque couldn't be much better, given its basis on the Korean . . . . Anyway, thanks again for your kind help.

Such were her words about their work . . . and ours. Also, here are her photos:

Above are the gate and restored walls, and below are some of the decorations:

Below is the historical marker, or plaque:

If you click on the image, you'll be able to read the plaque's words, which Professor Moon translated and I edited -- except that the people who actually constructed the plaque changed our punctuation slightly and twice left out the essential space required before a parenthesis.

They may even have reworded a slight bit. I'm not sure . . .

Seoul Incarnate!

Seoul's Gangnam
Photo by Zeng Han
NYT Magazine

The New York Times Magazine has an interesting, if somewhat superficial, article on Seoul by Phoebe Eaton, cleverly titled "The Reincarnation of Seoul" (March 22, 2013):

"Pali! Pali!" everybody likes to say. Faster! Faster! South Korea has been sprinting down the road to recovery since the end of the Korean War. As fast as PSY's "Gangnam Style" anthem, mocking Seoul's Ferrari-and-furs nouveaux riches, galloped to the top of the Western music charts this year, the city has emerged as one of the most hip (and most underrated) cultural capitals in the world. Cruise-line-proportioned flagships, architecturally bombastic headquarters, museums celebrating traditional houses to handbags, haute and hot restaurants are all competing for the attention of its 10 million increasingly affluent residents.

Koreans have the reputation for being nose-to-the-grindstone, study-smarties. But looking around Seoul today, one can only conclude they're ready to enjoy themselves. It's no longer the city voted least favorite layover in the Far East. Let everyone rabbit on about how places like Shanghai are The Future: Seoul residents are smarter dressers; its restaurants feel more fussed over, more daring; and after an early force-feed of education, everyone's creative, individualist side is emerging.

South Korea never just apes the West but puts its own topspin on music, fashion, food, technology. Apple may have won its patent-infringement lawsuit against Samsung, but Samsung's Galaxy S III is neck and neck with the iPhone 5 in stores, early to the notion that people wanted smartphones with bigger screens. Samsung has overtaken Sony as the world's biggest maker of TVs. "Apple takes forever to develop a jewel of a phone, but Samsung, they just throw it out there. Bam-bam-bam!," says the architect Euhlo Suh. "People don't like this feature? Let's make another one. Bam-bam-bam!"

That's just the hardware. Content has arrived, too. The cultural wave rolling from these shores already has a name -- hallyu -- literally, the Korean Wave, coined by awestruck Chinese who were the first to acknowledge Korea's revised profile in Asia. Its "K-pop" music and television shows have been embraced with such a Pacific Basin bear hug that money from these sectors alone buoys South Korea's economy by $4.5 billion a year. This year, Korean directors transitioned from Hallyuwood to Hollywood, and will open their first English-language films, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger and Nicole Kidman.

Seoul is reincarnating itself as a world-class city with daring architecture and an eye for art and fashion. Quite an exciting place to be right now, even for an old man like me! The article doesn't exactly do the city justice, but it's a fun read, especially for a resident foreigner who can chuckle over exaggerations like "the all-powerful mayor" and "the economy-minded socialist government" -- meaning the city government, of course, which has a mayor with leftist views, but Seoul doesn't have a socialist government, nor is the mayor omnipotent, so Ms. Eaton is perhaps joking? Pyongyang, Seoul ain't.

I'd comment more on the article, but I'm too busy, and you can click on over there and read for yourself, or go directly to the interactive slide show, or even plan your itinerary of where to eat, drink, and stay on a visit to Seoul.

I intervene in an altercation . . .

Seoul Subway Station Hoegi

Wikipedia

At about 5:30 on the subway home yesterday evening from teaching my final Friday class at Ewha, after I had changed trains at Wangsimni Station and had just passed Hoegi Station toward Jungnang Station on the Jungang Line, I heard a ruckus to my left . . . an ajeossi voice raised in command. But when I looked, I saw not a middle-aged man, but a harabeoji, a grandfather type who had been drinking, probably soju. The old fellow was trying to get a young African man to move to one side because he felt that the man was blocking people's passage from one set of exit doors to the other.

The African man was annoyed but trying hard to ignore the old man -- and in fact was listening to music on his earphones, so the old man removed them, poked the African man in his belly, and despite being much shorter tried to physically move the black man to one side, at which time, the latter pushed back, angering the old Korean man, who instantly expressed his upset emotions by further raising his voice.

I recognized the old man as an alcoholic who had two or three times accosted me, mumbling each time in Korean to ask me something that I couldn't comprehend, but I had always been polite, and he had each time relented, so I realized that I knew him well enough to intervene and therefore stepped between the two, taking the old Korean man gently by the shoulders and lightly restraining him while saying, "It's okay, it's okay . . ."

Remembering me, he settled down and complained less loudly, took my hand to shake it, and allowed himself to be mollified. A middle-aged Korean woman, an ajumma, then joined me, as did another Korean man, middle aged and therefore a real ajeossi, and among us, we calmed the old fellow down, though he pushed back a bit at them in his drunken state (but never pushed me).

When he was again stabilized and his attention directed elsewhere, I turned to the African, made the motion of downing a bottle, and received a nod in return, acknowledgement that he knew the man was drunk. I added, "He's spoken to me several times while drunk." The African man smiled and politely asked, "Has he?" I smiled in reply and nodded . . .

Mangu Station came a couple of stops later, whereupon, not seeing the Korean woman, I thanked only the other Korean man for his assistance and exited the train.

Not quite so exciting as that other altercation . . .

But on a lighter note . . .

Lollipop House

Moon Hoon

New York Times

Liza Foreman, writing "In South Korea, Houses With a Sense of Whimsy" for the NYT (September 20, 2012), tells of whimsical architecture by Seoul's Moon Hoon:

Kim Dae Sung, a 36-year-old computer programmer, his wife, Lee Ji Sun, 34, and their 4-year-old daughter, Kim Soo Min, look like a conventional family of three: a father who leaves for the office early each morning, a stay-at-home mother and a young daughter with cute pigtails.

But this family lives in an unconventional home, made all the more unusual by its striking contrast to the ranks of monotonous high rises that fill the Korean capital and spill out to the suburbs, including their town of Yong In.

Simply by living in a house rather than a high-rise apartment, the family is already unconventional, but there's more defiance of convention here, as you can see from the photograph above.

The Lollipop House is a wood-frame structure covered in a swirl of red-and-white steel plates, designed to resemble the candy -- though local children call it the Snail for its rounded silhouette. But regardless of the name, the seven-level house glows at night, yellow light pouring through its large glass windows.

There ought to be a photograph of that! Incidentally, my wife looked at the photo above and questioned the statement that it's a "seven-level" house. I share my wife's skepticism, and I wonder if the reporter jotted down "2-level" a bit unclearly and later read it as "7-level." I suppose I could try to contact Ms. Foreman . . . [Update: It really is seven levels! Go here and scroll a bit.]

The two-bedroom, two-bathroom home, designed by the Korean architect Moon Hoon, is unusual in other ways, too.

It was completed in February after just three months’ construction and cost a total of 170 million won, or $152,000.

And, perhaps most important, the Lollipop is part of a trend inspired by a 2011 book whose title in English is "Two Men's Journal of Building Their Homes," a story by Lee Hyun Wook and Goo Bon Joon about wooden construction that has intrigued homeowners here.

"Before, individual houses were for rich guys. It would cost you $100,000 for the architect alone plus $1 million for the house," said Mr. Moon, 44, who has a master's degree in architecture from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "Then came the book, which explained how to build in wood, which is much cheaper."

His 11-year-old firm, moon_bal_sso, is based in Seoul and most of his projects, including several homes and a school, are in the capital region.

"Apartments used to be an investment, which is why people tolerated living in a concrete box, but now they aren't going up anymore," he said. Seoul's real estate market has never recovered from the 2008 global downturn, and prices fell 2.14 percent in the first six months of the year from a year earlier, according to Doctor Apt., an online real estate site in Korea.

That global downturn merely burst a housing bubble that would have popped anyway, but I'm surprised that people didn't recognize the bubble and kept buying up apartments as investments.

Still, Mr. Moon's designs are not for the faint of heart. One of his recent homes, a quirky holiday house perched on the edge of a hill in Jeongseon, in the northernmost part of the country, features large gold horns on the roof.

"My professors would hate me for putting horns on a building," he said. "The client wanted something representative of a bullfight. Before and after the horns, it is a totally different building."

It certainly is, but you'll need to go to the article to see that one. I showed the photo to my wife, who told me she already knew about it. Here are more images, from Google Images.

I now think I'd enjoy living in a snail house, or even a horned house. Like a snail house, I'm slow, and like a horned house, I'm . . . well, never mind.

Out on Seoul . . .

Batman in Seoul?

Photo by Casey Lartigue

I took my daughter to see Batman yesterday. No, not the Seoul bar that Mr. Casey Lartigue stumbled upon a couple of years ago, but the recent movie, The Dark Knight Rises. Rather dark theme for a fifteen-year-old kid? Well, yeah, I guess, but she's not afraid to watch zombie films, stuff that I won't watch for fear of night terrors! Besides, she invited me to see the Batman movie. I had to pay, of course.

The theme was rather dark, even for me, but I have an interest in terrorism. An academic interest, I mean, not a personal one -- except to the degree that the 9/11 attack felt personal, and felt even more personal when I learned that one of my brothers knew a flight attendant who died in the first plane to strike the WTC.

The film was great, with several unexpected twists, and it explored some motifs of terrorism, if not very deeply, but the terrorist plot was believable only within the framework of this well-crafted movie. An army of terrorists gathered in the sewers beneath Gotham CIty where one expects to find merely alligators? And how many years would they need for mixing enough concrete and explosives to blow up bridges, streets, and a football field?

That football scene provided a somewhat amusing sight gag as an unsuspecting Heinz Ward rushes toward the endzone for a touchdown, the field collapsing just behind his feet at every step. As he turns around in triumph, he discovers an enormous hole where the field had been. The Korean audience got a kick out of that scene because Heinz Ward is half Korean and widely recognized here in Korea.

My daughter and I left the cinema impressed, with her remarking, "I'll have to see this again, with my friends!" We then headed for a nearby Vietnamese restaurant, where over a long meal we discussed the film and life, though we didn't touch upon the shootings at the premiere showing in Aurora, Colorado. I don't think my daughter knows about those, and I still know too little myself to comment in any way worth listening to, except to express sorrow for the victims.

But if you haven't yet seen The Dark Knight Rises and are still intending to see it, here's the official site, where you can watch four official trailers.

Midday in Seoul . . .

Yesterday was the first day of my so-called 'vacation,' so I spent the midday with a lovely lady watching Woody Allen's movie Midnight in Paris, which was both entertaining and thought-provoking, offering substance for discussion afterwards, over a meal, followed by dessert in the coffee shop Angel-In-Us. The first photo is of a wall design in the café implying that somebody spilled the beans:

Here's the initially uneaten dessert, a Korean-style dish known as "bing-su" (빙수), or "frozen water." Actually, it's known as "pat-bing-su" (팥빙수), but this variant comes without the "pat" (팥), namely, the "red beans."

Here's the eaten dessert, formerly known as "bing-su," but now rather slushy:

I asked the lady what past she would visit if by some quirk of time this were possible, as in the film, and she said she'd visit fin-de-siècle Vienna, meaning the late 19th century, of course, the time of a youthful Arthur Schnitzler. The lovely lady then asked what past I'd visit. I promised to follow her to Vienna . . . unless she had some private business to attend to with Herr Schnitzler.

I'd surely hope not, though, for the lady and I have been together since meeting on train through Germany twenty years ago, in July 1992 . . .

2011 Year's End: Chance Encounter with Bruno Littlemore!

Yesterday around midday, I took an end-of-the-year walk with Sun-Ae along Seoul's old city wall on the east side of town upon the hill known as Naksan, as you see below.

The day was cold, but to my surprise as we descended into the Daehangno neighborhood, I ran into an old friend from the States, Bruno Littlemore! He looks less dressed for the chilly weather, but Bruno's a Chicago boy and thus accustomed to cold weather.

I've never seen Chicago, only passed through on Amtrack back in 1984, so I didn't meet Bruno there in his hometown, but we have a mutual acquaintance in Benjamin Hale, the son of one of my high school buddies, Pete Hale, both of us being Ozark Mountain boys.

Bruno and I had a lot of catching up to do. Last I'd heard, he was in Georgia, incarcerated for murder (though I consider that killing justifiable homicide), so I wondered how he'd escaped. Seems some woman named Gwen Gupta had fallen for him big time and had slipped him a key to liberate himself -- "Shades of Paradise Lost!" I actually exclaimed that, but Bruno merely smiled. He did mention that he'd ended up in Seoul by stowing away on a merchant marine ship headed for the Far East. Discovered in the hold, he'd offered to work his way across the Pacific. When they realized his strength and agility and noted that he was a quick study, they'd offered him a permanent job, but he jumped ship in Busan Harbor and made his way to Korea's capital, where he teaches English to get by. He doesn't have a 'real' college diploma, but the local academies will hire anything on two legs that can speak American English, so he figures he'll be around for a while.

I couldn't chat long with Bruno since Sun-Ae and I were hungry, so we bade goodbye, promising to meet sometime for brews -- I intend to take him to the Taphouse! -- and my wife and I wandered on till we came upon a place called Queen's Town Public Restaurant and decided to try the place. I ordered a Budweiser on tap, against my better judgment, but when it appeared, I was so taken by its excessive carbonation that I could only admire the head of foam that built up and overflowed. You see my admiring glance below.

As you perceive, I'm now in shock at the continuing wellspring of foam!

The day went on after our meal as Sun-Ae and I sought out a café and talked until past four in the afternoon about what we'd achieved in 2011 and hoped to achieve in 2012. We then started the troublesome, too-long journey homeward.

I would have included photos of my wife, but she's camera shy and refused even the rare photo from being posted, so you'll just have to imagine her stunning beauty . . .

Norweans, or Maybe Koregians, Visit Seoul . . .

Norway
Polar Neighbors

Wikipedia

My daughter Sa-Rah was recently selected to act as one of the local guides for a group of Korean kids who are growing up as adoptees in Norway. I asked her to write on the experience, and here's what she left in my email inbox this morning:

Being a Guide for One Day

Sunday, October 30th, 2011, I got to meet eight kids from Norway. They were Korean kids adopted by Norwegian foster parents at a very young age. I was partnered by a girl named Marie, who was thirteen years old, and I had to be her guide around Seoul for the day. I came to having this experience because my mom introduced me to this activity. This activity wasn't just about introducing Korea to foreigners, but was supposed to give Korean teenagers a chance to think about "Coexistence." Relationships between other countries and understanding differences in culture have become very important, so I thought the activity would be good experience for me. That's why I signed up for this activity by sending an application, and got a yes from the Mizy Center. The Mizy Center is a organization that gives teenagers a chance to experience other cultures or help poor countries by hosting many activities.

After getting a yes from the Mizy Center, I also passed the interview and became one of the eight teenage students who were selected. I felt pretty good about becoming one of this program, but at the same time felt a sense of responsibility. I needed to show the Mizy Center that I could do a good job, and so a couple of days before the actual activity, I decided to investigate Seoul on my own. I visited the royal palace, went to a couple of museums, and went to a traditional Korean town. I also didn't forget to go to Insa-dong, which is a shopping and eating area, very famous for its interesting shops and foods. Tourists usually like to buy gifts for their friends at Insa-dong, so I took a walk around. I got used to the area, so that I could guide my partner around well.

Anyway, after all that investigation, I felt ready to be the Norwegian kid's guide. When I first met my partner, Marie, we had some time to get to know each other. I personally hoped for a energetic, talkative partner, but Marie wasn't that type. That didn't mean I didn't like her, but it was harder to get used to each other. I started asking her questions about her favorite subjects at school, and if she knew K-Pop or Girls' Generation. Marie said she likes Norwegian (the language), and wasn't so good at math, even though she actually kind of liked it. I agreed to her on that subject -– you know what I mean. She told me that she doesn't know any K-Pop, but was interested in Justin Bieber. She said she was a Beliber, and liked Justin Bieber's new song "Mistletoe" and one of his older songs, "Never let you go." Because I was a little bit interested in Justin Bieber, too, I could talk to her about how I liked his "Never let you go" Music Video.

We talked more about each other while designing shoes that would be donated for children in Ethiopia. As I talked to her, I could see that her English wasn't that good, and that we had some problems in communication. Many times, she wouldn't be able to understand what I was saying, so I would have to select easier words for her. Well, she was only thirteen. I could understand that. When we finished our shoe designing, we had lunch with the other teams and a Mizy Center supervisor, and had time to introduce ourselves to others. We had Bulgogi for lunch, which is like a Korean juicy beef barbeque. Marie seemed to be happy with our choice of lunch, because she said she liked Bulgogi the most out of Korean foods.

The lunch time was pretty interesting because I got to talk to other Norwegian kids, too, and we started the tour with other two teams. We all agreed that it may be awkward to walk around Seoul one-to-one for hours. One of the guides was two years older than me, and she was a type of person who liked to lead people. Also, she lived in the area we were going to take a tour, so she could explain the area well for our Norwegian partners. We first went to a police museum, and got to wear police officer clothes. I took some pictures and then we read the history of Korean policemen. It was interesting, because I didn't know much about police history either. We also went to the royal palace and saw some famous Korean actors filming a famous TV series.

After that, the Norwegian kids bought some coffee at Star Bucks, and we walked around the streets of Seoul. There were many make-up shops, and they seemed to be interested in make-up, so we went to many shops. They also bought some make-up stuff that I had no idea about what the heck it was –- I'm not into make-up at all. I don't mean having make-up on is bad. It's just different from what Korean teenagers do. All of a sudden, watching them buy makeup and talking to each other made me feel how different they were from me. They were "Korean," but they were not "Korean" at all. The environment that they grew up in made them so different from us. I imagined what I would look like and be like if I had grown up in a different environment. I would be a totally different person, and would have a totally different personality. That thought made me feel a bit strange.

Anyway, we went to Seijong Museum and went to the Korean traditional town that I investigated before. Marie and I joined three other teams and were guided by a couple of friends that lived in that town. They were friends of one of the Korean teenagers, and they showed us around the town pretty well. The Norwegian kids took many pictures, but were a bit loud. We did ask them to quiet down a little bit, because people actually live in that town, and are bothered everyday by tourists and people that go there, but they didn't seem to see importance in quieting down. I, of course, didn't like that, but tried to understand. I think I should have been more active so they would be quiet. After all the walking, we had dinner at Insa-dong, and the tour was finished.

I felt many things while doing this activity. One thing was that I should have been prepared more. I did prepare where to go and what to do, but I wasn't good at talking to my partner, Marie. I think as time went by, I spoke less and less to her. I tried justify myself by the fact that her English wasn't good enough, and that she wasn't so talkative, but after the whole activity was finished, I felt bad about myself. I should have prepared for situations like that, where people are different from what you imagined them to be, but I didn't. However, it was a very good experience for me, because I could learn from my mistakes and know what to do next time there is an activity like this. I now have more confidence in guiding people, and I understand what's important. Preparation. I believe I have earned a valuable lesson, and hope to do a better job from now on. I thank the Mizy Center for letting me have a good experience like this.

I've not yet talked with my daughter about this essay, so we've not corrected anything, but there aren't many mistakes, and none glaring. I found Sa-Rah's remark that her partner was "only thirteen" amusing since Sa-Rah's merely fourteen. Well, almost fifteen, and two years can make a big difference at that age.

If I had thought more, I would have tried to prepare my daughter better by having her read up on Korean adoptees, most of whom are overseas, and on Norway, for she knows almost nothing about that country.

Maybe we could have located a Norwegian greeting online and practiced it for when she met her partner . . . but I didn't think of that beforehand.

Heading for Insadong, getting sidetracked . . .

On October 8 of this year, my wife Sun-Ae had a significant birthday that I dare not identify too precisely. Let's just say she's no longer 29. Wherever the exact truth lies -- yes, it sometimes does lie, especially temporal truths -- we celebrated by heading off that Saturday afternoon for Seoul's traditional neighborhood of Insadong . . . and vicinity.

We decided to take the subway and walked from our apartment to Mangu Station on the Jungang Line, rode to Oksu Station and switched to Line 3, then rode for eight stops to Gyeongbokgung Station, where we got off and encountered a gate with Chinese writing opaque to my mind if visible to my eyes, but I decided to pass through anyway:

After I'd crossed that threshold, Sun-Ae noticed an explanation given in Korean -- and more importantly, for me, also in English:

That reads as follows:

This gate was made of monolith in imitation of PULLOMUN in CH'ANGDOKKUNG. It has a legend that once one passes through the gate, he would not be old forever.

I don't think "monolith" is a type of stone -- perhaps an indefinite article is missing? -- but the message is certainly reassuring. I won't stay old forever. Apparently, I will die . . . someday. Maybe never even knowing what "PULLOMUN" and "CH'ANGDOKKUNG" mean, for the informative sign failed to inform. But they must mean something odd, for weird things happened on the other side of that gate after we'd left the underground for the city streets above:

A man emerged from a mural as his girlfriend looked about to be run down by a mysteriously floating automobile . . . and by its equally buoyant couple. Sun-Ae and I soon even more mysteriously found ourselves beyond the mural in the midst of those traditional Korean houses known as hanok . . .

. . . hanok . . .

. . . and more hanok . . .

. . . after which we wound our way down that hillside -- unexpectedly encountering fellow translator Brother Anthony in our descent -- and ended up at our reserved table in the easily misheard Min's Club, a restaurant named after a descendant of Queen Min and located in a house designed by Korean architect Gilryong Park (1898∼1943) and built in 1930 in a combination of Korean and Japanese style:

You see from my glowing red eyes that I really was in a different state of being after passing through that gate that threatened to kill me.

But all of you are wondering, "Where's the lovely Sun-Ae?" Where indeed? She had the camera and refused to part with it, perhaps unwilling to document this birthday of hers too closely . . .

But happy belated birthday, anyway, my dear . . .

2011 Global Forum Civilization and Peace: "Points Toward a Culture of Discussion"

2011 Global Forum Civilization and Peace

Center for International Affairs

I've now had a night's sleep and can write a bit more, though not much since my classes start early today. I usually post introductions when I note a publication, paper, or presentation, but I'll instead post a conclusion this time:

Let us remind ourselves that this year's Global Forum on Civilization and Peace focuses on the "Resolution of Conflict in Korea, East Asia and Beyond," specifying "A Humanistic Approach," and our session is concerned with "Difference and Discrimination." I began, humanistically enough, with a conflict between a high-status university professor in the West who advocated critical discourse without reference to hierarchical status but who felt justified in physically attacking a 'lowly' graduate student who had insulted him. We then looked at hierarchy within Confucian Civilization in East Asia and noted some of the problems that result from Confucianism's suppression of open discussion, the implication being that Confucianism needs to find some means of accommodating critical discourse. We considered Huntington's thesis concerning the clash of civilizations, but reflected upon his appeal for intercivilizational understanding as well and noted the possibility of cultural commonalities and even commonalities grounded in our meta-civilizational human nature, especially our mortality. We saw how this common mortality can offer a basis for a culture of critical discourse in which reasons and evidence are privileged over hierarchical status even in strongly hierarchical societies. We drew attention to a necessity for the freedom to insult since even substantive points grounded in reason and evidence can be taken as insults, regardless of intention. All of these things point to the truth that a harmonious society cannot be imposed at the outset but can only be understood as an aim to be attained at the end of a discursive process, if such harmony is ever even to be attained at all. Finally, if this paper has raised issues controversial enough to stimulate critical discussion, then I will have succeeded in my goal.

This is from my presentation at a conference titled "2011 Global Forum Civilization and Peace." The paper was titled "Points Toward a Culture of Discussion."

I've not yet seen any newspaper reports directly on this year's conference, but the Korea Herald does have an article on a statement made by the keynote speaker, Jürgen Kocka, before the conference began, and that can be read online. I hope that his paper is eventually put online, for it's a very interesting analysis of German reunification that emphasizes how history can "surprise" us, and it brought back a lot of memories from my years in Germany, which covered that period, for I went to Germany in August 1989.

But more on this conference if the papers cover it, for I've got to prepare for teaching.

Back from a Conference . . .

Academy of Korean Studies

The clock says 9:00 p.m. Tuesday evening, and I've just returned from a two-day forum sponsered by the Academy of Korean Studies and hosted at the Seoul Plaza Hotel. I'll report tomorrow but wanted to touch base at my blog just to let readers know that I haven't died.

I was invited to give a 40-minute talk, and I chose to speak on East Asia's need for a culture of discussion, a point that I've sometimes raise on my blog. But more on this tommorow. Right now, I've got to reply to a few emails . . .


You See These Rocks?

Gypsy Scholar Himself

Actual Genuine Photo!

(Image of GS from FactZoo)



Maybe you can't see the rocks yet, and that's perhaps for the best anyway since rocks can get a guy into trouble, but on the subway yesterday, I inadvertently revealed that I also carry a couple of rocks.

I had just boarded a train on the unnumbered Jungang Line at Wangsimni Station, heading for Mangu Station, and I was taking my usual, standing position near the doors opposite from where I'd entered, when I heard rather loud yelling. I looked in the direction that everyone else was staring, and I saw a woman -- the ajumma type, i.e., short, loud, strong, and middle-aged -- tussling with a small, wiry man probably in his early fifties, possibly that ajusshi type who'll get drunk on soju, light up a cigarette anywhere he pleases, and spit on the sidewalk but still demand boundless respect. For a moment, I watched in stunned silence, but when the woman slammed the man to the floor in a move worthy of Championship Wrestling and landed on top of him as the subway train began to roll out of the station, I thought I'd better get involved since most other people were still immobilized with astonishment.

I walked over to where the two were locked in an angry embrace of mutual dislike and grasped the woman from behind, gripping her just below the armpits and pulling with all my might as two other men also now took action, each grabbing the wiry fellow by one or the other of his arms and tugging hard in the other direction. Even with our combined power, we had difficulty separating the two.

I somehow managed to lift that bulky ajumma up onto her feet, but she never even noticed me, just kept screaming at the fellow with whom she'd been fighting only moments before. I held onto her until she stopped trying to again get at the man. As they continued to face one another in a standoff, still trading insults, I looked at the floor and saw a clump of the woman's hair, then also a ripped piece from her shirt, and I realized that the older man hadn't been as overcome by the woman's force as had first appeared. I retrieved the torn piece of cloth, glanced at the clump of hair but left that where it lay, and handed the ripped fabric over to the woman, who accepted it with nary a glance in my direction as she continued to verbally abuse the man, who returned her investment of abuse with interest.

At this point, I decided to back out of the scene, returning to my initial position by the doors, but I watched long enough to see that the woman was one of those people who ride the subway trains all day selling cheap things to make a living. I tried to imagine what had set the two off. Perhaps the saleslady had been hawking her wares too loudly, prompting the older man to politely suggest:

"Shut up, please!"

If so, then I guess that ajumma showed him her rocks!

I got to show my rocks, too! Unclenched rocks, admittedly, but rocks nonetheless. Rocks that were revealed before the very eyes of all those other, staring passengers! Maybe some of them had caught a moving image of the events with their cell phones' video function, and I'll be on You Tube already. But with my luck, the videos will probably show only the scene of some foreign guy grabbing a Korean woman on the subway and pulling her away somewhere as she struggles and screams.

Ah, yes, another irrationally violent foreigner, but one quite easy to trace, given the very foreign appearance, as can be seen in the image above . . .

Hiking in 'Uptown' Seoul . . .

Although we returned to Seoul on Friday afternoon, we continued our short 'vacation' through the weekend and yesterday chose to hike Buramsan (불암산), which could be called Mt. Buram in English. But it's also more correctly transliterated as "Bulamsan", i.e., "Bul-am-san," meaning "Buddha-Rock Mountain," not "Fire-Rock-Mountain," as I'd wondered . . . though I saw that it didn't look volcanic.

The mountain doesn't tower over Seoul, for it rises to merely 507 meters (1,663 feet), but its final hundred meters or so rise rather steeply, and the peak offers a stunning panorama. Here's a side shot from the distance:


We paused at several lookout points during our ascent. Here's one with part of Seoul in the background and a grouchy-looking fellow in the foreground. That's what I look like when I'm smiling. Actually, I'm having to squint like Clint because the day was brighter than it appears in this photo:


Sun-Ae caught me looking back, but the photo is actually intended to be of the rock that I'm standing in front of, a landmark called "Turtle Rock." Shortly thereafter, the ascent grew difficult for daytrippers like us:


For that reason, namely the steepness, the next photos were taken at the peak, as you can see in this upcoming photograph where I'm again spoiling the scenery:


Here I am once more, but this time actually enhancing the overall aesthetic effect of the not-unspoiled nature:


At last, we see my lovely wife, Sun-Ae, who has turned her face from the camera and hidden her identity despite being the best thing in that picture:


We finally finished our 'easy' hike some four or five hours after setting out not far from Hwarangdae Subway Station (Line 6), emerging near Danggogae Subway Station (Line 4), where we located a restaurant and enjoyed a bowl of ice-cold soybean noodle soup (kongguksu, 콩국수) and a plate of typically odiferous, hot-and-spicey pig intestines (gopchang, 곱창), the latter shown below:


I also drank some hard-earned and thoroughly deserved beer . . .