Detox

Last post! I got home a couple of days ago. I had the WORST flight from Seoul to Atlanta. About four hours into the flight, we hit some major turbulence. The stewardesses were serving 'dinner' (if you can call airplane food that) when all of the sudden the plane started shaking so bad that they were falling all over the place, into people's laps onto the floor. So then the pilot came over the loudspeaker and told them to sit down and turned on the fasten seat belt light. Then the plane just dropped. It felt like being on the Tower of Terror at MGM except it was that much more terrifying because it was a plane as opposed to a amusement park ride. So then pretty much every baby on the entire plane starts crying. This one woman was screaming. I was trying to stay calm so I started praying one of those 'HOLY CRAP I'M GOING TO DIE PRAYERS' which basically consisted of me saying "God, you can't let me die on the plane back from Korea because it would break my parents' hearts" haha. Eventually the pilot moved to a safer altitude. But I just want to point out how unhelpful the stewardesses were. At one point one of them came over the speaker and was like "We're experiencing some turbulence but it's not that dangerous." I personally think that there is a big difference from 'not dangerous' and 'not that dangerous.' After that the flight was fine, I watched a couple of mostly crappy movies. ("Stop Loss" which was sad but still enjoyable because of Ryan Philllippe/Channing Tatum, "37th Dresses" which was horrible, and "The Other Boleyn Girl" which was ridiculous because there is no way anyone would pick Natalie Portman over Scarlett Johannson).

And now to end with a couple of things I've learned:
things that will never make sense to me about Korea
1. Why there is no bigger bill than 10,000 won- The largest bill in Korea is equivalent to $10 USD. I had a friend who had to pay her rent in cash because they didn't accept american credit cards and she literally had to bring in 50 bills.
2. Why there are never any trash cans anywhere
3. Why I can't get youtube to switch back from the Korean version
4. Why Koreans hate Cranberry juice and don't know what Ginger Ale is
Life Lessons
1. It's a super powerful thing to have someone make the effort to act in a way that is culturally relevant to w/e your cultural identity may be. I can honestly remember every Korean person that tried to help me when I looked lost (the majority of the time that I was in the subway lol) or tried to be friendly to me in a way that they thought was 'american.' That is honestly such a powerful relationship building tool to make the extra effort to show appreciation for another culture. I'm not sure if this is something that we really do in America. For example, a common gripe that I've heard about immigrants to the U.S. is that Americans don't believe that they make enough of an effort to learn english/assimilate themselves to American culture. Although I think that immigrants should try and learn english mostly for their own comfort and advancement, I understand now that there is a huge degree of homesickness that they are dealing with. So to go against the grain and as an American (or as a Korean interacting with Americans, etc) and make an effort to try and relate to someone that you really have no responsibility to relate to is a really amazing witnessing tool. Just a thought.
2. There is fun and happiness to be had everywhere.


And so ends my summer adventure. Thanks for reading the blog! Korea was pretty much one of the most amazing experiences of my life. I'm happy to have met so many cool people this summer but I'm also so happy to be back home with my family (esp. my Chicago peeps who are coming this weekend) because I don't think there are any other people who are quite as ridiculous and can make me laugh as much. I can't wait to see my friends in NJ/NY next week. Other than that, I plan on doing absolutely nothing until I go back to Penn Aug. 24th (besides studying for LSATs of course). holla. If I like you, you should come visit, we can BBQ, go in the hot tub in the new house, and drink cokes. America.

We Loved a Little and Laughed a Lot

This is probably the last post I am going to write before I get home. As per my last post: Our Korean professor, Dr. Kwon, really wanted to take us out. So the whole group went to a Korean BBQ place. Unfortunately, many people fell victim to the drinking culture. Dr. Kwon was basically challenging everyone, especially the boys, to a Soju drinking contest. I am of the opinion that if I were meant to drink as much as a man, I would probably be one. So I respectfully declined. However, I could see how it would be more awkward to refuse if you were either a) Korean b) a boy. The normal quiet and mild mannered Dr. Kwon was a little too crunk....and not going to lie I'm a little scarred for life. Then we of course went Karaoking.

I've been super busy writing papers and whatnot. I was able to experience more Korean nightlife on Friday and Saturday which is always amusing. One observation, no one dances! Last night we went to another hip-hop club and seriously everyone just stands around looking psuedo-gangster. They seriously formed a circle around us and were just staring at us dancing, bobbing their heads every now and then. The place we went was hilarious though because on the sign it literally said: "NB1: Black Music" I have a picture of it which I will put up later. I thought that was a bit incorrect as I would say that black people are disproportionally responsible for a ton of different musical genres. But hey.....ignorance is worldwide.

Speaking of the cultural influence of black people I was watching some Korean music videos of probably the most famous Korean singer/actor Rain and everything about him is a rip off of Justin Timberlake who is himself a rip off of Michael Jackson:


Getting to NB1 last night was a little tense. As we were driving there we passed through some people protesting American Beef. There were so many protesters and police in riot gear that it was really unsettling. It was very interesting seeing the range of emotions regarding this beef issue. Some Koreans that I have spoken to a frustrated with what they view as the backwardness of their nation because they see the reduction of trade barriers as not only being beneficial to their nation as a whole but also as symbolic of complete modernity. Yet if I'm talking to a Korean about politics then that clearly means they know English very well and are in all likelihood out of step with the majority of Koreans. At the same time our cabbie accused the protesters of being commies. So it's a mixed bag. In general, I really admire the degree of political activism here in Seoul. In particular, college students are especially bad ass in this regard. For example it was student protests that led to Syngman Rhee to step down as president. Similarly, the beef protests were started by a couple of students. Imagine if there was that level of political participation from students in the United States. CRAZY!

I'm a strong believer in that no one can have power over you unless you give it to them. So i've been trying a new approach with people staring. I just started waving at anyone who looks at me. It's been pretty amusing. I passed some high-school age kids that pointed and I just pointed back and made this face like "OMG KOREANS!" It seems to make the people looking at me uncomfortable but I'm enjoying myself. However, I definitely don't win the award for best foreign person response to being stared at. A friend of mine, who is white and doesn't speak Korean, was riding the subway to work and could tell that the people around him were talking about him because of their body language. So he picked up one of the Korean language newspapers they have on the train and pretended to read it, which resulted in....silence.

I moved to Chungmuro on Sunday. The place where I'm staying, Han Suites, is really nice. More importantly, they have the most attractive man I've seen in all of Korea working at the front desk. He speaks English really well although that's pretty much irrelevant as he's too attractive to talk to. All and all, I continue to live an undeservedly fantastic life. I have had such a great time. My one regret is that I ran out of days to go to Seoul Tower. Home soon, then nyc/nj then back to the grind. Where does the time go?

Songs I like today:
"Thanks a lot" by Neko Case
"All is full of love" by Bjork
"I Get Out" by Lauryn Hill

What's Beef?

I've been thinking about community a lot recently. In particular, I've been thinking about immigrant communities in the United States. I saw "Hancock" today and it reminded me of that Indian movie theater in Edison and how strange it used to seem to me that there would be an entire theater of movies in Hindi (Hi, I'm racist lol). But it felt so comforting to watch a B-level Hollywood blockbuster. Side note was it just me or did "Hancock" have a crap load of untied up loose ends? Did anyone else notice that while he was in jail Will Smith repeatedly drew a bunch of pictures of a silhouette of a man holding a child's hand and they just never explained it? You can't foreshadow massive daddy issues and then not deliver some back story! Don't tease me Will Smith!

I've also been thinking about community lately because I am so grateful for my Christian community at Penn. More importantly, I am so grateful for my wise wise christian friends. Recently I've been having a wee bit of 'beef' with this random dude that lives in my dorm. Not to rag on the Midwest but he's like the prototype of what I consider to be the worst aspects of that region. He's that guy from Middle of Nowhere, IA/Dakotas/MN/IN who inexplicably thinks that he knows everything and who of course is always 'Christian.' By 'Christian,' I mean thinks that smiling a lot and sending a check to Heifer International once a year makes you a good person and feels no obligation to try to understand anyone who isn't exactly like them (i.e. from a two parent home, upper-middle class, religious). Obviously I'm being harsh and overgeneralizing (btw this doesn't include Chicago) but when I lived in the Midwest I honestly ran across a lot of people that perfectly fit this description. Anyways, so this guy said some really judgmental and passive agressive ish to a bunch of my friends. Usually if I feel that someone is inconsequential or just a terrible person I wont confront them when they do stuff that offends me if I can just avoid them in the future. So the first time, I just let it go. Then he of course did the SAME THING again which of course made me want to call him out (nicely of course). The issue though was that he has a rather prominent physical deformity (missing limb) and as mean as I know I can be I do feel for him. So for a couple of days I was pretty much torn. Half of me was like "c'mon sarah, he clearly is going through a lot." Meanwhile, my other, meaner, half was like "Screw that, I'm an Equal Opportunity reality check provider!" But then I talked to Mariya and she really put things in perspective in terms of the fact that there's probably a reason I have had to deal with this type of person over and over again. What she was saying was that usually in these type of situations people respond 1 of 2 ways. 1) give in to the intimidation 2) get angry and talk crap about the person back thus proving that you are just as immature and obnoxious as they are. But what she said that blew my mind was just to remind me that I'm not bound by the patterns of this world. I don't really know what that looks like yet but I definitely feel a lot more peace in that regard. So I guess more updates of this situation are yet to come.

So everyone went out with our Korean professor yesterday and it was quite an adventure that I will have to write about another time as I've procrastinated enough already. ciao.

btw good song:
"Someone Please Call 911"- Wyclef t. Mary J. Blige

You Can Buy Anything

I made a rather sad discovery yesterday night. Karen wrote something about watching '30 rock' on my facebook wall and I wanted to see the episode she was talking about and looked for it on abc.com. To my dismay, I discovered that apparently you can't watch any tv shows from the internet (or download any movies from netflix) in Asia because of the huge pirating issues they have. My roommate suggested I watch this Korean Soap called "Princess Hours,"about this girl who has to marry this douchebag Prince (just for clarification there is no Royal family in Korea), that was fairly amusing:


Although, I was really pissed that i couldn't watch my show, I can actually understand the sentiment behind trying to do whatever possible to stop pirating here. There are seriously bootleg copies of movies EVERYWHERE. Similarly, there's a lot of knock of clothes of American brands. Hollister and Abercrombie are really popular but for some reason if you go to an actual store, the clothes costs about twice the American price (someone told me because it's imported but I highly doubt that those clothes are actually manufactured in the U.S.). I seriously saw a shirt that I bought for like $30 in the states selling for $80 here. Same thing goes for purses (saw a Chanel purse selling for an extra $1,000!). Unfortunately for me, the price of knock offs is approximately the regular price in the U.S. :-(

Copyright infringement seem to be a lot less important in Korea in general. There's a coffee company here, whose name I am currently forgetting, that has almost identical signage to Starbucks. Although I don't really feel bad for Starbucks because everything they sell in Seoul is AT LEAST $1 more than in Philly/Columbia/NYC. I'm running out of money to feed my habit! I've been forced to cut down to a cup every other day. Speaking of Starbucks being horrible in Korea, all the coffee chains (Starbucks, Starbucks rip off, 7 monkeys, the Coffee Bean, etc.) do this thing where every time you buy something they'll stamp this little card and after 10 drinks you get a free one. I combined cards with some of my friends and I have already had a free frappucino. I consider the fact that they don't do this on the Starbucks on 34th street a personal tragedy.

My friend Nikki and I went to Coex mall all day Monday.

It was enjoyable mostly because we were able to eat HAMBURGERS AND FRIES WITH COKE!!!! One of my friends wrote a reflection paper on the materialism of Korean society and I definitely could see what she was talking about at COEX. Koreans seriously perfected the art of selling anything to anyone. The prime example of this is the incredible amount of STUFF that you can buy once you have a significant other. It's a little ridiculous. So many couples wear these really cheesey 'couple t-shirts.' These shirts will say things like "This is my Boyfriend" with an arrow pointing to where the boyfriend is supposed to be standing wearing his shirt that says 'This is my Girlfriend" with the corresponding arrow. Btw unless you are an Alzheimers patient, I would hope you would recognize your significant other standing next to you without the help of a tshirt. Then the front will say something in English that vaguely makes sense like "Loving Forever and Ever Babe" or 'We Make Our Dream Come True.' At first, I thought it was a little bit much but still cute. But then I saw the store The Kiss Couple's. The store, which is a chain, is literally filled entirely with jewelry for couples. It was just kind of creepy because the way the store was arranged and the images on the walls were very clearly trying to make people feel as though they were buying love and not just STUFF. I've never taken marketing or anything but I've always been impressed with those De Beers commercials. When you think about what they're selling, rocks which quite possibly could have helped fund a civil war, the ads have nothing to do with the product. They're selling diamonds but communicating romance. I guess I'm a hypocrite though because I really like that one commercial where the husband slides the diamond necklace on his wife's neck as she's sleeping...I also like diamonds and sleeping....so.....get on that.

Speaking of hypocrisy, I was so happy about the presents I bought my parents today. I went back to Insadong, which is kind of like a more artsy version of Chelsea in the city. While we were in Insadong, I sustained a shopping related cut to my hand and am eternally grateful that my tetanus shots are up to date. Thus, I have gotten injured in some form the past 3 times that I have left the country. hot.

Hilarity and Romance

So on Friday, we went to the HOTTEST CLUB IN SEOUL. I put that in all caps to try and communicate the hilarity/irony of that statement. It was called Circle and pretty much on any Korean soap opera or music video (youtube Big Bang, “ Last Farewell”) in which they have a club scene that’s where its based. It’s also the place where most western celeberties go partying such as Lil Wayne and David Beckham (who unfortunately wasn’t there, --le sigh--).


Circle is a big hit amongst the orangejok set. Orangejok is a term used to describe young, rich Koreans. It usually implies someone who has inherited money, like the son/daughter of a chaebol owner, as opposed to earning it themselves. The reference to ‘orange’ is a rather pejorative way of making fun of them trying to emulate the orange-county lifestyle. Although I had fun, which isn't saying much because I pretty much always have fun, I think that if I had to have actually paid the cover (which I think was $30-50), I would have grasped the full weight of how overrated the place was.

Circle made me ponder one of the key mysteries of men that I have never understood. While we were out this super dusty old dude bought a bunch of shots for me and my friends (which I respectfully declined lol). I honestly don’t understand why men do this. No woman in her right mind is going to drink some roofie colada that a complete stranger tries to hand her. I’d also imagine that going out in general is a lot more expensive for men for various reasons so why waste money on some girl who probably just wants to be left alone? Maybe you can leave your money in your wallet and save up and buy some guitar lessons (aka the Keith Richards method of getting women, seriously the man looks like a corpse)?

Along those same lines, this week I’ve had a number of random unpleasant interactions with Korean men that have really made me feel grossed out. In particular, it’s been especially awkward in a country where the only reference young Koreans have to people who look remotely like me are music videos. There are a lot of stories, I could tell along these lines but it would take hours. It's just funny because I had originally planned on ending my ‘date fast’ in the near future but now these experience just make me feel like ‘eh.’ I still don’t feel like I understand anything. Like when I think of things that have made me attracted to someone it’s usually seeing them do considerate stuff for their friends/family or being passionate about something interesting or being creative, etc. Other than that, I for the most part have never even really had a concrete ‘type.’ But apparently no one in the world operates that way. I’ve been trying to not let it get to me but every time someone here, Korean or Western, pays attention to me because of how I look it just makes me feel a really deep loneliness. I think it’s the combination of not looking like anyone around me and feeling like no one thinks of things the same way I do, a total inner and outward isolation. Thankfully those moments have mostly been few and far between. I just wish some people weren't the way they are.

We stayed at Circle until about 4:30 and things started to get weird. Funny stories: So my friend Kristen told someone that my name was Beyoncé Berry (as in some fictional relative of both Halle Berry and Beyoncé Knowles) and they actually believed it because apparently black people all look alike to Koreans haha. Then randomly later, I was coming out of the bathroom and this man comes up to me and wanted me to be in some promotional video for the club. So he’s trying to explain it to me and I kept telling him to talk to my friend that speaks Korean. But the funny part was it was so late and I was so out of it that I didn’t realize he was speaking English the whole time. So somewhere on the internet there is a video of me literally saying “Club Circle, FUN FUN FUN!” There’s also one of my friend Nikki, who surprise surprise isn’t Asian either. They were clearly looking for the dumb foreign girls. He gave me his business card with the website on it but later I got annoyed at one of the boys (for calling a girl a bitch) and threw it at him and forgot to pick it up. Although my impression was: Not Legit.

I’ve written a lot since getting here, it’s making me very happy. I think it’s my way of taking being a tourist to a whole new level. I’ve been delaying the inevitable point in which I start to hate everything I’ve written and spend days adding and deleting periods/words/the whole thing by literally writing stuff and just leaving it alone for 2 weeks. But already I'm pretty unsatisfied so....oh well.

I love the glasses Koreans wear. Like this guy:

I really love glasses. I found a non-prescription pair the other day but I definitely was not meant to wear glasses. On the bright side, so many people i love wear glasses (Mom, Dad, Jess, granny, etc.) so glasses are still alright with me.

On a completely unrelated note, I had some really good pizza today. Korean pizza is so yummy. I was actually surprised this is the case because I'm pretty sure the only type of cheese they have in this entire country is American (vomit) but it was quite tasty. The crust of the pizza I had was filled with sweet potato puree which is actually pretty amazing.

Mmmm, sweet potatoes....

Brought to You by Coca-Cola

So confession, in spite of the fact that I NEVER drink soda in the states, I have wanted a Coke so badly every day for the past week. That's some powerful marketing. Apparently their product is America. Congratulations.

Anywho, I'm thousands of miles away from home and yet the crappy American economy has screwed me once again. When I left, the exchange rate was around 1,000 won per $1 and now $1 only buys 800 won. Lame.

A couple of days ago, we went to the korean foreign ministry. Long story short, Korea's foreign policy consists almost entirely of being friends with America. I actually think that it's feasible now since North Korea poses a threat to American national security (or so we're told...). The U.S. has consistently supported regimes in which their interests are served and ignored everywhere else. Prime examples of the former and the latter would be the 'democracy' in Iraq and Omar al-Bashir's dictatorship in Sudan (although he FINALLY has been indicted on war crimes). Basically, I think this is another reason why South Koreans should postpone reunification for as long as possible as reunification will eliminate the North Korean threat. The disappearance of the N. Korean threat coupled with the almost inevitable blow to the Korean economy that would result from reunification would pretty much get rid of any interest the U.S. has in being friends with Korea. On the global stage, we're kind of like that friend who only calls you when they need something.

Today was the last day of classes, yay! We watched the movie "Taeguki." This movie, which is about two brothers forced to fight in the Korean War, set a box office record in Korea. It was so good. I cried so hard that I was struggling not to start wailing in class (btw I realized when I wrote that that this blog makes it seem like I cry every day haha). I heard some sniffling coming from the direction of the guys in the class but they of course did the typical 'oh my contact lense is irritating my eye' or "I'M just crying from the adrenaline/because I'm so angry" thing. I definitely recommend the movie though and would be willing to watch it again with anyone who is interested.

One of the actresses in "Taeguki" committed suicide a couple of years after the movie. Her name is Lee Eun-ju (Korean last names come first):

Apparently there have been multiple prominent Korean actresses that have committed suicide, which is incredibly weird when compared with the status that famous actresses have in the states. Additionally, following her suicide there was a wave of copy cat suicides in Seoul. In general it seems that suicide holds a much more visible place in Korean society than it does in America. I was curious about the rate of suicide in Korea so I looked it up and apparently it has more than doubled in the past ten years and it is significantly higher than the rate of suicide in the U.S. I'm not really sure why this is the case but my guess would be that it is due in part both to Korea's economic crisis in the late 90s and the premium placed on honor/shame in Korean society. Allegedly one of the reasons why Lee Eun-Ju committed suicide was because of her family's disapproval of her decision to film nude scenes in a movie in which she was starring. On a related note, as I was writing this, I looked up the Assembly of God official position on suicide and they changed it! The only person I've known who has committed suicide was a christian so a couple of years ago, I looked up what the Assembly of God's position was. I did this more as a search for answers as opposed to actually giving a crap about what the district had to say. But at the time their response was basically that because mental illness and resultantly depression is a sickness, the bible is unclear as to whether or not someone who commits suicide will go to hell or not. But apparently someone over at the district had an epiphany that suicide is 'self-murder' and thus a violation of the 6th commandment (Thou Shalt Not Kill). I just thought that was weird that the Assembly of God thinks that a change in their opinion is really that important. It's not like God is in heaven saying "whoa! anyone who committed suicide after 2007 has to go to hell, every one else can stay." Self-importance strikes again.

All and all life has been fairly grand. I'm looking forward to being able to sleep in later, enjoy the rest of my time here, and make some dough teaching english. THE REAL WORLD looms in the distance a harrowing place full of LSATs, grad school, and BILLS. But I feel so blessed to have been able to see so much beauty this summer, to have so many people that I love enough to miss and think about every day, and to know so many people in general that are so incredibly beautiful. Earlier this last point seemed particularly poignang and I wanted to listen to that song "Everyone's Beautiful" by Waterdeep but then I realized that some bastard stole my ipod and i didn't have it on my laptop (and it wsan't on youtube). All that to say, apparently everyone is NOT beautiful....

Everybody Love Everybody

This past weekend was absolutely amazing. I was touched and challenged both physically (I climbed a mountain on Saturday) and emotionally (I listened to a survivor of the No Gun Ri massacre).

So on Thursday, I went to the DMZ. The overall experience was actually really disappointing because the conference room (which is like the main attraction) was closed. Also the ridiculous amount of propaganda on the tour really left a bad taste in my moth. Everything that was said basically consisted of "South Korea is wonderful and North Korea is FULL OF EVIL BARBARIANS THAT WILL EAT YOUR CHILDREN AND RAPE YOUR DAUGHTERS IF GIVEN THE OPPORTUNITY." For example, our tour guide was describing the discovery of a bunch of tunnels from North Korea to South Korea by saying "Yes the North and South were engaged in reunification talks when a South Korean soldier discovered the tunnels which is typical of the North Koreans' duplicitous negotiation style." Obviously this statement was made in far more broken less fluent english but the sentiment was pretty much the same. I was shocked by the fact that such blatantly pejorative language is so normalized within South Korean society that it could find its way onto an official tour.

However, by far the worst part though was that you weren't allowed to take pictures ANYWHERE. My poor little tourists heart almost broke at that realization. I saw this really obnoxious british man try and take a picture and one of the South Korean soldiers came up to him made him show him the picture and then deleted it from his digital camera. Here's a picture with me, my roommate Sunny, love of my life Anna and one of the Korean soldiers haha:




The same day that we went to the DMZ we also saw this railroad station that was built for when trains can travel from North to South Korea (and vice versa) which obviously is very symbolic for Koreans. As a foreigner the two things that struck me most about the station was 1) If it were function that would be amazing for people wanting to travel as you could literally take a train all the way from South Korea to Portugal 2) that train station is a colossal waste of money as there is no near future in which relations between the North and the South will have improved enough for travel to resume between the two countries. In general reunification is extremely important to all Koreans. Most Koreans that I have met here of all ages dream of a day in which the two regions will be one nation again and think that reunification is inevitable. More importantly, there are families that have been separated since the close of the Korean War. However, I feel as though the result of unification will only be disaster. While South Korea has experienced amazing economic development, North Korea has remained a developing nation in which large segments of the population are malnourished and do not receive adequate education. Seoul, which is pretty much where all South Koreans want to be, is so incredibly Americanized that it is completely saturated with the same ugly materialism that is such a large part of America. In contrast, North Korea is still largely rural and it's people are conditioned to value the state and their leader more highly than anything else. Essentially you have two societies in which the underlying ideology is completely incompatible. In my opinion, I think that if reunification actually happened, Korean society would probably fall apart. All that could possibly happen would be an underclass of uneducated and disadvantaged people would be added to South Korea. Nationalistic passion aside, people don't share and when it comes down to sacrificing individual comfort for someone you don't know that fact isn't going to magically change.

On Friday, my heart broke. I don't know how else to explain. I can only think of a handful of other times when I have felt such intense sadness. We went to the village in Hwanggan-myeon where the Gun Ri Incident took place. What occurred was, for still unclear reasons, U.S. soldiers killed between 150-400 Korean refugees, most of which were the elderly, women, or children. By the way, the U.S. government official stance is "What befell civilians in the vicinity of No Gun Ri in late July 1950 was a tragic and deeply regrettable accompaniment to a war." There has been a lot of controversy surrounding the details of the incident (mostly around the actual number of civilians killed and the journalistic techniques of those who originally broke the story). But I think that it is significant that there has been none concerning whether or not the incident actually occurred.

While we were there we were able to meet with one of the survivors whose account of what happened was face melting. He was about 14 years old in 1950 and was being escorted by South by U.S. soldiers along with his mother and younger sister. They were told to wait, with other villagers, on a train track. Eventually while they were waiting American planes flew overhead and began dropping bombs onto the villagers. Immediately after that all hell broke loose as people and oxen (they still used them to carry stuff back then) were either on the ground wounded/dying or trying to flee. Meanwhile, the U.S. soldiers opened fire on them. The survivor (he said his name but I couldn't pronounce it or attempt to spell it) and his family ran and hid in some bushes until they were spotted by a soldier who told them to move underneath the train tracks to the bridge underneath. I should point out now that all of this is taking place in the summer time and trust me it is SO FREAKING HOT HERE IN THE SUMMER. Seriously, the humidity alone is bananas. So obviously being crammed under a bridge (see pictures) in the summer is far from comfortable. In fact, even standing out there taking pictures and listening to this man talk was pretty unbearable. Anyways, so he and his family were crammed in with a bunch of other refugees underneath this bridge. They were then told that they were going to be shot and if they wanted to try and run away, they would be spared if they could make it. At this point, all of the people who could run fast, which was mostly men (excluding the elderly), ran off into the woods and the ones who didn't get shot made it. So the majority of the people who were left under the bridge were either women, children, or old people. Many people begged for their lives, in particular he mentioned a group of school teachers who begged the soldiers in Japanese (most of the soldiers had previously been stationed in Japan and knew far more Japanese than Korean) to let them live to no avail. Then they opened fire. He passed out and woke up the next morning to the realization that he had been shot (non-fatally) and when he tried to tell his mom that he had been hit, he realized she was dead. In fact, the only reason why he and his sister survived was because his mother had covered them with her body and as a result gotten shot in the back of the head and in the back multiple times. More importantly because her corpse was covering them when the soldiers went back through to make sure everyone was dead they missed the two children because they were under a dead body. He said that his last memories of his mother were of her saying a buddhist prayer for the souls of her children, clearly already having accepted her own death as inevitable. In the pictures of the bridge that I'm putting up of the bridge, the white triangular markings are spots were there are bullets lodged into the cement from the shooting.


There is so much more that he said that I want to write but in a way hearing his account made me feel too much. For starters, I instantaneously and unconsciously exempted myself from having to feel any guilt. I definitely felt the whole "Omg Americans are so horrible" but at the same time, I felt and continue to feel somehow exempt from 'that' america. It's like whenever I hear about something like that, Americans massacring innocent people in third world nations it's like 'hey, it wasn't that long ago that they were stringing black people up on trees.' I think that lynching in particular came to mind because a couple of days ago I was watching Nas's "Be a Nigger Too" video in which there is a lynching scene at the end (my assessment being Nas uses shock value to cover up the fact that he is a completely charisma-less, boring and uncreative artist). But at the end of the day that's not enough. It's not enough to try and insulate myself from other people's suffering because I belong to a historically oppressed group as well in spite of the fact that I really haven't suffered to the same extent. I could insert the typical protestant 'im the worst, most ungrateful sinner' speech here but really we all pretty much suck equally. I'm working on a poem about the incident, I have about a stanza and a bunch of images in my head. But that's really not enough either. I just pray that one day I will know what is.

On Saturday, we climbed a mountain. Not fun. The thing that is crazy though is that all the Koreans on the mountain seemed to treat it like going to the park. There were literally people who brought their small kids with them to climb this 5 km mountain, which doesn't sound like a lot but was so incredibly hard. After we climbed the mountain we visited this really pretty Buddhist temple which was interesting and at one point had one of the largest Buddhist statues in Asia. I wanted to take so many pictures (I did actually take a lot) but at the same time there were monks walking around praying and performing their monk-ly duties so I felt kind of awkward/disrespectful.

Overall, the combination of the Buddhist chants and the beautiful sculptures was really impressive. I think that the West has a very voyeuristic relationship with Buddhism. While I was at the temple there was this huge group of people, all of whom were white, who were participating in a temple 'homestay.' This homestay consists of a bunch of foreigners purchasing the opportunity to stay in a temple for a short period of time (i think about 24hrs) and wear gray monk robes. The benefit of this is that it allows you to 'authentically' experience Buddhism without having to do anything pesky like giving up all your worldly possessions. All that to say, westerns will pretty much buy anything and the trick for the rest of the world is just to figure out how to sell it.

Xenophobia at Its Finest!

Yesterday we went to the Korean War Memorial here in Seoul. We were only able to tour the outside portion of the monument as all national monuments are apparently closed on Mondays and the person in charge of planning didn’t feel obligated to call and check that it was open before we walked around in the heat for an hour (not that I’m bitter or anything).
I’m including a bunch of pictures of all of the old planes that were at the monument. One day, I want to actually learn all about the different kinds of planes and be able to identify them. My dad is a big Discovery Wings Channel fan, which is quite possibly the most boring thing on tv, so being at the memorial made me miss my family as I know that my dad and Louie would appreciate it a lot more than I do. In general, I have been missing them lately because I have been so happy that I wish they could be here with me.

So I had my first and second racial incidents in Korea in the past 3 days. Before I left a lot of people asked me if I was uncomfortable because obviously there are no black people. But in all honesty being here hasn’t really been that much different from when I lived in Wisconsin. People everywhere stare. Basically what happened was I was with a bunch of people going to a restaurant and some random man moves towards me like he is going to grab my arm. I of course pulled back away from him and he said something incomprehensible in Korean. My friend Anna, who speaks fluent Korean, was next to me and instantly comes along side of me and like rushes me away from him and was like ‘oh he’s just being annoying because you’re pretty.” But I badgered her into telling me what he said which apparently was ‘you’re darker than me!’ and he was trying to compare his arm to mine. I’m not really sure what he was trying to imply. But it made me so incredibly mad. I just want to be left alone.

My reaction to that man has really made me aware of the change in the way I react to racial conflict. I remember the first time I heard a white person say the word ‘Nigger,’ which was actually the first time I heard anyone say it, and the way I felt was completely different. Granted I was in elementary school but I remember that even though they weren’t speaking to me or any one person in general (it was used in the context of a ‘joke’) it actually hurt. The closest equivalent I can give is that it felt like getting the wind knocked out of you. But now, I find that the only time people being racist bothers me with that sort of intensity is when they are standing between me and something I want. Otherwise, it’ll make me mad for about fifteen minutes, I’ll say my piece if the situation permits and then I’m over it. On the one hand, I understand that it is necessary to toughen up to get through life. But on the other hand, I do feel as though I should mourn the loss of some softness and sensitivity in my personality. I don’t know if the price is too high. I don’t want to wake up one morning to the realization that on the inside, I’m made up of all sharp edges.

The second incident occurred a couple of days later. A bunch of Penn-in-Seoul people were on the subway when a drunk , older man asked two of the Korean-American girls whether they only like foreigners (in the romantic sense) and stated that he doesn’t like Americans. They immediately jumped up out of their seats and told everyone to move to the next car. Then after we moved the man began to follow us. So we ran out of the train (we were stopped at the station) and snuck back on into the last car. It was both intense and hilarious at the same time. Xenophobia at its finest!
So we’re going to the DMZ (de-militarized zone between North/South Korea) tomorrow. I can’t wait. We have a dress code because apparently the North Koreans will ocassionaly take pictures of inappropriately dressed tourists and use them as propaganda for the lack of morals in South Korea and the West. So there’s literally woman who have visited the DMZ and whose faces are on posters in North Korea with the word ‘SLUT’ on them.

Two good songs:
“Peruvian Cocaine” and “Golpe de Estado” by Immortal Technique

Independence Day

So first and foremost, I want to shout out all my peeps. MY ROOMMATE HERE WHO IS AWESOME AND SAYS HI. and everyone has e-mailed me saying they read my blog (esp. my granny <3 ).

"In war, there is no substitute for victory."- Douglas MacArthur

I celebrated the 4th of July for the first time outside of the United States. It was very interesting. That morning in my Korean War class, we watched a documentary about the massacre of a bunch of children by either the U.S. or South Korean forces. This painting was created by Picasso in response to that act. Basically what happened is a group of North Korean women refused to give up the location of a group of men and in response all of their children were gathered together and but into a building and then eventually a hand grenade was thrown in through a window and I believe all but two of the children died. Obviously, I am well aware of the fact that atrocities have been committed by Americans during numerous wars. But I think what struck me the most was more the loss of their voices in the broader sense. It's unconscionable that the 'victors' (although it's really arguable if anyone really 'won' the Korean War but I think it's pretty clear that Americas walked away ) of a conflict can not only take lives but also take away general awareness of something even occurring. Although the extent to which you can blame the victors of a conflict for a failure of the general populace to educate themselves. Anyways, Kyung Hee had a little independence day celebration for us foreigners. It was really funny there was a rock band made up entirely of people who all appeared to speak next to no english and yet were singing Alanis Morrisette and Metallica. It was pretty interesting, I would say A for effort.

Later on that day, a bunch of us went out to dinner and clubbing which was hilarious. Hip Hop culture is world wide. It's especially noticeable because there are literally tvs everywhere here. There in every restaurant i've gone to and everyone has these really crazy cell phones with tv sets on it. It's ridiculous. The clubs we went to were all american hip hop. I dunno it was really weird to be in Korea dancing to fifty cent (which of course is not in Korean) with a bunch of Koreans.

Then on sunday I WENT TO LOTTE WORLD. Lotte World is the equivalent of Disney World. Disney is of course a lot nicer but it was so cute. Everything in Korea is so cute by the way. And just like Disney we stood in lines for hours in unbearably hot weather. However, by far the best part was there was a gun range and I SHOT A GUN. Anyone knows me knows how ridiculous the thought of me shooting a gun is but I'm including photos as proof! I was really really bad. I had a 33% accuracy rate so if war ever breaks out, i'm probably not the person you want covering your back. I didn't even realize you were supposed to use the sights (?) to line up with the target.

All and all a magnificent weekend. My one complaint is that I wish my family were here with me.

Don't Let Life Ruin Your Life

So yesterday we went to Sanchon which is a Buddhist vegetarian restaurant in Insadong (I read it spelled, 'Insa-Dong' somewhere else?). It was founded by a former Buddhist monk who retired from monkdom after 18 years. The food was all vegetarian and pretty much the best thing ever. Then after dinner is served there is a traditional Korean dance show. The authenticity of the dancing seemed a little suspect because I couldn't help but notice that everyone else there seemed tellingly....not asian. But I just clapped and snapped pictures with all the other dumb Americans.

Today after classes I went shopping with a couple of my peeps and I am really going to miss being able to afford clothes. I am also going to miss how ridiculously flattering all of the salespeople here are. I was trying on some shoes and the woman was like 'ooooh you have such pretty feet!" Of course, I ate it up and was thinking to myself "wow. I DO have pretty feet!" (i do!). Then we went to another store and I tried on this belt that was clearly too small and the saleswoman was totally trying to convince me of how I was so thin that I could wear anything. By the way, all of the women here are ridiculously skinny. It's insane. I bet the average clothing size of Korean Women under 30 is a 0. Seriously they make me feel like Oprah Winfrey. Another thing about the women here is that they all wear heels all of the time, rain or shine. Last night I was walking back to my dorm and it was pouring (it's their rainy season) and there was this woman in front of me in stiletos climbing up a hill.

I can't believe I've already been here a week and my goal now is to not let my life ruin my life. The biggest impediment to me enjoying myself has thus far been my life at home. I've been trying to get a job for when I get back and next year in general is really looming on the horizon. But I watched this really crazy documentary on North Korea (you should watch it, it will blow your mind: http://kr.youtube.com/watch?v=FJ6E3cShcVU
) and it's so weird that everything I worry about is so small in comparison to the suffering of millions of people who are living so close to where I am currently living. Watch the documentary.

Stay Cool My Babies

Greetings from Seoul Korea! I got in Wednesday night at 5pm Seoul time after a 15hr flight from Atlanta, GA. The trip to get here was an adventure itself and I really thank God that I made it without getting robbed and dropped in a ditch somewhere.
I hate traveling alone, especially by plane. Just being by myself in the middle of a sea of people all busily trying to get somewhere really makes me depressed. So I wasn’t particularly excited about traveling all the way to Seoul without any companionship. But just getting to Seoul ended up being an adventure. The night before I ended up packing, talking to Vanessa on the phone, and bbm-ing Amanda until 2 hours before I was supposed to wake up. I am a chronic over packer so when I got to the airport I was like 20 pounds over the weight limit and ended up having to carry a ton of stuff in my backpack which resulted in an epic backache.

Everything was fairly uneventful until I got to Atlanta. While I was walking to my terminal in Atlanta, I walked passed this woman who was screaming “Gabriel!” over and over again. I asked her what was wrong and she said that she had lost her son. Little known fact, I really really really love children and pretty much anything remotely sad involving children will make me cry. So as she’s telling me this, I started bawling just thinking about Gabriel alone and how scared he must be. I seriously have never felt like such a tool before. I hate crying in front of people so I was super embarrassed. She was kind of like ‘umm wtf?’ and then we actually prayed together that God would protect Gabriel and help her to find him. I had to leave to get on my plane but I really feel like she found her son. I have no way of ever knowing if she found him or not but I really feel like she did. I do hope I never see her again because I still can’t believe I started to cry.
So I’m totally that person who talks to their seatmates on a plane which is kind of ironic considering I consider myself an introvert. On the way to Seoul (which was a 14hr flight btw!) I ended up sitting next to a guy who, no joke, is a promoter for female boxing. The fact that he was a female boxing promoter was hilarious because the guy on the other side of him was a Korean pastor coming back from the Lakeland revival. For those of you who don’t know, the Lakeland revival is this thing (I honestly don’t know what noun to use here) based out of Lakeland, Florida. My mom watches it every day. It’s all centered on miraculous healings etc. In general, stuff like Lakeland is very difficult for me to engage with. As much as I’d like to say otherwise my default response is always disbelief and Lakeland isn’t really an exception. I don’t doubt that God can heal people but I also don’t doubt that ‘Christians’ can be some of the crappiest, self-serving people on the face of the planet and seeing something on TV is not going to cut it for me. All that aside, the pastor was so sweet, he was actually Assembly of God which is cool because that’s the same denomination as my home church. He was so adorable and went on and on about how the American Pastors in Lakeland helped take care of him and were so helpful and then he gave me his contact information which was really really great because prior to that I had no contingency plan in case I got lost on the way to the University. All of this christianese started to make the fight promoter uncomfortable so he decided to repeatedly inform us of how many female boxers he gets (the ones that aren’t lesbians) and how he loves Asian women which was really awkward because what is the Pastor going to say “oh yea? I sleep with a lot of female boxers too!” Also, the veracity of the claim that he gets a lot of women seemed a little dubious. Eventually I just pretended to be sleeping because there was just so much bull crap inherent in everything he was saying it was ridiculous. Then I watched half of “There Will Be Blood” which was boring and “Charlie Wilson’s War.”

Korea has been a lot more ‘foreign’ than I expected. I don’t really consider myself to have a strong attachment to any one geographical place mainly as a result of moving around so much but being here has made me question that a lot. Everything here is just so counterintuitive for me whether it is the way that the soap is set up in the bathroom (a bar on a stick instead of liquid) or the way that Koreans interact with each other. But overall coming here has been exactly what I needed in terms of letting me see in a tangible way that there is a world full of people who don’t follow the Penn path and the East Coast believe it or not is not the center of the universe, which is news to me!

The biggest issue I’ve been having here so far is the culture surrounding food. Anyone who knows me knows that I am a horrible food waster. At home it’s usually ok because my brother will usually finish my food. But here it’s a really big deal because when you don’t finish everything it’s an insult. At lunch today, I didn’t eat all of my rice, which was really yummy, and the woman who made the food, no joke, came out of the kitchen and started interrogating me about why I didn’t like the food. I’ve been having a lot of fun being adventurous in terms of what I eat. I just want to try as many different things while I’m here as possible. This has for the most part been a pretty good policy with the exception of the super nasty chicken feet I ate yesterday. The texture of chicken feet is quite possibly the worst thing I have ever experienced in my life. I wish there were some other word than Chewy because it was the most awful chewiness ever.

Another cultural thing that has been weird to deal with has been the fact that drinking is a big part of life here. When you go to a restaurant the waitress will literally ask you what ‘alcoholic beverage’ you want as opposed to say what drink in general. Most Koreans drink beer or Soulja (not sure of the spelling but it’s pronounced ‘So-Jew’) with their meals. I am not against drinking but it’s never been something that has been a big part of my life. Prior to coming here, I hadn’t had anything alcoholic in at least a couple of months. Also, I am not a beer fan and soulja basically tastes like vodka which I don’t’ consider a casual mealtime beverage.

I’ve seen a lot of really interesting places here. On Saturday, we went to Itaweon which is where all of the foreigners congregate. The area has a very interesting history because during the Korean War and for a couple decades afterwards it was kind of a seedy area where the American GIs would hang out and partake of the then booming sex trade industry. The Korean government eventually stepped in cleared out all of the brothels, etc. and gentrification set in so nowadays the neighborhood is an interesting mix of foreigners (I saw a lot of europeans, caribbeans, and south asians) and Korean yuppies. The closest equivalent I can think of in the states would be Soho or a slightly more upscale version of the village. Then on Sunday we went to Insadong which had some really cute stores and to see the royal palace at Changdeokgunk. I’m planning on putting pics up as soon as I find someone to loan me a cord. In conclusion, I’m totally in love with everything and everyone.

Two good songs:
"No Names (Black Debbi)" Dangerdoom
"We Get On" Kate Nash<-- Makes me laugh

*I finally got the cord so above are a couple of pictures of the palace.