Is Japan Still Hiring?

North Korea renounces 1953 ceasefire with South Korea.  North Korea threatens South Korean and US shipping.

The Korean War (1950-1953) technically never ended.  A full-on peace treaty was never signed.

So hearing that the DPRK will now ignore the 1953 limited ceasefire doesn’t make me feel all that nervous.  For decades there’s always been a chance some higher-up North Korean officer would go rogue, murder Kim Jong-il, and order all southward facing artillery to open fire.  This is all posturing, trying to roll back as many international agreements as possible while South Korea deals with the suicide of a popular former president (popular among Koreans under 40, at least).

Or maybe this is all just wishful thinking on my part.  If North Korea was going to attack, I wish they would have done it last week before I had to write student evaluations.

Fallout

This editorial from the English language Korean newspaper The Korea Herald does as good a job as any in giving some perspective on the suicide of former president Roh:

Of his eight predecessors, the first president’s life ended in exile, one was killed by his own spy chief, two were forced out of office, another two sent to prison and the last two had their sons imprisoned for corruption. What brought all this misfortune to them all and, finally, to Roh?

It really is mind-boggling how prevalent outright corruption or at least the appearance of scandal has dogged every South Korean president since the inception of the Republic in 1948.  Here’s a list, via Wikipedia.

And it comes as no surprise that North Korea, classy as always, has taken the minor turmoil in the south as an opportunity to test-fire another nuclear bomb.

Sad Sad Songs

R.I.P. Jay Bennett, formerly of Wilco.

Crooked Little Alleys

Near Itaewon, Seoul, looking towards the Seoul Central Mosque.

Shock

Former South Korean president Roh Moo-hyun found dead in an apparent suicide.

Wikipedia is as good a place as any to start and try to figure out all of the complexities of his on-going scandals.

In power from 2003-2008, he had some tentative similarities to Bill Clinton who was also a relative liberal who was popular among the equivalent of “Generation X.”  Anecdotally, a Korean friend of mine in her early 30’s was telling me a few weeks ago how frustrated she was that the media was “out to get him.”  Then again, many of the corruption and kick-back charges seem impossible to refute.

Apparently a note was left, so this will be big news for a while here.

LOL Pedagogy

Who’s the education-minded genius who thought up pencil cases with video games built into them?

Field Trip, Chuseyo

Botanical garden near Paju, north of Seoul.

My Inner Nerd Is (Mostly) Sated

I liked the new Star Trek, but I didn’t really really like it as much as I thought given the glowing reviews.

They got the important things right — Kirk obviously, but also Spock.  I’d joked about how I wouldn’t be interested in this film unless Kirk was bedding a green female alien within the first half hour, and I basically got my wish.  (h/t to Eddie Murphy in this nsfw youtube clip.)

But why the time travel?  After the trainwreck that was Star Trek Generations, you’d think J. J. Abrams would’ve learned.  It’s the cheesiest gimmick for any sci-fi writer, and totally unnecessary other than to work in Leonard Nimoy and appease the grognards.

And while I love me some Simon Pegg, I wasn’t all that chuffed with Scotty’s role.  I’d rather he was cued in as a core figure early on like McCoy.

But you’ll have to excuse me while I go polish my 20-sided dice.

Some Sound And Maybe Just A Little Fury

I just had a letter to the editor printed in The Korea Times, one of the two major English language dailies here in South Korea.  I was responding to yet another ridiculous op-ed by John Huer, who’s notorious for his anti-foreign teacher attitudes.  I really shouldn’t link to it, but it’ll make my letter more understandable for anyone who’s interested.  (Outside of Korea, probably about three people.)

One thing that got edited out of my letter due to length, but really deserves to be addressed, is why some Koreans think foreign English teachers are rolling in cash given the miserable state of the Korean won right now.  A qualified English teacher can live very comfortably here on a standard foreign teacher salary due to the relatively low cost of living, but even the most frugal saver is going to get burned by the exchange rate if his or her goal is to convert hard-earned won to US dollars (or Canadian or Australian ones as the case may be).

And given the global economic crisis, everybody knows by now that the soundest money-making strategy is to fill mayonnaise jars with crinkled 20’s and bury them in the backyard, then wait for the ice caps to melt.

Live Long And LOL

The Onion’s take on the new (and apparently quite good) Star Trek movie:

“Trekkies Bash New Star Trek Film As ‘Fun, Watchable’”