Escaping North Korea, on The Daily Show

Mike Kim, author of ESCAPING NORTH KOREA, was on Jon Stewart's The Daily Show on Wednesday. You can check out the interview below.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Mike Kim
thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Jason Jones in Iran

It makes me wonder how North Koreans learn Calculus using dead Americans...

There was also a short but interesting article on Mike Kim in the Japan Times.

Korean History, Live and Online (and some random food notes)

For some research I was doing recently, I ran across the most amazing resource online -- a huge collection of photos and videos about Korea, dating from the 1950s to the present. Some are old news stories, others are government propaganda videos, and others are, well, I have no idea.

I'm talking about E-History website, run by KTV (Korea Policy Broadcasting?). For the video section especially, you can spend countless hours, just skipping around and browsing. Sadly, the site is only in Korean, but it is pretty easy to navigate, even for beginners.

There are 11 categories running down the left side, for politics, economics, military, society, eduction, culture and more. Below those categories, the site is also organized by decade. And because all the videos have been indexed and described, the search engine works surprising well.

Here is a sampling of some interesting videos related to movies and culture:
- Old movie theaters from 1957.
- Television starts in Korea in 1956, thanks to RCA.
- More about Korea's first TV station HLKZ, from 1956.
- AFKN from 1959.
- Opening of KBS headquarters in 1976.
- Some movie awards from 1959. Includes clips of Yu Hyun-mok (the famous director) and Choi Eun-hee (the great actress and wife of the late Shin Sang-ok).
- The first Best Korean Movie Awards in 1962. With awards going to Shin Sang-ok (for Romantic Papa) and Kim Ki-young (for The Housemaid) and Choi Eun-hee.
- The first Grand Bell Movie Awards, a few months later in 1962.
- Grand Bell Movie Awards from 1990. Features Kang Su-yeon winning an award, lots of really bad hair and shoulder pads.
- A report on Shin Sang-ok and Choi Eun-hee in North Korea from 1984 (with plenty of Bukgoe comments throughout).
- Sadly I could not find much interesting about old rock music. Did find this 1963 video about singer Lee Chun-hee.

And just some random stuff I liked:
- A golf tournament from 1954.
- Namdaemun devastated by a fire in 1954 (wow, deja vu).
- Yonsei's Severance Hospital back in 1962.
- Yonsei University's 80th anniversary.
- Korean boxer Yu Jae-du beating Koichi Wajima for the WBA Light Middleweight Champion belt in 1975 (Yuh Jae-doo?).
- A video from 1970 talking about Korea's next five-year plan and how Korea would develop in the future.
- The opening of the Yanghwa bridge connecting Mapo and Yeongdeungpo in 1965.
- The opening of the Seoul Sanga Apartments in Chungmuro in 1967.
- Namsan Wayne Apartments being destroyed in 1994
- Don't leave your nasty gum around, from 1990.
- Miss Korea 1957. Includes the swimsuit competition.

Okay, you get the idea. I could do this for days, but those selections should get you started. What a great website.

UPDATE: Given how popular Kim Yuna is these days, I thought people might want to check out these skating videos:
- Skating in 1955. Around 1 minute in, we get some figure skating, too. They could be the ancestors of Kim Yuna (metaphorically, that is).
- Rhee Sungman taking in some skating on the Han River in 1958 (including some more figure skating).
- 1959, more speed skating and figure skating (and the figure skaters are getting a little better). (Oh, love the spelling of "sports" in this one. 스포오쯔... never seen that before).
- Ice fishing and ice hockey from 1961 on this one.
- Skating at Gyeongbok Palace in 1963.
- Skating at the Dongdaemun Ice Rink, which I never knew existed, in 1964.
- Ice Carnival at the Dongdaemun rink in 1964. Including a talented little 6-year-old, Yoon Hyo-jin (who went on to finish 17th at the 1976 Olympics in Innsbruck).


* * *

A couple of random restaurant notes. Seems like every time I turn around, new Indian restaurants are popping up all over the place. I talked about Manokamana before (which now seems to be doing very well, as I can never get a seat there).

But if you cannot get a seat at Manokamana, there is another option just down the street -- Amma. Amma is just as good as Manokamana, if not better (I think the portions are bigger), and it is dead quiet. The furniture is a little odd (like out of a 1995 Korean dabang, but don't let that throw you). It is right behind the Hyundai Department Store. Map here. Totally worth checking out.

If you are looking for more of a Western bar experience, a new place just opened up in Shinchon that I also recommend called Beer O'Clock. Beer O'Clock has a good selection of beers (including Alley Cat Pale Ale), your basic bar food (which I have not tried yet, but looks good), and a great ambiance. It is on the second floor, with floor-to-ceiling windows that all open up, making almost every seat in the place a window seat.

I have not been there on a weekend yet, so maybe the vibe changes then. Hopefully not, but I do not know. But for a quite, comfortable mid-week place, Beer O'Clock was really good. Easily the best Western bar in Shinchon. Map.

* * *

UPDATE: Random note. As I write this post, my blog is the 10th most popular in the world under the Google search "distressed bondage." Sometimes I do not understand the Internet at all.

Korea Pop Wars in the News (sort of)

Hrm. There was a little writeup yesterday in the Joongang Daily about me. Just a short piece that touched on this blog, the Gig Guide, POP GOES KOREA and whatnot.

I would point out that the description of the IndiefulROK blog at the end of the story was Anna's own words, not mine. For a moment I thought the reporter was quoting me, and I did not recall saying anything like that.

Dancing on the DMZ

I just noticed that Matthew Harding, the dancing world traveler of Where the Hell Is Matt? fame, has a third video out, documenting yet another global jig.

And in this video, Korea gets not one, but two segments -- on the DMZ at about 1:45 and in front of Namdaemun at 2:45 (or is it Dongdaemun?).

As always, a fun and enviable video. I like watching all of Matt's videos, if only to shame myself into seeing more of this big world.



Or you can go here.

Random Notes - Vol 3, No. 4

An interesting little story on Mongolian hiphop in the UB Post. Unfortunately, it does not mention many bands (just Tartar and Har Sarnai, who have been around forever). But interesting to hear that hiphop continues to spread its influence.

The first time I went to Mongolia, back in the 1990s, the live bands were mostly rock. But each time I go back to Ulaanbaatar, it seems like there is more and more hiphop. I can still remember sitting beside my van once, in the middle of nowhere Mongolia, as this family on horseback rode by; the teenage kid in the family takes one look at me and reflexively said "Yo, gee!" and made a bunch of hiphop-esque sounds.

I'm sure you have heard by now, but the Wonder Girls have been named by Virgin Media as one of the top up-and-coming girl groups to watch. Kind of neat that they are getting noticed abroad. The cynic in me will try to overlook the difference between "groups to watch" and "groups to listen to."

Congratulations to Sangsang Madang, the arts space in Hongdae that is run by the Korea Tobacco & Ginseng. Until Sept. 7, Sangsang is holding the Sangsang Festa, featuring outdoor concerts, art exhibitions, movies and more.

What the heck? I just went to the Sangsang Madang website and found a post for a free Hongdae tour for foreigners. The tour is Sept. 28 at 1:30 and goes to 5pm. Tour will be lead by the singer for Band the Mu:n (never heard then, although I have heard of them, I think). Tour is limited to 20 people, and you need to apply by Sept. 15.

Copyrights and Wrongs and Rants

It has been a rather copyrighty couple of weeks for me, with the Korea Copyright Forum, the Seoul Digital Forum and the International Publishers Association Congress in Seoul and the USTR keeping Korea on its IP watchlist (sorry but I am too tired and lazy to link to all of those).

And throughout those "fun" events, a common message coming out of them was the need for governments to enforce copyright protections. Sometimes the message was nuanced and interesting (eg, Ted Cohen); sometimes it was the usual heavy-handed "arrest-them-all" rant (eg, Sumner Redstone).

(And once it was "Piracy is good," when will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas spoke at the Seoul Digital Forum. Luckily, it was the day after Redstone's rant, or else the ancient billionaire might have had a stroke).

While I do agree that there needs to be some respect for copyrights, listening to all of that corporate self-righteousness got me thinking, what are the corporations' responsibilities for respecting copyrights?

Korea has shown pretty clearly that people are more than willing to spend money on music and other digital entertainment, as long as that entertainment is convenient, reliable and reasonably priced.

They spent money even when the competition is "free." Because free really is not free at all. You hope the music file you are downloading works, but it might not. Or it might have a virus or some other nasty bit of code in it. And figuring how to make the bittorrent or emule or whatever work is not much fun. The "free" options are a pain in the butt, and that is a real cost, just like money.

Despite all the whining about Korea's piracy problems, last year Koreans spent over $300 million on online and mobile music. Combined with $80 million in CD sales and you have a number pretty consistent with music sales for the past 10 years. (Sure the music labels complain that they are not getting their fare share, but the important point is that consumers are still spending as much money as ever).

Cory Doctorow, Radiohead, NIN and plenty of others have shown that making your stuff available on the Internet does not hurt their value. If anything, availability and accessibility enhances value.

My main point is, what responsibility do the various entertainment companies (big and small) around the world have to make sure their content is available? In Korea, it is pitiful how few movies and TV shows are available here, whether on DVD or online. Even programs that I know have been subtitled in Korean.

How can companies expect customers to respect their copyrights when they do not provide access to their copyrighted contents?

In the Internet age, people anywhere in the world have the ability to find, download and watch/listen to just about anything (as long as the Internet connection is good enough). The whole idea that you can divide up the world into pieces and control when each area gets access to something is so antiquated and backward.

Until the media companies start making a serious effort to make their contents available to me here in Korea (and to people in general around the world), I am not going to lose much sleep about them losing money to "piracy."

Meetings and Forums and Fairs -- Oh My

I just realized how May is shaping up to be a rather busy season for official events in Seoul (at least for event related to the kind of work I do).

In early May, we have the SEOUL DIGITAL FORUM, which always attracts a lot of big names. This year, Sumner Redstone is going to be speaking, along with a host of other important people. It is an odd event, but there are usually 2-3 forums each year that I find useful to attend.

The follow week is going to be a big one for books in Korea. May 14-17 is this year's Seoul International Book Fair. But even bigger than that is May 12-15, when Korea's plays host to this year's annual congress for the International Publishers Association.

Before the Internet age and Starcraft descended upon us, Koreans were known as voracious readers. Today... not so much. But it looks like it could be an interesting event, at least as far as these stuffy industry events go.

* * *

Funny story from the Seoul Digital Forum of two or three years ago. I attended the big opening dinner thing and ended up sitting at a table right beside the head table. At the head table was one of the major speakers, Lee Soo-man, the founder and head of SM Entertainment, of course. Sitting with Lee was Boa, the singing star (I think she might have performed a song or two).

As you would expect with this kind of event, the hall was filled with dark suited officials... people rather proud of themselves for being so important and influential, most of whom were in their 40s and 50s. Not exactly SM Entertainment's prime demographic, right?

Well, age and dignity be damned, because the important, dark-suited bigwigs were falling all over themselves to get autographs from Boa. In the middle of some important speech by some important dude, these people would half-crouch (as if hiding, but not really), weave their way through the maze of circular tables, and make their way to Boa's table, where they would put some ratty piece of paper in front of Boa to be signed. Quite humorous.

Mind the Gap

Okay, this has nothing to do with Korean entertainment, but I found it wildly entertaining. GAPMINDER is a great website about world health and economics, with amazing tools for graphically displaying those statistics.

For example, here is a graph comparing North Korean and South Korean incomes-per-person and life expectancy from 1960 to the present.

It is a big database so it might take a couple of minutes to load, but it is pretty cool stuff. Once it is loaded, you can look at so many things:
- Comparing the percentage of people in Korea living in cities to income since 1960 here.
- South Korea's Internet users per 100 people since 1990 here

'Night & Day' and other Random Notes - Vol 3, No. 5

So I got the chance to see Hong Sang-soo's latest film NIGHT & DAY a few days ago. The film officially makes its world premier on Feb. 12 at the Berlin International Film Festival, but, well, there are ways...

Of course, I am sworn to secrecy about the film. But I can say what the press kits talk about -- it is the story of a middle-aged artist who flees to Paris after smoking a little pot in Korea. While in Paris he meets an ex-girlfriend, makes a new girlfriend, and smokes and drinks a lot.


It was Hong's longest movie so far, clocking in at 144 minutes, but it felt quite brisk and I never felt bored. Perhaps not as fun as WOMAN ON THE BEACH, but most worthwhile. I will try to write more about it after its official premier in 10 days.

Not that anyone asked, but here is my unofficial list of Hong Sang-soo's best films:
1. A Virgin Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors
2. Woman on the Beach
3. Night and Day
4. Turning Gate
5. The Day a Pig Fell in the Well
6. The Power of Kangwon Province
7. Woman Is the Future of Man
8. Conte du Cinema
I would not put too much stock in that list, though. Nos. 1 and 8 are fairly entrenched, but the rest of the list fluctuates a lot day by day.

After the screenings, a bunch of us went to eat and drink and noraebang (because "noraebang" should be a verb at this point). Director Hong led us in a pretty brutal drinking version of Rock, Paper, Scissors. And there was much merriment. Drinking with director Hong just after watching a Hong film (full of drinking and such), is a pretty amusing experience.

I cannot believe I missed this news when it broke (well, actually I can... I have been swamped with work for the last couple of weeks) -- Kim Chang-ik, drummer of the great Korean rock group Sanullim, died a few days ago. Apparently there was some sort of accident in British Columbia, where he lived.

Like Popular Gusts, I have long considered Sanullim's second album to be one of my favorites. When you have had a couple of adult beverages too many and you are at some old bar at 2 or 3 in the morning, and that great bass line from Nae Maeum-ae Judan-eul Kkalgo comes on the bar's stereo, it is one of my favorite feelings. I am just happy I was able to catch the band live in concert at their 30th anniversary show a couple of years ago.

A very sad story in the New York Times a couple of days ago about the fate of Michael Vick's dogs. Wonderful to see that people are trying to nurse them back to health (both physical and mental). But the story of Georgia is really heartbreaking...

THE WIRE. I have now managed to see the first five episodes of season five of THE WIRE, and I continue to be as impressed as ever. As I believe I said before, I am especially enjoying this season because it focuses on the Baltimore Sun newspaper, which I used to read regularly in the couple of years I spent in that city.

What makes it even better for me is that when I was breaking into journalism a few years ago, I was working at the Joongang Daily under Hal Piper, a first-rate reporter and editor who spent most of his career at the Baltimore Sun.

Season five has been especially controversial to some (journalists, mostly) because of its portrayal of cutbacks and the modern evolution of the news room. Some people think that David Simon, the show's creator and veteran crime reporter for The Sun, has been unduly harsh and petty about the leadership at The Sun when he was there. Others think he was spot on. There have been some great debates.

As for Mr. Piper, he has not seen THE WIRE, but this is what he had to say about The Sun and Mr. Simon and the others:

Yes, I knew Simon (not well), Carroll and Marimow. The latter two were my bosses in my last few years at the Sun, and I respected them a lot. I have seen what Simon says, but I think Carroll and Marimow reversed a prior decline in the quality of the Sun. When I left it in 2001 I thought it was a better paper than it had been in 10 or 15 years. Now that I am back in Baltimore, and reading the Sun again, I think it is a worse paper than I can remember in my lifetime. So, acknowledging Simon's talent -- he really was a great police reporter -- I wouldn't trust his evaluation of the paper as a whole. That said, I am dying to see the show. Some of my friends who are no longer with the paper have bit roles as reporters.

He goes on to say: "The issue, it seems to me, is that management has made a strategic decision in favor of mediocrity (closing foreign bureaus, using mostly wire stuff for travel and book reviews, etc.)." Ouch.

At any rate, you can read Simon's point of view about the series and Baltimore and more in this fine story.

Concrete Bungle, and Other Random Notes - Vol 3, No. 4

Despite the strange urge to stick a canal through the length of the country, President-elect Lee "The Bulldozer" Myung-bak is apparently not just about the concrete. The Chosun Ilbo introduced us on Monday to Lee's Design Korea plan to beautify the peninsula. This will involve everything from inviting top architectural companies to work on major building projects to toning down the garish signs and lights the blanket too much of Korea. A great and overdue idea... if he can pull it off.

Monday's Chosun also had a pretty amusing story about the illegal CD sellers who roam the Seoul subways, taking a rough sample of what kind of stuff is popular these days. The article claims 40 ventures sell on the various subway lines, making it seem almost like a normal job. Kicker quote, though:

Thus an eight-volume CD collection named “The New Original Hit Pops” contains a hologram mark of the Korea Music Copyright Association. But the certificate serial number C6-00028279 on the sticker was given to a soap opera starring Choi Ji-woo, the association said.

(How is selling on the subways legal anyhow? Shouldn't those "vendors" all get the boot and fined for selling things without a permit? Seems like an easy way to end the problem and put a bit of money into the city's coffers.)

The Seo Taiji PR machine is ramping up again. A new album is on its way.

This is a little late, but I meant to mention that I had a little column in the Seoul Shinmun last week. Nothing terribly exciting, just some musings on creativity and globalization.

Actually, I really misjudged the amount of space they had available, and originally I wrote way too much. Cutting was probably for the best, though. I can usually use some tightening up. In case anyone cares, here is what I wrote:

By Mark Russell

Of all the different aspects of the entertainment industry, none have had a deeper and yet more complex relationship with globalization than the movies.

The importance of the outside world in stimulating the creative boom of the 1990s is well known and well documented. Many of the great strides made in Korean movies, whether on the artistic side or the financing, came from innovators who were educated abroad for at least a few years – for example, Lee Mie-kyung and CJ Entertainment, director Kwak Kyung-taek (“Friend”), and Ryu Seong-hee, the art designer for such movies as “The Host” and “Hansel & Gretel.”

In fact, the global film market has had an important role in Korea pretty much since the film industry started here. In the 1920s and 30s, Korea was the most lucrative movie market in Asia for Hollywood, and all the major studios (Universal, Paramount, United Artists, MGM, RKO) had offices here. After the Korean War, too, international films flourished for a time.

Even the movie market opening to foreign direct distributors in the mid-1980s, generally considered an event that nearly killed the local movie business, in many ways was good for Korean movies. For example, as the Hollywood studios fought for access to the Korean market, they also fought against the heavy censorship regulations that once stifled domestic creativity.

These days, it feels like those lessons have been forgotten. Foreign movies are seen by some as a threat to the local industry, despite the huge growth in Korea’s movie exports over the past decade and despite Korean movies far outpacing their foreign competitors at the box office. The screen quota remains another major hot-button issue. And I even hear about Korean actors losing roles in major international movies because their managers are not comfortable with English or working outside of Korea.

The trouble is, globalization is always a two-way street, and anytime you cut yourself off from the world, you are cutting yourself off from new ideas, innovation, and creativity.

The Seo Taiji boom in music has long since turned stagnant, a neverending recycling of the same teen pop ideas.

Korean television dramas, once seen as a fresh, lively alternative around Asia, have quickly lost their freshness, and with that they are losing their audiences.

And the movie business – arguably the most innovative and impressive of Korea’s entertainment industries – is threatening to fade, declining into mainstream mush and a handful of innovative directors.

Strangely, despite Korea’s amazing shift into becoming an online information society, it has defied one of the most basic assumptions of what the information age means – Korea has not grown more diverse, in many ways it has grown less so.

Many analysts and writers have long said that as a society moves into the information age, choice will naturally grow as people can find easily anything they like and producers lose their control.

But the movie industry in 2007 produced far fewer interesting, challenging and bizarre movies than it did in 1997. Korea’s films are usually very good looking and slick, and each year usually brings a few big-budget ambitious epics. Creatively, however, not a lot is happening these days.

“The Korean Wave” was an impressive achievement. It brought international level production, distribution and related skills that revolutionized the entertainment industries and made Korea into an example for much of Asia.

Clearly another wave is now needed, one that focuses on creativity, if Korea is to continue to be a major cultural force in the future. A handful of star directors is not enough. Korea needs to systematically put creativity into the movie development process. Movie companies, particularly the largest ones that dominate so much of the business, need to carve out niches where experimental and promising talents can be nurtured and encouraged to develop.

It is a lesson that many of Korea’s automobile and electronics companies have already learned, and that more of the Korean economy will need to learn in the future. It is not enough to copy on the cheap, true value comes from innovation. And if you want to compete on the world stage, your products must be innovative at world class levels.

Random Notes - Vol 3, No. 2

I checked out some surprisingly good bands at Freebird the other night. It has been quite a while since I even thought about Freebird, but this time it had the best bands I have seen in Korea for ages.

Most notable was ORIENTAL LUCY (sorry, I only have these crappy cell phone pics). Each song was quite different, ranging from a retro-70s-rock sound to a bizarre cover of a trot classic that sounded like something by SIOUXSIE AND THE BANSHEES. (They have a Cyworld page here, but it is one of those annoying ones you need to sign into to use, so it is pretty much useless for most people.)


Another very good band was FRENZY, a four-man instrumental shoe-gazing band that sounded a bit like classic Echo and the Bunnymen (my friend's assessment).


The other band was JERANG, perhaps not as good, but still interesting in their own way. A bit of an early-Radiohead, whiny sound, but not bad. I believe JERANG won the most recent Korea national high school talent competition. They four guys in the band are just 20 (Korean age, I would imagine, so 19 in the rest of the world), so they have some time to improve. But a good beginning.

I just ran across a relatively new-ish magazine and website dedicated to the Seoul art scene, called NEXART (actually, I think Nex Art has been around since 2006, but I just discovered it). At the moment it is in Korean only, but the website claims that an English section will be coming in March. If you pick up the 'zine around town, most of the stories have a short English intro, which is limited but quite interesting.

Poking around on the Nex Art website then led me to the English (and Korean) website EAST BRIDGE, another site for finding out more about the Korean art scene.

As long as you are at East Bridge, do not forget to check out their huge list of Korean art links.

I just checked out the first two episodes of THE WIRE's fifth season (through totally legitimate means, I am sure... Stealing them via Bittorrent would be wrong).

Totally love it. Season 5 is, somehow, even more bleak than the first four seasons. But despite the depressing edge to things, it is still the best show on television, by far. Great writing, solid insights and, despite the dark cynicism, more than a few funny moments.

In case you have not heard, THE WIRE season 5 turns an eye to the media, in particular to modern newspapers, with all the brutal insight the show has used to examine city politics, the war on drugs, schools and all the rest.

Some early reviews have criticized the shows creator for having an exaggerated or cartoon-like perspective on the troubles facing the modern newspaper, but I think those criticisms are off-base. Sure it is not 100-percent correct, but THE WIRE is a fictional, entertainment program, not a documentary. I am guessing its view of the newsroom is as accurate as all the other institutions it has skewered over the years (which is to say quite accurate, but very much fiction).

If you are in Korea, you can still track down season 1 of THE WIRE here and there, for just 20,000 won or so. Totally worth it. Or you can order seasons 1-4 from Amazon.com.

Music, Manners and Mammaries

I usually try not to just link to other people's stories when I do not have much of my own to add, but there were a bunch of interesting articles in today's Chosun Ilbo. And they all made the English edition, so that is even more convenient.

First up, there was an article about Seo Taiji's latest, a new CD set and other events to commemorate the singer's 15th year anniversary of stardom. Funny old photos of Seo, too. Say what you will about the quality of his music, it is great to know there was a time when someone off the radar appeared and genuinely transformed a country with his songs (and dancing and whatnot).

Very amusing story about Korean audiences' "bad manners." Usually I am not a big fan of those self-flagellating, aren't-we-Koreans-terrible story (or their silly opposite, the boastful, aren't-we-Koreans-amazing stories), but this one seemed a little more interesting than most.

The article lists the usual litany of social faux-pas, like bringing very young children to classical music concerts (or anywhere, in my humble opinion), snoring at the movies, not turning off cell phones at the movies, talking on cell phones at the movies, taking endless pictures of golfers with cell phones at tournaments (I seem to notice a theme to theme complaints...). But in addition to just complaining, it added a little analysis toward the end:

The lack of manners is probably due to the small number of concert-goers here, most of whom have little education in the etiquette. According to a 2006 survey on Koreans’ culture and art-related activities, only 6.8 went to museums and 3.6 percent to classical concerts.

Really? Do more Chicagoans or Torontonians go to classical concerts? I guess it depends if we are talking about "going in a year" or "going ever in their lifetimes." But I think the article finally got at a more interesting, local aspect of the problem here:

Another big problem is the mass giveaway of concert tickets.

Bingo. The whole live music scene here (classical and contemporary) has some rather odd economics. People love to complain that shows are "too expensive," but somehow corporations have the money to sponsor these shows and then give away scads of tickets to anyone and everyone.

Although the article cited a lot of problematic behaviours, personally my biggest complaint about audiences here is the applauding of utter crap. It's like a competition to see who can shout encore first and loudest. And the multiple curtain calls to some off-key warbler at the opera or wherever is just plain annoying. I prefer the Italian example, where people feel free to boo a lousy performance, like it were a sporting event.

I think that ties into the free tickets... people are going who are not really fans of the performance and who do not know much about it, and are instead just acting out some misconceived idea of what a classical concert should be.

Then again, I have been repeatedly watching Carrie Underwood singing the Heart song "Alone" on American Idol (via Youtube), so maybe I should keep my bitchy comments about people's bad taste to myself.

Finally (and best of all) was the Chosun's article about photographer Kim Yong-ho. Kim got into trouble recently when he published some topless photos of ballerina Kim Ju-won in the local VOGUE magazine. Or, rather, the ballerina got into trouble (women tend to get blamed for moral outrages in Korea).

Some of Kim's other photos are currently on display at the Daelim Contemporary Art Museum in Seoul, in an exhibit called BODY (or mom, in Korean). As Kim says in the article:

I wanted to get attention from all sectors of society; that was the main objective of my exhibition. But all I got was the realization that our reality does not tolerate diversity. We had a fine response from the readers of Vogue magazine. But what happens to the model? She’s criticized and disciplined. Those are in a way the different faces of our society.

It looks like a good show. You should check it out if you get the chance.

Random Notes - Vol. 2, No. 9

TAEWANGSASINGI (aka, LEGEND, aka, FOUR GUARDIAN GODS OF THE KING) is off to a solid start in Korea. In its first three episodes this week, nationwide ratings were:
Tuesday - 20.4
Wednesday - 26.9
Thursday - 26.9

In Seoul, ratings rose slightly from Wednesday to Thursday, too. Too early to know if it will be a moderate hit or a big hit (or even if people will get bored and lose interest), but it is definitely a solid start.

Note: Ratings are not a percentage. Shares are written as percentages, ratings are not. Ratings refer to the number of viewers and households (but damned if I can figure out the math in Korea).

A little late, but I just saw the Sept. 7 episode of Bill Maher's REAL TIME. Which was capped by a very good New Rule segment that featured the Korean missionaries. Go to about 2:25 in to hear his take on the matter.

(Actually, the Korean missionary schtick was the weakest part of this week's New Rules, but I still think it is worth a listen).

Greetings to all my German visitors. Thank you for your interest. But who is this "Rin" person and why is she being so nice to me? Anyhow, it is much appreciated. Danke.

14% fresh.

FYI:
League of Extraordinary Gentlemen - 16%
Alexander - 16%
Hannibal Rising - 15%
Underdog - 13%
Garfield - 13%
Dungeons & Dragons - 11%
Catwoman - 10%
Elektra - 10%
Battlefield Earth - 3%
Half Past Dead - 2%

So I guess Shim Hyung-rae really is a Hollywood-quality director.

What the hey? D-WAR made its US release on Friday on 2,279 screens?! Why, for the love of god, why? That is so wrong at so many levels. Anyhow, I will mention how it did in the United States as soon as Box Office Mojo or Nikki Finke or whoever reports...

UPDATE: Crap. D-WAR is actually making a little money. $1.5 million on Friday alone. Looks like it is a lock to become the highest grossing Korean film in the United States (not hard, since the previous record holder, SPRING SUMMER FALL WINTER... AND SPRING only had about $2.3 million).

Happy Birthday to Blog

While posting my previous story about the fake degree scandal, I suddenly realized that KOREA POP WARS is exactly one year old. That is kind of nifty. The first article I wrote is here. Kind of amusing that it was about a Japanese band, but such are the gentle ironies of life.

For the first couple of months, almost no one knew about KOREA POP WARS, with just a couple of visitors a day. Then in November, Darcy Paquet mentioned the blog over at KOREANFILM.ORG, and that gave me a little bump... to around a dozen or two visitors a day. Things changed pretty radically in early December when I posted the first online review of Park Chan-wook's I'M A CYBORG, BUT THAT'S OK. That grouchy little review got linked and quickly my hits spiked into the hundreds. Things died off, but then spiked again for my even grouchier RESTLESS review (both those articles still regularly show up in my Google search results).

Feb. 1 was my biggest day ever, thanks to a prominent endorsement at THE MARMOT'S HOLE. I appreciated his enthusiasm, but honestly I would not consider this blog a "must read" by any stretch of the imagination.

All told, KPW's first year, I wrote 187 articled (about one every other day, on average), and received 45,992 page loads and 35,834 unique visitors. Not exactly DEADLINE HOLLYWOOD DAILY, but not bad, I guess, considering the subject matter.

Certainly the blog has unfolded differently than I thought it would. At first, I thought I might do something anonymous and full of all the fun gossip and stories I come across in my work. But I quickly realized that if I wrote the really good stuff, it would be rather obvious who I was, and people would stop talking to me about the good stuff.

Then I thought I might be publishing extracts from my book... try to get a little feedback from people as I cranked the thing out... kind of like Chris Anderson's THE LONG TAIL. But that did not work out, either. For one, my writing process did not work like Anderson's, and did not lend itself to excerpting.

For a while, I thought about translating the tabloids and sports newspapers, but there are already plenty of people doing that (Shenyue, Pop Seoul, etc.) ... and besides, those papers' considerable inaccuracy would have driven me bonkers quickly.

So, in the end, what you see before you is what I did. Not quite sure how I got here or where this little project will continue to go. But for now I am here. Thanks for reading.

6 Degrees of Obfuscation

There has been much ink spilled over the last couple of months in Korea over the fake degree scandal, with dozens of leading figures and celebrities caught having lied about their university education and other qualifications. Good overview of the story at the IHT here (and at the New York Times, too, but the IHT links do not expire after a week).

I find this whole scandal to be particularly amusing because years ago I was actually on the receiving end of the exact opposite situation, where I was denied a job because the prospective employer did not believe my credentials were real (even though, I assure you, they are).

Many years ago, before this journalism thing was working for me, I applied for a teaching position at a university outside of Seoul, and I needed a Master's Degree for the position. Which I have. But the strange thing is, I earned my Master's while I was still an undergraduate. It is called "submatriculating," which is starting work on graduate school while still an undergraduate. Not all universities allow this, but mine did, and through a quirk of scheduling and my idiosyncratic interests, I ended up taking a lot of graduate level classes in my junior and senior years. End result was that I received my BA and MA at the same time.

But the school to which I was applying had not heard of submatriculating and they told me they did not believe I could really have earned both degrees at the same time. This was despite my having original transcripts and diplomas for both degrees. They had not heard of this before, therefore I was lying. They did not bother calling my university to check out my degrees.

Which is, I suppose, how my story intersects with all the fake degree stories in the news now -- not checking. Anyhow, I thought it was kind of an interesting flipside to the current scandals.

Personally, I am pretty ambivalent about the whole idea of "qualifications" in the arts and writing. I never took a journalism course in my life, but I seem to have figured out how it works okay (thanks to a lot of help from some very kind journalists and editors). And the world if full of MFA graduates who make terrible art. When I go to the doctor, I want someone who is qualified. When I get legal advice, I want someone who is bar certified. But for writing, art, criticism? Screw it, I want someone creative, intriguing and who can do a good job.

The interesting follow-up story on the fake-degree scandal I would like to read is how good of a job did all those fakers do. What did people think of Shin Jeong-ah's work as a curator/critic? Were Lee Chang-ha's buildings well designed? Were they even structurally sound? Did the monk Jigwang have less enlightenment because he never really graduated from Seoul National University? Heck, he should have just claimed to have transcended transcripts and overcome the materialism of the degree.

Buena Hongdae Social Club

You know that experience where you walk past some place (a sign or an entranceway or wherever) hundreds of times without giving the location a second thought, then one day, for no particular reason, you decide to go inside and discover an amazing place? Something really special was right under your nose the whole time, but you had no idea. Well, that happened to me on Thursday night.

The location in question was MOONGLOW, a jazz club kind of in Hongdae, kind of outside the usual Hongdae limits (somewhere between Hongdae proper and Hapjeong Subway Station).

Moonglow is owned and operated by Shin Kwan-Woong, one of Korea's early jazz musicians. He's apparently been playing professionally since 1966, and is an interesting character. He plays piano pretty much every night at the club, with the band accompanying him changing each night.


I have not been there every night of the week, but Thursday nights are pretty cool, as the band consists of all his old friends and bandmates from the 1960s. Some pretty solid names playing him, and they still can groove. Somewhat like the guys in BUENA VISTA SOCIAL CLUB (to use a rather uncreative comparison).

According to the Moonglow website, on drums is the amazing 76-year-old Choi Se-jin, who has been playing since 1947 (but last Thursday, I think someone else was playing... looked different from the photos of Choi).

Anyhow, I'll try to write more about these guys some time soon.

If I have a complaint (and me being me, of course I do), it is how typical their repertoire was. If I could get through the rest of my life without hearing Chuck Mangione, I would not be unhappy (Feels So Bad). But I imagine they playlist reflects what people are always asking them to play. And at least the band played the hell out of those tunes, turning them into something special. That club is definitely a great find. Highly recommended.

(Sorry, could not find an English map).

This is kind of random. STARDUST had a pretty understated opening on Aug. 14 across Korea. I saw it at the local Art Reon theater, where it was playing on the smallest screen they had. Well today I checked out the Art Reon movie listings, and lo and behold, STARDUST is now playing on the second-biggest screen in the multiplex. Is this a sign the movie is getting really good word of mouth? Or is it just one of those inexplicable things?

I finally checked out SHIM"S TAPAS in Hongdae. Wow, their food is really first-rate. Coffee, too. Homemade bread, plenty of choices... The group I was with ordered about eight things (not including dessert), and seven of them were excellent (their pizza was okay, but not great). Another big recommendation -- if you can get a seat. I will post a map if I can ever find one. It is located in Seogyo-dong, if that helps, not far from Sanulim Theater (even closer to the bar Stereo, if you know where that is).

Naver Say Naver Again...

Hey, for the first time, the Korean Internet world seems to have noticed my presence. Very exciting. And rather unexpected.

If I may explain... On Friday, I will be giving a presentation at Kyung Hee University, as part of some seminar and other things in a day of Hallyu (the Korean Wave). The university asked us presenters to write a little paper, basically going over what we will talk about at the seminar. No big deal, was happy to do it.

But apparently the university gave out copies of our papers to the local press... trying to stir up interest in their event, I guess. In any event, this morning I started getting phone calls from some friends and acquaintances in the entertainment industry, asking about the mean things I had written.

My first response was "Huh?"... partly because it takes a while for my brain to get moving in the morning, and partly because I had not expected the press to take an interest in my little paper. But mostly because I wrote a fairly positive story about the local entertainment biz.

So I hit the Internet and found a couple of stories. The worst was definitely the Segye Ilbo, who totally misunderstood what I wrote. And (surprise, surprise) did not bother contacting me. Niiiice. Very professional. Granted, I gave my paper a cheeky little title ("The Zombie Wave"), but not for any special reason... because I could not think of a decent title and because I was just joking around.

In any event, where there is news, there is a Naver discussion (Thanks to the Marmot for pointing it out to me). As of 11pm, there were over 1,200 comments... Rather remarkable, especially for little old me. It was mostly the usual Naver mix of complaining, joking and what not, but I was surprised how many people seemed sympathetic to what I said (even though much of it was taken out of context).

FYI, for any Naver or Newsis or other folk dropping by, my presentation is mostly about how the Korean Wave and Korean pop culture has been perceived by the Western media. It is much more a critique of Western journalism in Korea than it is an analysis of Korean pop culture.

FYI2, I am not American. I write for American magazines, but I am not American. Not that there is anything wrong with that...

PS: Hi Mikstipe. Nice blog... and thanks for the kind words.

Like Making Love in a Canoe

JoongAng Daily writer Cho Jae-eun gives us an odd, brief history of Korean beer. I am tempted to fisk the article, but I fear I would be here all evening. The article has a little bit of useful information in it, but, sadly, it is obvious the writer does not know much about "real" beer, and so had to recycle a lot of OB and Hite PR material. I do not want to sound all mean and negative... Oh, who am I kidding? I am mean and negative.

Suffice it to say, Korean beer is bad. Really, really bad. I do prefer Cass and Hite and Hite Prime/Max (whatever they are calling it this week) over Budweiser and Miller and mainstream American beers. But that is not saying much. Japanese beer is rarely much different, although there are a couple of brands that are marginally nicer.

As for Canadians who love Labbats or Molsons -- you need to be quiet. Contrary to popular opinion in Canuckland, mainstream beer there is nearly as bad as in America.

The other Korean beers -- Cafri, OB Blue, Cass Light -- are pretty much undrinkable. And Cass Red is just nasty. It tastes like syrup, not beer. It is the Majuang Port Wine of beers. (I mean the Majuang stuff they used to sell at convenience stores for 1,800 won... count yourself lucky if it never passed your lips).

I am slightly ambivalent about Hite Stout. It certainly is no stout. I can remember when it tasted a little bit like a dark mild, but (as they story states) it has been rejigged and watered down for local tastes since then.

Whatever happened to Hite's ExFeel? That was another terrible beer. The name was supposed to mean "Excellent Feeling," but instead sounded like a way of referring to an former girlfriend.

Korea's brew houses are a little better, but not much. Very uneven. They often start out okay, then the brewmaster takes off and quality quickly goes down the toilet (Exhibit A: Platinum... such a sad decline and fall of a once good beer joint). I am told Big Rock in Gangnam is pretty good, but I do not get down to that part of town much.

I wish I had a most useful way of ending this article, but I do not. Oh, yes I do. Watt's on Tap in Shinchon has a decent pale ale on tap (from Canada). Good weather for sitting on the roof and drinking that.

Anyhow, I hope someone comes up with the bright idea of offering well-made, natural, flavorful beers to the public. Bring in Sleeman's or some German microbrewery or somesuch. It is just crazy enough an idea that it might work.

Random Notes - Vol. 2, No. 8

Early word I am hearing about the box office on Song Hye-gyo's costume feast HWANG JINYI is not good. It opened Wednesday, on the holiday, but its attendance so far is quite poor. Strangely, HWANG JINYI's distributor, CJ Entertainment, also released SHREK 3 on the same day. Maybe they were thinking the two films had a totally different target market, so would not interfere with each other? Anyhow, victory goes to SHREK 3.

According to local media reports in Korea (and, of course, the thousands of obsessed fans over at Soompi.com), Rain's North American tour has been canceled "postponed." This Soompi account is basically correct. No big surprise there. Rain is a very nice young man, but his break from JYP Entertainment was one of the more spectacularly poor career moves I have seen in quite some time (imho). Anyhow, I hope he manages to straighten out his various troubles soon and gets back to making his fans happy.

Speaking of JYP... Look for a big media blitz coming out soon for the opening of the JYP Entertainment office in New York. Billboard will have Park Jin-young on the cover (with substantial stories inside), along with all the major media you would expect in New York. JYP may have lost Rain, but the company still has a lot of really interesting stuff in the works.

Korea Poop Wars

As a member of the press (well, kind of), I find myself on all sorts of mailing and emailing lists. Some are quite helpful, some are less so, and some are just sort of odd.

So I open my mailbox a few days ago, and what do I find? TOILET WORLD #1 (meaning the first issue, not an issue dedicated to number one-ing). They even have a website, handily available in Korean, Spanish, French and Arabic.


The World Toilet Association, that newsletter tells me, grew out of the Korea Toilet Association, which was founded in 1999. The newsletter features a Q&A with toilet ambassador Jeffery D. Jones (on page 10, although the About Jones section at the end is nearly as large as the interview) and a related AP article by Burt Herman (page 11).

Although the urge to make dumb jokes is high (toilet humor), the WTA points out the 2.6 billion people in the world are without access to adequate toilet facilities, which is a direct contributor to several nasty infectious diseases.

(Coincidentally, Korea is also home to one of the more important groups tackling those very diseases, the International Vaccine Institute, which is celebrating its 10th anniversary later this year. A great group, that is really making a difference around the developing world. Believe me, you do NOT want to catch Shigella ever).

Anyhow, if you would like to learn more about toilet culture, the WTA is having its inaugural general assembly meeting at the COEX Convention Center in Seoul on Nov. 21-25.