Korea Life Blog - They Killed and Ate Their Boss's Dog


Here's a scary and bizarre story from Friday's Korea Times:

Dog Meat Lovers Face 80-Million-Won Lawsuit

*80 million won is about 70,000 US dollars.

As a meat eater it's hard for me to say with any credibility that eating dog is wrong. I disagree with the inhumane treatment of any animal, but simple saying that is easy. Though I have stopped eating fast food for the time being (after reading Fast Food Nation), I blindly and zealously devour Kalbi, Sam Gyeop Sal and other meats without really considering how the meat ended up on my plate. Without doing anything to stop cruelty to animals, and by continuing to eat all sorts of meat, I'm just part of the problem, I know.

However, I can say with a clear conscience that it's wrong to steal a person's pet and eat it. That's just sick. Since the police don't care, I hope the bastards who did this are forced to pay up in court.




For anyone who may be interested in learning more about the tradition (and it's not only Korea, of course) of eating dogs and the inherent cruelty that goes with it, click here.(don't click here if you want to avoid seeing animal cruelty.)

It's important that I point out that Korea is making advancements toward the better treatment of animals, though there is still a long way to go for those involved in the crusade. Here is just one website devoted to the cause: Korean Society for the Protection of Animals

written by shawn matthews    -|link

Korea Life Blog - New Search Engine: A9.com


After reading this article in PC World, I tested out this new search site by Amazon.com:

A9.com

Though it's still "enhanced" by Google, it's got a lot of unique features that I like. If you click on "site info" under the links you can see a bunch of stats and, in the tradition of Amazon's user interface, see what other pages people who click on those links visit. You can also see the "traffic rating" for a site (the lower the number the better). For example, my site has a ranking of 348, and Swiss James' Lost Seouls has a ranking of 5,402,786. I'm not making this up.

Nice! I wonder if Google will add some similar features too.

The only thing I don't like about A9.com is that it displays "sponsered links" on top of search results. I like how Google does away with that and puts the advertising way off to the right.

written by shawn matthews    -|link

Korea Life Blog - Singing Room


Be sure to stop by and check out James' site for a brief rundown of last night, a few pics, and to read his plugs for my book.


Here's James last night singing "Beat It" by Michael Jackson again...

written by shawn matthews    -|link

Korea Life Blog - John's Update


John saw a request from a reader to keep my readers posted on his progress in Korea. John took it to heart and spent the last few hours writing this. He was on such a roll that he never even bothered to hit enter for a paragraph break. He also included his notes from yesterday too.


Hi Everyone,

Today is day four here and I'm still not over my jet lag. I woke up at 5am here and forced myself to sleep until about 8am then I got up grabbed a fresh peach at Yeokgok Outdoor Market and headed over to Yongsan Electronic Market. Yongsan has every gadget and gizmo you could ever need in about 5 large 3-6 story building and all surrounding streets. Video games, telephones, camera's, computers and accesories. You want it and almost everyshop here has got it. If you walk slow they will suck you in and try and sell you something. I ended up getting an 256MB LG Ultra High Speed Compact Flash Card for my new Canon S410 camera. I also had to get an adapter for the charger so I can plug it in here so I brought that with me. After saying the word adapter about 50 times in my head in Korean on the way of course I forgot when I arrived. So...I just pretended to plug my charger into the wall...biffed myself on the forehead and said "Babo" which means dummy in Korean. After laughing he got the point and gave me one for free. After going the wrong way on the subway on the way home I finally made it back to Yeokgok where I hade more Kimbab. You can't beat the price of less than a dollar for a full meal! I heard back today from one of my recruiters "Jennifer" that always attaches "from Korea" to the end of her introduction. She said she still has a job starting October 1st if I'm interested but I forgot the details and asked "Jennifer from Korea" to send them to me. "John from Korea" will keep you posted. Earlier while I was waiting for the train I had one sided ten minute conversation with an ajuma (older korean woman). I kept telling her I don't speak Korean but she persisted untill eventually she ran out of things to say. Other than that not much new. I'm going to try and call my friend Bin Kim later on. It's about 6:45 pm here (5:45 am EST) I think she works till around 8pm, can't remember, and i'm not sure how to use the phone in my room, or if i get charged for local calls? I guess i should try and figure out how to ask the guy that owns the place if there is a phone number, and if its free. He's a really nice guy. Poor guy and his wife actually live there in the office. They sleep on the floor Ondol style. They have all their clothes on shelves and even have a shower and head in there, but its about half the size of my room. Life for Koreans isn't grand for all I guess. Its nice to be a westerner here. Well with all that said. I'm freakin starving! I need to grab a bite to eat before I fall asleep at the keyboard like the guy next to me.

Let me get my notes so I can actually remember what i did...ok. Unfortunately nobody in my little hotel speaks even a word of English so when i need something i have to put together the sentences in advance and prepare some back up answers and responses based on their response. Needless to say it can be difficult at times to get things done here when you don't even know how its done. For example one of my recruiters asked me to fax her a copy of my diploma yesterday. That was a half day project. There is no such thing as a kinkos in korea so if you don't own a fax how do you send one? After wandering around Yeokgok for a few hours looking for some clue I gave up and went back to my room. I picked up my trusty Berlitz Korean phrase book and looked for something about fax machines and low and behold it told me I needed to go the post office to send a fax, Hoping this was true I taught myself how to say I need to send one document by fax and prayed they wouldn't laugh at me if they didn't send faxes from the post office. After sitting for a few moments what appeared to be the young lady qualified to send faxes came out. It seems that in Korea everyone has their purpose at their job and it was clear that the women I first spoke with was not the "faxer." Once the faxer arrived everything went fairly smooth and for 300 won or about 25 cents my fax was sent. I decided against Kimbab for lunch and got mandu guk or dumpling soup. it was yummy and if I ever get a chance to upload my photos I'll show you all the pics I'm taking. Later on that day I met up with Bin which I'll get to eventually. I met Bin online about 7 months ago. I'm not sure how exactly but we have been chatting ever since and we decided to meet up and grab a bite to eat. She had asked me as a favor to get her some Godiva choclates before I left the states. I searched boston and finally found a store at the Cambridgeside Galleria Mall. Now lets jump ahead to my 3rd hour of my flight on Korean Air. In the third hour it is duty free shopping time and of course what are they selling? Godiva Choclates! Early that day I figured I should try to get some of my dirty laundry done. I spent 15 minutes teaching myself how to ask the ajuma's where the washing machine was and she brought me into the closet and showed me a ladder. I'm not sure exactly why she thought I may need a ladder in my room for but eventually she realized I wanted to wash some clothes but insisted that the "ajuma" do it for me. Hesitantly I wondered as to why this old lady wanted to wash my stinky socks and underwear but she seemed very please to do it for me. I went back to my room, collected my dirty things and handed them to her and she scurried away with a smile. After I went for a walk in Yeokgok Market. It was about 5pm and at that time of day everything is bustling. Most of the students are out of school by then parading throught the streets. Echoes of "Hello" and "Hi, how are you?" fill the air and many of the young students are thrilled to pieces when I simply respond "Hi." Their friends seem more impressed that I can speak English and respond to me "Wow! pretty good." After my walk I called Bin. She was just getting off work and suggested we meet up. She told me to go to Yeongdeongpo Station and meet her there. Of course I was there in about 10 mins and Bin in about oh say 60 mins. I managed to catch the express train and Bin rightfully figured it would take me longer since it would usually take about 30-40 mins plus add on for lack of experience using the subway. Eventually we met up in front of a Pizza Hut then decided to get some sam gyuep sal, basically grilled pork with lots of little side dishes and some sauces. You grill the onions pork and garlic right in front of you on the table and then wrap everything up into a nice little lettuce or persimon leave package pop it in your mouth as gracefully as possible and chew. Very yummy. After dinner we went down the street and had some beksoju, a traditional Korean wine, with some Kimchi Bokum, wich is stirfried kimchi with pork and steamed tofu on the side. Neither of us were hungry but in many of the more traditional places they force you to buy food with drinks but I'm glad they did because it was the best kimchi bokum I've had yet. Ah yes I forgot to mention Bin also got me a gift as well. She baught me a cool book "The way Koreans talk" that teaches you idioms and and funny phrases that Koreans use to get the point across. Bin and I had a good time but I had to catch the last train home soon enough. I arrived home and flicked throught the channels and found a Korean movie that had just started on MBC movies. The movie was Nabun Namja, a sort of love story set in the backdrop of the darker side of Korea's sex trade. It was moving, shocking, disturbing and upsetting. It was very well made and you don't need to understand Korean to know exactly what is going on in the movie. I'll try and get a copy to send home, it's definitelly worth seeing again. I fell asleep and missed the ending cuz I think I had a wee bit too much soju. The next day I did little but meet up with shawn, julkie and james later on. James is from Britain and works here at the airport in incheon. Shawn stopped by Yeogkok and we weent on to Songnae where he had to pick up his bill of health from the doctors office. His job required that he have a full physical to prove his health and he's gonna make it another day it seems. After we grabbed a pitcher of beer at a chicken restaurant and waited for julie to arrive. We ate anju (complimentary snacks) and drank beer untill Julie arrived then went to the Toona department store to meet James. Once together we went to a great Kalbi (beef) place. Similar idea to the sam gyuep sal but with beef on a wood fired grill that is in the middle of your table, and we were outside. The food was delicious and the company was great. After many bottles of soju we headed of to a norebang (kareoke room.) Being a westerner and born ina country that shuns public displays of bad singing I was a little nervous but Shawn reassured me it was nothing a shot of soju couldn't fix. After my first song I loosened up but realized that I suck at singing and shawn kept getting scores in the mid 90's while I was getting 70's. Next time Shawn...next time... I also forgot to mention that we played one of Koreas great tension tamer games that are on the side of the street. Koreans like to beat the crap out of machines to show how macho they are. I thought this was very silly to start but then realized how fun no addicting it can be. The three of us kicked the crap out of a socker ball and again shawn beat me by 4 points...damn. Later we walked by the same game and these little Korean kids were kicking it harder than all us big western guys. Damn Koreans and thier taekwondo...lol. Made us look silly. Next time. After the three of us were thouroghly drunk julie put us all in cabs and sent us back to our homes. Julie is the designated driver even though we always walking. I guess what I'm trying to say is since she doesn't drink she makes sure we are all safe and happy and that everyone gets home ok. She's a really nice girl and patient to put up with us three drunken monkeys. Thanks Julie! This morning Bin awoke me from my hangover coma at oh sometime just before 9am. It was wierd to hear the phone ring but refreshing as well. I watched a few movies then ended up here at the pc bang. just a few mins ago I heard my name and shawn walked in to the bang. He went over to my room looking for me figuring I would be sleeping, but i was here. I managed to lose my battery from my camera while i was running across the street. It popped ouit of my pocket fell out in the road and i didn't notice. Now I need to go back to Yongsan to buy another if I get in the mood. Thats all for now....

ttyl John

written by shawn matthews    -|link

Korea Life Blog - Good News!


One of the requirements of working at a public school in Korea is the submission of a doctor's examination which includes a physical and blood tests. This, of course, is to ensure you don't have any contagious viruses that you may pass on to the children, which is understandable. However, it seems a little strange to me at this point seeing as I already started teaching the kids almost two weeks ago. Anyway, I received all the results back and I am in good health. My lungs look fine, my urine didn't turn up anything, my blood pressure is normal and I don't have diabetes (not sure why this test was included), hepatitis B or syphilis. Whoo hoo!

written by shawn matthews    -|link

Korea Life Blog - Groceries!


A long time reader, Chris Garson, bought my book and amazingly went on to donate today in appreciation of my blog.

Here's a few things Julie and I picked up with the added funds while we were grocery shopping tonight. Thanks Chris!


We got a huge bag of Poki Kimchi, 4kgs of rice, some eggs, some Ziploc containers (Poopy ruined our other ones), some Australian Camembert cheese which came with 10 clices of fondue cheese for free, a bottle of beer and a can of black olives (Walmart was sold-out of regular olives...all the foreigners around here must be buying them up). Tonight we are going to eat the salami John gave us with some cheeses, mustard and the black olives and a little beer. Yum! I can't wait!

I stopped by yesterday and checked on John at the yeogwan. We were able to find an adapter for his notebook computer. I feel kind of bad for him staying in that yeogwan, but it's not that bad and it is a convenient location anyway. The only real downside in that area is the mosquito trucks that go by and spray that chemical smoke in the air like they used to do in the states years and years ago. I've never seen them do it in any other area in Korea except Yeokgok.

I've been meaning to take my camera with me to the school and get some pictures but my camera is kind of big, and with all the teacher's books and materials I've been bringing home, I haven't wanted to lug the camera along just yet. Today I taught the Thanksgiving theme. It went better than I thought. I had the kids compare and contrast Korean Thanksgiving (Chuseok) with American Thanksgiving.

My assistant was pretty helpful again. She made copies of a big Thanksgiving turkey wearing pilgrims' clothes for the kids to color. And get this, the agency also included a Thanksgiving word search puzzle that ended up taking the older kids over half the period to finish. It was printed off the same site I used to get my puzzles from when I lived in Nowhere-dong.

Tomorrow it will be back to using their books: English Time. It's been the first time I've used this series and I really like it. Thursday I will teach the story books again, then Friday is song/game day. We have several children's' music CDs and a while file full of game ideas. I have so many things to do with the kids and have been really enjoying the job. I wish every teaching job could be so good.



I also received my E-2 visa letter last week and will be going to Japan once again in the near future. I may try to go to Osaka this time rather than Fukuoka. I've been to both cities at least 3-4 times each. There are good things about each city. I can't wait to do some more exploration, practice my Japanese and have some more sushi there! I hope the weather is nice.

I'm not exactly sure when I will be heading off. I have to pay for the trip myself, though they are paying me for the time off. My current visa doesn't expire until mid-October, so I may try to stall until then. The confirmation letter is valid for 90 days. Maybe I can hold off and John and I can go over together. He's looking for a job now.

written by shawn matthews    -|link

Korea Life Blog - John from Boston


One of my long time readers, John, from Boston, arrived on Saturday. We started to chat on messenger one night after one of my posts and basically had kept in contact every day for the past 6 months. We have very similar backgrounds and a lot in common. He had been planning to come here to teach after having visited here for a few weeks before and he finally got here.

He flew from Boston to San Francisco and to Seoul. With the traffic, the layovers, etc., it took him over a full day. Julie and I met him at the airport on Saturday and it was raining hard outside. We brought him back to our place and the bus stopped too close to our building to take a taxi, and we had to carry his bags down the street in the pouring rain. It rained all weekend so he ended up staying with us until this morning. Today I brought him over to that yeogwan in Yeokgok and the ajushi gave him the same deal he gave me, a decent room for a month for only 350,000 won (about $300). See this post. John plans to stay for at least a year and learn Korean and teach English.



The only thing we don't have in common is size. The guy is beefy like Ah-nold.



We were trying to use his nice new Canon digital camera, but obviously we haven't figured out how to use it right yet.



Another shot with his camera. I kind of like this one. That's my foot there. Julie cooked up this mandu snack for us on Sunday afternoon. I made poor John watch Rocky 1, but he genuinely liked it. Everyone should see that movie again (and again and again). He was just as surprised as I was when I re-watched it for the first time.



He showed us some pictures like this one of his last meals before he came to Korea. I miss meatball subs like this. Fortunately, John loves Korean food just as much as me, if not more. He kept buying bags of dried squid from the convenience stores here.



Here are John's expensive bags. I guess thats another difference we have. He's a man of high-class style and I'm absolutely not. He brought a lot of stuff including pillows and a blanket and a nice new IBM laptop and even that huge framed photo someone gave him at the last minute and he was forced to bring here. I feel kind of bad for him staying in that small yeogwan with all of this, but you can't beat that deal. Plus he's right near the subway, which will make it very convenient for him to go out and look for a job.



He asked me what I needed from the states and I had him bring me some necessities such as these two logs of salami and pepperoni. All of us munched on the salami already. Julie just loves it. She's never had it before (except when JongnoGuru gave us some after his trip to California). I wish they had a nice Italian grocery shop somewhere in Korea. By the way, I took this with my camera. Not bad for a Minolta.


In other news: I had a great day at work. I still can't believe what a good job I have. My "secretary" makes me coffee and does all the paper work (calling the parents, writing down my daily lessons for the school, etc.). She even jumps in to give me good ideas while I'm teaching. These ideas are always very helpful, not intrusive. The kids are amazingly well behaved and have taken to the class already. I feel like I'm a real teacher for the first time in ages. This is the first time I've ever enjoyed my job, actually. More on this soon.

written by shawn matthews    -|link