Where the sun doesn't shine

My Korean-English phone dictionary often makes me chuckle, with humorous definitions or odd word choices.

It makes me wonder who wrote the examples, and whether they knew exactly what they were doing when they wrote them.

Here are two excellent entries that I stumbled upon recently. I'm still trying to find a good way to work them into my daily routines.

1. 지우다 (ji-oo-da): have a miscarriage; have an abortion; commit feticide; cause [induce] abortion.

그녀는 그의 아이를 가졌으나 지웠다 She received the dear pledge of his love, but she had it aborted.

2. 항문 (hang-moon): the anus; the back passage; the fundament. where the sun doesn't shine.

(I can't even begin to describe why I was looking this up.)

I think the lesson here is this: If you want to avoid an abortion, you should only receive the dear pledge of someone's love where the sun doesn't shine.

In Support of Public Intoxication

Drinking is a big part of Korean culture - that's not news. Drinking is heavily encouraged almost everywhere. 

Public intoxication is not a crime here (or if it is, it is never enforced). It's not uncommon to see grown men passed out in parks or on the sidewalk. Hiking groups carry soju and beer with them on the hike to drink along the way. Beer is sold on trains and in bus stations for the ride.

Perhaps one of the most transparent endorsements of public drinking is the attitudes of convenience store owners. They keep corkscrews and bottle openers behind the counter, so you don't have to wait until you get home to enjoy your adult beverage. You can drink it on your way out the door.

Mudfest T-shirt

Tired of shitty Korean festival T-shirts?

Get a Mudfest Shirt. 

Korean Flight Attendants

In the US back in the mid-20th century, and up into the 90's, flight attendants possessed a certain mystique. Airlines flaunted their stewardesses like bikini models, bringing sex appeal into the air in a way that would change airline travel forever. Well, until the 2000's, anyway, when some airlines (*cough* Delta *cough*) started hiring average-looking people (and men) to vend microwave meals along their aisles. American flight attendants have lost the allure they once possessed.

In Korea,  however, where discrimination based on appearance is smiled upon, the attraction is still alive and well. Young Korean girls dream of growing tall enough and pretty enough to fly the skies with Korean Air. Their beauty, grace, and impeccable grooming is internationally renowned, as it is for many Asian carriers. 

Several universities in Korea actually offer a "flight attendant" major, where (girl only!) students can practice their manners, dress and geography skills to perfection.

At Uiduk university, the freshmen are required to stand by the front entrance at times, in their standard student uniforms, to greet every car and/or pedestrian that enters the campus.

Mud Festival: Keep your Shirt On

I went out to Boryeong over the weekend with a couple of friends to make arrangements for the Boryeong Mud Festival trip in July. 

Along the beach the city council had posted entries in a photo contest from last year's mud festival. There were probably three dozen photos in total, and all of them were quite good. Most focused on foreigners enjoying themselves in the mud.

One of the pictures, though, was a bit surprising.

The actual photo isn't blurred

My friend Justin and I, discussing opinions on the presence of the photo along the beach, felt shock and a bit of mild outrage, but couldn't decide who was causing it - the girl who posed so carelessly for a professional photographer, or the photographer who entered it into a contest.

Justin brought up the issue of privacy, which is always heavily guarded in Korean society. If this were a picture of a Korean girl it would NEVER get posted. This is true. Koreans tend to think of foreigners as a funny sideshow, without rights or feelings of our own.

But then again, Korean girls don't flash strangers.

It's not surprising that girls do this at mudfest. Some girls get drunk and like to flash people. Big deal. If you want to take a picture of some poor drunk girl's breasts and keep it for your own personal records, that's fine by me (and apparently her). 

I don't know if the photographer had the girl's permission to share the photo. But to post it along the beachfront in a photo contest is in extremely poor taste.

Soccer Tennis - 족구

I used to go to a lot of pretty intense soccer camps when I was younger. During breaks we would pass time by inventing new games with a soccer ball, from juggling competitions to obstacle courses. A common favorite was soccer tennis, played two-a-side on a regular tennis court.

Sepak takraw in Myanmar

I was somewhat familiar with sepak takraw, the SE Asian sport played with a small wicker ball over a volleyball net.

But I never considered soccer tennis more than a distraction during times when we weren't actually playing soccer.

It turns out that it's a real sport all on its own.

On a sunny day you will find a group of old-ish men playing the game leisurely (though the games often get quite heated) in many parks around Korea. But it's not just old people who play. Koreans take soccer tennis (called "jok-gu" [족구] in Korean) very seriously.

Last weekend my soccer team was booked on a pitch next to a 족구 tournament, where teams of four uniformed players squared off against each other on a series of lined turf courts. Each team had a coach, and each match had three referees officiating. Some of the teams were amazing to watch, with flying kicks and spins and smash winners every other play.

I never knew it was such a serious sport. And not only in Korea, either. Apparently the origins of the global sport date back to as early as the 1920's. I feel like I completely missed the boat on this one.

http://www.soccertennis.org/

Energy Conservation - in English only, please!

If you care about the environment, then let's hope you speak English! Or maybe POSTECH is just trying to keep foreigners off the road, under the guise of being green...?

BURMA: Faces

Some faces of the people (and other creatures) I encountered on my travels through Myanmar in February 2011.

Driving in Korea: Traffic Cameras

One of the worst things about driving in the US is the paranoia. It often seems that the main duty of police departments in many states is to trap and ticket errant speeders - on the highway, in the city, or on a dirt road behind your house. No matter where you go, a cop has the jurisdiction to pull you over and give you a ticket. They lie in wait - in hiding - for HOURS, as if speeding were the nation's biggest crime problem. (It's obviously not, and everyone knows that it's how police departments get paid. In a budget crunch there are suddenly more fast drivers on the road!)

Speeding is not a problem. It seems much more dangerous for speeding drivers to be constantly distracted, worried that every shadow and light flash on the road is their next ticket, braking and speeding and changing gears and lanes, always attempting to outsmart or outspeed the law.

Korean cops don't really bother with traffic violations, at least on the scale that their American counterparts do. The police officers that are on patrol serve more as a reminder that they're around than a threat of any particular action. Though I've heard it's possible, I have NEVER seen a Korean cop in hiding, trying to catch an unsuspecting traffic violator. Police cars here literally do not turn off their red-and-whites. Ever. It's as if they are actually trying to PREVENT crime - imagine that! - drawing attention to their presence instead of slinking around in shadows and trying to catch you red-handed.

Perhaps this is material for another post. I'm slightly off-topic here.

Cameras have replaced cops in Korea as the babysitters of the roadway. Speeding is controlled almost exclusively by CCTV. Cameras with radar guns are mounted above the street at varying intervals to take pictures of speeding violators as they pass. Tickets are mailed to the driver.

Korea doesn't even try to hide the cameras - not only are they out in plain site, there are street signs WARNING you of their presence ("Police Enforcement CCTV in 200m"). GPS units - a staple in virtually every Korean car nowadays - warn you when they are approaching and tell you when to slow down.

[If you're speeding, the GPS flashes red and beeps to warn you that a camera is approaching - the red exclamation point in the video - and stops once you pass under it.]

Though this kind of enforcement might never fly in the US (*sob* violation of privacy!), it works for Korea. It's a pain in the ass to keep speeding up and slowing down every few kilometers, so drivers tend to maintain a consistent pace. It actually makes the police force seem like they're trying to solve a dangerous situation, instead of using a dangerous situation purely as a money-making scheme.

Burma: Shwedagon & Kyaitikyo (Video)

I took a bunch of video footage when I was in Burma but had trouble making heads or tails of it after coming back. It was too random.

This is my first shallow attempt.