Still not muddy in Seoul

I can't believe I skipped this! I was invited to attend--or participate--in the Boryeong Mud Festival. I declined, preferring to stay clean in Seoul for the weekend. I may make the news one day while I'm in Seoul, but I guess this is not what I want to be known for...

The festival runs through July 19 so you still have time to hustle to the event...

I had a relatively quiet weekend, I guess the heavy rain slowed things down. Yesterday I participated in a language exchange group with about 30 people (2 Americans, 1 Chinese, 1 German, about 20 to 25 Koreans). After about 2+ hours, we had dinner, then went drinking for a few hours at a place called 70s Radio. It appeared to be all Beatles, I guess they put on the Best of the Beatles with subtitles in Spanish.

The Long Island Iced Tea was stronger than any I've ever had. I had wanted to try Cherry Soju or Lemon Soju but they didn't sell it there. 8,000 won or about 6 dollars for the Long Island Iced Tea.

I'm not wondering over here!!!

The Korea Times ran a piece from Dan Walters of the Sacramento Bee wondering about whether or not Californians are getting paid too much.

I'm not wondering over here! The tax rate in Korea is 3.3%. No sales tax. No tipping.

Koreans Curious about Secret Behind Jewish Education

Listening to Jewish friends talk over the years, they are also curious...

Anyway, there's an article in today's Korea Times featuring the Israeli ambassador to Korea pontificating about why Jews are so great at education.

The most noteworthy items:

"Children are taught to challenge everything, not to take things for granted,'' he said when it comes to education."

"A strict teacher is a bad teacher and a shy student is a bad student,'' which means teachers should not dictate to students, and students should not be shy about making mistakes and asking questions.

East meets West, on an exotic island

There's at least one way Korea reminds me of back home: organizations holding events in really nice places. The Korea Federation of Small and Medium Business on Jeju Island held a forum over the weekend on Jeju Island (which Koreans call the Hawaii of Korea). There's nothing like solving the world's problems after you've been sipping pina colada on the beach the day before.

Ohmae Kenichi gave out some tough love to Koreans and Americans at the event, suggesting that Korea and the U.S. are in for rough times, that Korean companies should focus on their core businesses rather than expanding into other sectors, that the rest of the world should stop relying on the U.S.

They almost got away with it!!!

My favorite section of the Washington Post has always been the Metro section. It is that slice of life not quite worthy of being front page news, but too hilarious to be left out of the paper.

In the Korean equivalent, the National page, we learn that two Korean "businessmen" attempted to buy a company with two forged checks. Checks forged in the amount of about $20 million.

According to the Korea Times: "The two, identified as Kim and Park, both 45, met when they were in prison in May and agreed to 'a big project.'"

Trying to pass a $20 million check is certainly a big project. But why didn't they just try to buy Seoul instead? A $20 trillion check might have at least gotten them in the door to talk with the mayor...

The funny part of the story...they almost got away with it!

According to the article: "They approached another man who was interested in taking over the target company and agreed to jointly invest in it. Providing the deposit certificates as collateral, they succeeded in signing a contract to buy management control of an unidentified Kosdaq firm for 16 billion won. However, at the last minute, the joint investor became suspicious during the process of confirming the validity and asked a legal documentation handling firm to verify the authenticity of the checks."

CJL

Park Jin welcoming remarks to FSI (and Casey Lartigue)

National Assembly member Park Jin makes the welcoming remarks at FSI's conference featuring North Korean diplomats. Park Jin | Greeting message to FSI and Casey Lartigue mention - YouTube

Does a flower turn to the sun?

I tend not to address points raised by people commenting on posts. In the back-and-forth of such discussions, people sometimes say things they don't mean or take extreme positions. In other cases they are just trying to be provocative, especially when they can remain anonymous. But a discussion on Greg Mankiw's blog caught my attention. That's because a couple of the folks suggested that parents don't really have the knowledge to make decisions about the quality of schools. Between 2002-2004 I was actively involved in the fight to get school vouchers for families in DC. I often heard the argument that parents don't know how to choose between good and bad schools and that, anyway, parents had enough choices with the school system's "out-of-boundary" options and charters (that had also been opposed). Without getting too deep into the out-of-boundary program, I'll point out that Woodrow Wilson HS, considered one of the best schools in the city, recei...

2018-09-28 Not everyone at KFC cooks chickens

Most of the people who contact us at TNKR naturally want to tutor North Korean refugees. Many potential volunteers are shocked shocked shock ed to learn that they can volunteer with TNKR in other ways. I tell many of them: "Not everyone at KFC cooks chickens. There are also delivery people, accountants, marketers, personnel, and a host of other positions." Earlier this year, we began developing the TNKR Volunteer Leadership Academy. I'm still waiting for someone to take over that little project. Until then, I will continue with developing it. And be developing it, I mean telling people, "Don't write me a long business plan about what you would like to do. Just start doing it, keep me updated and in the conversations, then let's talk and update." We have had a recent influx of volunteers who want to help TNKR in other ways. Jackie Cole is now running our Instagram. She constantly surprises me with the flyers and videos she posts. I made it clear from the ...

Common Sense on North Korea (Korea Times, April 2, 2012)

By Casey Lartigue, Jr. As interesting as Kookmin University professor Andrei Lankov’s writings are, there is nothing quite like attending one of his lectures. He can barely restrain himself behind the podium, often pointing and waving his arms. I also enjoy his unscripted speeches, but his answers in Q&A sessions are like the difference between watching Michael Jordan shoot baskets in warm-ups and an actual game. I have finally discovered the secret behind Lankov’s consistently solid analysis about North Korea: Use common sense. At an Asan Institute conference last summer, he argued that North Korea watchers should try to understand North Korea from its perspective. Don’t most people know that you must understand the mindset of others you are dealing with? Yet, common sense in theory gets ignored politically. From the North Korean perspective, nuclear weapons are the best thing they’ve got going. They will NOT give them up easily, even if President Obama ...

Random scenes in Seoul

Yesterday morning I stopped by to buy some kimbab 김밥 at one of the places that sells rolls for 1,000 won (about $.80, depending on how much the Korean or U.S. government have screwed up their respective currencies). I stop by there often so of course the woman there recognizes me. Of course, they probably recognized me from the first time I went there... Yesterday, she asked in Korean if I liked tan mu gi 단무지. I said yes, that I loved it. As I was trying to pay, she hurriedly cut some up right then, then fed it to me, like I was a 6 year old child... I could see everyone in the shop watching... then, I said, "맛있어요!" delicious! I could see everyone smiling. I'm surprised they didn't start applauding. * * * Friendly fights Saw a funny fight the other day. Two guys in a restaurant were wrestling with each other, knocking over at least one table. I watched, not really interested in getting involved. They could be two friends fighting over a woman or for some other reason,...

The Casey Lartigue Show!

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