Skip to main content

What if...

According to both English language papers in Korea: 2 of 3 Men Feel Urge to Flee From Home.

A poll by online recruiter Career said 66 percent of working men in their 30s
and older have felt the urge to flee from their homes and escape today's reality
in the past year due to suffocating economic difficulties. Forty-something men
turned out to have the strongest desire to run away with more than 72 percent of
them saying they wanted to take off, while men in their 30s followed next with
64 percent.

1) What percentage are actually leaving?
2) The survey I want to see is: what percent of their wives would like to see them leave.

* * *


What if....Jon Huer actually made a point?

Regular Korea Times contributor Jon Huer has some haters. I don't count myself among them yet. In the three weeks I have been reading his columns I find myself wondering why (1) he bothered to write (2) I bothered to read.

Writers typically write to motivate readers, to inform them, or to get them to change the way they think. Huer says a lot, but not concisely. The musings don't get to a significant point. He does address many points, but in the way a salesman may approach the door of a potential client and talk without actually knocking on the door.

Today, he writes a "what-if" column about the arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates. I'm not saying an opinion writer should always avoid asking "what-if" questions, but I will say that it is the journalistic equivalent of taking a survey and then reporting on the survey as if it were major news. What-ifing when there is an actual case to be addressed is for children and intellectuals.

* * *

Kim Seong-kon of Seoul National University opines that Korea's public education system has failed.

He quotes and notes:

* public school teachers say they can't control their students.
* private institute teachers are much more responsive, even calling when a child is late or absent for class.
* Koreans are beginning do ask: "Why do we need school when hagwon [private institutes] can do a better job?"

1) This should be another bloom off the rose when it comes to those who hail the success of public education in South Korea.
2) In America, it is said to be a right-wing conspiracy or an attempt to keep people stupid by questioning if public education has failed.

Kim concludes: "Such questioning shows that our public education system has largely failed and been utterly defeated by the more competent hagwon. Our secondary schools, which have degenerated into a battlefield for the college entrance exam and ideological warzone between radical and conservative teachers, are insolvent enterprises that need radical overhauling and restructuring in order to survive.

"Although Obama recently praised Koreans' unusual zeal for education, it is undeniable that our public education system is plagued by chronic problems. Hagwon thrive because people no longer trust public education. But the fever for hagwon is not normal. Hagwon entail many serious problems as their primary purpose is monetary profit, not education. We need to resuscitate our moribund public education system that has gone in the wrong direction for far too long.

* * *

75 ways to make your life better

The papers could have done a public service by actually listing the 75 ways.

* * *

I didn't grow up on a farm so one thing it takes some time getting used to in Korea is seeing the actual bodies of the various food I eat. Here's a photo from a "Buy Korean Food" event in Seoul yesterday.

In a related story, foreign travelers have fewer opportunities to eat Korean food at luxury hotels. Of course, the next complaint would be that foreign travelers skip Korea because they must eat Korean food at luxury hotels.

I guess not every hotel can be the COEX hotel. I went there a week or two ago, they had four menu options at 50,000 won each: Chinese, Korean, Japanese, and...Indian?

CJL

Popular posts from this blog

Open door to N. Koreans (Korea Times, January 16, 2013) by Casey Lartigue, Jr.

Open door to N. Koreans By Casey Lartigue, Jr. Last Dec. 12, I fired off an opinion piece of about 1,500 words to the Washington Post. It easily could have been 1,600 words, but I deleted all of the curse words. The day before, I had learned that the United States government had rejected visa applications by three of the students at the Mulmangcho School for North Korean refugee adolescents. Mulmangcho (meaning, ``forget-me-not”) is a small alternative school located in Yeoju, more than an hour south of Seoul. It opened last September with 11 former North Korean children who are orphans or are disadvantaged in some other way. It was founded by former national assembly member Park Sun-young and a distinguished board of directors. Why were the youngsters rejected? The explanation I got: 1) The U.S. government is concerned that they might not return to South Korea and 2) there was a question about their refugee status because they didn’t have pr...

Park Chung-hee: Dictator or benevolent autocrat? (The Korea Herald, July 20, 2011)

The Korea Herald published my analysis of Willam Easterly's paper "Benevolent Autocrats." Check it out at the CFE Website . Easterly questions if "benevolent autocrats" really deserve credit for high economic growth. The Idiots' Collective calls it "a must-read" piece. I agree. [Casey Lartigue, Jr.] Park Chung-hee: Dictator or benevolent autocrat? It ain’t necessarily so. That’s what New York University economics professor William Easterly essentially says about crediting “benevolent autocrats” like South Korea’s Park Chung-hee for high growth rates. In “Benevolent Autocrats,” a provocative working paper posted in May, Easterly 1) argues that economists should be skeptical of the “benevolent autocrat” theory; (2) questions whether benevolent autocrats truly deserve credit for growth; (3) and concedes he is making a losing argument because cognitive biases lead many to believe in benevolent autocrats regardless...

2014-02-14 Yeon-Mi Park`s debut

Yeonmi Park, February 14, 2014, making her debut! Yesterday I was one of the speakers at a special session on North Korean refugees at the Canadian Maple International School. Wow, it was a wonderful time! * Yeon-Mi Park delivered her first major speech in English. She was wonderful! She told her story (35 minute speech without notes), discussed different aspects of North Korea, and then handled questions from students for more than an hour. She did seem to be nervous at the beginning-she took a deep breath just as she started, looked at me, then told her story from her heart. * Returning from the speech, I told Yeonmi that she had star potential. She told me that she didn't believe it, but I told her that the way she handled Q&A and told her story, I would be lucky to have her still returning my phone calls within a year. * The students had many questions. They have been learning about North Korea. They are now reading "Escape from Camp 14" featuring Shin Dong-h...

2015-04-25 First-time TNKR speaker

  When I hear people say that South Koreans don't care about North Koreans, I have three main responses. 1) North Koreans are one of many groups that South Koreans don't care about. 2) The ones who do care, care a lot! Let's focus on getting them more involved rather focusing on the ones not involved. 3) It may just be that those of us engaged in activism for NK refugees need to try different methods rather than dismissing or denouncing others for not getting involved... http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2015/01/626_155820.html Last night, Saturday April 25, 2015, I met with two South Koreans to help a North Korean refugee get ready for her first public speech. Thanks so much, TNKR co-director Lee Eunkoo and TNKR coach Clare JH Yun! It will be a challenge, will be this particular speaker's first speech in English. She is also a newcomer to English. But her determination, wow! She is studying with a few coaches in the Teach North Korean Refugees project. I wish...

복날

Tomorrow is 복날 ( bok nal ). It seems to mean that it is start of the dog days of summer. So we'll be eating 삼계탕 ( sam gye tang, which is chicken broth with ginseng) to celebrate the day before the rest of Korea does so. Update #1 : You must literally rip the chicken apart with chopsticks and a spoon. It helps to wear a bib so it won't get on your clothes. The food is cooked after you order it or call ahead with reservations . Update #2 : It is pronounced by me as bok nal , but when I say it Koreans around me don't understand until I pronounce it as " bok nallllllll ." This is a common problem with the little Korean that I can say. I'll say it, Koreans will say I speak Korean well, then ask each other in Korean, "What did he say?" Update #3 : James explains that I am probably pronouncing bok nal incorrectly. Instead, it is probably better to pronounce it "bong nahl ." I have the feeling I still won't be understood unless I say ...