Archive for January, 2010
Authors Note: The following is the first of a three-part entry on abortion issues in Korea Followers of the website know about the mad, yet all too recent, Korean practice of aborting fetuses because they were female. The trend ended just a few years ago when people finally realized how destructive this was to the commonwealth [ READ MORE ]
I can’t claim to have uncovered this for the purpose of the blog, but I believe this urban myth deserves some mention on the site. Traveling home from Tesco on Wednesday (yeah, Brits and Irish, you read that right), Stuart mentioned something called “fan death” in Korea. It wasn’t anything do with the Canadian-based band, [ READ MORE ]
If in doubt of what Coca Cola or Pepsi can do, take a cloth and clean off the windshield of your car, and also try the engine in a spot! If it can clean all that grime off think of what it does not only to your teeth, but your stomach. Yes, Coke and Pepsi [ READ MORE ]
Everybody gets a shit-needle. So will you if you come to Korea. And if you’re here you’ve already had one or more. To say that you haven’t would either be a lie or an indication you’re teaching children older than six years old. Me? Hell, I’ve had more than ten. And counting. The reason for this is a [ READ MORE ]
I learned a rather surprising thing the other day. As I was sitting in a restaurant eating some galbi tang (beef soup), a TV news story came on about an odd demographic trend occurring in Korea among children ages 5-11: there are way more boys than girls. This is something I hadn’t really noticed, but since [ READ MORE ]
After reading Andrew’s incredibly thoughtful post about not paying his heating bill I was inspired to come up with some examples of things you would never do at home, but would (or could) do in Korea. I would encourage readers who have been to, or currently live in Korea to share some of their own [ READ MORE ]
Principal Skinner once remarked to Superintendent Chalmers that the Northern Lights were visible from his kitchen in the middle of the day. Skinner’s tale was a long one, but I can confidently declare that mine is not; I write this blog entry from the comfortable surrounds of the French Riviera – only that it has [ READ MORE ]
Planning on visiting a GP or hospital in Korea? Oh, well, let me tell you, it’s a lot of fun! If you are not accompanied by a native speaker, then this is one of life’s great, but untold, enigmas. The reason being that even highly educated professionals in Korea, like doctors, may not speak English. [ READ MORE ]
When you meet a Korean it’s one of the first things they will ask — how old are you? Obviously, in any other part of the world I’d be inclined to say I’m 24 years old (as per my number of years actually alive). But you, my faithful readers, now realize that this can’t be [ READ MORE ]
OK, so this is probably not exclusive to Korea, but it was funny nevertheless and I felt it warranted a small entry on the website. I was teaching my seven-year-old class today about goods they can purchase in a supermarket or convenience store. Before long, it was clear they knew what is for sale in any [ READ MORE ]