Something About Having Prejudices

The Korean Herald, an English newspaper in Korea, exposed an organization called "World Class" operating in the country. In it's advertisements, World Class says the group "brings together all nationalities to discuss world issues and break down cultural barriers and prejudices." The advertisement ends with "No Canadians please." When the Korean Herald contacted the organizer of World Class, Bernard Carleton, he said: "The thing is, CANDIANS ARE SCUM! They are self-loving, welfare supporting, over taxing, work ethic hating scum!!! They are not welcome in our group." The article in the Herald ended with this: "Anyone who would like to join the meetings with Carleton in order to break down prejudices, dissolve stereotypes and have an enhanced understanding of people from other countries can contact him at cbicsmd@yahoo.com." I would encourage any Canadian, no matter where they live, to send this guy an email explaining how hypocritical this group is.

Something About Construction

When I first came to Dajeon the place was one big construction area. The city was building it's first subway line and it seemed to be taking forever. It wouldn't had been so bad had the traffic not been snarled because of the construction. Spending over an hour in a cramped bus in 40 degree heat is not my idea of fun. Well, three years after I first arrived in Korea the line is finally complete. Well, most of it. The city opened the first 12 lines last Thursday with the remaining 10 to be opened next Summer. Even still, the stations that are open makes transit much more comfortable. The 900 Won (CD$1.07) fare is much cheaper than the CD$2.50 I would pay for a ride on the Toronto Rocket. Here is a map of line 1. You can also read an article about the opening here.

Something About A "Head's Up"

Something strange happened to me just before Christmas. I received an email from the Royal Bank telling me that something was wrong with my account. They directed me to a website and asked that I confirm my account number and password. In January I got a similar email from Pay Pal. And now, just yesterday, I received yet another similar email from Visa. Here's the thing: I don't have a Visa, Pay Pal or Royal Bank account. I guess this is just a "head's up" to those people who receive similar emails to mine. I would suggest phoning the bank/online service or whatever to ask whether the email was legit or not. On a completely different note: yelling "head's up" to a cat does not mean squat. I opened my freezer door and a piece of frozen chicken fell out, hitting poor Venus on the head. I yelled "head's up!" but she didn't move. Maybe she does only understand Korean.

Something About White Day

Koreans celebrate two special day's of love. The first and most obvious is Valentines Day on February 14. The difference in Korea is that this day is limited to women giving men chocolate, candy etc... . The second is White Day on March 14. This day has the men giving gifts to their significant other. The odd part is that Valentines Day is a much bigger holiday. The Saturday before Valentines day was absolutely crazy with department stores offering a great number of gift ideas. White Day, on the other hand, is a much lesser fan fair. Since White Day is this Tuesday I've had to put long thought and consideration into what to buy for my someone special. Fish flavored chocolate? Tuna covered candies? A catnip-filled teddy bear? After spending great time thinking about the perfect gift I came to a conclusion: I'll have her ovaries removed! It's the gift that will be sure to please both of us. The hard part is keeping it a secret. I'm sure the cat will be out of the bag when I take out her carrying case on Tuesday morning and lug her to the train station. She might think she's going to visit Catticus, but when she sees the knife totting vet I'm sure she will figure it out. Happy White Day, Venus!

Something About Marketing

Over the past few weeks Microsoft has been promoting a new device code named "Origami." When I heard this I thought, "hey, that's a catchy name." Despite the name, nobody really new what the new device was. Microsoft finally unveiled it on Thursday, minus the name. Turns out the device won't be called "Origami" but instead an "Ultra-Mobile PC." Gee, what title sounds more catchy? I think Microsoft should have kept the first nickname. Besides the name, the product doesn't look that great. It's not very "pocket-sized", is pretty pricey ($600-$1,000US), and weighs 2.5 pounds. That doesn't sound very mobile to me. It is enabled with a touch screen and a stylus to maneuver around the screen. Holding this thing with one hand would be a little difficult. Christi Lu Strauss, morning host on CNN International, commented she didn't know how she would carry it around. You can't put it in your pocket and it's bigger than most purses. Not only that, but it's a hand-held device. The machine seems to big and bulky to be holding in your hand. And, for the price, you could buy a cheap laptop instead.

Something About Sa

Living in Korea is sometimes more humorous than interesting. I saw this advertisement while I was in Dajeoen on Saturday. At first glance, it looks like any other banner:

But, on closer observation:

I just had to take a picture. Not only did I want to ask my Korean teacher what it meant, I also thought it was funny that an advertisement would include a picture of a boy peeing on the ground. So far I've been in the presence of 3 children peeing in public (2 boys and 1 girl). The most recent (and the most disgusting) was while I was on the train. The washrooms were occupied, so the father let his son urinate on the steps leading out of the train. Needless to say I chose a new car to stand in. Now, back to the advertisement. I could read "sa sa sa sa", with sa being the Korean word for "4." I could also read the "il" (1) and "ah" (5). The words on the banner were simply the Korean words for the phone number. What I didn't understand was the child urinating. My Korean teacher told me that the word "sa" is sometimes what children call urine. I knew the more common word "ojum" but "sa" was new to me. When you take that into consideration the advertisement is kind of funny.

Something About "Shivers"

As you may or may not know, I have a "Lost" blog. You can click the link on the right side of this blog. What you may also know is that I haven't posted in it for quite some time. I don't want to go so far as to delete it, there just haven't been that many exciting episodes to comment on.

Really, I don't know what is up with this show. The first season was amazing. Never before have I actually had shivers when watching a television show. For example, in the first season when Locke started banging on the lid to the hatch, screaming and yelling, and then all of a sudden a huge beam of light came out of it. That gave me shivers. I could hardly sleep that night. This season has had some shiver episodes but they have been confined to the first 5 episodes. Going into the hatch, meeting Desmond, watching the orientation movie; awesome entertainment. But then, nothing happened! Seriously, the past 8 or so episodes have actually been boring.

Wednesday's episode, however, had me sweating. The apartment could have been on fire and I wouldn't had even noticed. From start to finish, this episode was non-stop action. The shivers came back, with a vengeance! I could hardly sleep that night. Ethan came back, albeit in Claire's flashbacks. That guy just gives me the creeps. I'm glad they killed him off last season. Then, another hatch! If my memory serves me right, that's a total of 3 hatch's on the island (so far). Given that there are only a total of 6 in the world, the possibilities of all 6 being on the island are pretty good. What was strange was that in Claire's flashbacks the hatch was crowded, however when the girls went back to it, the place was deserted and stripped off all supplies. What I thought was interesting was the theater glue and fake beard Kate found in one of the lockers. Nothing happens on this show without a reason. Which brings me back to the previous episode when Sawyer got bitten by the blue tree frog. I still think something is going to happen to him (tree frogs aren't blue!). We get to see many of the "other's" in this episode. Why did they want Claire's baby? Who is this head guy the other's kept talking about? Finally, we get to see Russo's daughter. Until now we knew she had an offspring on the island, but didn't know the sex of it or if it was even alive. Excellent episode, folks. If they keep this up I might just start posting in my Lost blog again.