UPDATE: Please, PLEASE read Oranckay’s take on Lefkowitz’s cold reception–it would seem the special envoy isn’t completely blameless. Attending a street rally criticizing the policies of the host government is probably NOT an appropriate thing to do, regardless of the cause. I’d have been pissed if it was Chung attending a rally in D.C. criticizing [...]
After the U.S. ambassador to South Korea slammed Pyongyang as a "criminal regime" last week, the Hankyoreh Shinmun challenged Washington to "show us the proof." Well, the LA Times goes about trying to do just that with a MUST READ piece on North Korean counterfeiting operations. Fascinating stuff — almost Clancy-esque:
For 15 years, U.S. officials [...]
KBS reports that British songwriter Michael Hoppe, who discovered musicians like ABBA and Vangelis, has recently composed a piano piece entitled "Prayer for Dokdo," reports KBS.
Hoppe said that with the world media bringing attention to the Dokdo/Takeshima dispute/non-dispute, he wanted to write a piece that would bring reconciliation and peace to the much-talked-about (in Korea, [...]
UPI’s Martin Walker makes some interesting observations about the upcoming East Asia Summit:
The United States will not take part in next week’s East Asia summit, but, to paraphrase a former secretary of state’s phrase about the Balkan wars, the Americans most certainly have a dog in this fight.
There is a fight under way at the [...]
The KBO has issued a commemorative stamp to mark the 100th anniversary of the introduction of baseball to Korea.
And the Red Sox still suck.
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Readers of Car Magazine voted the Rodius SUV by Korea’s very own SSangyong Motors the biggest automotive atrocity ever, according to The Sun (UK). Voters said the car was so ugly "it made small children cry." Ouch.
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Some officials from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services have apparently been sent for retraining after asking Koreans applying for U.S. citizenship which side they’d take if Korea and the U.S. were to fight, reported the U.S. edition of the JoongAng Ilbo (and reprinted in Yonhap). Late last month, a Korean man in his 40s named [...]
Catch Bruce Cumings’ critique of Bradley Martin’s Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader: North Korea and the Kim Dynasty and Jasper Becker’s Rogue Regime: Kim Jong Il and the Looming Threat of North Korea in the London Review of Books before it goes to archive. Pretty much what you’d expect out of Cumings, [...]
Wrap your heads around this:
While the [Seoul Summit: Promoting Human Rights in North Korea] conference commenced with a welcoming dinner at Shilla Hotel in downtown Seoul, about 20 progressive civic and religious groups denounced the forum in an adjacent part of the city, raising questions over the "hidden political motives" of the forum.
The groups claimed [...]
The NYT is reporting what readers of this blog have known for a while–South Korea bans games that depict North Korea in a less-than-positive light:
While American game designers see North Koreans as diabolical enemies, South Korean game censors say they see North Koreans as wayward cousins. Unhappy that North Koreans are replacing Nazis and cold [...]
The "cyber-diplomacy" group VANK has now set its sites on world software companies producing games that contain what it views as distorted or mistaken information about Korea, according to the Segye Ilbo (Korean). Among the games it has taken exception with:
Risk (U.S.): Yes, they’re nonplussed that this Hasbro classic has made Korea part of Mongolia [...]
You know, Jang Jin-yeong looks good with her hair like that.
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Comedian and "3rd-rate writer" Kim Yong is pissed, and he wants his movie back. Kim held a one-man demonstration in front of the U.S. embassy (surprise, surprise) yesterday claiming Universal Pictures ripped off the idea for the film "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" from a scenario he wrote.
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Unlike Brian, I’m not so picky as to seek out the "real deal," but that doesn’t make these Italian calendars (NOT work safe) any less pleasing to the eye.
And kudos to Jeff for this truly astute observation:
You know you have been in Korea too long when women of your own race begin to look unusual [...]
Gyeonggi Province and China’s Guangdong Province have gotten together to build a traditional Chinese garden in Suwon’s Hyohaeng Park as part of an exchange agreement between the two sister regions. Just judging from the photo, it seems worth a visit after it opens to the general public later this month.
Meanwhile, in the Chinese city of [...]
Travel money never goes quite as far as you expect it, does it? Well, according to Kuki News, two Korean women (ages 33 and 27) were traveling around Queensland, Australia when their cash reserve ran dry. What to do in such a situation? Well, if you’re the two women in question, you run an advertisement [...]
Unregulated hunting has placed Mongolia’s Siberian marmots in grave peril:
If the good news in Mongolia is the gradual comeback of the Przewalski wild horses, the disturbing news is the diminishing numbers of other wildlife, under relentless siege by overhunting and excessive trade in skins and other animal products.
A new study of wildlife, one of the [...]
Coming home from work today, I spotted not one, but two seemingly new Honda Accords on the road. Now, I can certainly understand how men of means might be willing to shell out the won for a quality imported luxury car like BMW or Lexus. But a Honda Accord? I mean, if all things were [...]
It has come to my attention (via my Site Meter) than the Marmot’s Hole is a finalist in the Best Asian Blog category of Wizbang’s annual Weblog Awards. I’m quite honored, although how this blog became a finalist, I have no clue, because as far as I could tell, it wasn’t even nominated. And frankly, [...]
Got back last night from Beijing. Thanks go out to Andy for posting some good material while I was gone, and my commenters for keeping things civil, porn and donuts aside.
OK, and for more big, red buildings than you can shake a stick at it, I give you my photos:
Tiananmen Gate, Uncle [...]
