This is probably more productive than sticking a knife in your gut. Or at least less destructive. But not by much:
On Tuesday morning at Hangang River Park in Seoul’s Yeouido, beekeeper Ahn Sang-gyu does a “bee attack” performance by covering himself with about 180,000 bees and jumping from a 60cm podium onto the red circle of the Japanese flag (Yonhap)
Now see how it’s done:
Remember, children—don’t try this at home.
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Is the last photo supposed to be a gag? It looks as if he exploded into a swarm of bees on impact.
The Dokdo Riders don’t look so stupid now, do they?
Yes, this was a fantastic idea of a publicity stunt. Now, nobody will believe that South Koreans are xenophobic, racist, backward and isolated by having desecrated the Japanese flag yet again. Geez. What happened to making fun of Canadians?
All of these public temper tantrums against Japan must be pretty ‘impressive’ to any outsiders looking at Korea.
Bees are good, but how about ants? They’re really scary sometimes, you know. Or spiders, or worms – some people get freaked out by worms. I guess they could just check with Joe Rogan.
Yep, when you live in South Korea, blogs do write themselves sometimes.
The best antidote for this kind of behavior would be for every TV station in the world to show this on prime time, with the reporters in tears from laughing their @ss off. Then, the local media here could complain how the hub’s “image” took yet another beating.
This is the Korean media’s equivalent to the American media’s hiring of retired general’s for their analysis of Iraq.
The beeman will send his bees to protect the magic Isles!
i like to think that these sorts of things are high performance art. like, this guy is not being nuts, he’s making fun of nuts people while at the same time sort of being one. someone with an MFA could do a better job of running through all thte different levels of meaning, but i think we should all of us at least admit that multiple levels of meaning exist.
like, the word for honey in korean sounds like the english word for a type of monster.
We are now entering the theater of the absurd. To all you nationalistic nutters: Thanks for keeping this place unboring!
CLASSIC! The guy reminds me of Spider-man’s enemy, “Swarm”.
He was made of bees.
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.spiderfan.org/comics/images3/spiderman_spectacular/036.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.spiderfan.org/comics/reviews/spiderman_spectacular/036.html&h=110&w=71&sz=4&tbnid=A5_RIOVmYpxWRM:&tbnh=80&tbnw=51&hl=ko&start=5&prev=/images?q=swarm+spiderman&svnum=10&hl=ko&lr=&rls=DVXA,DVXA:2005-38,DVXA:en
(Sorry, don’t know how to link)
1. Has anyone checked with the ASPCA?
2. Thanks for clarifying that it was bees. When I first looked at the picture I thought this knucklehead had taken a shit bath and was fixing to unleash a shit storm. Wait, maybe I shouldn’t give anyone any ideas …
My days of not taking these guys seriously are certainly coming to a middle.
This is no less absurd than Roh declaring “diplomatic war” over the little rocks–in fact, the bee man gets more points for originality.
This is the Korean media’s equivalent to the American media’s hiring of retired general’s for their analysis of Iraq.Oh my word, I choked with laughter to read such!
This incident did make it into the BBC: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4964512.stm
I like my honey without tasteless politics . . .
What’s the Japanese media coverage of this like? This beekeeper’s stunt is even funnier than the Tokyo flag muncher.
His fingers are all there, aren’t they? His left hand looks awfully red.
“His fingers are all there, aren’t they? His left hand looks awfully red.”
Maybe he wanted to cover all bases in this protest. Cut up hand (maybe he didnt cut off any fingers, but the blood adds to the effect) and jump on a Japanese flag in a swarm of bees. What’s next? Lighting himself on fire? Cutting off his own head?
Cutting off his own head? Like with a sword? That would be some trick.
I have to admit, this is kind of impressive, although I have to wonder about the motivations of the individuals who do this sort of thing. Are they really trying to make a real statement, or just being plain old media whores in a new and interesting way? Today, he’s jumping onto a Japanese flag with a swarm of bees on him, tomorrow he’s spending a week covered in bees, allowing them to feed him with their sweet, sweet nectar. Hell, I bet if he did that, some American network would pay him a truckload of money and give him his own special, like the Uberwhore of all media, David Blaine.
The bee man made the 5/2 Daily Show “moment of zen”.
McSnack,
if you watch the video linked at lost nomad, you can see the bee man cut himself with what looks like a utility knife. he never tries to remove a finger, just get enough blood to “sign” his poster.
the video is really worth watching, because you can hear all the reporters laughing just before the guy jumps onto the flag, followed by some polite clapping once he lands. it sounds like there were no more than five people there watching.
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