And to think I was just bemoaning the lack of Western Korea-boosting; in the Seattle Times, Lance Dickie goes all Ezra Vogel on us, predicting that the Korean Wave won’t crest anytime soon:
Spending time in South Korea is like hanging out with the cool kids of the coming Asian century.
Get beyond those archived images of the Korean Peninsula — grainy footage of haggard GIs, taut presidential jaws at the DMZ and the chubby visage of North Korea’s Kim Jong Il. Time to notice the Samsung consumer electronics around the house, the Hyundai in the garage, South Korea’s broadband infrastructure and a country with the financial independence and military confidence to resist being told what to do.
The country is full of a dynamic, aggressive energy we in Washington state increasingly experience through growing cultural exports, business links — look at Microsoft’s recent investments — and family ties.
Read the rest on your own.
(Hat tip to Oranckay)
37 Comments
Wow. Maybe this guy has a Korean g/f, too.
If there’s anyone who’s qualified to be the arbiter of cool, it’s a 60-year old geezer.
Next week, rap recommendations from Dick Cheney.
A very rosy portrait of Korea by Mr. Cool himself, Lance Dickie
The “chubby visage” of one of history’s worst genocidal dictators remains to spoil the fun though…and “The standoff at the DMZ feels dusty and irrelevant” only to somebody an ocean away.
There’s no real point to the story–Korea is a happening place because a lot is happening there. Uh, yeah.
That reporter is taking bread from Shelton’s mouth!
Haha, who is this guy? You might have already posted this somewhere else but here’s his May 5th article, “Show a little respect for our steady Korean ally”
http://seattletimes.nwsource.c.....cation=rss
“Quit the Third World treatment of a friend who is fractionally away from satisfying the statistical standards of visa rejections to qualify. U.S.-ROK relations are strained, and this is one annoyance that could be eliminated.
So, Ambassador Vershbow: Please remind us of the name of that body of water to the right of the Korean peninsula.”
Lance DICKie.
Pretty cool illustration though.
…the 26-year-old Henney had me at “Yo”.
‘Nuff said.
I can’t find evidence of Lance Dickie’s long-term commitment to Korean issues, but as a former Seattle resident I am familiar with him as a particularly dunder-headed columnist from the Seattle Times who consistently gets it wrong. This is not surprising. Also, it sure is curious that a flood of Korea-related articles spew forth from Lance’s pen right after he completes the official Korea Inc. indoctrination course.
I can’t wait for his editorial on Dokdo and the Sea of Japan. Oh, hold on — no need to wait!
Interesting that the itinerary of what Brendon perceptively labled the Korea Inc indoctrination course sponsored by the East/West Center at UH corresponded with the US road show put on by ROKGOV to
bamboozlepersuade the US public of Korea’s bona fides re the FTA, the first US stop on which was —- Seattle.From Dickie’s May 5th article:
And yet, despite efforts to stem the tide, Koreans still maintain an inablity to lower the percentage of visa-holders who ‘overstay’ their their visas to an acceptable level, as required in order to obtain a visa waiver - and as other countries are able to do. And what precisely is the link between the volume of trade and the violation of law?
Given his sentiment generally, here’s a stand that Dickie ought to support as well:
One response to America’s friendship and the reality of $70 billion in bilateral trade would be to let Americans own and bear arms in the ROK. Right now, tens of thousands of Americans suffer through an inability to bear arms during relatively short stays in South Korea.
Ok, I’ll fess up, I paid the guy $25 to write that. Everybody happy now?
Seriously, someone slap him and wake him up.
It’s amazing how easy it is to be misled about Korean when you only spend a couple of days here. Six months here and he’d be bemoaning how uncool it is.
Just goes to show how far off the mark the Korean authorities are — who on Earth would pick Seattle as a receptive ground for free-trade arguments?
poor guy’s gonna herniate his mouth.
“Just goes to show how far off the mark the Korean authorities are — who on Earth would pick Seattle as a receptive ground for free-trade arguments?”
Seattle may not a bad place for FTA arguments among the Korean immigrant population there who have very little in common with the rice farmers or film directors back in Korea. Nearly every Korean immigrant I encountered in Seattle was intensely into personal wealth creation, not egalitarian wealth distribution. Just like any other Korean immigrant in the U.S. It’s especially not hard to see why Koreans in Seattle would be pro-capitalism, anti-protectionism considering how many huge success stories live right next door.
Sambek, I think Brendon might have been referrring to the ant-globalization folks that shut down the WTO (or was it G8 meetings) in Seattle couple of years ago…
Yeah I know, but I doubt the same folks would show up on a FTA issue between the US and S.Korea. S.Korea is probably not third-world enough to provoke a huge riot. And I doubt the Korean population in Seattle would cast much negative attention on it either.
ah…is the scumbag expat upset? ahhhhhh…po, po, baby.
‘he’s getting it wrong…’ brendan
well, then, he’d be just like you and your brothers here:
‘korea will never be anything but a third world country!’ whined the expat
‘korea will never be able to build anything like a ship!’ exclaimed the would-be burger flipper
‘korea can’t build cars!’ predicted the redneck
‘korea? an information society? never!’ roared the expat from the trailer park
‘what a stupid fucking idea; nobody going to be interested in korean movies and music!’ marmot
i could go on and on. you can’t acurately predict korean ability, brendan, cause you’re just too full of hatred for your wive’s* people. and btw, you still choose to live in korea, don’t you? do you really believe that someone won’t notice that as you spew your vitriol? it’s a major contradiction.
* i brought up again, marmot.
OUR PRIDE OUR COOL
A couple interesting things about that Korea Inc indoctrination and handjob tour that Brendan links to above:
It’s an all expenses paid 2 weeks in Seoul, Busan, and Kwangju for the American journalists, with the goal of “meeting with government and business leaders, academics, non-governmental organizations and other members of the community” in order to “bridge gaps in understanding.”
As if that weren’t enough, it ends with a free couple days in Hawaii for the participants to “report on their experiences and exchange opinions.” In Hawaii. Free.
Here’s 2005 participant Don Chapman in an “article” he wrote just after he got back, complete with a picture of him doing soju shots with some of his Korean hosts:
It was after being in South Korea for just a week — and more specifically after just a few shots of soju, a goes-down-easy distilled sweet potato liquor, at a seafood restaurant in Busan — that I announced to our hosts: “I love Korea!”
Just the kind of hard-hitting journalism they paid him for.
http://www.midweek.com/content.....uth_korea/
Google Don Chapman Korea and you can find his other advertisements…er…articles.
And then there’s Vanessa Hua, 2005 participant, who wrote this Korean dramas are overtaking the world article shortly after her free vacation:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/.....EDJH11.DTL
It includes this infamous quote, showing that the indocrtination tour got its money worth: “My mom said, ‘Who knew Koreans were so refined and sophisticated?’ ” the UC Berkeley graduate added. “She thought they were copycats of Chinese people.”
She also wrote a completely one-sided love letter to OhMyNews, without a hint of skepticism of the citizen “reporters”:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/.....EPL151.DTL
I’m sure you can find similar drivel from other participants as well…it’s just a matter of googling.
The interesting question is what the Korean journalists who took the US tour came back and wrote for their respective publications. I’ll take a stab and say that they weren’t writing love letters to American culture and posting pictures of themselves drinking Budweiser and proclaiming “I love America!”
Nulji’s English is getting worse.
That’s something worth investigation, but the purpose of the Korean journalists attending is not to acquire any understanding of or affinity for the United States — it’s to help the organizers of the conference impart the “correct” understanding of Korea. Sort of like a VANK World Tour.
Goose shit alert! That’s what you need Marmot, a sort of analogue to 18th MedCom’s Yellow Dust alert.
It shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone whose been in Korea a while to learn that when big advertising-driven publications like Time Magazine meet those with money who crave international attebtion, you’ll get hacks like Bryan Walsh praising/promoting guys like ‘Rain’, ‘Seoul’s Asia-leading ‘Green Revolution’, whatever myth-of-the-day they wish to promote for foreign or local consumption. Local TV stations get in on the act too, which is why we see laughable world cup ads in which all the foreigners run around in bliss, waving Korean flags.
Korea is certainly wiling to buy air time and advertising in the interests of promoting the ‘Korean wave’ and such via Arirang TV, pieces in foreign magazines, you name it.
Pawikirogi:
“ah…is the scumbag expat upset? ahhhhhh…po, po, baby.
‘korea will never be anything but a third world country!’ whined the expat
‘korea will never be able to build anything like a ship!’ exclaimed the would-be burger flipper
‘korea can’t build cars!’ predicted the redneck
‘korea? an information society? never!’ roared the expat from the trailer park
‘what a stupid fucking idea; nobody going to be interested in korean movies and music!’
OUR PRIDE OUR COOL”
That’s great Pawikirogi, but instead of insulting every contributer to this blog and putting words in their mouths why not put aside that cool pride for a moment and seriously ask yourself how much of these ‘great Korean achievements’ would have been (would be) be possible without Western, Japanese and Russian technology, tech transfer agreements, Western-educated researchers, and outright patent infringement. Every item you mentioned was invented or relies on technology invented in the lands of said scumbag expats, rednecks and trailer trash. And don’t slag burger-flippers, at least a lot of them are putting themselves through university or supporting their families. We call it “working for a living”.
It doesn’t help your credibility that you so keenly buy into all that ‘Korean wave’ hype. I know nobody (as in zero people) in the west or Europe who can even name many (if any) Korean movies and in the interests of good taste we won’t delve into K-pop.
As for Brendon still being in Korea, I see you’re still in the USA. Pot. Ketlle. Black.
I wonder what it is about Korea that makes this country unable to attract talent. According to our friend pawikirogi’s thesis, all the foreigners who come to Korea are losers unable to make it in their home country. The unspoken corollary is that this is in contrast to the wildly talented people like pawikirogi who flock to America.
Brendan,
How many wives do you have? (Read Nulji’s comment.)
“Brendon”
Pawikirogi, My contrarian friend, perhaps you should start reading something other than the back of your Lackey Charms box. The Miracle on the Han had help. For instance Hanjin Shipping was made possible with the help of Sealand shipping back in the day. Oh and by the way you enema nozzle, Do you think the Foreign Direct Investment would be at its current state without the existence of U.S. troops on the ROK?
M_kay?
I wonder what it is about Korea that makes this country unable to attract talent.
Probably people like Pawikirogi..
Having spent some time in Singapore, I can see why Singapore is the true “hub” that Seoul will never be. It’s got enough diversity to make a university administrator wet himself.
“South Korean companies have set up shop to meld their technology and capital with cheap, limitless North Korean labor. Planned in three phases, the entire complex will cover 16,000 acres by 2012 and feature hotels and a theme park.”
It’s a good piece, but the part about Kaesong is misleading. Consumers are not offered a less expensive product from Kaesong. The workers are not being treated or paid properly, and the cost of development and production is consumed by the North Korean worker. It’s obvious that South Korea does not barter the price of each item produced.
H&T, You are correct! the Norks are giving the workers 3% of what they should and using the rest to feed the military. Should we be surprised?
Janus, Singapore has done a wonderful job of not shooting the golden goose. What my adopted country has problems with is not killing their neighbors pig.
HIS PRIDE, HIS COOL
Thanks, Pawikirogi. Your comments were hilarious.
You’re basking in the pride that Korea can finally build cars and ships. Welcome to the 19th century! Oh, and “information society” is really so 20th century. You’d think a nation of uncool nerds would be future minded instead of bringning up the rear…
Mizar5, Pawkirogi is among the crowd who believes the U.S. started the Korean war. He is a douche bag.