Comments on: What Is a Kyopo (Gyopo)?

By: Hugh

Hugh — Fri, 03 Nov 2006 05:39:53 +0000

A kyopo is another fellow from home whom you think of as Canadian as you, and with whom you have worked with and got along fine for a few months. Then, at some random moment usually involving his having consumed a number of drinks, the anguished memory of a time when a little white boy kicked him in the knee in Grade 2 or tried to date his sister in grade 10, or WHATTHEFUCKEVER, surfaces with great angst and dramatics, and gets you cursed out as “you Canadians blah blah blah” and general ranting about something or other “you will never understand” because of your irredimable whiteness, about the fact that you have a Korean girlfriend and he..well, he has one too, but he’d prefer it if you didn’t.

Then a week later he cusses out Koreans over something - “These goddamn people, arghh!”

Several incidents like this later, you learn to keep a friendly small on your face, your back to the wall, and your schedule “too busy to meet ya, sorry” around Kyopo’s. Emotional time bombs, I call em.

By: dogbertt

dogbertt — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 00:43:07 +0000

kyopo
kyopis
kyopit
kyopimus
kyopitis
kyopunt

By: Mark

Mark — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 10:02:24 +0000

Good catch, hardyandtiny. Forgot that one.

By: seouldout

seouldout — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 06:29:05 +0000

If they still use uri nara for Korea they’ve said they’re not American.

By: Paul H.

Paul H. — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 05:58:19 +0000

Jim Lehrer News Hour this evening (31 October) here in CONUS had a story on Korean Americans’ reactions to NorK nuclear test. Most older generation, anti-Communist and disillusioned with sunshine, though there was a couple of “1.5″ academic types who expressed that it was not the big threat as hyped in stateside media.

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/in.....orthkorea/, link says it has a “Realaudio / MP3″, not sure if this means just audio or video/audio, I’m not an ipod/mp3 person.
Pbs.org also has an interview from the same Lehrer broadcast with Nicholas Burns, US undersecretary of state, ref supposed NorK readiness to return to 6 party, available in written transcript.

By: hardyandtiny

hardyandtiny — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 05:02:43 +0000

Mark, and you must change in and out of uniform in the office.

By: Mark

Mark — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 02:01:23 +0000

To be a gyopo in USFK, you must have at least 2 girlfriends in the States and 2 in Korea; you must drive a foreign car; you must party at least 3 nights out of the week; you must live in a luxury apartment; you must not work.

By: SomeguyinKorea

SomeguyinKorea — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 01:05:44 +0000

Well, bluejives has a point. There are too many personal nuances to group all Korean-Americans in the same pot. But, some similarities naturally exist, mainly linguistic ones. It’s to be expected. After all, language is a product of social, cultural, and historical influences. Not to say that shared socio-linguistic factors between immigrant and non-immigrant members of other ethnic groups do not exist, but research suggests that Korean and Korean-Americans, regardless of whether their first language is English or Korean, possess common socio-linguistic traits. I recommend that you read, “Negotiating conflict within the constraints of social hierarchies in Korean American discourse” (Agnes Kang, 2003).

By: R. Elgin

R. Elgin — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 00:53:07 +0000

. . . Maybe the definition of gypo is this, if you can borrow money from a bank in Korea you are Korean. If you can’t, even though you have Korean ancestry, then you are Gypo.

Yes, absolutely.
This puts forward the notion that, by today’s standards, it is not ethnicity that counts but economic capability. As my Korean friends often say, “Money solves many problems.”. An education and money will always go further than what somebody thinks because it is what is in one’s mind that is truly important.

By: a-letheia

a-letheia — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 00:47:12 +0000

Born during the Enlightenment, “American” is an idea, an abstraction. To most Koreans, “Korean” is a race… Americans see two Koreas–a good nation and a bad one. Koreans see one divided race.

This is the core of the identity problem, it seems to me.

Additionally, I think it is interesting that Korea and the US are two of the rare cases in which propaganda is shoved down their throats at early ages. How many other countries pledge the flag every damned morning…? Canada? No. Germany? No. I always say, in this respect, the US and Korea have one thing in common: both have stong convictions of their identities, albeit in very different ways. A Kyopos, at least for a generation or two, are inevitably going to struggle.