You know, I’m glad this guy found Korean prison a spritual experience [JoongAng Ilbo, English], but wouldn’t it have been better just to shave your head and join a Buddhist monastery? (HT to reader)
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18 Comments
Didn’t you post about this guy a while back or am I mistaken? (Not that you can’t do it again….) His book inexplicably got some good reviews despite reading like a teenager’s diary.
Diary of Anne Frank was a good read
Wasn’t he in a _men’s_ prison?
Yep, it’s here: http://www.rjkoehler.com/2007/.....trackback/
“Didn’t you post about this guy a while back or am I mistaken?”
Yes, he did. The reason I sent Robert the story was that I found one of the images on the book cover to be a curious choice: there is a visa stamp from the PRC embassy in Seoul. Why use a Chinese visa on the cover of a book about a guy who spent time in a Korean prison for smuggling hash from the Philippines? Maybe Chinese characters and the 5-star red flag were thought to be more foreign-Asian-scary to American readers than Hangeul and Taegukki.
Yes! and Mr. Dildo does not need a visa to come back. That being said, Mr Choi will send him off to the little room when he trys to enter. What a zero, don’t put a nickel in this pussy boil’s pocket!
South Korean prisons sound a bit soft on trouble-making wandering slackers devoid of purpose and meaningful existence. Perhaps SK’s penal system can make an arrangement to outsource the incarceration of foreigners to NK.
I was wondering about the big red stamp with the 5 stars…sure didn’t look like a South Korean visa stamp.
The article mentions that he learned Korean in prison…I bet he’d have a distinctive way of speaking Korean! (Colourful vocab, gangster (?) dialect….)
“If anything is suspicious, the package is opened and searched. ”
Actually, they open nearly everything that has a foreigner’s name on it. They don’t always reseal the packages properly either.
PS. Thanks for smashing to pieces the expensive Swiss chocolate Easter Bunny that my mom sent to my son.
“trouble-making wandering slackers devoid of purpose and meaningful existence” That describes most of the foreigners in Korea.
I keed! I keed!
I enjoyed the book mostly for the info on an aspect of Korea I rarely hear anything about. I can’t fault the guy for making the best of a bad situation. Learning from mistakes and experiences is a part of life. The people that refuse to do so I usually find quite boring. Plus, getting coerced into a confession when the police had very little actual evidence just isn’t cool, even if you were stupid and actually did it.
I don’t think it’s true that Customs opens EVERYTHING with a foreigner’s name on it. I order packages of dutiable goods pretty regularly but get dunned for customs tax only about one out of six arrivals.
Now I’ve gone and done it! Potheads now are going to get the idea they can slip their weed through the post. Attention potheads: You can’t. Dogs can smell drugs in the package; they’re not trained to sniff for generic hair-loss drugs, business software, programming manuals and science fiction books, or butt plugs. So all of my packages arrive unmolested, but yours will be caught!
The latest variation I’ve run across is the pothead having weed mailed to a friend’s house with a fake name for the addressee. Pretty clever, huh?
For an apple computer hippie you sure hate weed.
So Brendon, extrapolating from your list of favorite contraband items, are we to assume that you are trying not to lose the hair on your ass, or that you need instructions for the butt plug?
Not all dogs work for the dark side. We once had a dog who loved to eat the leaves as we–how shall I say it–processed the harvest.
I could tell you that he was the best dog we ever had (which he was), but you wouldn’t be able to believe me. The fact that he willfully consumed ganja speaks for itself. He was obviously a terrible, evil dog (even though he wasn’t, in fact).
I don’t think hopheads are “terrible” or “evil” because they willfully consume ganja. Nor does being a pot smoker make one a dummy, necessarily.
But to do it here, in Korea, makes you a certifiable idiot. Do it in Cambodia, or Canada, or the Netherlands, or somewhere in Africa if you like — just don’t do it here. The official Korean reaction to drugs and the foreigners who use drugs is so ridiculously hysterical that calamity is all-but-guaranteed to those who can’t put their habit aside for the time being.
The guy had it easy. One of my Korean students told me he spent two weeks in a Korean military jail where he had to spend his waking hours staring at the wall on his side of the cell. He said the cell had closed-circuit cameras that the guards used to make sure prisoners did not look at or talk to each other in the cell. Can you imagine doing that for two weeks?
He told me he spent the two weeks in jail for hitting a lower-ranking soldier, who reported him to the commanding officer. However, he told me it was a Catch-22 since higher-ranking soldiers were expected to hit lower-ranking soldiers and could get in trouble if they did not. He also said that the soldier who reported him was also put in jail for two weeks for reporting him.
‘Thomas was enchanted by the rebelliousness of the man’s lifestyle, the ease with which he made his money, and the amount of it he made. The attraction to the way of life was stronger than the possible consequences.’ (from the article)
Wow - Cullen Thomas was ‘enchanted’. That’s the same thing that happened to the Charming Prince when he first saw Snow White. After reading that, I get the impression that the Joongang’s Richard Scott-Ashe is a bit interested in ‘the lifestyle’ as well.