North Korea Holds its Largest Magic Show Ever

Seriously?  In a country where six million people are on the verge of starving to death, a top priority of the regime includes a giant magic show.

ABC has the story:

Amid a burst of fireworks and a haze of smoke, a burly showman in a white sequined suit and gold lame cape appears with a flourish. Over the next 45 minutes, he appears to make a Pyongyang bus levitate and wriggles free from a box sent crashing to the stage through a ring of fire. 

This is magic North Korean-style performed in a show touted as the country's biggest ever and mounted in a city where good, old-fashioned illusion, a dancing bear and a dose of slapstick comedy can still command the biggest crowds of the year. 

The country's love for magic is a legacy of the circus traditions they inherited decades ago, during an era of Soviet influence. 

North Korean founder Kim Il Sung ordered the creation of the Pyongyang Circus in 1952 in the middle of the Korean War. The tradition of highly technical stagecraft — including the Arirang mass games, where 100,000 performers move in sync in a feat that has come to embody North Korean discipline and regimentation — still dazzles in a country where high-tech entertainment is scarce. [...]

You can follow the link to read more.  I guess I am not surprised the regime would have a magic show be such a big deal, last month I saw the below video and this passes for pre-school education.  I wonder how many six year old children were brutalized and discarded before they found the perfect five to play this silly melody in perfect unison.  This video would be impressive if children in North Korea led happy and healthy existences, but it is all propaganda all the time and these kids and their families are slaves to the regime.

The 10 Worst Chants/Songs/Story Time/Role Plays of the Old Public Elementary School English Curriculum

If you have in the past taught English at the elementary school level in South Korea, then you are probably familiar with the textbook characters Jinho, Nami, Mrs. Smith, Peter, Joon, and Ann.  Millions of South Korean children over the last decade have learned English from this text book series and it was finally changed this year to an updated version designed for three hours of English instruction a week instead of two hours a week.

The expressions, vocab, and 98% of all the grammar in these books was acceptable. The problem with these books was the production value and quality of the videos. There were also some awkward cultural moments and just bizarre choices made for settings and situations. The accompanying CD-ROM for the books looked like it was best designed to run on Windows 98, and here it was still being used in 2010.  The main dialogues were pretty good and had nice animation (see here and here).  Some of the songs were decent as well, but just about all of the chants, role plays and story time activities in the text books were worthless.

I already posted last month the ten worst dialogues (look and speak 2).  It received a lot of interest and several people asked if I could post some of the other content from the CR-roms.

South Korea prides itself on how much of a priority they have on investment in education. The teachers here are excellent, classrooms have no shortages of supplies, lots of useful technology available, new English classrooms and language learning facilities, etc. But the problem was that for nearly a decade everything revolved around these horrible, horrible textbooks.

These are the worst 10 chants, songs, story time activities, or role plays of the 5th and 6th grade curriculums:

#10 - Grade 5, Ch 15 - Role Play "Dude, wanna join the band?"

#9 - Grade 6, Ch 8 - Let's Chant "Asian people actually say ping-pang-pong?"

#8 - Grade 5, Ch 9 - Role Play "Nero's pencil is huge."

#7 - Grade 5, Ch 4 - Let's Chant "Can a tower be beautiful?"

#6 - Grade 6, Ch 9 - Story Time "Peter Pan was an excellent ice skater."

#5 - Grade 5, Ch 12 - Let's Chant "Kids love being kept overnight at the future house."

#4 - Grade 6, Ch 12 - Role Play "Jack's such a good bucket holder."

#3 - Grade 6, Ch 14 - Role Play "Snake snubs Prince."

#2 - Grade 6, Ch 14 - Song "I shower and sleep with my shoes on."

#1 - Grade 6, Ch 1 - Role Play "Uganda knows good fashion!"

Creepy Classroom Pledge Scene in Homefront

Homefront is a recently released video game that takes place in the not too distant future and North Korea has become the most powerful nation on Earth and has conquered the United States.  The premise of the game is that you are a resistance fighter in America trying to expel the North Korean occupiers.

Here is a creepy Easter Egg clip you can find in the game.

If you want a Korean's opinion of this game, check out Ask the Korean.  Here is the backstory trailer for the game.

Most Bizarre ESL Workout Video Ever

This is not new to the internet (and the video looks like it is from the 90's), but it is new to me.  This is one of the weirdest things I have ever seen.  Is this video suppose to be preparing health-conscious Japanese business women for taking trips to crime ridden English speaking countries?

Chinese Vendors Selling Live Turtles in Plastic Bags as Keychains

Holy moly!  This is pretty f***ing sick.

Source:

Chinese vendors have been selling pretty depressing keychains that consist of either a Brazil turtle or two small kingfish sealed inside a small plastic baggy. Each baggy, seven centimeters in length, is filled with colored liquid and the imprisoned animal(s) of choice. The vendors, who sell the baggies at the entrance to subways or train stations, claim the colored liquid water is a "nutrient rich" solution that allows the live creatures shoved inside a seven centimeter bag to live for a few months, after which–if this story couldn’t get any more depressing–the animals die and, according to Helablog, “rumor has it…the cadavers are heated in the microwave for 15 seconds and eaten while enjoying an ice cold beer.” 

If the existence of these keychains wasn’t depressing enough, the fact that they’re not illegal makes them even worse, as China only has a Wild Animal Protection Law, under which these keychains do not happen to fall. Since there is no law preventing the existence of these keychains, so there may not be an end to them anytime soon and, according to the Global Times, the depressing keychain business is doing well, as they reportedly watched one fish keychain and nine turtle keychains sell in five minutes time, to both people who think they’re neat, and others who buy the keychains to free the animals. 

According to the cofounder of the International Center for Veterinary Services, Mary Peng, the fish and turtles wouldn’t survive too long in the sealed plastic bag due to the lack of oxygen, regardless of how “nutrient rich” the colored water may be. Animal protection groups are voicing their opinion on the matter, so hopefully they can quickly make progress toward getting these keychains made illegal.

This is crushing my soul right now...

Korean Kids "World Losers" in Social Skills

South Korean children are already the unhappiest kids in the developed world, apparently all the studying they have to do has not only made them hate their lives, but has made them socially inept and awkward.  It really can be a tough life here for a kid sometimes with all the pressure they are under.

Article in the Chosunilbo:

A highly competitive, regimented education system focusing on exam grades means Korean youngsters fail to acquire proper social skills, a study suggests. The National Youth Policy Institute on Sunday said Korea ranks 35th out of 36 countries when it comes to youngsters' capacity for social interaction.

Korea scored just 0.31 on a scale of 0 to 1 in an assessment of social skills taken from a comprehensive study by the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement, which covered some 140,000 eighth grade students around the world.

The score is an average of ratings in relationship orientation, social cooperation and conflict management. Korean students scored 0 in terms of relationship orientation and social cooperation, which measures how much they get involved in civic organizations and student unions. But they scored 0.94 in conflict management, which gauges how well they handle democratic processes, right after Denmark's perfect score of 1.

"Korean students performed well only in areas that involved written exams but very poorly in areas that involved extracurricular activities," said one researcher.

Thailand scored highest overall with 0.69 points, followed by Indonesia (0.64), Ireland (0.6), Guatemala (0.59), the U.K. (0.53) and Chile (0.52).

In other findings, only 20 percent of Korean students said they trust their government, just one-third of the average of 62 percent among participating countries. Indonesians had the most trust in their government with 96 percent, followed by Finland and Lichtenstein with 82 percent each and Austria with 77 percent. Only 45 percent of Korean students said they trust their own schools, far below the overall average of 75 percent.

I think it is a good thing that Koreans do not trust their government and are highly skeptical of their elected leaders.  It keeps the pressure on them and hopefully reduces corruption.

Arirang World TV Shits on "Healthy" Women

I want to thank The Grand Narrative for posting on this topic and raising awareness of it.  Since he posted, the video was taken down from Arirang's Youtube channel.  You can read TGN's posts here and here.  The segment is an outrage and I seriously want to find the editor who okay'd this segment and punch him in the face.

This segment actually had the audacity to tell these gorgeous women that they should take "more care" of themselves or do "some yoga" to fix their disgusting and "chubby" looking legs.  The photoshoped images of how much skinnier these "healthy" legs should be almost made me vomit on my keyboard.

Seriously, the left leg on the "after doing some yoga" picture is creepy.

One of the worst things about Korean culture is their obsession with physical beauty.  Unattractive people are openly discriminated against daily in every social situation and I have had coworkers deliberately go out of their way to make other less attractive coworkers feel like shit all the time.  It is also socially acceptable amongst my coworkers to talk about the physical attractiveness of other coworkers and even our students (sometimes in front of them).  I always refuse to participate and when Koreans comment about my physical appearance I put my foot down and let them know that is not in anyway appropriate or appreciated.

I can't believe in this segment actually targeted T-ara's Eun-Jung (함은정) and said she needed to slim down those "healthy" legs in order to become perfect.  This is one of the most attractive women on the planet and there is nothing about her that needs changing before I can declare her perfect.  Her legs look great.

Japan Radiation Fear Sparks Korean Diaper Rush

There has been a panic on goods coming from the area surrounding the Fukushima power plant in Japan.  Many countries have halted imports or announced increased screening to ensure that the food and goods coming from Japan are safe to consume and use.

This has led to a rush by Korean parents to buy their favorite Japanese brands of diapers.

Source:

(Reuters Life!) - The risk of radiation contamination from Japan's damaged nuclear power stations has sparked food bans across the globe and more surprisingly, a buying frenzy from South Korean mothers who fear their favorite Japanese-made diapers may suddenly become unavailable.

Cho Myung-jin, who organizes online group-buying for Japanese diapers, saw her website collapse on Tuesday under the weight of traffic as panicked South Koreans chased brands they believe are better quality than locally-made products.

"The reaction was scary. Some mothers did not go to work to reserve diapers," the 31-year old mother told Reuters. 

According to Auction Corp (www.auction.co.kr), the second-largest online shopping website in South Korea, sales of Japanese diapers have doubled since the quake. 

After her social commerce website collapsed, Cho opened a new message board selling 300 packs of diapers, limiting sales to one pack per person, and said she received 2,000 offers in a minute. 

She said the price of Japanese diapers available online has nearly doubled to 150,000 won ($133.30) a package. 

"I feel sorry that they sold out, upsetting parents who had waited for days," said Cho, whose 22-month old infant uses the Japanese product.

Why are Koreans spending twice as much for Japanese diapers ($133.30) instead of buying locally-made products?  Are Korean diapers just that bad?  Or are Korean parents operating under some silly cultural superstition that I do not understand?  Go buy some Huggies.

South Korea Faces Rescue Search Dog Shortage

I have no idea if South Korea actually has a rescue search dog shortage, but that is the conclusion I draw from this this article on The Korea Times titled "Why did Korea send only 2 rescue dogs to Japan?"  The article states they only sent two dogs to help with the coordinated search and rescue operation because they only had two trained dogs in the whole country... right, let's hope there is never an emergency (like a shelling?) or national disaster in this country.

My Blog is Killing Journalism

The Huffington Post was sold last month to AOL for $315 million.  People are debating if the site is a real news organization and if it is actually worth that amount.  The Huffington Post does a little of its original reporting, but most of the time it just links to other sources.  In so many ways it is just one of the world's biggest blogs.

Bill Keller of The New York Times wrote an editorial about the Huffington Post recently and said the site just aggregates.  It has made a fortune off of cute kitten videos, celebrity gossip, editorials from unpaid bloggers, and quoting and linking to hard news sources like The New York Times.  Blogs and aggregation websites like the Huffington Post are stealing advertisers and revenue streams from hard news sources and slowly killing them.

My blog is really the same thing.  I read hard news sites and the link and quote them on my blog.  Many other K-blogs do as well... I doubt the Korea Times or Herald cares about us...

Here is Stephen Colbert's take on the Huffington Post making money off linking his videos.

Owl vs Korean Rat Snake!

Not sure how I got here, but I was goofing off watching bizarre animal fights online and came across this EPIC battle between an owl and a snake.  This is one of the strangest animal fights I have ever seen.  At one point it looks obvious that both animals think they are going to die and both are content to die as long as they take the other one out with them as they go.

Subway Suicides Down, But Bridge Suicides Up

South Korea has a problem in that they have the regrettable title of the nation with the highest suicide rate in the developed world.  On average, about forty South Koreans commit suicide every day.  How do they do it?  Jumping from high places and jumping in front of trains and subways appear to be common choices.

Recently, Seoul has been installing screens in many of the subway stations in an effort from discouraging people from jumping in front of the tracks.  Article Link Here:

South Korea has one of the highest suicide rates in the developed world, but a sharp drop in the number of people that tried to kill themselves by jumping in front of subway trains in Seoul last year following prevention measures is stirring discussion about similar steps at other common suicide sites. 

According to a police report, the number of people attempting suicide by jumping from platforms of subway stations in Seoul declined 62% to 29 from 77 in 2009. The decline comes after the installation of screens along many subway platforms that ensure people are unable to get on to the tracks. Most of the deaths occurred at subway stations where screens hadn’t been installed. 

Despite that sharp decline, suicide attempts from bridges spanning the main Han River in Seoul rose 30% to 108 last year from 83, according to the report, which was submitted to Rep. Yoon Seok-yong of the ruling Grand National Party. 

Kim Sung-hoon, an aide to Rep. Yoon, said the lawmaker, who belongs to the National Assembly’s Health and Welfare Committee, is thinking of ways to reduce the number of suicide attempts at Han River bridges. 

“He believes the government should establish stumbling blocks or set up fences near the bridges that are notorious for suicide attempts,” Kim said. 

“Years of efforts to install screens at subway stations have made those trying to commit a suicide head towards no-screen stations or Han River bridges where safety checks are still lacking,” said Kim Sung-il, an official at the Korea Association for Suicide Prevention, a non-governmental organization. 

He said the government needs to take measures to prevent suicides at the bridges by, for example, setting up fences. 

According to the police report, the Hangang Bridge topped the list of attempted suicides at the Han River, at 17 cases, followed by Mapo Bridge with 16 attempts. 

In 2009, the latest year for which data are available, South Korea had the highest suicide rate among the 33 mostly wealthy nations in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, at 28.4 deaths per 100,000 people, compared with the OECD average of 11.2 deaths. The rate was 24.3 for South Korea in 2008. 

OECD data showed the rate in South Korea has increased rapidly even as it has slowed in most other developed nations, with suicides among South Korean males, for instance, almost tripling between 1990 and 2006.

Koreans still have this wrong.  Having screens and safety rails in the subways is a good idea.  This could potentially save the life of someone who loses their balance or the life of a child that does not realize the danger.  However, if you want to stop Koreans from killing themselves as such an alarming rate, then the culture in this country has to change.  

Koreans who experience economic hardship or suffer from a mental disease or depression are encouraged by the culture to keep it hidden from their family and friends.  Too many people here would rather live a lie in public to save face than look vulnerable.  This causes people to eventually snap and if they want to kill themselves, they will find a way.  Fences and screens cannot save a determined suicide case.  Counseling and treatment programs can.  People who need help need to be able to publicly seek it out and not become pariahs amongst their family and friends.

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Oldest Prostitute in Brussels Retires

I do not know why I read the Korea Times.  More than half their articles are fluff news, celebrity drama, and pulp fiction.  I saw the headline for this article and chose to read it... then it made me think the rampant prostitution in South Korea.

There should be more public advocates for prostitutes in South Korea.  Legally, the entire industry is illegitimate and workers have no protections under law.  In 2007 there were more than 250,000 prostitutes working in South Korea and it is a 14 trillion Korean won annual industry.  Koreans need to stop living in denial about their sexuality and have a more mature and compassionate approach to sex workers in their country.

Link:

The Brussels regional news website brusselnieuws.be reports that the capital's oldest and possibly most famous prostitute is to retire after a career spanning 37 years.

The 59 year-old Sonia Verstappen has worked in the red light district around Brussels’ North Railway Station since she was 22 and was a spokeswoman for women that have willingly chosen to work in the world’s oldest profession. 

In recent years, Ms Verstappen has given lectures at universities on male sexual desires. 

Sonia Verstappen stated to work as a prostitute of her own volition at the age of 22. She says that she did so as she was jealous of the women that were able to go upstairs with clients while she sat at the till of the brothel where she worked. 

She has never had a pimp and was able to choose her clients. Ms Verstappen’s door was always kept firmly shut for bedraggled, unkempt, dirty or drunken men. 

Over the years Sonia Verstappen has campaigned for prostitution to be given legal recognition as a profession as this would offer greater protection to the thousands of women in Belgium that work as prostitutes.

She has also slammed the lack of action by the authorities against the problems of forced prostitution and people trafficking that are all too prevalent in the red light district around Brussels North Railway station.

Wow... thirty years on the job...

High School Graduates Expected to Keep Clothes On

In America, high school graduates might prank the school just before graduation.  Some kids might go to the graduation ceremony and be completely naked under their gown.  Teachers houses might get egged or toilet papered.  Apparently, Korean high school grads have their own hazing and self-deprecating rituals as well.

Source:

For parents, aunties and grandparents, middle and high school graduation day is a time for pride, nostalgic tears and celebration.

But for the high school students themselves it’s a step toward freedom, and as graduation day approaches next month, authorities are going to prevent graduates from celebrating too freely, raucously or butt-naked. Schools, the police and the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology have all vowed to prevent the rowdy and ribald demonstrations that occurred after last year’s graduation ceremonies across the country.

The Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education announced Monday it will deploy all teachers in the city to patrol their own schools as soon as graduation ceremonies finish. According to the office’s announcement, teachers will cooperate with police officers in their patrols, and at least one official from the office of education will be sent to each school to observe the graduations.

Oh yeah, because nothing will stop an 18 year old boy from doing something like a disapproving glare from a teacher who no longer has any authority over him from a school he doesn't have to go to anymore.

The shock of last year’s raucous graduation celebrations brought on the restrictions. In Goyang, northwest of Seoul, about 20 senior boys and girls took off their clothes and posed naked for photos after their graduation ceremony. The pictures spread rapidly on the Internet. 

In Cheongju, North Chungcheong, male middle school graduates held a street march clad only their underpants, while 30 students in Busan went on a rampage on Heundae Beach, pelting each other with flour and eggs and ripping girls’ clothes off. On Jeju Island a dozen high school students took seven middle school graduates to a beach after their graduation, ripped off the graduates’ uniforms, underwear and stockings using scissors and razor blades, poured mayonnaise and corn syrup on their bodies and threw them into the icy sea. The attackers graduated from the same middle school. 

There’s a history of raucous graduations in Korea, even uplifting ones. During Japanese colonial rule from 1910 t0 1945, high school graduates pelted themselves with flour, and ruining the school uniform was considered a protest against Japanese authorities.

In late 1990s, students expressed their sense of freedom by dying their hair or intentionally tearing their uniforms, but as time went by, such demonstrations became more aggressive and even violent. 

“When I graduated from high school back in 2001, throwing eggs and flour at each other was a matter of course,” recalled Lee Eun-seon, 28. “Students who were considered to be going overboard were those who smashed the windows of teachers’ cars. But when I read the news about the violence after last year’s graduation ceremonies, I was shocked.” 

Experts say students from schools known for rough corporal punishment get particularly violent upon graduating.

“A uniform is a symbol of oppression to a student,” said Lee Ji-hwan, 36, head of the Horeb Youth Cultural Center, which runs a major camp for students in Gangwon. “Ripping or destroying it releases stress and expresses a sense of freedom.”

In an effort to stop students from desecrating their uniforms, numerous schools have started programs in which students are asked to donate their uniforms to juniors who can’t afford new ones. Kuwol Middle School in Incheon has let its graduating students wear formal clothes on graduation day instead of uniforms. [...]

Some say parents and authorities take graduation day rowdiness too seriously, and point out that graduation is the end of one phase of life and a moving on to the next. 

“Students want to mark the day by doing something eventful and express their sense of freedom,” said Lee of the Horeb Youth Cultural Center. 

Most middle and high schools in Seoul will hold graduation ceremonies between Feb. 9 to 11.

I see no reasons why middle schoolers would be doing any of this.  Not sure what exactly they have to celebrate about.

Pakistani Mother Enrolls in First Grade

OMG.  Hearing about this makes you just thank mercy you were born in a part of the world where education is a right and not a privilege.

CNN:

Rukhsana Batool doesn't quite look like her fellow first graders at an elementary school in this village in northwest Pakistan.

Batool towers over the rest of the children, she is covered in a white burqa - the full length Islamic veil- and she is a 25-year-old married mother of three. [...]

Now, when the school bell rings, she walks into class and sits next to her two favorite classmates - her two sons, age 4 and 5. [...]

Here's the video:

North Korea has an Amusement Park!

I found this on CNNGO, but apparently North Korea has one amusement park, Kaeson Youth Park in Pyongyang.  It has existed for a while, but it was recently renovated and reopened last spring.  It features new (Italian made) rollercoasters and is open daily from 7pm to midnight.

Barry Neild wrote a piece for CNNGO about theme park aficionado Stefan Zwanzger being allowed to visit the park.  Here is a small part of the article:

Zwanzger visited Pyongyang in October as part of an organized tour that -- in addition to an endless parade of statues and museums honoring the dictatorial dynasty of Kim Jong Il and Kim Il Sung –- took in Kaeson and the city's more elderly theme parks: Mangyongdae and Kaesongsan.

Like many outsiders visiting a country that the United Nations says is barely able to sustain its closely controlled population, he says much of what he saw was "depressing."

Inside the amusement parks it was a different story.

"When you watch the locals on the rides, it seems like the happiest place in North Korea," he says.

"They're exactly like us, they scream the same way on the fun rides and they make exactly the same faces on the roller coaster when it's dropping on the first loop."

The rides themselves are another revelation, says Zwanzger. Roller coasters apparently not being subject to the international embargoes that have added to the country's isolation, Kaeson boasts several new Italian-made rides.

He describes one year-old ride as "probably the most cutting-edge installation in the whole country." Given the North Korea's parlous economic state, it's a joke that probably isn't far from the truth.

The ride is a "belly-down flying" roller coaster that hurls passengers suspended in four-man carriages around a bright orange track.

Check out the article for more of the story and additional photos of the park.  I also typed in the park name to google and found this video on yourtube.  Very strange that this place exists when you consider how impoverished the country is.  I wonder what kind of restrictions are in place for people to visit here.

Japan Is Losing Its Sex Drive

Two years ago there was an interesting article in Slate Magazine about the rise of "Herbivores" in Japan.

Japan panics about the rise of "grass-eating men," who shun sex, don't spend money, and like taking walks.

The article was about Japan, but much is applicable to Korean men as well.  Basically, as the economy in Japan stalled, the standard of living for young Japanese men stopped going up.  Japanese men stopped caring about money, their careers, and being dominant alpha-males.  They lost interest in chasing after girls.  Coupled with the rise in technology like personal computers, video games, and the internet, lots of guys prefer to stay home and play by or with themselves than go out and meet women.

This article was in the Huffington Post this week:

Now for some frigid news from Japan that has nothing to do with winter temperatures: a new government-commissioned study finds that young Japanese men are losing their interest in sex, yet another warning sign in a nation notorious for its low birth rate.

According to the AFP, a whopping 36.1 percent of teenage boys between the ages of 16-19 said they had little to no interest in sex, and in some cases even despised it, more than twice the 2008 figure of 17.5 percent. Futhermore, the survey, conducted in September 2010, reportedly found that 83.7 percent of Japanese men who turned 20 this year were not dating anyone, while 49.3 percent said they had never had a girlfriend. Girls, it seems, are suffering from a similar lack of heat: 59 percent in the same age group felt the same way, up 12 percentage points from 2008.

Kunio Kitamura, head of the clinic of the Japan Family Planning Association which took part in the survey, said the data confirms a wider social belief that younger Japanese men are becoming "herbivorous," a label attached to passive men who do not actively seek women and sex. Many younger people were opting to delay starting a family due to the perceived burden on their finances, lifestyles and careers. "The findings seem to reflect the increasing shallowness of human relations in today's busy society." Kitamura is quoted by CNN as saying.

The study, which reportedly surveyed 1,301 people aged 16 to 49, yielded a handful of other surprises: 40.8 percent of married people said they had not had sex in the past month, up from 36.5 percent in the 2008 survey and 31.9 percent in the 2004 survey, while nearly 50 percent of married people older than 40 years old said they have not had sex in the past month. Some participants claimed work fatigue and reluctance to have sex after childbirth, while others said they "can't be bothered."

"Obviously, the most important reason for Japan's declining birth rate is that people are not having sex," Kitamura told the Telegraph. "Combined with the rising number of elderly people, this population imbalance is a major problem."

Korea is not as bad, but the situation is similar.  Children are expensive and many families cannot afford them.  Then if you factor in married couples with sixty hour work weeks, they are never home or in the mood to do it.

This article did not mention it, but the rise in internet pornography HAS GOT to be another factor.  Japan and Korea are the world's second and third largest consumers of internet pornography and if young men are playing with themselves at home on the computer, then they aren't going to the clubs later than night to find some girls.

South Korean Man Arrested for Using Twitter to Support North Korea

A first of its kind.  Beware what you post on your twitter or facebook accounts.  The South Korean government has set the precedent that people can and will be arrested for being supportive of North Korea or at least critical of the South Korean government's handling of the North.

Source:

In what is believed to be the first case of its kind, the South Korean authorities have arrested and filed charges against a man for posting Twitter and other internet messages praising North Korea.

The 54-year-old South Korean man, identified only as Cho, is said by the South Korean government-affiliated Yonhap news agency to have posted 100 messages and video clips in support of the regime in Pyongyang.

Mr Cho's alleged offences took place between 2009 and October last year and involve content on his own blog, Twitter and other websites.

Postings said the sinking in March of the South Korean naval vessel Cheonan, which killed 46 sailors and was widely blamed on North Korea, was faked by South Korea and the United States. Messages also blamed South Korea for provoking the shelling in November of Yeonpyeong Island by North Korea, in which two marines and two civilians died.

That makes me nervous... I posted on my own blog to a degree something similar.  In July I posted about the Cheonan Conspiracies and felt myself that the Korean government was deliberately misleading the public in some way about the sinking (or were just being incompetent with their investigation).  At the time, 20% of Koreans did not believe that North Korea was responsible for the sinking.  That number is probably much lower now after North Korea admitted to the November artillery attack.

Mr Cho, who had 3,000 followers on Twitter, is said to have posted material from the official North Korean Uriminzokkiri website. He also praised the likely transfer of power from the current leader, Kim Jong-il, to his son and heir apparent, Kim Jong-un.

Okay... that is where it comes in that he is crazy.  But is he a criminal?  How do you arrest him for just being delusional?  Was he making threats?  Was he advocating violence?  If not, then he should not have been arrested.

Activity such as this, which falls foul of South Korea's national security law banning activities or the publication of material supporting Pyongyang, is viewed as "subversion", said Alan Chong, an associate professor in the S Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore.

Under the previous government, which promoted a "sunshine policy" of engagement with North Korea, similar offences might have been dealt with by a "stern warning", suggested Mr Chong.

However, under the current conservative administration of the president, Lee Myung-bak, despite there being "a very vibrant opposition", pro-Pyongyang material "cannot be tolerated", said Mr Chong, especially following the Cheonan and Yeonpyeong incidents.

"Those voices who might take a more left-wing view - 'Let's be nice to them, hopefully they will be nice to us' - this has become politically risky in the current climate," he added.

Charges were pressed against Mr Cho on Monday, two days after a separate incident in which North Korea's official Twitter account was hacked.

Messages posted on Saturday, Kim Jong-un's birthday, did not contain the usual praise for the country's leaders, but instead accused them of living comfortable lives and said they should be killed "with a sword", Yonhap reported. The official YouTube account was also reportedly hacked.

Pyongyang set up Twitter, YouTube and Facebook accounts in August last year, apparently to attract international support, since internet access within North Korea is heavily restricted. About 1,300 messages have been posted on the North Korean government Twitter account – @uriminzok – which has more than 10,000 followers.

It never ceases to be ironic that North Korea would setup internet propaganda channels and then have no way for any of their people to access it.  It might be designed for foreigners, but probably more people follow and read it as a joke or out of curiosity than as a real source of news or propaganda.

If Mr. Cho loves North Korea so much, then the South Korean government should fly him up there, give him a parachute, and push him out of an airplane.  If he wants to join them, let him go.  If he doesn't want to join them, then he must know it is all a lie, and he is just doing all this because he is either crazy or seeking attention.  He is not a criminal either way.

Japan's Cat Cafes

South Korea has animal themed cafes.  Brian in Jeollanam-Do posted about a dog and cat themed cafe in Gwangju that I have been to.  Apparently there are many people in Korea and Japan that live in large apartment complexes that do not allow animals and these people miss their comfort and companionship.  Time did a short video about a cafe in Japan that charges $9 an hour to let people pet their cats.

FYI, the embedded clip doesn't appear in feeds, you have to go to the page to see the video.

Man Kills Prostitute, Gives Her Last Rites

There are over a quarter million prostitutes living and working in South Korea.  Of course it is all illegal, but it is a 13 billion dollar annual industry and accounts for 1.6 percent of South Korea's total GDP.  According to The Korea Women's Development Institute, 20% of Korean men in their 20s pay for sex at least four times a month, with 358,000 visiting prostitutes daily.  I read these numbers and it is almost unbearable to swallow the hypocrisy when Koreans who are anti-NESTs complain that we care about sex too much.

I feel so bad for these women.  There are a lot of crazy guys out there and they run this risk every time they go out and this is what can happen if they dare to say "no".  I hope this guy goes to prison for a long time and somewhere a bit more fiery and unpleasant after that.  Story on the Jeonju Hub.

A man hired a prostitute, after intercourse, they ordered breakfast. He wanted to go again, but she said 'no' because the money was gone. She then got in the shower, where he came and drowned her in the tub. He was very broken up about what he did, so he went and got religious paraphernalia and performed rituals upon her. He then rolled her in a tarp and took her body out and dumped it. Police found her i.d. card still on her, and easily traced the man through the motel's hallway CCTV recordings. Courtesy Jeonbuk Ilbo.

How nice of him to show concern for her eternal soul before rolling her up in a tarp and dumping her body.