Patriotic Teen Fails Spanish

This is satire of course, but I cannot help but feel like there is some truth in this.  I am American, and I had to take Spanish in high school and remembering a lot of classmates saying things like, "Why don't they just learn English?"

Hispanics in America are the fastest growing minority at 16%.  Now, 45 million Americans speak it as their first or second language with an additional 6 million students in America studying Spanish, making the USA the world's largest Spanish speaking country second only to Mexico (and just ahead of Spain).  That's fun to think about.

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...

My Questions Get Answered About EatYourKimchi

Simon and Martina of Eat Your Kimchi were on an episode of Heart to Heart on Arirang TV a couple weeks ago.  I guess now I am only one of about 85,000+ people who follow their blog regularly.  But I have been watching their videos weekly for the last two years and I have always had a couple questions about them floating around in the back of my head.  This interview answered them all and was a pleasure to watch (and a pleasure to see the NEST blogosphere get some positive viewing time).

It is obvious from the video that the interview is targeting Korean housewives looking to practice their English, but this interview was well done.  Check it out if you are curious what these two are planning for their future.

KPOP Korral - [Girl's Day] - Twinkle Twinkle

Girl's Day (걸스데이) is a five member girl group under DreamTea Entertainment.  Their five members are So Jin (박소진), Ji Hae (우지해), Min Ah (방민아), Yura (김아영), and Hyeri (이혜리).

This is their third MV release, and their first song that has got them noticed.  The song is called "twinkle twinkle" (반짝반짝) and it has an infectious chorus line and easy to mimic dance moves.  The video is cute enough... but I think the guy in this video is really not that attractive...

Their debute song and video was "tilt your head" (갸우뚱).  Interesting look...

Thanks for Reading and the First 100,000 Hits

Hey Everyone,

My blog went over 100,000 hits over the weekend.  I just wanted to thank everyone who visits, comments, or is reading this.  I'm still relatively new to the world of blogging, and I have enjoyed doing this for the last year as a part-time hobby.

If you have your own blog about something Korea related, consider adding a link to your page to help increase my traffic.  I am also always down for a link exchange if it is something related to Korea.  Leave a comment or e-mail me.  thewaygookeffect [at] gmail [dot] com

If you want to follow me on Twitter or facebook... I do that now.

Facebook Link

Twitter Link

For fun, here are all my blogger stats.  They are fun to look at.  I was on vacation in February, so that it what I credit to the dip in traffic.  The Korean Blog List and Brian in Jeollanamdo have easily been my greatest sources of referring traffic.

More than 3% of all my traffic has been from people google searching how to get an FBI background check. I'm glad people are getting use from that post.  Most of my other top posts are KPOP related because that is what people search for.

Easily, native English speakers living in Korea and people from North America dominate the English speaking Korean blogosphere.  The UK doesn't even come close.

Radioactive Trace Elements Spread Across Korea

This is from the Gwangju Blog:

Traces of the radioactive element iodine-131 leaked from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan have been detected throughout Korea. The particles are expected to keep floating into Korea from Japan until after the crisis is brought under control.

But the amounts are too small to have an impact on drinking water and food. Even if exposed all year round to iodine-131, which was detected at 12 nationwide radiation detection stations, people would get a mere one-200,000th to one-30,000th of 1mSV, the annual maximum permissible dose, a spokesman for the Korea Institute of Nuclear Safety said Tuesday.

Korean-American Version of 'Jersey Shore' Coming Soon

After the runaway success of MTV's highest rated program of all time, Jersey Shore, it was only a matter of time before other programs were created to exploit the lowest achieving members of other ethnic communities in America.  It looks like this group of Korean Americans will be given a national platform to showcase Korean (or just Korean-American) culture.  The show was having trouble getting picked up by a network but it has been reported that they have been picked up and an announcement is coming soon.

I can't wait for Korean netizens to get a load of these guys...

and...

I will be watching this show...

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.