North-South Korean Border Bombing September 2010

I recently traveled to the tranquil, river-delineated border between North and South Korea. More often than not, my travels take me in search of praiseworthy drink and amenable grub, and this journey was no different.

Very little is known about North Korea's next leader.

It was a beautiful, blue-skied, quiet, uneventful day on the thickly armored 38th parallel. Quite unlike today, the 23rd of November, 2010, when bombs rained on a South Korean island.

But let us not forget that just like the last time something like this happened, the unnecessary yet mostly comfortable stalemate between the increasingly distant Korean brethren will continue for the foreseeable future.

Meanwhile, the Japanese media is freaking out, much to North Korea's delight. The South, on the other hand, is predictably beside itself with restraint. The Chinese are patiently awaiting a request for comment.

Once again, let us remember that, first and foremost, a war is not about to break out.

The North would never wish for such an outcome. They know that they would lose handily inside of two or three days (read O'Hanlon and Mochizuki, 2003 for more on this).

And the South won't retaliate with anything resembling real force because they know that downtown Seoul would crumble inside of 180 minutes if the North felt that the end was near.

In other words, your sons and daughters serving in the military on the Korean peninsula, Korean or non, are in very little danger--especially when compared (fairly or otherwise) with the other hot-zones of the world. [Our thoughts and hearts go out to the family of the South Korean soldier that was killed by the most recent North Korean provocation.]

The North Korean dictatorial family is in the midst of a leadership baton-pass, and an international scuffle or two helps to shore up the military credentials of the most recent successor from the Kim family.

Daedonggang Beer with
N. Korea in the background.

Jong-un Kim (should be translated as Jeong-eun in English, by the way) is currently being ushered through the ranks of the People's Party so that he is well-positioned if and when his father's health forces him to step aside.

During my recent visit to the border--calmer times which will soon return, then lapse, then return once again--I enjoyed a couple bottles of North Korean beer not even half of a mile from the country where it was produced. And to my surprise, and delight, the beer was definitely worth a second sip.

It was an odd feeling to drink a "Daedonggang" (also spelled Taedonggang) beer while being able to actually see a small, nearly inactive, village where the people had likely never even seen the beverage that I was enjoying. Not that they would be able to afford it if they had. Soju is reportedly far cheaper and domestically preferable anyway, no matter how appetizing the local beer is.

From my vantage point, the North Korean landscape was bizarrely naked. Very little of the lush vegetation waving to the south was present just across the thin river to the north, and the skeletal, gulag-esque buildings were nearly the only insinuations of life available to the southernly eye. All the better to spot people who are trying to escape, apparently. The lifeless shade of brown of the crops to the north contrasted unfavorably with their irrigated neighbors just across the river to the southwest.

It was perhaps a miracle that the beer I was enjoying was as good as it was. Maybe I just benefited from a good batch. At any rate, a blind tasting would likely find three out of four South Korean beer fans choosing it over the local swill.

Let's hope the fresh-blooded North Korean leadership understands that North Korea's future can be secured by a deescalation of tensions and the emergence of a North Korean economy that doesn't depend on or extort outside goodwill. While "Daedonggang" beer isn't going to win any rice lager awards, it may just be a hint of where the time-locked half of the Korean Peninsula could go.

North-South Korean Border Bombing September 2010

Fingerprinting and Photographing: Japanese Immigration

Just for fun, I thought I'd throw this pic in here.

This is from our return leg to Japan (from Korea). As most people know, the new fingerprinting regime has long since been in place, and unlike other nations with similar systems in place for documenting foreign tourists, Japan likes to book all foreigners every time they enter/re-enter the country (even if they already pay taxes here).

Anyway, we were given this piece of paper after we were told to stand in the wrong line. It's intended to help them figure out how long people are standing in line. The immigration officials that are in charge or shepherding the hundreds of people coming off the planes every half hour stay on the move and try not to stand in one place for very long. It's mostly an act of self-defense as they know that everyone is angry and they are trying not to become a target for verbal abuse. One annoying side effect, at least in our case, is that they tend not to listen very well when they are walking around, so we wasted about 15 minutes in the mile-long line for tourists.

Apparently they have set up another line for people with re-entry permits (people who live and work/study in Japan) in their passports in order to expedite the process, but it was quite a challenge for us to figure out where that line was located. The immigration officials spent a lot of time escorting VIP's through gaps in the line to avoid fingerprinting/mug shot taking. Quick question: everyone knows that politicians are criminals, so shouldn't they be prime suspects for post-landing booking?

Well, we finally got ourselves in the correct line, and after a computer failure and the requisite reshuffling of the lines of people, we made it through immigration at about 2:21 pm. That's 31 minutes after we started standing in line according to the sheet of paper pictured above left. I have no idea how their system of checking waiting time works, but our case probably skewed some of their results. We undoubtedly spent less time in line than the tourists did (by my estimates they were waiting for 45-60 minutes), so if they use our 31 minute wait as evidence that the system is getting faster, then this post is evidence that they need to double-check their methods.

Endnote: when the computer was restarted after it crashed, it was just hilarious/ironic to see the Windows OS screen appear on the monitor as it rebooted.

Check this website, Re-entry Japan, for more information on this topic.

Fingerprinting and Photographing: Japanese Immigration

Weird English at the Stationery Store

I make a point of visiting stationery stores when I go to Korea. It's a one stop shop for all of your study and souvenir needs.

It's also one of my favorite places to find wacky permutations of the English language, many of them worthy of admission at Engrish.com.

One such example is pictured to the right. This is a shopping/gift bag that was on sale at a shop in front of Busan National University.

Intending to spruce the text up with a little extra English, the designer of this bag unwisely opted for plagiarizing the first 22 words of an article in the JoongAng Daily English newspaper (which can be found here). The resulting creation is just plain weird.

On the plus side, at least this example is grammatically correct except for the fact that it's a sentence fragment.

Weird English at the Stationery Store

Chicken and Beer

One of the staples of the Korean culinary landscape, at least if one heads out to eat, is chicken. And beer. There are shops everywhere that sell the two together. It's a wonderful thing.

The accompanying shot is of a shop near my brother-in-law's new apartment. Chicken in abundance. The place is called "Boor", but it should be spelled "bueo" when romanized. I'm being a bit nitpicky, but I think it's obvious why the proprietor chose the spelling that she did.

How else would they be able to borrow the Hooters logo that is the central part of the storefront advertising? Incidentally, Seoul got it's first Hooters last year.

Intellectual property rights aside, this type of advertising plagues the nation of Korea. It's no wonder that nobody seems to give a hoot about architecture because the building's facade is going to be plastered with these vinyl encased beds of fluorescent lights anyway.

Apparently there are moves afoot up in Seoul to cut down on this type of advertising. One can only hope that it catches on nationwide.

Until then, I'll try to get my brother-in-law to pop by this place and check what type of outfits the waitresses wear.

Chicken and Beer

Changwon Starbucks has Smoking Lounge

Changwon city, South Korea, is a rapidly growing city. It sits about 50 minutes west of Busan by bus, and it's one of the only properly planned cities in the country. Canberra, Australia, apparently, was used as a template for the city.

The population is still rather small, but it's attracting jobs and development like few other municipalities. What that happens, the chains come flocking.

This is a picture from the inside of the city's first Starbucks. It's massive. The one thing that I found to be different about this particular shop was the fact that it is the first Starbucks I've seen with my own eyes that has a smoking room in it. I have no idea why Starbucks felt compelled to do that as the Korean citizenry is quite amenable to the idea that smoking should be done outside.

Starbucks outlets in Japan, by all accounts a much more tobacco-friendly nation, have ashtray-equipped tables outside their outlets.

Changwon Starbucks has Smoking Lounge

Busan Government Works to Improve Quality of Life by Giving Space Back to Citizens

The city of Busan did a nice job of cleaning up the filthy canal/river that stagnated under the elevated train tracks on line number one. The water now smells like, well, water, and much of the area was reclaimed for public use.

In many areas there are basketball courts and other public recreational facilities that now sit on the flat land beside the water. Additionally, a many-many-kilometers long rubberized-track path was laid so that people could get some exercise.

This picture was taken near the entrance to Jangjeon-dong train station (장전동 역) which is along an elevated portion of line one. The bridge spanning the gap sports a rather large sign informing people of how much exercise they need to do to burn off a certain number of calories.

In other train-related news, most of line number three has been completed and is open for public use. Line three (the red line in this map) connects Suyeong station, which is not far from the beach, with Daejeo station, which is a short cab ride from Gimhae International Airport. I'm pretty sure that train service should soon extend all the way to the airport, and my eyes confirmed as much when I saw all the construction there a few weeks ago, but this map doesn't have any information on that. Instead, it seems to indicate that line three will become a one line transfer station as it forks and intersects line one at Dongnae station and continues on until it reaches Bansong.

The official Busan Urban Transit Authority website, however, says that line three will terminate at Anpyeong which is a little bit further out than the Bansong region of Busan. Their map also has line three ending at Daejeo, so it seems that an outside company or authority is responsible for the line that will attach Gimhae airport to the rest of the city.

Anyway, it was nice to have extra commuting options when we were there last. I'm sure that the transportation system will have evolved even more the next time we visit.

Update 1 [April 9, 2008]:
The connection between Gimhae airport and downtown Busan will not be connected to line three. It seems that it will be a completely elevated line stretching from Sasang station on line two in western Busan, which also happens to be a large inter-city bus terminal, to the growing suburb of Gimhae city west of Busan. The line will travel through Gimhae International Airport on its way through.

All of the trains will be unmanned and the line is scheduled for completion in 2010. Capacity is projected at a maximum of 300,000 passengers per day.

Busan Government Works to Improve Quality of Life by Giving Space Back to Citizens

2005 APEC Summit Facilities in Busan, South Korea

They went all out in the preparations for the 2005 APEC Summit which was held in Busan, South Korea.

This meeting hall is part of the complex that was set up on the waterfront at Haeundae beach. This is where the heads of state sat during the second (?) round of meetings during the summit. The building, the surrounding paths and gardens are absolutely gorgeous. The facilities are completely open to the public, and if I lived in Busan then I would probably go jogging there every day (all the walkways and roads are rubberized track).

I highly recommend it for anyone who is staying in Busan.
Step one: Busan aquarium.
Step two: hit Papa John's for lunch (see post below).
Step three: long leisurely walk along the beach in the direction of the Westin Chosun hotel.
Step four: 2005 APEC Summit village (entrance located on the other side of the hotel).

2005 APEC Summit Facilities in Busan, South Korea

Papa John's in South Korea!

Imagine my surprise and delight when we discovered a new Papa John's outlet in Haeundae when we were there a couple of weeks ago!

We quickly bundled ourselves up the stairs and sat down for some meat-covered pizza and a side of breadsticks.

Papa John's, my favorite pizza supplier when I was attending university in Ohio, is using former Korean national soccer team coach Guus Hiddink as the face of its movement into the Korean pizza market.

From what I can tell, South Korea has a far wider variety of sit-down pizza joints than Japan does. Most pizza places in Tokyo are delivery establishments led by big names such as Pizza Hut, Domino's and Pizza-La. Shakey's is the only major chain in Tokyo that I can think of that is primarily a pizza restaurant.

I think Papa John's could do well over here if they combine deliveries with a nice restaurant environment. Domino's just opened a shop near Hanakoganei train station that combines the two although I can't comment on how well or poorly the system is working for them.

Anyway, it was very nice to have a box of breadsticks again!

Papa John's in South Korea!

Watering the Shrubs

Nothing special, just thought this was funny.

I took this photo while walking down the street in Busan. Whoever was in charge of watering the shrubs out in front of the building didn't feel like it was worth the effort to go outside and hose them down the way a custodian in Japan probably would.

Not that there's anything wrong with that; I applaud the creativity.

Watering the Shrubs

Artsy South Korean Electrical Appliances

This captured my interest while I was browsing in an electronics store.

This isn't a photo of a picture frame. Well, it is a picture frame, but it's also something else.

It's an air conditioner.

South Korean appliances are leaning towards the floral these days with lots of companies opting for similar designs--lots of red appliances too.

In addition to this picture frame air conditioner, they had others that looked like paintings. It's a nice way to disguise that ugly unit hanging on the wall--especially if you can change the display.

Artsy South Korean Electrical Appliances

South Korean Beer

This has been going on for quite some time, but I always find it amusing when I go to the supermarket to buy some beer.

My first reaction when I look in the cooler is that beer is much cheaper in Korea than it is in Japan. It has always driven me crazy that I have to pay about 200 yen (two dollars) for a beer brewed in Japan that is only marginally better than a Miller Lite. And it always comes in a can!

In Korea you can generally expect to pay a dollar (1,000 won) for a glass bottle of comparable low-quality beer. Imports, naturally, cost more.

And one way that they keep costs down is the packaging they use in South Korea: plastic bottles.

This is primarily the case if one is looking to buy a 1.6 liter bottle of cheap summer brew, but smaller sizes are also available. So if you’re just visiting Korea, and browsing the aisles of the local grocery store in search of some soft drinks, just remember that you can’t feed everything that comes in a plastic bottle to the kids.

South Korean Beer

Bon Juk (본죽) Rice Porridge Restaurant

Another trend in South Korea, this one of a culinary nature, is the recent proliferation of "juk" restaurants. Juk is rice porridge and is considered to be very healthy.

Since the last time we were in Busan, a company called "Bon Juk" has set up camp at a large number of locations around the city.

When we visited a Bon Juk shop across the street from the DMV in Busan, we had a seafood juk and a beef juk. The picture here is of the seafood juk.

While not flashy, it was quite good (and very filling!).

I wonder if there are any juk shops in Shin-Okubo yet. If not, I imagine that this would go over quite well in Japan. I'd be willing to bet that one pops up somewhere in that part of Shinjuku ward before too long.

Bon Juk (본죽) Rice Porridge Restaurant

Trip to Busan (South Korea)

Just got back from a week in Busan, South Korea to spend time with family and friends.

It was great to see everyone and catch up--we hadn't made the trip since 2006.

As always, Korea changed a lot since the last time we were there. There are gadgets everywhere now; money, signatures and other personal information are often transmitted wirelessly in places as diverse as convenience stores and the DMV.

Other innovations/trends abounded as well, and one of them was the newest (?) type of vending machine that has popped up everywhere--a book vendor.

The one in this photo was at the DMV, but the most common place to find them is in train stations. Books (paperback) usually sell for 2,000 won each which is pretty cheap. 2,000 won is roughly the equivalent of 200 yen or two US dollars.

Trip to Busan (South Korea)

Christmas 2007

The next morning in Nasu. A cup of coffee before hitting the onsen (natural hot spring bath).

Christmas 2007

Christmas 2007

On vacation in Nasu (Tochigi prefecture). The Harvest Club hotel there is brand new and gorgeous. We've now been to four different HC hotels, and it's probably a tie right now between the Nasu hotel and their Kyu-Karuizawa hotel for top of the charts.

Christmas 2007

Sweet Snack Lady

This larger-than-life lady beckons customers inside a souvenier shop in Nikko. Her head is on a hinge, and she bows non-stop all day long.

Sweet Snack Lady

Trip to Enoshima

We had already taken a day trip out to Kamakura with our friends, Arata and Junko. This is a picture of the Buddha statue that Kamakura is famous for.

We headed out that way again a couple of weeks ago to commemorate our second anniversary. Yong-nam grew up near the ocean, so she really wanted to go somewhere with water for once (we always head for the hills when we have time to get away).

Enoshima is an island that is basically a tourist trap. It is connected to the mainland by a bridge that carries bike, car, and foot traffic. We didn't really spend any time on the mainland beach because it looked like this:



Unfortunately, this is the first thing we saw when we arrived on Enoshima:



Enoshima is basically a rocky mountain out in the water that is dotted with soba shops, souvenir shops, a big garden (that you have to pay to look at), a few escalators (that you have to pay to ride), and about 9 million cats.

I'm kidding about the cats, but the deal with the escalators is true.

There are a lot of cats though. A lot of cats! Apparently Enoshima has a very progressive immigration policy regarding stray felines. Every time you turn a corner in Enoshima, you are bound to see at least one cat.

Here are a few that we stumbled across:



I don't really remember a whole lot about our short tour around Enoshima, but I'm proud of the fact that the only thing we spent money on was ice cream.

For the record, Kamakura is definitely worth the trip, but I would advise finding a different beach. I don't think it's possible for all of them to be that dirty. I would only recommend going to Enoshima if you've already seen almost everything else in the Kanto region of Japan.

Trip to Enoshima

Fingerprinting and Photographing

Japan is set to level the playing field by requiring that all foreign nationals submit to fingerprinting and photographing at the nation's points of entry. The new system will start on November 20th.

This is a trend that was made all the rage when the United States started it a few years ago, and similar programs are being operated in countries from Europe to South America.

Like other nations, Japan's government sees this as, "a bid to block the entry into Japan of individuals designated as terrorists by the justice minister." Apparently nobody bothered to tell them that all recent terrorist acts committed within the Japanese homeland have been carried out by Japanese nationals.

Another major difference between the United States and Japan is how "free" the person is after clearing immigration at the airport. A visitor to America is, for the most part, allowed to go and do as she pleases (so long as it coincides with the type of visa that the person has in her passport). No special card is issued. Japan, on the other hand, requires that foreign nationals report any change in residence or job to their local ward or city office. They are also issued cards that mark them as non-Japanese and must carry these with them at all times (not doing so is illegal).

Personally, I am not a big fan of all the fingerprinting and photographing, and I would like to see it done away with everywhere. That said, Japan is perfectly justified in embarking upon a little tit-for-tat because Japanese people are forced to deal with this type of humiliation when they enter countries in Europe and the Americas.

At the same time, Japan should do away with the "gaijin cards" (foreign registration ID cards) now that it has an effective way to keep undesireables out of the country. With both systems intact, non-Japanese are essentially "on parole" while living in Japan.

Fingerprinting and Photographing

Zimbabwe's Language Worries

It seems that the tourist industry in Zimbabwe, in line with its plan to attract more Chinese visitors to the country (click here for outbound tourism numbers for China), endeavored to write some messages of welcome for the good people from the east. However, things became unraveled when:

...it became apparent at a media briefing that the Chinese were not
impressed by being greeted in the language of their great rivals, the
Koreans.

"We arrived at the Harare International Airport and felt embarrassed to see
messages meant for the Chinese written in Korean," said a member of the
delegation.

Zimbabwe Tourism Authority (ZTA), in a bid to save face, said the
organisation now would hire Chinese translators to correct the error and avoid
similar ones in future.

Oops.

On another note, I'm not exactly sure what the author meant by the title of this piece because the surnames Zhing and Zhong aren't readily found in Korea (click here or here for info on South Korean surnames). It is arguable, however, that we shouldn't be asking both the tourism industry AND the press corps to do their homework before dealing with foreign languages and peoples, so I'll stop being mean.

Zimbabwe's Language Worries

I don't like traveling to the US with my wife

The thought of traveling to the US with my wife is scary. It's not that the door-to-door travel time takes about 24 hours, or even that we have to sit in coach the entire way. The thing that scares me the most is US immigration / passport control.

My wife is from South Korea, and she loves spending time with my family in Vermont. However, the disrespect she receives when she enters the US has brought her to tears on more than one occasion.

South Korea, for those that don't know, does not qualify for the visa waiver program like Japan and a number of European countries. This means that a long wait and 'guilty until proven innocent' treatment are guaranteed at many US ports of entry. Despite having a ten year tourist visa stamped into her passport, she is questioned like a criminal every time she attempts to come back.

We have visited the states at least twice, and occasionally three times, a year since 2001. She always comes and goes when she says she's going to, and it's obvious (due to the nature of the questions) that every bit of information they ask for is written right on the screen in front of them. This isn't a situation where someone is traveling with a fake passport. My wife has entered and exited the US with the same passport for the past six years. Apparently there's no way to improve your reputation with the immigration officials. Even after several years of playing by the rules, visitors from other countries are greeted by some of the harshest people in uniform that we as a nation have to offer (click here for a peek at 2004 hourly rates for airport security personnel).

How do I know that all of this goes on? Because I get to watch it unfold every time we land.

I zip through the American citizens line at the airport in less than four or five minutes each time I go home. But then I have to sit and wait on the baggage pickup side of the immigration turnstiles for at least 40 minutes as my wife wilts in line. The immigration officers, who are often not the friendliest people when on the clock, are generally slow to react to large amounts of people lined up outside the 'foreign visitors' half of the hall. They emerge from the office, one at a time, and walk at a snail's pace toward their respective booths, take a couple of minutes to get everything set up just to their liking, and then rudely motion to the first person in their line to come forward for questioning. Oh, and if they forgot something in the office? They get up out of their chair, exit the booth, and walk even more slowly back to that central box with tinted windows. I'm confident that I have never seen people walk so slowly in my life! And meanwhile, these poor passengers' luggage is just waiting on the other side of the turnstiles for someone to walk off with it.

When it's finally my wife's turn for some questioning, fingerprinting, and a mugshot, she nervously answers the questions as politely as she can. I have been called in three times over the years to help expedite things. Sometimes I'm asked the same questions that she was just asked to verify the veracity of her statements. Maybe my wife fits the profile of a terrorist...? Or perhaps it's just that they find her attractive and the immigration officers resort to junior high school type nastiness to show their affection and win some more time talking at her.

I'm not doing a very good job of describing how messed up the whole system is, and how detrimental it is to America's image, but it basically all adds up to bullying and/or harassment. My wife and I have been waiting patiently for South Korea, America's biggest military ally and home to one of the most highly-educated populations in the world, to be granted visa waiver status, but there are a lot of politicians who are dragging their feet.

Is South Korea's delayed ascension to 'preferred nation' status the thing that truly makes my wife angry? No, it's not. The thing that enrages her is how a country that desires so badly to be loved and admired by the outside world would allow this kind of thing to happen (especially to a person who is married to one of its citizens). To be perfectly honest, I do not know that visitors from visa waiver countries are treated any better. A couple of my Japanese and British friends have reported similar treatment. What I do know is that every time we travel to the states my wife loses a bit of her love for America. And so do I.

Help is on the way?

The Discover America Partnership (DAP) is preparing to help a number of private-sector groups pressure the Bush administration to ease up on its visa regulations. As it turns out, there are a lot of people out there who have experienced the same things that my wife has. Despite the fact that global travel is booming, the number of foreign visitors to the US is still down since September, 2001, and this poses serious ramifications for businesses, universities, and the tourism industry. The DAP estimates that the US has shut itself out of 93 billion dollars due to post 9/11 visa restrictions. That means that the government, by way of its own sluggishness in addressing these issues, has forfeited a cool 15 billion in tax revenues.

Universities in other countries have begun advertising that they don't have a US style visa system, and that marketing campaign has been seen as successful in luring students away from the states. Studying English (or some other subject) in England or Australia would be a fantastic experience to be sure. However, when people are choosing not to study in America because the hassle of getting in is too great, and other economies are benefiting from said hassles, there is obviously a problem that needs to be addressed.

I have a feeling that people living and working in the US are largely unaware that they are not highly regarded in other countries. The DAP asserts that one way to reverse that reality is to make it easier for travelers to visit the United States. For starters, they could eliminate mugshots and fingerprinting for return visitors. My wife and I would certainly appreciate that.

I don't like traveling to the US with my wife