Apologies for any typos you see: I’m still adjusting to the itty bitty keyboard on my Asus Eee and, well, you know… Someone I know recently told me how she has learned to take pleasure in refusing requests that make no sense. There will always be some people who will ask you to do something — often some work for them often unpaid. It’s all in how they ask, though. Sometimes I’m willing to do a favour for a friend, sometimes I’m glad to pitch in on a project for a good cause. When someone who is neither a friend …
Category: KOREA
Rewrite?
When the first written comment on your essay reads, “This borders on completely unreadable,” and the professor stops writing editorial marks a few pages in after complaining of the paper’s incomprehensibility having given him a headache, then you should not be surprised — let alone shocked — when he expects you to redraft the thing completely when you resubmit it for as a final draft.
When Governments Are Quarrelling…
When governments are quarreling, The little folk get caught between: They say, “But wait! There is a way!” But none by bureaucrats is seen. “Fill this form out in triplicate, But no, not with that sort of pen. And this one was due yesterday, So now, you must submit again.” Submit, submit, papers and soul, Upon the desk the papers pile, And standing in the queue, souls wait, Submitting to the foul and vile. Like lice, they invade everywhere, And cling, and suck the living blood From institutions. We need them? Why? What official added to the common good? No, …
Things You Learn Grading Student Essays
No, really. This is not a litany of typos and mistakes and the like… instead, this post is made of meat… that is, of truly interesting facts I learned grading essays this week: Everyone knows that the world leader in sex-change operations is Thailand. But did you know that the runner-up is Iran? Wikipedia says so, therefore it must be, er… plausible? Now, why is Iran so big on sex change operations? For some reason, John McCain singing, “Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran,” comes to mind. That’d probably be the biggest mass death of transsexuals on earth. And then, sadly, …
How to Mess Up Your Kid, or, Is There a Korean Kids Help Phone?
“How was your dinner?” the shop lady asked me. I sputtered, in Korean, “The food was good, but this crazy… crazy… this crazy b-i-t-c-h messed up my whole evening. You know, if this were Canada, I’d call the cops. And the cops would come, and it wouldn’t be easy for her. She would have a problem.” Because, obviously, the woman did have a problem. I hate the B-word. I use it very rarely. (And even less so in Korean, though I don’t know a good insulting but less-extreme word I could have used instead.) To understand why I went ahead …
Stuff Going On
Well, lots of things going on… in a personal sense, too, though I’m not ready to blog my recent news. Instead: There’s some great fiction online that I need to link to. For now, just one story: the wonderfully nastyglee party that is Tina Connolly’s “A Day Out, with Stereoscopes” is up at Birkensnake. I’ve a copy of the zine, actually, and it’s lovely. You could do worse than to subscribe. Tina has a talent for mixing the cute with the horrifying. Ever heard of Drapetomania? It’s this disease that can be summed up as “longing to be free and …
“Soybean Paste Girls” as a Barometer of, or Catalyst of, Consumerization of Korean Society?
I have a cold, so I’m keeping this relatively brief; hopefully it will also be relatively coherent. I was thinking in EMart the other day. (E-Mart, for those who aren’t in Korea, is the big grocery chain here.) Lime and I had just been in a restaurant, and the food had some to the table, well, er, unacceptably cold. I complained, and the server’s first reaction was to tell me, “No, it’s supposed to be a little cold.” To which I responded, “Uh, no, it’s not.” With an implied, Yes, it’s Western food, and yes, I do know what the …
Bruce Sterling at Lift 2008, Jeju
I thought about going to the Lift conference in Jeju, just because Bruce Sterling was talking there. I didn’t get around to it, but thanks to a post by Florence Chee, I was made aware of the online video of his talk. For anyone interested in Korea, the future, and/or SF, it’s worth checking out, since Bruce Sterling is a major SF author and futurist, and since it’s all about Korea. Unfortunately, I think Bruce skipped the likeliest solution to the problems he outlines early on in his talk: physical restraint. I suspect that the North Korean borders will become …
How Candlegirl and V Took on 2MB
It feels so long ago, but I still think it’s worth a look back: My article on the SFnal side of the anti-2MB protests that rocked Seoul this past summer, titled “How Candle Girl and V Took on 2MB”, is now up at the excellent Clarkesworld. It touches on the political reception and adaptation of foreign SF, techno-protest culture, Korean politics and food-culture, and more. Not quite something for everyone, but lots of stuff swirling around the nexus there. The ending is a bit, well, dated — I wrote it back in August, and it sounds like the protests just …
More SF Goodness, Including a Bunch of Korean SF in Translation…
I’m thinking I should start a reference page for all the Korean-SF goodness I’ve been coming across, and just link my post series from there. For those living in Seoul and interested in seeing SF films with other SF enthusiasts, editor/critic/translator Park Sang-Jun has teamed up with the proprietor of a newly-relocated cinema in Shinchon to put together Cinema Odyssey an SF & Fantasy film club that will meet periodically to view screenings of SF films. (That link is the Naver cafe, so you need to be logged into Naver to access it.) I met with Park on Friday just …