Lack of planning in Korean soaps.

"Dave's ESL Cafe" poster and fellow Jeonnam resident agentX put up an interesting piece from the Dong-A Ilbo about the extreme lack of planning that goes into making Korean dramas. The two-week-old article reads, in part:

No other countries broadcast more dramas than Korea. Perhaps because of Korea’s emotion-rich ethnicity, Korea offers all kinds of dramas, including morning, daily, weekend, Monday and Tuesday (Wednesday and Thursday), and special dramas. Despite the richness in quantity however, drama producers have to bear with substandard production conditions. A prime example is the so-called “page script” system that gives actors lines for the day’s shooting only. Sometimes actors and actresses do not receive scripts until after they finish their makeup. These “page scripts” arrive by fax or e-mail, page by page. Worse yet, they are sometimes transmitted by mobile text messages sentence by sentence.

Since actors and actresses have to act their parts without knowing what will happen next, it is hard for them to identify with their characters. Furthermore, they cannot rehearse with their counterparts beforehand because everyone is busy memorizing their own lines. Acting by “page script” often means they have to stay up all night, sometimes pushing them to breakdowns. For the producers, they are kept in the dark about the shooting location until the “page script” is released. Since this allows no time to ask for cooperation at the locations beforehand, producers sometimes damage properties on location, such as cultural assets. The biggest problem with “page scripts” is deterioration in drama quality because the flow of the story may be interrupted at each page.

Funny stuff. The assault the article mentions in the first paragraph refers to an incident between actor Yoo Dong-geun and staff members of an SBS drama. Yoo was pissed b/c the last-minute stuff had stressed out his wife, who also stars on the program. From a little piece on the incident and Yoo's apology:

Yoo was enraged because the scripts were turned in late, which exhausted Jeon. He visited the set and had a bust-up with two of the producers, Kim Yong-woo, who took four weeks to recover, and Lee Chang-woo, whose jaw was hurt.
Yoo went into hiding after the incident. Kim and Lee, supported by the SBS Producers’ Association and Producer Journal demanded that Yoo apologize and admit responsibility.

Chosun Ilbo: "How Manga Reflect Resurgent Japanese Chauvinism"

Park Soon-ae, a professor of Japanese at Gwangju's Honam University is troubled by a trend she sees in Japanese comics. From the Chosun Ilbo:

“Postwar Japanese comics have been through several stages -- fear of war, nihilism and otaku-like obsession. Now, they directly analyze the war and even support imperialism.” So says Prof. Park Soon-ae at the department of Japanese Language and Literature at Honam University. Prof. Park's paper about how manga deal with war, was published in the latest issue of the biannual magazine Japan Space.

I don't know anything about that, but Wikipedia tells us that both On War, a recent comic mentioned in the Chosun Ilbo article, and its author Yoshinori Kobayashi are pretty out there.

As an aside, I wonder if anyone over at Honam U. is aware that, among the letter blocks they've used to represent "English" on the English Language Department webpage is a number 4. Funny/sad. I would suggest that one of six the foreigners there fix it, but they are designated as lecturers, not professors, and are thus probably not qualified to make such an executive decision.

김효진 is Annoying.

Meet Kim Hyojin. She stars with 남궁선 and others on the TV show "Talk and City" (토크&시티)" which too frequently comes between me and entertainment on an otherwise good channel, "Story On."



The entire show is pretty irritating, but Hyojin especially annoys me to no end. I can't quite put my finger on it. I guess I just find her extremely loud, brutish and out of place in the fashionable or sophisticated locations she and her cohost are disturbing in that particular episode. "Talk and City" is probably a Korean equivalent of Dave Attell and his show Insomniac, and perhaps as the ugly one her job is to provide a comic foil to the only-slightly-less obnoxious 궁선. However, I do find that Hyojin looks about as natural in the latest high-fashion trends of 1987 as a spaniel in a Halloween costume, and, whether she's gnawing on some baguettes or forcing mangled Engrish words into her observations, the 31-year-old comports herself with the grace and elegance of a middle school girl at a Super Junior concert. I reckon the show is not about the places they visit but rather the stars' reactions to them, though we might expect a little more from a fashion designer and an actress. The presence of loud tourists and overbearing talkshow hosts---who, if you watch the program, spend a lot of time talking over their "foreign" interviewees---doesn't exactly provide counterbalance to the reputation Korean travellers have earned.

Normally I don't mind people that end up annoying Europeans, but her show is a bit much. Since I can't get the video to embed for some reason, go here instead to see a little clip of the show. See, I don't know exactly what it is . . . but her and 김원희 just annoy me to no end.


No.

There are evidentally three notable 김효진s. One is a model and one is an actress who likes to play with African kids and who jumped on the trend a year before Lee Hyori. Thus, an image search will produce some interesting photos, but will mercifully not turn up many shots of the host pictured atop this entry.

A lot of people don't like Chae-yeon.

According to a survey whose methodology I don't understand, Gwangyang's own Chae-yeon (채연) had the most number of registered antis, or people who don't like her. Her 8,630 antis are way more than the second- and third-place people combined. I like her, if that counts for anything.



The Chosun Ilbo tells us what makes her sexy, though it apparently works to make lots people jealous:

Chae Yeon has a lovely nose as well as overall sex appeal. It is the mole, or beauty spot, that makes her nose look so cute. Her sexy choreography is as hot as Lee Hyo-lee’s.

The same article also tells us what makes Seo In-young so special:

Seo In-young maximizes her strong point with a fashion style that highlights her waist, hips and crotch. At 1.62 m tall, she is the smallest of the four, but like IVY’s, her legs make up for it on stage.

LMFAO. Seo In-young, who I hadn't even heard of until about four minutes ago, is the third-place person I alluded to above. She and Chae-yeon appeared together in April on a show called "Musicbank." They used lots of rain in their performance, and had to do it because apparently the original version was too risque for prudish South Korean sensibilities. Pop Seoul has the pics here, but they're not really safe for work.

Seo In-young is also famous for pole dancing.

* Edit: Now I remember Seo In-young. She came out with this irritating song a year or two ago.

You look nervous.

According to some reports, one component of the new E-2 visa regulations will be a face-to-face interview at the Korean consulate nearest the applicant's hometown. For some reason I anticipate it will go something like this:

The Brian.

Introductory classes usually go pretty well because, in lieu of teaching skill, I have a ready-made ice breaker. I share my name with "브라이언," one half of the singing duo "Fly to the Sky." My first year my hagwon students would always write "I love Brian" on their desks, and I was afraid that the bosses would think I was compelling them to do that. The students, it turns out, did not love me at all but were actually writing about the crooner of the month.

While looking around for something else I found a video of Brian speaking English. I was surprised to see that he's fluent.



Turns out he was born in Los Angeles and raised in New Jersey. There are a few Korean pop stars who spent significant time overseas, including members of hip-hop groups like Epik High, Dynamic Duo, and Drunken Tiger. It also turns out that, like all Korean-Americans from Los Angeles, Brian speaks English like Rosie Perez.



Wikipedia tells us that he is only 21 days older than me and that, in 2006, he released an album titled The Brian.



I definitely have to work that into my lessons at every possible opportunity.

In October I read a little article wondering whether Brian was gay. The Chosun Ilbo's tabloid sports insert has the scoop on the incident, which stemmed from an appearance on a popular MBC comedy show:

During the broadcast on Thursday, the 16th, where Lee Sang-won participated as the guest performer in “Fire Engine”, Lee asked to Brian of “Fly to the Sky”, “you wear women’s clothes and made friends with the singer Eru, so what’s going on?” Brian was unable to hide his puzzled appearance and explained. He said, “I’m just good friends with Eru so you’ve misunderstood it. And yes, Eru sometimes comes to my house to hang out, goes to sleep and then leaves." (translated by Korea Beat)

The article continues:

In the end, Lee asked Brian to do push-ups to prove that he is a real man.

I guess the rumors that Brian was gay and dating his new singing partner were big news in 2007 among talk shows and 16-year-olds.

Brian's Wikipedia page also has a "controversy" section, which I found hilarious at first, but now seems timely in light of a recent post. He got himself into some trouble over the US military incident in 2002 in which two middle school girls were accidentally killed. Wikipedia tells us:

Joo's ties to the United States stirred controversy in 2002, when Fly to the Sky was the host of the radio show "1010 Club." At that time, the murder of two teenage Korean girls by an American soldier stationed in South Korea caused a surge in anti-American sentiment. Because of Joo's American citizenship, guest Hyun Jin Young asked for his opinion regarding this matter. In response, Joo stated that while the American soldier must be brought to justice, he did not want relations between Korea and the United States, his home country, to become strained. His comments were reported as "You can't talk badly about the United States in front of me.. I'm an American. Please only hate the American soldiers (responsible for the incident)." (내앞에서 미국에 대해 나쁘게 얘기하면 안된다...나는 미국인이다..(사건을 일으킨) 미군 부대만 싫어해달라).

I don't have too many facts about this controversy. Both links given on the Wikipedia page are broken. Googling around turns up different dates, different quotations, and interpretations like:

In 2003, Brian stirred up controversy when he was misquoted during a radio interview. At that time, anti-American sentiments were high because an American soldier had murdered two teenage girls.

I'm a little surprised that a guy could get misquoted so badly, but given the media bias here and the political expediency of fanning the flames of anti-Americanism, it's not surprising that a guy could get knocked around like that. I'm a little tempted to bring up the 2002 controversy in a teachers' workshop, just out of curiosity.

You can tell I have a day off today because I also want to bring up another little controversy that stems from Brian's dual identity as a Korean and an American. According to one K-pop site, Brian and other pop stars chose American citizenship over Korean for one reason:

The Koreans think that they gave up their Korean nationality to escape from the compulsory military service and that they should not make a fortune in Korea.

I don't know how widespread that belief is, but I do know the issue of dual-citizneship is a tricky one. According to the US Embassy in Korea's site, "[t]he Government of the Republic of Korea does not permit dual citizenship after the age of 21." It continues:

In addition, South Korean men over the age of 18, including American citizens of Korean descent, are subject to compulsory military service. A dual national may not be allowed to abandon his ROK nationality until he finishes his military service, or has received a special exemption from military service. There have been several instances in which young American men of Korean descent, who were born and lived all of their lives in the United States, arrived in the ROK for a tourist visit only to find themselves drafted into the South Korean army.

Internet searches will bring up examples and more information. I'm pretty ignorant on that topic. It does seem absurd that a Korean-American, who was born in the US and lived there until about age 16, and who acquired fluent English would choose American citizenship just to dodge compulsory military service. The idea isn't out of the ordinary, though, and Korea Times columnist managed to put together a decent article when he wrote about Yoo Seung-joon, the Korean singer who in 2002 was barred from entering Korea after taking US citizenship in order to skip military service. Lim also brings up golfer Christina Kim (김초롱), the Korean-American who invited some fan scorn here when she was seen cheering for the American team at a tournament. It's also worth remembering a quotation by golfer Michelle Wie's father, made while pandering to Korean audiences in a 2006 interview:

I’m well aware there that some say, since Michelle Wie is an American why is she making such a fuss. But you know what, the only thing about her that’s American is her passport, she is “definitely” Korean.

I tire pretty quickly of such Korean-American, American-Korean squabbles, and I normally skip any message board threads with "gyopo" in the title. It is interesting to think about Brian's case, though, because unlike Michelle Wie and Christina Kim (I guess), Brian Joo is entirely unknown in the U.S. I'm sure he's popular here for his looks and his voice, but I'll bet a huge part of his gimmick is his ability to speak English. That's what shows up on the talk show clips, anyway. I can understand how Koreans feel compelled to claim him as their own, given his bloodline and his fanbase here. But if you look at Brian's media miscue from a few years ago, and his statement that his Korean skills aren't 100%, it's easy to wonder how Korean he really can be.

Batman, "The Dark Knight" trailer

Officially released on Monday. Awesome.

Prudential commercials.

Here are two recent commercials from Prudential Financial, advertising life insurance with very cute babies. The first one is absolutely hilarious.





The videos are authentic "user created content," according to the fine print on the bottom. Thanks to Mongdori for the walk-through on embedding Korean videos, and thanks to Daum for making the process much easier than Naver.

Juno and Jenny, Juno

Evidentally one of the higher rated movies of the year is Juno, a comedy about "whip-smart teen confronting an unplanned pregnancy by her classmate Bleeker," according to Wikipedia. IMDB says: "Faced with an unplanned pregnancy, an offbeat young woman makes an unusual and bizarre decision regarding her unborn child." I don't know what that decision is because I've never seen the movie.

When I saw the trailer on TV here I immediately thought of the 2005 Korean movie Jeni, Juno (제니주노, can be romanized Jenny or Jeni). A summary from a blog on Koreanfilm.org (via Gusts of Popular Feeling):

Yesterday was the press screening of Jenny, Juno, a story about a 15-year old boy and girl who discover that, after having things get a little out of control one night, they are expecting a baby. This film from the director of My Little Bride has stirred up a little controversy of its own these days. The Korea Media Ratings Board originally gave it an 18+ rating, despite the complete absence of any onscreen sex, nudity, violence, or foul language (distributor Show East was expecting a 12+ rating). The ratings board instead cited the very idea of the film itself as being potentially damaging to young viewers -- one board member reportedly said, apparently seriously, "If we let this through, soon they'll be making films about elementary school students having sex!"

The writer of Juno addresses the coincidence on her blog:

Unbeknownst to me, we had another spiritual cousin out there, a Korean movie called Juno Jenny. This time, the cousinry goes one step further and the movie is about--seriously--a pregnant teenager and her cute, sweet boyfriend. (The guy character is named Juno, not the girl.) There's no adoption subplot and apparently the film is otherwise dissimilar to mine, but how fucked up is that? I bring this up because a journalist drilled me about it recently--awkward!--and also because I saw someone on our IMDB board wondering if Juno was a remake of the K-flick. So for the record, 1.) it isn't a remake 2.) I haven't seen Juno Jenny, though I want to now, and 3.) I don't think anyone would even bat an eye about this if my film was called Jenny. The name Juno is just so darned distinctive that confusion is inevitable.

Actually, I think Jonny addressed this in the most succint way: "Like you'd watch a Korean movie."

Yeah, well, I'm not sure I buy that it's a coincidence. The plots deviate in a few key areas, although I find the similarities too. . . similar.

Anyway, here's a portion of a review of Jenny, Juno from 2005 from the blog All For The Love of Movies:

What I'm afraid of is the impression that this movie might give to young audience. Raising children by children isn't like raising puppies that only need to be fed and played with. It takes more than that. The film failed to emphasized that or even mention it. Aside from that, what saddens me is that abortion becomes part of the choices. Shouldn't it be not mentioned at all?

Anyway, as a romantic/drama movie, this one had surely soared high! It's great! One of the best, I should say, especially for being so bold in tackling such topic. However though, I'd advised parents to see this films with their teens and not let them get the impressions that teen pregnancy is cool! Despite that, this one tops my favorites list!

Take a look at the Popular Gusts post I mentioned earlier for some social context on teenage sex in Korean movies. In case you were wondering, UNICEF---in A League Table of Teenage Births in Rich Nations---has data on "births to women aged below 20 per 1,000 15 to 19 year olds." South Korea has 2.9, the lowest out of all nations examined, while the US has 52.1, the highest. Elsewhere in the report it says that 5,621 births to women under 20 in South Korea in 1998. There were 494,357 in the US. Even adjusting for the great population difference (roughly 48 million to 300 million), South Korea has 93% fewer such births in comparison to the States. You can read the document here, in .pdf form.

That's not to say that there aren't bizarre attitudes toward teengers and sex in South Korea (see here and here, for example), but based on the numbers I think it's a little inappropriate for a country with the highest rate of teenage pregnancy among "rich nations" to use the words "comedy" and "teenage pregnancy" in the same sentence.



* edit: As if you needed further evidence that I should never be a math teacher, I just realized that there's no reason to account for the population difference, because the stats out of 1,000 would---duh---still be the same.

Love Story in Harvard.

I was happy when I learned that episodes of Love Story in Harvard were available on youtube with English subtitles. I'm not smart enough to be able to watch and understand Korean TV, and I was eager to see some dramas.



I could barely make it through the first episode. Absolutely terrible, and not in the sobaditsgood way. The Caucasian actors are awful, but that's nothing new in an Asian movie or television program. The spoken English is, thankfully, subtitled. What bothers me, beyond the run of the mill bastardization of my native language, is that the show's producers felt that a guy who talks like that has what it takes to enroll and compete in one of the most prestigious universities in the world. It'd be one thing if you had, say, Daniel Henney in that role, although I'm sure some Koreans wouldn't want to listen to him for too long.

I haven't researched the show much, beyond looking it up on Wikipedia. Is the premise a rags-to-riches story? An after-hagwon special to encourage kids to study hard? Is it just a fluff piece that plays into the fascination with "Ivy League" here? Whatever, I just don't think it indicates a very respectful attitude toward the US or its universities when you imply that anyone can get in. It'd be like an American getting into the University of Tokyo on the strength of his tattoos and his Pokemon collection.



I could really do without the attitude and shit-eating grin. Not sure why some Koreans feel the need to drop the politeness in English just because they're not using honorific speech. See, that's why I wonder if it's the right thing to do to accept an Asian student just because they donate money.

Anyway, episode 1 is here, and the others can be found on youtube.

Wonder Girls and Soulja Boy

One of the benefits of living overseas is that I’m pretty much out of the pop cultural loop both in Asia and back home. I don’t follow entertainment news from the US, or pay attention to celebrity gossip, or watch MTV, or do anything much more than check “What Would Tyler Durden Do?” every day. And the language barrier prevents me from really knowing what the kids are talking about over here. I do watch MTV, and I read the 낙서 on my students’ desks, and I glance at some of the pop culture entries on local blogs, but for the most part I’m blisfully unaware.

I guess the newest pop culture craze in Korea is the Wonder Girls and their song “Tell Me,” a story I broke back in October. It’s hard to escape the song, but since their story’s been covered to death on blogs and messageboards I won’t really say too much more on them, other than to mention that my fortysomething coworker recently added the song as her ringtone.


Aged 15 to 19.

What I find a little bizarre, and kind of sad, is the reaction the Wonder Girls have gotten among foreigners in Korea. The moral indignation with which a lot of bloggers and posters have reacted to this apparent offense to their refined sensibilities is laughable, and is about as awkward as . . . well, about as awkward as old people talking about young people usually is.

Some people are pissed because of the similarities they see between the “Tell Me” song and the Stacy Q song “Two of Hearts.” Korean entertainers (and corporations, for that matter) are notorious for ripping off intellectual property, and nobody really seems to mind. Last year’s big hit “Maria,” actually a cover of this Blondie song, comes to mind, as does the Britney Spears v. Lee Hyori lawsuit, the Starbucks v. Starpreya suit, and the big page Occidentalism did a few years ago . . . and those are the things I could come up with without having to do any real work.

Others seem pissed because the girls are far too young to be parading around shaking what they would have were they not far too young or far too Asian. The Metropolitician goes into it a little bit, and makes the connection between the girls and the popularity of prostitution and wonjo kyojae (원조교재, or prostitution by students).

I can't seem to separate WG from many of the actual hard and heavy lusting for teen girls that goes on in this culture. Yeah, perhaps there was some of that in Britney Spears, but in that case, there wasn't a parallel industry built around young, underaged girls actually selling their bodies to men. And "wonjokyojae" (Japanese "enjokyosai") isn't just in Japan, nor are "gravure" nudie pics. And to me, the fact that such overt sexual behavior is encouraged and defended amongst a large number of young girls is testament to just how mainstreamed the coveting of their sexuality has become.

Certainly the group wasn’t formed in a vacuum, and their conception and popularity owe to trends in society as a whole. From a Chosun Ilbo piece, “Pop Life is Tough Work,” from mid-October,

The girls looked tired in their short skirts. "We sing seven or eight times after finishing school every day," says one of the Wonder Girls, somehow managing a bright smile. The five Wonder Girls -- Sun-mi, Sun-ye, Ye-eun, Yoo-bin and So-hee -- were wearing heavy makeup and their individually unique, funky outfits. "We really feel our popularity when 30-year-old guys ask us for autographs. It's amazing. It seems like people have been waiting for easy songs like ours."

I do wonder how appropriate it is to make a connection between dancers and hookers. There are different standards of behavior, to be sure. At school festivals it's common to see girls wearing tube tops and gyrating around. In Jinju there was a photo shoot during the Lantern Festival with prepubescent girls in very revealing clothing (holding swords, so that hits a few different fetishes). And on a few occassions I've heard teachers telling their (elementary and middle school) students "sexy pose" while taking pictures.

Others are just pissed because they think the song is stupid, and people who listen to stupid songs are stupid. I find this the most ridiculous complaint of all, and, really nobody under the age of 60 ought to be making it. Every few years there is a new pop act deemed a harbinger of the apocalypse, and folks begin pining for whichever one-hit wonder represents the pinnacle of civilization for their generation. According to another Metropolitician incarnation, Feet Man Seoul:

So, I'm just gonna say it: the Wonder Girls have no talent. None. Oh, come on. Don't get mad. Just think about it objectively for a minute. They can't sing AT ALL and they can't dance to SAVE THEIR LIVES.

I don’t have much of an opinion on the Wonder Girls, and I haven’t whipped myself into a frenzy (not a euphamism) over what a segment of a foreign country’s population chooses to dance to. The little frustration I do feel toward the song is that it made a very common request, “tell me,” into a gag, so I can’t go into class and say “tell me the answer” without all the students going apeshit. It’s irritating, and I wish my students had better English-language role models, but I guess when one of the largest corporate entitiees in the country decides that “Bravo Your Life” is the way to go, then you’re screwed.

I'm sure smarter blogs than mine can tackle the issue of 원조교재 better than I, can look at the ways the sex trade influences Korean adolescents, and can offer their opinions on the relationship between the Wonder Girls and the practice of teenage prostitution. You can, for instance, get a nice run-down of 원조교재 and prostitution in Korea from Gusts of Popular Feeling here. I'm not even going to get into how whorish the Wonder Girls are. I haven't watched any of the videos, and aside from doing an image search for this post, haven't seen any of their pictures.

I did get to thinking, though, about how harmful the Wonder Girls really are. More specifically, how do they compare to some of the bullshit going on the US pop cultural landscape. I did mention earlier that I don't really keep up with the trends back home. Once in a while I do come across an article linked from another blog, and a short while ago I read a post called "The 9 Worst Trends of 2007." I was largely indifferent to most of the finalists---I didn't even know "that's a good look for you" was trendy, and can't imagine a black person ever saying it---but the one that did stick out was "Retard Rap." It seems a little redundant, and I am really surprised that garbage like crunk has survived as long as it has.


17 years old.

The guy in the picture, I found out, is "Soulja Boy," and his big hit is "Crank That," which is evidentally as big a hit as "Tell Me." "Crank That" has a little different a vibe, with lyrics like:

Soulja Boy Off In This Hoe / Watch Me Crank It / Watch Me Roll / Watch Me Crank Dat Soulja Boy / Then Super Man Dat Hoe / Now Watch Me Do

And then he repeats stuff a bunch of times. If you want to superman a ho, by the way, you have to ejaculate on her back and put a towel on her that will stick when she stands up, a la Superman. Now watch me do. Anyway, I could only take about 40 seconds of the song, and 20 seconds of another example of retard rap from 2007, "Laffy Taffy." (You'll have to find it yourself, I'm not going to sully this blog with a link to it.) I'm not sure what makes this year's products more "retarded" than other hip-hop of the last decade, but I guess things must've hit rock bottom when you have 50 Cent---"We say you a wanksta, and you need to stop frontin'"---talkin shit on you and calling you a dumb fuck.

Interestingly, a few days ago on Deadspin (sports blog) I saw links to a couple videos of people doing the Soulja Boy Dance. Cheerleaders, football players, basketball teams, little kids, white people, cartoons, instructional videos, etc. That's what jogged my memory about the worst trends article, and it doesn't say much about a song that, after seeing an unrelated video, a viewer can say "Wait, that's retarded!"

As I mentioned up there, more able bloggers can get into how detrimental a trend like the "Tell Me" craze can be to a society. Or, they can use a lot of hyperbole and conjecture as an excuse to post racy pictures and link to their friends. I personally am far more troubled by the ghetto fabulous aesthetic in the US and the culture of uneducated, misguided marble-mouths it both typifies and perpetuates.

Back when I was a kid, and probably long before, people were complaining about rap, about its language, about its fashion, and about the values it promoted. A lot of us turned out all right, and a lot of the fears were unfounded (the gyrating, potty-mouthed Vanilla Ice did not ruin a generation). You do have entire demographics, though, measuring out their lives in porch steps, content with emulating their rock-slinging, ho-supermaning idles/idols in the neighborhood.

At least the Wondergirls go to school; Soulja Boy is a drop out. You can slam them all you want (not a euphamism), but their fans are still among the highest educated in the world. Soulja Boy's fans live in a country rife with teenage pregnancy, gun violence, and low test scores. The Wonder Girls have bastardized another bit of English---like "have a good time"---though Soulja Boy thought it prudent to glorify the mispronunciation of "soldier," especially when his country is at war. Personally, I'd rather have my students incessantly singing "tell me tell me tellmetellmetellmetellme" than have them going on about fucking, smoking, shooting, and spending.

Korean Oldies and Classic Rock

A week ago I posted a question on Dave's ESL Cafe asking for information about Korean oldies and classic rock. I found a few links, so I thought I'd repost them here for anyone interested. This site has music from the 50s through the 00s, though it looks like most of it is from the 70s and 80s. There are, as of this post, 312 songs, and to browse you click the numbers at the bottom of the page. If you click directly on a link below, you can change songs by hitting "다음글" for next, or "이전글" for previous. Here are a few that I liked, and I'll be linking more as I find them (and please pardon my poor translations; I doubt their entirely accurate):

* 신중현과 엽전등, "바람," from 1975.
Shin Jung-hyeon and the Coins (?), "Wind."

*김선, "떠나야 할 그 사람," from 1969.
Kim Seon, "The One That's Leaving" (?)

*정훈희, "안게," from 1967.
Jeong Hun-hui, "Fog." This song was covered by current pop star BoA. See the video here.

*임희숙, "고향 하늘은 멀어도," from 1973.
Im Hui-suk, "Hometown sky is far away, too."

There are also a few good songs by the band He6 (히식스) on this naver blog. Numbers 3, 4, and 5 are good (you'll have to hit the "stop" button on the first one before you play the others.) The second #1 is a cover of "Proud Mary."

I'm going to spend some time digging around when I get the chance, and hopefully I find more good songs to post.