Korean Labor and Goods

So I needed to get a new bridge for my violin. I got it from Julie's Mom in March 07 when she passed away she gave it to me. It's beautiful-sounding and has a lot of character (meaning it's not all varnished up like a new one)- and it's over 100 years old. Carved in 1903 or 1907, it's a Stradivarius copy but it sounds like a real one to me! Then again, I have an untrained ear.
I took it down to Insa-dong Market with the kids and for 25,000 won (about $20 USD) and in 20 minutes, it had a new bridge and for another 12,000 won, I got tuners put on the tailpiece. 35,000 won got me a new set of D'Addario Helicore Strings which is cheaper than the US. I was just amazed it was done so fast. In Papillion at a certain music store that will remain nameless- I dropped off a cherrywood bow and the guy ruined it trying to get the old horsehair out of it. I should have refused to pay for that and really let them have it, but I'd bought a carbon-fiber bow at a better shop in town. So when I go to the States, I can expect more of that. So I'd better not get used to it.
And I got a music stand for 22,000 won. It's a really nice one, too. Julie likes to play duets with me, but doesn't like when I look over her shoulder and play in her ear. So a music stand will help her out. Cheap won, cheap stuff. Korea ROCKS!
We got a Christmas gift for a Korean orphan for around $30- a remote control car. Treasures in the markets are a lot of fun. You can find all sorts of stuff and the trick is - you're not looking for it right then, but if you don't get it, you'll never see it again. That's the hard part.
Finally, we're getting a Wii for Christmas. They're $250 on base at the PX and 257,000 won ($190 USD) off base. But the Korean ones don't play US games and don't come with much. But I found controllers off-base at the Electronics Market and they're 27,000 won. If it works on our Wii, I just saved a bundle on accessories. If it doesn't, I only lost 27,000 won. I'm going to test it out on Chris Chang's Wii. Then I need the stuff for Wii Fit, Rock Band and Guitar Hero. And the dance thing or whatever.
Oh, and I want one of those nice Daelim Motorcycle Trucks. It's a copy of a Kawasaki Ninja (Hyosung also makes a Ninja Knockoff) with a mini-bongo bed. There's only one word to describe how people ride motorcycles around here - DEATHWISH.

Korean TV

OK, so we live off-Post (it's an Army Post, not an Air Force Base) so we don't get the government-issued TV. We do have cable TV and internet here (at least the internet is in English). The vast majority of TV channels are Korean. So there's a lot of TV dramas that have people talking to each other and to me, it feels like they're going to start hitting each other any minute. Lots of tension. Then again, they may be just saying hi- but it sure looks intense. Anyway, they also show a lot of subtitled CSI and Law and Order. I don't know how the people read that fast, because I'll glance at the characters and try to sound out the word, but it changes way too fast. I do know all the sounds to the Hangul characters, but not when they're on screen for 2 nanoseconds.
The nice thing here, is they show very limited commercials, so you see most of the show at once. Then at the end, there's 15 minutes of commercials. So you just mute the TV and get stuff done. I need to post some of the commercials here, because they're funny. There's one that's not funny at all, it's kind of scary. There's a mountain in the middle of Seoul (there's really a lot of them), with the S Korean flag (Taegugki) on the top of the mountain, and all these giant hands start digging at the mountain and the flag starts to fall. Then other giant hands grab the flag and hold it up and fix the mountain. At the very end, there's a little family and they all hold up their pointer finger and the announcer says a bunch of stuff in Korean and then the phone number 111 ("il, il, il") pops on the screen. I didn't get what it was about and my description was too hard for my ROK counterparts to understand, until one of them that used to live in the US explained it to me. It's to report N Korean activities (like if you see someone plant a bomb or do something suspicious). Brought to you by the National Intelligence Service: http://eng.nis.go.kr/app/main/index
They have an immigration threat that makes the guest worker program in the US look Nobel Peace Prize material. People mostly go to the US to work and earn money. If they come here, it's usually to assassinate someone. So they have 55 years of paranoia that's worked its way into daily life.
Other commercials are for cars, kimchi refrigerators, and telephone services. Most are weird to Americans. But they seem to get our stuff, or it wouldn't be on here.
Maybe the US should show all the commercials at the end of the show- I wouldn't complain.
The kids watch Disney Asia which is more themed toward this part of the world. I wish we could go to Hong Kong Disney from here. Maybe we'll save up some won and go.

Ganghwa Island 강화도

We took another field trip for a few guys leaving the office. One was a commander out there at Ganghwa Island- just a mile away from N Korea. We could see the N Koreans moving around outside, but it was really cold outside, so there's not a lot of reason to be out there. There were some really grainy images on a camera they were panning around. I saw a guy on a bicycle and a truck rumbling around. It's a neat island with the Observation post on the North side to keep an eye on the 'show' village they have there to deceive the S Koreans. Interesting place.
There was also a museum that had exhibits on the invasions of the Japanese, Americans, and French. While it's a little unnerving that you're an American and they're showing your people killing their people, a little skirmish where our guys turned their cannons on a fortress and then let out a few hundred soldiers to wreak havoc on their military in 1871, is nothing compared to what the Japanese did around here. They still have a bad reputation around here. The fastest way to make friends with a Korean is tell him how bad the Japanese are. I'm not a big fan of Japan, because my kids can't be quiet on the subway here, so they'd talk on their subway and they'd hate us. Korea isn't like that, so it's nice that way. That and the subway doesn't cost 4 bucks to go 1 mile. The people in Korea are really friendly and open.
Once again, I thought I was buying manjoo on the street and it wasn't. So I gave it all away to Koreans. Manjoo is pudding-filled cake balls they sell on the street. YUMMY.

Korean Demilitarized Zone/Heartbreak Ridge

So today we left at 6AM to drive up to the DMZ. It's a long way up there. We went to the Ulchi Observatory and looked across the DMZ into N Korea. It was pretty cloudy, so we couldn't see anyone over there. But at the closest point, N Korea is 780 meters away. But there's a lot of landmines between us and them as well. It was just an ominous place to be. These are all just kids watching their less-nourished cousins across a chasm of 55 years and counting. Will this place ever heal? There's a lot of hate and resentment aimed south, but as long as Kim Jong Il is in charge (if he's not drooling into a cloth) things will be strained around here. Maybe someone will be able to turn things around one of these days, but 22 million people will be hungry and poor until then.
The soldiers gave a nice briefing on what we'd see on a clear day and were really nice and professional. It's a boring, thankless job sitting in the ROK army on a line for 2 years. But they do it because they have to. Freedom doesn't defend itself around here.
It was a long, windy road to the next location as well- the Infiltration Tunnel #4. They discovered it in 1992 and it scared a lot of people- to think that for 10 years N Koreans had been digging through solid granite to get to S Korea so they could attack. We went in 300 meters to the tunnel they had been digging. It was amazing. It's been sealed off and they have detection systems in there and probably explosives as well- so they can't use it again. Imagine your life was spent digging a tunnel to S Korea so you could attack it- because if you didn't dig, you didn't eat. Or they'd just shoot you.
Then we went up to Heartbreak Ridge. Here, the 2nd Infantry Division with a brigade of French Soldiers, killed or wounded 21,000 N Koreans at a loss of nearly 1,000 themselves. But the sheer steepness of the terrain boggled my mind. Amazing- and they fought with tanks and stuff there from Sep to Oct 1951. Makes me glad I did all my fighting from the air. On either side of the road, there were minefields. There's estimated to be at least a million landmines over here. They'll never be able to clean those up, either. They're still finding bombs dropped from the 1950s when they do construction around here. So we didn't do much wandering around out there. And the barriers are closer together there. The ones they set with charges and the roads become blocked. Americans never had to think about stuff like that.
Someday, this land will be healed.