KPop Invasion

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Wonder Girls... Nobody

I’m afraid Cass and I have officially been KPop’d… right upside the head, without us even knowing it. …and danngit, it feels good. Korea is a place steeped with a rich culture, a place evolving at a pace rarely seen in the world, with a strong desire to be hip. In every sense of the word. Enter…the world of KPop.

The pop culture has grown incredibly in the past decade or so, so much so that it has been dubbed as the Korean Wave. Movies, television shows, music, fashion… you name it, it’s kpoped to the nine’s. Can two kids from Montana immerse themselves fully into a world such as this? Oh, you know it, and I will do my best to let you know what we’ve been up to the past couple weeks all in the theme of KPop- since reflecting on these weeks has really brought up a lot of it.

Boys Before Flowers

Now I can’t say this one got completely got me, I just learned enough to be able to speak to my students about. …but Cass fell victim to the wavy dark locks of Goo Joon Pyo and Kim Boem the second she laid eyes on them. Actually, I can’t blame her either.

For a few months now, Cass has been faithfully watching the TV drama called Boys Before Flowers (in Korean something like ‘Goat Boda Namja’).

I’ll give you a synopsis as best I can… peasant girl saves a boy from suicide and get admitted to an extremely elite school to help its reputation. Four boys (the famous ‘Flower 4’ or F4) basically can do whatever they want to whomever they want at this school, she doesn’t think it’s o.k., and immediately puts up a stand against the discrimination. F4 thinks it’s cute and blah, blah, blah… he gets a crush on her, then another one has a crush on her, then her on him, then… you get the point. Right up Cass’ alley.

Boys Before Flowers has literally taken Korea by storm. The teachers at school were listening to the show’s soundtrack. Goom Jan Di, the peasant girl, is practically the face of Korean porridge shops, where she worked in the show, and there’s not a Dunkin’ Donuts around that doesn’t have a life sized cut out of Goo Joon Pyo in it, or a commercial TV for that matter.

Cass went over to Rachel’s house to watch the thrilling conclusion of the series not long ago (Jason and I got banished to the batting cages in town, a win-win as far as I’m concerned). The show, at it’s height of popularity, decided to shut it all down. Apparently there was a wedding of some kind… to find out more, I suggest you head to www.mysoju.com (that’s the real address, I’m not joking) and click on Korean dramas. I think it’s still labeled as ‘hot’!

Nobody, nobody, but you

Wonder Girls, Big Bang, Girls Generation, Super Junior… There is not a more Korean experience than wandering through E-Mart jamming out to the latest tunes coming on over the p.a. system. It’s dancy, pop-y, catch-y, and everything that you can imagine music to be in a world where singing rooms are the norm. Yes… it’s that good.

Recently I shared some of the limited music I had on me with Rockstar Kim at my school, he enjoyed it, and soon I found a cd on my desk which couldn’t have been a better gift. You have no idea the dance club vibe Cassie and I have going on in our apartment sometimes. Pair that up with hearing these tunes everyday at the gym we work out at, and you could say that we are bonafide kpop music critics… maybe.

Actually, my new goal in life is to memorize a Kpop song by the end of my time here and surprise the whole school at the Norae bong before I leave. It may literally take that long, but I’m gonna give it a go. In fact, I’ll start practicing now…

I want nobody, nobody, but you… I want nobody, nobody, but you…
Nan dareun sarameun sirheo niga animyeon sirheo…
I want nobody, nobody… nobody, nobody…

B Boy Dancing

As funny as this sounds, not long ago, we went to an English teachers orientation… nearly 7 months after we began teaching here. Outside of one or two ‘u-rah-rah’ informational sessions, it was four days of useless-ness that, at one point of our Korean adventure, would have been invaluable. Regardless, it took place over half way through our contract and could have done someone fresh to Korea a lot more than simply a couple days off of school. Okay, that rant is over…

One of the most memorable things to happen during the orientation was a night program consisting of B-Boy dancing. I think I can hear a collective, ‘what is b-boy dancing?’ (because we all said the same thing). It’s basically a cool version of hip hop break dancing. Apparently, this style of dancing is very popular in Korea and we were informed Korea is always a top finisher in international b-boy dance competitions. Did somebody say Kpop?

A group of three young Korean boys did a short performance for the crowd in a stuffy room in the basement of the convention center we were staying at. The flipped, jived, and spun their way around the room. Once they were done, it was our turn.

Giving it the ol’ college try, we were all out there making complete fools of ourselves as one of the boys tried to instruct us. It was all pretty fun, but don’t expect Cass or I to ne spinning on our head on a youtube clip anytime soon.

Korean Movies

The local movie theatre in Yeoju has three screens on the fifth floor of a building behind the bus terminal. Every so often it has random English movies, but those aren’t the kind of flicks I’m talking about here.

Mysoju.com has made a strong run at being one of the top websites we watch. The other television related websites we’ve found are pandora.tv for all our sitcoms from back home, and Justin.tv for all our movies have been keeping our sanity levels up to par since arriving here. (on a side note, we’ve cranked out the episodes for big bang theory, the office, how I met your mother, 30 rock and we’re pretty devoted to the old cheers show right now- don’t ask me why)

Back to the point, mysoju.com not only has the Korean and Japanese dramas we’ve been watching, but it has movies with English subtitles! We’ve already conquered a movie called 200 lb. Beauty and one of my favorite movies ever- really- The Sassy Girl. We are just beginning the movie called Oh Happy Day! But haven’t had the time to get through it all.

200 lb. Beauty is about an overweight backup singer who undergoes a complete body plastic surgery operation to impress her crush and self esteem- she becomes beautiful and… as you can imagine… hits a few bumps along the road. The Sassy Girl is, just that, about a sassy girl who- strings along a boy… wait, you all should check this one out, no spoiler alert here.

Both of these have given us a bit of insight into the culture, as well. There is a massive ‘keeping up with the Jones’ attitude and a valued superficiality of materialism, both themes within these movies. It continually blows both our minds seeing old world traditions and values almost literally hand in hand with modern consumerism and materialism. It is the evolution of Korea.

Busan & Blossoms & Festivals

Witnessing these last few weeks, I’m pretty confident in saying that I’ve never experienced a proper spring in the twenty eight years I’ve been wandering around this world. Wisconsin’s snow melts to reveal green grass underneath, Iowa’s seasons are basically winter and corn, Alaska’s seasons resemble more daylight hours than anything else, and Montana’s spring is a magic 8 ball of all four seasons in a day.

Spring here has been the most graceful of ease into progressively warm weather, longer days, and most importantly… cherry blossoms. Not the weak effort Washington D.C. claims it has on cherry blossoms. This is a phenomenon to behold!

First, there were rumors the blossoms were out in the southern part of the country, then we caught wind of an impending cherry blossom festival in Seoul, finally, we awoke to an explosion of color from our apartment windows. It seemed as though all the trees got together and ironed out a schedule, all pinky swearing to keep their agreement- it seemed that orchestrated.

Lucky for us, we overlook the Yeoju College. From our living room we had a birds eye view on the blossom lined streets of the campus. It even motivated me to take a jog up the lung busting hill to check them out. On the way to work, I grabbed my camera on the way out the door and the pictures you see here of that morning sunshine on the blossoms.

In the weeks that have passed, it’s a ritual every morning to look out the window, and if there is no fog, take note of the increasing amount of green below us. There are noticeable differences everyday, a patch here, a budding here, most recently there have trees I’ve never seen with the most brilliant red flowery explosions on them. Just beautiful, a sight to behold.

This, true enough, is not Kpop- as far as the theme of this blog goes. However- I’m going to file it under the heading, festivals. As the temperature rises, even more so are the amount of festivals planned or happening around Korea. The cherry blossom festival, the world ceramic’s festival (starting in Yeoju this weekend!!!), a lantern festival, a jazz festival, even a festival celebrating the rejuvenating effects of a certain area’s mud!

While we had our own little Cherry Blossom Festival from the window of our apartment, Busan, Korea’s second largest town on the southern coast, has an official festival of that name. We traveled the almost four hours in a bus to get there, but not for the festival, we missed that by a week, we were there to support our friends in their shark diving endeavor.
The Busan Aquarium offers a dive within the (un)friendly confines of their massive shark tank. I’m really not a tweak about things, but the only two things that get me are snakes, and - avoiding a real life encounter by all means- sharks. I am, however, more than happy to be on the other side of the thick plexiglass walls witnessing the beasts.

It was pretty neat to see five of our friends swimming in the tank, though. Cass and I spent a half hour in the two tunnels through the tank, and amidst the crowd of gawkers in the stadium seating getting some evidence for everyone that it actually happened. …and everyone left Busan with all their appendages still in tacked.

Busan is a great city, we spent most of our time on Haeundai Beach. There is quite a large foreign population, and we could tell by how the Koreans reacted to us, strangely enough. We weren’t the amazing novelty that we are treated like in our little Yeoju, just passed by without a thought- kind of nice for a change. It was great hanging out with the group, introducing Rachel’s sister to everything Korean, a marathon Norae Bong session, Korean food, and the love motels in all their glory.

I’d like to get back there and visit more of the town, it had a great vibe. It is also the port where Cass and I can grab a ferry to Japan that we are trying to iron out when we are going to get to that. All in good time.

Everland

Since we arrived in Korea, the word ‘Everland’ has been in the back of our minds, always being reminded of it from the locals. This is the Korean equivalent to Disney World. Cass and I sure couldn’t say no the invitation. Mr. Hong, a teacher at my school that I’ve been spending more time with since the departure of my co-teacher Mr. Kim, invited us to go with along with his wife and daughter. It was a great afternoon and evening.

Now, Disney World- it is not, but this is a legitimate, quality amusement park that I will stand up against any that are out there. Cass and I were definitely the typical American tourist running around the park with HaBin, Mr. Hong’s daughter, snapping pictures, eating tubs of popcorn, and getting on rides I haven’t been on in decades.

Our ride escapades began with the family suggesting we go on the log ride because they were too scared. The hoards of people on a sunshiny Saturday was borderline insanity, and we spent an hour waiting line, but luckily that was our longest wait.

T-Express… okay, you’ve now heard the name, now do everything you can to get your fanny in a seat of this wooden coaster. Way better than anything at Silverwood, the American Eagle wooden coaster at Great America in Chicago- don’t even hold a candle to this one… Cass and I are willing to say it was the best coaster of any kind we’ve ever been on, anywhere. The first drop alone is just about the wildest I’ve been on and it only gets crazier from then on.

We bummed around with the family after a white knuckle “oto kay” (scared) ride of the day. Once the evening settled upon us, Mr. Hong, HaBin, Cass and I boarded one of those circle rafts through an amazingly designed Amazon jungle. The dark atmosphere made it all the better.

We were off just in time to catch the nightly parade of characters all lit up in dancing the parade route in their floats, but the real fireworks were still to come. We set up camp in the middle of the flower garden, after all, it was the Everland Flower Festival, and took in the evenings multimedia extravaganza. The Everland characters were defending themselves against the evil dragons with lasers, smoke screens, fire balls, water spouts, and 3d digital images. Their victory was celebrated with an over the top fire works show that dominated anything Biners Boomers could manage to put together at Kelly Lake. Who doesn’t like a good fireworks show?



With the weather shaping up, we’re planning on getting out to the festivals in the area. Two weeks until we head off to Beijing- we’ve been looking forward to that for some time, then soon after I’ll be done with my graduate course and I’ll have a lot more time for things like this blog and my other writings. If you haven’t had a chance to read the articles I’ve been getting published, I invite you to check them out, they give some interesting perspectives of things here… I’ve had a few on www.bootsnall.com and www.travelmag.co.uk, check those sites out when you have a chance. I’m working on an edit for a cool website, www.glimpse.org, I’ll let you know when it’s up. As well as one going up on www.intravelmag.com sometime in their May/June edition. The one up right now on http://matadorabroad.com/chaos-culture-and-kim-chi-a-korean-cafeteria/ I’m particularly psyched about, it is my first paying gig (don’t worry, I’m not considering myself a writer anytime soon or anything), but the website is great and the layout of the article is really well done.

Hope all is well out there… Keep in touch!

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Photos

Seoul Tower Locks
They sell locks in the gift shop for you to personalize and lock onto a fence for decoration, great idea!

The Seoul Tower
We stopped here on our way home from the orientation. An imitation of the space needle on top of a mountain in the middle of Seoul... Dang that's a big city!

Comments

[chenee carillo]

wonder girls
very beautiful