Korea Expose

How to honor my paternal grandfather, who passed away when I was just one-year-old, remained a tricky matter in the family for a long time.My father, being the eldest son of a family from a conservative backwater village in South Jeolla Province, was expected to prepare and host memorial rites four times a year—on the Lunar New Year (Seolnal 설날), the mid-autumn festival (Chuseok 추석), my grandfather's birthday and on the anniversary of his death.My mother, a Christian urbanite who saw the whole t

Simsimhada 심심하다 is a Korean adjective meaning "boring" or "bland". Simsimhada 심심하다 is also a Korean adjective meaning "very profound".Difficult as it may sound, they aren't hard to distinguish in context for native speakers of the language, or so it was once the case. After a store in Seoul's Hongdae area issued on Aug 20 a "very profound apology" (simsimhan sagwa 심심한 사과) on Twitter for causing inconvenience during the signup process for an event, it was inundated with criticism from some who be

At a luxury apartment complex in Seoul's well-to-do Seocho District, residents complain of intolerable chemical stench. Completed only a year ago, the project sold out despite commanding 3 billion won (2.25 million dollars) for a 84 square-meter unit on the lower side of the price spectrum. And yet water is said to drip down the elevator shaft during heavy rain. Trees on the ground are mysteriously dying. Some owners speak of icicles forming inside apartments in winter months due to poor insulat

Mounds of juicy golden mango slices top fine shavings of frozen milk. Edible gold leaf disguising a ball of "thick mint-mango sauce made with techniques of molecular gastronomy" crowns it all. In case that weren't sumptuous enough, mango sorbet, mango sauce and even mango pudding accompany the set up.One might say this over-the-top affair is South Korea's most-talked-about delicacy of the season. Each summer the country's businesses compete to offer the trendiest takes on bingsu 빙수, an old-fashi

A set of ten photos featuring two men has dominated the news cycle in South Korea for the last ten days.In a sequence, the pair wait in a room, hands bound with ropes and plastic cable ties. Once outside, they are dragged by plain-clothed security personnel against will. One of the men holds his ground while being pushed over a long slap of stone. Two soldiers grab him by the elbow. He resists without success. A sense of desperation is palpable.Continue to read

Former Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe was assassinated Friday by a lone gunman in the city of Nara.The reaction from the South Korean public has been mainly that of glee.Under the title "Abe's death is pitiful", a photo of toasting circulated widely for days. (A colloquial expression in Korean for "pitiful"—jjanhada 짠하다—can also mean clinking glasses). Breaking reports on social media about his death were overwhelmingly liked and comment sections inundated with thumbs-up emoticons and laughi

On Monday, who's who of South Korea's business elite gathered at a church in central Seoul for a wedding. The bride was the eldest daughter of the Hyundai Motors Group chairman Chung Eui-sun. In attendance were leading members of the Chung family, the LG Group chairman Koo Kwang-mo, and the SK Group chairman Chey Tae-won among others.But the undisputed scene-stealer was the Samsung Electronics vice chairman Lee Jae-yong's 18-year-old daughter, Won-ju.Continue to read

This spring's K-drama Semantic Error is centered on two university students. One is reserved and rule-bound to a fault, the other is carefree and irresponsible, and their first encounter is as disastrous as can be expected. But following the conventional romance formula, opposites attract, misunderstanding transpires, and they discover that they are in love.That makes Semantic Error sound like generic small-screen entertainment, but the show offers a key difference from the usual Korean boy-meet

Early this week I was speaking with a thirty-something female Korean acquaintance, and she let out a great big sigh when the conversation turned toward the topic of finance."All my shares. They are now worth less than half what I paid," she buried her face in her hands in a mock-gesture at resignation.I tried to comfort her. "One needs to be a little patient when investing. Give it a few years and the market will recover," I said.Continue to read

Three weeks ago my brother flew from San Francisco to Seoul. As usual, he asked my mother in advance what she and my father wanted him to bring as presents.Answering him in our family chatroom on KakaoTalk, she wrote, "What could I possibly ask for? Multivitamins, coenzyme Q10 and omega-3 oil. I'm sorry for the requests."She is genuinely contrite about asking, but it makes sense to do so: such health products are certainly available in a metropolis that is Seoul, but they are rather overpriced (

When PSY, the singer of Gangnam Style fame, declared on May. 4 that each of his summer concerts required 300 tons of drinkable water, he probably didn't expect a controversy to erupt a month later.He was on the popular TV talkshow Radio Seuta 라디오스타 (Radio Star) to promote his upcoming summer tour, suspended for the last two years because of Covid. "At concert venues we mobilize water mains and even water trucks," he said. "All that water costs a lot of money."Given the Korean name Heumbbeoksyo 흠

News that two young people had taken their own lives shook South Korea early February.One was a vivacious 27-year-old live streamer going by the name Jammi. She had been active on Twitch and YouTube, having more than 100,000 followers on each.Live-streaming is a big industry in South Korea. Jammi made a living by broadcasting snippets of her life and chatting real-time with her viewers, who tipped her in exchange.Continue to read

Gangnam, celebrated in PSY's 2012 song Gangnam Style, may indeed be a very rich part of Seoul, but ask South Koreans and most will say its prestige pales in comparison to that of Hannam-dong: an area between Namsan, the mountain south of downtown Seoul, and the Han River bisecting the capital.Hannam-dong, outlined in red, sits between the Han River and Namsan (the large patch of green in the center), the so-called "Southern Mountain" because of its location south of old Seoul (source: Google Map

She is a junior at a costly private high school with an all-English curriculum west of Seoul.But at such a young age she's already founded a non-profit providing free online tutoring to underprivileged children. She's authored six academic articles and written ten e-books, and has organized an art exhibit to combat discrimination and racism.Her precocious contributions to society have belatedly come to attention thanks to her father, Han Dong-hoon, who's been nominated for the post of justice mi

When Myanmar’s ruling National League for Democracy claimed landslide victory in the November 2020 general elections, the Tatmadaw, the country’s armed forces, quickly rejected the results, citing electoral fraud. Three months later, on February 1, 2021, this rejection would turn bloody as the military launched a brutal coup that landed many former officials, including state counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi, in prison.Today, more than a year later, the country remains in conflict: dissent is quashed;