The Iceberg

A quick read of the writing on the left will tell you that the actress in this advertisement for the movie “Things You Talk About When You Love” (사랑할 때 이야기하는 것들) is Kim Ji-soo…

but a closer inspection of her t-shirt might lead you to mistakenly believe that it is actress Hwang Soo-jung…

or that perhaps Miss Kim is pilfering from Miss Hwang’s wardrobe.

I met her on a Sunday when I went to Lotte Mart
When I saw her on the shelf I had to put her in my cart
Five cups of Maxim Coffee at the start of each new day
But when I found Cucina I knew there was a better way

Oh Cucina!
You’ve made my mornings such a dream
Hello Cucina!
An-nyong to crystals and powdered cream

Boiling water on the stove, my java came from a packet
Then along came Cucina and 밀크 커피 couldn’t hack it
So get yourself one of these and you’ll see what I mean
You’ll wonder why you got your fix from a vending machine

Oh Cucina!
You’ve made my mornings such a dream
Hello Cucina!
An-nyong to crystals and powdered cream

The end

Not exactly Harrison Ford material, but entertaining nonetheless (from the Joongang Daily):

Almost a year and a half after he escaped from a detention facility, police arrested fugitive Lee Nak-seong yesterday after he went to the hospital to treat a case of three lost teeth.

According to police, Mr. Lee drank five bottles of soju in his Sinchon home, then fell on the stairs.

Mr. Lee was arrested in 1986 for theft, then served 12 years in prison for robbery, starting in 1988. In 2001, Mr. Lee committed another robbery, earning a sentence of three years at prison and seven years at the preventive detention facility. He escaped from the facility while being hospitalized for hemorrhoid surgery at a hospital in Andong, North Gyeongsang province.

On second thought, this sounds more like another movie…

There’s a big Halloween party in Yeosu tonight. I’m going as a gweesheen (귀신) - a Korean ghost. The party starts at 9 p.m., but before that I’m going to conduct a little social experiment. I want to determine what a typical night out on the town is like for a gweesheen. For example, what kind of service does a gweesheen get in a restaurant or bar? How easy is it for a gweesheen to catch a taxi? Can a gweesheen pull easily? I hope to have the answers to these and many other questions after tonight. Stay tuned.

Those of you who have been to Gwangju might have stumbled upon this restaurant:

However, you might notice that the Korean writing below the food in the poster says, “boneless dalk-galbi”.  Blatant false advertising.  Women - and Lee Joon-ki - would be disappointed.

When I passed by this restaurant again later in the day, I noticed another joint a few meters down the road called “Muffin”.  The yin and yang of dining.  Unfortunately I didn’t have my camera with me.

That nuke sho did fizzle.

I wanna throw the heater to announce my presence with authority. - Kim “Nuke LaLoosh” Jung Il

Alright meat. Give him your heat.

Hopefully the world will take you over the fence.

I studied phonetics in university, so I am familiar with and can pronounce every sound in any language.  For example, in English you pronounce the capital of France “Paris”, but in French it is pronounced “Par-eeeeees”.

According to this National Geographic story, South Korea aims to place a robot in every home by the year 2020. On the surface, this sounds like a good idea. Imagine a world of sexbots like the one in AI. What might this robot look like? Well, these are just preliminary models in need of a few enhancements, but chances are they will resemble something like the following:

The female model:

As for the male version, here are two prototypes:

The one on the left has had a little more detail work done on its face.

Ah, but do you smell something sinister in the air? If you read the article closely, you will notice a few points which ought to raise a few hairs on the back of your neck.

“South Korea intends to make robots full members of society.”

My interpretation: Is that stone-faced ajumma on the subway real or Memorex? You’ll never know - UNTIL YOUR DEAD!

“The new breed of ‘bots should be able to do everything from guiding museum visitors to teaching school children English.”

Bye, bye American (and Canadian) pie. The only thing left for most native English speakers will be to tour the museums. THEN THEY’LL HAVE YOU WHERE THEY WANT YOU!

“The South Korean Ministry of Information and Communication wants to use these existing robots as a platform for intelligent service robots by integrating network capabilities into them.”

Think about that. NETWORK CAPABILITIES! No big deal, you say? You’ll sing a different tune when a truck-full of robots start attacking your car as you’re driving down the freeway.

Perhaps you think I’m being too paranoid. If so, then have a gander at this quote from none other than the man who actually oversees the massive intelligence-service-robot project, Oh Sang-rok:

“If we (South Koreans) could show some killer applications with favorable business models…”

You need read no more. That’s the smoking gun right there, ladies and gentlemen.

They intend to kill us.

Conversational exchange over chicken and beer last night:

Co-worker A: Have any of you tried donkey meat? I wonder what it tastes like.

Co-worker B: I imagine it tastes like ass.