Another idiot going down in flames for making a racist comment:
Sophia Chang says a fellow patron at the Bluewater Grill told her to “go back to Wuhan.” @sophiachang/Instagram
A man who was accused of telling Korean-American entrepreneur Sophia Chang, 28, to “go back to Wuhan” was fired from his job Tuesday at Prudential, a Newark-based financial advising firm, the company confirmed.
Around 6 p.m. on Sept. 12, Sophia Chang and her sister were eating dinner at Bluewater Grill in Newport Beach, California when the man “made direct eye contact” with the women and told them to “go back to Wuhan” as he headed to the bathroom, Chang wrote in an Instagram post. When the man returned from the bathroom and the women questioned him, she says he responded, “I don’t speak Chinese.” This comment is not seen in the video.
Following the incident, Chang posted the video to her Instagram where it racked up over 800,000 views. The post — which does not show the “go back to Wuhan” comment — sparked outrage, with people calling for the man to be identified and held accountable for his alleged comments. The man was identified as a financial representative for Prudential, which confirmed his firing.
According to the article ramen sales up this year because of the hit Korean movie “Parasite”. I think it probably has more to do with people eating out less or facing quarantine because of the coronavirus:
Exports of Korean instant ramyeon have sharply increased this year.
According to industry data and the Korea Agro-Fisheries and Food Trade Corporation, ramyeon exports in the first eight months jumped 36-point-seven percent year-on-year to 405 million dollars.
The figure has more than doubled over five years between 2014 and last year.
By country, shipments to China, the biggest importer, increased 45 percent from January to August to top 105 million dollars.
During the same period, exports to the U.S. also rose 56 percent and to Japan by 48 percent.
Ramyeon exports to Southeast Asia are also on a rapid rise thanks to the Korean Wave phenomenon known as Hallyu.
The Moon Jae-in admin says NKorea didn't violate 2018 SK-NK Military Agmt in its shooting of SK maritime police & burning his body, because NK didn't use artillery & the agmt doesn't mention killing individuals. Wow. But sending leaflets is a violation?https://t.co/cwR685TWYh
Foreign students play Korean game Foreign students wearing the traditional Korean costume, or “hanbok,” play a jumbo version of “yutnori,” a Korean game traditionally played with sticks, at a university in Daegu on Sept. 25, 2020, as part of events to experience the Korean culture. The events were held ahead of the Chuseok holiday on Oct. 1, one of the country’s biggest traditional holidays. (Yonhap)
This might be the first Chuseok in a long time without bumper to bumper traffic if this poll is to be believed:
This file photo taken in a rural village in Boseong, southwestern South Korea, on Sept. 14, 2020, shows a banner written by village elders to urge their urban sons and daughters not to visit their hometowns during the Chuseok holiday due to the coronavirus outbreak. (Yonhap)
Three in four Seoul citizens don’t have any plans to visit their hometowns or travel long distances during the Chuseok holiday due mainly to fears of coronavirus transmission, a poll showed Saturday.
In the survey of 849 citizens aged 18 or older, 56.8 percent said they have no plans to travel long distances during Chuseok, while another 16 percent said they have canceled their holiday travel plans due to COVID-19.
Merely 12.4 percent said they have travel plans during the Korean equivalent of Thanksgiving, with 14.8 percent saying they are still undecided whether to travel.
You can read more at the link, but what I always tell people is that the best time to go to Seoul is on Chuseok. It is easy to get around with little to no lines for anything because of how many people leave the city for the holiday. Apparently that will not be the case this year.
I don’t think this is going to get much traction considering the control of most of the media the Moon administration has, but I am sure South Korean conservative politicians are enjoying this payback after what former President Park went through:
President Moon Jae-in applauds special warfare troops during a ceremony to mark the 72nd Armed Forces Day at the Special Warfare Command in Icheon, Friday. The anniversary falls on Oct. 1. / Yonhap
In response to the controversy over the reporting time to Moon, Kim Chong-in, interim leader of the main opposition People Power Party (PPP), said the incident is a national disaster due to the Moon administration’s lackluster security awareness.
“The Moon administration’s rosy prospects have led to the loss of a precious life of a South Korean citizen,” he said.
“President Moon needs to explain what he did for three days from Monday.”
He added that the government may have wanted to hide something from the public by disclosing the incident three days later.
The current situation leaves Moon in a similar situation to that faced by his predecessor in the wake of the Sewol ferry sinking in 2014. While the ferry carrying more than 300 passengers was sinking, the rescue operations were bungled, causing people to speculate on what then-President Park was doing for the first critical seven hours. Many still question the claims of presidential aides that she was receiving updates at her residence.
Rep. Joo Ho-young, the PPP floor leader, said President Moon should have attended the ministerial meeting on early Wednesday morning considering the severity of the incident.
“It is questionable about President Moon’s follow-up measures. It is not comprehensible whether President Moon was unaware of the incident or he ignored it,” Joo said.
Searching for remains of official shot by N.K.South Korean coast guard conducts an operation in waters off Yeonpyoeng Island bordering North Korea in the West Sea on Sept. 25, 2020, to find the remains and belongings of a South Korean official who was shot to death and burned by North Korean soldiers in the North’s waters on Sept. 22, in this photo provided by the coast guard. (Yonhap)
Not the best apology, but I guess it is something:
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un presides over an enlarged meeting of the political bureau of the Workers’ Party’s central committee in Pyongyang on Aug. 25, 2020, to discuss issues involving COVID-19 and the approaching Typhoon Bavi, in this photo released by the Korean Central News Agency.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has offered an apology to the South Korean people for the killing of a fellow citizen by its military earlier this week, Cheong Wa Dae announced Friday.
In a formal notice sent to the South, the North conveyed Kim’s message that he feels “very sorry” for greatly “disappointing” President Moon Jae-in and other South Koreans with the occurrence of the “unsavory” case in its waters, instead of helping them amid their suffering from the new coronavirus, according to Suh Hoon, director of national security at Cheong Wa Dae.
Notice how he still takes a shot at South Korea as being some kind of coronavirus hotbed. What makes this apology even worse is that they are apparently lying about what happened if you believe what the South Korean military is saying:
South Korean authorities have said the 47-year-old official surnamed Lee went missing at 11:30 a.m., Monday, while on duty on a patrol ship off the west coast, and was found by North Korean military personnel in the sea off Yeonpyeong Island near the maritime border at around 3:30 p.m., Tuesday.
According to the South Korean version of the story, Lee was on an unidentified floating item and expressed his willingness to defect to the North Koreans, who questioned him from a distance while leaving him in the water. About six hours later, the North Koreans shot him to death, then doused the body with oil and burned it.
Pyongyang’s account, however, differed in many crucial parts of the story.
In a notice it sent to the South, Friday, the North said an “unidentified man” who illegally intruded into its territorial waters on a floating item failed to properly respond to their verbal security checks when he was about 80 meters away. Approaching the man, the North Koreans shot two blanks, and he was seen as attempting to flee. They then fired more than 10 gunshots at a distance of 40 to 50 meters as allowed under the related rules of maritime border security.
When they approached for closer inspection, they were unable to find any trace of the body other than a large pool of blood, which led them to believe he had died from bullet wounds and sunk into the water. They subsequently set the floating item ― not the body ― on fire following the quarantine rules, according to the North’s account.
According to the notice, Lee did not express his willingness to defect.
