Hong Joon-pyo (R), leader of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party, shakes hands with Kim Jong-pil, a former prime minister and retired conservative icon, at a hospital in Seoul on July 18, 2017. Kim, 91, has been hospitalized to undergo a medical checkup. (Yonhap)
For those interested, the Boryeong Mud Festival is coming up:
An annual international mud festival will open in the South Korean city of Boryeong later this week under the slogan of “Let’s Go to Boryeong and Play with Mud!,” an official on the event’s organizing committee said Wednesday.
“The 2017 Boryeong Mud Festival will open for a 10-day run at Daecheon Beach in the namesake city, 190km south of Seoul, on Friday,” the official said.
Launched in 1998, the festival has developed into a top international summer event with its mud flats attracting many tourists from around the world. Rich in minerals, the mud is used in manufacturing cosmetics.
This year, the unique festival will present a total of 57 programs, ranging from bathing in a massive mud tub to mud massages, a mud photo contest, a marathon on the mud flats, a mud sliding competition, street parades and K-pop concerts, the official said. [Korea Times]
I think there are going to be so few of these situations that this really will not be a problem:
Mandatory Army training materials state that females will have to accept transgender women showering with them.
The Army has been rolling out a series of training materials entitled “Tier Three Transgender Training” to prepare soldiers to accept transgenders in their ranks, and one of the bullet points states that soldiers will have to accept austere, primitive conditions, which entails acceptance of trans women showering with other female soldiers.
The Federalist obtained the materials from an active-duty officer who completed the training last week.
According to the training, soldiers will be allowed to switch their gender markets without undergoing any kind of transition surgeries or physical changes. There are two crucial elements needed for transition. [Daily Caller]
I guess we will see if the Moon administration will eventually change this Park Geun-hye era policy, but for now North Korea apologistChristine Ahn can no longer enter South Korea:
An American who organized a controversial march of 30 female peace activists spanning the two Koreas in 2015 has been denied entry to South Korea.
Christine Ahn, a South Korean-born American citizen, learned about being “persona non grata” after Asiana Airlines stopped her from boarding a flight at San Francisco Airport on Thursday, according to the New York Times (NYT).
She reportedly planned to transit through South Korea’s Incheon International Airport on her way to China. After being told she was not allowed to, she bought a new ticket to fly directly to Shanghai, it reported.
A justice ministry official was quoted as saying in the report that Ahn had been denied entry because there were sufficient grounds to fear she might “hurt the national interest and public safety.” [Korea Times]
Maj. Gen. Scott Mcqueen (L), the new commander of the 2nd U.S. Infantry Division, and his predecessor, Maj. Gen. Theodore Martin, pose for a photo during a ceremony at Camp Casey in the city of Dongducheon, north of Seoul, on July 18, 2017, to mark the division chief’s inauguration and Martin’s departure. (Yonhap)
It looks like the US government will not be participating in any talks with North Korea any time soon:
The White House expressed veiled opposition to South Korea’s proposal for rare inter-Korean talks Monday, saying current conditions are “far away” from those needed to reopen dialogue with the recalcitrant state.
Seoul proposed military talks for this coming Friday and Red Cross talks on Aug. 1 to discuss ways to ease tensions along their shared border and resume reunions of families separated since the 1950-53 Korean War.
The offer came amid renewed tensions over the North’s first launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile on July 4.
“Well, obviously those comments came out of the Republic of Korea and I would refer you back to them,” Press Secretary Sean Spicer said during a briefing, when asked if there are certain conditions U.S. President Donald Trump would like to see met before the talks take place. “That being said, I think the president has made clear in the past with respect that any type of conditions that would have to be met are clearly far away from where we are now.” [Yonhap]
This whole incident is very unfortunate, but it seems what happened was caused by Mr. Han being drunk and harassing Mr. Davis in the first place thus influencing the jury’s decision to acquit him:
Naeem Davis, right, was acquitted of murder
A man accused of pushing a stranger to his death by shoving him on to the tracksof a subway has been acquitted of murder.
Naeem Davis, 34, was cleared on Monday of murdering Ki-Suck Han, 58, after he shoved him on to the tracks at the 49th Street station near Times Square in New York on December 3, 2012.
Mr Davis said he was defending himself when he pushed Mr Han off the platform. At least a minute passed before a train pulled into the platform and it Mr Han, killing him.
The scene was captured by a photographer for the New York Post, who controversially put a picture showing Mr Han on the tracks, seconds before his death, on its front page.
Mr Davis said that Mr Han, who was drunk at the time, had picked a fight with him after the pair bumped into each other accidentally near the subway turnstiles.
A court heard that Mr Han then followed Mr Davis down to the platform, shouting obscenities at him – including death threats – and grabbing his shoulder.
Mr Davis said Mr Han shouted at him, ’I’ll kill you!’, and that he was slurring his words and staggering. [Yahoo News]
You can read the rest at the link, but Mr. Davis spent four and half years in jail before being acquitted of the crime.
As far as I know the US embassy in Seoul wasn’t conscripting people to take unpaid internship positions. If these students wanted to get paid they should have applied for another job:
A student in her 20s, who requested to be identified by the alias Kim Hye-jin, recalled the distress she felt as an intern for the U.S. Embassy in Seoul in 2015, during which she received neither a salary nor even a stipend for transportation and lunch.
“I had to take an additional part-time job after finishing work at the embassy at 5:30 p.m. I barely had any time for myself,” Kim told The Korea Times.
“Since I was working for its public affairs department, I was always required to take part in the department’s events in the evening. Whenever I returned home late at night, I felt so depressed for losing personal time in addition to not receiving money.”
Sometimes, Kim even spent her own money for transportation during business trips and for lunch with organization partners and she had to wait two to three months to be reimbursed.
As an intern, Kim assumed a variety of roles, from translator and photographer to event organizer. Sometimes, she also answered the phones and does basic office tasks. “I applied for the post, aware that it was unpaid. However, it made me think the system was unjust, since my job was more vital than I initially thought,” she said.
Another worker, who also requested to be identified as Han Cheol-soo, worked for the U.S. Embassy last year and underwent similar hardships. “Since my parents couldn’t afford to give me a stipend, I couldn’t help but quit the internship earlier than I had hoped,” he said. “I think such an unpaid internship policy is a stumbling block for students from poor families to get equal opportunity.” [Korea Times]
