The Army has decided to place Highway 3 running in front of Camp Casey off limits. This is the road where the accident that killed an elderly South Korean woman last month occurred. The highway was put off limits due to concerns about cars parked on the side of the road and the amount of civilians in the area.

The new route to Camp Casey’s Gate 2 adds about 15-20 minutes on the already hour long drive for Army vehicles between Dongducheon and Uijongbu. What I find interesting is that the longer route still has the same problems as the more direct route. I drove on this route just last week. There are still cars parked on the side of the road, pedestrians in the streets, heavy traffic, and I saw an old lady pushing a cart with cardboard in the right hand lane that we had to get over to the left lane to avoid.

Which brings me to my point that no matter what route you choose you will have the same problems. When an accident occurs on this route then what is going to be the new route then? Were running out of roads to put off limits. The conditions on these roads would improve if sidewalks were installed and civilians and bicyclists were forced to use them. To often I see an area that does in fact have a wide sidewalk yet the Korean national is still riding his bike or pushing a cart in the right hand lane of the highway.

In the area where the elderly woman was killed there were sidewalks inn the area plus crosswalks with walk lights, but she chose to not to go to a crosswalk and to jaywalk through heavy traffic. She had probably jaywalked across the street for years and nobody ever ticketed her for it. Maybe a few tickets would of convinced her to use the crosswalks thus adverting the accident. These are the conditions that contribute to causing accidents and changing roads won’t change that.

This from Mark’s blog wouldn’t be so funny if it wasn’t so true.

10. Hey, I think I saw your name on global.
9.  Yeah, I’m thinking about teaching English here when I get out.
8.  Don’t worry, my latest HIV test came out negative.
7.  Didn’t we go to CAS3 together?
6.  So what is your branch?
5.  Baby, let’s split this joint and roll in my Daewoo!
4.  So, baby, who’s your commander?
3.  Yeah, I just did AIP (Another International Player/Playette).
2.  Don’t worry about curfew, I live off post.
1.  I’m here on TDY (Temporarily Divorced for a Year)!

The Katolic Shinja has an interesting report that during Bush’s G8 speech he mentioned Korea as an example for Africa:

I just caught a bit of President Bush’s G8 speech. Lauding trade, not aid, as the solution to Africa’s woes, he noted that just 30 years ago, South Korea was as poor as many Sub-Saharan African nations, but that after pursuing an export-driven economy, South Korea is now as rich as many European countries.

To an extent poorer countries can model themselves after Korea, but Korea did have a few advantages to help their economy become what it is today. First and foremost is that Korea has a homogeneous society that does not have the tribal/ethnic/religous turmoil you see in many poor African countries. Korea does have some internal rivalries such as between Gyeongsam and Cholla provinces but nothing that would even come close to the open warfare that is prevalent in many African countries.

Another advantage Korea had was that US troops stationed in Korea provided a nice economic boost initially by providing jobs and a market for Korean goods. Plus the US troops provided a security guarantee to international investors looking at investing in Korea and taking advantage of its cheap labor. Do you think that anyone would have invested in Korea initially if US troops were not stationed here? If US troops were stationed in an African country I bet international investors would be more willing to invest in that African country knowing that the US military is providing a security guarantee of their investment. Do you think anyone would be willing to invest currently in Iraq if US troops were to pull out tomorrow?

Also Korea was given open access to the US market for their exports and received many contracts from the US government during the Vietnam War that really jumped started the Korean Economy in the late 60’s. Would African countries be given the same access to the US market to sell their goods? Plus Korea has two other huge exports markets right next door, Japan and China to sell their goods to.

It was in America’s interest to have Korea succeed during the Cold War. So Korea was given preferential treatment by the US. This added with Korea’s homogeneous society, cheap labor, a extremely hard working work ethic, plus leadership, despite his faults, from then dictator Park Chung Hee set the conditions that allowed Korea to become the nation they are today.

African countries will find it extremely difficult to match Korea’s success by trying to use the same formula Korea used to build their economy. Lessons can definitely be learned from Korea’s economic success but it is not the 100% solution to solving poverty in Africa.

I think ending the AIDS epidemic should be of the up most priority in Africa before economic development. No country will ever have a strong economy if their youth are dieing off and leaving the next generation as orphans. Would Korea have ever created their economic development if 15% of their population was dieing from AIDS 50 years ago? That along with internal tribal/religious/ethnic turmoil are the problems that many African countries are facing.

I have to give thanks to Far East Cynic for pointing out this sign:

This sign is from a bar in Shanghai, China. With the alleged crackdown on prostitution in Korea maybe signs like this can keep the prostitutes out of the clubs here too.

Jeff in Busan points out this letter to the editor in the Korea Times. Here are highlights from the letter:

I was sent to Korea and I served with the 7th Infantry Division. We were to serve for nine months and 36 points. When I finally rotated home, I was in Korea over 13 months and I had 52 points, but I was one of the lucky ones, I made it home.

I have always tried to feel I did some good in helping South Korea and its people. I wore my 7th Division cap with Korean ribbons on it in civilian life, but no more!

Like many Korean War veterans, I too have tired of the TV reports showing mobs of people in various Korean cities shouting “Americans, Go Home!”

When I think of the sacrifice we made and the number of people we lost in trying to protect the freedom of the South Korean people, it leaves a bad taste in my mouth, and to have the South Korean people throw our sacrifices in our face is too much to take.

Jeff tends to think that Korean anti-Americanism shouldn’t be taken at face value because the majority of Koreans do not want the US to leave they just want the US to change it’s attitude.

(…) letters like those written by Mr. Gunther remind me that to Americans, who do not understand the Korean way of doing things, words mean things. Americans hear the words and take them at their face value.

We don’t do a lot of processing words through the filters of other cultures. Although there needs to be greater education and less focus on the minor events in the Western press, the Korean side must also understand that a poor choice of words or misguided actions can end up doing much more harm than good

There is definitely cultural misunderstandings about what one sees on the news compared to the actual reality here in Korea. I remember last month’s Hanchongryun protest that totaled 3,000 college students at Yongsan fighting with the riot police. Most of those college students probably could care less about the ideology of Hanchongryun but just look forward to fighting with the riot police and trading war stories that night at the bar with their friends.

This violent protest was all over the world news and my parents even called me wondering what was going on over here after seeing it on the news. I just explained to them that this type of thing is something that college students typically do here every summer. It is like a rite of passage around here to protest something.

However, the next week 4,000 USFK workers stage an even bigger, but peaceful protest in favor of USFK and for keeping their jobs and no one cares or reports it. This selective reporting by the international media only further inflames the sentiment back in America. The international media in my opinion has an agenda to push anti-Americanism probably because it sells in the international market and the Hanchongryun types only continue to feed it and to further tarnish Korea’s image in America.

The domestic media in Korea is just as bad at fueling not just anti-American sentiment but also anti-foreigner sentiment in general with biased one sided reporting. This reporting only reinforces preconceived stereotypes that many Koreans hold about foreigners to begin with.

However, the Korea Times letter writer should take pride in the fact that him and his fellow American soldiers sacrifices during the Korean War are what have allowed the South Korean media to have biased free speech to begin with. Freedom and especially free speech, if even biased 50 years later is still something to proud of having given to the South Koreans.

The Japanese have agreed to a request from North Korea through South Korea to return a stone monument taken from Korea in 1905.

South Korea has asked Japan to give back a stone monument taken from the Korean Peninsula a century ago, an official said Wednesday.

The 2-meter- (6.5-foot- ) high stone monument was built in 1707 in what is now North Korea’s northeastern Kilju county to commemorate a Korean victory in a battle against Japan.

This reminds me of the time I went to the National Museum in Tokyo and the museum had artifacts from Korea that were designated as “gifts” from the Korean kingdom but I looked at the date of the Korean “gifts” and they were from 1592-1598 time period which so happened to be the same time line as the Hideoyoshi invasion of the peninsula where many artistic works were plundered from Korea.

It makes me wonder if this statue is also designated as another such Korean “gift”?

The first sign of summer time in Korea is not what you normally would think would be a sign of the summer season. In Korea summer time officially begins when national warnings of imminent fan death are broadcasted around the country.

Cathartidae has the latest in the fan death phenomenom that seems strangely limited to happening only in Korea.

For all the latest information on the fan death killer that continues to ravage the population of Korea every summer more than GI driving accidents, check out fandeath.net. As the website says, you never know you may be next.

This story is truly despicable. A group of people has vandalized the UN Cemetery in Busan:

A giant anti-U.S. President George W. Bush message apparently written in herbicide has appeared on the lawn of the UN Memorial Cemetery in Daeyeon-dong, Busan. The site is reportedly on the itinerary of visiting national leaders attending the APEC summit in November.

The office of the UN Memorial Cemetery said Thursday it notified Nambu Police Station on the morning of June 14 that someone had written “NO BUSH” in 10 m high letters on the lawn between the flags of nations participating in the Korean War and the graves.

The cemetery’s office said it appeared the perpetrators used liquid herbicide to write the message, which was 50 m wide, with each line some 30 cm thick. Given the scale, it must have taken several people with spraying tools to write it, the office said. The grass is being restored.

This reminds me of when the grave stones of GIs killed during the invasion of Normandy in France were spray painted by anti-American vandals with the words, “Remove this rubbage from French lands”.

If someone has got a problem with Bush that is fine. Go stand on the street corner and protest. You have every right to do so but you don’t have the right to harm others or vandalize property. Especially the hollowed ground of UN soldiers buried at the UN Cemetery. That is right it isn’t just the remains of US soldiers buried in Pusan. The cemetery in Pusan is the only cemetery administered by the UN in the whole world and includes remains of soldiers from all the countries that took casualties during the war. I have traveled to the cemetery before and it is really a beautiful and solemn place for being situated in the middle of Korea’s 2nd largest city of Busan.

I would hope that people no matter what their political persuasions may be would agree that such a place should be considered sacred. It is unfortunate that such an act of vandalism is kept in the back pages of the papers and is not causing an outcry here in Korea. The memories of these dead soldiers are cheapened by such an act of vandalism by a country these international soldiers gave their lives to save. The way the youth is today, I doubt these same protesters would be willing to die for Korea like these soldiers did during the Korean War.

Could you imagine the outcry if somebody put anti-Bush graffiti somewhere at Arlington National Cemetery? I think even the kookiest Democrats like Howard Dean would even condemn such an act. Why shouldn’t Korea do the same for this cemetery?

Big shout out to Katolic Shinja for pointing this story out.

How many countries in the world do their citizens complain about having too much free time?

On Friday, it will have been one year since the five-day workweek became law for all state-run companies, all financial institutions and all private businesses with more than 1,000 employees. On the same day, the five-day week will go into effect for companies with more than 300 workers.

The Ministry of Culture and Tourism recently surveyed 864 adults whose employers switched over to the five-day workweek a year ago. Of those surveyed, 57 percent said they were dissatisfied with the additional free time. Only 5 percent said they were “very satisfied” with it.

Here are some of the reasons Koreans are unhappy about all this free time:

A 40-year-old employee at a brokerage firm in Yeouido, Seoul, who asked to be identified only as Mr. Lim, said he rejoiced when he heard about the new system. But “after driving out to the country every weekend, there was nowhere else to go,” Mr. Lim said.

Sounds like Mr. Lim isn’t trying very hard to find something to do because Korea is anything but boring. There is always something going on here.

Many people complained about the financial burden placed on them by the extra leisure spending. Kim Kang-joon, a 39 year-old office worker, was skating along the Han River with his family last weekend. “I spent 400,000 won ($395) on the inline skates, and we’ve been to several water parks in the metropolitan area,” Mr. Kim said.

Sounds like Mr. Kim needs to take up cheaper hobbies. How about basketball instead of inline skating? Or how about hiking in the numerous parks where the tickets are extremely cheap?

“Since the five-day workweek, I have no strength left to think of anything else but making up for lost sleep, because I have to go to the office earlier than before and I am overloaded with work,” said an employee at Daewoo Securities who asked for anonymity.

Sounds like he needs to learn how to work more efficiently and take shorter lunch breaks to improve efficiency during the work day.

Here’s another shocker:

The survey by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism found that 83.1percent of those surveyed said their spending on leisure had gone up; 16.3 percent said it was the same as it was before the five-day workweek system was adopted.

Imagine that, leisure spending rising because people have more time off. Absolutely shocking news.

I have a recommendation for all these people being burned about by all this leisure time. Take up a hobby or how about spending time at home with your family if you are married.

Some of the Korean civilians I work with tell me the main reason Korean workers dislike the 40 hour work week is because they are making less money because they are working less hours. Not because they have to much leisure time. The truth of the matter probably lies somewhere in the middle.

The flights to and from Korea for USFK soldiers stationed on peninsula will end and be replaced by commercial flights from Incheon. This is great news because flying out of Incheon is a lot nicer than flying out of Osan. Apparently the flights that run twice a week out of Osan are much more expensive than regular commercial flights from Incheon.

But in a cost-cutting move, the Defense Department will by 2008 phase out Patriot Express service to all but five locations: Guantanamo Bay, Diego Garcia, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Incirlik, Turkey. It may use the Patriot Express to airlift troops into other locations when it needs to, Dutcher said.

“It’s financial,” said Dutcher. “Cost saving to the Department of Defense. Now the Department of Defense is losing approximately $67 million per year over what it would cost to fly by a commercial aircraft.”

I hope they let Singapore Airlines fly me home when it comes time for me to leave.