Scribblings of the Metropolitician

Podcast #23 - Monster Mash!

(From KrusherVision.com)

Podcast #23 is, after much time away from the Mike (hehe), finally out!

In this episode, (you can also listen and/or subscribe to the podcast in iTunes in the left menu) I travel to the press screening of The Host, which I predict will be the Korean hit of the summer (since I believe Hanbando will suck big rocks and sink into the sea of mediocrity from which it came), and even give you a short taste of the controversial opening scene. It's a short and sweet swipe at the US, but one pretty consistent with the origins of most maniacs and monsters in this kind of genre film – the "secret government laboratory" or "illegal corporate research facility." The movie's good, the post-game breakdown is good, and you heard it here first! Well, kind of.

Running Time: 19:15
File Size: 17.6 MB
File Info: 128 kbps (technically 96 kpbs stereo) at 44.010 kHz, MPEG-2, layer 3 (MP3)

Back to Podcasting!

Just a quick announcement – back to podcasting comes the Metropolitician!

Episode #23 is on the way.

I got to attend the press screening of The Host, and even after having seen the film multiple times in order to massage the English subtitles, seeing it in full cinematic glory as a digital projection on a big screen was simply amazing. I was just as absorbed by the story – and seeing for the first time with fully finished sound and foley tracks really helped suck me back in.

After the show, I sat down with Darcy and a new friend to the podcast in a Coex Mall coffee shop for a quick and dirty breakdown. Their takes and analyses are must-hears before watching the film and can make the experience much more worth it.

So when I get this thing up on the 'Net and up into your portable MP3 device, make sure you take it to the show.

Expect the 'cast in a couple days.

Podcast #22: LapPOP!

(Thanks, American Rhetoric!)

Space:

The final frontier

These are the voyages of the Starship, Enterprise

Its 5 year mission

To explore strange new worlds

To seek out new life and new civilizations

To boldly go where no man has gone before

(The Star Trek Lyrics You Probably Never Knew Existed)
(You can sing along!)

"Beyond
The rim of the star-light
My love
Is wand'ring in star-flight
I know
He'll find in star-clustered reaches
Love,
Strange love a star woman teaches.
I know
His journey ends never
His star trek
Will go on forever.
But tell him
While he wanders his starry sea
Remember, remember me."

Captain's Log, Stardate April 15, 2006.
Welcome to a special episode of Metropoliticking in Seoul. For my regular listeners, I'm sorry I've been out of things for so long, but between my back going out, the Yellow Sandstorm from China that's been burning my eyes and nose, and trying to shake a cold that's been destroying my voice, it's been pretty tough to get a podcast down lately.

For my listeners at LapPOP, who are listening to this as part of a show with bloggers and other performers, I'd like to say thanks for coming out and listening to me, a true geek living and working in Seoul. This is a podcast I do on life and people in Seoul, and a place for me to vent and express while I work on my doctoral dissertation on Korean nationalism out of Ethnic Studies at UC Berkeley. I'm also a photographer, and more recently, a blogger and podcaster. And the more I can try to put these things together, the happier I get – so being included in this show is a really cool chance for me to motivate, integrate, and presentate(?).

The Show Begins

So let the show begin! I thought this piece would be a good one to read and make an interesting audio segment out of; so I reworked it a bit and am "representating" it here; the piece is also old, so for those of you who've come into the blog recently and haven't dug back to all my early posts, I wanted to offer this up as one of my favorite little random pieces of Korea commentary. I don't often get a chance to talk about the various major forces in my life in one fell swoop: race, history, Korea, and Star Trek. So indulge me here. And please forgive me my geekiness.

Now, I love me some Star Trek and always have. I have always thought that people who claim not to like it either  have only a superficial impression of it or erroneously think that anyone who watches the show must automatically be the geeks rebuffed by William Shatner in that infamous Saturday Night Live skit: "Get a life."

And yes, there are geeky aspects to the Trek. The show takes place in outer space, there are aliens, blinking gadgets, and oodles of pseudo-tech-talk. But that's the flippin'-through-the-channels view of the show. If you look under the surface, you'll see some of the best writing on television (the various series have won more than their fair share of Emmy awards), extremely well-fleshed out characters, long-running, consistent, and soap operatic plot lines – elements that mesh together to make for a pretty darn good show.

You add on top of that some of the best elements of real science fiction – through futurist plotlines, technology, or other themes that allow a critique of society – and you get some really smart television that asks a lot of questions that are pertinent to us today.

Good science fiction is interesting, fun, and most importantly – challenging. Tellingly, it was the only television show Martin Luther King, Jr. would allow his children to watch. And when Nichelle Nichols (Uhura) was considering leaving the show, he made a personal request that she remain, as Star Trek was the only show that portrayed a vision of a true equality of the races. It may seem a bit outdated by our standards, but it was downright revolutionary at the time.

That's why the original Star Trek 1966-69 series was banned from most stations in the South, because they were too feminist, Communist, and suggestive of race-mixing for the time. I mean, there was a Russian deck officer, along with a Japanese navigator, a Black female main character who talked, and an ostensible Scotsman on the bridge. The 1960's viewer was reassured that the cocksure captain was a white man who didn't take shit off no aliens and always bagged the babes, but his first officer was a decidedly Asiatic-looking alien-human half-breed with devil ears. Here was the walking, talking embodiment of mixed-race – umm, scratch that – mixed-species lust, and he was a main character!

It should come as no surprise, for those of you not up on your Trek trivia, that Star Trek was the first show on television to show an interracial kiss, which got most Southern stations up in arms. Of course, science fiction was the only possible cover under which to get it through the censors even in the liberal, pinko North as well: the ostensible reason the kiss happened was because Captain Kirk and Lieutenant Uhura had been under the control of an alien force using them for his own demented amusement.

Neither character is kissing each other by choice, so the possibility of an expressed desire for interracial humping is eliminated by this neat plot device. This all, despite the fact that Uhura was undeniably hot, and old Bill Shatner, back in the day was pretty mackin' himself.

At this point, dear reader, you must be asking the question – so what the hell does this have to do with Korea?

Well, the fact is, for some inexplicable reason, Koreans don't like Star Trek. And I mean DO NOT LIKE AT ALL. So what, ask you? But think about it. For a country that is so relatively culturally colonized by America, in which almost every major genre of any art form is reproduced here, and most anything that enjoys some degree of popularity in the US holds a proportionally similar degree of popularity here, Star Trek is noticably, glaringly absent from the pop culture scene. No DVD's of the TV series exist here, and the movies get almost no play. I saw a poster for Star Trek: Nemesis a few years ago in a subway staircase, and it got only a single night of play in a tiny theater in Kangnam, w well-to-do area of southern Seoul. The only other people there was a couple on the other side of the room, and the woman was obviously not there by choice. It was sad, very sad.

I am using one of my favorite shows as a foil to get right at the heart of what is an oft-overlooked cultural pattern in a progress-obssessed society that is so deeply and uncritically steeped in a balls-to-the-walls hyper-modernity, the cracks through which one might look to see the under-layer of a deeper, pre-modern web of thinking that lurks beneath everything in the layer above.

Wait - one more time? In other words, what I'm saying is that there just might be a reason that this very American cultural product doesn't translate well into the Korean market – because the show, its assumptions, concerns, and core concepts, for some reason, seem unable to mesh with anything within the Korean cultural framework of the familiar – no matter how much or how little Korea can arguably be called a cultural colony of America.

In fact, the reason shows such as Friends or Sex in the City are hits all over the world lies in those shows' universality, as opposed to the specific and peculiar fit of that foreign culture to the American one. The real reason shows such as Star Trek find such little popularity in certain countries (such as Korea) versus others (such as Germany) is because of the fit – or lack thereof – with the mode within which those countries operate.

If one were to take the standard cultural imperialism analysis, one would expect that the structural power of the core would simply replicate itself onto the culture of the periphery. In other words, the cultural colonialism of America would leave an impression on the foreign cultures it influenced with roughly the same proportion of popularity as in the home culture that manifest themselves in the culture on the recieving end – but that doesn't happen in the case of Star Trek..

Take the fact that the two most famous public figures of Korean descent in America – whom I call the two Chos (Margaret and John) – have never been able to make the rounds of Korean TV, because then they'd have to explain why they got famous in the first place (standup routines about gay sex and "warrrrshing" one's vagina, the concept of the "MILF," or getting high on a blunt before riding a cheetah to White Castle – these wouldn't fly on Korean Sunday night primetime).

I am willing to bet that if either John or Margaret Cho had gotten as famous as they are as bubble gum pop singers, serious authors, or Super Bowl MVP, they'd have made the rounds to Korea as Korean Long Lost Son or Daughter #1 a long time ago.

But beyond all that, there's the fact that every single Korean national with whom I have watched the show, of various backgrounds and levels of education, invariably have the same reaction to watching aliens and humans interacting on the screen: "Eewww. They're so gross." Or alternatively – "It's so unrealistic! How can something like that even talk?"

The comments are generally variations on this theme. What fazes the Korean viewers is the fact of the aliens' difference and the fact that they look so animalistic and...alien. Most Koreans can't seem to get past the "alien" part – that they look so "무서워" (scary) or "징그러워" (disgusting) – before we even get to the facts of the plot being in the far-flung future, or the existence of transporter beams, phasers, and the possibility of galavanting throughout space at "warp speed."

Although watching a bug-eyed "Hobbit" and his shriveled little friend climb a lava mountain with a magic Ring of Power that grants the wearer invisibility and an unnaturally long life, as he's chased by hybrid Elven-Orcs controlled by an evil wizard with a white beard – oh, that's believable. And Koreans loved them some 반지의 재왕 (Lord of the Rings). Wait – which is more unrealistic again? I'd bet on humankind coming across a slimy alien or inventing a faster-than-light drive before I'd ever bet on us seeing a 20-foot tall killer troll or a Magical Ring of Power.

So - am I being nitpicky, or is there something more under the surface here? When I consider that question, I think about the fact that Star Trek, judged as an American cultural product, is so very...American. It is steeped in the discourses of multiculturalism, collective Western guilt over colonialism, and in the larger progressive discourses of equality and democracy, as expressed in more obvious aspects of its backstory, which nurses a Utopian vision of equality between the races (and species), complete gender equality and the elimination of poverty, along with constant explorations of contemporary social issues (for example, the Bajoran "comfort women" or the unmistakably Israel-Palestine-oriented critique of the Cardassian "settlers" who encroach on Bajoran lands). Star Trek is unabashedly steeped in very "real" things – the stories, no matter the presence of starships and intergalactic federations and alliances, are still set up in ways we can easily recognize and understand in terms of the pressures and politics of actual human life in the present.

Star Trek is simply more "American" in regard to the way one might define this as a set of ideals that were the basis for every form of progressive "advance" in America – and around most of the world, actually. For better or for worse, whether one thinks of them having come too late or too early, the ideals of equal qualifications for citizenship, racial and gender equality, rights for gay or disabled people, and every other "movement" one might think of involving a group in a disadvantaged position in relation to the white, male, Protestant majority in power – owes its existence to particularly American founding ideals.

To the extent that the Star Trek world's "prime directive" of non-interference with developing civilizations expresses guilt over the West's many excesses (e.g. American westward expansion, the eugenics movement, or the resulting Holocaust), Korea is itself still very much caught up in this paradigm of "progress" and "development" that has already gotten the West in so much trouble. In a very fundamental way, Star Trek is a post-modern set of discourses, whereas Korea is still caught up in a mix between the pre- and presently modern.

That's one reason I think Star Trek might not gel in a Korea moving out of pre-modernity into a confident modernity that promises a new car for everyone, clean and luxurious housing, shiny appliances and gadgets, and more leisure time, all of which boost national pride while also partially explaining the nation's eventual triumph over evil Communism. To many Koreans, this is a dream come true; to Americans, that's all just so...50's.

But I digress; here's the important point here, I think: A postmodern, Star Trekkian hesitation about the direction of modernity seems to run up against a Korean modern urge to move forward, ahead Warp Factor 9, by any and all means necessary. Even if a Korean viewer might be able to identify with some of these post-modern messages, I think that it is hard for Korean viewers to ever get past a very pre-modern, pre-contact view of the outside world, a paranoid and suspicious view of Otherness. This simple fear of the "alien" – terrestrial or not – prevents any real (re)consideration of a modern multiculturalism or post-modern multiplicity.

Just take a look at Korea's blood-based notion of racial purity, history of discrimination against mixed-race people, as well as the fact that Korean folks, in the aggregate, just seem to not like Black people but seem to love them some white folks.

In this way, Korea's is a worldview unmarked by the West's trepidation to trek, in which the notion of inevitable and desirable progress is the lifeblood of this civilization's existence – note the lack of attention or even dismissal of ethical concern over the then-questionable triumph of having successfully cloned a human being.

I originally wrote this piece well before the Hwang Woo Seok scandal, and all my concerns about the possible ethical problems posed by human cloning were dismissed by many Koreans as "attacks" against Korea and were taken as signs of American "jealousy."

But, a thought experiment: if it had been a Western nation – say, for example France, the United States, or Germany – that had led the charge to duplicate human beings from scratch in a petri dish, surely there would have been more trepidation, if only because of the history of the grotesque acts committed in the name of "science" and "progress" in these very states. In Korea, you heard nary a peep of criticism about the claim of having cloned a human being; in fact, even well after it became clear that the research was faked, the original MBC producers who delivered the scoop on national television were still receiving death threats.

And don't even get me started about the many people who just don't get why having Hitler and Nazi-themed bars here in Korea is just so...1940's – people here know about the Nazis and the Holocaust, but I think that so many just don't get why and how those things were a real moment of shame to the West's project; it was "enlightenment" and modernity gone mad, and a shockingly horrid moment of failure for Western culture.

"Sieg, Heil!" in Shinchon

Dear reader Sungwon sends an old picture of his local Hitler place in Daejeon.

Springtime for Hitler – in Pusan, 2002. Thanks, Matty!

Hitler as a part of a bingo game for kids. If get bingo, call out "Sieg, Heil!"
(Thanks, "Hater Depot!")

And this is one of my points – why a Star Trek worldview might actually have a lot to offer to a consumption and commodity-obssessed Korean popular culture; Star Trek has asked myriad questions about what it means to be human, a clone, a slave, a sentient robot, and about the ethics of absolute power, the pitfalls of "progress," and the follies of ideology, racism, and nationalism.

But still, it would be ridiculous to say that Star Trek itself needs to be watched by all Koreans, or that doing so will magically make people on the peninsula more moral, further enlightened, or somehow better people. That's just plain arrogant.

But – to add to the words of a friend who once said that Koreans were, more than most other place in the world, in serious need of some good-ass weed, I'll say that sitting back and watching some Trek along with that might do wonders to mellow Korean folks out. Shit – it can't hurt – and surely it's better than importing The Jerry Springer Show or Freddy Vs. Jason.

And after the human cloning debacle, am I really so wrong to think this?

So, since I'm not holding my breath for the legalization of blunt in Korea, Star Trek DVD's with Korean subtitles it will have to be. So when we starting the petition to Paramount Korea?

THANKS FOR LISTENING!
I hope this show was cool with ya'll and that you have fun listening to the artists who will hopefully be far less boring and pedantic than me. I can be contacted [email protected] as well as through the email link through my blog site, which is www.metropolitician.com. I hope to hear from some of you through my blog and podcasts, and I also sincerely hope that this reading worked for you. From Seoul, South Korea, this is Michael Hurt, signing off.

Thanks for listening!

Seoul's 1st Pod Party!

"Awwww – Geek out! (So chic; a geek)."

Announcing the 2nd event planned for friends of this blog and podcast – this time celebrated as a Pod Party! Last time was cool, but the big table in the restaurant was kinda awkward, no? So we're gonna mix it up while also doing some cool stuff!

THE PLACE
What does a pod party entail, you ask? Here's the plan. You come to the Lotte World and come alllll the way down into the deep, dark depths where the ice skating rink is. There you will find a Sizzler, where there is an "outdoor" terrace area perfect all reserved for us. You can see people whizzing around the skating rink, the sound of glee and cotton candy is in the air, and by the time our pod party is over, you'll be able to see their little fireworks/laser show. But what will we be doing there?

THE SCENE
Buffet. Diet Coke. People whizzing around in circles. Like-minded people. Such an environment encourages socializing and gettin' creative. What happens, I wonder, if we add a mike to the mix?

YOUR MISSION

There are several little tables spread around the terrace area, where you'll be eating, yapping, and meeting new peoples. Sometime in the 3 hours we'll be there, you'll be encouraged to come to the microphone area and put up to 5 minutes of anything you want in there, to go in the next podcast. A poem? Your rant about life here? A promo for your blog and why people need to go there? A song you recorded and you brought on your laptop? How about just you audioblogging a message to your friends? Got a list of top ten somethings about Korea? Maybe you want to grill me for 5 minutes of your agenda. Anything's possible. Just keep it to 5 minutes or less so we can link them all together into an interesting pastiche podcast composed of the content you make.

RENDEZVOUS POINT
St. Patty's Day – Friday, the 17th, in the Sizzler right next to the Lotte World skating rink. Just go to Lotte World in Chamsil and keep going down the escalators. We're reserved from 7-10 PM, when the Sizzler closes and we absolutely have to leave. For those of you planning St. Patty's parties, we'll be ending early enough for you to make it anywhere cool.

EQUIPMENT
Geek out! Bring your laptop, your digital camera, your iPod, and any other equipment that might make you more creative, that might go with the audio snippet you record. There will be power strips there and Nespot wireless internet is also in major effect. If you want to sign up beforehand, but still haven't, click here to read more as to how to do so. Like they said in that cheerleader movie, "Bring it!"

RSVP
Like last time, please RSVP if you're gonna come. The terrace has room for about 30 folks, technically, and I'd just like to know if well either be coming up short, or will need a few more chairs.

SUGGESTIONS?
Drop a line to the comments section if you have other suggestions about this event-in-motion. So let's party, pig, and podcast together!

WHY ATTEND?
Fellow pod partiers – if you attend this wildly cool and probably first-ever event, you will rise in levels of coolness that are simply indescribable. The only thing I can offer is an example, in the form of before and after shots. Here is a man before attending a similar "geeky" party I once held in Oakland, who benefitted immensely from the experience.

BEFORE PARTY

AFTER

ANY QUESTIONS!?

Podcast #21 Is Ready! Comments for the Next One?

The fabled and much anticipated 21st podcast is ready to listen in the left menu, or a click away from the white iPod icon, also in the left menu bar.

This week, the show starts off with a bangup old school song that's strangely apropos for the subject of media, misrepresentation of the truth, and the consequences of being naughty and getting caught in the public eye. First, though, we get a few listener letters and then try to fly through a few "What the Hell?" stories, including the non-issue of fan death and other urban myths. While editing, I realized that I could have dealt with the questions better, and thought of a few better answers after the fact, but realized that what with the difficulties of producing this episode, if I went to re-record, this podcast would never get done.

So I'll talk here a bit more about a couple things I thought of after I had already laid down my answers on the digital "tape." First of all, there is the issue of "air conditioner disease," which seems to be only a disease in Korea. I know many other places that are hotter, run air conditioners longer and hotter – but have never heard of this dread disease. I am convinced that it is simply part of many austerity, conservation, and public awareness programs typical of the more propaganda-filled pre-2000 Korea I remember. Back then, there was always an obligatory brainwashing piece public service announcement before every movie in the theater, focusing on subject such as not inadvertently starting forest fires with your family, the dangers of not conserving water, the need to continue keeping an eye out for spies, and detailed descriptions of "air conditioner disease." In that one, I distinctly remember describing how all kinds of evil bacteria live in the filter (which sounds like it might be plausible) but the real culprit lies in overuse of the air conditioner in the first place. Basically, the line was that overusing the "aircon" was not only a waste of resources, but it was also detrimental to your health. So STOP – turn that aircon down, get off your ass and get a handfan or two, and smile with the knowledge that you're helping make Korea a better, safer, and more energy-efficient city.

That's when I knew, deep in my heart, that I was a big, fat, ugly American – my reaction was, "Screw that. I'm keeping my aircon on at 11 on the dial and not stopping until my fingers turn blue and my Diet Coke starts developing ice crystals in the bottle. And pass my Big Mac, punk."

OK – so maybe I got a bias against believing such campaigns, and maybe I just assume everything I've learned on logical, scientific America is inherently true until proven otherwise. But I still think "air conditioner disease" is a crock. If it were so dangerous, then wouldn't frail, little old people in Miami be keeling over all the time? I mean, we're talking about sticking kimchee in air conditioners to prevent bird flu. Whaaaat?!

Anyway, the main feature is an interview with journalist Sei Chong, former editor of a major newspaper here in Seoul, who will give us the inside scoop on journalism and the Korean media. She's frank and likes to tell things straight – so if you've ever wondered what some of the issues are with journalism in Korea, standards of ethics, and how all that mixes together with various interests here – you gotta take a listen. The show runs a bit long, but that's the beauty of time-shifted media, ain't it? You can always save some for later!

Running Time: 1:25:29
File Size: 29.4 MB
File Info: 48 kbps (technically 96 kpbs stereo) at 22.050 kHz, MPEG-2, layer 3 (MP3)

Show Links:
Roland R-1 Digital Audio Recorder
The recorder I use – it's served me well. No real complaints here and more rugged than the cheap plastic body would have you think.

M-Audio's MicroTrack 24/96 Portable Digital Recorder
A highly-recommended recorder for prosumer enthusiasts.

Podcast #20 – Yongsan Walking Tour

This is the long-promised podcast – Podcast #20 – the Yongsan Electronics Market walking tour, in addition to a couple listener letters and a quick discount DVD recommendation. You can come into the tour from 3 main points, with the final destination being the new, high-end Yongsan "Jeonja Land" electronics market. Along the way, I'll show you the older building, which is connected to the new CGV complex. We'll pass by the Yonsan train station, newer electronics market (mostly prosumer/consumer stuff) in that new complex, through the old electronics market, then into our final destination, where I'll also stop by the Apple store, as well as the Apple service center.

Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto!

Running Time: 57:15
File Size: 17.9 MB
File Info: 48 kbps (technically 96 kpbs stereo) at 22.050 kHz, MPEG-2, layer 3 (MP3)

Show Links:

Yeinsa DVD Store
http://www.yeinsa.com

Podcast Questions...

I just finished up the recording of the parts for Podcast #20 – Yongsan Walking Tour, and I realize that I have a few questions for you listeners out there. Please, please be generous with your feedback. You guys are the reason I do this, so the more feedback you give, the more inspired I get, which is in addition to me trying to address any questions or suggestions that will help make my podcasts better.

#1 If you've observed anything strange and/or bewildering during your stay here in Korea, please drop a line for the "What the Hell?" series. Once we get the ball rolling, I'm sure it'll be a good segment, so let's put that ball into motion! Drop me an email using the link at the top of this page, or preferably, you can use the comments section of this post to post your question.

#2 For people who attended the Metropoliticking dinner, any suggestions as to how to improve the get-together in the future, or things that might make it more interesting, since I am thinking about making it perhaps a monthly shindig and trying to do something interesting so we might make a small community that everyone can participate in, benefit from, maybe make a new friend. Please place your thoughts in as comments to this post if you can.

#3 Does anyone out there have announcements that might be of interest to our listeners? Send them to me directly at the email address above.

#4 Do you have any feedback and/or suggestions for Susan or Darcy to cover in terms of food and film, respectively? Any kinds of cuisines you'd like to know about? Restaurants to suggest? What about questions for Darcy to address? Burning questions you want answered about Korean film? Thoughts to share? Please use the comments section for this post for your feedback.

#5 Any podcast feedback in general? Leave a comment to this post!

And again and as always – thanks for taking the time to subscribe and listen!

Upcoming Podcasts

Hey –

I just got a mixed review on the iTunes page. A blot on my image!

Well, it's of my own making, I guess – so the next podcast I will be doing the definitive treatment of Yongsan and how to get to recommended electronics markets and other sites of interest (this was the plan anyway, but I thought I'd make sure everyone knows). It's an amazing but confusing place, so it's a perfect candidate for podcast. So I'll be getting back to some more practical basics (I thought I was already starting to with my subway 'cast, though) and getting ya'll more stuff to chew on. Problem is, I was actually gonna do the Yongsan thing today, but I have a horrible cold and my voice is shot. This week's been a bad one.

I know I got a lot of good feedback on Darcy's podcast, but I also know that for those of you not interested in Korean cinema, such long interviews might be of little interest to you. I'll try to strike a balance. And I'd like to solicit you listeners for more suggestions.

Also in the bag is the response I recorded to a set of interview questions sent from Finland via email. I actually already recorded it, but want to do it again to make it less...umm...lame, and to improve on my answers by being more concise and less longwinded.

On top of that, we'll have more Susan and Darcy in the near future – the cuisine and cinema beats – as well as a few other surprises. And I do want to get out of the "family restaurant" and Western food rut, as one listener suggested, so Susan and I will come up with something soon. I was thinking of hitting up the popular chain Omuto Tomato – perhaps the Ehwa one, unless she thinks the one in Coex is better, and I have been thinking about making the CoEx trip a podcast unto itself.

Trust me – I'm working on making this podcast as good as it can be (which is a lot better than now!) I'm a perfectionist held back only by my lack of skills and organization (which means that I'm just not doing a good job!). But at least I know it's not where it needs to be, rather than be overly satisfied with mediocre content. To me, that's the main difference between mediocre and successful projects. Well, a little elbow grease and the skills to pay the bills doesn't hurt, either.

The Han River Miracle

Jesus was a carpenter, a man who made and fixed things with his hands. I think he may have already returned to the worldly realm, but this time in the form of a computer techniciain. For although my hard disk is dead, my data lives!

The miracle worker at the JR Mac Center resurrected my disk long enough to get the data off it onto the new 80 gig disk on my laptop. What special tricks did he use? What special magic from the Mac Technician Necronomicon did he invoke? My now beloved Mac Jesus said, with a smirk, that he just slapped my disk until it started. I'm glad I wasn't there to see it, but that, ladies and gentlemen, is the shit. Mac Jesus comes through for me again. (Previously, he had fixed my screen by just opening up the iBook right in front of me and just reconnecting a loose cable. Charged me 20,000 for the trouble. Coulda been like, "The biaxial defibrillator connector came out of sync with the LCD's lateral NTSC generator chip. 300 bucks.") You know what I'm talking about.

So now I have 1gigabyte of RAM memory, making my computer quick and snappy as all get out. My hard disk is twice as big. And Mac Jesus installed the new version of OS X – Tiger – so I essentially have a brand new computer and with every single file, every single icon exactly where I left it.

Grand total? 340,000 won, boyee!

That's killer. In the States, just to have someone cough on my machine would have cost me $100, before even getting to recovering data from a dead drive with special Slap Technique™, copying it over to the new one, and then updating me to the new operating system, which I hadn't even previously owned. You know they woulda just reinstalled my old OS, all following the rules to the letter. And for all that labor time, plus parts, you can bet this woulda cost like $700 back and taken a week back in the good ole US of A. It's times like this that you know it's good to live in Korea.

So, although I had been resigned to downloading some iPod hacking program to dig out years of illegally downloaded MP3's (umm, I mean "backup copies" of the CD's that I already own) along with a few hundred bucks worth of legally-acquired audiobooks and video content. I had been making myself OK with having lost a couple years worth of digital pictures from iPhoto that I hadn't backed up. And I had already said my goodbyes to countless little memos and notes, not to mention having made myself OK with rewriting a whole buncha parts for the next chapter of my book. So this is BETTER than a new computer! Yeah, boyee!

So?!

Blogging? Back online!

Writing? Ready!

Podcasting? Warp Factor Nine!

Engage! (and praise Mac Jesus!)

Whooooooooooooooooooooooooosh!

1st Official Metropoliticking Dinner!

OK – this time's the perfect time to do it. As almost all Koreans will be off doing Lunar New Year's stuff, or preparing for it, I've decided to have our first get-together this Saturday, January 28th at 7 PM at CHILI'S.

I know that this is short notice, but it looks like most of the first attendees will be non-Korean nationals. And since I won't be doing any Seollalling until Sunday (if I even do get together with relatives), I tend to think that a lot of ya'll with Korean kinfolk should still be able to make it out on Saturday.

So Chili's in Chamsil at 7 PM! Since I did my first decent podcast from there (podcast #2) and it has good cocktails and food, let's hit it! There's only one – come out of Chamsil exit from Green #2 line exit #8 or Light Green #8 line exit #9. There's a map below. If you're coming in a taxi, I'd suggest telling the driver to go to the "교통회관" (kyo-tong hwe-gwan), and you'll likely pass the Chili's as you come up on the building and then have to bust a U-turn. Even if you come from the other direction (not likely), you can't miss it if you pass by it.

I know that the short notice and closeness to Lunar New Year may make this first get-together tough, but I think we have enough people to give it a try. And I'll ask some of our other podcast luminaries to be there as well, so try to make it out!

And PLEASE RSVP in the comments section! I'm gonna make reservations on Saturday afternoon.

Thanks!

t