30 Things~

30 Things about Hanul!

1. I love Korean literature

I like reading Korean novels, and I like writing Korean poems. Considering that I'm international field student, it can seem quite awkward that I like Korean much more than English, but I really love it. The atmosphere that the cohesion and adhesion of words make is quite awesome. I thus wanted to go to Korean universities to study Korean literature, but now I'm planning for universities abroad... I'm trying to find ways to make my interest in Korean literature to be useful abroad.

2. PLZ

PLZ is rock band of KMLA. If I have to pick the most meaningful activity that I had done in KMLA, I would pick PLZ without hesitation. PLZ made me to be a confident person at least on the stage. The enthusiasm of the students watching our performance inspired me a lot. 

3. I like getting knowledge

I like subjects that I can broaden my knowledge. It seems quite ambiguous because every subject would make one to build up knowledge. Still, I have my own standard in differentiating subjects whether I can get knowledge from it or not. For example, my favorite subjects among those that I learned in KMLA are US History, World History, US Government and Politics, and Biology. I like getting knowledge that enables me to broaden the horizon.

4. I seem like bright, talkative person but not necessarily
I am very talkative when I am excited being with my friends or the topic of conversation is related to my interest, but in other instances, I remain silent or quiet. 

5. Diurnal

I wake up quite early in the morning. I do not feel it difficult to wake up in the morning. The problem is that I feel very sleepy from 11 p.m or 12 a.m. I'm a procrastinator so when I have assignments due tomorrow, I start it at about 10p.m.However, as I cannot sleep late at night, I always fail to finish that assignment, so finish it next day early in the morning. A strange thing is that I can be awake until 3 a.m or 4 a.m when I want to study what I want to do, but can't be awake that late if I have to do homework.

6. I love art

I do not know lots of things about art, but I loved Art history class that I took in the summer session. My favorite artist is Gustave Courbet, the father of realism. 

7. Thornapple 

Thornapple changed my writing style so much. It is might sound quite awkward to say that a band, not writer, changed my writing style. However, their lyrics were awesome than any other writings that I have seen.

8. I like shopping.
I like buying everything. pens, pencils, mechanical pencils, clothes, electronic devices, earphones, phone cases, notebooks, etc.. My mother does not understand why I need many mechanical pencils though I certainly have things to write on. It is not a matter of necessity. I just feel satisfied seeing those products I bought. It is just difficult to explain the psychology behind the shopping addiction. People who like shopping and who don't like shopping hardly understand each other. 

9. I do not eat 곱창, 막창, 닭발, 회 (small intestine of cow?? chicken foot???? sushi) 
I can't eat food above. It is not that I hate the taste of them. My parents just didn't like 곱창, 막창 that much, so I simply did not have opportunities to try them. I told my mother a few days ago that I want to try 곱창. Mom said it doesn't taste good so I wouldn't like it. After that, I suddenly wanted to eat 곱창. I'm going to try 곱창 and 막창 soon. My mom and dad like sushi more than 곱창 and 막창. I once went to eat sushi with my parents. However, next day, I found out that I'm allergic to something that I ate that day. Maybe fish egg or something. Since then, I do not eat sushi and fish egg. 

10. I like making artworks using tools such as powerpoint, photoshop
This inspired me a lot. Graphic designs are always interesting, though I sometimes feel disappointed that I lack ability and creativity to make great artworks. I am design crew for many clubs, so I hope I would have many opportunities to create artworks. 

11. My hometown in Dangjin, Chungnam Province
People actually do not know much about Dangjin. When I say I'm from Dangjin, most of the people don't know where it is. Dangjin was really undeveloped, but since 2012 it is rapidly growing. Dangjin has population of 166,823, and has McDonalds, Burger King, angel in us coffee, starbucks, twosome place, coffee bean, cgv, 엽기떡볶이, 신전떡볶이, 설빙, uniqlo, and more!!!

12. I don't feel cold easily

It is good in winter, but when it becomes spring and summer, I always need fan or air conditioner. I once thought I was in menopause 갱년기 because women feel hot easily during menopause. 

13. My earphones have wings 
I lose everything. Lipbalm, phone, pen, mechanical pencil, and even clothes. I lose things that I bought. Especially, earphones fly away every time I buy them. I like listening to music, so I always buy expensive earphones, but then after a week or month, I have to buy a new one. I can guess where I put my earphones, but never found it. I would never lose the one I'm using right now. 

14. I type with two fingers
Still, fast enough to do assignments 500-600 types. People do not even recognize that I'm typing only with two fingers, 

15. MBTI Test - Jeanne D'Arc or saint? (INFP, ISFP)
MBTI test shows the general characteristics of people. When I was middle school student, I was 'saint' (INFP), but when I tried once more in high school, i got 'jeanne D' arc'(ISFP). The test results are shown with 4 letters, and the two types of results are different in only one letter - whether I determine something through intuition or experience.

16. Foods I really like 
Cheese, Cream pasta, pizza, hamburgers, 김치찌개, 돼지고기김치찜, 된장찌개, 삼겹살, 계란말이, potato

17. My head is flat
When I was 5 years, I fell down from mother's desk. I could have died because I got holes in my head. I went to hospital right away, so everything worked well. However, as the shape of head was being formed in the age of 5, I got really flat head. When I tap the round part of my head, and tap flat part of my head, I can hear that the sounds are clearly different. I don't like the shape of my head, but I can't do anything to fix it. 

18. like handwriting 
I really like writing something. Just holding pens and putting any letters on the paper make me happy. This is also the reason why I like calligraphy. 

19. Red Velvet 

I do not have in idol groups or actors that much. I know they exist, but do not really love them. But, nowadays I really like Red Velvet. Their songs are very unique. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88VRss2U4Lk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gUwieWcISDU

20. i don't know what I want to do - various interests
I want to be designer, prosecutor, writer, scholar, professor, researcher in Samsung, product designer, and more. It is so difficult for me to decide what I most like and what I want to do. 

21. good at running 
I do not like long distance running. But, in the short distance running, I can run quite fast. 

22. can play clarinet
As I'm not the member of Orchestra, friends surprise when I say I can play clarinet. I'm not good at it, but I played in for about 4 years. Now, I do not even know where my clarinet is. 

23. headache, stomachache, lumbago (?)
I suffer from simple health problems like headache or stomachache. I always have stomachache, so my friends who have known me for long years always ask me if I have stomachache or not that day. 

24. I want to get married. 
I want to be a member of happy family. I want to a good mother and good wife. I'm now drawing simple blueprint for the house I want to live in the future, and thinking how I can teach my children. 

25. I procrastinate to the last minute 
The only thing that makes me nervous with the deadline in Mr. Yoon's literature journal. I've takenall his literature classes - Introduction to English Literature, American Literature, and now Contemporary Literature. 2 students should write free topic journal each class, and we review each other's journal, and teacher gives feedback on our journals. It is very demanding and as he reviews the journals very carefully, we need to wrtie good journals. I always write this right before the class time, so I need to concentrate. It is also demanding to concentrate during very short period, and I am nervous that I would not finish the journal on time, but as I',m procrastinator, I do not want to finish the journal early. 

26. I do not like people eating dirty - lots of food waste, etc 
I do not know why. I can't just bear seeing people eating dirty. Trashing half od the food they brought, lots of rices sticking on the plate.. etc. I am proud of myself because I east very well. I advocate the rights of chicken. They were killed to be eaten by us, and if we do not eat the chicken, why did that chicken die? We need to be responsibility for killing the chickens!!

27. I am good at catching the personality of a person at a glance 
I really think eyes are the window of mind. I usually can guess how the person would be. Haeun knows it well. 

28. like decorating my phone or laptop 
Friends say my phone and laptop is amazing. I change fonts, themes, and install strange things that others do not know. I thus can help others decorating their devices, and help solve problems they have with their devices. 

29. no-jam life until the age of 13 
Until 13, I lived with my parents. I lived really unexciting and dull life. I have never been to other provinces Chungnam, Seoul until 13. Now, I've been to Gyeonggido and Gangwondo additionally - where my middle school and high school are! I've never been to Jeju do even. I first tried skiing and swimming in KMLA. I've never changed my hair. Long hair, no bang hairs ponytail. In KMLA, I tried lots of things to change myself. I cut my hair, made bang hairs, once colored my hair during vacation. I still can't swim, but at least I tried. These trivial things were big challenges for me, and I'm happy that I have changed a lot. My mother doesn't like these changes I made. I even did not tell my mother that I cut my hair to this length.

30. gifts 
I said i'm shopping addict. So, it is very hard for me to spend money for other people. I have so many things that I want to buy. However, nowadays, I'm giving gifts to my friends, not only buying things I want to have. It was at first hard to me to give up buying things for me and giving gifts to other with that money. But seeing friends being happy about my friends made me happier, so I continue giving gifts to my friends. 

           I liked studying when I was young; I’m not saying about the mere memorization of meaningless stuffs. Roughly, reading books, delving into numerous poems made my life fruitful and vivacious. People said it would be impossible, but I cried reading the masterpieces of Dostoevskii when I was yet 7 years old. Maybe I’ve read one of his books for more than 20 times. I wrote poem then. The title was 'Studying.’ Reading articles, analyzing books, and finding the relationships between different concepts was intriguing. While others felt tedious about doing assignments, I was excited because those assignments were opportunities for me to find new aspects in understanding particular concepts.

           I was surely the beneficiary of this rapid development propelled by reading a lot  of books. However, it also conversely affected me. First, I became afraid of saying ‘wrong’ things. I wanted to be a student who always follows the ‘right’ path, because that is what others expected from me. The test score plainly mattered to me. When I got something wrong on my test, I cried and screamed all night in the bed, hitting myself. Even, I framed myself into the social norms. I was very sensitive to the zeitgeist, hence I forced myself to learn and absorb the concept of moralities that were prevalent in the society. When I was asked some questions that require my own interpretation of moralities, my answers were thus ‘perfect’. Adults thought that I was a smart kid who realized the principles of the world at the early age.

           My mother liked me being smart, so started to force me to study. I had to suffer from the inundation of books and assignments that I did not want to do. Materials from the academies made me to learn numerous facts and knowledges; however, I lost the opportunities to reconsider the social norms that I just coerced myself to memorize. I even started to dislike ‘studying’ because I was merely forced to study. My mother did not want me to rest. She gave me numerous stuffs to do, and I was punished if I do not finish those completely. I started to realize that something was going wrong. Those things didn’t make me happy as before. I did not tell my mother, but I thought that everything was terrible.

           After six years of horrible elementary school years, I entered to middle school. It was dormitory school, so my mother wasn’t there. No one forced me to study and memorize things. I just had to be ready for few regular tests. There, my life has encountered new things. I learned the fact that emotion really matters in human lives. Roommates, Classmates, and club friends were all entangled with numerous conflicts. Just memorizing things and getting good scores in the test didn’t solve any problems happening among them. Understanding others and comprehending myself were prioritized. Three years of dormitory life made me to think of the ‘social norms’ again, which I just absorbed without doubt. It naturally made me to think of the essence of human beings, and the standard of rights and wrongs. My interest towards books and poems reappeared. I started to write poems or short novels. However, I became a skeptical person: dark, gloomy person who always questioned about myself. Although I endeavored to find my own answers in between the social norms and moralities, I could not completely give my own answer for my questions. Since then, literature became my friend. As I wrote the poems and novels, I definitely could say that the things inside my poems are 'my' things. It was the only thing that I did not need to lie in front of other people. The word choice, the topic I wanted to convey inside the poem, and the tone of my poem were all mine. Thus, I could not give up literature. Without it, I thought that I can never find something that I can genuinely say that it is mine.

           However, I did not like my style of writing. It was yet young, naïve, and light. I even tried to give up writing poems because reading my incomplete writings made me unpleasant. Then, I met ‘Thornapple’Thornapple after entering KMLA. Their lyrics, the tone of the song were the things that I admire. They were writing things that I really wanted to write. Their songs were like a blue swamp; inescapable and heavy. Since then, I listen to their songs every moment, and I can’t live without their songs. Just one listening of the song explains everything. They make me cry.

Juliet, Elizabeth... those fancy names of a pain-staking, lovely novels are all unnecessary; what we need now is only the story between us – trust, belief, and sincerity are things that only matters to put an end to this story.

Umbrellas, rain boots, scarfs, backpacks, and necklaces were all blue that day – especially, yours – Once yours were dazzled under the orange sunlight, sparkling throughout the empty spaces between us, dancing into my ears, whispering your delighted happiness, although vague. Truly, vivid trembles were inside my fingers, as if they are stamped inside the beats of my heart. Never to be dampened, I drew every minute details of your memory till I even forget those of me. What if the time stopped there, without lengthening numerous sweetness, happiness, and sadness.

Never thought of the strong headed, obstinate, fastidious characters of yourself. But, time, the revengeful one that was jealous of every jovial moments inside single breathe, has changed the picture, maybe. From there, my eyes couldn’t see nothing but blue of yours, evilness of yours. Did blue came from evilness? Strange, still, but the fact is – the vivid things of yours have changed into blue. Monotone, no differences in the particles of its color, no cracks were permitted in the stable blue. What if I saw a one, one difference in yours. Maybe I would still be drawing your memories in mine, instead of writing this letter.

I believe you wouldn’t be surprised this after reading this. Thinking backwards, I bet I have seen your trembling eyes and static heartbeats when I was suffering from trembling heartbeats and static eyes. The fragrance has made me adamant. What if your odor was less intense thus made me to stop at the moment. It proved to be impossible, but still, I wish.

Odorless flower and colorless ore seem to turn vague. Condescending eyes are nevertheless significant. Your eyes were filled with indifferent hatred scrambled upon pity remained at least, it is now comprehensible sorrow, now understandable sigh. What if you had sighed first, before myself. Why did you keep holding this?

Right here, you told me that ‘Estrangement is the stinkest inendurance’. I couldn’t find out what it means then, but I now know. What if I knew it first before you let me know.

Lucid, I believe

           Intangible fantasies on lucid dream were always there to fulfill insatiable, forbidden desire. Tilted from the normalcy, evasion accomplishes regression, and collision establishes catharsis, with turbid, grayish pity upon oneself. When it comes to lucid dream, the evasion and collision coexists, throwing one upon extreme ecstasy, vivifying the imaginary utopia, outside, but inside the real world. Nonetheless, un-easy as it is, only selected few are allowed to step down the staircases of lucid dream. It is said, bundles of hostile stories and the ghastly figures surround one, as if they are Cerberus. If I’m one of the stars particularly glittering around, chosen by The Supremacy, I would definitely get into the lucid dream. Definitely, unquestionably, I will. I will.

           Remember the ‘break’, I was heard. It determines whether it is dream or real. Remember the ‘break’, I was heard.

           Then, suddenly, stunning laser lights colored – white, black, white, black- splashed inside my closed, dim eyes, making me fragile, drowning under the deepest surface of abyss, -fallen- into an addiction without gravity, then –beep-

           From the very moment the last scoop of dense air exited out of my lungs and my now-unbound soul seeped through my dry skin towards the heavens above, there were no more tears. I was dead and so did the pains that I've entailed. Gone. Erased. Yet my free soul was not, though my flesh and blood were naught. I fluttered through the air, racing towards the light above—a cosmic relief.
        After hours of mindless flight, I arrived at a gate of gold so marvelous, yet humble. It was silent, but it hummed a divine hymn. I was addicted to it. My eyes fixated, I stand for however long I pleased. It was a fortress of gold standing on a cloud—the outskirts of paradise.
        Then came a voice.
        "Majesty, welcome back to your shelter."

           Majesty. Quite satisfying character. Disempowered since the day of breathe, I believe, temporary taste of power would be a piece of delight and jolly. I take this.

           You’re welcome. How come there aren’t any newcomers?

           Mimic dwarfs out of my imaginations startled – seemed to be all my acquaintances, so I desired them to be ‘welcoming’, ‘pleasant’, thus, showed greetings, but erratically their faces were swirling into pieces as if they have confronted catastrophe, once experienced, quite a short time ago – The swirls invaded me with venomous, reddy blood drops all over the atmosphere, trying to crawl upon the barrier that might disgruntle every existence in between the dream and real world.

           Just before the scratches are fairly made as disgraceful scars, the scene had been frozen.

           Then,

           Break one.

           Hugh..

           Break two.

           Huh?

           Definitely, I wasn’t the selected few, I believe. 

Relay: "Brooding ashes"

 The smell of ash startled you, and the sight of the explosion turned out to be the last, the very last memory you shared with this world. To be honest, the last touch of yours was definitely not something of depression.

 It was more like a sense of liberation and a bit of regret, but not too much. You were trying hard to recall and embrace all the moments that you had in this world.

 Such rain… you think. All these draggles(?) yet now where is the use of it all? Know you must be on your way to god’s court. How that inevitability shakes your benes(?). You think back trying totally on your sins. What was it that led to here? Why did it have to be that you, a perfectly normal, ordinary, do-good type at person have to die of a car explosion? What had you done so wrong?

 NOTHING, and yet, EVERYTHING. The memories shimmered dances, as they were shown as hallucinations. Happiest memories: hugs, smiles, kisses- and depressing ones; the moment you brokedown-all at once, and all gone. Teardrops, from your folded eyes slowly rolled down as you stood there in the midst of ashes. And a screeching scream that scattered along the empty space. The dead bodies of your loved ones, burning apartment. A world, so red, black, and grey that nothing other than those three shades were available. So, there you stood, who seemed to be only living thing in that place.

 Suddenly, a thunder strikes your head. With an enormous pain, you start to struggle with your memories. They are coming back.

 A face, one from a long, long time ago burns white hot in your head. You gasp, of course, how could you have forgotten? Tears rush to your eyes and a sob breaks out from your throat. Just when you though the fire was out, it was back to engulf you into the invisible storm.

Revisionist History#4 Cry out for Carlos

           “All men are created equal…” This is how we starts, and others started when outcrying for their rights. Americans, who were originated by people who once shouted for “freedom, equality, rights” against the restraints of British government, would still think those values important, significant, and crucial. However, those ‘norm’s still didn’t perfectly settled up as the fundamental ideology of recent society ad its members, thus creating innumerable discriminations every moment. When it comes to Korea, where every development and change are rapidly done without consideration, the situation gets worse, making ‘Carlos’ give up his ‘potential’, and fall into deep despair.

           At first, there would be individual aids for Carlos. His newly made neighbors, friends, and even other organizations would help him. However, this can’t stabilize Carlos’ situation. Although these kinds of aid is necessary, it an be a burden to Carlos as he can't really compensate for those. Students like Carlos are all around Korea, crying out for some help, in a soft, silent voice. Then, who can dilute the seriousness of the problem? I believe the answer is government.

           Government, governors, and the politics in general work for “policymaking”. They hear people’s voice, see the devastated, invisibles, and reflect that directly into policies. Korea’s governing system isn’t making any progress: firstly because they don’t interpret the problem in detail, secondly because they come out with ridiculous solutions. Let me give few examples starting from the familiar issue, ‘the sports club contest’, the one KMLA students are participating, is the result of quite peculiar understanding of social issues. The start was ‘school violence’. The government has observed that the schools which hae lots of sprots activities have less school violence than others. As a result, without funding provincial schools to purchase to purchase instruments needed to form appropriate environment for various sports, the government started to hold the ‘Sports club contest’. It didn’t absolutely solve any problems of school violence as a result. Next, the birth rate problem. The government explains, the success of women in society contributes to low birth rate, while making maps, indicating the number of women who are able to be pregnant. Same as the previous issue, it doesn’t solve the birth rate problem at all. Lastly, the affirmative action. (It’s not only the problem of Korea government, so further explanations would be done from the next paragraph.)

           So many court cases had done on the affirmative actions. Government and the administrators of universities might wanted to solve similar issues such as ‘Carlos’ case. They thus added affirmative actions, which makes definite quota for those who had been historically discriminated. Minorities, including poor students as ‘Carlos’ could have earn benefits from it, so lots of people when first heard this policy would definitely approve on this. Carlos, when come to Korea, can go to universities by applying to that particular quota as explained easily. However, the problem doesn’t end by just passing the examinations for universities. Carlos must earn money, take care of her sister as it was told in the podcast, study for examinations; he can’ help “those things affecting his grades”. Moreover, the particular acquaintance culture would bother him. Rich students will get along with rich students, poor students will be bullied by others, people will neglect Carlos, he can’t get good jobs when poorly done with his grades, he can’t dream of positive future he was yearning for. He just can’t stop “those things affecting his grades”. He must struggle against so many things that were born to kill him. The society will not let Carlos to gain victory against this struggle. The government will not give solutions for the primary causes, nothing would be solved.
          One thing we must hope for students like Carlos, is to give ‘the equality of opportunity’ as said in the podcast. Not giving auxiliary support in ridiculous way, he surely needs to find ways to make a society that poor are not neglected and suffered. 

Malcom Gladwell Revisionist History #3. Peer Pressure

           ‘Peer pressure’ is, the way people directly influence each other to follow other’s opinion by changing one’s beliefs, ideologies, or actions. (partially referenced) It somehow sounds similar to ‘socialization’, in a way that it ‘affects’ others in their behavior. However, while socialization is done unconsciously, peer pressure is done quite consciously and directly. Peer pressure, the action of enforcing unfavorable forms of behaviors to others, definitely kills the variety of ideas, and spread the idea of uniformity in a severely negative perspective. The podcast by Malcom Gladwell introduces the examples in America, mainly, however, I believe, truly Korea, is one of the countries where the peer pressure impacts significantly, due to the prevalent ‘noonchi’ culture.

           There are numerous examples: still lots of people go through the alteration of attitudes in themselves, affected by others. However, to introduce one recent example that I felt quite interesting, it would be the case of ‘bustier’. It was said in one article that I saw, Korea was almost the only one country where people didn’t wear ‘bustier’ a lot on daily life, not the particular cases of celebrities. Last year summer, ‘bustier’ has risen popularly among the western countries. People in Korea also wanted to wear ‘bustier’ because it was unique, ­­­comfortable, and stylish. However, as it is rooted from underwear, some of the citizens severely put backlash on those people, by framing the action of wearing ‘bustier’ as impolite, irregular, crazy actions. The conservative atmosphere still remaining Korea society resulted this, although it is just the actions of wearing proper clothes.

           Besides this example, particularly, Korean educational system is the epitome of negative impacts the peer pressure gives. Before giving the opportunities for the students to firstly think about an issue, teachers suggest particular idea, and give lecture based on this idea. Thus, students get into a fixed frame while considering that issue, which fixes that suggested idea is an ‘ideal’ thing. Students no longer widen and expand their perspective, and if others come up with new ideas, there ideas cannot be respected fully as it is.

           This issue is most problematic especially in literature class. There are still lots of controversies and diversity in opinions regarding literature. I still wonder whether the prevalent interpretation of literature coincide with the intention of author. It really doesn’t matter as the clarification of literature after the author publishes it solely is responsible to the readers, however as I’m totally interest in writing literature, I still focus on the similarities and differences between the idea of author and readers. Therefore, there might be various approach in understanding literature if with supported evidences, which must be respected. However, this peer pressure restricts the understanding of literature by determining the frame of ‘what is right’. This made me to think of literature by myself a lot, by trying to escape out of the frame.

           To sum up, peer pressure, sometimes confused with socialization, negatively affects others by restricting creativity, and enforcing uniformity. At this time, that we need creativity as a whole, maybe we can resolve this problem by diluting the atmosphere of social pressure.