Working on it

Sorry if I haven't posted much lately. I've been working on my paper about Hallyu (I'm on a panel later this month at Korea University).

And since my focus is on wave dynamics and on respecting the whole ecosystem, I had to go all the way to this remote spot in Langkawi, Malaysia:

Rare photo of the elusive Andaman Sea Monkey, here stretching its toes to mark a territory shared with - among other rare species - flying squirrels, flying lemurs, flying lizards, flying frogs, and flying snakes (NB: I didn't see any flying snakes during my stay, and the only flying frog I met was yours truly, in the A380 back home)

But even on these distant shores, I could feel the impact of the Great PSY Tsunami of 2012:

Even in #Kualalumpur, @psy_oppa is following me. #gangnamstyle pic.twitter.com/Rbf1tDkt0c
twitter.com/theseoulvillage/status/379870103866589184 

Seoul Village 2013
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Gangwon-do Battlefield - 강원도 전쟁터 (무): Mu, The Lost Continent?

Gangwon-do, Autumn 2009. A field in the middle of nowhere, antropomorphous freak radishes left behind by the farmer. A surreal battlefield.

For a sunday special, a short video* of this limb limbo:



No radishes were harmed in the making of this video.

See other videos on Seoul Village's YouTube channel.

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* "Gangwon-do Battlefield - 강원도 전쟁터 (무)"

Naneun nangman gangaji

To the risk of infuriating many friends, I must confess I'm rather a "dog" than a "cat" kind of guy. I do like both, and had a purr-fect fit with many felines, but I enjoy much richer conversations with members of the canine family.

I grew up with a peaceful dog who barked only in case of clear and immediate danger - typically, when I played music, or when gangs of cats squared off at our place (Sharks from the South, Jets from the North). But that was in Paris, and here in Seoul, even if I don't have pets, I clearly live on cat territory.

In our neighborhood, the capo de tutti gati is a grey male, or rather the orange female who delivers every six month or so a couple of utterly cute kittens donning coats matching exactly the same grey or orange. This mob owned the place before we did, and they've made it clear to everyone ever since we moved in: each time new faces come to visit us, they pass by just to check them out, and to let themselves be noticed.

Each attempt of insubordination is followed by displays of power so spectacular that I sometimes provoke them just for fun. For instance, when I look at the cat the wrong way as it passes by the window, it will quietly stop, lazily stretch its body, ostentatiously lick its armpits and genitals, re-stretch in a jaw-breaking yawn, and before resuming its walk stare at me for a whole minute with medieval murder in its eyes. And the next day, if I'm not here when it passes by, it calls me so that I don't miss the show.

If these scavengers rule over the neighborhood, they can't expect food from us: I don't collaborate with the Occupant. Okaaay... last summer, I did leave some water for their meltingly cute kittens to lap, but not doing so would have been an outright crime against felinity. And yes, I did rescue an orange kid a couple of times but hey, when they Puss-in-boots-eye you up, you are the one begging for mercy.

So just like I pretend not to collaborate, I pretend to resist when they cross the line a triffle too far. For instance, I let them patrol at a safe distance, and even train their kids around when they're old enough to tour their kingdom, but I barked them out of their project of building a new home on our ground.

Not much of a sabotage, I know, but we dogs have to maintain some boundaries if we don't want to lose face.


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DMZ picnic

Early May, fresh green everywhere, a soft and gentle breeze... No mosquitoes, no bugs, just a delicate snow of white petals cast by the large tree protecting us from the bright sun. And a korani: this panicked water deer took off right in front of us on our way to a peaceful picnic.

Peaceful? Like distant thunder from a dry summer storm, every twenty minutes or so, a cannon shot reminds us that we're in a restricted area. Same for those small triangular signs, which tell us the spot used to be a landmine. When the area is not cleared, a chaplet of red flags blocks the passage. The big red flags issue yet another warning: drills are under way here, and we're using live ammos. The large red signs with a number on them mark the line beyond which nothing can fly, no bullet can be shot.

Because the DMZ is like an onion, it has layers. Like these thick concrete walls running across strategic valleys to slow down North Korean tanks. South Korean tanks? We saw plenty of those as we toured the zone, along with packs of soldiers exercising, countless training ranges (even a real size JSA mock-up).

No wonder our korani felt a triffle nervous when it saw a group of humans. But we're not soldiers, nor even poachers. Just civilians attending a seminar with the DMZ Culture Forum*. More interested in how to promote AND preserve the DMZ's cultural assets - I'm stressing the "AND" because in Korea, promotion has a knack for being incompatible with preservation.

The DMZ's military heritage is already been taken care of. And technically, the war is not even over. Heck, officially, the armistice itself has not been ratified by South Korea (BTW the signature didn't happen in Panmunjom but in Kaesong).

The topic of the day was nature. And we experienced first hand what might be lost once this curtain is torn down. A Korea that vanished almost everywhere else. Charming valleys, pristine landscapes, no "apateu" blocks, no concrete messes ruining every single hilltop. Time suspended. A bballi-bballi-free Korea.

Of course, everything is at the same time as artificial as this owl guarding a peach orchard. Or as the only village of farmers residing there, a surreal Architectural Digest that tells a lot about the brighter side of living in an overprotected area.

Overprotected for whom? Ever the pleasant and pleasing guy, CHUN Doo-hwan arranged decades ago a scheme to help scores of Seoul friends snatch huge parcels of land for almost nothing: after the war, impossible to tell for sure who owned which land, and the man in charge stated that if three witnesses concurred in their accounts, cases could be settled...

Unless a moratorium is implemented before sounder policies are crafted, you probably can kiss those pristine landscapes a sad goodbye.

Seoul Village 2012

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*DMZ Culture Forum (DMZ문화포럼 - dmzculture.org)

Ghost Month

A "danji" ("단지") is a block of estates which, for most Seoulites, usually brings to mind the image of a pack of concrete, overpopulated, high rise buildings. But here, that's just the opposite: low-rise, quiet, and green.

Yes, here too, real estate is claiming more land each time I visit, but that's life. And death.

Welcome back to the cemetery of Yongmiri*.

It's always a special moment when you pay homage to ancestors, share time, thoughts, a drink, and a bite with them. You also do a bit of gardening for them, like yesterday, between two rainy days. Of course, you can hire pros to maintain the grave site, but contributing is important, and I actually cherish these moments of earthly intimacy. If most Western tombs are made of stone, these tumuli are very much alive. And again, yesterday, the pheasants cleared their throats.

So much for the crow cliche.

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* see "Ray Banned". Note that: - this time, I skipped the fermented skate before coming, and opted for an excellent doeji kalbi - Yongmiri is located in Paju (Gwantan-myeon), but belongs to the city of Seoul (and full disclosure: this block 2 / "2단지" / "2 danji" is not our neighborhood)

Modern Art Pest Control

When I first noticed those white plastic bags hanging from the trees along Deoksugung walls, I thought a few angry kids had thrown their diapers around in a sudden potty training strike... or more likely, the nearby museum of art had excreted some disruptive installation from the other side of Deoksugung-gil.

But from a closer range, one can see the tubes and syringes reaching for the feet of the trees. So the bags were just containers for pest treatments... the most spectacular so far (I'm more used to the small bottles attached to the trunks).

I've always been amazed by the sharp contrast between the cold and warm seasons and how quickly green comes back with a vengeance, along with all sorts of insects. After one of the coldest Januaries on record, we're enjoying a more decent May, and in a remarkable parallel, humans and bugs have started swarming in their respective outdoor hot spots.

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A rice paddy on Gwanghwamun Square ?

Undeterred by the first official radioactive rain on the Korean capital (nothing serious according to the authorities*), Jongno-gu's Mayor proposed to install rice paddies at Gwanghwamun Square.

Enough to harvest significant volumes of rice, but more certainly enough to boost the Mayor's well-being-tree-hugging profile. Nothing new under the sun : a couple of years ago, French farmers would install a fake wheat field on Paris' Champs Elysees. And every year, wine is made from the city's last grape vines in Montmartre. Furthermore, Jongno-gu has already "produced" some rice in pots along Sajikno (was it last year or the one before ?), but the water didn't remain clean very long.

Just for the beauty of it, why not ? It sure beats the usual kitschy flower beds, and photographers will love it.

Not to mention mosquitoes, of course.

Seoul Village 2011

* Not my idea of an energy drink either : drinking 2 liters of it every day for one year would be equivalent to 40% of an X-ray.

Happy New Year Of The Golden (Silver) Tiger

This is supposed to be the year of the Golden Tiger but you will have to watch for a silver tiger next time you hike up Inwangsan : among the statues erected by Jongno-gu to celebrate the feline who used to roam its mountains until Japanese hunters eradicated it during the early XXth century, a big metal cat will be overlooking Seochon and downtown from the top of the rock.

Nothing scary about it, except for the poor taste of the self proclaimed art work.

A very happy new year to you nonetheless.

Seoul Village 2010

Let It Snow

I took this small video last Monday, under a bright sun in Gyeonghuigung, downtown Seoul, from the playground right behind the palace :

Unfortunately, the soundtrack is provided by Haemil, the green glass building coming right after the palace in this amateur 360 panorama (then there's an old villa, Space Bon in the background, and we're back to the woods on the hill separating Sajik-dong from Gyonam-dong).

Chung Mong-joon's think tank recently moved into their new headquarters and as you can hear, the big air-con blocks that spoiled our game* are working fine. As you can see, they eventually decided not to replace the wall, completing the "illusion" that they own the place... to the risk of causing incidents : particularily with this snow, visitors to the palace cannot see the deep gap in front of them (what to say about kids playing nearby...).

Anyway, nothing could ruin this beautiful day, nor the magic of Seoul under the snow. Sounds carry differently too. Yesterday morning, I heard the rooster from my window.

Seoul Village 2010


* see "Haemil construction, continued (game interrupted)"

NB: from now on we'll refer to the building as the ASAN Institute HQ instead of Haemil HQ. The AIPS / ASAN Institute for Policy Studies was named after Chung Ju-yung's nickname and hometown (Mr Chung's father founded the Hyundai Group).

Maemi Serenade

The tenor took position on my window's mosquito net. Moments later, the maemistro started its strident recital.

I only had time to clumsily turn my mobile phone's camera on, and I would be all thumbs with this device if the expression hadn't that positive meaning nowadays... so this video appears on the wrong direction.

I found a way of rotating it perfectly, but then the sound disappeared*. OK, it was poorly reproduced, but it gives you an idea of what filled the room. So here's my lousy bootleg video of that maemi serenade :

The artist left without waiting for a well deserved round of applause. Maybe he was a relative of the cicada I saved two summers ago (see "Save Korean maemis").


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* if you happen to know how to rotate a .mp4 video AND preserve the sound, I'm all ears...

Jongno-gu boars love goguma

On a piece of land she owns at the feet of Bukhansan, this old lady grows veggies for her personal use, for friends, and sometimes for unwelcomed visitors.

Her eggplants taste much better than the purple output of your usual greenhouse (or "vinyl house" as they are called here). And her zucchini leaves make a perfect wrap around the right rice and fine doenjang.

Some of her neighbors often cause trouble : whole families of wild boars come every now and then, picking up - more or less gracefully - a chunk of her productions.

One day she harvested sweet potatoes (goguma), she left a few rotten ones on the ground. The next day, she found the whole surface perfectly plowed : the boars came, tasted, enjoyed what they ate, and seeked for more. To no avail.

But for the first time, they somehow paid for the service.


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other Seochon marvels

Save Korean maemis

The other day, I saved a poor lad about to drown in Cheonggyecheon. I used my clutch to help him out of the water. He took my hand with a surprisingly strong grip and I left him rest by the stream.


The time for its wings to dry, the insect was ready for another recital.

The Korean maemi is a big fella with a chant that (scientists noticed) tends to grow louder in Seoul, where tall buildings modify its propagation.

But Korean maemis are threatened by their Chinese cousins. They've been flocking by millions recently, sometimes thousands on the same tree, claiming the country as greedily as Beijing revisionists claim Koguryo culture.

Maybe this guy was committing suicide. Could Cheonggye stream become the next Canal Saint Martin ?

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