Saving Japan - Let's fall the Indecision Tree

If I don't post about Shinzo Abe as often as I should on this site, that's because you already know my position about the worst enemy of Japan (see links below), and certainly not because he calmed down.

As we saw earlier, in spite of his still strong approval ratings and comfortable majority, Japan's controversial PM cannot push his anti-democratic agenda as fast and far as he fancies. We've even seen hardliners in his own alliance criticizing him because he's too bold and wants to precipitate things, which might harm the cause. So Shinzo Abe tries to find less direct ways of undermining the pilars of Japan peaceful post-war democracy. If he can't modify the constitution right now, he starts by modifying its interpretation, and if he can't reject the 1993 Kono Statement right now, he starts by questioning its basis:

"Would Germany ask holocaust survivors to testify again, cancel apologies? Japan doing that to sex slavery survivors, and never apologized! (twitter.com/theseoulvillage/status/441353492561543168)

Abe also feels in a hurry because he doesn't have the capacity to revive artificially the national economy for much longer: "ABEIGNomics" cannot prevail if "Abenomics" happens to fail, and any series of unfortunate events at the international level could derail his great plan.

Regardless of Shinzo Abe's personal future, the Japanese political system remains corrupted by Imperial Japan loyalists who make sure no government undertakes Japan's long overdue duty of memory regarding the nation's darkest era. Typically, the political debate or lack of focuses on nuclear issues instead of the very survival of democracy in Japan because few politicians dare to risk their own political careers.

So again, don't expect Japan's peaceful democracy to be saved from the top. And the changes we're witnessing at the citizens level clearly demonstrate where political inaction and the trivialization of extremism lead: revisionist ideas and extreme right-wing theories keep gaining ground among younger generations and women, reaching far beyond the usual extremist circles*.

More than ever, the future of Japan as a peaceful democracy lies in the hands of the Japanese people, and indecision is a choice against democracy.

I simply put on a basic decision tree the 7 boxes that sum up the situation:

• What's happening now (the 2 dominant trends):
• At the national level: your Prime Minister, the grandson of an untried war criminal, openly and deliberately denies war crimes, honors war criminals, promotes revisionism, pledges to end Japan's peaceful post-war constitution... 
• At the international level: the international community supports advocates of peaceful Japan, strongly denounces this government's behavior, exposes its impostures, demands long overdue apologies for Imperial Japan atrocities, multiplies memorials for the victims...
• What you do now (the only 3 possible choices):
• You refuse to see Japan re-establish its darkest past, You express your disagreement, You make the voice of peaceful Japan heard internationally, You vote pro-democracy.
• You love what Imperial Japan did to your country and overseas, you want even more disgrace. You support this government. You vote in favor of fascism, and against peaceful Japan.
• You see nothing. You hear nothing. You say nothing. You do nothing. You don't vote. You don't care about politics. You don't care about Japan's past, present, and future.
• What happens tomorrow (the only 2 possible end results):
• Japan's democracy lives
• Japan's democracy dies

I'd like as many Japanese citizens as possible to say where they stand. I know, that's not a nice choice, but that's the one their government is proposing them right now: do you prefer post-war peaceful Japan, or do you prefer fascism and Imperial Japan? It's all about what country you want to live in, what image you want other nations to have of Japan, and Korea or China have nothing to do with it**.

Just ask yourself where you stand, and demand each of your politicians to be as clear as possible regarding where they stand themselves.

Dear Japan, it's up to you.

*

• See all posts related to Shinzo Abe on Seoul Village, for instance "The Elusive Independence Day - When will Japan officially proclaim its Independence from Imperial Japan?", or the old "Dear Japan, Please Say No To Abeignomics".
• See all tweets tagged #ABEIGNomics on Twitter.

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* e.g. this recent article "Drift rightward has been building for years" (Japan Times 20140214)
** and again, they have their own mess to face (see "With neighbors like these...")

Seoul Story(telling)

You love to read about Seoul's past? Check the city's website devoted to the long and rich "Seoul Story":

Seoul Story

Free e-books are available on ISSUU, the platform that makes online reading much more enjoyable:

Familiar landmarks in the book on "Hanyang" around Namsan and Sungnyemun ("이야기를 따라 한양 도성을 걷다 남산,숭례문 구간").

The full menu of these walks across Hanyang, the Seoul of yore:

A focus on the Han River:

Seoul Story online:

• website: SeoulStory.org
• ISSUU: issuu.com/storyseoul

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W. at The Shilla for Chosun

You know you're entering POTUS territory when your mobile phone plays dead. Even when said POTUS is, in his own terms, "retired" and "out of the loop". For good measure, George W. Bush started oil painting a couple of years ago, but so far, his teacher has failed to bring out the "Rembrandt trapped in (his) body". Laura convinced him to expose at his Presidential Library the portraits of 27 heads of state, and I really wonder if Jacques Chirac is a member of this new "Axis of Easel".

When it comes to collecting former heads of state, you can trust Chosun Ilbo's prestigious Asian Leadership Conference. If we solely consider the host nation and the US of A, the conference started last year* with the Prime Minister and a former Secretary of State, and for this 5th edition, with President Park Geun-hye and "43". Whom do they have in store for 2015? 

This morning at The Shilla, Chosun Media also delivered 4 former Prime Ministers: Yukio HATOYAMA (who strongly condemned Shinzo ABE for his infamous Yasukuni visit), Julia GILLARD (still not much into foreign affairs, I reckon), Lothar de MAIZIÈRE (who signed the reunification treaty for East Germany), and Goh Chok Tong (who succeeded Lee Kuan Yew in Singapore). The first 3 were on stage with Leon PANETTA, the former Secretary of Defense of the United States / Director of the CIA / Chief of Staff, and RYOO Kihl-Jae, South Korea's Minister of Unification... or shall I say "Minister of Bonanza"?

James Pearson (‏@pearswick): "The Blue House says 대박's official translation is now 'bonanza', not 'jackpot'. So roll on the 'unification bonanza'". Seoul Village (‏@theseoulvillage) " @pearswick meet the new Ministry of Unification" twitter.com/theseoulvillage/status/436387918056128514

Note that Chosun Ilbo CEO BANG Sang-hoon used the English word 'jackpot' in his opening remarks. And that both he and PARK Geun-hye elaborated on the satellite night view of North Korea recently published by the ISS (see "Superpower failures").

Difficult to think of a better image to measure the challenge ahead for the theme this year: "One Korea, New Asia". But the two videos aired during the Opening Ceremony were much more positive: spectacular series of pristine DMZ landscapes (okay, a few military here and there), followed by an animated movie showing two railways reach across the Korean peninsula and, beyond, Eurasia: one via Beijing, the other via Moscow.

But so far, we've heard little about Russia, in spite of Vladimir Putin's efforts to steal some of the spotlights a priori devoted to KIM Jong-un.  

"Curious to hear what G. W. Bush will say about "Ukrainia" at ALC Chosun. An "Axis of Anvil" with Russia's resurrected hammer and sickle?"
twitter.com/theseoulvillage/status/440232628977799170

We also owe that to Dr. HAHM Chaibong. The President of ASAN Institute was moderating W's keynote speech, which turned out to be a friendly discussion that did venture into unexpected territories (that's where we learned about Dubya's artistic ambitions), but always remained focused on the topic of the day. 

The cameras focused on various parts of the audience while the two notoriously cool dudes chatted pleasantly on stage: are they talking about human rights in North Korea? here's a close-up of CHUNG Mong-joon on the giant screens; is Bush's recalling how Samsung invested in Texas when he was the Governor? here's LEE Jay-yong's face...

Let's be very clear: I'm not a Bush fan, and that's an outrageous understatement. Typically, I was not so convinced when this man tearfully recalled how "appalled" he was to see a government deny all justice to prisoners kept in the camps depicted in "The Aquariums of Pyongyang" or "Escape from Camp 14"**: Guantanamo or Abu Ghraib were not precisely the finest moments of his own Administration.

But give him that: George W. Bush remains the heckuvan entertainer, and I couldn't repress smiles at his incessant wisecracks, for example when he told the story of that lost phone call to Jiang Zemin. Dubya the pseudo-Texan also remains at his swaggering best: look at him dismiss the risk of seeing China eclipse America ("forget it! it's not gonna happen!"), or the risk of himself coming out of retirement ("I had all the fame and power, I don't want anymore!").

"W" at The Shilla for Chosun - Today, I learned that in the George W. Bush Presidential Library, you're likely to find not only bibles and rare editions of My Pet Goat, but also great books about North Korean prison camps.

The former POTUS gracefully praised all the Chinese and Korean leaders he served with, ROH Moo-hyun as well as his friend LEE Myung-bak (after all, The Attorney was the partner at the origin of the FTA).


And when he left the room, my mobile phone miraculously resurrected.


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* see "Asian Leadership Conference 2013"
** GWB will again meet with KANG Chol-hwan and SHIN Dong-hyuk this afternoon

GSM

Seoul Metropolitan Government launched the new version of its English website:

 english.seoul.go.kr homepage (20140301)
ADDENDUM - WARNING: to new users willing to enjoy the most interactive/participative functions, there seems to be temporarily glitches on the registration page

As you can see, and following current web trends (particularly with websites running on the popular WordPress platform), image rules over text. A very smart and user-friendly choice... which I'm not likely to make anytime soon: if this excuse for a blog is ill-written, it's even more ill-illustrated (now typically, that was ill-written).

Speaking of illustrations: my mugshot appears on Seoul's frontpage. I happen to be a member of the Global Seoul Mate program, like Mimsie Ladner, Hassan Abid, Lua Tsunliong, Kerliza Foon, or Alex Paik... and at least a hundred more not pictured here, but all over the web (e.g. fellow urbanist Nikola "Kojects" Medimorec, or fellow Seoul subway rider Michael "마익흘" Aronson). 

We write about Seoul in English, Chinese, or Japanese, we come from all over the world and all walks of life, and each one of us has their preferred angles (e.g. Seoul neighborhoods, photography, cultural events, Korean food, Korean oral traditions, K-Pop...), but we all have at least two things in common:

• be it as residents or just as distant admirers, we're all Seoulites
• we tend to be heavy SNS users, and some clearly in the hyperactive-pathological range. Which may explain why I'm among the oldest patients in the nuthouse... but hey, I used to develop online services before some of these kids were even born (thinking of it, back in 1993, we had a code name for our statistical category of heaviest users that pretty much sums us up now: "Stakhano-Repetitus").

A bit like in "Bitter, Sweet Seoul", you don't need to see Seoul and its Mayor through rose colored glasses. And if you've seen me palling around with PARK Won-soon*, you also know that, when needed, I can be as critical as I was with his predecessor.

So as the GSM program starts its 3rd year, I renew my initial pledge to You, Dear Reader*: "Seoul Village will remain totally independent, nonsensical, and poorly written".


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* see "Joint wishes from Seoul City Mayor and Seoul Village Minor"
** see "Seoul Friendship Fair 2012, Global Seoul Mates"

Superpower failures

You've probably all seen this updated image of the Korean "peninsula" by night, taken from the International Space Station. It adds colors to previous versions, but the "island of Pyongyang" remains the biggest speck of light in South Korea's "North Sea":

Pyongyang-do by night (the Korean peninsula from the ISS, North Korea still dark)
picture and video link via @northkoreatech
twitter.com/theseoulvillage/status/438127643787927553
(incl. link to the video below)

A closer look reveals that, in spite of global warming, more islets and rocks keep emerging around "Pyongyang-do".

• According to Seoul (the blinding supernova radiating 120 miles South of Pyongyang), this archipelago officially belongs to the Republic of Korea. 
• According to China's most radical group of revisionists (Northeast Project), the whole archipelago (which indeed, also includes South Korea) forms a perennial Province of the Middle Kingdom. 
• According to the guys supposedly in charge of said islets, this archipelago is the only world superpower not only capable of kicking Uncle Sam's ass, but also capable of using nuclear power just to get his attention ("these grotesquely forged satellite pictures may fool you into believing that we're experiencing a power failure but to the contrary, our perfect control of energy consumption demonstrates the sustainability of our Juche regime").
• According to the international community, this place should indisputably be called the Gulag Archipelago*.

Gravity (not the movie, but the situation in North Korea, not only electricity-wise)
twitter.com/theseoulvillage/status/438482551645028352

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*  reminder: "North Korea, Beware - Rest Of The World, Be Aware"

Madang Blues ("The Hen Who Dreamed She Could Fly")

We all keep very strong images from a few cherished books and animation movies of our childhood, and the most powerful ones are often the worlds we built in our heads as readers, sometimes fueled by a gem seeded by some talented illustrator along our paths.

For instance, I remember very well an apparently very simple illustration of a forest at the bottom of a page from a tale - I forgot which story, but that was very early in the narrative. It simply depicted a small grove's canopy from above, almost as a cute and round bouquet, and I wondered what marvels and threats could hide behind these innocent leaves. To me, this forest looked at the same time tiny and infinite, beautiful and scary, harmless and lethal, open to all possibilities and claustrophobically hermetic. Compared to that simple illustration, all others in the book felt dull, overly explicit, an insult to the story and its readers. For the first time, I realized the sheer power of illustration as a catalyst for imagination... and as a potential downer.

Much later, I realized that the animation movies that had left the strongest impression on me were all clay animations, and that their imperfections served as asperities for the viewer's imagination to take hold and to claim if not control, at least some room for manoeuvre. I didn't necessarily enjoy these movies, but I enjoyed that upsetting feeling, these unanswered questions, and I appreciated much more the artist's effort, as well as their respect for their young audience. I did enjoy Disney movies, but like you enjoy an industrial ice cream: yes that's what I wanted, but was it what I needed?

When the animation movie "Leafie, a hen into the wild" was released, three years ago, I learned that it was an adaptation from a very popular children's book boosted by a star-laden ro(o)ster (e.g. CHOI Min-sik). The film quickly became a hit, but I really didn't like its Marketing 101 / "what kids want" downer of a trailer. I found much more inviting the cover of the English translation of the book, published last year as "The Hen Who Dreamed She Could Fly" by Penguin Books (note that penguins can't fly either, but this one knows how to make books fly off shelves - particularly when the said book has already done it in several languages before).

I know you should never judge a book by its cover or a film by its poster, but check this contrast (speaking of forests...):

The Penguin's take at The Hen (get the book!)

The animated movie adaptation ("Leafie, a hen into the wild")

HWANG Sun-mi's bestseller "마당을 나온 암탉" could be translated as "The hen who came out of the yard", which conveys much fewer levels of universality than "The Hen Who Dreamed She Could Fly"... and much fewer levels of action than "Leafie, a hen into the wild" (NB: in Korean, the original title remains), but echoes the author's self-confessed, low-key approach: you can't reach for the universal without accepting the trivial*.

The title character, "잎싹", becomes "Leafie" in the film, "Sprout" in the book. I prefer the second translation: closer to the original in meaning, the word also sounds more like her, the frail but determined hen who refuses to remain a slave in a battery cage, and longs for a better life in what she believes to be the best and safest place on earth, the barnyard. Sprout will manage to escape her prison, but also struggle to adapt to a foreign environment, and fight to fulfill new responsibilities. Note that in French, the title is "La poule qui voulait vivre sa vie" ("The hen who wanted to live her life" - Chan Ok - Flammarion), and the hero Petite-Feuille (a trifle more poetic than Leafie).

Yesterday, thanks to Barry Welsh's 10 Magazine Book Club, we had the opportunity to buy the book, watch the movie adaptation, and meet the author. I did just that, regretting that, ever the lazy bird, I hadn't read the book before.

HwangSunmi and Barry Welsh about "The Hen Who Dreamed She Could Fly" at 10MagBookClub
twitter.com/theseoulvillage/status/437094164891570176

As I flipped through the pages ahead of the screening, I noticed with satisfaction that the illustrator (Kazuko Nomoto a.k.a. Nomoco) didn't draw actual portraits of the protagonists, leaving that up to the author and her readers. I didn't expect much from the film, but I tried to forget my 46-year-old-cynic self, and to switch back to my six-year-old-candid mode, and I enjoyed it much more than a Disney movie because the story hasn't been disneyfied all the way. I bet the audience didn't need that Korean cartoon classic, the overly swimming eye artifice, to sob noisily**...

Warning - spoiler alert: this is not a Disney ending, and in this life, except maybe through that ephemeral yet eternal marvel called love, there is no such thing as a comfort zone. The author wrote her story when she was on her father's deathbed, and death was the only outcome for her main character. So yes, Sprout/Leafie is her father (NB: nothing to do with Anakin, Luke). And no, the book is not about motherhood; Hwang said that she just needed a female character. The actual mother happens to be the least suspected character: 족제비 the weasel. Overall, "The Hen" is more about growing mature, expanding horizons, accepting death, and/or whatever the reader/viewer sees and feels, because...

... this story is not wrapped up hermetically, and along with its darker sides, that's what makes it so powerful. 

The author enjoys the sometimes guilty pleasure of writing, and fully respects her readers. It may have something to do with how, for her, reading and writing have always been entwined. HWANG grew up in the rural Korea of the seventies, where and when children's books were not commodities. An elementary school teacher put her in charge of the library's key, a key that could open doors beyond cages, barnyards, and even the real wide world. Back home, the young Sun-mi would write to remember the stories. She logically started with children's book, a genre and a joy she rediscovered as she raised her own kids.

And today, even with her international success, HWANG Sun-mi keeps a refreshing frankness, a profound respect for fellow children's book authors***. Of course she's very happy to see her books take new forms (musical, film), and to be translated in so many languages, but she's also not totally comfortable with the idea that she can't tell what her stories have gained or lost in translation.

HWANG Sun-mi

She does know that the film adaptation is very different, but since I didn't read the book, I couldn't expect one of the movie's pivotal characters to have been created for the screen****.

Now that I have the book (and glasses**!), I really have no choice but to jump and spread my reading wings.

***

• See other posts related to 10 Magazine Book Club
• Join the new Seoul Film Society hosted by Barry Welsh on facebook.com/groups/seoulfilmsociety (first projection on March 1st: LEE Man-hee's "Black hair" - 1964) 
• ADDENDUM 20140225: watch Charles and Barry's first Korean Literature Vidcast.

***

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* KTLIT's Charles Montgomery made a parallel with Yi Mun-yol (whom, by the way, we also followed across wintery landscapes in a recent RASKB book club, about "Winter that year").
** Were my own eyes swimming? Naah... 'twas only old age, plus smartphone/laptop abuse: I just came to term with the idea that I needed glasses, and bought my first pair today.
*** she listed many Korean and international authors, and I bet this little red riding hood wolfed down all the classics (speaking of bird migrations, she answered yes when I asked if she read Selma Lagerlöf's adventures of Nils Holgersson).
**** The Falstaffian otter Dalsu (달수/수달) struck me as a modern oddity in an otherwise timeless cast, and I wondered how the real estate corporation reacted to the caricature.

Seoul's New Town and Redevelopment Plan Update

Seoul updated its New Town and Redevelopment Plan after two years of probation*. Citizens are still being surveyed and their comments collected to facilitate key decisions: go/no go, and the allocation of resources and support (including in case of cancellation). The whole process is being monitored and doubled with conflict management teams to prevent the usual bubbles and rumor mill frenzies, but also to learn from best and worst practices.

For the cases without promotion, 266 of 286 surveys have been completed, and the rest shall be done by the end of June 2014.

148 out of these 266 cases are on the hot seat, and three projects have already been cancelled: 

• Cheonho-Seongnae (Cheonho-dong and Seongnae-dong, Gangdong-gu), 
• Mia Gyunchok (Mia Sageori, Gangbuk-gu), 
• Banghwa (Banghwa-dong, Gangseo-gu)

The final cancellation of 16 other projects shall be decided by June: 

• Hapjeong (Hapjeong-dong, Mapo-gu), 
• Cheonho (Cheonho-dong, Gangdong), 
• Sangbong (Sangbong-dong, Jungnang-gu), 
• Geoyeo-Macheon (Geoyeo-dong and Macheon-dong, Songpa),
• Junghwa (Junghwa-dong, Jungnang-gu), 
• Guui-Jayang (Guui-dong, Jayang-dong, Gwangjin-gu), 
• Sanggye (Sanggye-dong, Nowon-gu), 
• Ahyeon (Ahyeon-dong, Mapo-gu)
• Singil (Singil-dong, Yeongdeungpo-gu), 
• Susaek-Jeungsan (Susaek-dong, Jeungsan-dong, Eunpyeong-gu), 
• Jangui (Jangwi-dong, Seongbuk-gu)
• Mia (Mia-dong, Gangbuk-gu), 
• Sinjeong (Sinjeong-dong, Yangcheon-gu), 
• Imun-Hwigyeong (Imun-dong and Hwigyeong-dong, Dongdaemun-gu), 
• Gireum (Gireum-dong, Seongbuk-gu), 
• Heukseok (Heukseok-dong, Dongjak-gu).

The 19 potential red lights (the first 3 are already goners - note that Mia used to be a red light district anyway!)

No big surprises here. As I explained in "Inhuman, all too human Seoul", the New Town model belongs to the past, and it lost momentum in the Capital even before PARK Won-soon claimed City Hall. His bottom-up, collaborative approach was the only way of defusing potential outcries in a city where real estate speculation remains pervasive.

New Towns are not dead yet, and among the projects that will go on, some are already well "advanced", Buk-Ahyeon New Town much more than Donuimun New Town (a.k.a. Gyonam New Town).

And they're only part of Seoul's urban planning problems.

PS: Michael, don't rejoice too soon: the potential end of Ahyeon New Town wouldn't necessarily mean the survival of your old hanok.

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* "뉴타운·재개발 수습방안」추진 2년 성과와 향후 방향 발표" (20140221)