Tralalalalala!

First of all, if you read this today, make sure you head over to Google and play with their cute Gumby themed title. A blast from the past for all us 90's kids :)

Second of all, hooray! It's Wednesday ^_^ My co-teacher last year, the amazing Ms Shin, always used to remind me that Wednesday was "Hump Day", but me being daft took a couple of weeks of this to catch on what she meant, seeing as her English was excellent and I knew it couldn't mean what it sounded like to me. So even though this semester my Hump Day is actually a kind of camel hump of Thursday AND Friday (specifically classes 2-6 and 2-8), I still always remember her saying it to me. These days, Wednesdays are actually my chilled out day - I don't start until 9.30 (to make up for teaching extra hours within my 22 teaching hours but that are beyond my contracted 8 hour day), I only have two classes, one of whom is the best and smartest class of first years (actually... pretty much the ONLY consistently good first year class) and also boys so they actually talk and get involved, and one hour of after school class. Mind you, I do have four classes back to back on Thursday morning, ending with the dreaded 2-6, so it kind of evens out. And then bellydancing tonight, which always turns out to be fun, despite my perpetual reluctance to leave my house at night once I've gotten home and flopped on my bed.

Anyway, just some fun for today, I thought I'd share a music video of one of my new favourite songs (not more Rain, don't worry ^_^) that I tried singing with Michelle last night at noraebang (노래방 or karaoke) and that we actually did ok with. Michelle is much better with K-pop stuff than me (I don't really even listen to the lyrics of songs in English, I just pick up on the mood and then my mind tends to wander rather than actually concentate on music that I listen to) but it's not as fast a song as most so if I can actually force myself to listen I think I can get this one. And also, the music video is awesome fun to watch! "Breathe" by Miss A.

Also on my list of Korean songs (that I can remember right now) to master at the noraebang are:
- Big Bang "하루하루" ("Haru Haru")

- 비 (Rain) EVERYTHING!!! ^_^ Especially "난" ("I")

- Infinite "BTD" ("Before the dawn").

Songs I can actually sing semi-decently:
- "샤방샤방" ("Shabang Shabang") - a Korean trot song, meaning a kind of classic that catches or creates a certain mood that most people know. This is about a sexy woman with a S-line body and a V-line face, like the Korean parallel to Sir Mixalot's "Baby Got Back" (aka the "I like big butts" song).

- 비 (Rain) "I Do", "널붙잡을노래" ("Love Song")

- MBlaq "Y"

- Miss A "Bad Girl Good Girl"

- f(x) "뉴 예삐오/NU ABO"

- GD & Top "High High"

- GG (GD and 'Great Park' {박명수}) "바람났어" ("I cheated")

- CN Blue "사랑빛" ("Lovelight"), "외톨이야" ("I'm a loner")

- 2NE1 "Go Away" < I only know this one because some of my students translated it for a class activity last year. I hate the music video though and the terrible English lyrics and will refuse to sing it as much as is possible to resist it's catchy beat.

- I also feel like I could now sing most of 2pm's "Hands Up" purely by osmosis, that is, going to noraebang with Michelle who sings it as often as possible.

- Fly to the Sky "Missing You", "Sea of Love"

- Se7en "와줘", "Come Back To Me" (the first two are the same song in Korean and then in English), "욕심", "Girls" (ft. Lil Kim, in English) and "난알아요" ("Nan Arayo/I know"


Songs I've given up on ever getting the whole way through :(
- 김현정 (Kim Hyeon-Jeong) "B형 남자" ("B-type Man")

- 백지영 (Baek Ji-Yeong) "사랑안해" ("I won't love {again}")

I haven't tried singing a lot of the older songs on that list for a while though so I've probably forgotten how to do most of them. Also, when I say "I can sing these" I don't mean in a way that holds me accountable for actual accuracy of pitch :D A lot of these songs are also my favourites to listen to and are not a bad place to start (although by no means comprehensive and of course skewed completely to my own tastes) if you are curious about what Korean music is like.

Oh and I showed my good class *N Sync's "Bye Bye Bye" yesterday for a listening activity and they thought that they looked like the idol group ShiNee (pronounced 'Shiny'). Sadly, I only heard that eavesdropping in Korean so I couldn't say anything, but I think they would have been flabberghasted to know that *N Sync pre-dated their precious ShiNee by a good 15 years or so. They were amazed to see Justin Timberlake though in his "bubble hair" phase (as they put it). What do you think? ㅋ ㅋ ㅋ

Getting Jiggy!

I love how random Korean variety shows are, especially on MBC, which I like because they often subtitle stuff or add captions which makes it easier (for me) to understand. The morning stuff that I turn on as I get ready for school is usually re-runs and repeated every couple of days, which actually helps since it gives me a few goes at understanding what they're saying. One of my favourite shows is called 'I Love Pet' (of course!). Terrible English I know, but it's cute and easy to watch. Anyway, this morning, one of my favourite episodes came on - it's actually from last year, but being randomly repeated, and supports the idea that you can make anything a TV show. In this episode (or part of it seeing as the first bit was about a fat English bulldog that was in a play), the producers decided to make an idol group look after a raccoon. Sound odd? Yep, it really was. Especially since a) they initially only told the boys in the group (푸커즈 or F-Cuz/Focus) that they were getting a new female 'friend' and they thought that one of them was going to be on 'We Got Married' (a show where they pair two K-stars who have to pretend to be married and act as a couple). Seeing as the boys were only 18 and 19 at the time and they probably don't have enough time to have a girlfriend normally, they were thrilled! Less so when they got to the zoo and the raccoon was brought out - one of them actually pretended to beat up their manager.Oh and b) since they're so young, and Koreans (particularly idols) aren't as close-minded about gender-norm-based behaviour (i.e. they do cute stuff without it being considered gay), the stuff they do to the raccoon is ridiculously adorable! Like dress it up in little outfits, get upset when one of the others steals it away, feed it , make it dance, make it a little sand-bunker at the beach complete with umbrella and milk bowl, etc. Anyway, the one showing this morning was the first show (I think there are four in total but I could be wrong), but my favourite is the second which will hopefully be next week, because one of them, Kan, decides that Jiggy (the raccoon, named after their debut song) needs a wash. So naturally, rather than bathe it, he takes it in the shower with him. I couldn't find the episode online anywhere (I didn't search particularly hard) but I did find a bunch of GIFs from the episode from a blog about Kan (it's actually Lee-U or Ye-Jun in most of the photos though I think). Unfortunately the blog owner seems to be a bit precious about sharing so you'll have to go there to see them yourselves. I particularly like the 9th one - captioned (translation) "No! It's my Jiggy!!" ㅋ ㅋ ㅋ ㅋ They are such dorks^^ If you want to see an episode of this ridiculous concept, there is a blog with the 3rd episode that I similarly can't repost here. There aren't any subtitles, but you'll get the idea. Oh and the video for the actual song, 'Jiggy', which I find to be hilarious as I've never heard "Getting jiggy" sung in such a sweet and upbeat way before. Unless it means something different in Konglish, this is probably more evidence of the need for native English speakers in the Korean pop industry :)

 

P.S. And yes, they are dancing in a blue shower room in one of the scenes. After all, why not? ^_^

K-pop your peepers over that

Oh and one more quick blog for the weekend, I read this on the blog Sociological Images and most heartily agreed. Also, James over at the Grand Narrative has done two particularly good posts recently - the first on the 'oppa' issue in K-pop, the second his usual address of various issues - read numbers 1, 2, 6, 7, 9 and 10 and the referenced articles in particular (if you have the time). The one on abortion in Korea is especially interesting, as it is probably not something that is commonly even known as illegal (probably due to the negligible attempts at sex education in Korea - see number 9) and it is certainly not something that is commonly discussed. I don't have the reference on me, but researching something for a Korean gender course in Uni, I remember finding an article saying that up until the 1980's at least, most doctors didn't even know that it was illegal either.

Oh and for the record, I hate Girl's Generation. I don't even know who that is in the first picture on James' post, but I want to punch her in the face. Rational? Not really. Psychopathic? Not quite. Ok so fair enough, I recognise the fact that they work hard (at being cream puffs) and put in the hard yards to perfect their dance routines etc, and they do well by working that whole 'complete package' angle - e.g. they have their main singers and backup singers/dancers all in one permanent group (unlike Super Junior who change their members sometimes) and they have so many members that they can cater to every man's tastes (as long as all they have a taste for is cute little girl dollies) and so can effectively corner a large portion of the K-pop appeal ratings, but their incessant innocent good girl image pisses me off every time I see them, sometimes even when I just hear their music (even their "Run Devil Run" 'bad' sides were pretty tame). It's not like it matters who it is anyway - there are so many of them they're pretty much interchangeable.

Seriously, if I'm in a bad mood, or you just want to irritate me beyond all reasonable reaction, use 애교 (aegyo - cutie pie language) at me. Probably make sure you aren't wearing anything flammable at the time.

♥ Amber's back! ♥

Sorry that I haven't posted in a while. I've been a combination of busy, lazy and unable to connect to the internet. This last one is because my neighbour who also works at my school is getting married at the end of the month and so has moved out, taking her wireless with her. I now have that sorted however (an interesting afternoon of watching the SK Telecom man climb out of my balcony window and balance on the railing in his socks to reach the internet cable and then drill holes through my aluminium/fake wood plastic window frame to connect it).


But anyway, onto the K-pop! This is really just a short post functioning as a shout-out to my favourite female K-popper (and really the only female K-pop singer I actually like, rather than just liking the occasional song): Amber! Amber is the rapper in the SM Entertainment produced girl-group F(x), made famous through the song Nu ABO (뉴 예삐오) which is a great song in itself. Here's the music vid if you haven't seen it already (Amber is the one with the short hair).

Now before you judge me for going over to the dark side of girly 공주병 (princess syndrome), I should make a disclaimer. I like the SONG. And I love Amber - I'm not so keen on the other members of the band (Victoria, Sulli, Luna and Krystal). This is mainly because their girly Korean aegyo (애교 or affected cuteness) drives me up the wall, especially since Victoria isn't even Korean and Krystal grew up in America and Sulli always acts like the maknae (막내 or youngest member) and frankly like a baby even though Krystal is younger than her. Actually Krystal isn't too bad (probably b/c of the American thing and realising how freaking annoying aegyo is) but the others kind of make me grind my teeth if I see them on anything where they are being 'themselves'.

Anyway, back to the main and much less bitchy point; this is a great song, with a great beat and rhythym, and the group does have pretty consistently good choreography so I appreciate that the girls do work hard. But seriously, if it wasn't for Amber and her funky tomboy attitude, I wouldn't even bother looking up their new songs (rather than waiting until they become so mainstream you just learn them by osmosis). Now Amber is actually Chinese-American and like Krystal, probably realises the difference between 'cute' and 'sickeningly cute'. She does have her cutesy moments but these are pretty rare and nowhere near as intense as the others. She's also a really good dancer and rapper, and pretty much stands alone as the only successful female tomboy artist on the K-pop scene - she's known for her short hair cuts and I'm pretty sure she only ever wears pants (at least for anything publicised).

 Amber from F(x) vs Raina from Orange Caramel

In fact, looking her up on Google images, in a group picture of F(x) wearing hanbok or traditional Korean clothes, she's actually wearing a male hanbok (and looks like a boy). So yes, she's a bit butch, but there's virtually no such thing as lesbians in Korea (at least, not in public) so she makes the look work well without too many aspersions being cast on her sexuality. Oh and haha, yes, if you can't tell by now, she's totally my girl-crush^^

Anyway,  she has also been away for a while due to some sort of injury and is now back in time to be in their new song 피노키오(Danger) ["Pinocchio (Danger)"]. It's a pity that her injury prevented her being in F(x)'s short TV show 코알라  ("Koala") last year following them around their international tour (which was otherwise fairly boring) and also from not being featured more in last year's season of 우리결혼했어요 ("We Got Married") - a 'reality' show where two celebrities are paired together and have to pretend to be a married couple - with Victoria and Nikhun from 2pm. I'll have a whirl at translating the lyrics to some K-pop songs I like one of these days if anyone is interested, but then and again there's always Google :p Enjoy!^^

A look at last week in K-Land

So if you are living in Korea and especially an English teacher with EPIK in Korea who obediently followed your PoE/MoE's directive to open a Nonghyup account because they are the biggest bank in Korea and thus very reliable, you will already know that the biggest and pretty sensational thing that happened last week in Korea was that Nonghyup's servers crashed, disabling most transactions requiring any kind of electronic jiggery-pokery above a basic command. Now, everyone knows that foreigners like to complain - usually very loudly - about things that inconvenience them but luckily most hadn't realised that Nonghyup had been having problems all week in different areas until everyone's chequing cards stopped working on Wednesday evening. Even better, it got fairly quickly resolved, but it was a bad week for a lot of people, such as the teacher at my work who was stressing she'd lose her savings and wouldn't be able to pay for her father's chemotherapy. But if you don't speak or more importantly read any Korean you may very well have found the sudden rejection of your card very surprising indeed as you probably didn't realise that the Korean SMS you got from your bank was about this and not just the usual loans spam.

But really, you were the lucky ones, as those of us who do, and especially those of us who do and are inclined to panic slightly at such revelations (i.e. me) got the text message on Wednesday evening and immediately rushed to an ATM to confirm that yes indeed the world was ending and we were all going to be stranded in Korea without a won to our names and unable to ever recover our hard earned savings. Now just to give some context, to me this was a real concern after the problems one of the biggest banks in Australia, NAB, had last year on a payday just before the weekend that led to thousands of people not getting paid, getting paid ridiculously small amounts, getting charged for repeated transactions, etc. Luckily bankbook withdrawals were still working (which I'm sure probably lead to a huge drain of cash resources from Nonghyup as everyone panicked and tried to withdraw as much as possible just in case) but of course these only work at a) Nonghyup branch ATMs and b) if you HAVE a bankbook so it was a worrisome 24 hours before I could get to one that took bankbooks and supplement the w18000 (about AU$16) I had in my wallet to see me through the weekend. Luckily the problem was fixed by Friday afternoon, and other problems like with electronic transfers and internet banking etc were fixed by the weekend. According to the Marmot over at The Marmot's Hole, this was caused by a fairly simple command sent from a worker's (possibly hacked) laptop. Worrying in oh so many ways.

Anyway, that was last week's Big Thing. In other areas of scandal, a video that's been causing a lot of kerfuffle in the K-pop world is Ra-Nia's "Dr Feel Good". But no, it doesn't seem to be the lyrics with lines like "Dr, Dr Feel Good, come make me feel real good" and "strap me down into my chair" (most Korean versions sub it as "sit me down into my chair") that are causing the concern - rather, it's the '쩍벌춤' (cheok-beol-juum) or "wide leg spread dance" moves (aka "skank dance") that have led the video to be banned from many music shows. See 0:37 of the video beneath for an idea of why these moves might be considered rather suggestive. Although to be fair it looks a lot skankier when they do the dance live here than on the official music video.

 James over at The Grand Narrative of course does an excellent critical analysis of this clucking and much ruffling of feathers over this "compelling song with powerful sound and an addictive refrain" [파워풀한 사운드와 중독성 강한 후렴이 돋보이는 곡이다] and references other bands who have done similar dance moves, although none probably as explicit as this one. I'm actually curious now to see what my students think of this - well, the girls anyway, the boys are way too predictable - after seeing how popular Miss A's "Bad Girl Good Girl" was last year and having to watch my 15 year old students innocently do what I consider the inappropriate and slightly disturbing moves for children that age to the song at our school's performance day. But this is probably not appropriate either. Having said that, I did teach the 1st year girls (about 13 years old) in my Super Duper English group the word "stripper" to properly discuss the Miss A song, although this was immediately followed up by the comment "they look like worms" (because of their stripy outfits) so I am fairly sure that the word didn't in fact make much of an impression on them ㅋㅋㅋㅋ

 

By the way, bravo to Korean political correctness on Music Bank for describing the Brave Girls as apparently inspired by "'80's style black music".

Anyway, that's what's been happening lately. It's also the cherry blossom time of year again, so expect some pictures when I get around to taking a stroll with my camera. I actually watched that 1993 classic "the Secret Garden" (based on Frances Hodges Burnett's classic of course) on the weekend so I have been somewhat inspired. There are of course numerous cherry blossom festivals around, the most famous being in Jinhae, but they are pretty spectacular in Cheongju along our Mushim-Jeon ("Absent-minded Stream') that runs through the middle of town and make even a taxi ride in rush hour traffic a more beautiful and tranquil thing.

벗꽃 from last year at Songrisan

I did also spy a very small-scale cherry blossom festival thing near Geumseok Intersection/Bridge (near the 금석교 bus stop). I think it's behind the fitness centre there (don't remember the name sorry) but Google maps is telling me that it's actually behind the Ilsan Wedding Plaza. Anyway it's near the bridge/intersection and apparently there's a whole bunch of streets named around the Cherry Blossom or Cherry Tree (or whatever the English name for 벗나무 actually is) around there too. I'm going to go check it out sometime this week so I'll let you know how it goes :)