| August 16th, 2001 Yesterday was another nice Korean National Holiday and it was a pretty big one: Liberation Day. There is a lot going on here with respect to Japan and the public sentiment towards the country is especially low right now. There were a lot of demonstrations and ceremonies to celebrate "a great day to hate Japan" and eariler in the week a group of men cut of the tops of their pinkie fingers. They were protesting the Japanese president's visit to a war monument honoring, among other soliders, war criminals. I was sorry I missed that and I didn't do much to celebrate Liberation Day. I find it very interesting to watch the hateful reactions regarding Japan from my students, the oldest of which are twelve. I can't say that I blame Koreans for hating Japan so much: the atrocities are still so fresh in the minds of so many and I'm sure my students get most of their opinions from their parents. However, I wonder about the younger generation's demonstrations against the American military's presence here and always think it would be interesting to talk to them about it. I guess I'll wait until I meet an anti-American Korean one-on-one--I hear non-Koreans aren't treated too favorably at these gatherings, American or not. Last weekend I went to Kanghwa City and then to some tidal flats (ie. mud flats) on the north west coast (it may be as close as I get to North Korea. I'd never seen a mud flat before and was very impressed. The shallow water kept receding throughout the afternoon and by the time we left to go home it looked like you could have trudged all the way to the island across from us. Though my travel companions and I originally thought we were going to a beach, it was an overcast and cool day and it was fun to get muddy and try to swim in the two feet of water while getting creeped out by the mucky bottom. Apparently this tidal flat is "one of the five most precious tidal flats worldwide" providing an awesome habitat for birds, bugs and crustaceans. The Koreans are very into the benefits of mud on skin so it's normal to rub it all over your body and walk around as it dries. On the way home we hitched a ride back to the bus terminal with a police officer.....I got to ride in a Korean police car and didn't even have to break a law. It was a good time and so nice to see some beautiful countryside and spend a day outside of the concrete monster called Suwon. |