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Category Archives: Foreigners in Korea

Foreigners, mainly Brits, in Korea

100 years of the Salvation Army in Korea

23-Nov-08

100 years of the Salvation Army in Korea

By Michael Rank London isn't exactly full of reminders of Korea, so I was surprised to discover in Abney Park Cemetery, Stoke Newington, a newly placed plaque in memory of the man who brought the Salvation Army to Korea. The black marble plaque describes in English and Korean how "With Marching Orders from [Salvation Army founder] William Booth in hand, the then Colonel Robert Hoggard arrived on the Korean penninsular [sic] on 1st October 1908 to commence The Salvation Army ... He waved the Blood and Fire Flag throughout the land of Korea as Territorial Commander of The Salvation Army from 1908 to 1916, by which time some 87 officers had been trained; 1,201 Salvationists sworn-in; 3,500 copies of The War Cry ...
Also filed in DPRK, Historical, Religion | Tagged , | Comments (4) »

Musical diplomacy

04-Nov-07
A while ago I posted about Jason Carter's trip to Pyongyang to participate in the annual Friendship Festival. While in Pyongyang, Carter met up with Middlesborough opera diva Suzannah Clarke, who has been performing at the Friendship Festival every year since 2003. Clarke's North Korean connection is through football. She's had a long association with the beautiful game, warming up the crowds at Wembley at the opening celebrations for Euro 96. She also sang at the England - Albania world cup qualifier recently, singing the Albanian national anthem in the language it for which it was written. In 2001, while filming The Game of their Lives, Nick Bonner and Dan Gordon brought the surviving members of the 1966 North Korean soccer team ...
Also filed in DPRK, Western classical music | | Comments (0) »

DPRK travellers’ tales

15-Sep-07
Two travel accounts have recently been highlighted in the BAKS list. First, a long account by guitarist Jason Carter of his 10-day trip to Pyongyang earlier this year to perform in a spring music festival. Like many DPRK travel accounts, we find the author having moments of frustration with the minders as well as appreciating contact with the people he meets. Carter shared the festival with hundreds of other performers, and turned up not knowing what he was expected to play. He gave them one of his own compositions, though the minders wanted something a bit jollier. For those who have been hanging around the various DPRK themed events in London this year, there will be a familiar name - Suzannah Clarke, ...
Also filed in DPRK, Travel, Western classical music | | Comments (0) »

British designer boosted by degree faker

08-Sep-07
Alexander McQueen's tops have been flying off the shelves of a trendy Apgujeong department store (at $200 a time) ever since Shin Jeong-ah was papped in JFK wearing this: McQ can be bought at HANDSOME-SPACE MUE, 93-6 Chungdam-dong, Kangnam, if you're quick. Source: Chosun Links: Alexander McQueen website Related posts:British-owned culture cafe opens in Bucheon Thanks to Peter Orange for letting me know about an...The FT’s smooth weekend in Seoul I don’t usually spend much time reading the Weekend FT’s...British veterans remember the Korean War on Radio 4 Yesterday’s edition of The Reunion had Sue MacGregor talking with... Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.
Also filed in Business, Design, In the news | | Comments (0) »

Saemangeum update

14-May-07
Birds Korea and the Australasian Wader Studies Group have just completed part of their monitoring programme of migrating birds at Saemangeum. A key conclusion: many Great Knot have been displaced by the Saemangeum reclamation, and have subsequently failed to stage through the remainder of the spring at either Gomso Bay or the Geum Estuary -- contradicting the bland claims made by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry in 2003, that shorebirds displaced by the Saemangeum reclamation will simply move to Gomso Bay and the Geum. One of the leading lights of Birds Korea is British-born Nial Moores. According to the Korea Herald, Moores, the first and only full-time foreign environmentalist in Korea, is in charge of survey, public relations, education and fundraising ...
Also filed in Conservation | | Comments (0) »

British-owned culture cafe opens in Bucheon

30-Mar-07
Thanks to Peter Orange for letting me know about an interesting new venture in Bucheon (부천): Cafe Nicolia, run by British / Korean couple Nicholas and Lia Young. From their website, it looks like a version of Seoul Selection, but obviously with more food and, I'm guessing, fewer books. On my rare visits to Seoul Selection I've thought that they could do with something slightly more substantial to sustain you than a cup of coffee - so maybe Cafe Nicolia is it. Only you have to head out to Bucheon for it. The cafe features: a range of English language books, travel guides, popular international magazines and newspapers for sale and for customers to dear in the cafe. In addition, customers ...
Also filed in Food & Drink | | Comments (0) »

The Irish Contribution to Joseon Korea

18-Mar-07
Another post in honour of St Patrick: OhMyNews has a piece on the Irish contribution to Korea's early modern history Arguably the first Irishman to live in Korea arrived in Seoul in the mid 1890s. His name was John McLeavy Brown, and he was a lawyer by trade, but was employed with the Imperial Chinese Maritime Customs Department. Brown was described as a "learned man" with a personal library of nearly 7,000 books -- an extraordinary number considering it was the 1890s and books were much harder to obtain. He had sunken eyes, a heavy Edwardian moustache and walked with a cane that he occasionally used to thump some sense into those he felt were disrespectful. He was sent to Korea by Sir ...
Also filed in Historical | | Comments (0) »

The Spirit of Kahoidong

31-Jan-07
Bukchon, (북촌) a genuine old part of Seoul, a haven of peace preserved between the two major palaces. A little bit of old Seoul carefully preserved and nurtured, saved from the twenty-first century metropolis below. Stroll around the quaint streets of Kahoedong, one of the most protected parts of Bukchon, and if you're not looking terribly hard you believe the myth. It's certainly quiet and peaceful, and there are wonderful views down the hill to the skyscrapers of the downtown area or across to the Gyeongbokgung. And those beautiful curved tiled roofs. But then look around. The main streets are well paved, walls are of brick, scrubbed clean. All very sanitised frontages. You can see a lot of money has been spent, ...
Also filed in Conservation, Seoul | | Comments (0) »

Seoul’s hanoks

21-Oct-06
There was a feature in FT a couple of weeks ago on the Bukchon district of Seoul. It's a place as far as you can get from Apgujeong in terms of style of living. It's the sort of place where Kim Ki-duk might be caught filming traditional housing as seen in 3-Iron, and is inhabited by folks such as Anna Fifield, the FT's Seoul correspondent, Kim Hong-nam, the director of the National Museum, and Brit David Kilburn (whose hanok was in fact the one used in 3-Iron). The Jongno-gu website (the source of the image to the left) offers a walking tour of the district - though it seems to be a little out of date. Here's Anna Fifield's article: Related posts:Brit ...
Also filed in Conservation, Seoul, Travel | Tagged | Comments (3) »

British birdman fights for Korean environment

13-Oct-06
A recent article in the Hankyoreh, forwarded by Tom Coyner, highlighted another Korean environmental issue which I hadn't come across before: the destruction of an important mudflat area at Saemangeum on the Byeonsan peninsula on the West of Korea in order to build - well, they're not quite sure what. But reclaiming 99,000 acres of tidal wetlands, by building the world's longest sea wall (20 miles), and turning them into landfill is obviously a Jolly Good Thing. They might even build a 540-hole golf course there (the world's largest), according to the Christian Science Monitor. How depressing is that? Never mind, it'll bring in the money, allegedly. Using the Zuiderzee Works reclamation area in the Netherlands as a rough model, the ...
Also filed in Conservation | | Comments (0) »

Careful not to try earning a little cash on the side

10-Oct-06
The Marmot has picked up a little news item from the Korean press: a couple of foreigners were caught out earning a little but of cash by getting bit-parts in Bong Joon-ho's The Host, and they now face deportation. One of them was only in Korea on a 90 day tourist visa. Good news for the both, however. If they pay a 1 million won fine and leave Korea, they can return anytime they like. If they fail to pay the fine, however, they would be forcefully deported and barred from reentering the Land of the Morning Calm for 3-5 years. Which would suck. Other foreigners doing a bit of moonlighting include the wife of the American ambassador who ...
Also filed in Bloggers and newspeople, Bong Joon-ho, Film | | Comments (0) »

Brit mobilises the arts to save part of old Seoul

23-Sep-06
Thanks to David Kilburn for sending me the occasional update on his campaign to prevent Kahoi-dong, an area of traditional housing in Seoul, from being buried under mountains of concrete. He recently put on his own arts festival in his home, including two intangible cultural assets, and got the Korea Times to send along a reporter to cover the event. Cast your imagination to a world where man was more intimately connected to the natural world than he his today. Reflect on how, for centuries, Koreans used to build their homes so that they nestled into the natural landscape without unduly disturbing it. In this almost forgotten world, music, vocal arts, dance, and calligraphy could all be acts of communion with ...
Also filed in Conservation, Seoul | | Comments (0) »

Seoul’s redevelopment is not all positive

30-May-06
At the London Korean Festival we've been treated to images of the revitalisation and greening of central Seoul, with displays of the Chonggye Cheon reconstruction. However, there is an all-too-familiar flipside to modern construction projects: my attention has just been drawn to a website which catalogues the demolition of Seoul's last few streets of traditional housing in Kahoi Dong. The site contains some useful external links. Thanks to David Kilburn for the link and the graphic. Related posts:Brit mobilises the arts to save part of old Seoul Thanks to David Kilburn for sending me the occasional update...The Spirit of Kahoidong Bukchon, (북촌) a genuine old part of Seoul, a...Defensive Walking on the streets of Seoul One day I’ll work out, ...
Also filed in Conservation, Seoul | | Comments (0) »