The Execution of Troy Davis

Troy Davis was convicted 17 years ago for the murder of a police officer. He is scheduled to be executed by the state of Georgia in two weeks. In his trial, no physical evidence was presented to link him to the crime. He proclaimed his innocence but was convicted on the testimony of nine witness for the prosecution. Since then, seven of the nine witnesses have recanted their testimony, saying they were pressured or coerced by police. One of the other two witnesses is Sylvester "Red" Coles, the other principal suspect, who is implicated in the crime by affidavits signed by 9 people. Davis was issued a 90 day stay against his execution last summer, but his appeal to the Supreme Court has been denied.

In the interest of justice and sane policy with regard to the human rights of the citizens of our country, please sign Amnesty International's petition to stop the exectution of Troy Davis. Then, if you are so moved, write to your legislators and tell them what you think of a death penalty that is applied nearly exclusively to the black and poor.

Won Gains Over 6% in 5 Days

Since I last posted about the won-dollar exchange rate - on Friday - the won has gained over 6% on the dollar. Incredible. And this over the period the massive bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac was announced. I would think that would strengthen the dollar and cause the won to slide further, but clearly I don't understand. If anyone can explain this to me, I'd love to get it. Otherwise, I'll just sit happy with the 6% raise I got this weekend. ;^>

Vegetarian Mis-adventures in Korea-land

We had our first big vegetarian failure in Korea tonight with the Tuesday Night Eating Club. We went to a Chinese restaurant downtown and foolishly thought that with the help of a Korean-American friend who is nearly fluent in Korean we'd be able to find or order dishes without beef, pork, chicken, dog, fish, crustaceans, cephalopods or any other animal, but that turned out to be too much to ask. We thought we'd try the yachae bokumbap (vegetable fried rice), and u dong (thick noodle soup).

Here's the u dong. Notice the tentacle in Melanie's chopsticks.

Several minutes into trying to suck down some of the noodles Melanie pulled a full prawn out - eyes and whiskers and all. We tried to keep putting it down for a bit, but it just wasn't happening.

The bokumbap looked more hopeful, and tasted great, until Melanie got something chewy and we realized there was beef in the black bean sauce. You'd never guess from looking at it would you? There's a lesson in there for vegetarians in Korea.

So we left a little nauseous and more than a little disappointed that we paid ~US$10 to get that way. On the way home I picked up the always reliable economic assistance kimbap and an asian pear and am feeling grateful for them both now.

Celebrating Pizza the Korean Way

How else could you celebrate the opening of a neighborhood pizza restaurant, but with a 25-foot tall inflatable blue man, ten bulls eyes made of flowers, and a giant archway of balloons?

Gender Dynamics in Korea

I don't want to say that this picture captures the gender dynamic in Korea, because men here work damn hard for their families. But this photo definitely resinates with much of what I've seen.

Trip to Seoraksan

Seoraksan is the third highest mountain in South Korea, and the highest in the Taebaek Range, in which we find ourselves living. On the fourth day of our orientation to the Gangwon-do EPIK program, we were bussed up to Seorak National Park and let loose. Having been couped up in a hotel for five days, we were pretty excited to get out and do some hiking. So we took off from the group, hoping to get some exercise and a nice view, and were immediately impressed with the mountain.

We went in a ways and found this quite helpful, if slightly cartoonish, map of the park. It's amazing how they can turn just about anything into a cartoon here!

Just a bit further up the path, we came across a gigantic statue of Buddha. I'd estimate it at 40-50 feet high! I love this photograph. If ever one of my photos has captured the contrast of modern and traditional Korea, this must be it.

After that we started hustling, as we had about two hours and really wanted to make it up to a cave called Geumgangul and had heard it's a tough hike up there. It was indeed a tough hike up. This next picture is from a platform just below the cave. You can see how tough a hike it was by how proud I look to be there. In the interest of full disclosure, the man who took this picture was wearing loafers. I don't know how Koreans do it.

Here's a look at the hike that remained from there. Thankfully, in Korea, there tend to be stairs leading to just about anywhere you might want to go.

I had left Melanie a bit down the mountain because we thought we wouldn't have time to make it up together. But lo and behold, just as I was leaving the cave, up the stairs she came! Here's a look from within the very modest cave. It contained three small statues of Buddha, a woman selling Buddhist wares (and coffee, of course), and lots of these hanging lanterns, the significance I'm unsure of.

We made it back to the bus in just over two and a half hours. It was a great hike for such a short time... plenty of culture, beautiful scenery and athletic challenge.

LA Meat

If you pay any attention to international news, surely you remember the massive protests recently held across Korea against the country resuming imports of US beef. After a Mad Cow Disease scare years ago, Korea suspended imports, then recently, I think as a condition to the bilateral trade agreement, was set to start importing again. The entire country it seems took to the streets against the policy, but it was pushed through in spite of the protests (shocking isn't it, that the protests were ineffectual?).

So with that in mind, you wouldn't expect a butcher on every corner to be wrapped in the American flag, calling themselves "LA Meat". But low and behold, on every corner here in Samcheok:




And they seem to be busy every hour of the day, US beef or not.