Farewell blog

Bringing it back to the past, when I first came to ICS, I thought the students at ICS were cold individuals. I was ignorant on the fact that they have already created fences around them when I got here. I struggled a few years, but after getting to know many different people at ICS, and it was so recent, I started to express my emotions and thoughts to many people. You guys opened my heart. It almost became a trauma you know. This word ICS to me was not a friendly word at all. I really appreciate your loves guys. I just can’t imagine the world without you guys, but our missing hearts can’t be delayed anymore. So let’s carve our memories in our deepest hearts, and let’s pull it out when the time comes.

I hate to just hastily say goodbye to each other. I hate to turn my back so soon. I want to be backstepping, watching for our adieu. I was so lazy to even think that this moment would come eventually, but now we are here after all the good memories that we’ve been through at ICS. I hope to see you all in the later life, and appreciate the bond we shared. I don’t know what you will be in the future, we are all blind actually at this very moment, but whatever the situations may be, I will still be missing you guys with all my heart.

Some particular individuals have reached inside of my heart. Some nights are going to be disappointing and not special. The nights that will open the window and beckon to all the sad people in the world, and when that night comes, I will remember you guys. As long as I toss about, not being able to sleep on that night, I will be able to reach out to you guys. You guys are at the point where it could become my song or poem. I treasure you that much. You were my happiness. Let us all fly away now.

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Damage Project, External Sense

In every countries, there are always few political faces who are revealed to be corrupted, or have done something that was immoral. This cycle of corruption in politics have given us room to lose faith in them. However, in Korea, the corruption of many politicians are neglected.

Social media in Korea are revealing bunch of scandals and crimes of celebrities nowadays. Such as one male singer creating a group chat room in order to talk about the prostitution businesses, and people in that group were all investigated. Few people from that group chat are actually going be jailed for years. Also, just few days ago, one foreign celebrity who live in Korea got caught using many different types of drugs at home, and it spread throughout the social media.

However, few people believe that these news were already known among their circles, but started revealing these news only because of some bigger dirty truth that politicians are hiding. Some big news have actually attempted to reveal their corruption such as reasons behind death of many different female celebrities in Korea, but these news weren’t spotlighted on any sort of social media, and faded away as other news covered it up. The reporter claims that those female celebrities have killed themselves in a weird position. Such as Choi Jin Sil, who hung herself in her bathroom when every members of her family live in that house. It is odd since her husband suggested that she wouldn’t do such a thing to her innocent daughter, and if she really wanted to hang herself, she would do it somewhere that nobody could witness. There are many more cases that just didn’t make sense, so the reporter suggested that their deaths are related to few influential politicians.

Also, this sort of hiding the truth situation have occurred in the past. The former president, Keunhye Park, was accused for becoming a puppet behind a politician called Soonsil Choi. It turned out to be true, and all her unreasonable actions made sense after all. The former president and that politician are in jail until now. They were hiding the truth until almost the end of the former president’s term of presidency. This sort of corruption shouldn’t happen again, and people must have multifaceted awareness in order to see the truth.

Do I need calls to action?

Che’s compassionate motive to save the world is beautiful. It was an extreme feeling of love that he felt from every single soul that made him move. Was it worth it? My response to his calls to action is that our lives are indefinably complex, so his actions did not just ruin his life, but also presented havoc to those innocent people who joined his group.

My life is in a pause right now. I need some time to recover and reminisce on the things I’ve done. Che’s willingness to take action was courageous, but I can’t risk it for now. I have too many things to lose if I dare to seek for the answers. Convincing myself to go and take one more step is going to be hard, and I got to keep asking myself until that day comes. I should wait for everything to settle, and then I’ll consider to take that step.

Virtue of Tourism

I personally believe that the tourism leads the way to your mindfulness. The new stranger you acquaint with, the new corner of the street you visit, and the new sight of the scene you witness. They all have their own way of impressions that are subconsciously planted in our mind. These impressions create new point of view in the world. Sometimes travelling resets our noisy mind into a peaceful mind.

When I travelled to Vietnam, our family roamed around many places, and witnessed many things to fascinate ourselves such as mud pool, bicycle swarm, and amusement park on an island. It was a terrific view. All just worked together so well to describe the culture and history of Vietnam. This trip also presented us an opportunity to make a new friend. A korean gentleman who lived in Vietnam for a long time.

The value that travel holds is inexplicable. It is only taught through real experiences, and if you really cherish all the moments, the teachings through these experiences will surely influence your entire life.

Eagle side of Daegu

It’s my hometown, or I should confidently say that it’s my homecity. Daegu is a 4th largest city in Korea, and I was born in there. People in Seoul would say it’s just another rural area, but I believe that it’s a city 🙂 Despite of its lack of popularity by the mass, this place just has so many different aspects to fascinate us.

The symbol of Daegu is an eagle, and it represents the enterprising spirit and the frontier spirit. Many people that I know of in Daegu are bearing this eagle spirit in them. I’ve never made ordinary friends in Daegu, and they were very apart from each other. One was seeking for major soccer scene, one was looking forward to travel the whole Earth, and one was dreaming to become the best hiphop dancer in the world. They were very different with each other, but they made a perfect group. This is another aspect of Daegu. People in Daegu are very, verryy friendly. If you go there, you can make your best friend. They love strangers from another country.

Daegu is covered with mountains on every four sides, and that makes this place a city surrounded by mountains. There is a long river running through Daegu called Keumho River, and around this river they got many events going on. I’ve participated in different events for different occasions, and they were all great and showed its color of culture in Daegu. It is hard to describe, but it kind of is similar with the night market in Bangkok, but with many traditional korean style performances.

Daegu is a great place for a modernistic wanderer.

SE Asia Unit Reflections

One major thing I learned from this unit was the perils of stereotypes. Also, it was a lucky coincidence that I was able to learn about the similar topic in Sociology. After this, I started to think differently. I learned to understand the poors. In the past, I also was one of those people who thought that it was their fault to become poor. I felt ashamed to even think that I had this stereotype, and I tried to influence others to be in poor people’s shoes.

These people have been working hard only thinking about surviving through today. We are blessed to even think about the future. Environment factor was one of the biggest influencer in our lives. We just thought that it was our hardworks that brought us up here. Maybe we wanted to think this way to feel superior over others. I repent to these people who are working even harder than us to survive through the day.

The Power of Hope

The statement that we are in the middle of hope and fear and we are constantly getting tugged from each edges resembles my state of mind. Most of the time, however, I fear. When most of my valuable time vanishes with my fears, hope suddenly comes in to somehow pull me back into the real world. This excrutiating lasting of fear and sudden shortburst of hope got me to here. However, I didn’t have time to think about the fear that has been always with me, and I tend to think about the hopes that rarely stays with me.

If you ask why is having hope so important, in my opinion, there is one answer to that question. No matter what happens to you, hope leads you to better thoughts and results. Of course, in order to fully reach the desire, hope has to correlate with the work you put in, however, at the least it helps you to think positively. Nobody can be posilutely absotively sure about the actions that you take, but with hope, things do get better.

Holocaust Survivor stories

Joseph Moses Lang’s story

On Joseph’s 17th birthday, he was transported by cattle car with other hundreds of other Jewish people, to Auschwitz. When arrived, men and women were immediately separated. He was sent to work camp, and he did many arduous works such as working in a cement factory, railroad working, and woodworking. During that time, he was beaten very badly several times. One time he was sent to the “dentist” to get his wisdom teeth pulled out as a punishment. Another time he was charged to run four laps when the German shepherd dog was chasing him. He was beaten on his neck. Every single thing in that place was horrible. When Jews were liberated, he lost track of their family, which gave them even more horrible time. 6 months later, he found Meir, who was his older brother, but couldn’t find the rest of the others except some of the relatives from his mother. On mid 1970s, Meir got killed from the agricultural accident. He got a skin cancer from the woodworking when he was at the work camp. The End.

At first, I chose this story because the name of the fellow was pretty interesting. However, when I read the story, I was shocked. I was shocked on how he was brutally treated. I was shocked on how his life did not have an awarding ending compared to how much he has suffered. The fact that he could not talk about this story right until his death came nearby explains how traumatic his life in concentration camp was. It is a very depressing story that will stick in my head for a long time.

World War II Poetry Analysis

Truly, the title embedded lots of meanings. In that period of time, the soldiers were treated as numbers. Of course, they provoked tears in citizens eyes, and were very well respected, but there were just too many for all of them to be remembered. Were those forgotten soldiers’ sacrifices worth it? It is for them to decide the worth, but the fact is that they were forgotten.

E.L Mayo effectively uses the word, “delicate,” by expressing the relationship between hand and gun. This partnership of gun and hand just didn’t end up to a bright situation, but triggered the wary bird of peace fly away. When people were celebrating for how the war went, these forgotten soldiers weren’t able to attend these cheerful moment, and had to stand outside like wolves in the moon. At the end, all they knew was the war. They knew this concept of war bitterly well, but they didn’t get to know this thing called peace.

In many ways, Mayo delivers depressing message of the forgotten ones. It is like he knew what they have been through, and he created a great mixture with his opinions about them. Wars create many emotions, and they always give the soldiers the worst emotion that could ever come out from the war, Loneliness.

Nationalism

My grandfather always told me about when he lived in one of the poorest countries in the world. He always starts his story with, “you are lucky to be born in this century,” and he tells me that people in the past had to go through bunch of hardships, and it was normal for them. He believes that he was in part of developing the country in such a short amount of time. He is proud to be Korean and I also am proud of my nationality. Nowadays, people tend to forget where they are from, and started to adapt other countries’ perspectives.

In the past, people stood up as one country often enough to create many historical events. This was possible because before then, there was passion in everyone’s heart. In this continually globalizing world, it is just not possible to convince majorities to support their nation when we all are so busy trying to become global citizens. Nationalism, however, is sometimes important to correct the wrong doings. Korean citizens were very self-centered, and seemed to have no passion for the country’s well-being, however when the former president did things that were against ethics, Korean citizens stood up as one country to bring her down. This wasn’t possible without the love of their nation. Nationalism isn’t always bad, but with the sinful thoughts in their leader’s mind, nationalism could be devastatingly harmful.