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  • Water Skaters

    Submitted by on

    Water skaters belong to the insect family Gerridae. They sit on the surface tension of the water, skimming around and their legs have tiny little hairs which help keep them afloat. The ones in Korea are pretty big and I like to watch them. They wait for another insect to fall into the water, and when that happens, they scoot over and make a meal of the hapless victim.

  • Three Cheers for Air-Conditioning

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    Our lab purchased a new air-conditioning unit last week. Up until this time, we only had fans in the lab and an ineffective, medieval, centrally controlled unit that seemed to come on for a couple of hours at a time. I imagine the ajossi at the switchboard downstairs chuckling to himself as he turns it off everyday at 10am.

  • Korean Gender Reader

    Submitted by on

    ( Source. See here for the details ) 1) A much needed American woman’s guide to dating Korean men. 2) Transgender model Choi Han-bit (최한빛) reached the final round of competition in the 2009 Asia-Pacific Supermodel Contest in Seoul, which will be held on September 25. See AllKpop for more pictures and videos, and FeetManSeoul translates an [...]

  • Klausland

    Submitted by on

    While in Thailand we visited a town that, well, let's just be polite and say 'skip it' ... although for some strange reason Klaus really seemed to have enjoy himself there.

  • ON THE MEKONG

    Submitted by on

    It's now hot. We've descended into the tropical part of the province, with palm tree lined streets and guys walking around with their wifebeaters rolled up around their bellies. The midday sun beat us down, and we spent the late afternoon drinking ice-cold cans of Chinese beer in the shaded area below our obscenely cheap hotel.

    Jinhong is a lovely town, feeling more like Thailand or Laos than China. Tomorrow we'll spend the day exploring the surrounding villages by bicycle, and on Tuesday we embark on a three-day jungle trek into the hills near the Burmese border.

  • My Wired Hiatus

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    A few weeks ago, I discovered The Wire. From then on, until I ran out of episodes, time that would have otherwise been spent reading, updating this blog, or writing elsewhere, was spent glued to the computer screen watching episodes, analyzing them, and reading reviews. It was a very sad period for my social life, but an enlightening experience as a TV fangirl.

  • OFF TO JINHONG

    Submitted by on

    I'm tired. My body is slightly sore and I smell of sweat and bus fumes. Yesterday was all about hiking, and today we rented bikes and cruised all over this city, seeing it the way it should be seen. Kunming is great because all of the big roads have large, well-established bike lanes, blocked from the rest of the road by metal barriers. A lot of locals do indeed get around via bicycles, along with electric scooters. It seems that China has banned gas-powered scooters in many of its cities, so people cruise on electric models.

  • Thomas's Dog

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    Studies have shown that patting an animal lowers your blood pressure. If I had time and energy, I'd get a fish, because there's not much space in Korean apartments. Attempting to pat a fish though, would probably raise the stress levels of both parties involved.

  • Korean Sociological Image #14: How And Why Koreans Became The World’s Greatest Consumers

    Submitted by on

    ( Source ) If you’re reading this, then the news that Koreans now spend more and save less than Americans may well come as a bombshell. I base that on the natural assumption that, as an English speaker interested in Korean sociology, most of your earliest and most-deeply held views on the subject were likely gained [...]

  • Time to Evolve

    Submitted by on

    While I've always tried to keep Lee's Korea Blog running in the background of my daily life, I must admit that it has grown into something I'm rather proud of at times. However, the downside of this is that it has become something begging a certain amount of upkeep. A compulsory voluntarianism of sorts. Usually a week after I blog, I feel fine. But toward the 2 week mark, the impending urge to update the blog increases to a dull roar.

  • KUNMING

    Submitted by on

    Well it appears as if the Chinese censors have UNBLOCKED livejournal for the time being. This is cool, since now I don't have to email posts to my girlfriend or go through unreliable and slow proxy servers.

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