K-pop

Being that I teach primarily 4th-6th graders, I'm constantly inundated with and benefited by knowing a little something about the Korean popular music (K-pop) scene. I've also been here long enough to start seeing a shift in trends and an emergence of something new.

Korean music has, for as long as I've witnessed it, been characterized by excessive cuteness and feelings. As a whole, there is nothing in the mainstream outside of love ballads and dance music. Even the dance music has always been lyrically identical to the ballads, with only the addition of a Backstreet Boys style collective dance to go along with the beat. The whole "scene" is fairly shallow and unoriginal, to speak plainly (not to say that the American pop scene is any different, but just to characterize).

Lately, however, I have seen a shift in Korean music that has been noteworthy. There are three parts to this change. The first step was 2NE1. Whereas for ten years, the artists have dressed similarly and safely, 2NE1 brought a whole new style to the table. Since their introduction of vertical hair and outrageous outfits, the entire music industry has followed closely behind. Half the time they look like George of the Jungle should have watched out for that 5th Element. The pictures speak for themselves.

Debuting early last year, 2NE1 is certainly no longer a latest development. However, I think that their advent paved the wave for what was to come. What started as simply different clothes and attitude soon spread into the lyrical aspect of K-pop.  In the past several months there's been a shift from the typical, ballad style lyrics to a new format.  Korea, for some time now having been dominated by the girl group, has constantly been plagued with the same song to a different tune.  Either "omg I like him soooooo much.  what should I do?  my heart won't stop beating!" or "we broke up!  there's no one in my heart but you!  even now I can't stop thinking about you!" (sadly, the format barely differs when guy groups perform).  Lately, however, I've witnessed the emergence a new trend toward songs about women standing up for themselves, much in the style of Beyonce.  The prime examples of this would be the nearly simultaneous releases by groups SNSD, Kara, and now Lee Hyori, all of which saw the once cute-to-the-max take on a role with more independence, maturity, and substance.

This week I've seen what I hope to be the next step. Fairly new group f(x) releases their song NU ABO with positive reception. Blood type in Korea acts as a substitute for zodiac signs, predicting a person's personality and relationship compatibility. In 4 varieties, this uber-homogeneous society has summed up all personality possibilities. Finally, f(x) steps up to the plate and questions this "ABO" system, claiming that they are not A, AB, B, or O but in fact an entirely "Nu" blood type. In a country where sharing and following is a powerful cultural status quo, a dominant pop group is directly challenging the uniformity. High five to these girls for doing something original in K-pop (gasp!), though in my eyes they may just be a vessel for the build up I've been witnessing off and on for almost 5 years.



In completely related and yet still unrelated news, apparently the President has decided to use K-pop group 4minute as broadcast propaganda to the North?

International

Let's pretend I've opened a fancy coffee shop in a trendy area of town. I give it a mysterious and undecipherable name like, say, Coffee Break: Season 1. Then I set about decorating. It's very modern, all white and black. I'm a cutting edge coffee shop owner, you see. I don't want a cozy nook for Yeats fans. Oh no. I'm creating a cool hang out for the urban youth of a globalized city, one that they will frequent with the same regularity with which they view their television shows. I know my audience: they like an international atmosphere. One way to achieve this is through clocks on the wall with times from the major cities of the world. Something that draws the coffee-sippers mind to other modern and fast paced locales that I'm surely associated and familiar with.

The problem: only one of the cities I have chosen can anyone recognize as a legitimate city, much less an urban hub.

From left: Thimbu, Yerevan, Santiago, Praha, Accra

I know that "Praha" is how the Koreans pronounce and thus anglicize "Prague," and Accra is a city somewhere in Western Africa, but Thimbu is flat out made up.

***Thanks to some fast response from followers, we have a complete list of the 5 cities whose times coffee drinkers need to be aware of: Thimbu, Bhutan; Yerevan, Armenia; Santiago, Chile; Prague, Czech Republic; Accra, Ghana***

Tteokbokki

They say this is the next big push in the "Korean Culture Wave" or hallyu: Korean food to the world! I tried to make this particular dish at home today, and it was a delicious success.

Spicy, chewy tteokbokki is made with pieces of "tteok," which is basically rice that's been compacted into thick noodles. Korean mac'n'cheese?

Kim Yuna

Perhaps I missed the international blog wave by a few months, but this chronicle would be incomplete without an entry about Yuna Kim (henceforth to be referred to in the order I'm used to: Kim Yuna).

For the vast majority of Americans, Kim Yuna is a name we can't recognize, much less identify. She is the 19 year-old Korean girl who won gold in the Vancouver Winter Olympics, beating out her only slightly more well-known Japanese rival Mao Asada.

Kim Yuna (center) with Asada Mao (right) and some white chick

Kim is a national celebrity here like nothing I've ever seen.  Seoul is an extremely wired city, and gadgets are the name of the game.  More so than in the states, TV on the cell phone has really taken root here.  I happened to be out and about on the day that Kim Yuna was skating for the gold.  I saw cars pull over in the already unusually empty streets to watch the action on their cell phones.  Coffee shop employees had laptop wires running across the espresso machines: coffee stopped for the viewing of this program.  Bus drivers, while still keeping on their route, refused to be the only ones on the bus not watching a cell phone.  People clustered around TVs in windows, and everyone stopped talking.  The third largest city in the world literally stood still for 6 minutes of figure skating.

Some of the commercials featuring Kim Yuna

The popularity of Kim Yuna is twofold.  First, there's the enormous weight of being a country's sole representative to the international world.  Among Korean people, there are only maybe 4 who have achieved any measure of notoriety outside the peninsula.  UN Secretary General Ban Ki-mun, Manchester United team member Park Ji-Sung, and Korean pop star Rain (who has been part of a mock rivalry with comedy talk show host Stephen Colbert as well as star of several bad Hollywood movies) are the only other South Koreans that any one in the West has any real chance of knowing.  Aside from that, Korea is always burdened with its negative association to Kim Jung-Il as well as hidden in the cultural and economic shadow of its number one rival Japan.  Kim Yuna not only beat Mao Asada but also brings international attention to Korea, and therefore is practically royalty.

The other side of Kim's appeal is her personality.  In a country where some of the biggest stars have been cast aside because they became recognized for bragging, bad-mouthing, or womanizing, Kim Yuna has managed to charm the nation with her innocence and humility.  She is very respectful to the people who have helped her get this far and seems to disbelieve the success she's gotten.  She has tasteful and conservative outfits, and her "signature" 007 move has swept the nation.  The cynical American in me is quick to jump to the conclusion that she's just another pretty face, but Koreans will readily tell you that they don't think Kim Yuna is pretty at all.  "Her eyes are much smaller than Mao Asada's."


In her short lifespan, she's managed to not only win medals and set records, but also land some of the most sought after advertising spots. In Korea, there are not many people whose faces you'll see more often than Kim Yuna's. There's a permanent advertising slot left open for the hottest girl and boy groups of the moment, but nothing comes close to the mountain of sponsors heaped on this girl. She's the Korean face of Nike, top cell phone provider Anycall, Hyundai motors, Hausen air conditioners, Smoothie King, numerous makeup products, Samsung, school uniform company Ivy Club, those softening dryer sheet things, local bakery chain Tous Les Jours, a brand called Everyday Milk, Kookmin (citizens') Bank, and Whisper feminine products, to name what I can think of. You can basically see her everywhere you go, all of the time.

You can currently buy the Yuna "Be White" smoothie (not as racist as it sounds), the pink Yuna Haptic smart phone, or bite into the only bagel with a name branded on it. Can you think of another human in history who has been so idolized that their names were burnt into pastries?  Interesting fact about Kim Yuna: she's officially a student at Korea National University, though I can't imagine it's anything more than another advertisement.  How could she set foot on campus between the time constraints and the drooling fans?