| Event: | Rubber Seoul 2009 |
| Where: | Hongdae, 3 Clubs FF, DBGB, and Jane’s Groove |
| When: | December 5th 2009 |
| How much: | 10, 000 Won cover complete with Little Traveler |
| What: | A night of fun, frivolity and music! |
| Contacts: | Thency 010-4363-0609 before 3pm and Sue Bullas 010-5680-1800 after 3 |
| Check us out on Facebook at Rubber Seoul 2009 |
Come out and share the world with Little Travelers and Medi peace! November 19, 2009 – December 5th the world will be celebrating World AIDS Day and you can join in the celebrations right here in Seoul.
Little Travellers and Medi peace have joined forces to offer you a day of awareness, discussion, fun and most importantly the opportunity to help those affected by HIV/AIDS.
On the evening of December 5th the event “Rubber Seoul” will be taking place in Hongdae for its second year running. As well as to raise money the event is being held to remind people to have safe sex. This is a very important issue since the Korea Centre for Disease Control and Prevention reported that 99% of the new cases of HIV/AIDS found in 2008 were transmitted sexually.
What Rubber Seoul is offering is access into three of Hongdaes most vibrant clubs: Janes Groove, FF and DGBD and be able to see some of Seoul’s hottest bands, all for a tiny 10,000 won. If that’s not enough, you will also receive a Little Travellers doll to take home with you. Last year over 1000 people came out in Hongdae to join in Rubber Seoul and we raised an astonishing 12 million Won. Which really helped improve women’s lives in Africa. So don’t miss out on this years event, come along have fun and help us to help others.
Also on December 5th Medi peace are offering an interactive discussion with expert opinions. Not only will they address the dangers and medical facts surrounding AIDS but also the wider social issues such as the discrimination that people with AIDS live with and how we can change the stigmas attached with AIDS. It is of pivotal importance that AIDS ceases to be ignored and viewed as an irrelevant problem in Korea if the steady spread of the disease is to be halted. So come along and join in the discussions.
Little Travellers are beautiful hand made pins made by women affected by HIV/ AIDS in South Africa. Little Travellers is a not-for-profit organization that started in Canada and is now here in Korea, run mainly by volunteers. These dolls are sold for 5,000 Won and 100% of the proceeds are go to help fight HIV/AIDS in the KwaZulu-Natal province of South Africa, where over 40% of adults are infected. All proceeds from Rubber Seoul will go to the Hillcrest AIDS Center in South Africa. To learn more about Little Travellers please visit http://www.littletravellers.net/.
Medi peace, a Korean founded organization, is a global healthcare NGO that aims to join aid efforts and help establish a primary health care system in disaster zones. Medi peace also provides medical care for those who are isolated from global healthcare systems. In order to achieve these goals, Medi peace has several major projects which it is currently working on. To find out more about Medi peace and the projects they are working on please go to http://medipeace.tistory.com/.
If after reading this you are inspired to do more to help then you’re in luck as we are looking for volunteers to help us on the night of the event. You can contact us at korea@littletravellers.net . Please don’t forget to check the Rubber Seoul 2009 Facebook or http://www.rubberseoul2009.wordpress.com for updates on venues and bands!
U.S. President Barack Obama Monday attributed South Korea’s successful economic growth over the past decades to Korean parents’ enthusiasm for education of their children.
“I just want to mention the importance not only of students but also of parents,” Obama said in a forum here to launch the “Educate to Innovate” campaign for U.S. excellence in science, technology, engineering and math education.
Click Here for the Full Story (Source: Yonhap News)
The administration is moving to lower the age of primary school admission by one year to five in a desperate bid to fight the falling birthrate.
It is also seeking to offer incentives to third-born children when they take college entrance exams and seek jobs.
Click Here for the Full Story (Source: The Korean Times)
Here’s an interesting write up from Brian in Jeollanam:
Here’s an excerpt from a piece on KBS:
Representative Cho Jeon-hyuk of the ruling Grand National Party, who is also a member of the parliamentary committee on education, proposed on Thursday revisions to laws on schools and private institutes.
The revised bills seek to make it mandatory for private institutes to have foreign teachers complete educational programs on South Korea’s culture and people.Cho said most foreign teachers in the nation do not have enough of an understanding about Korea’s culture and practices. He said the revisions are aimed at raising the quality of the nation’s English education programs by mandating that foreign teachers have better knowledge of Korea.
An article in Korean here.
Orientation programs are a good idea, and Jeollanam-do puts on a relatively good one for new teachers arriving in public schools via the Jeollanam-do Language Program. I just wish there were more opportunities for education and professional development. In three years teaching in Jeollanam-do we only had one meeting where we could watch presentations from other teachers on lesson planning on classroom issues.
Click Here for the Full Story (Source: Brian in Jeollanam-Do)
On Nov. 11, the JoongAng Daily reported that 100 teachers from India will be hired next year to teach English in Korean public schools. If that trial period is successful, more teachers will be accepted in the future. The education ministry official quoted in the piece remained anonymous, so it’s not clear whether the plan is set in stone. But it nonetheless raises interesting questions.
“I can’t imagine that a system that is so obviously biased toward white North Americans will hire Indians who those same North Americans can’t understand when they’re on the other end of a call center,” writes Mike.
Click Here for the Full Story (Source: JoongAng Daily)
To explain this first Tiger and Bear Comic – This one is in fact a parody of the real life Tiger and Bear’s performances. You see they don’t actually do anything and the strip reflects this quite literally. It’s purposely a minimalist one and also plays around with the tradition concept of a comic strip where there has to be some event or situation or a punch line, instead here there is just a tiger and bear doing absolutely nothing.
Produced in association with Daegu Pockets/ Spark Media the Tiger and Bear comics are unique because rather than having one person do all the stories and illustrations James Topple and Colin Riddle (Tiger and Bear) instead decided to create a collaborative experiment, with every strip being written and illustrated by two different people, from a range of backgrounds and nationalities.
No themes or stylistic guidelines were imposed on the writers or illustrators, except that the work should be in the form of a four panel comic based on the Riddle and Topple’s interpretation of the myth of tiger and Bear. The results have been remarkable, with a wide array of themes, ideas and artistic styles.
The contributors feature both illustrators and writers from within and without South Korea, coming from a range of background and nationalities. Some are professional artists or writers, other just do it as a hobby. Some contributors have an intimate knowledge of Korea, its mythology and how the nation is changing, whereas some contributors have a remote and limited amount of information about Korea at their disposal.
While the project already boasts a strong portfolio of work the Tiger and Bear comic series is still open for submissions, both in terms of writing and illustration. If you’re interested please don’t hesitate to email us at tigerandbearkorea@hotmail.com or search out our Facebook group, “Tiger and Bear Comic: Writers & Illustrators Needed!”.
Prime Minister Chung Un-chan called for a crackdown on illegal private tutoring, Friday, saying it was crucial to rein in the growing household burden of private education to address the country’s low birthrate.
“We must strengthen the monitoring of private cram schools, or hagwon, to reduce household spending on private education,” Chung said during a meeting with educational policymakers.
Click Here for the Full Story (Source: The Korean Times)
As some of you are already aware ATEK is backing a letter by Andrea Vandom that was mailed to the NHN , the parent company of Naver,calling for them to pull all offensive and racist material from the Anti English Spectrum’s (AES) blog. These two articles detail this:
- http://www.koreaherald.co.kr/NEWKHSITE/data/html_dir/2009/11/20/200911200005.asp
- http://www.koreaherald.co.kr/NEWKHSITE/data/html_dir/2009/11/20/200911200006.asp
It would be appreciated if you could circulate and pass on these articles to as many as possible to raise awareness of why the AES’s page is an issue and why NHN needs to remove the offensive material. If any of you would like to read the original letter in English you can do so here:
There is also a Korean translation here, please pass this onto any Korean speakers and invite them to comment on it:
To clarify the letter asks for the following:
- Remove content that claims foreigners are targeting Korean children in order to sexually molest them.
- Remove content that spreads rumors of foreigners seeking to infect Koreans with AIDS or other diseases.
- Remove content that contains racially derogatory images and messages that promote racial hatred and discrimination such as the group’s many “promotional posters.”
- Remove content that profiles, targets and stigmatizes individuals on the basis of race and nationality in order to expose them to greater suspicion.
- Remove content that involves vigilante activities such as the tracking or stalking of any persons, whether Koreans or foreigners.
- Remove content that targets interracial couples and seeks to stigmatize and degrade Koreans for having any kind of relationships with foreigners.
● 외국인들이 성추행할 목적으로 한국의 어린이들을 표적으로 삼고 있다 는 내용의 게시물들을 거해주십시오.
● 외국인들이 한국인들에게 AIDS 또는 그 외의 병을 감염시키려 한다는 소문을 퍼뜨리는 내용물들을 제거해주십시오.
● 안티-잉글리쉬스펙트럼 모임의 수많은 “홍보 포스터”와 같이 타인종에대한 증오와 차별을 증진시키는 목적으로 다른 인종을 비하하는 이미지나 메시지들이 든 내용물들을 제거해주십시오.
● 외국인들에 대한 더욱 더 큰 의혹을 불러일으키기 위한 목적으로 개개인을 인종이나 국적을 바탕으로 차별화, 표적화 및 낙인 찍는 내용의게시물을 제거해주십시오.
● 자경단 활동과 관련된 내용물, 즉 외국인이건 한국인이건, 그 어떠한사람에 대해서건 그들을 추적하거나 스토킹하는 행위에 대한 내용물들을 제거해주십시오.
● 다른 인종으로 구성된 연인 또는 부부 커플들을 표적으로 삼고 외국인과 어떠한 형태로든 관계를 가지려는 한국인들을 낙인 찍고 비하하는내용의 게시물들을 제거해주십시오.
—–
Dann Gaymer
010-2335-4999
Communications Director, The Association for Teachers of English in Korea (ATEK)
media@atek.or.kr
1) Grocery (ROKetship)
By Luke Martin (www.ROKetship.com)
2) English is Stupid
Lets face it
English is a stupid language.
There is no egg in the eggplant;
No ham in the hamburger
And neither pine nor apple in the pineapple.
And while no one knows what is in a hot dog,
you can be pretty sure it isn’t canine.
English muffins were not invented in England;
French fries were not invented in France.
We sometimes take English for granted.
But if we examine its paradoxes we find that
Quicksand takes you down slowly.
Boxing rings are square.
And a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.
Sweetmeats are candies, while sweetbreads,
which aren’t sweet, are meat.
If writers write, how come fingers don’t fing.
If the plural of tooth is teeth,
One goose, two geese.
So one moose, two meese?
Is cheese the plural of choose?
One mouse, two mice; one louse, two lice,
One house, two hice?
Shouldn’t the plural of phone booth be phone beeth
If the teacher taught, why didn’t the preacher praught,
Or the grocer groce, or hammers ham?
If a vegetarian eats vegetables,
What the heck does a humanitarian eat!?
Why do people recite at a play,
Yet play at a recital?
Park on driveways and drive on parkways?
Ship by truck, and send cargo by ship…?
Have feet that smell and noses than run?
How can the weather be as hot as hell on one day
And as cold as hell on another
You have to marvel at the unique lunacy
Of a language where a house can burn up as
It burns down,
And in which you fill in a form
By filling it out
And a bell is only heard once it goes!
How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same,
while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?
English was invented by people, not computers
And it reflects the creativity of the human race
(Which of course isn’t a race at all)
That is why
You get in and out of a car, and on and off a bus.
When the stars are out they are visible
But when the lights are out they are invisible.
And why it is that when I wind up my watch
It starts,
But when I wind up this poem,
It ends.
Click Here to go through to this Joke’s Source
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Welcome to Expacked (Issue #48)
Its amazing how quickly things change. I had a bad day yesterday and I started to feel just how far away from home I really was and just how hard certain things in this country can be. I started to doubt myself a little and needed some better news today. Well I got it and in the space of 24 hours I had completely turned around.
You will find that everyone teaching in a foreign country will have their ups and downs. What’s important is that you ride it through and realise that things will always get better.
Friends in Korea play a big part in keeping you sane while your family and friends are miles away back home (of course, Skype is always a great tool for keeping in touch with home). So make the most of your time here and meet as many people as you can – both English AND Korean. There’s so much to see and do while you are in Korea
Here’s the stories making the news this week:
Feel free to comment on any of the stories and make use of the easy sharing options available – in just a few quick clicks you can share any of these stories to all your teaching mates in Korea.
I hope you enjoy the read and, of course, have a good laugh at this week’s jokes at the end.
Thanks,
Ken
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from → Issue #48