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By Jane Han
DALLAS — Whenever the Korean peninsula makes headlines here in the U.S., it usually has to do with North Korea and its provocations that often draws the same stale public reaction at best.
This time, it's all about South Korea's first female president and a spiraling soap opera-style scandal that's gotten people puzzled, appalled and amused at the same time.
"It's so weird that it's almost intriguing," says Julie Horton, 35, a preschool teacher who lives in the suburbs of Dallas. "I usually don't get to read much international news, but this one I saw repeatedly on my Facebook feed so I had to look."
Since the damaging scandal surrounding President Park Geun-hye surfaced late last month, mainstream media in the U.S. were quick to tell the story with catchy headlines sprinkled with words like "cult" and "shamans."
For ordinary Americans, it may be an unusual story worth checking out.
"I perceived Korea as a country with an advanced economy and politics, so the series of news articles I came across seemed a bit off. It definitely got me curious," said Mary Eckert, an online news editor based in Los Angeles.
The swirling scandal, in a nutshell, involves the president handing over classified information to her 40-year-long friend, Choi Soon-sil, who has no official post, almost on a daily basis, and mysteriously allowing her to make decisions on critical government affairs and enabling her to rake in millions.
Here's where the scandal takes a quirky turn.
Choi is the daughter of the late quasi religious cult leader, Choi Tae-min, who not only claimed to have the power to speak to the ghost of the president's late mother, but is also rumored to have been involved in a spiritual and improper relationship with Park.
In a matter of two weeks since the news broke, Park delivered two unusual televised apologies to the Korean public, but they weren't enough to stop tens of thousands of people from marching in the streets of Seoul calling for her to resign.
"Before I got a chance to read anything, a photo of a massive candle-light protest caught my eye in the newspaper," said Joav Jenkins, 42, who works for a non-profit environmental advocacy agency based in New York City.
"I thought to myself, ‘Wow, impressive. These people know how to pull off a protest,"' he said. "I read through the article and was surprised to learn that the protest was against a president of a country, and more surprised that the scandal sounds so bizarre."
Aside from the surreal cult aspect, many Americans are drawing a similarity between Park and U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton with regards to the carelessness in handling classified materials.
"It looks like both women have a tough time keeping information to themselves. In that sense, I find it interesting. Maybe these protests will be the future of America?" says Allison Bedell, 38, a systems engineer, who lives in San Francisco.
Dozens of people expressed similar thoughts as they reacted to news articles published on the Internet.
"Take note America," wrote Mike Underwood on a Facebook page of a news outlet. "This is how it's done."
Another user named Monica Jones wrote, "At least Koreans know how to team up and take a stand together. Can Americans do that?"
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