Contributor
Robert Neff has authored and co-authored several books, including Letters from Joseon, Korea Through Western Eyes and Brief Encounters.
“Old sayings are generally shadows of skeletons of things that once had a being,” declared a newspaper article from the late 1880s. The article was about a Korean artifact that had been added to the Smithsonian Institution's collection and was on display. The artifact was, of course, a jaewoong, a doll made from rice straw with some Korean coins (cash) placed within its stomach.
Today is the Korean Lunar New Year and children throughout the country are busy bowing down before their parents, relatives and even elder siblings in hopes of obtaining some New Year money. It is a cherished tradition that is likely to be practiced for many more years, but not all New Year’s traditions survived.
In the early 1900s, streetcars were a ubiquitous sight in Seoul as they raced through the streets. Different people viewed them in different ways. To some, they were symbols of modern technology, the awakening of the Hermit Kingdom. To others they were vehicles of liberation. They were greatly responsible for the end of the nightly curfew and the closing of the gates. They helped free women from the social-enforced segregation of their homes. They transported people of all classes, gender and ages.
There is no doubt that for many Korean people in the 19th and early 20th centuries, life was difficult and people did what they could to survive. The idea of eating dogs may have been unthinkable for many of the self-described civilized Westerners, but it wasn’t unheard of. Explorers, especially at the poles, ate dogs. In 1912, Roald Amundsen, the Norwegian explorer, ate many of his dogs during his South Pole expedition and found it appealing, claiming “it is anything but a real hardship to eat dog flesh.”
Earlier this month, the Korean government announced that it will ban breeding, butchering, distributing and selling of dogs for meat — to take effect in 2027. The dog-meat issue has long been a contentious one between those arguing its part of Korean tradition and those arguing the practice is cruel and barbaric — a vestige of the past when Korea was not as prosperous.
In the summer of 1971, Jeju Island was anything but a tropical paradise. Frederic H. Dustin, an American who had recently married, was trying to complete his house so that he could bring his bride, Marie-Louise, to live with him on the island. The worst drought in 37 years gripped the island and many fervently wished for a storm to come and bring relief. Dustin was one of those praying, despite not being very religious (although he married a missionary’s daughter), for rain as he feared for his crop of watermelons and cantaloupes. He should have heeded the old saying, “be careful of what you wish for, lest it come true.” His wish did come true, and a powerful typhoon struck the island in early August.
For many people, Christmas is the holiday for giving. A time to gather together with friends and family, put aside petty differences and concentrate on making things better. Gifts are exchanged, toasts are made and all enjoy a bountiful feast — even during years marked with turbulence, unrest and disease.
Long before smartphones — and prior to them, pagers — became an integral part of our daily life, there was “Korean time.” When I first arrived in Korea as a young soldier, the only way to contact and meet my Korean friends was by the ambiguous public payphones. As I remember, a local call cost only 20 won — even then, a very small sum of money. Although the calls were affordable, standing in the long lines to use the phone was particularly annoying. And, even worse, you could only call the person at their home, business or at a prearranged phone number.
They say that time is the most precious thing in life – far more valuable than money or luxury goods. People often freely (and sometimes, grudgingly) give and receive it between friends and family, but would you be willing to steal it from strangers?
Often business is nothing more than the purchase of another person’s time. But sometimes, it takes a physical form. One of the earliest business transactions involving Americans and Koreans took place in the summer of 1883 when Kim Ok-kuin, a Korean official, purchased a number of items from James R. Morse, an American businessman who owned “The American Clock & Brass Company” in Yokohama, Japan.