Itaewon Halloween

I don’t think I need to explain what happened last Saturday in Itaewon. It’s a tragedy and it’s amazing that such a thing could happen in an open area with no obvious catalyst. In any case, let me just quickly go about with my musings.

First off, I appreciate all of the calls of concern I got from people. I live near the area and I could easily have gone to celebrate Halloween that night. Fortunately for me, I had a very busy week, and I wasn’t really in the mood to go out for Halloween night. Also, the tragedy happened on a Saturday. The big Halloween parties usually happen on Friday nights in Itaewon. I’m guessing the crowd was bigger on Friday night than it was on Saturday, so it’s a mystery as to why the tragedy occurred on Saturday while nothing happened on Friday.

And yeah, when the tragedy happened, I was out having a meal and drinking somewhere else close by. I was so tired, I was home by around nine, watching crime shows on Netflix. The gravity of the news didn’t really hit me until the next morning.

Itaewon has a really interesting history. It was first seen as the foreign underbelly of Seoul. While popular, people would rather hang out in other, more hip places. Itaewon was simply just a place for foreigners to hang out. Then the song “Itaewon Freedom” came out and made it a popular place among the locals. Halloween made it particularly popular, with people dressing up and everything. A sexy nurse here, a Harley Quinn there… it was prime fodder for social networking material.

Then covid hit, and many of the bars and restaurants were forced to closed down. Several places I used to frequent are no longer around. Many of the small restaurants and buildings have been demolished, and now a lot of spaces in Itaewon are under construction, bound to be giant buildings or office spaces in the next couple of years. Last year, people started to be more comfortable going out in Itaewon. Business was starting to pick up. People even celebrated Halloween, I remember. But this year, with this thing happening over Halloween, I’m afraid it’s going to once again scare some business away from the area. After all, who wants to party where over 150 people died in one night? It’s such a grim scenario.

There are videos online of people chanting “push, push, push” as the crowd tried to move, regardless of what was happening a few feet from people. People don’t directly see what’s happening a few feet from them, so they could be unwittingly crushing someone as they’re going with the crowd which is chanting “push, push, push.” A smaller version of this happens every day in trains. I experience it regularly. People would push their way in, not considering the people already inside, regardless of whether the train is already packed. These people would ignore the discomfort their causing and pretend everything is normal as they hug the doors of the train. Selfishly, these same people would not move out of the way or just step out of the train for a bit whenever people want to get out, probably in fear that they would not be able to push themselves in a second time around. When a simple “실례합니다 (Shil-leh-ham-nee-dah)/ Excuse me” wouldn’t do, I have to resort to “Get out of my damned way.”

Now imagine about a hundred of these train jerks in the Halloween crowd just starting to push themselves through in one direction. One pusher multiplies his/her force via domino effect. Now imagine a hundred more pushers going on the opposite direction, unwilling to compromise, pretending that each push is not inconveniencing or hurting other people, the same mentality of the person squeezing himself in at the crowded train door. Then add in a chant of “push, push, push.” Push, push, push. Then you can stop wondering why such an incident could happen.

On April 16, 2014, a ferry, the MV Sewol, full of high school students sank in Korea, killing 360 people. In memory of the tragedy, people wore yellow ribbons. People are already comparing the Halloween incident to the Sewol incident, and now I see black ribbons online for the tragedy. It is certainly something that has shocked the nation and made them aware of life’s fragility. I think this will be seen in the same light in the future, the same collective PTSD. Right now, the small alleyway and the are around it is still closed off to the public. Who knows what will happen to the area in the future once things have settled down. Will businesses be affected? Will people still go to Itaewon to have a good time?

Some people in the government are blaming the tragedy on the lack of police presence to prevent such tragedy. I’m not sure if more police would have prevented the tragedy. I don’t think young people and definitely inebriated foreigners wouldn’t pay much attention to Korean police. They have such a weak presence in the country and don’t really command that much authority.

The lack of police presence could be attributed to political rallies happening close by. The president moved his political headquarters close to Itaewon, and it made the area a hotbed of protests and counter protesters during the weekend. Who knows, maybe if the president was more popular, there wouldn’t be too many protests. And there would’ve been more police available for the Itaewon Halloween celebration. It’s an interesting “what if,” but as I mentioned, I’m not sure more police presence would’ve prevented the tragedy.

Will this prevent future Halloween celebrations in Itaewon? Probably not. There would probably be a memorial set at the alleyway where the tragedy happened, but as for young people partying, I don’t think there’s no stopping it. If not Itaewon, there’s always Hongdae and other places. You don’t have to look far really. Hebangcheon is just a few minutes walk from Itaewon, and it’s filled with bars and foreigners (though not clubs).

God Save the Queen

It’s been a while since I’ve written anything here, but I guess if anything, the death of the Queen is something to write about. I’ve kinda been wondering about her death for the past couple of years, how a shift that would be. Many people, including my mother, lived and died with only one monarch in the British throne. Now I get to see one pass, one that’s been there for seven decades. The lady’s been in our money for so long. She’s a staple in ‘Kid’s in the Hall’ and many Canadian sketches. We used to sing “God Save the Queen” right after singing “Oh, Canada” back in school (The national anthem followed by the royal anthem). She’s as ubiquitous to Canada as the moose and the beaver.

I asked a British friend if it’s strange that I’d feel upset over the Queen’s passing. He thought it odd. I think it odd too. Afterall, she doesn’t really affect me much, nor does the monarchy. But I guess I’m mourning not just the death of from what I know is a pretty decent monarch that presided over the whitling away of the British empire’s colonies, but also the passing of a Canadian symbol.

I’m not a fan of the monarchy for its tabloid drama. I don’t watch ‘The Crown’ either. I really find all of the drama behind the royals a bit tacky, and I could only imagine how mortified as a parent and a grandmother the Queen must’ve been throughout each scandal. My wife was never a fan of the Queen due to her perceived coldness during Diana’s death. But people do acknowledge that she did bow over the late princess’ casket, something that was never done. It was always vice versa; subjects bow to the Queen and the Queen never bows to anyone. That bow shows love, respect, and humanity, as much as the tabloids would love to cast the Queen as the villain during the princess’ death.

If there’s anything I’m not happy about, but I really can’t blame her for, was the way Prince Andrew’s scandal was handled. The man clearly had illegal relations with minors and the Queen made it disappear. I realize she’s dealing with her own son, but the whole thing cast such a dark, disgusting shadow over the monarchy. The prince was caught being a pedophile, and the Queen had to fetch money from her purse to bail her son out. It was disappointing. I would’ve let the courts handle the whole thing instead of sorting it out in the shadows. Sure, the prince had to give up privileges and military ranks, but so did Prince Harry. One is a criminal pedophile, while the other is just someone who wants to protect his wife from the paparazzi. What Prince Andrew got was barely a slap on the wrist.

Looking at the monarchy, it would seem like the Queen’s biggest challenges came not from external forces but more from her own family.

Now of course there’s bitterness towards the monarchy over its colonial past, but I really don’t think the Queen is responsible for much of it. As I mentioned, she presided over the shrinking of the British empire, preserving as much diplomatic relations with the country’s former colonies as she could. In Canada, we are fully not divorced from the authority of the monarchy since many of the agreements with the First Nations were with Canada’s colonial powers at the time. But it’s not like Britain lords over Canada, except maybe once in a while when some British idiot would remark to me that, “we used to own you guys.” To which I would reply, “as someone with a Filipino background, technically it’s the Spanish that used to own me. Also, your racism is showing.”

God bless the Queen. It’s like a good distant grandmother has died. The Queen is dead. Long live the King. 

About Covid

It’s been a while since I’ve done a coronavirus update, so here it is. It’s been over two years now, and I still haven’t caught it. Knowing someone who’s caught it is much more common these days, so is getting over it without much complications. I think taking the vaccine helps, and the treatments have gotten much better. My sister-in-law here and her family caught the virus from a daycare center, and they’re all much better now. I got coworkers and acquaintances here who caught it, too.

My bestfriend in Canada caught the virus, too. She seems to be doing well, but it shows that the virus is still out there causing trouble.

And me, I’m still successfully dodging that bullet.

They’re giving out second booster shots now to people who want it, but only to a certain age. A lot of people didn’t even bother getting the first booster because not long after they made the booster available last year, they made vaccine passes no longer necessary.

For a while, cases in the country were down to around 10,000 a day, which was quite low. People have begun to relax more as open public mask mandates have been lifted, although it is still required in closed public spaces. Even in the office, I see people occasionally taking off their masks when sitting around their desks. It just doesn’t seem to be something people worry too much about anymore.

There are no more limitations to gatherings, nor are there curfews. Once again, drunk people roam the streets and ride the trains of Seoul late at night. That’s one thing I kinda miss about the pandemic. The people and quiet at night. That, and the obligation to finish drinking at 10:00. I know, I know. That’s early. But I’m getting old, and going out for drinks has gotten pretty expensive these days.

I’ve been able to go to the gym these days, too. Finally. I haven’t regularly worked out in two years. Just doing push ups and ab rollers at home. People still have to wear masks however, but I come in super early and I tend to work out without a mask on when no one is around. Shhhhh!

When it comes to traveling though, some people are still wary, while a significant number of Koreans are taking the first opportunity to travel that they can. Some countries don’t require negative tests nor visas to enter, but South Korea still requires negative PCR tests to allow people in. My sister will be visiting on September and she’s got herself a visa. So yeah, tourism is slowly making a comeback in the country.

Relations between Japan and Korea still haven’t been normalized however, and Koreans would still need to apply for a visa when traveling to Japan. Uncertainty regarding Covid and the situation with Japan made me decide to just stay in the country for now and just vacation somewhere I haven’t been to: Busan. I will be on vacation this week, and I’m hoping all goes well.

What scares me though is the current uptick in cases happening around the world due to the new omicron variant. Yesterday, Korea had 40,000 new cases of coronavirus in the country. Japan had over 100,000. I’m hoping this is just a minor blip and not something that would last. God, I remember when Korea was being hailed as a model country with cases less than 1000 a day. Now it seems we’re just as bad (or as good) as other countries.

With Covid

I finally got my second vaccine shot. I haven’t experienced any side effects, so I guess I’m lucky. I got the shot in the middle of the day then went straight back to work. Later, I started feeling a mild numb pain in my arm, but it’s nothing too serious. I’m glad I got more protection and there’ll be less chance of me spreading covid to other people.

I posted about this on Instagram and just as I expected, it flushed out a number of anti-vaxxers who happen to be following me. “You are never fully vaxxed.” “You will keep needing boosters and it will never end.” “Complying with authoritarians will not end tyranny.” Later, they unfollow me. I kinda expected this kind of political craziness on Facebook or Twitter, not on Instagram. I post nothing but art. They also ignore that I’m a Canadian living in Korea. Both countries have extremely high vaccination rates. Koreans are very diligent regarding mask use. Neither countries have death rates that compare to the numbers that the US has. But oh well, I don’t need anti-vaxxer crazy people following me.

Koreans will adopt a “with Covid” strategy starting next month. The country will be dealing with Covid-19 as a fact of daily life and just live with caution instead of trying to eradicate it from the country. Bars and restaurants will open longer and seat more people. Masks will no longer be mandatory outdoors. Gyms and other businesses will be allowed to operate. All of these changes are due to the rapid vaccination of the population. Over 70% of the population are now vaccinated, with younger people being allowed to be vaccinated as well. I worry that Korea will have the same fate as England with its cases rising after adopting a “with Covid” strategy and easing restrictions, but I don’t think Koreans will be so quick to ditch mask-wearing in public. They were very eager to wear masks and practice strict safety measures well before they became mandatory. I suppose part of it is because of their Confucian community-oriented culture as opposed to the western individualist approach to things. No one is complaining about constrained freedom or tyrants around here.

Anyway, I’m quite excited. It’ll be nice to finally be able to go back to the gym. I think I’m amazingly lucky though not to have caught the virus at all. Here’s to continuing to be lucky.

On OnlyFans

So what was that whole thing with Onlyfans about? Well, just a quick recap of the events. Onlyfans, a platform that is made popular by creators selling homemade pornography, has grown even bigger due to the pandemic and many adult-performers opting out of mainstream pornographic productions. Looking for bigger investors, they announced that they will no longer be hosting sexually-explicit content, effectively alienating the creators that made them big to begin with. After a huge backlash from their creators and users, the company decided to go back on their announcement and continue to allow sexually-explicit content “for the moment.”

The initial move has been compared to Tumblr banning sexually-explicit content. For those unfamiliar with the events, Tumblr used to be huge, rivaling Twitter, Instagram, and Reddit. Then it decided to ban sexually-explicit content and its user base just plummeted. Now barely anyone uses Tumblr. Now, the sexually-explicit content Tumblr had wasn’t just raunchy pornography, it also included blogs on the LGBTQ community which were underrepresented online. But due to being forced by Apple, which has a notoriously anti—pornography stance, Tumblr had to follow suit in order to be available on Apple’s IOS platform and thus lost most of its value. Not many people remember it, but the whole thing reminds me more of Playboy magazine when it decided not to feature nude pictorials anymore. It was a move that spectacularly failed and had to be reversed later on when the publisher realized that GQ already exists.

I read commentary that Onlyfans needed to weed out sexually-explicit content in order to please payment processors like Mastercard who are quite conservative. Some even blamed Christian lobbyists as the ones pushing for the move. I also read that the problem that investors and payment processors are trying to avoid is the risk of being involved in child pornography. Onlyfans, being a platform for homemade pornography, it is possible for content with minors in it to be hosted in the platform. That, and perhaps other legal albeit unusual proclivities that investors might not be comfortable with. Now, instead of Onlyfans investing more money in policing their content, prematurely decided to scuttle the most profitable portion of their users. Laziness plus greed.

With that in mind, it also reminds me of the pump and dump scheme prevalent among cryptocurrencies these days. Influential personalities will publicize a new cryptocurrency, not mention that they are invested heavily on it, or perhaps even the creators of the cryptocurrency, and once people buy a huge amount of the cryptocurrency, they sell all of their shares and watch the value plummet on all of the people who trusted them. I’m thinking the heads at Onlyfans were trying to secure huge investments in order to expand, increase the value of the company, leave the company with their golden parachutes, and watch a pornless Onlyfans shrink to oblivion. The only problem was the backlash was so swift and so severe that their investors and payment processors got wind of the inevitable downfall that the plan had to be postponed.

And I say postponed because Onlyfans already showed their cards. Their creators better start looking for a plan B should Onlyfans finally decide to ditch them for good.

Regarding to the initial reactions, however. There were two interesting camps. The one trending on Twitter were the ones celebrating the downfall of Onlyfans and meme-ing that the girls on Onlyfans now have to find real jobs. Well, first off, sex-work is actual work. If anything, I think the men celebrating the plight of sexworkers are the same men who secretly enjoy pornography but don’t really pay for them. They hate women and feel slighted by not having the option of being able to take of their clothes and have swarms of women willing to pay for their time online.

The other interesting camp are from adult actresses who believe Onlyfans is offering a false sense of security among its creators. They are also giving naive young girls an “easy way out” by making easy money online. This is a more interesting take which I’m more keen on hearing. Apparently, Onlyfans is not very keen on its security and creators often have to deal with being hacked, stalked, and terrorized online. Not to mention that nudes online can easily be leaked and once your nudes are online, it’s there forever, often for free. Creators are also competing with one another. One girl posting for the first time is competing with several others who have bigger user bases, more content, and more experience with the platform. I do wonder how many people actually make a decent amount of money on Onlyfans and stick with it as compared to those who try it out for a few months and just flame out.

April Fools, Too

Residents in a Vancouver town have filed a petition to not allow a sculpture to be installed on the South False Creek Seawall in Vancouver. The sculpture is part of the annual Vancouver International Sculpture Biennale and was created by Chinese artist Chen Wenling. He is a world-renowned neorealist whose often grotesque but otherwise very visually arresting works have been exhibited all and one is even installed in Vancouver. ‘Proud Youth’ has become somewhat of a popular landmark near where the proposed ‘Boy Holding a Shark’ is to be installed. Actually, both pieces remind me of another installation, ‘A-maze-ing Laughter’ which I initially thought was a work of the same artist. ‘A-maze-ing Laughter,’ prior to being installed was also subjected to protests, but later became a popular feature in Vancouver’s artistic landscape.

So why do people oppose ‘Boy Holding a Shark?’ Apparently, the grotesque look of the sculpture, which is a call to environmental protection, would harm the natural beauty of the local scenery. More importantly, it could potentially hurt the value of the property around the areas. Personally, I don’t find the look of the sculpture particularly offensive. Looking at art is subjective and this is entirely my speculation, but I believe people who oppose the installation are not the gallery-viewing crowd to begin with. Also, a sculpture belongs in the natural Canadian landscape as much as rows of condos and boats. The opposition due to the look of the piece or how it harms the beauty of the environment just rings a little hollow to me. As for the argument that it would hurt property values, as a millennial living in Seoul who has given up owning a home and can’t even dream of being able to afford a waterfront property in Vancouver, I couldn’t care less about that concern. It seems like rich, white people problems.

Some argue that Canadians should be spending more tax dollars promoting and uplifting Canadian artists. However, the Biennale is a non-profit organization and does not involve the government at all. Canadian taxpayers are not on the hook for the piece. If anything, I tend to be critical of how the Canadian government be it, federal or provincial, chooses public art. I find a lot of public art, especially in my hometown Winnipeg, very uninspired. Just look up ‘Agassiz Ice.’ I’ve written about if before, but it’s a sculpture of glaciers. Glaciers! In a town that has tons of snow and ice for half the year and even has ice and snow sculpture events annually. Described as “monumental,” there is nothing monumental about the three pieces of aluminum. One of the three glaciers is literally three feet tall.

Granted, the tendency for governments and other organizations to choose uninspired corporate art to dot the landscape is not unique to Canada. Seoul has a law which mandates the installation of sculptures to be installed near large buildings. Unfortunately, the choice of works and the fear of offending people and hurting property value has resulted in Seoul being filled with what some has described as “stupid statues.” I’m not saying many of the works in Canada or Seoul are awful, many are in fact brilliant and I applaud them being in the public space, but more often than not, they are meaningless metal features that people simply ignore.

So yeah, God bless organizations like the Biennale for being more adventurous in their selection. Hopefully the city goes ahead with erecting that statue.

No Tokyo Olympics, Please

It’s really time for the Olympics to get cancelled. It’s time. We all can see the Olympics for what they are. They are a company interested in their own profits. They’re not about sports, camaraderie, or triumph over adversity. The sports and the athletes are just a secondary concern. What the IOC values more is licensing, advertising, and broadcasting the games.

The games have been slowly showing its hand in the past few Olympic games. A couple of years after the games were held in Beijing, people noted the abandoned structures that were hastily built for the games. Then people started questioning whether it truly is worth it to host the Olympics, especially when the money used for infrastructure could be used for so many other things. This was especially true when the Olympics were held in Rio. Last year, the Olympic park was closed due to safety concerns. Hosting the Olympics means spending money on infrastructure that would never be recovered, infrastructure that has a high probability of not being maintained after the games. But yeah, the countries/cities are losing money, but someone is getting rich out of all of the construction and other Olympics-related logistics.

As for the sport, Sochi Olympics has demonstrated that widespread cheating can occur with very little consequences to the athletes. After Russia was caught having a national doping program, they barely suffered any consequences for it, and many of their athletes were later allowed to compete under no flags. Pointless.

And now Tokyo, despite rising coronavirus cases, insists that the city will continue to host the games as scheduled. There will be no spectators, and athletes will not be required to get the vaccine, but will however be required to sign a waiver that they risk illness and death by competing in the city. Why is the UN allowing this? This is akin to South Korea’s old law of revoking foreigner’s visas should they learn they are HIV positive. What if they caught the virus in South Korea? (Instead of having brought the virus into the country) Isn’t that not their fault fully but also the fault of the environment they are in? The UN saw it as discrimination as well as a backwards policy that unfairly treats visitors to the country. In Japan, what if the athletes catch covid in the country and dies? Doesn’t the country or the IOC have any responsibility for it? Doesn’t this shift the blame for catching diseases fully on the visitors and not the country the same way South Korea did before with HIV?

Inviting a host of people from countries all over the world could potentially turn Tokyo into a hotbed for the pandemic and naturally, many of the people in Tokyo are against it. Around 80% of people in a recent survey wanted to have the games cancelled altogether. So the games aren’t really for the benefit of the city either. They don’t want to risk dying from covid should the worst happen as a result of thousands of athletes visiting. Even a group of Japanese medical professionals want the game cancelled. Japanese cities are not doing well with infections and vaccinations. As much as some people are saying that Tokyo has handled the pandemic well. They truly haven’t. They came into the pandemic with so much hubris, even allowing people to go out cherry blossom viewing in spring 2020. And now Americans are officially warning people not to visit the country for the Olympics.

As much as I love Japan, I can’t stand the conservative Japanese government. The Olympics has a policy of not allowing politics to be part of the games, and yet recently, Tokyo has been using a map that shows Dokdo, a Korean island, as part of Japanese territory. This revisionist claim is just par for the course for the Japanese government in the past couple of years. They have denied wartime atrocities and downplayed claims of sexual exploitation. South Koreans are understandably unhappy about the recent Dokdo fiasco and many are pushing to boycott the Olympics altogether.

I believe this push to have the Olympics in Tokyo this summer no matter what is simply companies trying to make good on their investments. I’m sure contractors and other beneficiaries to the Olympics, be it the Japanese government side, the corporate side, or the IOC, who were disappointed last year are still hoping that they can make money off of the event. And it truly doesn’t matter whether the events have people watching them on the ground. What truly matters is how many people will be watching the games on television and online. As for me, I think I’ll be watching better shows on Netflix instead. I can just read about whoever won whatever event on Twitter or Reddit.

Tired of Historic Events Yet?

Today, Trump’s MAGA goon squad marched and broke into the US Capitol in protest of President-elect Biden’s electoral votes being ceremoniously counted. This was a coup attempt. This was insurrection and sedition fueled by craven politicians telling MAGA supporters that there is still a way for Trump to win the presidency, that it was somehow stolen from his via complex global, pedophile conspiracies, and that what they are doing is akin to being patriots. The last time forces stormed the Capitol was back in the War of 1812, when the United Kingdom and Canada went to war with the United States. Confederate generals dreamed of someday flying their flag in the US Capitol, and Trump’s MAGA forces this possible. A few years ago, Trump was also in charge of judging whether Gary Busey should be pretend-fired on a pretend job interview. Now, a man with Trump’s wall tattooed on his arm and who traveled with a buffalo headgear to Washington broke several laws making a jackass of himself in the US halls of power. Now, four people are dead.

I love politics. But as much as I love politics, I also love the law and how it works. This was a disgraceful day in US history in what it has done to politics and what it has done to the law. Now, much has already been said about the Republican politicians who allowed this to happen and to the racist police force who let the seditious terrorists run wild in the government building, but I have to say, I have a bigger problem with the weakness of the Democrats.

Joe Biden, in his response to the terrorist attack, tells the nation that the actions of Trump’s supporters “borders on sedition.” Ridiculous. If that mob caught up to one Democratic senator, who knows what would have happened. Even at this point, he talks about “restoring order.” Restoring order? What about arrests? What about prosecution? People made a mockery and attacked the people’s house. The house of the nation who proclaims to be the model of democracy. The nation whose troops all over the world fight wars to defend. Idiot MAGA terrorists ran amok through those hallowed halls and we are still hesitating on calling sedition what it is?

Even as Trump leaves this year, it will be a disappointing four years for Americans who are keen on democracy and justice. As much as Obama was beloved, he cursed America with probably the stupidest seven words he ever uttered, “We don’t look backwards, we look forward.” A recording of Trump committing an impeachable crime by pressuring officials to manufacture phantom votes for him in Georgia surfaced two days ago, and seemingly without even much consideration, we hear US representative Hakeem Jeffries saying those same dumb seven words, “We don’t look backwards, we look forward.” Then how can Trump or any other officials learn? What’s stopping people from committing crimes in the future? It doesn’t even make any logical sense. ALL crimes in order to fit the definition must have “actus reus,” the conduct of the crime. How else can you establish conduct if you don’t look backward? If someone slaps Hakeem Jeffries in the face, will he immediately respond by, “We don’t look backwards, instead, we look forward to the inauguration of a President Joe Biden and will not allow ourselves to be distracted by these slapping in the face issues.”?

See, back in 2020, armed protesters stormed the Michigan statehouse in order to protest wearing masks. They essentially held the statehouse hostage and the police barely touched them. Not much of consequence happened to the agitators as the nation moved on to the next outrageous thing in the news cycle. Fast forward to now and again, armed agitators fueled by conspiracy theories essentially invade the US Capitol. See how they didn’t learn their lesson?

But wait, that was under under Trump. Are the Democrats still to be blamed for that? Yes, because they have short memories and easily move on. Republicans fueled so many congressional hearing on four deaths in Benghazi. How many congressional hearings will come out of this? How many hearings came out of the storming of the Michigan statehouse? Heck, when Bundy ranchers pointed rifles at police officers during Obama’s presidency, Democrats essentially let them get away with it. Gabby Giffords got shot in the head and the Democrats didn’t use it as a rallying cry for some sort of sensible gun legislation. I’d call the Democrats weak tea, but that would be offensive to teas everywhere.

So yeah, even as progressives like Representatives Cori Bush and Ilhan Omar are calling for impeachment, most of the Democrats will likely try to oppose them or at least try to weaken their call to action. As Trump’s ugliness infected Republicans and the rest of body politic, so will Barack Obama’s weak look-forward, not backward continue to lull Democratic politicians to inaction and complacency. Don’t get too excited about Trump leaving, folks. As we learned in 2020, things can always, ALWAYS get worse.

…

Note my entry last week. Canada lost the World Juniors yesterday, and now there’s a failed coup. 2021 off to a great start.

December 31

I would like to think that next year will be better than 2020, but I have learned not to be too optimistic, lest I be disappointed. Christmas was a quiet affair spent watching Netflix. New Year’s Eve is probably going to be the same. I can feel myself getting old just thinking about it.

Here’s hoping that 2021 is indeed an improvement over this lousy year. 

Asshole Dream, Asshole Reality

I don’t have much patience for hearing about other people’s dreams, but since this is my website and no one is being forced to read it, I’m going to indulge myself a bit and talk about an asshole dream I had last night.

My mom passed away back in 2008 of pancreatic cancer. It was rather fast. She started experiencing pain in her stomach around November of 2007, then she was finally diagnosed with pancreatic cancer on February 2008, then she passed away come July. Pancreatic cancer is awful.

So last night, I had a dream that my mom committed suicide. Apparently, she had a fight with my dad during her birthday and she jumped off an apartment building roof in the middle of the night. We were all in shock. I remember my grandmother, her mother, was there too, mourning my mom’s sudden passing. Interestingly, my grandmother passed away two years ago as well. So anyway, it was a pretty depressing dream/nightmare. I couldn’t remember much but several things happened regarding investigations and funerals but eventually, I woke up.

You know when you wake up from a nightmare and you’re all relieved that it was all a nightmare and that everything is going to be fine? Well, I woke up, felt relief, then I remembered that my mom already passed away over ten years ago. I also remember that Korea is also in the middle of a second wave of coronavirus infections and that I don’t know what awaits me at work. Depressed, relieved, then back to depressed. My brain’s subconscious is a jerk asshole.

Speaking of the coronavirus, for two days in a row now, Korea has been having over 1000 cases a day. Before that, the country’s jumped to over 600 a day. We are currently on a high alert level, close to the strictest level yet, which would mean a total lockdown and closing of businesses and schools. While Korea has been a model for containing the virus with its constant testing and contact-tracing, the country appears to have been caught flat-footed with the second wave. Unfortunately, while the rest of the world is already getting started with vaccination, the government decided to wait it out until March 2021 before getting the vaccine. The government wants to see how the rest of the world reacts to the vaccine first. There is some wisdom to healthy skepticism and caution, but the government seems to be neglecting to help people and businesses while they hold out and wait for life to go back to normal. The Trump administration is being lauded for only providing a $1200 check once to its citizens. Well, Korea only gave out assistance once as well.

As much as I appreciate the government’s initial reaction to the virus, it seems like the government only has testing and contact-tracing in its bag of tricks. Cases are increasing and all we’re doing is testing. They put free testing facilities all over Seoul, even outside my workplace. What I don’t see are financial aid for businesses and for people who are unable to earn a living while they are forced to stay at home. As for waiting and see for the rest of the world to react to the vaccines’ side effects, I wonder if that skepticism would be there if it weren’t for the anti-vaccine movement.

Here We Go Again.

We are back to lockdown. Seoul will be on lockdown starting tomorrow until the end of the year. We’re now ending 2020 the way it’s been the whole year: miserable indoors, wondering if my job will be safe at the end of it all. Right now, we are required to wear masks at work even at our desks in the office. There are strict limits imposed on restaurants and coffee shops. The same goes for gyms, saunas, study rooms, and karaokes. So far, I haven’t been asked to work from home, but I work with publishing and testing. This might not affect the publishing side of things, but scheduled language tests were canceled a few months ago due to the pandemic.

It’s kinda ironic because just over the weekend, I happened to run into an old classmate from Korean class while I was in a bookstore. This is a class I had to stop attending due to the risk of catching COVID-19 and spreading it to my company. Well, I was thinking of maybe contacting him later for drinks sometime, just to properly catch up. Then BOOM, the government raises the pandemic alarm level. Minimize socializing. Stay home. Don’t take unnecessary risks.

What’s depressing is how all of this has affected many businesses in the city. Bars, restaurants, and stores which relied heavily on foot traffic, especially from Chinese and Japanese tourists have just been wrecked. Shopping and tourist districts have been ghost towns, which is more evident considering it’s the Christmas holiday. We were doing quite well, a couple of months ago, even had daily cases down to less than 50. But for the past few days, there’s been a huge uptick. Just today, there’s over 600 cases added to the country’s total. Luckily, people are not protesting against wearing masks. Everyone understands that it’s a necessity. I just wish the government provided more aid to businesses and made it easier for people to work from home.

There’s hope with the government securing contracts for the vaccine once it becomes available, but who knows when regular people would have access to it? Just like the rest of the world, I don’t think normal people would have access to it until summer 2021. And just to add more to the stressful situation, the government is also currently trying to contain a highly pathogenic strain of bird flu after a couple of cases broke out south of Seoul.

Seriously, I’m just tired of worrying. I’m just tired of wondering if it will be me next. I keep seeing all of these people suddenly put into these dire situations, and I can’t help but constantly be anxious of the axe finally dropping down on my skinny, selfish neck.

All of this comes to one conclusion: New Year celebrations are bullshit. I know, I know. It’s a bit early, but I’m stewing here. Last year, I saw Post Malone and BTS try to make the Times Square Ball Drop still be a thing for young people. I also saw several Japanese acts perform their annual song competition on NHK followed by solemn temple blessings. In Korea, they rang the Bosingak Belfry five minutes from where I work. It was crowded with people. Pengsu, a viral penguin mascot, was one of the bell ringers, which I assume added to the popularity of the usually crowded event. All of these events, all of these “farewell to 2019 and hello to 2020,” all of these blessings… they didn’t stop 2020 from being the disaster that it’s been. I can’t help but think that if 2020 had a face, it would look like Post Malone’s. And now the year is almost past and if we’re lucky, we all just got older fast. The unlucky one lost their livelihood, lost a loved one, or passed away themselves. And yeah, the mayor of Seoul committed suicide six months after ringing that bell (That’s not the only suicide story that happened around my periphery this year as well!).

New Years are like birthdays. They just happen regardless, and the only reason people celebrating them is they happen to survive another year. There is nothing special about them. If anything, the hope one feels at the end of the year should extend to every night when the day turns because that’s exactly what New Years are: just another day passing (how’s that for a somewhat positive turn?).